His ethic differs from that of the utilitarians, since it holds that only a minority of the human race
have ethical importance--the happiness or unhappiness of the remainder should be ignored. I do
not myself believe that this disagreement can be dealt with by theoretical arguments such as might
be used in a scientific question. Obviously those who are excluded from the Nietzschean
aristocracy will object, and thus the issue becomes political rather than theoretical. The utilitarian
ethic is democratic and anti-romantic. Democrats are likely to accept it, but those who like a more
Byronic view of the world can, in my opinion, be refuted only practically, not by considerations
which appeal only to facts as opposed to desires.
The Philosophical Radicals were a transitional school. Their system gave birth to two others, of
more importance than itself, namely Darwinism and Socialism. Darwinism was an application to
the whole of animal and vegetable life of Malthus's theory of population, which was an integral
part of the politics and economics of the Benthamites -a global free competition, in which victory
went to the animals that most resembled successful capitalists. Darwin himself was influenced by
Malthus, and was in general sympathy with the Philosophical Radicals. There was, however, a
great difference between the competition admired by orthodox economists and the struggle for
existence which Darwin proclaimed as the motive force of evolution. "Free competition," in
orthodox economics, is a very artificial conception, hedged in by legal restrictions. You may
undersell a competitor, but you must not murder him. You must not use the armed forces of the
State to help you to get the better of foreign manufacturers. Those who have not the good fortune
to possess capital must not seek to improve their lot by revolution. "Free competition," as
understood by the Benthamites, was by no means really free.
Darwinian competition was not of this limited sort; there were no rules against hitting below the
belt. The framework of law does not exist among animals, nor is war excluded as a competitive
method. The use of the State to secure victory in competition was against the rules as conceived
by the Benthamites, but could not be excluded from the Darwinian struggle. In fact, though
Darwin himself was a Liberal, and though Nietzsche never mentions him except with contempt,
Darwin "Survival of the Fittest" led, when thoroughly