46 NO STRUGGLE NO SELECTION 



Now, I quite admit that it is the business of science 

 to examine into the truth, and not into the morality 

 of any propounded cosmical theory ; and though I feel 

 assured that Nature is not governed by a principle of 

 diabolism, and that no alleged principle of action on 

 her part that can with justice be stigmatised as 

 immoral can be true, yet I rest my argument not 

 upon an endeavour to prove that the doctrine of the 

 struggle for existence is immoral, but upon the proof 

 that it rests upon demonstrably false assumptions, 

 and that all the phenomena of the world of Nature 

 unite in crying out that the doctrine itself is false. 



I regret to believe, but too many evidential circum- 

 stances concur to confirm my belief, that by a section 

 of Darwinian scientists the doctrine of Natural 

 Selection, or the Survival of the Fittest, is cherished 

 with a boundless fervour, because of its immorality, 

 because it renders belief in a benevolent Deity 

 impossible, because it pours contempt upon all 

 religious aspirations. The world of Nature presents 

 to-day the same phenomena that spoke to our fore- 

 fathers of the Divine goodness, for they believed in a 

 governing and controlling Power above and beyond 

 Nature. But the men of this post- Darwinian genera- 

 tion look upon the same world, and see a reign of 

 ravine that shrieks against the comfortable creed 

 of their forefathers. 



The naturalist now goes forth to the woods to 

 observe " the tragedy " of feral life, as exemplified in 

 the destruction of their hapless victmis by the car- 



