41 8 DARWINISM AND THE PROBLEMS OF LIFE 



morality will have survived ; men will dare to express 

 their individuality, and their long repressed egoisms 

 will explode. There will be a fierce struggle for the 

 light of the sun. No values will be recognised. The 

 day of the beyond-man will have come. 



We will not go further into the subject, as this is not 

 the place to deal with the ideas of Nietzsche. We 

 merely wanted to point out that they are based on 

 selection. As a matter of fact, little can be said against 

 them from the scientific point of view. The Darwinist 

 believes that the struggle for life creates the best — let 

 the phrase pass for the moment — and is most effective 

 when it is most destructive. Away, then, with what- 

 ever limits the struggle ! Away with the State and the 

 whole of civilisation ! Away with our physicians and 

 hospitals, which run counter to selection, by preserving 

 the weak ! Epidemic diseases are the most drastic 

 selective agencies ; they suffer only the very soundest 

 to survive, and the generation that follows their ravages 

 is the healthiest conceivable. 



How will it be when one state embraces the whole 

 world ? Then all selection will cease, and everything 

 will be done in accordance with laws framed by men 

 for the attainment of certain ends. But the laws of 

 Nature that they interrupt can achieve more than man. 

 Hence we ought to prevent the formation of such a 

 state and all institutions that restrict the struggle for 



life. 



Can Nature's eternal laws be corrected or suppressed 

 by the puny hand of man ? A natural law is some- 



