Chapter XV: , does enable us in the main to understand how the physical (5)

1. The study of the formation of tradition is a matter of great complexity. Many important aspects of the problem await elucidation. It is proposed here to reduce the discussion to the barest outline, and to confine it to the origin of skilled processes and in particular to the origin of skill in the provision of the essential requirements of daily life. We further take into account only the most important aspects of the environment—namely, the influence of fertility and the influence of contact of man with man and of race with race. All questions connected with innate differences in mental and physical characters will be for the present disregarded. We want to know—other things being equal—how skill will originate and grow, given such differences in the environment as regards fertility and contact as exist.

2. The first problem which confronts us is concerned with the differences in the environment arising from differences in fertility. To this term a special meaning is attached. Fertility as here employed corresponds to what is usually spoken of as the wealth of any country or district. The nature and abundance of the fauna and flora, the surface features of the land, the composition of the upper layers of the ground, the minerals and to some degree the climate, as well as other factors, all go to make up the fertility or wealth of any area. The differences in the factors which go to make up fertility as between different portions of the world’s surface are well known; they are very great—areas closely approximated being at times sharply differentiated one from another whereas in other places conditions remain very similar over large areas.

The most important fact to be observed in this connexion is that there is no absolute standard of fertility. ‘The term fertility’, says Marshall, ‘has no meaning except with reference to the special circumstances of a particular time and place.’[1660] Fertility is in fact purely a relative term, and, now that we have for the moment put aside differences in mental and physical characters, fertility is relative for our purpose only to the amount of skill and such other elements of tradition as may be in existence. An area, which is very fertile for a race with some agricultural skill, may be far from fertile for a race with a knowledge only of hunting and fishing, and the presence of minerals obviously adds nothing to the fertility of an area to a race lacking knowledge of their use. The country inhabited by the Eskimos, who maintain a standard of living that, relative to the standard achieved by many races, is far from low, would be wholly infertile to a race not possessed of the peculiar skill distinctive of Eskimo culture.

It should be noticed that, so far as fertility is dependent upon animal and plant life, the fertility of different regions of the world’s surface has varied in the period covered by the emergence of man, not merely relatively but absolutely. There have been climatic changes of which the glacial periods were the most remarkable. There have been changes in the boundaries of seas, such as the Mediterranean, which have profoundly affected the fertility of the neighbouring regions. The Sahara at one time was certainly not as barren as it is now. In any survey, such as that we are going to make, which was at all detailed, such changes would have to be taken into account. But in what follows they may be disregarded.

It may be observed here that in certain areas there is a destructive element in the total make-up of the surroundings. The variable climatic conditions of Australia and India which have been noticed in another connexion are of importance also in this respect. The hurricanes of New Caledonia are another example. So too are all those features in the Central African environment which destroy the products of man’s handiwork.[1661] This destructive element is only an exaggeration of certain features which characterize all areas; nevertheless where these features are exaggerated important results follow. There may be, for instance, two areas, otherwise equally fertile; but if the destructive element is important in one area, it is probable that so high an economic stage will not be reached or maintained there as in the other, and further, for the same reason, there will be less tendency for any advance in tradition to be made. The reason for this will be clear when we have examined the influence which fertility has upon skill. For this destructive element is a kind of negative fertility, and just as fertility is on the whole favourable to progress in skill, so what is equivalent to its absence is a hindrance to progress in skill.

3. Fertility is thus relative to the tradition prevalent at any one time. Let us suppose that man has spread over the surface of the world and that the tradition present is everywhere very similar, being of a simple form so far as skill is concerned, and consisting in a rudimentary knowledge of hunting and fishing. It is clear that certain areas—the great deserts, the frozen wastes of the north—will be absolutely infertile; with this degree of skill only, life cannot be maintained there. The remaining areas will vary from those which are just sufficiently fertile to permit of life being maintained to those which are the most fertile relative to this particular degree of skill. Supposing for the moment that the degree of skill remains everywhere similar, it follows, from what has been said earlier, that population will be most dense and the return per head highest where the fertility is greatest. Other things being equal, differences in fertility are thus responsible for important differences in social life.

From these differences in fertility therefore consequences of the greatest importance follow. In the first place, where population is most dense, there, other things being equal, will be the greatest amount of contact between men. With the results that flow from contact we shall deal later, but it may be mentioned here that contact is in itself a stimulus leading to the origin of, additions to, and modifications of, tradition, and that the greater the amount of contact the more quickly and the more thoroughly is tradition transmitted. Therefore, in the first place, where the fertility is greatest, there will be the greatest opportunity for existing tradition to be quickly absorbed. In the second place, quite apart from the question of contact, where fertility is greatest there is also for other reasons the greatest stimulus to increase in skill. To illustrate this point let us remember in what fertility consists. The existence of areas of greater fertility implies that there are in such areas either a greater abundance of animals, plants, minerals, and so on which can be of use, or a greater variety, or both together. Let us further remember how inventions come about. For thousands of years in a variety of ways the fact that the seed if sown would produce its like in twenty-, fifty-, or a hundred-fold measure must have been pressing itself upon the attention of man when supporting himself by hunting and fishing only. How often the metal softened in the camp fire before the method of fashioning a far more effective tool than stone was adopted, we cannot guess. Eventually the facts were observed, the practical applications to the needs of life undertaken, and valuable additions made to skill and embodied in tradition. Man in fact throughout the greater part of his history has not gone about consciously trying to better his lot. Rude and poor as life was, his necessity was not the mother of his inventions. Once, however, an invention was made it became a necessity, and it is more in accordance with the facts to invert the proverb and to regard invention as the mother of necessity. But where should we expect the facts to be noticed and the improvements to be made in skill? Obviously where they most often happened, where, in other words, fertility was greatest. For it is in those regions where there is the greatest abundance in quality and quantity of useful objects that there will be the greatest chance of their usefulness being observed, and that there will be derived the highest return per head from any improvements in skill.

The greater the fertility, therefore, the greater the incentive to progress in skill. This conclusion may seem to be in contradiction with the commonly accepted idea that, when a living is easily obtained, there is a tendency to stagnation.[1662] This notion is derived from observations and descriptions of countries where, so it is said, such is the bounty of nature that the hand has, so to speak, only to be stretched out in order to gather in the fruits of the earth. This idea is largely founded upon an under-estimate of the labour undergone, especially on the part of the women, and upon an exaggeration of the returns per head, and, as far as it is so derived, it is incorrect. But it is true that often in such regions there is a tendency to stagnation; such tendency, however, is in no way derived from the fertility; it arises because to the tradition there is added for quite other reasons a spirit of apathy and of listlessness. How this comes about may be discussed later but it may be mentioned here that a destructive element in the natural endowment of any area, such as not infrequently exists in tropical regions, is one cause of the existence of this spirit.

4. Fertility then is relative, but, other things being equal, where fertility is greatest there we find the greatest incentive to increase in skill. From this follow certain important consequences. So long as progress in skill keeps along any one line, so long as it takes the form, for instance, of improvement in methods of hunting, so long, as a general rule, will the same areas remain the more fertile areas. But this does not always follow. It may be that some remarkable invention, that of the bow and arrow perhaps, renders areas, previously not the most fertile, the most remunerative. Hitherto it may have been that in such areas the hunting of game was for various reasons difficult until a higher degree of skill was reached, but this higher degree having been reached, these areas became more remunerative than those previously the most fertile. With the progress of skill there is thus a shifting of the centres of the highest fertility.

This shifting of centres becomes more marked where progress takes a different turn, where, for instance, agriculture arises. For this there are two main reasons. First, it generally happens that an area which is very fertile to a high degree of development of one kind of skill, as the north-west coast of America is fertile to hunting and fishing, is relatively infertile to another type of skill, as, for instance, agriculture, in any case in its lower forms. It is rare that any area is so highly endowed that at one and the same time it offers a large return to the development of a particular form of skill and is also relatively fertile to the first beginnings of another and ultimately far more remunerative type of skill. Secondly, it is not as a rule where skill is specialized that we find the beginnings of a new form of skill. Tradition tends to move in grooves and where attention is with success concentrated upon one type of skilled process, it is not there that we should expect to find the origin of quite another type of skilled process. This is only an application of a principle noted in another connexion, namely that evolution proceeds from the generalized and not from the specialized type.

In this manner the differences in natural endowment which distinguish one part of the world from another bring about a shifting of the centres of progress. There are other factors still to be considered which work in the same direction; but apart from them this shifting comes about. Though this shifting has been a feature of every stage of human history, it must have been most noticeable where the great steps in skill were made—when agriculture superseded hunting, when animals were first domesticated, and when metals came into use.

5. To differences in fertility we have to add differences in contact as affecting progress in skill. Contact may be considered as varying in quality and quantity and may be thought of as influenced chiefly by two groups of factors which we may call geographical and economic. We may first ask how it is that differences in contact bring about differences in skill.

From contact two results follow. The spread of tradition is in varying degrees encouraged and progress in tradition is more or less stimulated. For the most part differences in the spreading of tradition are to be traced to differences in the quantity of contact, though differences in quality also play a considerable part, while differences in the manner in which progress is stimulated arise chiefly from differences in the quality of contact.

It is obvious that tradition can only be transmitted by means of contact. Later developments such as writing and printing allow of contact at a distance; but for the most part it is personal contact with which we are concerned. It is on the whole true that, other things being equal, the more contact, the more swiftly and easily is the existing mass of tradition disseminated throughout any society, and that therefore the more fertile an area, the greater the chance of the spreading of tradition. But other things are by no means equal throughout history. At a certain stage, owing to the working of what we may sum up as economic factors, there comes about a profound change in the organization of society, the nature of which is described below. This change markedly favours the transmission of tradition and therefore we have to remember that the amount of contact ascertained by the density of population is by no means a fair measure of the degree in which the passing on of tradition is facilitated. Further consideration of this point may be left until we come to deal with the changes referred to. Geographical factors also have a bearing upon the transmission of tradition, but since their influence is chiefly pronounced in the stimulus to skill arising from the conflict of traditions of different quality we may leave them to be dealt with later as a whole.

Of more importance than the bearing of contact upon the transmission of tradition is the part it plays as a stimulus to tradition. The remarkable change which at a certain period supervenes in the organization of society and to which reference has been made above, has as far-reaching effects in affecting stimulus to skill as it has in facilitating the transmission of tradition. Again we may leave the consideration of this point until we have described the nature of this change. It is clear, however, that the presence of other men is on the whole a stimulus, though not in itself an important stimulus, so long as tradition is fairly uniform. Nevertheless the more contact there is, on the whole the more stimulus there is. ‘There be thoughts’, wrote Maitland, ‘which only come to men when they be tightly packed.’[1663] But it is when traditions of different quality come into contact that the stimulus becomes important. Where this happens, we have to distinguish two things. There is the passing over of the elements peculiar to each tradition to the other tradition and there is the stimulus which the mere contact affords.

The passing over of elements of one tradition to another and the stimulus afforded go more or less together. Under certain circumstances there is no passing over and there is no stimulus, or at least they are reduced to a minimum. This sometimes happens when two cultures varying very markedly one from the other come into contact—one being distinguished by the possession of a far higher degree of skill than the other. The less skilled race is driven from its territory, and if it survives it is because certain areas of its territory are relatively infertile to the higher skill of the conquering race. A remnant of the less skilled race survives in some corner of its former territory and reaches a _modus vivendi_ with the dominant race. This _modus vivendi_ may take the form of an almost complete disregard of one race for the other; no influence is exerted by one on the other; little, if anything, is absorbed from the other tradition. Some such condition was reached as between the Veddahs, the Todas, the Central African pygmies, and the races respectively surrounding them.

In order that the contact should be effective it is necessary that the differences between the cultures should not be too great. It is most effective in such a region as Western Asia where in close proximity there are several areas varying markedly one from another. In such a region there will grow up, owing to the variations in fertility, somewhat different traditions. These traditions coming into contact will rarely wholly overwhelm one another; there will be a perpetual taking over by one tradition of some elements from the other so that each tradition will be enriched as it could not have been enriched had it depended entirely upon the environment which gave birth to it. Further, the fact that implements, skilled processes, customs, and institutions of a strange nature are now and again coming under the notice of each race acts as a stimulus to thought and invention quite apart from the advantage that may be gained by the absorption of what is valuable into its tradition. It is probable that in this stimulus to thought we have to recognize one of the most important factors making towards progress.

There is no space to pursue this subject here. It may perhaps be noticed that, when two cultures come into contact, all the elements do not spread with equal rapidity. It has been observed, for instance, that, when a tradition comprising greater skill comes into contact with a less full tradition, ‘it is the recognition of the superiority of the natural objects and arts which prevails and makes possible the acceptance of other elements of an introduced culture.’[1664] Certain general principles can be made out but there is much that requires elucidation. There is a considerable body of evidence in favour of the view that megalithic buildings have been derived from one centre. If this is so, it is a remarkable example of the fact that an art of an obviously impressive though not useful nature can pass from one race to another without any noticeable assimilation of other elements of the culture where the art was first practised. Again, if this is so, it is not improbable that useful arts which in their way are equally impressive may have similarly proceeded from one centre. It is remarkable also that mythology can apparently spread from one culture to another. To whatever source we may attribute their origin there seems little doubt that in North America, for instance, tales and legends have spread from one side of the continent to the other after very different economic systems had been evolved and without any marked spreading of other elements in the traditions at the same time.[1665]

6. Having thus indicated the manner in which contact influences the origin, growth, and transmission of tradition we may turn to consider what bearing geographical and economic factors have upon contact. The former problem may be passed over with a few words; the latter will require a rather longer discussion. The former has been the subject of much attention and the main facts, which are all that concern us, are familiar; the latter has not received so much attention though it is of great importance.

Not only the spread of elements of culture but also the movement of peoples are governed by geographical factors. An isolated area is isolated from the slow permeation of elements of tradition, as well as from migratory races. To the degree, therefore, to which any area is isolated, it is removed both from those influences which favour the passing on of elements of tradition as well as those which form an incentive to skill. Isolation is never complete. The more isolated an area is, the less often have migratory races reached it, with the result that when they have done so, there has usually been a conflict between a culture so dissimilar in skill that the migratory race has often wiped out the original race. Apart from the visits of migratory races the beneficial results of contact are reduced to a minimum within an isolated area. The differences in traditions are small, and both the elements of culture which can be acquired and the stimulus which can be derived from contact are of little importance. What these geographical features are is fairly well known.

The first factor is isolation by sea. America was apparently peopled some time in the first period. Subsequently to the date of its original peopling it may be regarded as having been for all practical purposes isolated from the other continents and thus its inhabitants had been long cut off from contact with the rest of the human race when it was ‘discovered’ by Columbus. America was probably visited, perhaps more than once, by parties reaching the Pacific Coast and was certainly visited by the Norsemen, but this small amount of contact has exerted no influence upon the evolution of skill. America is the most remarkable instance of isolation by sea. Isolation by sea has exerted a profound influence upon Australia, New Zealand, and Oceania; and important also has been the semi-isolation of Africa, which continent, until great progress had been made in navigation, was only in contact with Asia by a narrow neck. Among primitive races deserts and mountains hinder contact in almost equal degree, and, though in one sense not geographical features, forests and vegetation, especially in tropical countries, exert a profound influence upon contact.

Other features in the environment may be regarded rather as facilitating contact. Rivers form great arteries of communication, and it is remarkable how small a hindrance they are to contact. Thus ‘Christopher Gist, exploring the Ohio in 1751, found a Shawnee village situated on both sides of the river below the mouth of the Scioto, with about a hundred houses on the north bank and forty on the south. The small and unique nation of the Mandan Indians were found by Lewis and Clarke near the northern bend of the Missouri in 1864 in two groups of villages on opposite sides of the river. They had previously in 1772 occupied nine villages lower down the stream, two on the east bank and seven on the west.’[1666] Fresh-water lakes, though not salt lakes, have again been centres in which contact has been favoured, as was the case in Switzerland at one period and also in Mexico and Peru where the highest level of progress was reached in America.

In considering any area there are certain general features of importance quite apart from those which actually hinder or facilitate contact. In the case of any area there is what we may call its location, that is to say, its position relative to its surroundings. The position of any area in Africa with regard to its distance from the north-eastern corner, through which contact with inhabitants of other continents came about, is obviously of great importance, and similarly is the distance of any one area from the sea when navigation has been developed. To location we may add diversity of features which brings about the contact between different economic systems. This feature of diversity is chiefly relevant when considering large areas; and in this respect Europe and Asia are far more favoured than America.

Lastly, differences in language are a potent influence in hindering contact though they are rather evidences than causes of isolation. When once established differences in language intensify the isolation due to other causes. It may be observed in passing that, contrary to what might be expected, the degree to which among primitive races ‘foreign’ languages are understood is considerable.

Though in the first two periods the importance of the various factors in hindering and facilitating contact has varied greatly, it is sufficient, when taking a broad view, to bear the general nature of these influences in mind. The tendency in the third period has been obviously to reduce vastly the importance of all hindrances to contact arising from features of the environment. Railways cross deserts and tunnels pierce mountains, and that amount of contact, small though it may be, which owing to the inventions of writing and printing now occurs between all parts of the world, can transmit more tradition than wide avenues of contact between neighbouring peoples previously made possible.

Here we can leave this matter. It has been worked out in much detail. All that is necessary for our purpose is to bear in mind the fact, which indeed is obvious, that contact is in various ways hindered and facilitated by geographical causes.

7. We have now to consider what is less familiar—the bearing of what we may call economic factors upon contact. These factors are themselves but an expression of the working of the economic system, and the economic system is correlated with fertility though modified by the degree and kind of contact allowed by the geographical environment. Therefore in considering the working of these economic factors, we are in fact considering another aspect of the manner in which the environment bears thus indirectly upon contact.

Progress in skill, as we have said, is correlated with increasing density of population, and, other things being equal, the greater the density of population, the more contact there is. But other things are not equal; the chief disturbing factors are those connected with the organization of society in their influence both upon the quality and quantity of contact. The vast importance of the step which led to the origin of primitive society has already been remarked upon. When we observe primitive society in more detail, it is seen that, compared with the type of organization which arose in the third period, this form of society essentially consists of a repetition of similar elements.[1667] A perfect type of this form of society would be one which consisted merely of a collection of families, not differing essentially one from another, each being a microcosm of the whole society. Actually we find that primitive society is usually composed of the repetition of larger elements than the family, which Durkheim calls ‘clans’. This term is employed in order to mark the family and political features which characterize these elements. The variations of the constitution of primitive society are very numerous, but it has essentially this form which Durkheim calls ‘segmentary’. The solidarity of such a society rests solely upon the similarity between these clans; the binding forces, that is to say, which keep the society together, do not take their origin in the fact that these elements are complementary to each other and in combination form one organic whole; such coherence as there is arises solely from the fact that these elements, in so far as they are similar, coalesce together. Typically, then, we find in this stage of organization families living side by side very largely independent one of another but combining to form clans. These clans have as a rule no definite constitution; but at times, owing to internal dissensions or warfare, a leader or leaders may arise who put themselves at the head of these groups.

As has been said, variations in and developments of this type of organization may arise and, though among primitive races some approach to the higher type can be detected, the evolution of the higher type of organization is essentially a development which took place in the third period. This type of organization we call organic, as distinguished from segmentary, because in the first place the elements which go to form the whole do not simply cohere owing to their similarity; they are in the nature of more or less specialized organs all of which are necessary in order that the whole may exist. Each again has a particular rôle and each organ is formed of differentiated parts. These organs are not simply connected one with another like links in a chain; they are co-ordinated one with another and subordinated one to another into an organic system. The parts are dependent on the whole and the whole on the parts.

In an organic society, in fact, men are grouped according to their profession and not according to their descent. One of the marks of the segmentary type of society is that men are grouped according to their descent, real or fictitious, and it is this relationship which determines their position in society. In the organic type of society, that which determines a man’s position is the function which he fulfils. In this form of society there are remnants of the older form of organization, as is seen in the recognition of areas, smaller elements such as parishes being united into larger areas such as boroughs, which are united in turn into provinces of which the country is composed. This, however, is not the form of organization which keeps the higher type of society together. That which forms its essential difference from the lower type is the organic nature of the relation of the parts—the complementary co-ordination of the various professions one with the other. It is this interlocking of complementary parts and not the coherence of similar segments which cement the form of society typical of the third stage.

8. The evolution from the segmentary to the organic form of social organization was relatively speaking a rapid process. The approach that can be made to the organic type within the segmentary type is only slight. Doubtless the new type developed within the old forms. Thus we see among the Hebrews the assumption of priestly functions by a single tribe—that of the Levites. But the development of the organic type cannot go far without breaking up the segmentary form of organization; the number and importance of functions does not correspond with the existing forms of organization and cannot long develop within them.

We have now to ask what brings about the evolution of the organic type of society and then what bearing these forms of organization have upon the growth and transmission of tradition. It is rather that the crumbling away of this segmentary organization of society brings to birth the organic type than that the growth of the latter is the cause of the disappearance of the former. This must be so because, as we have seen, the existence of the segmentary type is a barrier to the development of the organic type. This crumbling away is brought about by what Durkheim calls the growth of moral density. Growth in moral density comes about through the pressure of the increasing contact between men performing the same functions, and this causes the decay of the segmentary type of organization and brings about an organization resting upon function. The effect acts upon the cause and accelerates the process. The growth in moral density is connected with the growth in volume of society which is measured solely by the increase in population. But growth in moral density, though only made possible by growth in volume, does not of necessity go hand in hand with it. Growth of moral coalescence is not correlated absolutely with the increase in volume. The density of population can become very considerable, while the moral density remains relatively undeveloped. This result is sometimes attributable to the survival of certain elements of segmentary organization to which religious feelings have become attached and which have, therefore, resisted the forces which make for their dissolution. This is the case, for example, with regard to the maintenance of the family system in China, which is the great barrier to a development of moral coalescence. The most powerful motive in Chinese life is the devotion to the family system, and this motive prevents the progress of division of labour. Among the Hindus the caste system has the same effect. But it is not merely a survival from a former segmentary organization to which religious motives have become attached; it has actually undergone a development for the most part in opposition to the organic organization of society. ‘The divisions’, says Sherring, ‘among the Hindus involving complete separation in respect of marriage and social intercourse, number not hundreds but thousands. In other words the Hindu brotherhood is split up into innumerable clans, holding not the smallest connexion with one another, acknowledging no common bond save that of idolatry.... Caste dissolves the social compact found in other countries, infuses the poison of deadly strife into the small village communities scattered in tens of thousands over the land, induces enmity between neighbours on the most trivial grounds, carries out its own childish rites and laws with Draconian severity, exercises the strongest power of disintegration the human race has ever been subject to, and only displays a spirit of binding and uniting in relation to those selfish creatures who belong to one and the same caste, and who are thereby kept apart from all the rest of mankind by an unnatural divorce.’[1668]

Thus primarily it is the breaking down of the segmentary type of organization and the condensation of society which permits the division of labour. In the end the advance to the higher type of organization is attributable to the growth of population. It is first necessary that a relatively high degree of skill should be attained involving a certain density of population. Then there arises a tendency for the segmentary organization to break down and give way to the organic type. The breaking down may be more or less imperfect and there may be factors which work against the full development of the organic type.

9. The degree to which the higher type of organization favours the increase of skill cannot be overestimated. So long as all men are more or less self-supporting and perform all the functions necessary to maintain existence, the securing of food, the building of shelters, the fashioning of weapons, the making of clothes, their skill in any one direction must remain small. But as soon as certain men begin to concentrate upon certain functions the whole position changes. It then becomes possible for skill to reach a far higher level, and with the further division of functions there is practically no limit to the degree of skill which may be obtained. A concentration upon one function and the association of men so employed are themselves powerful stimuli to further progress. The facts are familiar and there is no need to elaborate the position. At length classification by function tends to override classification by any other standard, and all those engaged in any country in any one function become associated in such a manner that the stimulus is further emphasized and the possibility of any favourable new departure being lost is reduced to a minimum.

The importance of the organic type of organization in favouring the transmission and storing of tradition is equally well marked when compared with the segmentary type. The more society is divided into self-contained and self-sufficient segments, the less likelihood is there that any development in one segment will spread to the other segments. All events tend to be localized, and any promising departure in a new direction is unlikely to penetrate far and become embodied in tradition. New departures are more likely to be lost altogether than to be preserved. The more society is organized on the organic type, on the other hand, the more facilities there are for the transmission and storing of tradition. As the segmentary system breaks down, the transmission and storing of tradition themselves become special functions. Various means of communication are elaborated, the spreading of news becomes a function in itself, teaching becomes a profession, and libraries are established.

10. Such very briefly are the nature, causes, and results of the change in the organization of society so far as concerns our present purpose. There are certain points in this connexion to which some allusion may be made. We have already commented on the fact that the transformation to the higher type does not go hand in hand with growth in numbers. The two examples from India and China showed how little correspondence there may be between density of population and division of labour. Again, in modern communities there is an apparent anomaly. There are considerable differences as regards the amount and kind of tradition present in the different strata of society, and this may appear all the more anomalous because in such societies the division of labour has been developed to the greatest extent. Tradition, it would seem, should be very uniform. Uniformity of tradition, on the other hand, is a mark of primitive society. But this anomaly is only apparent. Among primitive races there is infinitely less tradition than among civilized races. Among the latter not only is the amount of tradition vast, but it is in the course of rapid evolution, and there is therefore in the first place a far greater possibility for differences in tradition to arise. Further, the very fact of the division of labour means that different forms of skill are cultivated deliberately by different elements of the community. Thence arise the differences in social customs and conventions which are apparent in the different strata of modern society. Where there is division of labour, there must be, as we have seen, differences in the acquirement of the tradition of skill, and we may think of the differences in the social and conventional tradition as originating in the differences in functions. Where there is ownership of property on a large scale, ownership may be regarded as a function in society, and clearly enough certain customs and conventions become connected with this function and distinguish the so-called upper classes. Differences in social tradition so arising do lead to some approach to a segmentary division of society. Once classes are set up, there is a tendency for a man to take his position rather according to his class than according to his function. Actually what happens is that the upper classes adopt certain functions, the sacerdotal or the military for example, and thus the differences in custom and convention become somewhat artificially perpetuated, perpetuated that is to say over and above the distinctions which would be the inevitable accompaniment of different functions. In this fashion class becomes of considerable importance in modern communities as a barrier to the transmission of tradition, and there is thus less coalescence between those performing different functions than the mere division of labour brings about.

Interesting as are these modifications of the working of what we have called economic factors, they do not seriously affect the conclusions to be drawn in a broad survey. The transformation to the organic type of society is a mark of the third period, and therefore within this period the conditions became such as to stimulate the growth of skill and to facilitate the transmission and storing of skill in a manner never before approached.

11. Given, therefore, differences in fertility and in the geographical configuration as between one part of the world’s surface and another, and given migration, we can understand how skill arises, how it is transmitted, and how it is stored. The factors considered are not the only factors, but they are the chief factors, and a consideration of them alone enables us to understand how in the main progress may be achieved—how, that is to say, to some degree command over nature may be attained. Further, in thus tracing the causes of progress in this narrow sense we are tracing in some manner the origin and growth of other elements in tradition, not directly concerned with command over nature. This can be illustrated by a reference to the results obtained by Messrs. Hobhouse, Wheeler, and Ginsberg. As we have seen, progress in skill falls easily into a series of stages—hunting and fishing, agricultural and metal-using. These authors further subdivided hunting people into two stages, agricultural peoples into three, and pastoral into two. They then investigated the correlation between these stages and the conditions relative to justice, the family, warfare, and so on. It was found that in the points indicative of the degree of social organization there is a certain correspondence with economic advance. ‘This correspondence’, they say they have found, ‘in the development of government and of justice alike, in the fact that as we mount the scale there is more of government and more of the public administration of justice within society, and in the fact that the unit for government and for justice extends. Both intensively and extensively there is a growth of order corresponding roughly to the industrial advance. On the other hand economic development has no necessary connexion with improvement in the relation between members of a society. It does not imply greater considerateness or a keener sense of justice, and in some ways may be held even adverse to them. Thus in relation to marriage and the position of women, we find little change throughout the grades, and of those which we do find the most marked are specifically connected with the economic factor, viz. the extension of purchase and of general polygamy.... Economic causes are again associated with the development of organized warfare and the substitution of the enslavement of prisoners for their slaughter, liberation, or adoption.’[1669]

In other words social institutions are correlated to a considerable extent with economic systems, and in tracing economic systems to differences in the ‘wealth’ of the environment and to differences in contact, we are at the same time accounting to the extent of this correlation for the existence of most social institutions. Those aspects of tradition which are not correlated with the economic system are obviously often explicable as due to the direct influence of the environment; for differences in the environment which have little or no bearing on the economic system may give rise to differences in these aspects of tradition. It has often been pointed out, for example, that the trend of legends is explicable as due to certain aspects of the environment; thus in Assyria legends were largely connected with floods. In large part, therefore, differences in fertility and differences in degree and kind of contact account not merely for progress in skill but also in large measure for many social institutions, and those aspects of social institutions which are not so to be explained are in part due to the influence of aspects of the environment which do not contribute directly to fertility, and in part to a complicated interaction of tradition. It was remarked that, so far as can be seen, the more conscious methods of adjusting the level of population to the optimum number are not correlated with the economic system. There is no evidence of infanticide and abortion, for example, being so correlated. The occurrence of these institutions among certain races irrespective of the economic conditions may be accounted for by differences in the environment which do not affect wealth. We have seen that certain methods must of necessity be employed, and the adoption of one method in one place and of another in some other place may be due, for example, to the presence in one area of plants by the use of which abortion can be brought about, or the presence in another area of an instrument designed for some other purpose which can be employed for this object. In other areas the practice of killing deformed children from superstitious motives may have been developed into a regular custom of infanticide, or the taboo upon intercourse for short periods may have become developed into a practice of abstaining for prolonged periods.

XXI
THE RELATIVE IMPORTANCE OF TRADITION AND HEREDITY

1. We are now in a position to attempt an estimate of the relative importance of germinal change on the one hand and of the accumulation of tradition on the other.[1670] The direct influence of the environment cannot be left altogether out of account; it is, however, already apparent from what has been said on the subject that, although the direct influence of the environment may modify the course of history, it is not an important factor in comparison with the other two. That which renders the problem so difficult is the fact that the manifestations of human characteristics are shaped both by traditional changes and by germinal changes, and that each kind of change reacts on the other. Thus if we observe increasing subservience in the characteristics of a race, we must remember that previous elimination of the more self-assertive may manifest itself in this manner by moulding tradition through a long course of years, that the nature of the environment may set the current of tradition flowing in this direction, or that both factors may be at work; and that, so far as the second factor is at work, it may for reasons to be explained below cause the elimination of the more self-assertive and so accelerate the process. It is in fact very difficult to arrive at any precise conclusions regarding particular problems, but we shall, after considering certain problems, reach a fairly definite conclusion regarding the relative importance of these factors in general.

2. With these problems in view we may first consider the general characteristics of the intermediate period and then those of the three subsequent periods.

It is clear that at the beginning of the intermediate period the ancestors of man were living under those conditions which we have seen to be common to all species in a state of nature and that, therefore, if we are to speak of history at all, history was at this time an expression of germinal change alone. We know nothing directly as to what happened within this period, but from such hints as we can get we must apparently make certain deductions. We know that within this long period—many times as long as the whole period which has succeeded it—there was accomplished by far the greater part of the evolution of the human intellect. This is the conclusion we draw from the fact that the intellect of primitive races, which must be taken as representing man in the first period, differs in a small degree from that of modern man relative to the difference which we must suppose to have existed between the intellect of man in the first period and that of the pre-human ancestor. Again the picture we must draw of our ancestors in the intermediate period is that of a species acquiring domination almost solely by its intellect. Further we have seen that the advance to the stage of primitive society was only made possible by an important step in mental evolution—so important a step that none of our ancestors who did not take it have survived. The deduction to be drawn is clearly that in the intermediate period history was founded in the main on germinal change. If we find reason to conclude that germinal change has ceased to play so important a part in the following periods, it should be remembered that the sum of all these latter periods represents but a fraction of the length of the intermediate period. If we regard human history as a whole and date the beginning at the time when our ancestors began to move away from those conditions which govern the existence of all species in a state of nature, then we must conclude that germinal change has been the explanation of what has happened during far the greater part of history as defined above.

3. The course of history from the beginning of the first period to the present day presents certain remarkable features. It has to be remembered that the course of events in the first and second periods has been reconstructed from evidence gathered almost solely in Europe, and even then in large part from one country, namely, France. Europe was not the centre of progress, and it may be that the abrupt replacement of one stage of culture by another, of which we find evidence, would not be what we should find nearer the centre of progress. There the evolution of culture may have been more continuous. From time to time waves of migration swept westwards and a higher stage of culture overwhelmed the lower. It may be that the culture systems on reaching Europe followed lines of development of their own which, owing to circumstances being relatively less favourable, did not carry them so far as nearer their point of origin. Therefore the next wave as a rule brought a higher degree of skill which replaced the then existing European system.

However this may be, what we do undoubtedly find is a relatively slow rate of progress in the early part of the first period. Progress became more rapid in the Upper Palaeolithic and in the Neolithic. Finally at the opening of the third period progress was vastly accelerated and has gone on with ever-increasing rapidity subject to certain checks at various times and places. This speeding up of the evolution of skill is the chief outstanding characteristic of history since the opening of the first period, and with it we may associate the facts that progress has not been uniform as between different countries, and has been subject to set-backs within countries especially within the third period. Recalling what was said in the last chapter as to the influence of fertility and contact upon the growth of tradition, we may now note that the main outline at least of these outstanding events is apparently explicable as the result of the working of these factors. We may begin with a consideration of the facts regarding America.

America was apparently peopled from Asia at an early date.[1671] Putting aside the Eskimos, it is probable that the invaders possessed a simple and fairly uniform type of culture and that the cultural differences found at the time of the discovery as between races in different parts of the continent were indigenous. In other words America is a country in which a section of the human race was early cut off from contact with the remainder—such contact as occurred with the Norsemen and may have occurred with the Pacific Islanders having been without importance. For many thousands of years cultural evolution had proceeded independently in this isolated area. At the time of the discovery it had in Mexico and Peru reached a fairly high level. A form of writing had even been evolved, and in general the level of culture was such as we may compare with that attained shortly before the opening of the third period in Eur-Asia. It is possible that at this time the evolution of culture was on the verge of making a great step forward similar to that made in Eur-Asia in the third period. But in any case progress in America had fallen behind progress in Eur-Asia by some thousands of years, and it is thus interesting to compare the endowment of America with that of Eur-Asia.

It may first be noticed that the area is a large one and that it is diversified in that it contains within it many types of geographical and climatic environment. Nevertheless the shape of the area as a whole, and more especially perhaps the absence of relatively fertile areas in proximity differing sharply from one another such as we find in Eur-Asia, renders it less favourably disposed to facilitate contact than are parts of Eur-Asia. In this connexion it may be observed that the Isthmus of Panama is a barrier rather than a means of communication. Apparently the civilizations of Mexico and Peru had no knowledge one of the other.

The differences in respect of fertility are more remarkable. Generally speaking America is not notably less fertile than Eur-Asia, relative to skill in hunting and fishing. The north-west coast of North America is possibly more fertile relative to this type of skill than is any other area in the world. But when we come to examine the endowment of America as a whole relative to skill in the lower forms of agriculture and in the domestication of animals, we find that America is poorly endowed compared with Eur-Asia. Maize and rice are the only important indigenous cereals. All the other valuable cereals were absent from America. This is a very important fact because cereal culture is in many ways a far more profitable art than either root-culture or arboriculture. But America is poor not only in cereals; many plants which play so important a part elsewhere in primitive agriculture are absent—the plantain, yam, banana, breadfruit, and date-palm, for instance. Among the important plants we may note the potato, coco-nut palm, manioc, arrowroot, and the cocoa plant. Brazilian arrowroot is, it may be observed, very easily propagated. ‘Even if the plant is left in the ground when the root has been taken, new tubers grow from its joints after the first shower of rain.’[1672] Some such plant as this in America or as the yam elsewhere must have presumably been that first cultivated.