for the
struggle for existence as the law of evolution has been exaggerated out
of all likeness to the conception of Darwin himself. In "The Descent of
Man," for instance, Darwin raises the point under review, and shows how,
in many animal societies, the _struggle_ for existence is replaced by
_cooeperation_ for existence, and how that substitution results in the
development of faculties which secure to the species the best conditions
for survival. "Those communities," he says, "which included the greatest
number of the most sympathetic members, would flourish best and rear the
greatest number of offspring."[89] Despite these instances, and the
warning of Darwin himself that the term "struggle for existence" should
not be too narrowly interpreted or overrated, his followers, instead of
broadening it according to the master's suggestions, narrowed it still
more. Thus the theory has been exaggerated into a mere caricature of the
truth. This is almost invariably the fate of theories which deal with
human relations, perhaps it would be equally true to say of all
theories. The exaggerations of Malthus's law of population is a case in
point. The Marx-Engels theory of the materialistic conception of history
is, as we have seen, another.

Kropotkin, among others, has developed the theory along the lines
suggested by Darwin. He points out that "though there is an immense
amount of warfare and extermination going on amidst various classes of
animals, there is, at the same time, as much, or perhaps even more, of
mutual support, mutual aid, mutual defense, amidst animals belonging to
the same species or, at least, to the same society. Sociability is as
much a law of nature as mutual struggle.... If we resort to an indirect
test, and ask nature: 'Who are the fittest: those who are continually at
war with each other, or those who support one another?' we at once see
that those animals which acquire habits of mutual aid are undoubtedly
the fittest. They have more chances to survive, and they attain, in
their respective classes, the highest development of intelligence and
bodily organization. If the numberless facts which can be brought
forward to support this view are taken into account, we may safely say
that mutual aid is as much a law of animal life as mutual struggle, but
that, as a factor of evolution, it most probably has a far greater
importance, inasmuch as it favors the development of such habits and
characters as insure the