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 ETHICS OF THE COMPETITIVE PROCESS 169

that they should be. But this, as we have seen, is not the com- parison which Kidd makes. His assertion is that past and pres- ent social regimes, so far as they are competitive, are irrational when viewed from the individualistic standpoint ; and, so far as non-competitive, irrational when viewed from the social stand- point. He thus excludes the possibility of a regime rational from both standpoints. He is, therefore, unable to conceive of an absolutely ideal state, though, as between the two, he pre- fers that absolutely competitive state in which the progress of the race is best secured.

For the sake of clearness, we will restate our position. We agree with Kidd in believing that the absolutely com- petitive state is the ideal one ; but we disagree with him as to the impossibility of securing general individual welfare there- under. When we speak of the ideal goal of human progress necessitating the establishment of an absolutely competitive regime, we qualify this by adding the condition that competi- tion is to be maintained only upon the very highest planes. The regime must be one in which, as has been already implied, the criteria of fitness for success or survival will be the possession of absolutely the highest moral qualities. This, naturally, implies the disappearance of all the lower and more brutalizing forms of strife, and with them the avoidance of all the unnecessary forms of suffering to which they give rise. It means that no one shall find himself born into a social world in which he is to any degree so bound by social requirements or so hindered by the intricacy of the economic machinery, in the management of which he constitutes but an insignificant agent, that he is unable to develop to the fullest his capacities, to educate to the fullest his desires, and to reap to the fullest the rewards of his indi- vidual merit. Thus interpreted, it needs no imaginative devel- opment to show that in a society so organized there would need be no sacrifice of the welfare of individuals, either present or to come. Thus, as a result of this long course of reasoning, we are finally brought to sustain the thesis of Mr. Spencer, which we originally criticised, namely, "that the interests of human- ity are to be best subserved by giving full effect to the law that