THJE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE : A PROGRAMME. ^6,7 



and therefore that it may take such measures as seem fitting for 

 the attainment of- that which the general voice decides to be the gen- 

 eral good. That the suffrage of the majority is by no means a scien- 

 tific test of social good and evil is unfortunately too true ; but, in 

 practice, it is the only test we can apply, and the refusal to abide by 

 it means anarchy. The purest despotism that ever existed is as much 

 based upon that will of the majority (which is usually submission to 

 the will of a small minority) as the freest republic. Law is the ex- 

 pression of the opinion of the majority, and it is law, and not mere 

 opinion, because the many are strong enough to enforce it. 



I am as strongly convinced as the most pronounced individualist 

 can be, that it is desirable that every man should be free to act in 

 every way which does not limit the corresponding freedom of his 

 fellow-man. But I fail to connect that great induction of sociology 

 with the practical corollary which is frequently drawn from it ; that 

 the state — that is, the people in its corporate capacity — has no busi- 

 ness to meddle with anything but the administration of justice and 

 external defense. 



It appears to me that the amount of freedom which incorporate 

 society may fitly leave to its members is not a fixed quantity, to be 

 determined a priori by deduction from the fiction called "natural 

 rights " ; but that it must be determined by, and vary with, circum- 

 stances. 



I conceive it to be demonstrable that the hischer and the more com- 

 plex the organization of the social body, the more closely is the life of 

 each member bound up with that of the whole ; and the larger becomes 

 the category of acts which cease to be merely self -regarding, and which 

 interfere with the freedom of others more or less seriously. 



If a squatter, living ten miles away from any neighbor, chooses to 

 burn his house down to get rid of vermin, there may be no necessity 

 (in the absence of insurance-ofiices) that the law should interfere with 

 his freedom of action. His act can hurt nobody but himself ; but if 

 the dweller in a street chooses to do the same thing, the state very 

 properly makes such a proceeding a crime, and punishes it as such. 

 He does meddle with his neighbor's freedom, and that seriously. So 

 it might, perhaps, be a tenable doctrine that it would be needless, and 

 even tyrannous, to make education compulsory in a sparse agricultural 

 population, living in abundance on the produce of its own soil ; but, in 

 a densely populated manufacturing country, struggling for existence 

 with competitors, every ignorant person tends to become a burden 

 upon, and, so far, an infringer of the liberty of, his fellows, and an 

 obstacle to their success. 



Under such circumstances an education rate is, in fact, a war-tax, 

 levied for purposes of defense. 



That state action always has been more or less misdirected, and 

 always will be so, is, I believe, perfectly true. But I am not aware 



