EFFECT OF NATURAL SELECTION 85 



sufficient number do prosper, for it is upon them that the 

 succession depends. 



If the conditions are so hard or the individuals so far below the 

 standard that none, or at most but very few, can meet the demands 

 of the struggle, then, of course, are the days of the species num- 

 bered, and thousands of races like millions of individuals have 

 met these conditions and gone down under them since the world 

 was young. We speak of these as extinct species, but who knows 

 what buried possibilities were lost in the dim past when the ele- 

 mental energies were at work laying the foundations of things ? 



Interest of the individual and the race not identical. In this 

 way we fully realize that the interests of the race are not identi- 

 cal, indeed are often at variance, with those of the individual. 



This is true, however, only for the existing generation, be- 

 cause the interests of future individuals are involved with those 

 of the race, and whatever benefits the race as a whole is good 

 for future individuals, just as we all, in these days, are happier 

 for the bloodshed and self-sacrifice of the thousands of our fore- 

 fathers who gave themselves up in labor and in war to make 

 the world a better place in which to live. 



In the struggles of a race with or against its environment 

 one or the other must yield. With intelligent and powerful 

 beings like men it is often possible to modify the conditions of 

 life and not submit to the necessity of its hardships. When, 

 however, this is impossible, either by reason of the rigidity of 

 conditions or the helplessness of the race, then nothing remains 

 but that the species as a whole should bow to the inevitable 

 and bend its characters to conditions it cannot break. Here the 

 sacrifice of individuals of one generation is fully compensated 

 in the next, so that in the long run the interests of the race and 

 the individuals that compose it are identical. 



A close fit between a species and its environment is inevitable. 

 This rapid shaping of a species in harmony with its surround- 

 ings is bound to bring about a close "fit" between a species and 

 the peculiar circumstances by which it is surrounded. 



