Chapter IV: Mental Characteristics of the Gregarious Animal (9)

The exploration of the psychology of man’s social relations has been left almost exclusively to the operation of what we may call the method of prophetic intuition, and there is no branch of knowledge where the fumbling methods of unclarified intuition have introduced more confusion. Intuitions in the sphere of feeling—moral intuitions—have more than the usual tendency of intuitions to appear as half-truths surrounded and corrupted by fantasies of the seer and isolated from correlation with the rest of knowledge. Let us consider, for example, the intuitional doctrine of philosophic anarchism. The nucleus of truth in this is the series of perfectly sound psychological conceptions that all social discipline should be, as experienced by the individual, spontaneous and voluntary, that man possesses the instinctive endowment which renders possible a voluntary organization of society, and that in such a society order would be more effectively maintained than under our present partially compulsory system. This nucleus, which of course is not understood or expressed in these {254} definite psychological terms by the anarchist, is apt to be associated with dogmas which altogether obscure its strictly unassailable truth. Communism, again, is another doctrine which contains its core of psychological truth, namely, that individual property is an economic convention rather than a psychological necessity, and that social inequality is an infirmity of the state rather than its foundation stone. As it is exemplified in practice, however, communism is so deeply tainted by the belief in an inverted class segregation of its own, and by a horror of knowledge, that its elements of reality are wholly obscured and rendered useless.

Every doctrine that makes disciples freely must contain in it some embodiment of psychological reality, however exiguous; but where it has been arrived at by the methods of the prophet, there is no reason to expect that stress will be laid on the true more than on the false elements of the doctrinal scheme, and experience shows that the inessential falsity has for the expositor as many, if not more, attractions than the essential truth. An expert statecraft would be able to identify the real elements of discovery that were present in any fresh prophetic appeal to public belief, and would be able at any rate to save the state from the condition of petrified embarrassment into which it now falls when faced by social dogmas and experiments which win attention and adhesion while at the same time they outrage convention and common sense.

* * * * *

The examination of the functional satisfactoriness of society, which has been a chief object of this book, has yielded a certain general body of conclusions. An attempt will now be made to summarize these in a compact and even dogmatic form, and to add what further element of definition seems indispensable for clearness. {255}

1. All societies of which we have any knowledge have shown two general defects—they have proved unable to develop and direct more than a small fraction of the resources they theoretically possess, and they have been impermanent, so that time after time laborious accumulations of constructive effort have been wasted. According to our analysis these defects are due to the drift of power into the hands of the stable-minded class, and to the derivation of moral power and enterprise from the mechanisms of leadership and class segregation.

2. A society, in order to have stability and full functional effectiveness, must be capable of a continually progressive absorption of its individual members into the general body—an uninterrupted movement towards a complete moral homogeneity.

3. A tendency towards a progressive integration of this kind can be detected in society to-day by direct observation. It is weak and its effects are fluctuating, so that there is doubt whether it can, unless directly encouraged by human effort, counteract the forces which up till now have always limited social evolution to movements of oscillation rather than of true progress.

4. The only way in which society can be made safe from disruption or decay is by the intervention of the conscious and instructed intellect as a factor among the forces ruling its development.

* * * * *

This last doctrine has been repeatedly stated, but we have perhaps scarcely defined it precisely enough to avoid misunderstanding. Some such definition is our concluding task. Of all the elements we find in a general examination of the whole biological series the human intellect is the one that most clearly gives the impression of a new and intrusive factor. The instinctive side of man, with its derivatives, such as his morals, his altruism, and his aspirations, {256} falls very easily into line with the rest of the natural order, and is seen to be at work in modes which nowhere show any essential new departure. The intellect, however, brings with it a capacity for purpose as distinct from and additional to desire, and this does apparently introduce a factor virtually new to the biological series. The part that the purposive foresight of the intellect has been allowed to take in human affairs has always been limited by instinctive inhibitions. This limitation has effectually prevented man from defining his situation in the world, and he remains a captive in the house of circumstance, restrained as effectually by the mere painted canvas of habit, convention, and fear as by the solid masonry of essential instinctive needs. Being denied the freedom, which is its indispensable source of vigour, the intellect has necessarily failed to get a clear, comprehensive, and temperate view of man’s status and prospects, and has, of course, shrunk from the yet more exacting task of making itself responsible for his destiny. Nowhere has been and is the domination of the herd more absolute than in the field of speculation concerning man’s general position and fate, and in consequence prodigies of genius have been expended in obscuring the simple truth that there is no responsibility for man’s destiny anywhere at all outside his own responsibility, and that there is no remedy for his ills outside his own efforts. Western civilization has recently lost ten millions of its best lives as a result of the exclusion of the intellect from the general direction of society. So terrific an object lesson has made it plain enough how easy it is for man, all undirected and unwarned as he is, to sink to the irresponsible destructiveness of the monkey.

* * * * *

Such ostensible direction as societies obtain derives its sanction from one or more of three {257} sources—the hereditary, the representative, and the official. No direction can be effective in the way needed for the preservation of society unless it comes from minds broad in outlook, deep in sympathy, sensitive to the new and strange in experience, capable of resisting habit, convention, and the other sterilizing influences of the herd, deeply learned in the human mind and vividly aware of the world. Plainly enough, neither of the classes enumerated above is any more likely to possess these characteristics than any one else. To the representative and official classes there even attaches, at any rate theoretically, the suspicion that the methods by which they are chosen and promoted, while they obviously in no way favour fitness, may actually tend to favour unfitness. Of the hereditary class it may at any rate be said that while it does not in any special degree include the fit, its composition is random and in no way tainted by popular standards of suitability or by the prejudices and conventions of the examination room. It would seem, then, that none of the methods by which society appoints its directors shows any promise of working towards the effective intervention of the intellect in social affairs. In reaching this conclusion we have perhaps passed too lightly over the claims of the trained official as a possible nucleus of an ultimate scientific statecraft. The present-day controversies as to the nationalization of various industries give an especial interest to this very problem, and illustrate how unpromising a source of knowledge is political discussion. One group of advocates points to the obvious economies of conducting industry on the great scale and without the destructive effects of competition; the other group points to the infirmities which always have infected officially conducted enterprises. Both sides would seem to be perfectly right so far and both to be wrong when {258} the first goes on to affirm that governments as they now are can and do conduct industrial affairs quite satisfactorily, and the second goes on to affirm that the only mechanism by which society can get its work effectively done is commercial competition, and that the only adequate motive is greed. It seems to have escaped the notice of both parties to the controversy that no civilized country has evolved, or begun to evolve, or thought of evolving a method of selecting and training its public servants that bears any rational relation to their fitness for the art of government. It is not here denied that selection and training are both of them severe in many countries. Mere severity, however, as long as it is quite without relevance, is manifestly worthless. We are forced to the conclusion, therefore, that to expect an effective statecraft to be evolved from the official, whether of the Chinese, the Prussian, or any other type, is a mere dream. To encourage such a hope would be to strengthen the grip of the unsatisfactory stable-minded class upon the gullet of society. The evidence then shows that among the mechanisms whereby the directors of society are chosen there is none that favours that intervention of the conscious and instructed intellect that we have suggested is necessary to the effective evolution of civilization. Nowhere in the structure of society is there a class tending to develop towards this goal. Since from the point of view of social effectiveness segregation into classes has been entirely random, the appearance of such a class would have been indeed an extraordinary accident. Good as are the grounds for hoping that human society may ultimately mature into a coherent structure possessed of comprehensive and intelligent direction, it would be no more than idle optimism to suppose that there is any institution or class now existing which promises to inspire a fundamental {259} reconstruction. If the effective intrusion of the intellect into social affairs does happily occur, it will come from no organ of society now recognizable, but through a slow elevation of the general standard of consciousness up to the level at which will be possible a kind of freemasonry and syndicalism of the intellect. Under such circumstances free communication through class barriers would be possible, and an orientation of feeling quite independent of the current social segregation would become manifest.

* * * * *

Throughout the enormously long period during which modern man has been established on the earth human society has been left to the uncontrolled contention of constructive and destructive forces, and in the long run the destructive have always proved the stronger. Whether the general level of consciousness will reach the height necessary to give a decisive predominance to constructive tendencies, and whether such a development will occur in time to save Western civilization from the fate of its predecessors, are open questions. The small segment of the social process of which we have direct knowledge in the events of the day has no very encouraging appearance. Segregation has reasserted itself effectively; the dominion of the stable and resistive mind is as firmly established as ever, and no less dull and dangerous; while it is plain how far, in the atmosphere of relaxation and fatigue, the social inspiration of the common man has sunk from the high constancy of spirit by which throughout the long pilgrimage of war so many weary feet have been upborne, so many dry lips refreshed.

{261} INDEX

AFFIRMATIONS of the herd, belief in normal, 39

AGE and the herd instinct, 86

――, the predominance of, 87

AGE AND YOUTH, jealousy between, 86

――, reactions of, in relation to sex, 84, 85

ALCOHOLISM, psychological meaning of, 58

ALTRUISM, instinctive meaning of, 122–124

――, a natural instinctive product, 46

――, not a judgment, 46

――, energy of, 47

ANARCHISM, psychological basis of, 253

ANTHROPOMORPHISM in psychology, 14

BEER, and comparative psychology, 14

BELIEF, non-rational and rational, distinction of, 43, 44

――, characters of, 44

BETHE, and comparative psychology, 14

BINET, 34

BREEDING against degeneracy, objections to, 64

―― for rationality, objections to, 45

CAT AND DOG, instinctive differences in feeling, 98

CERTITUDE and knowledge, 35

CHURCH, the, in wartime, 154

CIVILIZATION, its influence on instinct in man, 93

CIVILIZATIONS, the decline of, 241, 242

COMMUNISM, psychological basis of, 254

CONFLICT in the adult, superficial aspects of, 52, 53

―― in childhood and adolescence, 49

―― in civilized man, 49

CONSCIENCE, peculiar to gregarious animals, 40

CONVERSATION as a mode of recognition, 119

DARWINISM as a herd affirmation, 39

DEDUCTIVE METHOD in psychology, 14

DUTY, 48

ENGLAND, social type, 201, 202

――, morale of, 207–209

――, and the spirit of the hive, 203–206

ENVIRONMENT OF THE MIND, importance of, 63

――, need for rational adjustment of, 64

FREUD’S PSYCHOLOGY, general discussion of, 76

――, as an embryology of the mind, 88

――, biological criticism of, 77, 78

――, evolution of the “normal” mind, 73

――, hypothesis of mental development, 72

――, importance of conflict, 72

――, nature of mental conflict, 73

――, suggested deficiencies of, 88, 89

――, the unconscious, 74

GERMANY, features of government, 163–165

――, aggressive social type, 167, 168

――, social structure, 169, 170

――, observed mental characters, 173 _et seq._

――, conscious direction of the State, 163, 169, 191

――, in relation to other nations, 179–182

――, morale of, 182–188

――, discipline, 189–191

――, conditions of morale in, 193, 194

――, objects of war with, 194–201

GOVERNMENT, Sources of, 257

GREGARIOUSNESS, not a superficial character, 19

――, widespread occurrence in nature, 20

―― in man, probably primitive, 22

――, mental equivalents of, 31–33

――, biological meaning of, 101, 102

――, analogy to multicellular structure, 103

――, meaning of wide distribution of, 103, 104

――, specialization and co-ordination, 105, 106

――, varieties of, 107, 108

――, in insects, 105–107

――, in mammals, 107, 108

――, protective and aggressive, 110, 111

―― in man, disadvantages of:
disease, 133;
resistiveness, 133

―― in man, defects of specialization, 135;
of homogeneity, 137

――, aggressive, protective, socialized, 166, 167

GREGARIOUS ANIMAL, special characteristics of, 28

――, general characteristics of, 29

――, characters of, 108, 109

――, fear in, 111

GREGARIOUS CHARACTERS IN MAN:
intolerance of solitude, 113;
religion, 113;
sensitiveness to the herd, 114;
mob violence and panic, 115;
susceptibility to leadership, 115;
recognition by the herd, 118

HAECKEL, 24

HERD INSTINCT, contrasted with other instincts, 47

――, mode of action of, 48

―― in the individual, special character of, 98

HISTORY, biological interpretation of, 99, 100

HUMAN CONDUCT, apparent complexity of, 13, 14

HUXLEY, antithesis of cosmical and ethical processes, 24

INSTINCT, definition of, 94

――, mental manifestations of, 95

――, disguised but not diminished in man, 99

INSTINCTIVE ACTIVITIES, obscured in proportion to brain-power, 97

INSTINCTIVE EXPRESSION, essential to mental health, 244, 245

INTELLECT, the, essential function of, 243

――, biological aspect of, 255

JAMES, WILLIAM, introspective aspect of instinct, 15

LEADERSHIP, 116, 117

―― in society, 246

―― a substitute for common impulse, 247

――, defects of, 247

―― in Germany and in England, 248–250

LE BON, GUSTAVE, 26

MAN as an animal, a fundamental conception, 66, 67, 243

―― as a gregarious animal, vagueness of earlier conceptions, 21

―― as an instinctive animal, current view of, 93

MENTAL CAPACITY and instinctive expression, 121

MENTAL CONFLICT, discussed in relation to Freud’s doctrines, 79–81

――, the antagonism to instinctive impulses, 82

MENTAL CONFLICT, source of the repressive impulse in, 82, 83

MENTAL INSTABILITY, and conflict, 57

――, in modern society, 56, 57

MINORITIES and prejudice, 216, 217

MORALE, in England, 207–209

――, in Germany, 182–188

――, maintenance of, 147–155

――, relation of homogeneity to, 144–147

―― and officialism, 155

MULTICELLULARITY and natural selection, 18

MULTICELLULAR ORGANISMS, the, 18

NATIONAL consciousness, 228

――, simplicity of, in England, 228

NATIONAL feeling in war, 216–218

――, growth and common impulse, 245, 246

NATIONAL industry and private enterprise, 257

NATIONAL types contrasted, 232

NON-RATIONAL OPINION, frequency of, 35, 36, 93, 94

“NORMAL” type of mind, 53, 54

NUEL and comparative psychology, 14

PACIFISM, 125

PEARSON, KARL, biological significance of gregariousness, 23, 24

――, possibility of sociology as a science, 12

PERSONALITY, elements in the evolution of, 87

PREJUDICE, precautions against, 220–222

PRIMITIVE MAN, rigidity of mental life, 34

PSYCHO-ANALYSIS, characteristics of, 70, 71

PSYCHOLOGICAL ENQUIRY, biological method, 91, 92

――, primitive introspective method, 68, 69

――, objective introspective method of Freud, 70

PSYCHOLOGY of instinctive man, failure of earlier speculations, 16

RATIONALIZATION, 38

RATIONAL statecraft, need of, 241, 251

――, basis of, 252, 253

RECOGNITION, 118, 119

RELIGION and the social animal, 50, 51

SEGREGATION of society, effects of, 215

SENSITIVENESS to feeling, importance and danger of, 64

SIDIS, BORIS, and the social instinct in man, 26, 27

SOCIAL EVOLUTION, in insects, relation to brain-power, 62

――, in man, delayed by capacity for reaction, 62

SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY, continuous with individual psychology, 12

SOCIAL stability, an effect of war, 235, 236

SOCIAL instability, a sequel of war, 236, 237

SOCIOLOGY, definition of, 11

――, psychological principles of, 255

SOLITARY AND GREGARIOUS ANIMALS, elementary differences, 17

SOMBART, WERNER, Germans the representatives of God, 177

SPEECH in man, and gregariousness, 34, 40

SPENCER, 24

STABLE-MINDED type, 54, 55

SUGGESTION and reason not necessarily opposed, 45

UEXKÜLL and comparative psychology, 14

UNSTABLE-MINDED type, 58, 59

VARIED REACTION and capacity for communication, importance to the herd of, 61

WAR, instinctive reactions to, 140–143

―― and rumour, 144

―― as a biological necessity, 126–132

WARD, LESTER, views on gregariousness in man, 24, 25

WELLS, H. G., impossibility of sociology as a science, 12

WOLF PACK, the, as an organism, 29

_Printed in Great Britain by_

UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

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Page 239. The phrase “but it is must be remembered” was changed to “but it must be remembered”.

Page 264. Index entry “UEXKULL” was changed to “UEXKÜLL” to agree with the text on page 14.