Reflecting for a moment on what precedes, we may observe that, from the mouths of the evolutionists themselves, we have encountered three different views regarding the ethical significance of evolution.  In the first place, there is the view of Darwin that natural selection is a criterion of moral fitness only up to a certain stage, and that the noblest part of man’s morality is independent of this test; in the second place, there is the view of Huxley that morality is entirely opposed to the cosmic process as ruled by natural selection; and, in the third place, there is the view of Nietzsche that the principles of biological development (variation, that is to say, and natural selection) should be allowed free play so that, in the future as in the past, successful variations may be struck out by triumphant egoism.  Neither these views, nor the still more elaborate treatment of Spencer, do I propose to examine in detail.  But I wish to offer some reflexions upon the fundamental conception underlying them all, accounting in this way, perhaps, for the differences of opinion between Darwin and Spencer, Huxley and Nietzsche.  The conception of natural selection and of evolution by natural selection is applied by men of science and by philosophers in three very different spheres, to three very different kinds of struggle or competition.  There may be many different kinds of competition:  it will be sufficient here to consider the three following:—­

First, there is the competition between individuals for individual life and success.  Now, so far as we are dealing with this competition, the only qualities which natural selection will favour are of course the qualities which lead to the continuance and efficiency of the individual organism.  The qualities ‘selected’ in this process are therefore only the self-assertive qualities,—­the qualities of strength, of courage, of prudence, and also of temperance.

But in the second place there is also, as I have already indicated and as was seen by Darwin (though he did not draw this distinction), a second kind of competition, the competition between groups.  Now the group competition has as its end the continuance and efficiency of the group, be it horde or tribe or nation, or be it one of those subsidiary groups which enter into national life.  In this competition between groups it is clear that those qualities will be favoured by natural selection which contribute to the efficiency of the group; and the qualities which contribute to the efficiency of the group are not those only which contribute to the efficiency of the individual, but also qualities implying self-restraint and even self-sacrifice on the part of one member of the group for the sake of other members of the group or of the group as a whole.  The habit of obedience, for example, obedience to the authority of the group or its representative, may be of fundamental importance in maintaining the existence of the group as a group, although that habit of obedience has no place at all in promoting the interests of the individual when he is competing with other individuals.