THE PRICE OF DEVELOPMENT 



becomes more and more a biological law, more and 

 more prominent in social and national progress. 

 The law of the jungle begins and ends in the jungle; 

 when we translate it into human affairs, we must 

 take the cruelty of the jungle out of it, and read it 

 in terms of beneficent competition. Man is the 

 jungle humanized; the fangs and claws are drawn, 

 and the stealthy spring gives place to open and 

 fair competition. 



ii 



In the Darwinian struggle for existence there is 

 first the struggle with environment, or with the non- 

 living forces — heat, cold, storm, wind, flood; the 

 organic always at war with the inorganic out of 

 which its power comes. The fateful physical and 

 mechanical forces go their way regardless of the 

 life that surrounds them and which draws its en- 

 ergy from them. Gravity would pull down every 

 tree and shrub and every animal that walks or flies. 

 The wind and the storm would flatten down the 

 flowers and grasses and grains like a steam roller, 

 and often succeeds in doing so. See the timothy and 

 wheat and corn struggle to lift themselves again. 

 Behold how the trees grip the rocks and soil, and 

 brace themselves against the wind ! This struggle is, 

 of course, not a conscious one. Apart from the origi- 

 nal push of life, it can all be explained in terms 

 of physics and chemistry. The bio-chemist will tell 



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