time: the refreshing river 



whose genetic constitution predisposes them for aggressive action.^ 

 Yet, as we have seen, humanity must move onwards to closer co- 

 operative forms or perish. Individuals of the opposite type, charac- 

 terised by more than the usual tendency to affection, kindliness, and 

 fellow-feeling, naturally adapted to a co-operative social order, are 

 on the contrary selected against. In the world of commerce, they 

 have to go out of business; in learned circles, their just recognition 

 is stolen from them; in medicine they are worn out with over- work 

 and under-pay. Most significant of all, into the higher ranks of 

 administration, government, and finance, they never penetrate. This 

 state of affairs requires a "godly thorough reformation." After the 

 adoption of an overtly social ideal by society, says Muller, and tlie 

 changes in economics, ethics, and education that this will bring about, 

 the urge to utilise all means of progress towards this ideal will become 

 irresistible. The possibility of the genetic as well as the environmental 

 improvement of mankind will then for the first time receive adequate 

 recognition. But this will not in the least resemble the programmes of 

 those present-day eugenists who accept the class-stratification of our 

 society as inevitable and naively equate it with assumed genetic 

 differences. 



The Denial of the Sociological Level- ^^ PhysicismJ" 



If some thinkers try to force the phenomena of human social life 

 into the narrower framework of purely biological categories, it is 

 perhaps hardly surprising that others should have made the attempt 

 to force them into categories of physico-chemical type. This is what 

 Pareto did. The Treatise on General Sociology of Vilfredo Pareto, 

 first published in 191 6, has attracted attention in much wider circles 

 than those of professional sociologists and economists. It has been 

 described as a work of genius which should be read by all who take 

 an interest in human affairs and human relationships, whether 

 politically or from the point of view of the pure spectator. 



Pareto was bom in 1848 in Paris, where his father was in exile on 

 account of revolutionary activities in connection with the party of 

 Mazzini. It was against this revolutionary atmosphere that Pareto 

 was in rebellion throughout his life. He shared in the disillusionment 



^ The Tory propagandist, F. J. C. Hearnshaw, has the following extraordinary 

 passage in a pamphlet issued by the Individualist Bookshop, Ltd. (No. 7). "Socialism 

 is tlie system which legislates unsuccessful people into prosperity by legislating successful 

 people out of it. It is essentially predatory." He has not examined his criteria of success; 

 or perhaps they hardly admit of statement in plausible or even diplomatic terms. 



168 



