ETHICS AND ALTRUISM 273 



have this as the cause of it. As long as a lawyer who 

 has a case important enough to justify the cost, can 

 go to the legislature before filing his complaint, and 

 have a law passed to fit his case, so that a judge will 

 have to decide in his favor, whether he is right, or 

 wrong; so long, will the people hold legislators, and 

 judges in little respect. No wonder the people are 

 struggling with such lawyers and legislatures to obtain 

 the recall, the initiative and referendum. 



ALTRUISM. The psychology of the Christian doc- 

 trine of unselfishness, or altruism, or the principles 

 of kindness to, and preservation of, the community as 

 a whole; the establishment of insane asylums, 

 charitable institutions of all kinds, orphan asylums, 

 care of the blind, and deaf and dumb, is a study of 

 most profound interest. Little of this was found in 

 savagery, more in barbarism, and most in civilization. 

 It is a growth parallel with the evolution of cerebral 

 power. It has developed, hand in hand, with wealth 

 accumulating power. The red Indian, who lived from 

 hand to mouth, who roamed the forest, or prairie in 

 pursuit of sustentation, who lived in movable tents, 

 could not care for the aged, or disabled. They were 

 abandoned to their fate. In his loose ties of tribal 

 association, he could not develop the idea. He could 

 not conceive, with his relatively small brain develop- 

 ment, the abstract principle, that, until he exercised 

 unselfishness, there would be none extended to him. 

 But when the Aryan and Semitic races began farming, 

 and raising domestic animals for food, wealth began 

 to accumulate, closer ties of citizenship were formed, 

 communities became localized, and the hard struggles 

 of savagery, and barbarism, gradually passed away. 

 Then unselfishness, or local morality, or limited altruism 



