130 TKAXSACTIONS OF THE 



their mutual friction, they are equilibrated and come to rest. Art 

 commands them with tones of authority to pursue paths selected 

 by intelligence and thus indefinitely to continue to exert their 

 power. Under the dominion of Science, /. e., under the intelligent 

 control of physical forces, man's i)ower to create the .objects of de- 

 sire and to send them where he will, is practically unlimited. But 

 under the dominion of Nature, /. e., under the free operation of the 

 social forces, as yet beyond the reach of science, these objects of 

 human necessity in seeking unaided their proper destination con- 

 flict perpetually in their j)assage, dasliing against unseen obstruc- 

 tions, forcing themselves into inextricable entanglements, polariz- 

 ing themselves around powerful centers of attraction, heaping them- 

 selves up in inaccessible " corners," or flying off on tangential lines 

 to be lost forever. 



This is what in modern phrase is very properly denominated the 

 "waste of competition." But it is far more than the mere waste 

 of the wealth produced. It is the paralysis of the strong hands of 

 science and art as they co-operate with labor in the creation of 

 value. It is the stubborn, the protracted resistance which the moral 

 forces of society offer to its material as well as to its moral progress. 



The statement of the problem is its theoretical solution, which 

 can be nothing less than the conquest by science of the domain of 

 the social as it has conquered that of the physical forces. 



But alas ! how wide is the difference between the theoretical and 

 the practical solution of a problem to the bare statement of which 

 the foremost thinkers of the age are as yet unwilling to listen. 



DISCUSSION. 



The paper was discussed at length by INIessrs. Powell, Welling, 

 Thomas, Baker, Peters, Hart, and Ward. 



Major Powell maintained that there had been much moral prog- 

 ress, and gave numerous illustrations of this among uncivilized races. 

 He said that some of these races had elaborate codes of morals often 

 worthy of imitation by civilized races, and that the work of devising * 

 means of preventing and terminating controversy and securing jus- 

 tice had engrossed the energies of all people from time immemorial, 

 that it had been largely successful, and had resulted in great moral 

 progress, as great as, or even greater, than the material progress 

 achieved bv such races.. 



