THE WONDER OF LIFE 585 



in its manifold forms ; the process is discriminate elimina- 

 tion ; and the result is the survival of the variants fittest 

 to the given conditions. 



Referring, for discussion, to our ' Darwinism and Human 

 Life, 9 we wish to emphasize what seems to us of the greatest 

 importance, that Nature's sifting is extraordinarily mani- 

 fold and subtle, as Darwin always insisted. The struggle 

 for existence is much wider than is suggested by the words 

 taken literally. It expresses the sum total of the reactions 

 which living creatures make to their limitations and diffi- 

 culties. We see the struggle for existence wherever living 

 creatures press up against limiting conditions ; wherever 

 living creatures, with their powers of growing and multiply- 

 ing, thrusting and parrying, changing and being changed, 

 competing and combining, working for self and working 

 for others, do in any way say, ' We will live '. 



In the same way the Natural Selection which Darwin 

 spoke of metaphorically as ' daily and hourly scrutinizing 

 throughout the world the slightest variations ', is only 

 thought of truly when it is thought of subtly. For it 

 comprises all the forms of discriminate criticism which meet 

 the experiments or variations of organisms, now working 

 with dramatic swiftness in killing off unfit variants even 

 before they are born, again working with imperceptible 

 slowness giving to some a slightly longer life or a slightly 

 larger family, now singling the full-grown, and again the 

 young, and again the germ-cells themselves. As Goethe 

 said, ' Nature's children are numberless. To none is she 

 altogether miserly ; but she has her favourites, on whom 

 she squanders much, and for whom she makes great 

 sacrifices. Over greatness she spreads her shield'. 



Summary. Our view is that the organism is the 



