Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 10.djvu/674

* INDIVIDUALISM. 588 INDIVIDUALITY. strictcd privilege of any man to buy labor as cheap and to sell it as dear as the relation l)c- tween supply and demand allows. No niininiuni of wage, no nia.inium of hours, no restriutiun upon the age or sex of employees, no employer's liability except as specified by contract, no foster- ing of industries by taritT or subsidy, no political arbitration of economic disputes, no (iovcrnment ownership or operation of any industrial plant — in short, no State interferi-nce in production, dis- tribution, or consumption — this is what absolute and unadulterated individualism is apt to bold before itself as the true type of the industrial life. Hut pure economic individualism is at the present d.iy more a theory than a practice. Pub- lic iiolicy has asserted itself against private license, and the struggle at present is not so much between .State interference and free com- points at which State interference is advisable. Thus, in the United States both of the great political parties are anti-individualistic in their economic principles. The Republican Party stands for State interference in international trade, while in matters of internal jxilicy it is inclined to allow competition a freer hand. Tlia Democratic Party advocates greater freedom in international economic activity, while, at least of recent years, it has sought to interfere with the freedom of capital to cond)ine and with the free- dom of natural preference for the economically more valuable medium of exchange found in gold. The paternalism of the taritT is olTset by the paternalism of .State-ordained bimetallism. In- dividualism has become more of a war-cry than an accurate designation of economic principle. What is true of .American economics is also true of the economic status in other civilized eoim- tries. The socialism and the agrarianism of Ger- many arc no more and no less anti-individualistic than the governmental policy they ojipose. Tlie question is only as to the character of the limita- tions to be put upon the freedom of the indi- vidual in his economic relations. In ethical theory individualism is not now so important a factor as it was a century or so ago. Pure individualism is incompatible with morality as ordinarily understood. If each man's ideals are the measure of his morality, rtioral- ity ceases to have any general meaning. This is frankly recognized by some individualists; but some, on the other hand, still maintain the pos- sibility of carrying their theory oit logically without detriment to morality. The typical rep- resentatives of the latter view are to be found among those who claim for the individual con- science the right to pass definitively upon all questions of morals. "There is no such thing as an erring conscience," they say. In some thinkers, as. for example. Kant, the individualism of the conscience theory of morals is ofTset by the uni- versalism of the criterion of reason, which directs the conscience. f)ne must see one's duty only in what can be duty for all. The combination of individualism and anti-individualism in an ethics of conscience is, however, a tour dr force which can be successfully achieved only by those who unknowingly have a higher standard for morality than either conscience or pure reason. But when this higher standard is lacking, individualism gets the upper hand, and we have as the logical result the view that everything is right which a man thinks to be right. The individual with all his idiosj-ncrnsies becomes the measure of the universe. Most ethical thinkers have come to sec that this is the natural conseiiuence of the conten- tion that conscience is the supreme arbiter murum, while moral practice has always been controlled by other influences besides the con- science of tlie individual. Or perhaps it would be more correct to say that these other inlluences ofierate upon a num by giving character and direction to his conscience, so that while he is guided by his conscience, that conscience is not merely an indivi<Iual peculiarity. It relleclswith greater or less accuracy the ideals of his conunu- nity — a connnunity sometimes large, sometimes snuill, but, whether large or small, of dccisiTc influence in determining the kind of con- science the man is to hae. Hence, as conscience is not something ultimate and intuitive, but de- rivative, there is no reason for supposing that its dictates are incorrect. The individual reflects the opinions, prejudices, superstitions, and sane judgments of a conunimify, and gives to them pcrluips an individual coloring, especially in mat- ters l)earing on his own conduct. The result we call conscience. The history of individualism cannot here be given. All that can be done is to refer to other articles in this Encyelopcedia treating of persons who have made that history. See .Sophists: Gko- Tiis: HoBBEs; Locke: Spi.noza; Quesnay: MiHAUEAi": TiKi;oT: Smith. -Vdam ; Bentham: liKiciiT. .Toiix: Marx: Spencer. Hekhekt: Xietz- KC'llE. Consult, also: Donisthorpe, hKlitiduolisni. a Hystcm of Politics (London, 188!>) : Le Gall. 7>o doctrine individiialixle ct Vamirchic (Tou- louse. 1894) : McKechnie. The fi'titc atid the In- dividual (Glasgow, 180G) ; Ritchie, The Prin- ciples of tStale Interference (London, 1891): .Schmidt (Max Stiner). Der Einziae und scin Kigrnthuin ( I.ei[)zig, 184.5) : Spencer, ifnn rcrsus the ^tnlr (London, 1884): Wenzel, (Icmeinschaft und Pcrsiinlichkrit (Berlin, 1809); Lutoslawski, Vebcr die (lrumlroriiussetzunf;cn und Cohscv/i/cii-
 * >etition as between dill'crent views as to the
 * rn der indiridualixlixchen M'cltantchauunfi (IIcl-

singfors, 1898) ; Tufts and Thompson, The In- dividual and His lielntion to SSociet;/, as Reflected in Itritish AV/iiV.s (Chicago, 1898).' INDIVIDUALITY (from ML. imliridualita>i, from individualis. relating to an individual). Separate <r distinct existence. There is some dilTerence of opinion as to what constitutes indi- viduality, the discussion being principally con- fined to the domain of natural history. Some authorities regard the various organisms spring- ing by buds from a single hydroid as indi- viilual. Others consider various parts of a tree to be individuals. In one sense all the organisms proceeding from one egg may be considi*l-cd as constituting one individual, since they are de- rived from one germ, and the production of the zoilids by budding is similar to the development of a stock by grafting: but similar only because, iti grafting a part of one individual, and not a germinal part, is inserted into another, and there proceeds to grow, as if the original plant ex- tended itself. But in the budding of hydroids the difTcrent zoiiids produced exactly rcsendile each other, depart from each other, and develop independently into hydroids like their parent : and some may develop much more rapidly than others. The production of a zoiiid is more like original germination or o-um development than