CHAPTER II

PROGRESS THE RESULT OF A STRUGGLE NOT FOR SURVIVAL, BUT FOR DOMINATION

In order to see how the great man promotes progress, we must consider that whilst the fittest survivor only promotes it • 130

by living, whilst others die, • 130

the great man promotes progress by helping others to live • 131

He promotes progress not by what he does himself, but by what he helps others to do • 132

We can see this by considering the progress of knowledge which, as J. S. Mill says, is the foundation of all progress • 132

But all progress in knowledge is the work of “_decidedly exceptional individuals_,” • 134

as Mill admits, though in curiously confused language • 135

Now how do the exceptional individuals, when they acquire knowledge, promote progress by doing so? • 136

They promote progress by conveying their knowledge to, and imposing their conclusions on, others • 137

A similar thing is true of invention, which is knowledge applied • 138

Invention promotes progress only because the inventor influences the actions of the workmen who make and use his machines • 139

The man of business ability promotes progress also only by so ordering others that the precise wants of the public are supplied • 140

And the same principle is obviously true in the domain of war, politics, and religion • 141

Greatness, however, is not in all cases equally beneficial • 142

The influence of some great men is more advantageous than that of others • 143

Progress, then, involves a struggle through which the fittest great men shall secure influence over others, and destroy the influence of the less fit • 143

We now come to another point of difference between the fittest great man and the fittest survivor • 143

The social counterpart to the Darwinian struggle for survival is to be found in the struggle of labourers to find employment • 144

But this is not the struggle to which historical progress is due • 145

For the most rapid progress has taken place without any increased fitness in the labourers • 145

The progressive struggle in industry is confined entirely to the employers; • 146

and in every domain of progress it is confined to the leaders, to the exclusion of those who are led • 146

In the progressive struggle between great men, the mass of the community play no part whatever • 147

Let us take, for instance, two rival hotel-keepers • 148

One becomes bankrupt, and the other takes over his hotel and his staff • 148

The sole struggle is between the employers, not the employed • 148

The staff of the unsuccessful hotel-keeper gain, not lose, by being employed by the successful • 149

Historical progress, then, results from a struggle not for subsistence, but for domination • 149