Page:The Religious Aspect of Philosophy (1885).djvu/106

Rh admit that whenever one can outwit society prudently, and can gain for himself his selfish aims by anti-social but for him in this case safe means, then and there the selfish man may do this anti-social thing if he likes, the doctrine, with all its good motives, being unable to show why not. For it will not do to resort to some such subterfuge as this, and to say: “A man’s advantage depends upon the prosperity of the whole. But anti-social acts ultimately tend to weaken society. Hence they ultimately tend to diminish the prosperity of the whole, and therefore tend to harm the selfish individual.” All this is irrelevant, in case the social consequences cannot return upon the selfish individual’s head during his lifetime. The wasteful owners of great forests in our western mountains, the great and oppressive capitalists that crush rivals and outwit the public, the successful speculators, the national leaders whose possession of the biggest battalions enables them to demand of weaker neighbors unjust sacrifices, all these may listen in scorn to talk about their prosperity as dependent upon that of society, their enemies and victims included. “We eat the fruit,” they can say. “To be sure we consume it by eating, and we like to waste it so long as we ourselves profit by the waste, and we could neither eat it nor waste it if there were no fruit; but there is enough to last us and our children for our lifetimes. After us the social famine, but for others, not for us.” The now famous reply ascribed to one of our great railroad kings when, some time since, he was asked about the “accommodation of the public” by a certain train,