SCIENCE AXD INTERNATIONAL GOOD TV ILL 3°5 



may be adequately fed, clothed and housed. The death-rate has been 

 decreased to one half; the ensuing lower birth-rate has freed nearly 

 half the .time of women and reduced proportionately the labor of men. 

 The period of childhood and youth may be devoted to universal educa- 

 tion, and equality of opportunity can be given to all. It is no longer 

 needful to depend on a privileged class to conduct the affairs of govern- 

 ment and to supply men of performance. Those selected from all the 

 people as most fit can be given the preparation and opportunity needed 

 to enable them to become leaders, and everv one can take an intelligent 

 share in political affairs and in appreciation of the higher things of life. 



In giving us democracy science has made its greatest contribution 

 to the limitation of warfare. It must be admitted that a democratic 

 people may be inflamed into a mob mad for war ; but this is not likely 

 to happen in the case of a war of policy or of aggression. In the past 

 wars have been more often due to the ambitions, difficulties and in- 

 trigues of kings and princes than to the passions of the people, and the 

 decrease of wars has been largely a result of the establishment of con- 

 stitutional governments and of the legalization of the methods of con- 

 scription and taxation. If a declaration of war or an ultimatum lead- 

 ing to war were subject to a referendum, the vote being taken not too 

 promptly, and if the estimated cost of the war were collected in taxes in 

 advance, there would not be many wars. 



We are still far from having a true political and social democracy. 

 The production of wealth has increased rapidly; but we have not 

 learned to distribute it justly or to use it wisely. The education sup- 

 plied by our schools is inadequate and inept. We may be confident that 

 a complete democracy will be the strongest force for peace that the 

 world has seen. Even now the great mass of the people, most of them 

 having some education and some property, are the true guarantees 

 against wanton war. A king can no longer summon his nobles and the 

 chiefs gather together their retainers to invade a foreign country. A 

 war which, with its accompanying pestilence and famine, would reduce 

 the population of a country to one half, as in the case of the thirty 

 years' war, is now almost inconceivable. And this we owe to social and 

 political democracy, which in turn we owe to science. 



As a result of scientific progress and invention, the law of Malthus 

 has been reversed. The means of subsistence increase more rapidly 

 than the population. The sinister voluntary limitation of childbirth, 

 which may give rise to racial deterioration and actual depopulation, is 

 unnecessary. As population increases under a given condition of cul- 

 ture, the number of men of genius and talent competent to make the 

 labor of each more efficient increases in proportion ; as their inventions 

 are of benefit to all, the means of subsistence tend to increase as the 

 square of the population. As the level of education and culture is 



VOL. LXXXIV. — 21. 



