THE STRUGGLE FOR LIFE, 201 



emphasized the ahiiost ethical substantive " Struggle " 

 and ignored the biological term " Life." A secondary 

 implication of the process has thus been elevated into 

 the prime one; and this, exaggerated by the imagi- 

 nation, has led to Nature being conceived of as a vast 

 murderous machine for the annihilation of the 

 majority and the survival of the few. But the Strug- 

 gle for Life, in the first instance, is simply living 

 itself ; at the best, it is living under a healthily nor- 

 mal maximum of pressure ; at the worst, under an 

 abnormal maximum. As we have seen, initially, it is 

 but another name for the discharge of the supreme 

 physiological function of Nutrition. If life is to go 

 on at all, this function must be discharged, and con- 

 tinuously discharged. The primary characteristic of 

 protoplasm, the physical basis of all life, is Hunger, 

 and this has dictated the first law of being — " Thou 

 shalt eat." What distinguishes scientifically the 

 organic from the inorganic, the animal from the stone? 

 That the animal eats, the stone does not. Almost all 

 achievement in the early history of the living world 

 has been due to Hunger. For millenniums nearly the 

 whole task of Evolution was to perfect the means of 

 satisfying it, and in so doing to perfect life itself. 

 The lowest forms of life are little more than animated 

 stomachs, and in higher groups the nutritive system 

 is the first to be developed, the first to function, and 

 the last to cease its work. Almost wholly, indeed, in 

 the earlier vicissitude of the race, and largely in the 

 more ordered course of later times, Hunger rules the 

 life and work and destiny of men ; and so profoundly 

 does this mysterious deity still dominate the round of 

 even the highest life that the noblest occupations 



