Principles of western civilisation

406 WESTERN CIVILISATION CHAP.

from the outset the character of certain principles which ultimately govern it.

Now it has been pointed out by an American writer, Professor H. C. Adams, that in the conditions of an unregulated competition for commercial supremacy there is a result always inherent in the resulting struggle which must sooner or later become visible. It is impossible, this writer points out, for the conditions of such a struggle to rise beyond a certain fixed level. They must always in the end adjust themselves, to the level not of the qualities that we may consider desirable from the social or from any other point of view, but of those which contribute most directly to one end—fitness to survive in the state of unregulated competition which prevails. The struggle must, as it were, always tend to reduce itself in the end to the level of this its permanent governing denominator.

For example, to quote Professor Adams’ words, ‘Suppose ten manufacturers competing with each other to supply the market with cottons. Assume that nine of them, recognising the rights of childhood, would gladly exclude from their employ all but adult labour. But the tenth man has no moral sense. His business is conducted solely with a view to large sales and a broad market. As child labour is actually cheaper than adult labour, he gives it a decided preference. What is the result ? Since his goods come into competition with the goods of the other manufacturers, and since we who buy goods only ask respecting quality and price, the nine men, whose moral instincts we commend, will be obliged, if they would maintain themselves