Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 38.djvu/865

Rh subject of socialism, first historically, then critically, and lastly constructively. From first to last he holds the attention of the reader by the vigor of his style and his own manifest interest in the important questions at issue. The thorough impartiality of his attitude also compels admiration. The object he has set before himself is to discover in what points the present constitution of society is faulty, and what promise of better things the different socialist programmes now before the world contain. Considering that he is an exponent of what is so often spoken of as "the dismal science," the energy with which he arraigns the vices of the existing social order and the sympathy he expresses for the unhappy victims of an excessive competition may appear surprising; but the fact is, that political economy to-day is not content with recording facts and indicating the laws of which these facts seem to be the expression and proof, but aims at showing what ought to be as well as what is. It no longer confines itself to the question, How is the maximum of wealth to be produced? or, What motives sway men in the pursuit of wealth? It inquires into the general conditions of social well-being; it wants to know how far it may be possible to check that reign of universal cupidity on which the older economists seemed to count as an unalterable attitude of the human mind; and it asks searching questions as to the nature and requirements of justice between man and man. The one thing to dread in connection with this new departure of political economy is a possible lapsing into sentimentalism The wider the scope it allows itself the more rigorously should it adhere to strict scientific method. There is nothing weakly sentimental in the tone of Mr. Graham's book, and yet it hardly appears to us that he has given due recognition to some of the severer aspects of the problem with which he is grappling. "Man's inhumanity to man," as we all know, has been a dark feature in past history; but is it not the case that Nature itself, in the production of imperfect individuals—imperfect from the social point of view, and taking into account the present development of civilization—is primarily responsible for a large, if not the larger, part of the troubles with which we are contending to-day? Every one in the least familiar with the doctrine of natural selection knows that if different species are kept up to a certain standard of efficiency, it is due to the disappearance in the struggle for life of the more poorly endowed individuals that come into existence. Among mankind, if even the most poorly endowed perishes from want, our whole civilization is considered to be disgraced. This is a point which certainly requires very careful consideration, not only in connection with the criticism of existing institutions, but also in connection with any plans which may be formed for the improvement of our social organization. There is no use in trying to fight against Nature; the only thing to do, when we clearly recognize the incidence of a natural law, is to see how we can best convert it to our uses or turn aside any injury it may threaten to our interests. Thus, having recognized the fact that, by the operation of the simple law of variation. Nature will produce imperfect individuals, ill-adapted to their environment and destined in all probability to be a drag on the society in which they have a place, the question arises how to deal with them; and that question ought to be very fairly and fully met.

But, supposing even that all individuals produced were of average quality, how does the law of population bear upon the social question? How far are our social troubles the result of an undue rate of increase in population? It is true that there are large tracts of the earth yet unoccupied, but the vis inertiæ of mankind counts for something; and it does not follow because there is still room for settlement that any given rate of increase might not be in excess of the available means for spreading population over the face of the earth. In early ages tribes used to swarm very much like bees; but in those days men were not particular where they found their new abodes, or whom they dispossessed, or otherwise disposed of, in doing so.

Looked at from certain points of view, competition seems a terrible thing; but is there any certainty that the world could do without it? The successful and the less successful cr unsuccessful alike are impelled by it to exertion; it keeps the world at work, and so far helps to make the world happy. What would come from any marked