THE HISTORY OF INSTITUTIONS. 1=9 



gradually, because it has ceased to have a 

 meaning and a value, that is an illustration of 

 the cessation of natural selection : if it be- 

 comes positively hurtful, it may lead to the 

 destruction of the society that observes it, 

 unless a wise change anticipates the operation 

 of natural selection. 



4. " THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE." 



Most of what would fall to be said on this 

 subject has already been discussed in the two 

 preceding essays : l and therefore a very brief 

 summary of results must suffice here. First 

 of all, the units engaged in that struggle which 

 constitutes human history are not individuals 

 only, but aggregates of individuals, such as 

 tribes, races, nations, classes, sects. Secondly, 

 apart from the struggle between individual and 

 individual, between race and race, nation and 

 nation, there is a struggle between institutions, 

 languages, ideas. From these differences, in 

 degree of complexity, between the biological 

 and the sociological meaning of " struggle for 

 existence " there follow two consequences : ( 1 ) 

 The death of the individual organism is not 



1 Cp. pp. 13 ff., 97 ff. 



