Principles of Sociology

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Herbert Spencer

Жанр: социология

Язык: Английский

Добавлена: 13.06.24

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Here my purpose has been to give general ideas of the original external factors, in their different classes and orders; so as to impress on the reader the truth, barely enunciated in the preceding chapter, that the characters of the environment co-operate with the characters of human beings in determining social phenomena.

One result of enumerating these original external factors and observing the parts they play, has been that of bringing into view the fact, that the earlier stages of social evolution are far more dependent on local conditions than the later stages. Though societies such as we are now most familiar with, highly organized, rich in appliances, advanced in knowledge, can, by the help of various artifices, thrive in unfavourable habitats; yet feeble, unorganized societies cannot do so. They are at the mercy of their surroundings.

Moreover we thus find answers to the questions sometimes raised in opposition to the doctrine of social evolution – How does it happen that so many tribes of savages have made no manifest progress during the long period over which human records extend? And if it is true that the human race existed during the later geologic periods, why, for 100,000 years or more, did no traceable civilization result? To these questions, I say, adequate replies are furnished. When, glancing over the classes and orders of original external factors above set down, we observe how rare is that combination of favourable ones joined with absence of unfavourable ones, by which alone the germs of societies can be fostered – when we remember that in proportion as the appliances are few and rude, the knowledge small, and the co-operation feeble, the establishment of any improvement in face of surrounding difficulties must take a long time – when we remember that this helplessness of primitive social groups left them exposed to each adverse change, and so caused repeated losses of such advances as were made; it becomes easy to understand why, for an enormous period, no considerable societies were evolved.

But now having made this general survey of the original external factors, and drawn these general inferences, we may leave all detailed consideration of them as not further concerning us. For in dealing with the Principles of Sociology, we have to deal with facts of structure and function displayed by societies in general, dissociated, so far as may be, from special facts due to special circumstances. Henceforth we shall occupy ourselves with those characters of societies which depend mainly on the intrinsic natures of their units, rather than with the characters determined by particular extrinsic influences.

IV. ORIGINAL INTERNAL FACTORS.

§ 22.

As with the original external factors, so with the original internal factors – an adequate account of them supposes a far greater knowledge of the past than we can get. On the one hand, from men's bones, and objects betraying men's actions, found in recent strata and in cave-deposits, dating back to periods since which there have been great changes of climate and re-distributions of land and sea, we must infer that the habitats of tribes have been ever undergoing modifications; though what modifications we can but vaguely guess. On the other hand, alterations of habitats imply in the races subject to them adaptive changes of function and structure; respecting most of which we can know little more than their occurrence.

Such fragmentary evidence as we have does not warrant definite conclusions respecting the ways and degrees in which men of the remote past differed from men now existing. There are, indeed, remains which, taken alone, indicate inferiority of type in ancestral races. The Neanderthal-skull and others like it, with their enormous supra-orbital ridges so simian in character, are among these. There is also the skull lately found by Mr. Gillman, in a mound on the Detroit river, Michigan, and described by him as chimpanzee-like in the largeness of the areas over which the temporal muscles were inserted. But as this remarkable skull was found along with others that were not remarkable, and as such skulls as that from the cave in the Neanderthal are not proved to be of more ancient date than skulls which deviate little from common forms, 110 decisive inferences can be drawn. A kindred, but perhaps a more positive, statement, may be made respecting that compression of the tibiae in certain ancient races, which is expressed by the epithet «platycnemic». First pointed out by Prof. Busk and Dr. Falconer, as characterizing the men who left their bones in the caves of Gibraltar, this peculiarity, shortly afterwards discovered by M. Broca in the remains of cave-men in France, was observed afresh by Mr. Busk in remains from caves in Denbighshire; and more recently Mr. Gillman has shown that it is a trait of tibiae found along with the rudest stone-implements in mounds on the St. Claire river, Michigan. As this trait is not known to distinguish any races now living, while it existed in races which lived in localities so far apart as Gibraltar, France, Wales, and North America, we must infer that an ancient race, distributed over a wide area, was in so far unlike races which have survived.

Two general conclusions only seem warranted by the facts at present known. The first is that in remote epochs there were, as there are now, varieties of men distinguished by differences of osseous structure considerable in degree, and probably by other differences; and the second is, that some traits of brutality and inferiority exhibited in certain of these ancient varieties, have either disappeared or now occur only as unusual variations.

§ 23.

So that about the original internal factors, taken in that comprehensive sense which includes the traits of prehistoric man, we can ascertain little that helps us. Still we may fairly draw from the researches of geologists and archaeologists the important general inferences that throughout long-past periods, as since the commencement of history, there has been going on a continuous differentiation of races, a continuous over-running of the less powerful or less adapted by the more powerful or more adapted, a driving of inferior varieties into undesirable habitats, and, occasionally, an extermination of inferior varieties.

And now, carrying with us this dim conception of primitive man and his history, we must be content to give it what definition we may, by studying those existing races of men which, as judged by their visible characters and their implements, approach most nearly to primitive man. Instead of including in one chapter all the classes and sub-classes of traits to be set down, it will be most convenient to group them into three chapters. We will take first the physical, then the emotional, lastly the intellectual.

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