efficient for
industrial purposes. Without presuming to pronounce upon such
questions, I will simply ask whether this does not interpret Professor
Huxley's remark about that "cosmic nature" which is still so strong,
and which is likely to be strong so long as men require stomachs. We
have not, I think, to suppress it, but to adapt it to new
circumstances. We are engaged in working out a gigantic problem: What
is the best, in the sense of the most efficient, type of human being?
What is the best combination of brains and stomach? We turn out saints,
who are "too good to live," and philosophers, who have run too rapidly
to brains. They do not answer in practice, because they are instruments
too delicate for the rough work of daily life. They may give us a
foretaste of qualities which will be some day possible for the average
man; of intellectual and moral qualities, which, though now
exceptional, may become commonplace. But the best stock for the race
are those in whom we have been lucky enough to strike out the happy
combination, in which greater intellectual power is produced without
the loss of physical vigour. Such men, it is probable, will not deviate
so widely from the average type. The reconciliation of the two
conditions can only be effected by a very gradual process of slowly
edging onwards in the right direction. Meanwhile the theory of a
struggle for existence justifies us, instead of condemning us, for
preserving the delicate child, who may turn out to be a Newton or a
Keats, because he will leave to us the advantage of his discoveries or
his poems, while his physical feebleness assures us that he will not
propagate his race.

This may lead to a final question. Does the morality of a race
strengthen or weaken it; fit it to hold its own in the general
equilibrium, or make its extirpation by low moral races more probable?
I do not suppose that anybody would deny what I have already suggested,
that the more moral the race, the more harmonious and the better
organised, the better it is fitted for holding its own. But if this be
admitted, we must also admit that the change is not that it has ceased
to struggle, but that it struggles by different means. It holds its
own, not merely by brute force, but by justice, humanity, and
intelligence, while, it may be added, the possession of such qualities
does not weaken the brute force, where such a quality is still
required. The most civilised races are, of course, also t