THE KINSHIP OF LIFE. 29 
tion. If we “put our heads together” we may know or 
do everything. If we stand apart we can do nothing, 
and in the struggle for existence those who can stand 
shoulder to shoulder loyally have the promise of the 
future. Those who can not hold together find every 
man’s hand raised against them. This principle holds 
good whether applied to the directors of a hospital or 
to a band of wolves. 
Whatever form the struggle for existence may take, 
it is a permanent factor in all operations of life. Each 
creature must take part in a threefold struggle—with 
like forms of life, with unlike forms of life or creatures 
unlike itself, and with the conditions of life themselves. 
Each man must, whether he will or not, compete with 
his neighbours, must compete with other creatures, and 
must be judged by the conditions of food, climate, and 
environment under which life exists. Sometimes one 
element will determine, sometimes another. In the city 
one competes with his neighbours, in the jungle with 
the beasts, and in the arctic with the elements of cold 
and storm. Ina similar way each animal has to justify 
its existence. Co-operation may modify and dignify the 
struggle for existence among men, but it can not set it 
aside. It may change its point of incidence, but it can 
not reduce its stress. Were it not for this struggle, which 
calls out from each generation its best and strongest for 
life purposes, there could be no progress in life. With- 
out competition there could be no adaptation, without 
selection there would not be a creature on earth to-day 
higher than a toadstool! 
It was a favourite saying of Agassiz that “Facts are 
stupid things until brought into connection with some 
general law.” The law of descent, with change through 
“natural selection,” brings into organic connection a 
host of facts hitherto isolated. Each one considered by 
