70 THE SCIENCE OF POWER 



sees them in civilization only as interfering with 

 natural selection that is to say, with the natural 

 selection of the individual efficient in his own 

 interests. Natural selection, Darwin complained, 

 is tending to become inoperative in civilization. 

 " For/' he continued in a surprising passage, " we 

 civilized men do our utmost to check the progress of 

 elimination (of the unfit) : we build asylums for the 

 imbeciles, the maimed and the sick ; we institute poor 

 laws, and our medical men exert their utmost skill 

 to save the life of every one to the last moment." l 



Darwin did not proceed to press to practical issues 

 the conclusions involved in this remarkable and pro- 

 foundly significant passage. But the effect which 

 such opinions involved of carrying the standards of 

 civilization back to those of primitive man and of 

 eliminating the psychic sense of responsibility to life 

 from its wider function in civilization was evident. 



This inevitable effect inherent in Darwinism 

 became more and more pronounced as the mili- 

 tarism of Europe began openly to base itself on 

 the theories of the Origin of Species. The re- 

 version to the standards of the jungle as the basis 

 of natural selection in civilization soon became 

 clearly visible in all the literature of the modern 

 military movement in Europe. Thus, in a passage 



1 Darwin, Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, chap. v. 



