128 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



benefits would be far more than proportional to its universality, 

 since inequality itself often renders knowledge positively injurious. 

 Although it be true that if the actual wealth of the world were 

 equally distributed the share of each individual would be a very 

 small fortune, yet if the limitations to possible distribution were 

 removed production would so far increase that almost any desired 

 portion might foil to each and all. 



Wherein, then, consists this mysterious yet potent barrier to the 

 distribution of wealth and wisdom : this practically prohibitory 

 tariff upon the world's commerce in both thoughts and things? 



The answer is rather deep than difficult. The two processes as 

 they go on in society belong to antithetically opposite categories 

 of social phenomena. We have in them the ultimate kernel of that 

 broad contrast which has just been drawn between moral and mate- 

 rial progress. It is the great distinction between natural and arti- 

 ficial processes, between genetic and teleologic activity, between 

 growth and manufacture, between the method by which feeling works 

 and that by which intellect works. The former is a method of 

 direct effort, and fails in the great majority of cases to attain its end 

 because of obstacles which are never taken into account. The lat- 

 ter is a method of indirect calculation by which the obstacles are 

 foreseen, and in one way or another provided against before the 

 advance is attempted. Hence it is always successful if the phenom- 

 ena and laws to be dealt with are really understood. This is why 

 science and art, as already stated, move. ever forward, never back- 

 ward. The discovery of truth on the one hand, and the invention 

 of artificial appliances on the other, are always going on, multiply- 

 ing the power of man to produce and distribute the objects of desire. 

 Of the gain thus made nothing is ever lost. But when we come to 

 the actual utilization of the products of discovery, invention, and 

 handicraft, we find this under the control of the opposite class of 

 forces. The power to produce either knowledge or wealth is con- 

 trolled by man, exercised when it can serve his purposes, checked 

 or arrested when it no longer does this. But the power to possess — 

 the ability to obtain the truth discovered or the commodity wrought 

 — is controlled by natural laws and depends upon the thousand acci- 

 dents of life — the conflicting wills of men, the passions of avarice 

 and ambition, the vicissitudes of fortune, the uncertainties of cli- 

 mate and seasons, the circumstances of birth and social station, the 

 interests and caprices of nations and rulers. Of what use is discov- 



