6 THE SCIENCE OF POWER 



in it. He has set his science and his philosophies 

 to reason it away. He has gone forth on his business 

 to the conquest of the world fortifying himself 

 against it and with his spirit resolutely tuned to the 

 doctrine of force. In his national wars he has made 

 the right of conquest the ultimate right of the 

 fittest. In the social struggle he has trained himself 

 to see, in the steel claws of devouring tyrannies 

 closing on the worsted, the natural law of efficiency. 



It is only our lifelong familiarity with the out- 

 standing features of our civilization, which has 

 dimmed our vision to its altogether surprising 

 features. As the spirit of the belief, which is the 

 flat denial of the conception of the omnipotence 

 of force, has gradually overmastered the world- 

 builder of the West, the results baffle all adequate 

 description. The pagan has captured the world 

 by force. He holds it by force. But the system of 

 ideas in which he is enmeshed flings into sight an 

 unparalleled significance. While his philosophies 

 have argued with it, while his sciences have branded 

 it as foolishness, it has slowly enfranchised the 

 world around him. It is bringing into the rivalries 

 of life on terms of equality with him every class and 

 substratum of his societies, every race of men on 

 the planet. 



The problems which are evolving themselves out. 



