I PROLEGOMENA 21 



would have put an end to the struggle for exist- 

 ence between the colonists, and the competition for 

 the commodities of existence, which would alone 

 remain, is no check upon population. 



Thus, as soon as the colonists began to multiply, 

 the administrator would have to face the tendency 

 to the reintroduction of the cosmic struggle into 

 his artificial fabric, in consequence of the competi- 

 tion, not merely for the commodities, but for the 

 means of existence. When the colony reached 

 the limit of possible expansion, the surplus popu- 

 lation must be disposed of somehow ; or the fierce 

 struggle for existence must recommence and 

 destroy that peace, which is the fundamental con- 

 dition of the maintenance of the state of art 

 against the state of nature. 



Supposing the administrator to be guided by 

 purely scientific considerations, he would, like the 

 gardener, meet this most serious difficulty by 

 systematic extirpation, or exclusion, of the super- 

 fluous. The hopelessly diseased, the infirm aged, 

 the weak or deformed in body or in mind, the 

 excess of infants born, would be put away, as the 

 gardener pulls up defective and superfluous plants, 

 or the breeder destroys undesirable cattle. Only 

 the strong and the healthy, carefully matched, with 

 a view to the progeny best adapted to the pur- 

 poses of the administrator, would be permitted to 

 perpetuate their kind. 



