BRUTE FORCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 25 March 1918, Page 7

BRUTE FORCE.

WHAT IT STANDS KQK. A POINT FO.lt NEW ZEALANDEKS TO OOX'-LDHR, Wellington, Marcli 23. Bruce force, is it tlu- foundation of a | perfect social system» Tll« idea that tho ultiumto element in any stable soeial system must be force underlies the teaching of modern German writers,? i and seems to have been taken for grunted by a great many of our own countrymen, despite the fact that the greatest of our philosophers have not voiced that opinion. Prussian militarism and the doctrine that ''might is right" rest on tho assumption that in the course of evolution the strongest and most efficient, fighters must como to the lop, and that the nobler and essentially human faculties of 'benevolence, sympathy, ■ truth and justice do not count in the struggle for existence. This is the doctrine of Bernhardi, and has naturally been accepted by tho present rulers of Germany as in every way conforming to their ideals of military conquest and world domination. That, force is the ultimate test of ability to survive is apparently a self-evident fact, and those who are content with approximate explanations will accept it as admitting of no further discussion. There are in nature many such apparent facts, which prove on investigation to be absolutely wrong. Take sunset, for instance. We see the sun sink behind a hill, and can contend that this is absolutely ultimate incontrovertible fate, yet every schoolboy knows that it is the sun which rises up and hides the sun. The doctrine that brute force is the ultimate goal of the evolution is probably on a similar footing. At any rate, this German doctrine leaves many well-known facts wholly unexplained. If brute force were the ultimate test of survival, liow is it that so many ancient forms of life, larger, stronger, and with much more eflicient figh'ting weapons than those now existing, have become extinct? How is it that the vast majority of living .creatures now 011 the earth are almost defenceless? Take the hundreds of thousands of species of insects, for instance- How did poorlyarmed primitive man utterly outstrip the gorilla in the struggle for existence, seeing that the gorilla was naturally much the better fighting animal? How have the faculties of benevolence, justice, etc:} arisen in man if brute force is the determining factor in success? Tho Fact remains that the interpretation of evolution is a much more difficult and complex matter than these Germans are prepared to admit and we must go to our own philosopher:;, Darwin, Herbert Spencer, and Huxley, if we want to get light on the true course of evolution. In the meantime a certain amount of brute force is necessary to counter the Gorman foriito force. Otherwise the higher humanitarian qualities we so much appreciate may be overwhelmed. So far as we are concerned we must win this war, so that the better things may triumph, and to, bring this about every man, woman, and child should subscribe to the third New Zealand war loan.