328 Evolution and Social Reform: 



common good to prevail, we must remember that if our 

 neiglibors became too thoroughly altruistic they might all 

 commit suicide. Though such an act would not be without 

 its compensations to us, it would leave us rather lonesome, 

 and might be otherwise inconvenient. If we are convinced 

 that our butcher is a wicked man, we would not like to have 

 him become so altruistic as to stop killing sheep and 

 calves, till we had learned where another butcher could be 

 found of the old way of thinking. We do not care to have 

 the liquor-dealer spill his liquors into the street till enough 

 of his best whiskey is safely domiciled in our cellars. We 

 want all lawyers to be honest and kind-hearted, but in our 

 own cases we think the thing to be done is to bedevil and 

 beat the other side. Beautiful as absolute altruism may be 

 in theory, if put into practice it would either result in 

 universal hari-kari or in a reversed form of selfish competi- 

 tion. Some of you may have read James De Mi lie's 

 " Strange Manuscript found in a Copper Cylinder," wherein 

 the remarkable tale is told of a land at the South Pole, 

 whose inhabitants thought poverty and low-estate to be the 

 most desirable objects of life. But the moment these 

 became ends to be sought, a condition of struggle was 

 developed, caused by every man endeavoring to put off his 

 wealth and his comforts upon others. Hence it became 

 necessary to limit and regulate altruism by law, restraining 

 those too eager to give away their possessions for the sake 

 of attaining the pauper condition. If there happened to 

 be any public occasion at which there were places of honor 

 or vantage, a fight was apt to ensue from the circumstance 

 that everybody would insist on his neighbor taking the 

 better place. Death, too, was regarded as the greatest of 

 boons, and self-destruction had to be strongly discoun- 

 tenanced, people being compensated for this prohibition by 

 tlie promise of a public deatli as a matter of honor if they 

 succeeded in repressing their self-denying impulses. It 

 thus appears that we must be carefiil to love our neighbors 

 only as ourselves, not better; else ruinous consequences 

 may ensue and the Avorld be turned topsy-turvy. 



The Scientific rule of the a])plication of all general 

 principles is, Survey the whole field and be sure of your 

 facts. All through Kature, frustrating causes are in 

 constant operation. Tliere is a compounding of forces 

 which everywhere modifies effects. In the social organism 



