Note 26 — Chapter II

But is this class of poor persons absolutely fit for nothing? It seems to me that (leaving the sick out of consideration) the answer must be decidedly in the negative. It is true that a part of this group succumbs in the struggle because it is inferior. But it would be as absurd to say of the runner who comes in last in a race that he cannot run at all, as to say of the man who goes under in the struggle for existence that he is fit for nothing. Those who do not succeed in life are in great part those who through accident of birth have not obtained the place for which their talents fitted them. How many among the bourgeoisie are ruined from their incapacity for directing a business enterprise, while they would have become useful members of society if they had been able to follow their true vocation? And how many proletarians have fallen lower and lower through not being fitted for the trade to which their birth destined them, while their innate qualities predestined them to a different form of work?26