314 Mutual Aid as a Law of Nature 



tion. Association is always a means. The vital 

 intensity of the component units of the association 

 is the end. 



Association produces an exaltation of life because 

 the functions are carried on simultaneously. At 

 the same time that the lungs breathe air and the 

 stomach digests food, the brain thinks. As the 

 result of the association of cellules, each of them 

 profits immediately from the favourable results 

 of all three actions. It is as if each cellule ac- 

 complished at the same time the function of oxi- 

 dation, assimilation, and cerebration. Since it 

 accomplishes in this way and in an indirect manner 

 a larger number of functions, the cellule which is 

 part of a collective organism lives, naturally, with 

 a greater intensity. Exactly the same results take 

 place in society. Individually I may not have any 

 direct part in the extraction of coal from the mines 

 of the earth, or in the scientific researches which 

 have for their object the discovery of a more 

 perfect electric light, but as a result of human 

 association and the division of labour, it is as if I 

 had a part in the work, because in a certain meas- 

 ure I enjoy the advantages which they produce. 

 Innumerable other concrete examples might be 

 given to demonstrate that association is a process 

 which augments the vital powers of the individual. 



The philosophy of force fails even to compre- 

 hend the essential nature of struggle which it has 

 made in theory the corner-stone of the structure 

 of society. Struggle is not the object of life. The 



