fighting animal.

The first indication in our conscious life of any tendency to inhibit or
modify the functioning of any instinct or habit must appear in the form
of a dislike of, a revulsion from, the resultants of this functioning;
and in the creation of an ideal of functioning that shall avoid the
discomforts attendant upon this revulsion. And when such an ideal has
once been gained, it is possible, as we have seen, that the
characteristics of nature may be changed by our creative efficiency
through the devising of means looking to the realization of the ideal.

We have the clearest evidence that this process is developing in
connection with these special instincts that make for war; for we men
and women in these later times are repelled by the results of the
functioning of these fighting instincts, and we have created the ideal
of peace, the conception of a condition that is not now realized in
nature, but which we think of as possible of realization.

But the very existence of an ideal is indicative of a tendency, on the
part of the man who entertains it, to modify his characteristic
activities. Thus it appears that we have in the very existence of this
ideal of peace the evidence that we may look for a change in man's
nature, the result of which will be that we shall no longer be warranted
in describing him as a fighting animal.

C. RIVALRY, CULTURAL CONFLICTS, AND SOCIAL ORGANIZATION

1. Animal Rivalry[212]

Among mammals the instinct of one and all is to lord it over the others,
with the result that the one more powerful or domineering gets the
mastery, to keep it thereafter as long as he can. The lower animals are,
in this respect, very much like us; and in all kinds that are at all
fierce-tempered the mastery of one over all, and of a few under him over
the others, is most salutary; indeed, it is inconceivable that they
should be able to exist together under any other system.

On cattle-breeding establishments on the pampas, where it is usual to
keep a large number of fierce-tempered dogs, I have observed these
animals a great deal and presume they are much like feral dogs and
wolves in their habits. Their quarrels are incessant; but when a fight
begins, the head of the pack as a rule rushes to the spot, whereupon the
fighters separate and march off in different directions or else cast
themselves down and deprecate their tyrant's wrath with abject gestures
and whines. If the combatants are both stro