Evening journal., 1911-12-02
COMPETITION
STRENGTH WEAKNESS
BY John S. Hamilton.

Just at this time we hear a great
deal of discussion about competition.
The disputants talk about the matter
very much as they would about so
much pig iron or pork or railway
stocks. They treat the subject as If
It were a commodity or a security
subject TO the law of demand and sup
ply and subject also to any decision
that men may arrive at concerning IL.
The writer does not believe It is pos
sible TO interfere with or regulate in
any way the law that underlies the
manifestation of human activities that
men call competition. IL would be as
impossible, The writer thinks, to pass
laws that would regulate or interfere
in any way with this principle as il
would be impossible to pass laws that
would regulate the tides or the rain
fall
Competition is no more or no less
than what men can see Of the strug-
gle Of the race towards higher and
better things. Il began, as we under
stand it, in the Garden Of Eden, when
mother Eve aud father Adam ac-
quired The knowledge of good and
evil and became responsible. What
we call competition is really what
can bn seen OF the war OF good against
evil, which must and will go on until
one or the other is destroyed. Il is
true that the foolish efforts of ignor-
ant men may shift the field of their
own activities, and we shall see as
we do today. condition that appears
as II competition had been destroyed,
but If you Will stop to think and look
more carefully and more closely you
viii find that men have merely chang
ed their base, and the battle is on,
man against man, right against
wrong, as bitter and as destructive as
I ever. Yesterday there was competi-
tion in business. and those that were
strong In the qualities that made for
business success, outwitted the weak
hngs and took the business for them
selves. They had scarcely taken
! possession Of the spoils OF war, how
| over. when they found that there was
another war declared, and where
/ thcy had won a victory in a contest
that required peculiar qualities, with
which they were endowed, they found
/ that they we're now compelled to face
an army that marched under other
standards, and the new champions
! fought with weapons that were dead
| ~ aud unfamiliar. To tell Il I'm q
word in destroying what was called
competition" in business, they mere
I ly produced competition" IN men, and
hero they are at terrible disadvant-
age.
II is after all the old law of the
Eurvival of the fittest, which, cold
| blooded as it is, cannot and will not
! be denied The writer for several
years has been very much interested
| in observing a piece Of wild land that
was reclaimed from the river. The
year after the water was turned of
/ this piece of land there was luxur-
! liant growth OF vegetation, and thu
4 writer thought that the possibilities
Of the temperate zone vegetation was
here exhausted in the way of variety
| The next year there was a coarse
grass with a survival of some of the
| eccentricities Of the year before
Every year since the grass has i'm
proved in quality
II Is always and everywhere tbs
same. The battle is ever waging
The weak are ever succumbing TO The
strong, and the good is ever demon
strating its strength.
An abandoned piece Of land vii
soon show a growth Of forest trees
Some come up puny and weak am
some sturdy and strong. There Il
the struggle; there is the universe
principle at work The strong vii
reach out and take the nourishmcn
away from the weak, and so It goe
on. What men call competition i
only a manifestation of this principle
Il extends as far as human under
standing goes to all things. Mel
may interfere with what they will o
the working of this underlying law
but the law itself is above the powe
or comprehension of men.
Il is idle and disturbing merely q
think and talk about such things l
the thoughts here suggested do no
reveal the divine plan, what is IN
use? The lesson It teaches IN
writer is that weakness is the penalr
of violated law and that strengu
is the reward of the law abiding.