We hear little of individualism, and much of the solidarity of society. A bloodless and selfish destruction of the rights of the many has threatened the very foundations of human happiness and compelled the recognition of the fact that the weakness and injury of one are the weakness and injury of all. Ours is a world in which the law of the survival of the fittest not only works, but works very rapidly. Thus the more wealth a man has the more he can achieve. To-day, it is said, the various members of the Rothschild family in the different capitals of Europe control nine billions of dollars. This sum is accumulating like a rolling snowball, and will soon surpass, and perhaps absorb the wealth of several of the smaller European nations. Similarly, in the realm of wisdom, the more a man knows the more he can know. Sir William Jones tells us that he gave five years to mastering his first language, while six weeks were sufficient for acquiring his fortieth dialect. Thus, too, in the realm of inventive skill, each tool becomes the parent of a score of other tools. The studies preparatory to Edison's first mechanism covered a long period of years; but, gaining momentum, his inventive skill increased in geometric ratio, until to-day the famous electrician holds nearly a thousand patents; but, as nothing succeeds like success, so nothing is so ruinous as failure. The weaker a man is, the weaker he must become. When a man who seeks employment is shabby and gaunt and nerveless, his poverty lessens his chances, but to-morrow he will be weaker and shabbier, and day by day the rapidity of his declension will increase.
Startled by these considerations, our generation perceives that success feeding upon its gains will soon drink up all the energies of the earth, while failure, growing more ruinous, will sweep multitudes into the abyss. Therefore, society has come to fully recognize the importance of a mutual love and mutual service. When a man falls we are less and less ready to kick him. If the poorly born drops behind in life's race, society is increasingly ready to set him upon some beast. If some man's brain is spongy, and his mental processes slow, the stronger minds are belting his faculties to their swifter energies. If a man's moral springtime is slow, says one of our social reformers, society fits up for him a little ethical conservatory, with steam heat and southern exposure, where the buds are given a little judicious stimulating and pushing.