522 PROGRESS OF SCIENCE IN THE CENTURY. 



conscious purpose may be called artificial or ra- 

 tional, as opposed to natural selection, but the dis- 

 tinction is apt to disguise the fact that the general 

 formula remains the same. And if the philosopher 

 wishes to show in the end that we can only under- 

 stand the whole sweep of the evolution-process in 

 the light of the self-conscious personality towards 

 which it has been making, that morality is not only 

 an element in cosmic life but the reality of it, he 

 should not dwell on the supposed contrast between 

 the cosmic and the ethical process. 



But it must be clearly recognised that the selec- 

 tive process may be varied in its form, at dif- 

 ferent times and in different spheres. It is always 

 a sifting, but the nature of the sieve is variable. A 

 struggle for subsistence around the platter may be 

 replaced by an endeavour after well-being; military 

 competition may give place to industrial; a pre- 

 mium may be put on mutual aid just as markedly as 

 on self-assertion. But the cruder forms of struggle 

 are often persistent, both at the margin of industrial 

 society and in international relations. While we see 

 in the course of history a raising of the level of com- 

 petition from a war with weapons to a battle of 

 wits, from individualistic to co-operative endeavour, 

 and so on what Huxley chose to call a checking of 

 the cosmic process by substituting for it the ethical 

 process, we see, on the other hand, that the pressure 

 of destructive competition still falls heavily upon the 

 laggards, and that if it be not allowed so to fall, 

 evil results. 



Even those who, like Novicow, seem to accept 

 the old words "strife the parent of all," 

 recognise that the universal conflict has had many 

 forms. Thus Novicow distinguishes the slow and 



