se in the history of the
whole progress of the world, and still of first importance for the
further development of mankind.

This view is at the opposite extreme from Huxley's, for it overlooks
the advantages mankind has gained by means of the social instinct and
the social solidarity which it secures. But there is a further
point in Nietzsche's reflexions which is suggested by the theory
of development. Natural selection is not the sole agent in the
development of organic life: it cannot be too often enforced that
natural selection produces nothing, that its operation is purely
negative. It does not properly select at all, it only excludes. What
it does is to cut off the unfit specimens of living beings which
nature supplies. It would have no field of operation were it not
for the variety of nature. While individuals tend to repeat the
characteristics of their parents, they do not repeat them without
change: the principle of heredity is counterbalanced by a principle
of variety equally hard to explain. All organic life exhibits this
tendency to variation; and one variation proves better adapted than
another to the environment. It is this which makes possible the
operation of 'natural selection.' Unfit varieties are exterminated by
natural selection, and room is thus left for varieties which are fit
to perpetuate themselves and to increase in efficiency.

Now, if we apply this conception to human conduct, should we not
encourage all varieties to carry on their experiments in living and
in morality so that we may see whether success will justify them? An
affirmative answer to this question is sometimes vaguely hinted at; by
Nietzsche it is proclaimed from the housetops.

"There is no monopoly of morals, and every morality which exclusively
asserts itself destroys too much good strength, and is too dearly
bought by mankind. The straying ones, who so often are the inventive
and productive ones, shall no longer be sacrificed; it shall not even
be deemed a disgrace to stray from morals either in deeds or thoughts;
numerous new experiments shall be made in matters of life and society;
an enormous incubus of bad conscience shall be removed from the
world--these are the general aims which ought to be recognised and
furthered by all honest and truth-seeking people."[1]

[Footnote 1: Nietzsche, Werke, iv. 161, 162; Dawn of Day, sec. 164.]

Reflecting for a moment on what precedes, we may observe that, from
the mouths of the