ABSTRACT
Ethics has to recognize the truth, recognized in unethical thought, that egoism comes before altruism. The acts required for continued self-preservation, including the enjoyment of benefits achieved by such acts, are the first requisites to universal welfare. Unless each duly cares for himself, his care for all others is ended by death; and if each thus dies, there remain no others to be cared for. The adequately egoistic individual retains those powers which make altruistic activities possible. When the egoistic claims are so much subordinated to the altruistic as to produce physical mischief, the tendency is towards a relative decrease in the number of the altruistic, and therefore an increased predominance of the egoistic. A society in which the most exalted principles of self-sacrifice for the benefit of neighbours are enunciated, may be a society in which unscrupulous sacrifice of alien fellow-creatures is not only tolerated but applauded.
