telligences. Mr. Bernard
Shaw, for instance, adopts it with enthusiasm. Henrik Ibsen--if it is
ever possible to tie a true dramatist down to a doctrine--preaches in
_Peer Gynt_ that "to be thyself is to slay thyself." Mr. Wells has a
cloud of witnesses to back him up; and yet it is very doubtful whether
the turn of phrase is a really helpful one--whether it does not rather
get in the way of the natural man in his quest for a sound rule of
life.

It is a commonplace that the entirely self-centred man--the Robinson
Crusoe of a desert island of egoism--is unhappy. At least if he is not
he belongs to a low intellectual and moral type: the proof being that
all development above the level of the oyster and the slug has
involved more or less surrender of the immediate claims of "number
one" to some larger unity. Progress has always consisted, and still
consists, in the widening of the ideal concept which appeals to our
loyalty. Is it not Mr. Wells's endeavour in this very book to claim
our devotion for the all-embracing and ultimate ideal--the human race?
So far, we are all at one. But when we are told that "conversion" or
"salvation" consists in a "_complete_ turning away from self," common
sense revolts. It is not true either in every-day life or in larger
matters of conduct. In every-day life the incurably "unselfish" person
is an intolerable nuisance. Here the common-sense rule is very simple:
you have no right to seek your own "salvation," or, in non-theological
terms, your own self-approval, at the cost of other people's; you have
no business to offer sacrifices which the other party ought not to
accept. It is true that in the application of this simple rule
difficult problems may arise; but a little tact will generally go a
long way towards solving them. In these matters an ounce of tact is
worth a pound of casuistry. And in our every-day England, in all
classes, it is my profound conviction that a reasonable selflessness
is very far from uncommon, very far from being confined to the
"converted" of any religion. For forty years I have watched it growing
and spreading before my very eyes. Reading the other way _The
Roundabout Papers_, I was greatly struck by the antiquated cast of the
manners therein described. Of course Thackeray, in his day, was
reputed a cynic, and supposed to have an over-partiality for studying
the seamy side of things. But even if that had been true (which I do
not believe) it would not have accou