BENEVOLENCE AND DISCIPLINE 131 



this traffic in constructive materials between man and 

 man, and man and nature, commerce, or culture. 



If growth results therefrom, there must be some 

 profit in the transactions; something must have been 

 gained. What is that gain and where does it come 

 from? 



We may recognize four different phases in vital 

 growth: (i) increase in the mass, or volume, of the 

 individual in question; which merely means an in- 

 crease in the number of its constituent parts; (2) mul- 

 tiplication, or increase, in the number of individuals, 

 which means an increase in the total number of con- 

 stituents; (3) increase in the power of each individual, 

 which means better organization, or the summation of 

 mutual services between their .constituent parts; (4) 

 increase in the power of the aggregate, or of the social 

 group, which means its better organization and the 

 summation of mutual services between the constituent 

 social individuals. This process of growth may pro- 

 ceed indefinitely, but not necessarily to the same degree, 

 in any two or more of its phases. 



All this increase in living constituents, in their vol- 

 ume, numbers, and power, represents, at any given 

 period in evolution, the world's supply of organic capi- 

 tal, which in turn represents the total product, or the 

 accumulated profits, of countless individual lives and 

 of their constituent parts. 



Whatever vital power this aggregate of organic 

 capital may have is dependent on the range and volume 

 of its exchange in time and space; its endurance de- 

 pends on its power to preserve its gains; its growth, on 

 its power to add new gains to the old. 



All these gains, material and directive, must come 



