History of Human Society
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Title: History of Human Society
Author: Frank W. Blackmar
Release date: December 6, 2009 [eBook #30610]
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Language: English
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HISTORY OF
HUMAN SOCIETY
BY
FRANK W. BLACKMAR
PROFESSOR OF SOCIOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
NEW YORK ---- CHICAGO ---- BOSTON
ATLANTA ---- SAN FRANCISCO
Copyright, 1926, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Printed in the United States of America
{v}
PREFACE
This book tells what we know of man, how he first lived, how he worked
with other men, what kinds of houses he built, what tools he made, and
how he formed a government under which to live. So we learn of the
activities of men in the past and what they have passed on to us. In
this way we may become acquainted with the different stages in the
process which we call civilization.
The present trend of specialization in study and research has brought
about widely differentiated courses of study in schools and a large
number of books devoted to special subjects. Each course of study and
each book must necessarily represent but a fragment of the subject.
This method of intensified study is to be commended; indeed, it is
essential to the development of scientific truth. Those persons who
can read only a limited number of books and those students who can take
only a limited number of courses of study need books which present a
connected survey of the movement of social progress as a whole, and
which blaze a trail through the accumulation of learning, and give an
adequate perspective of human achievement.
It is hoped, then, that this book will form the basis of a course of
reading or study that will give the picture in small compass of this
most fascinating subject. If it serves its purpose well, it will be
the introduction to more special study in particular fields or periods.
That the story of this book may be always related more closely with the
knowledge and experience of the individual reader, questions and
problems have been added at the conclusion of each chapter, which may
be used as subjects for {vi} discussion or topics for themes. For those
who wish to pursue some particular phase of the subject a brief list of
books has been selected which may profitably be read more intensively.
F. W. B.
{vii}
CONTENTS
_PART I_
CIVILIZATION AND PROGRESS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. WHAT IS CIVILIZATION? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
The human trail. Civilization may be defined. The material evidences
of civilization are all around us. Primitive man faced an unknown
world. Civilization is expressed in a variety of ways. Modern
civilization includes some fundamentals. Progress an essential
characteristic of civilization. Diversity is necessary to progress.
What is the goal of civilized man? Possibilities of civilization.
Civilization can be estimated.
II. THE ESSENTIALS OF PROGRESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
How mankind goes forward on the trail. Change is not necessarily
progress. Progress expresses itself in a variety of ideals and aims.
Progress of the part and progress of the whole. Social progress
involves individual development. Progress is enhanced by the
interaction of groups and races. The study of uncultured races of
to-day. The study of prehistoric types. Progress is indicated by
early cultures. Industrial and social life of primitive man. Cultures
indicate the mental development of the race. Men of genius cause
mutations which permit progress. The data of progress.
III. METHODS OF RECOUNTING HUMAN PROGRESS . . . . . . . . . . 35
Difficulty of measuring progress. Progress may be measured by the
implements used. The development of art. Progress is estimated by
economic stages. Progress is through the food-supply. Progress
estimated by the different forms of social order. Development of
family life. The growth of political life. Religion important in
civilization. Progress through moral evolution. Intellectual
development of man. Change from savagery to barbarism. Civilization
includes all kinds of human progress. Table showing methods of
recounting human progress.
_PART II_
FIRST STEPS OF PROGRESS
IV. PREHISTORIC MAN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
The origin of man has not yet been determined. Methods of recounting
prehistoric time: (1) geologic method, (2) paleontology, (3) anatomy,
(4) cultures. Prehistoric types of the human race. The unity of the
human race. The primitive home of man may be determined in a general
way. The antiquity of man is shown in racial differentiation. The
evidences of man's ancient life in different localities: (1) caves, (2)
shell mounds, (3) river and glacial drifts, (4) burial-mounds, (5)
battle-fields and village sites, (6) lake-dwellings. Knowledge of
man's antiquity influences reflective thinking.
{viii}
V. THE ECONOMIC FACTORS OF PROGRESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
The efforts of man to satisfy physical needs. The attempt to satisfy
hunger and protect from cold. The methods of procuring food in
primitive times. The variety of food was constantly increased. The
food-supply was increased by inventions. The discovery and use of
fire. Cooking added to the economy of the food-supply. The
domestication of animals. The beginnings of agriculture were very
meagre. The manufacture of clothing. Primitive shelters and houses.
Discovery and use of metals. Transportation as a means of economic
development. Trade, or exchange of goods. The struggle for existence
develops the individual and the race.
VI. PRIMITIVE SOCIAL LIFE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
The character of primitive social life. The family is the most
persistent of social origins. Kinship is a strong factor in social
organization. The earliest form of social order. The reign of custom.
The Greek and Roman family was strongly organized. In primitive
society religion occupied a prominent place. Spirit worship. Moral
conditions. Warfare and social progress. Mutual aid developed slowly.
_PART III_
SEATS OF EARLY CIVILIZATION
VII. LANGUAGE AND ART AS A MEANS OF CULTURE AND
SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
The origin of language has been a subject of controversy. Language is
an important social function. Written language followed speech in
order of development. Phonetic writing was a step in advance of the
ideograph. The use of manuscripts and books made permanent records.
Language is an instrument of culture. Art as a language of aesthetic
ideas. Music is a form of language. The dance as a means of dramatic
expression. The fine arts follow the development of language. The
love of the beautiful slowly develops.
VIII. THE INFLUENCE OF PHYSICAL NATURE ON HUMAN PROGRESS . . 141
Man is a part of universal nature. Favorable location is necessary for
permanent civilization. The nature of the soil an essential condition
of progress. The use of land the foundation of social order. Climate
has much to do with the possibilities of progress. The general aspects
of nature determine the type of civilization. Physical nature
influences social order.
IX. CIVILIZATION OF THE ORIENT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
The first nations with historical records in Asia and Africa.
Civilization in Mesopotamia. Influences coming from the Far East.
Egypt becomes a centre of civilization. The coming of the Semites.
The Phoenicians became the great navigators. A comparison of the
Egyptian and Babylonian empires. The Hebrews made a permanent
contribution to world civilization. The civilization of India and
China. The coming of the Aryans.
X. THE ORIENTAL TYPE OF CIVILIZATION . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
The governments of the early Oriental civilizations. War existed for
conquest and plunder. Religious belief was an important factor in
despotic {ix} government. Social organization was incomplete.
Economic influences. Records, writing, and paper. The beginnings of
science were strong in Egypt, weak in Babylon. The contribution to
civilization.
XI. BEGINNINGS OF CIVILIZATION IN AMERICA . . . . . . . . . . 186
America was peopled from the Old World. The Incas of Peru. Aztec
civilization in Mexico. The earliest centres of civilization in
Mexico. The Pueblo Indians of the Southwest. The Mound-Builders of
the Mississippi Valley. Other types of Indian life. Why did the
civilization of America fail?
_PART IV_
WESTERN CIVILIZATION
XII. THE OLD GREEK LIFE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
The old Greek life was the starting-point of Western civilization. The
Aegean culture preceded the coming of the Greeks. The Greeks were of
Aryan stock. The coming of the Greeks. Character of the primitive
Greeks. Influence of old Greek life.
XIII. GREEK PHILOSOPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
The transition from theology to inquiry. Explanation of the universe
by observation and inquiry. The Ionian philosophy turned the mind
toward nature. The weakness of Ionian philosophy. The Eleatic
philosophers. The Sophists. Socrates the first moral philosopher (b.
469 B.C.). Platonic philosophy develops the ideal. Aristotle the
master mind of the Greeks. Other schools. Results obtained in Greek
philosophy.
XIV. THE GREEK SOCIAL POLITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
The struggle for Greek equality and liberty. The Greek government an
expanded family. Athenian government a type of Grecian democracy.
Constitution of Solon seeks a remedy. Cleisthenes continues the
reforms of Solon. Athenian democracy failed in obtaining its best and
highest development. The Spartan state differs from all others. Greek
colonization spreads knowledge. The conquests of Alexander.
Contributions of Greece to civilization.
XV. ROMAN CIVILIZATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
The Romans differed in nature from the Greeks. The social structure of
early Rome and that of early Greece. Civil organization of Rome. The
struggle for liberty. The development of government. The development
of law is the most remarkable phase of the Roman civilization.
Influence of the Greek life on Rome. Latin literature and language.
Development of Roman art. Decline of the Roman Empire. Summary of
Roman civilization.
XVI. THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
Important factors in the foundation of Western civilization. The
social contacts of the Christian religion. Social conditions at the
beginning of the Christian era. The contact of Christianity with
social life. Christianity influenced the legislation of the times.
Christians come into conflict with civil authority. The wealth of the
church accumulates. Development of the hierarchy. Attempt to dominate
the temporal powers. Dogmatism. The church becomes the conservator of
knowledge. Service of Christianity.
{x}
XVII. TEUTONIC INFLUENCE ON CIVILIZATION . . . . . . . . . . 281
The coming of the barbarians. Importance of Teutonic influence.
Teutonic liberty. Tribal life. Classes of society. The home and the
home life. Political assemblies. General social customs. The
economic life. Contributions to law.
XVIII. FEUDAL SOCIETY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
Feudalism a transition of social order. There are two elementary
sources of feudalism. The feudal system in its developed state based
on land-holding. Other elements of feudalism. The rights of
sovereignty. The classification of feudal society. Progress of
feudalism. State of society under feudalism. Lack of central
authority in feudal society. Individual development in the dominant
group.
XIX. ARABIAN CONQUEST AND CULTURE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
The rise and expansion of the Arabian Empire. The religious zeal of
the Arab-Moors. The foundations of science and art. The beginnings of
chemistry and medicine. Metaphysics and exact science. Geography and
history. Discoveries, inventions, and achievements. Language and
literature. Art and architecture. The government of the Arab-Moors
was peculiarly centralized. Arabian civilization soon reached its
limits.
XX. THE CRUSADES STIR THE EUROPEAN MIND . . . . . . . . . . . 319
What brought about the crusades. Specific causes of the crusades.
Unification of ideals and the breaking of feudalism. The development
of monarchy. The crusades quickened intellectual development. The
commercial effects of the crusades. General influence of the crusades
on civilization.
XXI. ATTEMPTS AT POPULAR GOVERNMENT . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
The cost of popular government. The feudal lord and the towns. The
rise of free cities. The struggle for independence. The
affranchisement of cities developed municipal organization. The
Italian cities. Government of Venice. Government of Florence. The
Lombard League. The rise of popular assemblies in France. Rural
communes arose in France. The municipalities of France. The
States-General was the first central organization. Failure of attempts
at popular government in Spain. Democracy in the Swiss cantons. The
ascendancy of monarchy. Beginning of constitutional liberty in England.
XXII. THE INTELLECTUAL AWAKENING OF EUROPE . . . . . . . . . 347
Social evolution is dependent upon variation. The revival of progress
throughout Europe. The revival of learning a central idea of progress.
Influence of Charlemagne. The attitude of the church was
retrogressive. Scholastic philosophy marks a step in progress.
Cathedral and monastic schools. The rise of universities. Failure to
grasp scientific methods. Inventions and discoveries. The extension
of commerce hastened progress.
XXIII. HUMANISM AND THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING . . . . . . . . . 364
The discovery of manuscripts. Who were the humanists? Relation of
humanism to language and literature. Art and architecture. The effect
of humanism on social manners. Relation of humanism to science and
philosophy. The study of the classics became fundamental in education.
General influence of humanism.
{xi}
XXIV. THE REFORMATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 375
The character of the Reformation. Signs of the rising storm. Attempts
at reform within the church. Immediate causes of the Reformation.
Luther was the hero of the Reformation in Germany. Zwingli was the
hero of the Reformation in Switzerland. Calvin establishes the Genevan
system. The Reformation in England differed from the German. Many
phases of reformation in other countries. Results of the Reformation
were far-reaching.
XXV. CONSTITUTIONAL LIBERTY AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION . . . . 392
Progress of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The struggle of
monarchy with democracy. Struggle for constitutional liberty in
England. The place of France in modern civilization. The divine right
of kings. The power of the nobility. The misery of the people. The
church. Influence of the philosophers. The failure of government.
France on the eve of the revolution. The revolution. Results of the
revolution.
_PART V_
MODERN PROGRESS
XXVI. PROGRESS OF POLITICAL LIBERTY . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413
Political liberty in the eighteenth century. The progress of popular
government found outside of great nations. Reform measures in England.
The final triumph of the French republic. Democracy in America.
Modern political reforms. Republicanism in other countries. Influence
of democracy on monarchy.
XXVII. INDUSTRIAL PROGRESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429
Industries radiate from the land as a centre. The early medieval
methods of industry. The beginnings of trade. Expansion of trade and
transportation. Invention and discoveries. The change from handcraft
to power manufacture. The industrial revolution. Modern industrial
development. Scientific agriculture. The building of the city.
Industry and civilization.
XXVIII. SOCIAL EVOLUTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 443
The evolutionary processes of society. The social individual. The
ethnic form of society. The territorial group. The national group
founded on race expansion. The functions of new groups. Great society
and the social order. Great society protects voluntary organizations.
The widening influence of the church. Growth of religious toleration.
Altruism and democracy. Modern society a machine of great complexity.
Interrelation of different parts of society. The progress of the race
based on social opportunities. The central idea of modern civilization.
XXIX. THE EVOLUTION OF SCIENCE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 458
Science is an attitude of mind toward life. Scientific methods.
Measurement in scientific research. Science develops from centres.
Science and democracy. The study of the biological and physical
sciences. The evolutionary theory. Science and war. Scientific
progress is cumulative. The trend of scientific investigation.
Research foundations.
{xii}
XXX. UNIVERSAL EDUCATION AND DEMOCRACY . . . . . . . . . . . 475
Universal public education is a modern institution. The mediaeval
university permitted some freedom of choice. The English and German
universities. Early education in the United States. The common, or
public, schools. Knowledge, intelligence, and training necessary in a
democracy. Education has been universalized. Research an educational
process. The diffusion of knowledge necessary in a democracy.
Educational progress. Importance of state education. The
printing-press and its products. Public opinion.
XXXI. WORLD ECONOMICS AND POLITICS . . . . . . . . . . . . . 486
Commerce and communication. Exchange of ideas modifies political
organization. Spread of political ideas. The World War breaks down
the barriers of thought. Attempt to form a league for permanent peace.
International agreement and progress. The mutual aid of nations.
Reorganization of international law. The outlook for a world state.
XXXII. THE TREND OF CIVILIZATION IN THE UNITED STATES . . . . 495
The economic outlook. Economics of labor. Public and corporate
industries. The political outlook. Equalization of opportunity. The
influence of scientific thought on progress. The relation of material
comfort to spiritual progress. The balance of social forces.
Restlessness vs. happiness. Summary of progress.
BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 504
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 509
{3}
_PART I_
CIVILIZATION AND PROGRESS
HISTORY OF HUMAN SOCIETY
CHAPTER I
WHAT IS CIVILIZATION?
_The Human Trail_.--The trail of human life beginning in the mists of
the past, winding through the ages and stretching away toward an
unknown future, is a subject of perennial interest and worthy of
profound thought. No other great subject so invites the attention of
the mind of man. It is a very long trail, rough and unblazed,
wandering over the continents of the earth. Those who have travelled
it came in contact with the mysteries of an unknown world. They faced
the terrors of the shifting forms of the earth, of volcanoes,
earthquakes, floods, storms, and ice fields. They witnessed the
extinction of forests and animal groups, and the changing forms of
lakes, rivers, and mountains, and, indeed, the boundaries of oceans.
It is the trail of human events and human endeavor on which man
developed his physical powers, enlarged his brain capacity, developed
and enriched his mind, and became efficient through art and industry.
Through inventions and discovery he turned the forces of nature to his
use, making them serve his will. In association with his fellows, man
learned that mutual aid and co-operation were necessary to the survival
of the race. To learn this caused him more trouble than all the
terrors and mysteries of the natural world around him. Connected with
the trail is a long chain of causes and effects, trial and error,
success and failure, out of which has come the advancement of the race.
The accumulated results of life on the trail are called _civilization_.
_Civilization May Be Defined_.--To know what civilization is by study
and observation is better than to rely upon a formal {4} definition.
For, indeed, the word is used in so many different ways that it admits
of a loose interpretation. For instance, it may be used in a narrow
sense to indicate the character and quality of the civil relations.
Those tribes or nations having a well-developed social order, with
government, laws, and other fixed social customs, are said to be
civilized, while those peoples without these characters are assumed to
be uncivilized. It may also be considered in a somewhat different
sense, when the arts, industries, sciences, and habits of life are
stimulated--civilization being determined by the degree in which these
are developed. Whichever view is accepted, it involves a contrast of
present ideals with past ideals, of an undeveloped with a developed
state of human progress.
But whatever notion we have of civilization, it is difficult to draw a
fixed line between civilized and uncivilized peoples. Mr. Lewis H.
Morgan, in his _Ancient Society_, asserts that civilization began with
the phonetic alphabet, and that all human activity prior to this could
be classified as savagery or barbarism. But there is a broader
conception of civilization which recognizes all phases of human
achievement, from the making of a stone axe to the construction of the
airplane; from the rude hut to the magnificent palace; from crude moral
and religious conditions to the more refined conditions of human
association. If we consider that civilization involves the whole
process of human achievement, it must admit of a great variety of
qualities and degrees of development, hence it appears to be a relative
term applied to the variation of human life. Thus, the Japanese are
highly civilized along special lines of hand work, hand industry, and
hand art, as well as being superior in some phases of family
relationships. So we might say of the Chinese, the East Indians, and
the American Indians, that they each have well-established customs,
habits of thought, and standards of life, differing from other nations,
expressing different types of civilization.
When a member of a primitive tribe invented the bow-and-arrow, or began
to chip a flint nodule in order to make a stone {5} axe, civilization
began. As soon as people began to co-operate with one another in
obtaining food, building houses, or for protection against wild animals
and wild men, that is, when they began to treat each other civilly,
they were becoming civilized. We may say then in reality that
civilization has been a continuous process from the first beginning of
man's conquest of himself and nature to the modern complexities of
social life with its multitude of products of industry and cultural
arts.
It is very common for one group or race to assume to be highly
civilized and call the others barbarians or savages. Thus the Hebrews
assumed superiority when they called other people Gentiles, and the
Greeks when they called others barbarians. Indeed, it is only within
recent years that we are beginning to recognize that the civilizations
of China, Japan, and India have qualities worth studying and that they
may have something worth while in life that the Western civilization
has not. Also there has been a tendency to confuse the terms Christian
and heathen with civilized and uncivilized. This idea arose in
England, where, in the early history of Christianity, the people of the
towns were more cultured than the people of the country.
It happened, too, that the townspeople received Christianity before the
people of the country, hence heathens were the people who dwelt out on
the heath, away from town. This local idea became a world idea when
all non-Christian peoples were called uncivilized. It is a fatal error
for an individual, neighborhood, tribe, or nation to assume superiority
to the extent that it fails to recognize good qualities in others. One
should not look with disdain upon a tribe of American Indians, calling
them uncivilized because their material life is simple, when in reality
in point of honor, faithfulness, and courage they excel a large
proportion of the races assuming a higher civilization.
_The Material Evidences of Civilization Are All Around Us_.--Behold
this beautiful valley of the West, with its broad, {6} fertile fields,
yielding rich harvests of corn and wheat, and brightened by varied
forms of fruit and flower. Farmhouses and schoolhouses dot the
landscape, while towns and cities, with their marts of trade and busy
industries, rise at intervals. Here are churches, colleges, and
libraries, indicative of the education of the community; courthouses,
prisons, and jails, which speak of government, law, order, and
protection. Here are homes for the aged and weak, hospitals and
schools for the defective, almshouses for the indigent, and
reformatories for the wayward. Railroads bind together all parts of
the nation, making exchange possible, and bringing to our doors the
products of every clime. The telephone and the radio unite distant
people with common knowledge, thought, and sentiment. Factories and
mills line the streams or cluster in village and city, marking the busy
industrial life. These and more mark the visible products of
civilization.
But civilization is something more than form, it is spirit; and its
evidence may be more clearly discerned in the co-operation of men in
political organization and industrial life, by their united action in
religious worship and charitable service, in social order and
educational advancement. Observe, too, the happy homes, with all of
their sweet and hallowed influences, and the social mingling of the
people searching for pleasure or profit in their peaceful, harmonious
association. Witness the evidences of accumulated knowledge in
newspapers, periodicals, and books, and the culture of painting,
poetry, and music. Behold, too, the achievements of the mind in the
invention and discovery of the age; steam and electrical appliances
that cause the whirl of bright machinery, that turn night into day, and
make thought travel swift as the wings of the wind! Consider the
influence of chemistry, biology, and medicine on material welfare, and
the discoveries of the products of the earth that subserve man's
purpose! And the central idea of all this is man, who walks upright in
the dignity and grace of his own manhood, surrounded by the evidence of
his own achievements. His knowledge, his power of thought, {7} his
moral character, and his capacity for living a large life, are
evidences of the real civilization. For individual culture is, after
all, the flower and fruit, the beauty and strength of civilization.
One hundred years ago neither dwelling, church, nor city greeted the
eye that gazed over the broad expanse of the unfilled prairies. Here
were no accumulations of wealth, no signs of human habitation, except a
few Indians wandering in groups or assembled in their wigwam villages.
The evidences of art and industry were meagre, and of accumulated
knowledge small, because the natives were still the children of nature
and had gone but a little way in the mastery of physical forces or in
the accumulation of knowledge. The relative difference in their
condition and that of those that followed them is the contrast between
barbarism and civilization.
Yet how rapid was the change that replaced the latter with the former.
Behold great commonwealths built in half a century! What is the secret
of this great and marvellous change? It is a transplanted
civilization, not an indigenous one. Men came to this fertile valley
with the spiritual and material products of modern life, the outcome of
centuries of progress. They brought the results of man's struggle,
with himself and with nature, for thousands of years. This made it
possible to build a commonwealth in half a century. The first settlers
brought with them a knowledge of the industrial arts; the theory and
practice of social order; individual capacity, and a thirst for
education. It was necessary only to set up the machinery already
created, and civilization went forward. When they began the life of
labor, the accumulated wealth of the whole world was to be had in
exchange for the products of the soil.
_Primitive Man Faced an Unknown World_.--But how different is the
picture of primitive man suddenly brought face to face with an unknown
world. With no knowledge of nature or art, with no theory or practice
of social order, he began to dig and to delve for the preservation of
life. Suffering the pangs of hunger, he obtained food; naked, he
clothed himself; {8} buffeted by storm and wind and scorched by the
penetrating rays of the sun, he built himself a shelter. As he
gradually became skilled in the industrial arts, his knowledge
increased. He formed a clearer estimate of how nature might serve him,
and obtained more implements with which to work
The social order of the family and the state slowly appeared. Man
became a co-operating creature, working with his fellows in the
satisfaction of material wants and in protecting the rights of
individuals. Slow and painful was this process of development, but as
he worked his capacity enlarged, his power increased, until he mastered
the forces of nature and turned them to serve him; he accumulated
knowledge and brought forth culture and learning; he marshalled the
social forces in orderly process. Each new mastery of nature or self
was a power for the future, for civilization is cumulative in its
nature; it works in a geometrical progression. An idea once formed,
others follow; one invention leads to another, and each material form
of progress furnishes a basis for a more rapid progress and for a
larger life. The discovery and use of a new food product increased the
power of civilization a hundredfold. One step in social order leads to
another, and thus is furnished a means of utilizing without waste all
of the individual and social forces.
Yet how irregular and faltering are the first steps of human progress.
A step forward, followed by a long period of readjustment of the
conditions of life; a movement forward here and a retarding force
there. Within this irregular movement we discover the true course of
human progress. One tribe, on account of peculiar advantages, makes a
special discovery, which places it in the ascendancy and gives it power
over others. It has obtained a favorable location for protection
against oppressors or a fertile soil, a good hunting ground or a
superior climate. It survives all opposing factors for a time, and,
obtaining some idea of progress, it goes on adding strength unto
strength, or is crowded from its favorable position by its warlike
neighbors to perish from the earth, or to live a {9} stationary or even
a deteriorating life. A strong tribe, through internal development and
the domination of other groups, finally becomes a great nation in an
advanced state of civilization. It passes through the course of
infancy, youth, maturity, old age, and death. But the products of its
civilization are handed on to other nations. Another rises and, when
about to enter an advanced state of progress, perishes on account of
internal maladies. It is overshadowed with despotism, oppressed by
priestcraft, or lacking industrial vitality to such a degree that it is
forced to surrender the beginnings of civilization to other nations and
other lives.
The dominance of a group is dependent in part on the natural or
inherent qualities of mind and body of its members, which give it power
to achieve by adapting itself to conditions of nature and in mastering
and utilizing natural resources. Thus the tribe that makes new devices
for procuring food or new weapons for defense, or learns how to sow
seeds and till the soil, adds to its means of survival and progress and
thus forges ahead of those tribes lacking in these means. Also the
social heritage or the inheritance of all of the products of industry
and arts of life which are passed on from generation to generation, is
essential to the rapid development of civilization.
_Civilization Is Expressed in a Variety of Ways_.--Different ideals and
the adaptation to different environment cause different types of life.
The ideals of the Persian, the Greek, the Roman, and the Teuton varied.
Still greater is the contrast between these and the Chinese and the
Egyptian ideals. China boasts of an ancient civilization that had its
origin long before the faint beginnings of Western nations, and the
Chinese are firm believers in their own culture and superior
advancement. The silent grandeur of the pyramids and temples of the
Nile valley bespeak a civilization of great maturity, that did much for
the world in general, but little for the Egyptian people. Yet these
types of civilization are far different from that of Western nations.
Their ideas of culture are in great contrast to our own. But even the
Western nations are not uniform in {10} ideals of civil life nor in
their practice of social order. They are not identical in religious
life, and their ideals of art and social progress vary.
Moreover, the racial type varies somewhat and with it the national life
and thought. Compare England, Germany, France, and Spain as to the
variability in characteristics of literature and art, in moral ideals,
in ethical practice, in religious motive, and in social order. Their
differences are evident, but they tend to disappear under the influence
of rapid transit and close intercommunication, which draw all modern
nations nearer together. Yet, granting the variability of ideals and
of practice, there is a general consensus of opinion as to what
constitutes civilization and what are the elements of progress. Modern
writers differ somewhat in opinion as to elements of civilization, but
these differences are more apparent than real, as all true civilization
must rest upon a solid foundation of common human traits. The
fundamental principles and chief characteristics are quite uniform for
all nations and for all times, and writers who disagree as to general
characteristics may not be classified by national boundaries; they
represent the differences of philosophers.
_Modern Civilization Includes Some Fundamentals_.--As applied at
different periods of the world's progress and as a representation of
different phases of life, civilization means more to-day than ever
before; its ideal is higher, its conception broader. In the modern,
accepted sense it includes (1) _a definite knowledge of man and
nature_. The classified knowledge of science and philosophy and all
phases of the history of man socially and individually are important in
estimating his true progress. All forms of thought and life are to be
estimated in considering the full meaning of the term. It also
includes (2) _progress in art_. While science deals with principles,
art deals with rules of action. Science gives classified knowledge,
while art directs to a practical end. Art provides definite plans how
to operate. If these plans are carried out, the field of practice is
entered. In its broadest conception art includes the making {11} and
the doing, as well as the plan. The fine arts and the industrial or
practical arts, in all of their varied interests, are included in art
as a factor in civilization. This category should include the highest
forms of painting, poetry, sculpture, and music, as well as the lowest
forms of industrial implements.
Civilization includes (3) _a well-developed ethical code_ quite
universally observed by a community or nation. The rule of conduct of
man toward himself and toward his fellows is one of the essential
points of discrimination between barbarism and civilization. While
ethical practice began at a very early period in the progress of man,
it was a long time before any distinct ethical code became established.
But the completed civilization does not exist until a high order of
moral practice obtains; no civilization can long prevail without it.
Of less importance, but of no less binding force, is (4) the _social
code_, which represents the forms and conventionalities of society,
built, it is true, largely upon the caprices of fashion, and varying
greatly in different communities, yet more arbitrary, if possible, than
the moral code. It considers fitness and consistency in conduct, and
as such is an important consideration in social usage and social
progress. In Europe it has its extreme in the court etiquette; in
America, in the punctiliousness of the higher social classes of our
large cities. But it affects all communities, and its observance may
be noted in rural districts as well as in the city population.
The mores, or customs, of man began at a very early time and have been
a persistent ruling power in human conduct. Through tradition they are
handed down from generation to generation, to be observed with more or
less fidelity as a guide to the art of living. Every community,
whether primitive or developed, is controlled to a great extent by the
prevailing custom. It is common for individuals and families to do as
their ancestors did. This habit is frequently carried to such an
extent that the deeds of the fathers are held sacred from which no one
dare to depart. Isolated communities continue year after year to do
things because they had always done so, {12} holding strictly to the
ruling custom founded on tradition, even when some better way was at
hand. A rare example of this human trait is given by Captain Donald
MacMillan, who recently returned from Arctic Greenland. He said: "We
took two ultra-modern developments, motion pictures and radio, direct
to a people who live and think as their ancestors did two thousand
years ago." He was asked: "What did they think?" He replied: "I do
not know." Probably it was a case of wonder without thought. While
this is a dominant force which makes for the unity and perpetuity of
the group, it is only by departure from established tradition that
progress is made possible.
Civilization involves (5) _government and law_. The tribes and nations
in a state of barbarism lived under the binding influence of custom.
In this period people were born under _status_, or condition, not under
law. Gradually the old family life expanded into the state, and
government became more formal. Law appeared as the expression of the
will of the people directly or indirectly through their
representatives. True, it may have been the arbitrary ruling of a
king, but he represented the unity of the race and spoke with the
authority of the nation. Law found no expression until there was
formed an organic community capable of having a will respecting the
control of those who composed it. It implies a governing body and a
body governed; it implies an orderly movement of society according to a
rule of action called law. While social order is generally obtained
through law and government, such is the practice in modern life that
the orderly association of men in trade and commerce and in daily
contact appears to stand alone and to rise above the control of the
law. Indeed, in a true civilization, the civil code, though an
essential factor, seems to be outclassed by the higher social instincts
based on the practice of social order.
(6) _Religion_ must take a large place as a factor in the development
of civilization. The character of the religious belief of man is, to a
certain extent, the true test of his progressive {13} nature. His
faith may prove a source of inspiration to reason and progressive life;
it may prove the opposite, and lead to stagnation and retrogression.
Upon the whole, it must be insisted that religious belief has subserved
a large purpose in the economy of human progress. It has been
universal to all tribes, for even the lowest have some form of
religious belief--at least, a belief in spiritual beings. Religious
belief thus became the primary source of abstract ideas, and it has
always been conducive to social order. It has, in modern times
especially, furnished the foundation of morality. By surrounding
marriage with ceremonies it has purified the home life, upheld the
authority of the family, and thus strengthened social order. It has
developed the individual by furnishing an ideal before science and
positive knowledge made it possible. It strengthened patriotic feeling
on account of service rendered in supporting local government, and
subjectively religion improved man by teaching him to obey a superior.
Again, by its tradition it frequently stifled thought and retarded
progress.
Among other elements of civilization must be mentioned (7) _social
well-being_. The preceding conditions would be almost certain to
insure social well-being and prosperity. Yet it might be possible,
through lack of harmony of these forces, on account of their improper
distribution in a community, that the group might lack in general
social prosperity. Unless there is general contentment and happiness
there cannot be said to be an ideal state of civilization. And this
social well-being is closely allied to (8) _material prosperity_, the
most apparent element to be mentioned in the present analysis. The
amount of the accumulation of the wealth of a nation, its distribution
among the people, and the manner in which it is obtained and expended,
determine the state of civilization. This material prosperity makes
the better phases of civilization possible. It is essential to modern
progress, and our civilization should seek to render it possible for
all classes to earn their bread and to have leisure and opportunity for
self-culture.
The mastery of the forces of nature is the basis for man's {14}
material prosperity. Touching nature here and there, by discovery,
invention, and toil, causing her to yield her treasures for his
service, is the key to all progress. In this, it is not so much
conflict with nature as co-operation with her, that yields utility and
eventually mastery. The discovery and use of new food products, the
coal and other minerals of the earth, the forests, the water power and
electric power, coupled with invention and adaptability to continually
greater use, are the qualifying opportunity for advancement. Without
these the fine theories of the philosopher, exalted religious belief,
and high ideals of life are of no avail.
From the foregoing it may be said that civilization in its fulness
means all of the acquired capabilities of man as evidenced by his
conduct and the material products arising from his physical and mental
exertion. It is evident that at first the structure called
civilization began to develop very slowly and very feebly; just when it
began it is difficult to state. The creation of the first utility, the
first substantial movement to increase the food supply, the first home
for protection, the first religious ceremony, or the first organized
household, represents the beginnings of civilization, and these are the
landmarks along the trail of man's ascendency.
_Progress Is an Essential Characteristic of Civilization_.--The goal is
never reached, the victory is never finally achieved. Man must move
on, ever on. Intellect must develop, morals improve, liberty increase,
social order be perfected, and social growth continue. There must be
no halting on the road; the nation that hesitates is lost. Progress in
general is marked by the development of the individual, on the one
hand, and that of society, on the other. In well-ordered society these
two ideas are balanced; they seek an equilibrium. Excessive
individualism leads to anarchy and destruction; excessive socialism
blights and stagnates individual activity and independence and retards
progress. It must be admitted here as elsewhere that the individual
culture and the individual life are, after all, the highest aims. But
how can these be obtained in {15} modern life without social progress?
How can there be freedom of action for the development of the
individual powers without social expansion? Truly, the social and the
individual life are complementary elements of progress.
_Diversity Is Necessary to Progress_.--If progress is an essential
characteristic of modern civilization, it may be said that diversity is
essential to progress. There is much said about equality and
fraternity. It depends on what is meant by the terms as to whether
these are good sayings or not. If equality means uniformity, by it man
is easily reduced to a state of stagnation. Diversity of life exists
everywhere in progressive nature, where plants or animals move forward
in the scale of existence. Man is not an exception to the rule,
notwithstanding his strong will force. Men differ in strength, in
moral and intellectual capacity, and in co-operating ability. Hence
they must occupy different stations in life. And the quality and
quantity of progress are to be estimated in different nations according
to the diversity of life to be observed among individuals and groups.
_What Is the Goal of Civilized Man?_--And it may be well to ask, as
civilization is progressive: What is our aim in life from our own
standpoint? For what do men strive? What is the ultimate of life?
What is the best for which humanity can live? If it were merely to
obtain food and clothes and nothing more, the question could be easily
answered. If it were merely to train a man to be a monk, that he might
spend his time in prayer and supplication for a better future life, the
question would be simple enough. If to pore over books to find out the
knowledge of the past and to spend the life in investigation of truth
were the chief aims, it would be easy to determine the object of life.
But frequently that which we call success in life is merely a means to
an end.
And viewed in the complex activity of society, it is difficult to say
what is the true end of life; it is difficult to determine the true end
of civilization. Some have said it is found in administering the
"greatest good to the greatest number," {16} and if we consider in this
the generations yet unborn, it reveals the actual tendency of modern
civilization. If the perfection of the individual is the highest ideal
of civilization, it stops not with one individual, but includes all.
And this asserts that social well-being must be included in the final
aim, for full and free individual development cannot appear without it.
The enlarged capacity for living correctly, enjoying the best of this
life righteously, and for associating harmoniously and justly with his
fellows, is the highest aim of the individual. Happiness of the
greatest number through utility is the formula for modern civilization.
_Possibilities of Civilization_.--The possibilities of reaching a still
higher state of civilization are indeed great. The future is not full
of foreboding, but bright and happy with promise of individual culture
and social progress. If opportunities are but wisely used, the
twentieth century will witness an advancement beyond our highest
dreams. Yet the whole problem hinges on the right use of knowledge.
If the knowledge of chemistry is to be used to destroy nations and
races with gases and high explosives, such knowledge turns civilization
to destruction. If all of the powers of nature under man's control
should be turned against him, civilization would be turned back upon
itself. Let us have "the will to believe" that we have entered an era
of vital progress, of social improvement, of political reforms, which
will lead to the protection of those who need protection and the
elevation of those who desire it. The rapid progress in art and
architecture, in invention and industry, the building of libraries and
the diffusion of knowledge, the improvement of our educational system,
all being entered upon, will force the world forward at a rapid pace,
and on such a rational basis that the delight of living will be greatly
enhanced for all classes.
_Civilization Can Be Estimated_.--This brief presentation of the
meaning of civilization reveals the fact that civilization can be
recounted; that it is a question of fact and philosophy that can be
measured. It is the story of human progress and {17} the causes which
made it. It presents the generalizations of all that is valuable in
the life of the race. It is the epitome of the history of humanity in
its onward sweep. In its critical sense it cannot be called history,
for it neglects details for general statements. Nor is it the
philosophy of history, for it covers a broader field. It is not
speculation, for it deals with fact. It is the philosophy of man's
life as to the results of his activity. It shows alike the unfolding
of the individual and of society, and it represents these in every
phase embraced in the word "progress." To recount this progress and to
measure civilization is the purpose of the following pages, so far as
it may be done in the limited space assigned.
SUBJECTS FOR FURTHER STUDY
1. Are people of civilized races happier now than are the uncivilized
races?
2. Would the American Indians in time have developed a high state of
civilization?
3. Why do we not find a high state of civilization among the African
negroes?
4. What are the material evidences of civilization in the neighborhood
in which you live?
5. Does increased knowledge alone insure an advanced civilization?
6. Choose an important public building in your neighborhood and trace
the sources of architecture of the different parts.
{18}
CHAPTER II
THE ESSENTIALS OF PROGRESS
_How Mankind Goes Forward on the Trail_.--Although civilization cannot
exist without it, progress is something different from the sum-total of
the products of civilization. It may be said to be the process through
which civilization is obtained, or, perhaps more fittingly, it is the
log of the course that marks civilization. There can be no conception
of progress without ideals, which are standards set up toward which
humanity travels. And as humanity never rises above its ideals, the
possibilities of progress are limited by them. If ideals are high,
there are possibilities of a high state of culture; if they are low,
the possibilities are lessened, and, indeed, frequently are barren of
results. But having established ideals as beacon lights for humanity
to follow, the final test is whether there is sufficient knowledge,
sufficient ability, and sufficient will-power to approximate them. In
other words, shall humanity complete the trail of life, go on higher
and higher grounds where are set the standards or goals to be reached;
or will humanity rest easily and contentedly on a low level with no
attempt to reach a higher level, or, indeed, will humanity, failing in
desires for betterment, initiative, and will-power, drift to lower
levels?
Groups, either tribes, races, or nations, may advance along given lines
and be stationary or even retarded along other lines of development.
If the accumulation of wealth is the dominant ideal, it may be so
strenuously followed as to destroy opportunity for other phases of
life. If the flow of energy is all toward a religious belief that
absorbs the time and energy of people in the building of pyramids,
mausoleums, cathedrals, and mosques, and taboos the inquiry into nature
{19} which might yield a large improvement in the race, religion would
be developed at the expense of race improvement.
_Change Is Not Necessarily Progress_.--It is quite common in a popular
sense for people to identify change with progress, or indeed to accept
the wonderful changes which take place as causes of progress, when in
reality they should have taken more care to search out the elements of
progress of the great moving panorama of changing life. Changes are
frequently violent, sudden, tremendous in their immediate effect. They
move rapidly and involve many complexes, but progress is a slow-going
old tortoise that plods along irrespective of storm or sunshine, life
or death, of the cataclysms of war or the catastrophes of earthquakes
or volcanoes. Progress moves slowly along through political and social
revolutions, gaining a little here and a little there, and registering
the things that are really worth while out of the ceaseless, changing
humanity.
Achievement may take place without betterment, but all progress must
make a record of betterment with achievement. A man may write a book
or invent a machine at great labor. So far as he is concerned it is an
achievement, but unless it is a good book, a good invention, better
than others, so that they may be used for the advancement of the race,
they will not form a betterment. Many of the changes of life represent
the results of trial and error. "There is a way that seemeth right" to
a nation which may end in destruction. The evil aroused is sometimes
greater than the good. The prosperity of the Roman Empire was
destroyed because of luxury and corrupt administration. The German
Empire developed great powers in government, education, in the arts and
sciences, but her military purpose nearly destroyed her. The Spanish
Empire that once controlled a good part of the American continent
failed because laborers were driven out of Spain and the wealth gained
by exploitation was used to support the nobility and royalty in luxury.
Whether the United States will continue to carry out her high purposes
will depend upon the right use of her immense wealth and power.
Likewise the {20} radio, the movie, and the automobile are making
tremendous changes. Will the opportunities they furnish improve the
moral and intellectual character of the people--a necessary condition
to real progress?
In considering modern progress, too frequently it is estimated by the
greatness of things, by the stupendous changes, or by the marvellous
achievements of the age, and we pause and wonder at what has been
accomplished; but if we think long enough and clearly enough, we may
get a vision of real progress, and we may find it difficult to
determine the outcome of it all, so far as the real betterment of the
race is concerned. Is the millionaire of to-day any happier,
necessarily, and any more moral or of a higher religious standard than
the primitive man or the savage of the plains or forest of to-day?
True, he has power to achieve in many directions, but is he any happier
or better? It may be said that his millions may accomplish great good.
This is true if they are properly applied. It is also true that they
are capable of great harm if improperly used.
As we stand and gaze at the movements of the airplane, or contemplate
its rapid flight from ocean to ocean and from land to land around the
world, we are impressed with this great wonder of the age, the great
achievement of the inventive power of man. But what of the gain to
humanity? If it is possible to transport the mails from New York to
San Francisco in sixteen hours instead of in five days, is there
advantage in that except the quickening process of transportation and
life? Is it not worth while to inquire what the man at the other end
of the line is going to do by having his mail four days ahead? He will
hurry up somebody else and somebody else will hurry the next one, and
we only increase the rapidity of motion. Does it really give us more
time for leisure, and if so, are we using that leisure time in the
development of our reflective intellectual powers or our spiritual
life? It is easier to see improvement in the case of the radio,
whereby songs and lectures can be broadcast all over the earth, and the
{21} community of life and the community of interest are developed
thereby, and, also, the leisure hours are devoted to a contemplation of
high ideals, of beautiful music, of noble thoughts. We do recognize a
modicum of progress out of the great whirring, rapid changes in
transportation and creative industry; but let us not be deceived by
substituting change for progress, or making the two identical.
Thus human progress is something more than achievement, and it is
something more than the exhibition of tools. It is determined by the
use of the tools and involves betterment of the human race. Hence, all
the products of social heredity, of language, of science, of religion,
of art, and of government are progressive in proportion as they are
successfully used for individual and social betterment. For if
government is used to enslave people, or science to destroy them, or
religion to stifle them, there can be no progress.
_Progress Expresses Itself in a Variety of Ideals and Aims_.--Progress
involves many lines of development. It may include biological
development of the human race, the development of man, especially his
growth of brain power. It may consider man's adaptation to environment
under different phases of life. It may consider the efficiency of
bodily structure. In a cultural sense, progress may refer to the
products of the industrial arts, or to the development of fine arts, or
the advancement of religious life and belief--in fact, to the mastery
of the resources of nature and their service to mankind in whatever
form they may appear or in whatever phase of life they may be
expressed. Progress may also be indicated in the improvement in social
order and in government, and also the increased opportunity of the
individual to receive culture through the process of mutual aid. In
fact, progress must be sought for in all phases of human activity.
Whatever phase of progress is considered, its line of demarcation is
carefully drawn in the process of change from the old to the new, but
the results of these changes will be the indices of either progress or
retardation.
{22}
_Progress of the Part and Progress of the Whole_.--An individual might
through hereditary qualities have superior mental traits or physical
powers. These also may receive specific development under favorable
educational environment, but the inertia of the group or the race might
render ineffective a salutary use of his powers. A man is sometimes
elected mayor of a town and devotes his energies to municipal
betterment. But he may be surrounded by corrupt politicians and
promoters of enterprises who hedge his way at every turn. Also, in a
similar way, a group or tribe may go forward, and yet the products of
its endeavor be lost to the world. Thus a productiveness of the part
may be exhibited without the progress of the race. The former moves
with concrete limitations, the latter in sweeping, cycling changes; but
the latter cannot exist without the former, because it is from the
parts that the whole is created, and it is the generalization of the
accumulated knowledge or activities of the parts that makes it possible
for the whole to develop.
The evolution of the human race includes the idea of differentiation of
parts and a generalization that makes the whole of progress. So it is
not easy to determine the result of a local activity as progressive
until its relation to other parts is determined, nor until other
activities and the whole of life are determined. Local colorings of
life may be so provincial in their view-point as to be practically
valueless in the estimation of the degree and quality of progress.
Certain towns, especially in rural districts not acquainted with better
things, boast that they have the best school, the best court-house, the
best climate--in fact, everything best. When they finally awaken from
their local dream, they discover their own deficiencies.
The great development of art, literature, philosophy, and politics
among the ancient Greeks was inefficient in raising the great masses of
the people to a higher plane of living, but the fruits of the lives of
these superiors were handed on to other groups to utilize, and they are
not without influence {23} over the whole human group of to-day. So,
too, the religious mystic philosophy and literature of India
represented a high state of mental development, but the products of its
existence left the races of India in darkness because the mystic
philosophy was not adaptable to the practical affairs of life. The
Indian philosophers may have handed on ideas which caused admiration
and wonder, but they have had very little influence of a practical
nature on Western civilization. So society may make progress in either
art, religion, or government for a time, and then, for the want of
adaptation to the conditions imposed by progress, the effects may
disappear. Yet not all is lost, for some achievements in the form of
tools are passed on through social heredity and utilized by other
races. In the long run it is the total of the progress of the race,
the progress of the whole, that is the final test.
_Social Progress Involves Individual Development_.--If we trace
progress backward over the trail which it has followed, there are two
lines of development more or less clearly defined. One is the
improvement of the racial stock through the hereditary traits of
individuals. The brain is enlarged, the body developed in character
and efficiency, and the entire physical system has changed through
variation in accordance with the laws of heredity. What we observe is
development in the individual, which is its primary function. Progress
in this line must furnish individuals of a higher type in the
procession of the generations. The other line is through social
heredity, that is the accumulated products of civilization handed down
from generation to generation. This gives each succeeding generation a
new, improved kit of tools, it brings each new generation into a better
environment and surrounds it with ready-made means to carry on the
improvement and add something for the use of the next generation.
Knowledge of the arts and industries, language and books, are thus
products of social heredity. Also buildings, machinery, roads,
educational systems, and school buildings are inherited.
Connected with these two methods of development must {24} be the
discovery of the use of the human mind evidenced by the beginning of
reflective thought. It is said by some writers that we are still
largely in the age of instincts and emotions and have just recently
entered the age of reason. Such positive statements should be
considered with a wider vision of life, for one cannot conceive of
civilization at all without the beginning of reflective mental
processes. Simple inventions, like the use of fire, the bow-and-arrow,
or the flint knife, may have come about primarily through the desire to
accomplish something by subjecting means to an end, but in the
perfection of the use of these things, which occurred very early in
primitive life, there must have been reflective thinking in order to
shape the knife for its purpose, make the bow-and-arrow more effective,
and utilize fire for cooking, heating, and smelting. All of these must
have come primarily through the individual initiative.
Frequent advocates of social achievement would lead one to suppose that
the tribe in need of some method of cutting should assemble and pass
the resolution that a flint knife be made, when any one knows it was
the reflective process of the individual mind which sought adaptation
to environment or means to accomplish a purpose. Of course the
philosopher may read many generalizations into this which may confuse
one in trying to observe the simple fact, for it is to be deplored that
much of the philosophy of to-day is a smoke screen which obscures the
simple truth.
The difference of races in achievement and in culture is traced
primarily to hereditary traits developed through variation, through
intrinsic stimuli, or those originating through so-called inborn
traits. These traits enable some races to achieve and adapt themselves
to their environment, and cause others to fail. Thus, some groups or
races have perished because of living near a swamp infested with
malaria-carrying mosquitoes or in countries where the food supply was
insufficient. They lacked initiative to move to a more healthful
region or one more bountiful in food products, or else they {25} lacked
knowledge and skill to protect themselves against mosquitoes or to
increase the food supply. Moreover, they had no power within them to
seek the better environment or to change the environment for their own
advancement. This does not ignore the tremendous influence of
environment in the production of race culture. Its influence is
tremendous, especially because environmental conditions are more under
the direction of intelligence than is the development of hereditary
traits.
Some writers have maintained that there is no difference in the
dynamic, mental, or physical power of races, and that the difference of
races which we observe to-day is based upon the fact that some have
been retarded by poor environment, and others have advanced because of
fortunate environment. This argument is good as far as it goes, but it
does not tell the whole story. It does not show why some races under
good environment have not succeeded, while others under poor
environment have succeeded well. It does not show why some races have
the wit to change to a better environment or transform the old
environment.
There seems to be a great persistency of individual traits, of family
traits, and, in a still larger generalization, of racial traits which
culture fails to obliterate. As these differences of traits seem to be
universal, it appears that the particular combination which gives motor
power may also be a differentiation. At least, as all races have had
the same earth, why, if they are so equal in the beginning, would they
not achieve? Had they no inventive power? Also, when these so-called
retarded races came in contact with the more advanced races who were
superior in arts and industries, why did they not borrow, adapt, and
utilize these productions? There must have been something vitally
lacking which neither the qualities of the individual nor the stimulus
of his surroundings could overcome. Some have deteriorated, others
have perished; some have reached a stationary existence, while others
have advanced. Through hereditary changes, nature played the {26} game
in her own way with the leading cards in her own hand, and some races
lost. Hence so with races, so with individuals.
_Progress Is Enhanced by the Interaction of Groups and Races_.--The
accumulation of civilization and the state of progress may be much
determined by the interaction of races and groups. Just as individual
personality is developed by contact with others, so the actions and
reactions of tribes and races in contact bring into play the utility of
discoveries and inventions. Thus, knowledge of any kind may by
diffusion become a heritage of all races. If one tribe should acquire
the art of making implements by chipping flint in a certain way, other
tribes with which it comes in contact might borrow the idea and extend
it, and thus it becomes spread over a wide area. However, if the
original discoverer used the chipped flint for skinning animals, the
one who would borrow the idea might use it to make implements of
warfare.
Thus, through borrowing, progress may be a co-operative process. The
reference to people in any community reveals the fact that there are
few that lead and many that follow; that there is but one Edison, but
there are millions that follow Edison. Even in the educational world
there are few inventors and many followers. This is evidence of the
large power of imitation and adaptation and of the universal habit of
borrowing. On the other hand, if one chemical laboratory should
discover a high explosive which may be used in blasting rock for making
the foundations for buildings, a nation might borrow the idea and use
it in warfare for the destruction of man.
Mr. Clark Wissler has shown in his book on _Man and Culture_ that there
are culture areas originating from culture centres. From these culture
centres the bow-and-arrow is used over a wide area. The domestication
of the horse, which occurred in central Asia, has spread over the whole
world. So stone implements of culture centres have been borrowed and
exchanged more or less throughout the world. The theory is that one
tribe or race invented one thing because of the {27} adaptability to
good environment. The dominant necessity of a race stimulated man's
inventive power, while another tribe would invent or discover some
other new thing for similar reasons. But once created, not only could
the products be swapped or traded, but, where this was impossible,
ideas could be borrowed and adapted through imitation.
However, one should be careful not to make too hasty generalizations
regarding the similar products in different parts of the world, for
there is such universality of the traits of the human mind that, with
similar stages of advancement and similar environments, man's adaptive
power would cause him to do the same thing in very much the same way.
Thus, it is possible for two races that have had no contact for a
hundred thousand years to develop indigenous products of art which are
very similar. To illustrate from a point of contact nearer home, it is
possible for a person living in Wisconsin and one in Massachusetts,
having the same general environment--physical, educational, ethnic,
religious--and having the same general traits of mind, through
disconnected lines of differentiation, to write two books very much
alike or two magazine articles very much alike. In the question of
fundamental human traits subject to the same environmental stimuli, in
a general way we expect similar results.
With all this differentiation, progress as a whole represents a
continuous change from primitive conditions to the present complex
life, even though its line of travel leads it through the byways of
differentiation. Just as the development of races has been through the
process of differentiation from an early parent stock, cultural changes
have followed the same law of progressive change. Just as there is a
unity of the human race, there is a unity of progress that involves all
mankind.
_The Study of the Uncultured Races of To-Day_.--It is difficult to
determine the beginnings of culture and to trace its slow development.
In accomplishing this, there are two main methods of procedure; the
first, to find the products or {28} remains of culture left by races
now extinct, that is, of nations and peoples that have lived and
flourished and passed away, leaving evidence of what they brought to
the world; also, by considering what they did with the tools with which
they worked, and by determining the conditions under which they lived,
a general idea of their state of progress may be obtained. The second
method is to determine the state of culture of living races of to-day
who have been retarded or whose progress shows a case of arrested
development and compare their civilization statistically observed with
that of the prehistoric peoples whose state of progress exhibits in a
measure similar characteristics to those of the living races.
With these two methods working together, more light is continually
being thrown upon man's ancient culture. To illustrate this, if a
certain kind of tool or implement is found in the culture areas of the
extinct Neanderthal race and a similar tool is used by a living
Australian tribe, it may be conjectured with considerable accuracy that
the use of this tool was for similar purposes, and the thoughts and
beliefs that clustered around its use were the same in each tribe.
Thus may be estimated the degree of progress of the primitive race. Or
if an inscription on a cave of an extinct race showed a similarity to
an inscription used by a living race, it would seem that they had the
same background for such expression, and that similar instincts,
emotions, and reflections were directed to a common end. The recent
study of anthropologists and archaeologists has brought to light much
knowledge of primitive man which may be judged on its own evidence and
own merits. The verification of these early cultures by the living
races who have reached a similar degree of progress is of great
importance.
_The Study of Prehistoric Types_.[1]--The brain capacity of modern man
has changed little since the time of the Crô-Magnon race, which is the
earliest ancestral type of present European races and whose existence
dates back many {29} thousand years. Possibly the weight of the brain
has increased during this period because of its development, and
undoubtedly its power is much greater in modern man than in this
ancient type. Prior to that there are some evidences of extinct
species, such as Pithecanthropus Erectus, the Grimaldi man, the
Heidelberg man, and the Neanderthal. Judging from the skeletal remains
that have been found of these races, there has been a general progress
of cranial capacity. It is not necessary here to attempt to determine
whether this has occurred from hereditary combinations or through
changing environment. Undoubtedly both of these factors have been
potential in increasing the brain power of man, and if we were to go
farther back by way of analogy, at least, and consider the Anthropoid
ape, the animal most resembling man, we find a vast contrast in his
cranial capacity as compared with the lowest of the prehistoric types,
or, indeed, of the lowest types of the uncultured living races.
Starting with the Anthropoid ape, who has a register of about 350 c.c.,
the Pithecanthropus about 900 c.c., and Neanderthal types registering
as high as 1,620 c.c. of brain capacity, the best measures of the
highest types of modern man show the brain capacity of 1,650 c.c.
Specimens of the Crô-Magnon skulls show a brain capacity equal to that
of modern man. There is a great variation in the brain capacity of the
Neanderthal race as exhibited in specimens found in different centres
of culture, ranging all the way from 1,296 c.c. to 1,620 c.c. Size is
only one of several traits that determine brain power. Among others
are the weight, convolutions, texture, and education. A small, compact
brain may have more power than a larger brain relatively lighter. Also
much depends upon the centres of development. The development of the
frontal area, shown by the full forehead in connection with the
distance above the ear (auditory meatus), in contrast with the
development of the anterior lobes is indicative of power.
It is interesting to note also that the progress of man as shown in the
remnants of arts and industry corresponds in {30} development to the
development of brain capacity, showing that the physical power of man
kept pace with the mental development as exhibited in his mental power
displayed in the arts and industries. The discoveries in recent times
of the skeletons of prehistoric man in Europe, Africa, and America, and
the increased collection of implements showing cultures are throwing
new light on the science of man and indicating a continuous development
from very primitive beginnings.
_Progress Is Indicated by the Early Cultures_.--It is convenient to
divide the early culture of man, based upon his development in art into
the Paleolithic, or unpolished, and the Neolithic, or polished, Stone
Ages.[2] The former is again divided into the Eolithic, Lower
Paleolithic, and the Upper Paleolithic. In considering these divisions
of relative time cultures, it must be remembered that the only way we
have of measuring prehistoric time is through the geological method,
based upon the Ice Ages and changes in the physical contour of the
earth.
In the strata of the earth, either in the late second inter-glacial
period or at the beginning of the third, chipped rocks, or eoliths, are
found used by races of which the Piltdown and Heidelberg species are
representatives.[3] Originally man used weapons to hammer and to cut
already prepared by nature. Sharp-edged flints formed by the crushing
of rocks in the descent of the glaciers or by upheavals of earth or by
powerful torrents were picked up as needed for the purpose of cutting.
Wherever a sharp edge was needed, these natural implements were useful.
Gradually man learned to carry the best specimens with him. These he
improved by chipping the edges, making them more serviceable, or
chipping the eolith, so as to grasp it more easily. This represents
the earliest relic of the beginning of civilization through art.
Eoliths of this kind are found in Egypt in the hills bordering the Nile
Valley, in Asia and America, as well as in southern Europe. Perhaps at
the same period of development man selected stones suitable for
crushing bones or for other purposes when hammering {31} was necessary.
These were gradually fashioned into more serviceable hammers. In the
latter part of this period, known as the pre-Chellean, flint implements
were considerably improved.
In the Lower Paleolithic in the pre-Neanderthal period, including what
is known as the Chellean, new forms of implements are added to the
earlier beginnings. Almond-shaped flint implements, followed later by
long, pointed implements, indicate the future development of the stone
spear, arrowhead, knife, and axe. Also smaller articles of use, such
as borers, scrapers, and ploughs, appeared. The edges of all
implements were rough and uneven, and the forms very imperfect.
_Industrial and Social Life of Primitive Man_.--In the industry of the
early Neanderthal races (Acheulean) implements were increased in number
and variety, being also more perfectly formed, showing the expansive
art of man. At this period man was a hunter, having temporary homes in
caves and shelters, which gradually became more or less permanent, and
used well-fashioned implements of stone. At the close of the third
interglacial period the climate was mild and moist, and mankind found
the open glades suitable places for assemblages in family groups about
the open fires; apparently the cooking of food and the making of
implements and clothing on a small scale were the domestic occupations
at this time. Hunting was the chief occupation in procuring food. The
bison, the horse, the reindeer, the bear, the beaver, the wild boar had
taken the place of the rhinoceros, the sabre-tooth tiger, and the
elephant.
Judging from the stage of life existing at this time, and comparing
this with that of the lowest living races, we may safely infer that the
family associations existed at this time, even though the habitations
in caves and shelters were temporary.[4]
"Yet, when at length rude huts they first devised,
And fires and garments; and in union sweet
Man wedded woman, the pure joys indulged
{32}
Of chaste connubial love, and children rose,
The rough barbarians softened. The warm hearth
Their frames so melted they no more could bear,
As erst, th' uncovered skies. The nuptial bed
Broke their wild vigor, and the fond caress
Of prattling children from the bosom chased
Their stern, ferocious manners."
--LUCRETIUS, "ON THE NATURE OF THINGS."
AFTER OSBORN.
Thus the Lower Paleolithic merged into the Upper; with the appearance
of the Mousterian, Augrignacian, Solutrian, Magdalenian, and Azilian
cultures followed the most advanced stage of the Neanderthal race
before its final disappearance. The list of tools and implements
indicates a widening scope of civilization. For war and chase and
fishing, for industry and domestic life, for art, sculpture, and
engraving, and for ceremonial use, a great variety of implements of
stone and bone survived the life of the races.
Spears, daggers, knives, arrowheads, fish-hooks, and harpoons;
hand-axes, drills, hammers, scrapers, planes, needles, pins, chisels,
wedges, gravers, etchers, mortars, and pilasters; ceremonial staffs and
wands--all are expressions of a fulness of industrial and social life
not recognized in earlier races. Indications of religious ceremonies
represent the changing mind, and the expression of mind in art suggests
increased mental power.
_Cultures Indicate the Mental Development of the Race_.--As the art and
industry to-day represent the mental processes of man, so did these
primitive cultures show the inventive skill and adaptive power in the
beginnings of progress. Perhaps instinct, emotion, and necessity
figured more conspicuously in the early period than reflective thought,
while in modern times we have more design and more planning, both in
invention and construction. Also the primitive social order was more
an unconscious development, and lacked purpose and directing power in
comparison with present life.
{33}
But there must have been inventors and leaders in primitive times, some
brains more fertile than others, that made change and progress
possible. Who these unknown geniuses were human records do not
indicate. In modern times we single out the superiors and call them
great. The inventor, the statesman, the warrior, the king, have their
achievements heralded and recorded in history. The records of
achievement of the great barbarous cultures, of the Assyrians, the
Egyptians, and the Hebrews, centre around some king whose tomb
preserves the only records, while in reality some man unknown to us was
the real author of such progress as was made. The reason is that
progress was so slow that the changes passed unnoticed, being the
products of many minds, each adding its increment of change. Only the
king or ruler who could control the mass mind and the mass labor could
make sufficient spectacular demonstration worth recording, and could
direct others to build a tomb or record inscriptions to perpetuate his
name.
_Men of Genius Cause the Mutations Which Permit Progress_.--The toiling
multitudes always use the products of some inventive genius. Some
individual with specialized mental traits plans something different
from social usages or industrial life which changes tradition and
modifies the customs and habits of the mass. Whether he be statesman,
inventor, philosopher, scientist, discoverer, or military leader, he
usually receives credit for the great progressive mutation which he has
originated. There can be little progress without these few fertile
brains, just as there could be little progress unless they were
supported by the laborers who carry out the plans of the genius. While
the "unknown man" is less conspicuous in the progress of the race in
modern complex society, he is still a factor in all progress.
_The Data of Progress_.--Evolution is not necessarily progress; neither
is development progress; yet the factors that enter into evolution and
development are essential to progress. The laws of differentiation
apply to progress as well as to evolution. In the plant and animal
life everywhere this law {34} obtains. In man it is subservient to the
domination of intelligent direction, yet it is in operation all of the
time. Some races are superior in certain lines, other races show
superiority in other lines. Likewise, individuals exhibit differences
in a similar way. Perhaps the dynamic physical or mental power of the
individual or the race will not improve in itself, having reached its
maximum. There is little hope that the brain of man will ever be
larger or stronger, but it may become more effective through training
and increased knowledge. Hence in the future we must look for
achievement along co-operative and social lines. It is to social
expansion and social perfection that we must look for progress in the
future. For here the accumulated power of all may be utilized in
providing for the welfare of the individual, who, in turn, will by his
inventive power cause humanity to progress.
The industrial, institutional, humanitarian, and educational machinery
represents progress in action, but increased knowledge, higher ideals
of life, broader concepts of truth, liberty of individual action which
is interested in human life in its entirety, are the real indices of
progress.
SUBJECTS FOR FURTHER STUDY
1. Why do some races progress and others deteriorate?
2. Compare different communities to show to what extent environment
determines progress.
3. Show how the airplane is an evidence of progress. The radio. The
gasoline-engine.
4. Discuss the effects of religious belief on progress.
5. Is the mental capacity of the average American greater than the
average of the Greeks at the time of their highest culture?
6. What are the evidences that man will not advance in physical and
mental capacity?
7. Show that the improvement of the race will be through social
activity.
[1] See Chapter IV.
[2] See Chapter III.
[3] See Chapter IV.
[4] See Chapter VI.
{35}
CHAPTER III
METHODS OF RECOUNTING HUMAN PROGRESS
_Difficulty of Measuring Progress_.--In its larger generalization,
progress may move in a straight line, but it has such a variety of
expression and so many tributary causes that it is difficult to reduce
it to any classification. Owing to the difficulties that attend an
attempt to recite all of the details of human progress, philosophers
and historians have approached the subject from various sides, each
seeking to make, by means of higher generalizations, a clear course of
reasoning through the labyrinth of materials. By adopting certain
methods of marking off periods of existence and pointing out the
landmarks of civilization, they have been able to estimate more truly
the development of the race. Civilization cannot be readily measured
by time; indeed, the time interval in history is of little value save
to mark order and continuity. It has in itself no real significance;
it is merely an arbitrary division whose importance is greatly
exaggerated. But while civilization is a continuous quantity, and
cannot be readily marked off into periods without destroying its
movement, it is necessary to make the attempt, especially in the study
of ancient or prehistoric society; for any method which groups and
classifies facts in logical order is helpful to the study of human
progress.
_Progress May Be Measured by the Implements Used_.--A very common
method, based largely upon the researches of archaeologists, is to
divide human society into four great periods, or ages, marked by the
progress of man in the use of implements. The first of these periods
is called the Stone Age, and embraces the time when man used stone for
all {36} purposes in the industrial arts so far as they had been
developed. For convenience this period has been further divided into
the age of ancient or unpolished implements and the age of modern or
polished implements. The former includes the period when rude
implements were chipped out of flint or other hard stone, without much
idea of symmetry and beauty, and with no attempt to perfect or beautify
them by smoothing and polishing their rough surface.
In the second period man learned to fashion more perfectly the
implements, and in some instances to polish them to a high degree.
Although the divisions are very general and very imperfect, they map
out the great prehistoric era of man; but they must be considered as
irregular, on account of the fact that the Stone Era of man occurred at
different times in different tribes. Thus the inhabitants of North
America were in the Stone Age less than two centuries ago, while some
of the inhabitants of the South Sea Islands are in the Stone Age during
the present century. It is quite remarkable that the use of stone
implements was universal to all tribes and nations at some period of
their existence.
After the long use of stone, man gradually became acquainted with some
of the metals, and subsequently discovered the method of combining
copper with tin and other alloys to form bronze, which material, to a
large extent, added to the implements already in use. The Bronze Age
is the most hypothetical of all these divisions, as it does not appear
to have been as universal as the Stone, on account of the difficulty of
obtaining metals. The use of copper by the Indians of the Lake
Superior region was a very marked epoch in their development, and
corresponds to the Bronze Age of other nations, although their
advancement in other particulars appears to be less than that of other
tribes of European origin which used bronze freely. Bronze implements
have been found in great plenty in Scandinavia and Peru, and to a
limited extent in North America. They certainly mark a stage of
progress in advance of that of the inhabitants of the Stone Age.
Bronze {37} was the chief metal for implements throughout the early
civilization of Europe.
Following the age of bronze is the Iron Age, in which the advancement
of man is especially marked. The bronze implements were at first
supplemented in their use by those of iron. But gradually iron
implements superseded the bronze. The Iron Age still is with us.
Possibly it has not yet reached its highest point. Considering the
great structures built of iron, and the excessive use of iron in
machinery, implements, and furniture, it is easy to realize that we are
yet in this great period. Though we continue to use stone more than
the ancients and more bronze for decoration and ornament than they, yet
both are subordinate to the use of iron. General as the above
classification is, it helps in an indefinite way to give us a central
idea of progress and to mark off, somewhat indefinitely, periods of
development.
_The Development of Art_.--Utility was the great purpose underlying the
foundation of the industrial arts. The stone axe, or celt, was first
made for a distinct service, but, in order to perfect its usefulness,
its lines became more perfect and its surface more highly polished. So
we might say for the spear-head, the knife, or the olla. Artistic
lines and decorative beauty always followed the purpose of use. This
could be applied to all of the products of man's invention to transform
parts of nature to his use. On account of the durability of form, the
attempt to trace the course of civilization by means of the development
of the fine arts has met with much success. Though the idea of beauty
is not essential to the preservation of man or to the making of the
state, it has exerted a great influence in individual-building and in
society-building. In our higher emotional natures aesthetic ideas have
ruled with imperial sway.
But primitive ideas of beauty appear to us very crude, and even
repulsive. The adornment of person with bright though rudely colored
garments, the free use of paint on the person, and the promiscuous use
of jewelry, as {38} practised by the primitive peoples, present a great
contrast to modern usage. Yet it is easy to trace the changes in
custom and, moreover, to determine the origin of present customs. So
also in representative art, the rude sketch of an elephant or a buffalo
on ivory or stone and the finished picture by a Raphael are widely
separated in genius and execution, but there is a logical connection
between the two found in the slowly evolving human activities. The
rude figure of a god moulded roughly from clay and the lifelike model
by an Angelo have the same relations to man in his different states.
The same comparison may be made between the low, monotonous moaning of
the savage and the rapturous music of a Patti, or between the beating
of the tom-tom and the lofty strains of a Mozart.
_Progress Is Estimated by Economic Stages_.--The progress of man is
more clearly represented by the successive economic stages of his life.
Thus we have first the _primal nomadic_ period, in which man was a
wanderer, subsisting on roots and berries, and with no definite social
organization. This period, like all primary periods, is largely
hypothetical. Having learned to capture game and fish, he entered what
might be called the _fisher-hunter_ stage, although he was still a
nomad, and rapidly spread over a large part of the earth's surface,
wandering from forest to forest and from stream to stream, searching
for the means of subsistence and clothing.
When man learned to domesticate animals he made a great step forward
and entered what is known as the _pastoral_ period, in which his chief
occupation was the care of flocks and herds. This contributed much to
his material support and quickened his social and intellectual
movement. After a time, when he remained in one place a sufficient
time to harvest a short crop, he began agriculture in a tentative way,
while his chief concern was yet with flocks and herds. He soon became
permanently settled, and learned more fully the art of agriculture, and
then entered the permanent _agricultural_ stage. It was during this
period that he made the most rapid advances in {39} the industrial arts
and in social order. This led to more densely populated communities,
with permanent homes and the necessary development of law and
government.
As the products of industry increased men began to exchange "the
relatively superfluous for the relatively necessary," and trade in the
form of barter became a permanent custom. This led to the use of money
and a more extended system of exchange, and man entered the
_commercial_ era. This gave him a wider intercourse with surrounding
tribes and nations, and brought about a greater diversity of ideas.
The excessive demand for exchangeable goods, the accumulation of
wealth, and the enlarged capacity for enjoyment centred the activities
of life in industry, and man entered the _industrial_ stage. At first
he employed hand power for manufacturing goods, but soon he changed to
power manufacture, brought about by discovery and invention. Water and
steam were now applied to turn machinery, and the new conditions of
production changed the whole industrial life. A revolution in
industrial society caused an immediate shifting of social life.
Classes of laborers in the great industrial army became prominent, and
production was carried on in a gigantic way. We are still in this
industrial world, and as electricity comes to the aid of steam we may
be prepared for even greater changes in the future than we have
witnessed in the past.[1]
In thus presenting the course of civilization by the different periods
of economic life, we must keep the mind free from conventional ideas.
For, while the general course of economic progress is well indicated,
there was a slow blending of each period into the succeeding one.
There is no formal procedure in the progress of man. Yet we might
infer from the way in which some writers present this matter that
society moved forward in regular order, column after column. From the
formal and forcible way in which they have presented the history of
early society, one might imagine that a certain tribe, having become
weary of tending cattle and goats, resolved one {40} fine morning to
change from the pastoral life to agriculture, and that all of the
tribes on earth immediately concluded to do the same, when, in truth,
the change was slow and gradual, while the centuries passed away.
It is well to consider that in the expanded industrial life of man the
old was not replaced, but supplemented, by the new, and that after the
pastoral stage was entered, man continued to hunt and fish, and that
after formal agriculture was begun the tending of flocks and herds
continued, and fishing was practised at intervals. But each succeeding
occupation became for the time the predominant one, while others were
relatively subordinate. Even to-day, while we have been rushing
forward in recent years at a rapid rate, under the power of steam and
electricity, agriculture and commerce have made marvellous improvement.
Though we gain the new, nothing of the old is lost. The use of flocks
and herds, as well as fish and game, increases each year, although not
relatively.
_Progress Is Through the Food Supply_.--This is only another view of
the economic life. The first period is called the natural subsistence
period, when man used such food as he found prepared for him by nature.
It corresponds to the primal nomadic period of the last classification.
From this state he advanced to the use of fish for food, and then
entered the third period, when native grains were obtained through a
limited cultivation of the soil. After this followed a period in which
meat and milk were the chief articles of food. Finally the period of
extended and permanent agriculture was reached, and farinaceous food by
cultivation became the main support of life. The significance of this
classification is observed in the fact that the amount, variety, and
quality of the food available determine the possibility of man's
material and spiritual advancement. As the food supply lies at the
foundation of human existence, prosperity is measured to a large extent
by the food products. The character of the food affects to a great
extent the mental and moral capabilities of man; that is, it {41}
limits the possibilities of civilization. Even in modern civilization
the effect of poor food on intellect, morals, and social order is
easily observed.
_Progress Is Estimated by Different Forms of Social Order_.--It is only
a more general way of estimating political life, and perhaps a broader
way, for it includes the entire social development. By this
classification man is first represented as wandering in a solitary
state with the smallest amount of association with his fellows
necessary to his existence and perpetuation, and with no social
organization. This status of man is hypothetical, and gives only a
starting point for the philosophy of higher development. No savage
tribes have yet been discovered in which there was not at least
association of individuals in groups, although organization might not
yet have appeared. It is true that some of the lower tribes, like the
Fuegians of South America, have very tentative forms of social and
political association. They wander in loosely constructed groups,
which constantly shift in association, being without permanent
organization. Yet the purely solitary man is merely conjectural.
It is common for writers to make a classification of social groups into
primary and secondary.[2] The primary social groups are: first, the
family based upon biological relations, supported by the habit of
association; second, the play group of children, in which primitive
characters of social order appear, and a third group is the association
of adults in a neighborhood meeting. In the formation of these groups,
the process of social selection is always in evidence. Impulse,
feeling, and emotion play the greater parts in the formation of these
primitive groups, while choice based on rational selection seldom
appears.
The secondary groups are those which originate through the
differentiation of social functions in which the contact of individuals
is less intimate than in the primary group. Such voluntary
associations as a church, labor organization, or {42} scientific
society may be classified as secondary in time and in importance.
Next above the human horde is represented the forced association of men
in groups, each group struggling for its own existence. Within the
group there was little protection and little social order, although
there was more or less authority of leadership manifested. This state
finally led to the establishment of rudimentary forms of government,
based upon blood relationship. These groups enlarged to full national
life. This third stage finally passed to the larger idea of
international usage, and is prospective of a world state. These four
stages of human society, so sweeping in their generalization, still
point to the idea of the slow evolution of social order.
_The Development of Family Life_.--Starting with the hypothesis that
man at one time associated in a state of promiscuity, he passed through
the separate stages of polyandry and polygamy, and finally reached a
state of monogamy and the pure home life of to-day. Those who have
advocated this doctrine have failed to substantiate it clearly so as to
receive from scholars the recognition of authority. All these forms of
family life except the first have been observed among the savage tribes
of modern life, but there are not sufficient data to prove that the
human race, in the order of its development, must have passed through
these four stages. However, it is true that the modern form of
marriage and pure home life did not always exist, but are among the
achievements of modern civilization. There certainly has been a
gradual improvement in the relations of the members of the household,
and notwithstanding the defects of faithlessness and ignorance, the
modern family is the social unit and the hope of modern social progress.
_The Growth of Political Life_.--Many have seen in this the only true
measure of progress, for it is affirmed that advancement in civil life
is the essential element of civilization. Its importance in
determining social order makes it a central factor in all progress.
The _primitive family_ represents the germ {43} of early political
foundation. It was the first organized unit of society, and contained
all of the rudimentary forms of government. The executive, the
judicial, the legislative, and the administrative functions of
government were all combined in one simple family organization. The
head of the family was king, lord, judge, priest, and military
commander all in one. As the family expanded it formed the _gens_ or
_clan_, with an enlarged family life and more systematic family
government. The religious life expanded also, and a common altar and a
common worship were instituted.
A slight progress toward social order and the tendency to distribute
the powers of government are to be observed. Certain property was held
in common and certain laws regulated the family life. The family
groups continued to enlarge by natural increase and by adoption, all
those coming into the gens submitting to its laws, customs, and social
usage. Finally several gentes united into a brotherhood association
called by the Greeks a _phratry_, by the Romans a _curia_. This
brotherhood was organized on a common religious basis, with a common
deity and a central place of worship. It also was used partially as
the basis of military organization. This group represents the first
unit based upon locality. From it spring the ward idea and the idea of
local self-government.
The _tribe_ represented a number of gentes united for religious and
military purposes. Although its principal power was military, there
were a common altar and a common worship for all members of the tribe.
The chief, or head of the tribe, was the military leader, and usually
performed an important part in all the affairs of the tribe. As the
tribe became the seat of power for military operations, the gens
remained as the foundation of political government, for it was the
various heads of the gentes who formed the council of the chief or king
and later laid the foundation of the senate, wherever instituted. It
was common for the tribe in most instances to pass into a village
community before developing full national life. There were exceptions
to this, where tribes have passed directly into {44} well-organized
groups without the formation of the village or the city.
The _village community_, next in logical order, represents a group of
closely related people located on a given territory, with a
half-communal system of government. There were the little group of
houses forming the village proper and representing the different homes
of the family group. There were the common pasture-land, the common
woodland, and the fertile fields for cultivation. These were all
owned, except perhaps the house lot, by the entire community, and every
year the tillable land was parcelled out by the elders of the community
to the heads of families for tillage. Usually the tiller of the soil
had a right to the crop, although among the early Greeks the custom
seems to be reversed, and the individual owned the land, but was
compelled to place its proceeds into a common granary. The village
community represents the transition from a nomadic to a permanent form
of government, and was common to all of the Aryan tribes. The
federation of the village communities or the expansion of the tribes
formed the Greek city-state, common to all of the Greek communities.
It represents the real beginning of civic life among the nations.
The old family organization continued to exist, although from this time
on there was a gradual separation of the functions of government. The
executive, legislative, and judicial processes became more clearly
defined, and special duties were assigned to officers chosen for a
particular purpose. Formal law, too, appeared as the expression of the
will of a definitely organized community. Government grew more
systematic, and expanded into a well-organized municipality. There was
less separation of the duties of officers than now, but there was a
constant tendency for government to unfold and for each officer to have
his specific powers and duties defined. A deity watched over the city,
and a common shrine for worship was set up for all members of the
municipality.
The next attempt to enlarge government was by federation {45} and by
conquest and domination.[3] The city of Rome represents, first, a
federation of tribal city groups, and, finally, the dominant city
ruling over many other cities and much territory. From this it was
only a step to the empire and imperial sway. Athens in her most
prosperous period attempted to do the same, but was not entirely
successful. After the decline of the Roman power there arose from the
ruins of the fallen empire the modern nationalities, which used all
forms of government hitherto known. They partook of democracy,
aristocracy, or imperialism, and even attempted, in some instances, to
combine the principles of all three in one government. While the
modern state developed some new characteristics, it included the
elements of the Greek and Roman governments. The relations of these
new states developed a new code of law, based upon international
relations. Though treaties were made between the Greeks and the Romans
in their first international relations, and much earlier between the
Hebrews and the Phoenicians, international law is of practically modern
origin. At present modern nations have an extended and intricate code
of laws governing their relations. It is an extension of government
beyond the boundaries of nationality.
Through commerce, trade, and political intercourse the nations of the
Western World are drawn more closely together, and men talk of a world
citizenship. A wide philanthropy, rapid and cheap transportation, the
accompanying influences of travel, and a world market for the products
of the earth, all tend to level the barriers of nationality and to
develop universal citizenship. The prophets of our day talk of the
coming world state, which is not likely to appear so long as the
barriers of sea and mountain remain; yet each year witnesses a closer
blending of the commercial, industrial, and political interests of all
nations. Thus we see how governments have been evolved and national
life expanded in accordance {46} with slowly developing civilization.
Although good government and a high state of civilization are not
wholly in the relation of cause and effect, they always accompany each
other, and the progress of man may be readily estimated from the
standpoint of the development of political institutions and political
life.
_Religion Important in Civilization_.--It is not easy to trace the
development of man by a consideration of the various religious beliefs
entertained at different periods of his existence. Yet there is
unmistakably a line of constant development to be observed in religion,
and as a rule its progress is an index of the improvement of the race.
No one can contrast the religion of the ancient nations with the modern
Christian religion without being impressed with the vast difference in
conception and in practice existing between them. In the early period
of barbarism, and even of savagery, religious belief was an important
factor in the development of human society.
It is no less important to-day, and he who recounts civilization
without giving it a prominent place has failed to obtain a
comprehensive view of the philosophy of human development. From the
family altar of the Greeks to the state religion; from the rude altar
of Abraham in the wilderness to the magnificent temple of Solomon at
Jerusalem; from the harsh and cruel tenets of the Oriental religions to
the spiritual conception and ethical practice of the Christian
religion, one observes a marked progress. We need only go to the crude
unorganized superstition of the savage or to the church of the Middle
Ages to learn that the power and influence of religion is great in
human society building.
_The Progress Through Moral Evolution_.--The moral development of the
race, although more difficult to determine than the intellectual, may
prove an index to the progress of man. The first formal expression of
moral practice is the so-called race morality or group morality, based
upon mutual aid for common defense. This is found to-day in all
organized groups, such as the boy gang, the Christian church, the
political party, {47} the social set, the educational institution, and,
indeed, the state itself; but wherever found it has its source in a
very primitive group action. In the primitive struggle for existence
man had little sympathy for his fellows, the altruistic sentiment being
very feeble. But gradually through the influence of the family life
sympathy widened and deepened in its onward flow until, joining with
the group morality, it entered the larger world of ethical practice.
This phase of moral culture had its foundation in the sympathy felt by
the mother for her offspring, a sympathy that gradually extended to the
immediate members of the household. As the family expanded into the
state, human sympathy expanded likewise, until it became national in
its significance. Through this process there finally came a world-wide
philanthropy which recognizes the sufferings of all human beings. This
sympathy has been rapidly increased by the culture of the intellect,
the higher development of the sensibilities, and the refinement of the
emotions; thus along the track of altruism or ethical development,
which had its foundation in primitive life, with its ever widening and
enlarging circles, the advancement of humanity may be traced. The old
egoism, the savage warfare for existence, has been constantly tempered
by altruism, which has been a saving quality in the human race.
_Intellectual Development of Man_.--Some philosophers have succeeded in
recounting human progress by tracing the intellectual development of
the race. This is possible, for everything of value that has been
done, and which has left a record, bears the mark of man's intellect.
In the early period of his existence, man had sufficient intellect to
direct his efforts to satisfy the common wants of life. This exercise
of the intellectual faculty has accompanied man's every movement, but
it is best observed in the products of his industry and the practice of
social order. By doing and making, the intellect grows, and it is only
by observing the phenomena of active life that we get a hint or trace
of the powers and capacities of the mind. {48} But after man begins
the process of reflective thinking, his intellectual activities become
stronger, and it is much easier to trace his development by considering
the condition of religion, law, philosophy, literature, sculpture, art,
and architecture. These represent the best products of the mind, and
it is along this intellectual highway that the best results of
civilization are found. During the modern period of progressive life
systematic education has forced the intellectual faculties through a
more rapid course, giving predominance to intellectual life everywhere.
The intellectual development of nations or the intellectual development
of man in general is a theme of never-tiring interest, as it represents
his noblest achievements.
Man from the very beginning has had a desire for knowledge, to satisfy
curiosity. Gradually, however, he had a desire to know in order to
increase utility, and finally he reaches the highest state of progress
in desiring to know for the sake of knowing. Thus he proceeds from
mere animal curiosity to the idealistic state of discovering "truth for
truth's sake." These are qualities not only of the individual in his
development but of the racial group and, indeed, in a larger way of all
mankind; intelligence developed in the attempt of man to discover the
nature of the results of his instinctive, impulsive, or emotional
actions. Later he sought causes of these results. Here we have
involved increased knowledge as a basis of human action and the use of
that knowledge through discriminating intelligence. The intellect thus
represents the selective and directive process in the use of knowledge.
Hence, intelligent behavior of the individual or of the group comes
only after accumulated knowledge based on experience. The process of
trial and error thus gives rise to reflective thinking. It is a
superior use of the intellect that more than anything else
distinguishes the adult from the child or modern man from the primitive.
_Change from Savagery to Barbarism_.--Perhaps one of the broadest
classifications of ancient society, based upon general characteristics
of progress, makes the two general divisions of {49} savagery and
barbarism, and subdivides each of these into three groups. The lowest
status of savagery represents man as little above the brute creation,
subsisting upon roots and berries, and with no knowledge of art or of
social order. The second period, called the middle status of savagery,
represents man using fire, and using fish for food, and having
corresponding advancement in other ways. The upper status of savagery
begins with the use of the bow-and-arrow and extends to the period of
the manufacture and use of pottery.
At this point the period of barbarism begins. Its lower status,
beginning with the manufacture of pottery, extends to the time of the
domestication of animals. The middle status includes not only the
domestication of animals in the East but the practice of irrigation in
the West and the building of walls from stone and adobe brick. The
upper status is marked by the use of iron and extends to the
introduction of the phonetic alphabet and literary composition. At
this juncture civilization is said to dawn.
"Commencing," says Mr. Morgan, the author of this classification, in
his _Ancient Society_, "with the Australians and the Polynesians,
following with the American Indian tribes, and concluding with the
Roman and Grecian, which afford the best exemplification of the six
great stages of human progress, the sum of their united experiences may
be supposed to fairly represent that of the human family from the
middle status of savagery to the end of the ancient civilization." By
this classification the Australians would be placed in the middle
status of savagery, and the early Greeks and Romans in the upper status
of barbarism, while the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico would be placed in
the middle status of barbarism. This is an excellent system for
estimating the progress of ancient society, for around these initial
periods may be clustered all of the elements of civilization. It is of
especial value in the comparative study of different races and tribes.
_Civilization Includes All Kinds of Human Progress_.--The above
representation of the principal methods of recounting {50} civilization
shows the various phases of human progress. Although each one is
helpful in determining the progress of man from a particular point of
view, none is sufficient to marshal all of the qualities of
civilization in a completed order. For the entire field of
civilization should include all the elements of progress, and this
great subject must be viewed from every side before it can be fairly
represented to the mind of the student. The true nature of
civilization has been more clearly presented in thus briefly
enumerating the different methods of estimating human progress. But we
must remember that civilization, though continuous, is not uniform.
The qualities of progress which are strong in one tribe or nation are
weak in others. It is the total of the characteristics of man and the
products of his activity that represents his true progress. Nations
have arisen, developed, and passed away; tribes have been swept from
the face of the earth before a complete development was possible; and
races have been obliterated by the onward march of civilization. But
the best products of all nations have been preserved for the service of
others. Ancient Chaldea received help from central Asia; Egypt and
Judea from Babylon; Greece from Egypt; Rome from Greece; and all Europe
and America have profited from the culture of Greece and Rome and the
religion of Judea. There may be a natural growth, maturity, and decay
of nations, but civilization moves ever on toward a higher and more
diversified life. The products of human endeavor arrange themselves on
the side of man in his attempt to master himself and nature.
TABLE SHOWING METHODS OF RECOUNTING HUMAN PROGRESS
I. Method of the Kind of Implements Used.
1. Paleolithic, or Old Stone, Age.
2. Neolithic, or New Stone, Age.
3. Incidental use of copper, tin, and other metals.
4. The making of pottery.
5. The age of bronze.
6. The iron age.
{51}
II. Method by Art Development.
1. Primitive drawings in caves and engraving on ivory and
wood.
2. The use of color in decoration of objects, especially in
decoration of the body.
3. Beginnings of sculpture and carving figures, animals,
gods, and men.
4. Pictorial representations--the pictograph.
5. Representative art in landscapes.
6. Perspective drawing.
7. Idealistic art.
8. Industrial arts.
III. Method of Economic Stages.
1. The Nomadic Stage.
2. The Hunter-Fisher Stage.
3. The Pastoral Period.
4. The Agricultural Period.
5. The Commercial Period.
6. The Period of Industrial Organization.
IV. Progress Estimated by the Food Supply.
1. Natural subsistence Period.
2. Fish and shell fish.
3. Cultivation of native grains.
4. Meat and milk.
5. Farinaceous foods by systematic agriculture.
V. Method of Social Order.
1. Solitary state of man (hypothetical).
2. The human horde.
3. Small groups for purposes of association.
4. The secret society.
5. The religious cult.
6. Closely integrated groups for defense.
7. Amalgamated or federated groups.
8. The Race.
VI. The Family Development.
1. State of promiscuity (hypothetical).
2. Polyandry.
3. Polygamy.
4. Patriarchal family with polygamy.
5. The Monogamic family.
VII. Progress Measured by Political Organization.
1. The organized horde about religious ideas.
{52}
2. The completed family organization.
_a_. Family.
_b_. Gens.
_c_. The Phratry.
_d_. Patriarchal family.
_e_. Tribe.
3. The Ethnic state.
4. State formed by conflict and amalgamation.
5. International relations.
6. The World State (Idealistic).
VIII. Religious Development.
1. Belief in spiritual beings.
2. Recognition of the spirit of man and other spirits.
3. Animism.
4. Anthropomorphic religion.
5. Spiritual concept of religion.
6. Ethnical religions.
7. Forms of religious worship and religious practice.
IX. Moral Evolution.
1. Race morality (gang morality).
2. Sympathy for fellow beings.
3. Sympathy through blood relationship.
4. Patriotism: love of race and country.
5. World Ethics.
X. Progress Through Intellectual Development.
1. Sensation and reflex action.
2. Instinct and emotion.
3. Impulse and adaptability.
4. Reflective thought.
5. Invention and discovery.
6. Rational direction of human life.
7. Philosophy.
8. Science.
XI. Progress Through Savagery and Barbarism.
1. Lower status of savagery.
2. Middle status of savagery.
3. Upper status of savagery.
4. Lower status of barbarism.
5. Middle status of barbarism.
6. Upper status of barbarism.
7. Civilization (?).
{53}
SUBJECTS FOR FURTHER STUDY
1. In what other ways than those named in this chapter may we estimate
the progress of man?
2. Discuss the evidences of man's mental and spiritual progress.
3. The relation of wealth to progress.
4. The relation of the size of population to the prosperity of a
nation.
5. Enumerate the arguments that the next destructive war will destroy
civilization.
6. In what ways do you think man is better off than he was one hundred
years ago? One thousand years ago?
7. In what ways did the suffering caused by the Great War indicate an
increase in world ethics?
[1] See Chapter XXVII.
[2] See Cooley, _Social Organization_, chap. III.
[3] The transition from the ethnic state to the modern civic state was
through conflict, conquest, and race amalgamation.
{57}
_PART II_
FIRST STEPS OF PROGRESS
CHAPTER IV
PREHISTORIC MAN
_The Origin of Man Has not Yet Been Determined_.--Man's origin is still
shrouded in mystery, notwithstanding the accumulated knowledge of the
results of scientific investigation in the field and in the laboratory.
The earliest historical records and relics of the seats of ancient
civilization all point backward to an earlier period of human life.
Looking back from the earliest civilizations along the Euphrates and
the Nile that have recorded the deeds of man so that their evidences
could be handed down from generation to generation, the earlier
prehistoric records of man stretch away in the dim past for more than a
hundred thousand years. The time that has elapsed from the earliest
historical records to the present is only a few minutes compared to the
centuries that preceded it.
Wherever we go in the field of knowledge, we shall find evidences of
man's great antiquity. We know at least that he has been on earth a
long, long period. As to the method of his appearance, there is no
absolutely determining evidence. Yet science has run back into the
field of conjecture with such strong lines that we may assume with
practical certainty something of his early life. He stands at the head
of the zoological division of the animal kingdom. The Anthropoid Ape
is the animal that most nearly resembles man. It might be said to
stand next to man in the procession of species. So far as our
knowledge can ascertain, it appears that man was developed in the same
manner as the higher types in the animal and vegetable world, namely,
by the process of evolution, and by evolution we mean continuous
progressive change according to law, from external and internal
stimuli. The process of evolution is not a process of creation, nor
does evolution move in {58} a straight line, but through the process of
differentiation. In no other way can one account for the multitudes of
the types and races of the human being, except by this process of
differentiation which is one of the main factors of evolution.
Accompanying the process of differentiation is that of specialization
and integration. When types become highly specialized they fail to
adapt themselves to new environments, and other types not so highly
specialized prevail. So far as the human race is concerned, it seems
to be evolved according to the law of sympodial development--that is, a
certain specialized part of the human race develops certain traits and
is limited in its adaptability to a specific environment. Closely
allied with this are some individuals or groups possessing human traits
that are less highly specialized, and hence are adaptable to new
conditions. Under new conditions the main stem of development perishes
and the budded branch survives.
We have abundant pictures of this in prehistoric times, and records
show that this also has been the common lot of man. Modern man thus
could not have been developed from any of the living species of the
Anthropoid Apes, but he might have had a common origin in the physical,
chemical, and vital forces that produced the apes. One line of
specialization made the ape, another line made man. Subsequently the
separation of man into the various races and species came about by the
survival of some races for a time, and then to be superseded by a
branch of the same race which differentiated in a period of development
before high specialization had taken place.
_Methods of Recounting Prehistoric Time_.[1]--Present time is measured
in terms of centuries, years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and
seconds, but the second is the determining power of mechanical
measurement, though it is derived mainly by the movement of the earth
around the sun and the turning of the earth on its axis. Mechanically
we have derived the second as the unit. It is easy for us to think in
hours or days or weeks, though it may be the seconds tick off unnoticed
{59} and the years glide by unnoticed; but it is difficult to think in
centuries--more difficult in millions of years. The little time that
man has been on earth compared with the creation of the earth makes it
difficult for us to estimate the time of creation. The much less time
in the historical period makes it seem but a flash in the movement of
the creation.
======================================================================
TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR DIAL ILLUSTRATING HUMAN CHRONOLOGY[2]
Twenty-five thousand years equals one hour
[Illustration: Twenty-four hour dial]
Age of modern man 10,000 years = less than half an hour.
Age of Crô-Magnon type 25,000 years = one hour.
Age of Neanderthal type 50,000 years = two hours.
Age of Piltdown type 150,000 years = six hours.
Age of Heidelberg type 375,000 years = fifteen hours.
Age of Pithecanthropus 500,000 years = twenty hours.
Beginning of Christian era 2,000 years = 4.8 minutes.
Discovery of America 431 years = about 1 minute.
Declaration of Independence 137 years = about 21 seconds.
======================================================================
There are four main methods of determining prehistoric {60} time.[3]
One is called the (1) _geologic method_, which is based upon the fact
that, in a slowly cooling earth and the action of water and frost, cold
and heat, storm and glacier and volcanic eruption, the rocks on the
earth are of different ages. If they had never been disturbed from
where they were first laid down, it would be very easy to reckon time
by geological processes. If you had a stone column twenty feet high
built by a machine in ten hours' time, and granting that it worked
uniformly, it would be easy to see just at what hour of the period a
layer of stone four feet from the bottom, or ten feet from the top, was
laid. If, however, in the building of the wall, it should have toppled
over several times and had to be rebuilt, it would require considerable
study to see just at what hour a certain stone was put in the wall.
Studying the geology of the earth in a large way, it is easy to
determine what strata of the earth are oldest, and this may be verified
by a consideration of the process in which these rocks were being made.
Chemistry and physics are thus brought to the aid of geology. It is
easy to determine whether a rock has been fused by a fire or whether it
has been constructed by the slow action of water and pressure of other
rocks. If to-day we should find in an old river bed which had been
left high and dry on a little mesa or plateau above the present river
bottom, layers of earth that had been put down by water, and we could
find how much of each layer was made in a single year, it would be easy
to estimate the number of years it took to make the whole deposit.
Also if we could find in the lowest layer certain relics of the human
race, we could know that the race lived at that time. If we should
find relics later on of a different nature, we should be able to
estimate the progress of civilization.
The second method is of (2) _paleontology_, which is developed along
with geology. In this we have both the vertebrate and invertebrate
paleontology, which are divisions of the science which treats of
ancient forms of animal and vegetable life. There are many other
divisions of paleontology, some {61} devoting themselves entirely to
animal life and others to vegetable, as, for instance, paleobotany. As
plants and animals have gradually developed from lower to higher forms
and the earth has been built gradually by formations at different
periods of existence, by a comparison of the former development with
the latter, that is, comparison with the earth, or inorganic,
development to the life, or organic, development, we are enabled to get
a comparative view of duration. Thus, if in a layer of earth,
geological time is established and there should be found bones of an
animal, the bones of a man, and fossilized forms of ancient plants, it
would be easy to determine their relative ages.
The third method is that of (3) _anatomy_, which is a study of the
comparative size and shape of the bones of man and other animals as a
method of showing relative periods of existence. Also, just as the
structure of the bones of a child, as compared with that of a man,
would determine their relative ages, so the bones of the species that
have been preserved through fossilization may show the relative ages of
different types of animals. The study of the skeletons of animals,
including those of man, has led to the science of anthropometry.
The fourth method is to study the procession of man by (4) _cultures_,
or the industrial and ornamental implements that have been preserved in
the river drift, rocks, and caves of the earth from the time that man
used them until they were discovered. Just as we have to-day models of
the improvement of the sewing-machine, the reaper, or the
flying-machine, each one a little more perfect, so we shall find in the
relics of prehistoric times this same gradual development--first a
stone in its natural state used for cutting, then chipped to make it
more perfect, and finally beautified in form and perfected by polishing.
Thus we shall find progress from the natural stone boulder used for
throwing and hammering, the developed product made by chipping and
polishing the natural boulder, making it more useful and more
beautiful, and so for all the {62} multitude of implements used in the
hunt and in domestic affairs. Not only do we have here an illustration
of continuous progress in invention and use, but also an adaptation of
new material, for we pass from the use of stone to that of metals,
probably in the prehistoric period, although the beginnings of the use
of bronze and iron come mainly within the periods of historical records.
It is not possible here to follow the interesting history of the
glacial movement, but a few words of explanation seem necessary. The
Ice Age, or the glacial period, refers to a span of time ranging from
500,000 years ago, at the beginning of the first glaciation, to the
close of the post-glacial period, about 25,000 years ago. During this
period great ice caps, ranging in the valleys and spreading out on the
plains over a broad area, proceeded from the north of Europe to the
south, covering at the extreme stages nearly the entire surface of the
continent. This great movement consists of four distinct forward
movements and their return movements. There is evidence to show that
before the south movement of the first great ice cap, a temperate
climate extended very far toward the pole and gave opportunity for
vegetation now extinct in that region.
But as the river of ice proceeded south, plants and animals retreated
before it, some of them changing their nature to endure the excessive
cold. Then came a climatic change which melted the ice and gradually
drove the margin of the glacier farther north. Immediately under the
influence of the warm winds the vegetation and animals followed slowly
at a distance the movement of the glacier. Then followed a long
inter-glacial period before the southerly movement of the returning ice
cap. This in turn retreated to the north, and thus four separate times
this great movement, one of the greatest geological phenomena of the
earth, occurred, leaving an opportunity to study four different glacial
periods with three warmer interglacial and one warm post-glacial.
This movement gave great opportunity for the study of {63} geology,
paleontology, and the archeology of man. That is, the story of the
relationship of the earth to plant, animal, and man was revealed. The
regularity of these movements and the amount of material evidence found
furnish a great opportunity for measuring geological time movements and
hence the life of plants and animals, including man.
The table on page 64 will contribute to the clearness of this brief
statement about the glacial periods.
======================================================================
{64}
THE ICE AGE IN EUROPE[5]
Geological time-unit 25,000 years
RELA-
TIVE TOTAL
TIME TIME HUMAN ANIMAL AND
GLACIERS UNIT YRS. YRS. LIFE PLANT LIFE
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Post-Glacial 1 25,000 25,000 Crô-Magnon Horse, Stag, Rein-
Daum Azilian deer, Musk-Ox,
Geschintz Magdalenian Arctic Fox, Pine,
Bühl Solutrian Birch, Oak
Aurignacian
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
4th Glacial 1 25,000 50,000 Mousterian Reindeer, period of
Wurm Ice Neanderthal Tundra, Alpine,
Steppe, Meadow
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q 3d Inter- 4 100,000 150,000 Pre-Neander- Last warm Asiatic
U glacial thal and African ani-
A Piltdown mals
R ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
T 3d Glacial 1 25,000 175,000 Woolly Mammoth,
E Riss Rhinoceros,
R Reindeer
N ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
A 2d Inter- 8 200,000 375,000 Heidelberg African and Asiatic
R glacial Race Animals, Ele-
Y Mindel-Riss phant, Hippo-
potamus
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
2d Glacial 1 25,000 400,000 Cold weather
Mindel animals
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1st Inter- 3 75,000 475,000 Pithecan- Hippopotamus,
glacial thropus Elephant, Afri-
Erectus can and Asiatic
plants
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1st Glacial 1 25,000 500,000
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T
E
R
T
I
A
R
Y
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_Prehistoric Types of the Human Race_.--The earliest record of human
life yet discovered is the _Pithecanthropus Erectus_ (Trinil), the
apelike man who walked upright, found in Java by Du Bois, about the
year 1892. Enough of the skeletal remains of human beings were found
at this time to indicate a man of rather crude form and low brain
capacity (about 885 c.c.), with possible powers of speech but with no
probably developed language or no assumption of the acquaintance with
the arts of life.[4]
The remains of this man associated with the remains of one other
skeleton, probably a woman, and with the bones of extinct animals, were
found in a geological stratum which indicates his age at about 500,000
years. Professor McGregor, after a careful anatomical study, has
reproduced the head and bust of Pithecanthropus, which helps us to
visualize this primitive species as of rather low cultural type. The
low forehead, massive jaw, and receding chin give us a vision of an
undeveloped species of the human race, in some respects not much above
the anthropoid apes, yet in other characters distinctly human.
There follows a long interval of human development which is only
conjectural until the discovery of the bones of the Heidelberg man,
found at the south of the River Neckar. These are the first records of
the human race found in southern Europe. The type of man is still
apelike in some respects, but far in advance of the Pithecanthropus in
structure and general appearance. The restoration by the Belgian
artist Mascré {65} under the direction of Professor A. Rotot, of
Brussels, is indicative of larger brain capacity than the Trinil race.
It had a massive jaw, distinctive nose, heavy arched brows, and still
the receding chin. Not many cultural remains were found in strata of
the second interglacial period along with the remains of extinct
animals, such as the ancient elephant, Etruscan rhinoceros, primitive
bison, primitive ox, Auvergne bear, and lion. A fauna and a flora as
well as a geological structure were found which would indicate that
this race existed at this place about 375,000 years ago. From these
evidences very little may be determined of the Heidelberg man's
cultural development, but much may be inferred. Undoubtedly, like the
Pithecanthropus, he was a man without the tools of civilization, or at
least had not developed far in this way.
About 150,000 years ago there appeared in Europe races of mankind that
left more relics of their civilization.[6] These were the
Neanderthaloid races. There is no evidence of the connection of these
races with the Java man or the Heidelberg man. Here, as elsewhere in
the evolution of races and species, nature does not work in a straight
line of descent, but by differentiation and variation.
In 1856 the first discovery of a specimen of the Neanderthal man was
found at the entrance of a small ravine on the right bank of the River
Dussel, in Rhenish Prussia. This was the first discovery of the
Paleolithic man to cause serious reflection on the possibility of a
prehistoric race in Europe. Its age is estimated at 50,000 years.
This was followed by other discoveries of the Mid-Pleistocene period,
until there were a number of discoveries of similar specimens of the
Neanderthal race, varying in some respects from each other. The first
had a brain capacity of 1230 c.c., while that of the average European
is about 1500 c.c. Some of the specimens showed a skull capacity
larger than the first specimen, but the average is lower than that of
any living race, unless it be that of the Australians.
{66}
Later were discovered human remains of a somewhat higher type, known as
the Aurignacian, of the Crô-Magnon race. These are probably ancestors
of the living races of Europe existing 25,000 to 50,000 years ago.
They represent the first races to which may be accorded definite
relationship with the recent races.
Thus we have evidences of the great antiquity of man and a series of
remains showing continual advancement over a period of nearly 500,000
years--the Pithecanthropus, Heidelberg, Piltdown, and Neanderthal,
though expressing gradations of development in the order named, appear
to be unrelated in their origin and descent, and are classed as
separate species long since extinct. The Crô-Magnon people seem more
directly related to modern man. Perhaps in the Neolithic Age they may
have been the forebears of present races, either through direct or
indirect lines.
_The Unity of the Human Race_.--Though there are evidences, as shown
above, that there were many branches of the human race, or species,
some of which became extinct without leaving any records of the passing
on of their cultures to others, there is a pretty generally concerted
opinion that all branches of the human race are related and have sprung
from the same ancestors. There have been differences of opinion
regarding this view, some holding that there are several centres of
development in which the precursor of man assumed a human form
(polygenesis), and others holding that according to the law of
differentiation and zoological development there must have been at some
time one origin of the species (monogenesis). So far as the scientific
investigation of mankind is concerned, it is rather immaterial which
theory is accepted. We know that multitudes of tribes and races differ
in minor parts of structure, differ in mental capacity, and hence in
qualities of civilization, and yet in general form, brain structure,
and mental processes, it is the same human being wherever found. So we
may assume that there is a unity of the race.
If we consider the human race to have sprung from a single {67} pair,
or even the development of man from a single species, it must have
taken a long time to have developed the great marks of racial
differences that now exist. The question of unity or plurality of race
origins has been much discussed, and is still somewhat in controversy,
although the predominance of evidence is much in favor of the descent
of man from a single species and from a single place. The elder
Agassiz held that there were several separate species of the race,
which accounts for the wide divergence of characteristics and
conditions. But it is generally admitted from a zoological standpoint
that man originated from a single species, although it does not
necessarily follow that he came from a single pair. It is the
diversity or the unity of the race from a single pair which gives rise
to the greatest controversy.
There is a wide diversity of opinion among ethnologists on this
question. Agassiz was followed by French writers, among whom were
Topinard and Hervé, who held firmly to the plurality of centres of
origin and distribution. Agassiz thought there were at least nine
centres in which man appeared, each independent of the others. Morton
thought he could point out twenty-two such centres, and Nott and
Gliddon advanced the idea that there were distinct races of people.
But Darwin, basing his arguments upon the uniformity of physical
structure and similarity of mental characteristics, held that man came
from a single progenitor. This theory is the most acceptable, and it
is easily explained, if we admit time enough for the necessary changes
in the structure and appearance of man. It is the simplest hypothesis
that is given, and explains the facts relative to the existence of man
much more easily than does the theory in reference to diversity of
origins. The majority of ethnologists of America and Europe appear to
favor the idea that man came from a single pair, arose from one place,
and spread thence over the earth's surface.
_The Primitive Home of Man May Be Determined in a General Way_.--The
location of the cradle of the race has not {68} yet been satisfactorily
established. The inference drawn from the Bible story of the creation
places it in or near the valley of the Euphrates River. Others hold
that the place was in Europe, and others still in America. A theory
has also been advanced that a continent or group of large islands
called Lemuria, occupying the place where the Indian Ocean now lies,
and extending from Ceylon to Madagascar, was the locality in which the
human race originated. The advocates of this theory hold to it chiefly
on the ground that it is necessary to account for the peopling of
Australia and other large islands and continents, and that it is the
country best fitted by climate and other physical conditions for the
primitive race. This submerged continent would enable the races to
migrate readily to different parts of the world, still going by dry
land.
There is little more than conjecture upon this subject, and the
continent called Lemuria is as mythical as the Ethiopia of Ptolemy and
the Atlantis of Plato. It is a convenient theory, as it places the
cradle of the race near the five great rivers, the Tigris, Euphrates,
Indus, Ganges, and the Nile. The supposed home also lies in a zone in
which the animals most resembling man are found, which is an important
consideration; as, in the development of the earth, animals appeared
according to the conditions of climate and food supply, so the portion
of the earth best prepared for man's early life is most likely to be
his first home.
Although it is impossible to determine the first home of man, either
from a scientific or an historical standpoint, there are a few
well-acknowledged theories to be observed: First, as the islands of the
ocean were not peopled when first discovered by modern navigators, it
is reasonable to suppose that the primitive home of man was on one of
the continents. As man is the highest and last development of organic
nature, it is advocated, with considerable force of argument, that his
first home was in a region suitable to the life of the anthropoid apes.
As none of these, either living or fossil, are found in Australia or
America, these continents are practically excluded from the probable
list of places for the early home of man.
{69}
In considering the great changes which have taken place in the earth's
surface, southern India and southern Africa were large islands at the
time of man's appearance; hence, there is little probability of either
of these being the primitive home. None of the oldest remains of man
have been found in the high northern latitudes of Europe or America.
We have then left a strip of country on the southern slope of the great
mountain chain which begins in western Europe and extends to the
Himalaya Mountains, in Asia, which appears to be the territory in which
was situated the early home of man. The geological relics and the
distribution of the race both point to the fact that in this belt man's
life began; but it is not determined whether it was in Europe or in
Asia, there being adherents to both theories.
_The Antiquity of Man Is Shown in Racial Differentiation_.--Granted
that the life of the human race has originated from a common biological
origin and from a common geographical centre, it has taken a very long
time for the races to be differentiated into the physical traits they
possess to-day, as it has taken a long time for man to spread over the
earth. The generalized man wandering along the streams and through the
forests in search of food, seeking for shelter under rocks and in caves
and trees, was turned aside by the impassable barriers of mountains, or
the forbidding glacier, the roaring torrent, or the limits of the ocean
itself, and spread over the accessible parts of the earth's surface
until he had covered the selected districts on the main portions of the
globe. Then came race specialization, where a group remained a long
time in the same environment and inbred in the same stock, developing
specialized racial characters. These changes were very slow, and the
wide difference to-day between the Asiatic, the African, and the
European is indicative of the long period of years which brought them
about. Certainly, six thousand years would not suffice to make such
changes.
Of course one must realize that just as, in the period of childhood,
the plastic state of life, changes of structure and appearance are more
rapid than in the mature man, after {70} traits and characters have
become more fixed, so by analogy we may assume that this was the way of
the human race and that in the earlier period changes were more rapid
than they are to-day. Thus in the cross-fertilizations and
amalgamation of races we would expect a slower development than under
these earlier conditions, yet when we realize the persistence of the
types of Irish and German, of Italian and Greek, of Japanese and
Chinese, even though the races become amalgamated, we must infer that
the racial types were very slow in developing.
If we consider the variations in the structure and appearance of the
several tribes and races with which we come in contact in every-day
life, we are impressed with the amount of time necessary to make these
changes. Thus the Anglo-American, whom we sometimes call Caucasian,
taken as one type of the perfection of physical structure and mental
habit, with his brown hair, having a slight tendency to curl, his fair
skin, high, prominent, and broad forehead, his great brain capacity,
his long head and delicately moulded features, contrasts very strongly
with the negro, with his black skin, long head, with flat, narrow
forehead, thick lips, projecting jaw, broad nose, and black and woolly
hair. The Chinese, with his yellow skin, flat nose, black, coarse
hair, and oblique, almond-shaped eyes, and round skull, marks another
distinct racial type. Other great races have different
characteristics, and among our own race we find a further separation
into two great types, the blonds and the brunettes.
What a long period of time must have elapsed to have changed the racial
characteristics! From pictures made three thousand years ago in Egypt
the differences of racial characteristics were very clearly depicted in
the hair, the features of the face, and, indeed, the color of the skin.
If at this period the racial differences were clearly marked, at what
an early date must they have been wanting! So, also, the antiquity of
man is evinced in the fact that the oldest skeletons found show him at
that early period to be in possession of an average {71} brain capacity
and a well-developed frame. If changes in structure have taken place,
they have gradually appeared only during a long period of years. Yet,
when it is considered that man is a migratory creature, who can adapt
himself to any condition of climate or other environment, and it is
realized that in the early stage of his existence his time was occupied
for a long period in hunting and fishing, and that from this practice
he entered the pastoral life to continue, to a certain extent, his
wanderings, it is evident that there is sufficient opportunity for the
development of independent characteristics. Also the effects of sun
and storm, of climate and other environments have a great influence in
the slow changes of the race which have taken place. The change in
racial traits is dependent largely upon biological selection, but
environment and social selection probably had at least indirect
influence in the evolution of racial characters.
_The Evidences of Man's Ancient Life in Different Localities_.--The
sources of the remains of the life of primitive man are (1) Caves, (2)
Shell Mounds, (3) River and Glacial Drift, (4) Burial Mounds, (5)
Battlefields and Village Sites, and (6) Lake Dwellings. It is from
these sources that most of the evidence of man's early life has come.
_Caves_ (1).--It has been customary to allude to the cave man as if he
were a distinct species or group of the human race, when in reality men
at all times through many thousands of years dwelt in caves according
to their convenience. However, there was a period in European life
when groups of the human race used caves for permanent habitations and
thus developed certain racial types and habits. Doubtless these were
established long enough in permanent seats to develop a specialized
type which might be known as the cave man, just as racial types have
been developed in other conditions of habitation and life. What
concerns us most here is that the protection which the cave afforded
this primitive man has been a means of protecting the records of his
life, and thus added to the evidence of human progress. Many of these
{72} caves were of limestone with rough walls and floor, and in most
instances rifts in the roof allowed water to percolate and drop to the
floor.
Frequently the water was impregnated with limestone solution, which
became solidified as each drop left a deposit at the point of
departure. This formed rough stalactites, which might be called stone
icicles, because their formation was similar to the formation of an
icicle of the water dropping from the roof. So likewise on the floor
of the cave where the limestone solution dropped was built up from the
bottom a covering of limestone with inverted stone icicles called
stalagmites. Underneath the latter were found layer after layer of
relics from the habitation of man, encased in stone to be preserved
forever or until broken into by some outside pressure. Of course,
comparatively few of all the relics around these habitations were
preserved, because those outside of the stone encasement perished, as
did undoubtedly large masses of remains around the mouth of the cave.
In these caves of Europe are found the bones of man, flint implements,
ornaments of bone with carvings, and the necklaces of animals' teeth,
along with the bones of extinct animals. In general the evidence shows
the habits of the life of man and also the kind of animals with which
he associated whose period of life was determined by other evidence.
Besides this general evidence, there was a special determination of the
progress of man, because the relics were in layers extending over a
long period of years, giving evidence that from time to time implements
of higher order were used, either showing progress or that different
races may have occupied the cave at different times and left evidences
of their industrial, economic, and social life. In some of the caves
skulls have been discovered showing a brain case of an average
capacity, along with others of inferior size. Probably the greater
part of this cave life was in the upper part of the Paleolithic Stone
Age.
In some of these caves at the time of the Magdalenian {73} culture,
which was a branch of the Crô-Magnon culture, there are to be found
drawings and paintings of the horse, the cave bear, the mammoth, the
bison, and many other animals, showing strong beginnings of
representative art. Also, in these caves were found bones and stone
implements of a more highly finished product than those of the earlier
primitive types of Europe.
_Shell Mounds_ (2).--Shell mounds of Europe and America furnish
definite records of man's life. The shell mounds of greatest historic
importance are found along the shores of the Baltic in Denmark. Here
are remains of a primitive people whose diet seems to be principally
shell-fish obtained from the shores of the sea. Around their kitchens
the shells of mussels, scallops, and oysters were piled in heaps, and
in these shell mounds, or Kitchenmiddens, as they are called
(Kjokkenmoddings), are found implements, the bones of birds and
mammals, as well as the remains of plants. Also, by digging to the
bottom of these mounds specimens of pottery are found, showing that the
civilization belonged largely to the Neolithic period of man.
There are evidences also of the succession of the varieties of trees
corresponding to the evidences found in the peat bogs, the oak
following the fir, which in turn gave way to the beech. These refuse
heaps are usually in ridgelike mounds, sometimes hundreds of yards in
length. The weight of the millions of shells and other refuse
undoubtedly pressed the shells down into the soft earth and still the
mound enlarged, the habitation being changed or raised higher, rather
than to take the trouble to clear away the shells from the habitation.
The variety of implements and the degrees of culture which they exhibit
give evidence that men lived a long time in this particular locality.
Undoubtedly it was the food quest that caused people to assemble here.
The evidences of the coarse, dark pottery, the stone axes, clubs, and
arrow-heads, and the bones of dogs show a state of civilization in
which differentiation of life existed. Shell mounds are also found
along the {74} Pacific coast, showing the life of Indians from the time
when they first began to use shell-fish for food. In these mounds
implements showing the relative stages of development have been found.
_River and Glacial Drift_ (3).--The action of glaciers and glacial
rivers and lakes has through erosion changed the surface of the soil,
tearing out some parts of the earth's surface and depositing the soil
elsewhere. These river floods carried out bones of man and the
implements in use, and deposited them, together with the bones of
animals with which he lived. Many of these relics have been preserved
through thousands of years and frequently are brought to light. The
geological records are thus very important in throwing light upon the
antiquity of man. It is in the different layers or strata of the earth
caused by these changes that we find the relics of ancient life. The
earth thus reveals in its rocks and gravel drift the permanent records
of man's early life. Historical geology shows us that the crust of the
earth has been made by a series of layers, one above the other, and
that the geologist determining the order of their creation has a means
of ascertaining their relative age, and thus can measure approximately
the life of the plants and animals connected with each separate
layer.[7] The relative ages of fishes, reptiles, and mammals,
including man, are thus readily determined.
It is necessary to refer to the method of classification adopted by
geologists, who have divided the time of earth-making into three great
periods, representing the growth of animal life, determined by the
remains found in the strata or drift. These periods mark general
portions of time. Below the first is the period of earliest rock
formation (Archaean), in which there is no life, and which is called
Azoic for that reason. There is a short period above this, usually
reckoned as outside the ancient life, on account of the few forms of
animals found there; but the first great period (Paleozoic) represents
non-vertebrate life, as well as the life of fishes and reptiles, and
includes {75} also the coal measures, which represent a period of heavy
vegetation. The middle period (Mesozoic) includes the more completely
developed lizards and crocodiles, and the appearance of mammals and
birds. The animal life of the third period (Cenozoic) resembles
somewhat the modern species. This period includes the Tertiary and the
Quaternary and the recent sub-periods. Man, the highest being in the
order of creation, appears in the Quaternary period. Of the immense
ages of time represented by the geological periods the life of man
represents but a small portion, just as the existence of man as
recorded in history is but a modern period of his great life. The
changes, then, which have taken place in the animals and plants and the
climate in the different geological periods have been instrumental in
determining the age of man; that is, if in a given stratum human
remains are found, and the relative age of that stratum is known, it is
easy to estimate the relative age of man.
Whether man existed prior to the glacial epoch is still in doubt. Some
anthropologists hold that he appeared at the latter part of the
Tertiary, that is, in the Pliocene. Reasons for assumption exist,
though there is not sufficient evidence to make it conclusive. The
question is still in controversy, and doubtless will be until new
discoveries bring new evidence. If there is doubt about the finding of
human relics in the Tertiary, there is no doubt about the evidence of
man during the Quaternary, including the whole period of the glacial
epoch, extending 500,000 years into the past.
The relics of man which are found in the drift and elsewhere are the
stone implements and the flakes chipped from the flint as he fashioned
it into an axe, knife, or hatchet. The implements commonly found are
arrow-heads, knives, lance-heads, pestles, etc. Human bones have been
found imbedded in the rock or the sand. Articles made of horn, bones
of animals, especially the reindeer, notched or cut pieces of wood have
been found. Also there are evidences of rude drawings on stone, bone,
or ivory; fragments of charcoal, which give {76} evidence of the use of
fire in cooking or creating artificial heat, are found, and long bones
split longitudinally to obtain marrow for food, and, finally, the
remnants of pottery. These represent the principal relics found in the
Stone Age; to these may be added the implements in bronze and iron of
later periods.
A good example of the use of these relics to determine chronology is
shown in the peat bogs of Denmark. At the bottom are found trees of
pine which grew on the edges of the bog and have fallen in. Nearer the
top are found oak and white birch-trees, and in the upper layer are
found beech-trees closely allied to the species now covering the
country. The pines, oaks, and birches are not to be seen in that part
of the country at present. Here, then, is evidence of the successive
replacement of different species of trees. It is evident that it must
have taken a long time for one species thus to replace another, but how
long it is impossible to say. In some of these bogs is found a
gradation of implements, unpolished stone at the bottom, polished stone
above, followed by bronze, and finally iron. These are associated with
the different forms of vegetable remains.
In Europe stone implements occur in association with fossil remains of
the cave lion, the cave hyena, the old elephant and rhinoceros--all
extinct species. Also the bones and horns of the reindeer are
prominent in these remains, for at that time the reindeer came farther
south than at present. In southern France similar implements are
associated with ivory and bones, with rude markings, and the bones of
man--even a complete skeleton being found at one place. These are all
found in connection with the bones of the elk, ibex, aurochs, and
reindeer.
_Burial Mounds_ (4).--It is difficult to determine at just what period
human beings began to bury their dead. Primarily the bodies were
disposed of the same as any other carrion that might occur--namely,
they were left to decay wherever they dropped, or were subject to the
disposal by wild {77} animals. After the development of the idea of
the perpetuation of life in another world, even though it were
temporary or permanent, thoughts of preparing the body for its journey
into the unknown land and for its residence thereafter caused people to
place food and implements and clothing in the grave. This practice
probably occurred about the beginning of the Neolithic period of man's
existence, and has continued on to the present date.
Hence it is that in the graves of primitive man we find deposited the
articles of daily use at the period in which he lived. These have been
preserved many centuries, showing something of the life of the people
whose remains were deposited in the mounds. Also in connection with
this in furtherance of a religious idea were great dolmens and stone
temples, where undoubtedly the ancients met to worship. They give some
evidence at least of the development of the religious and ceremonial
life among these primitive people and to that extent they are of great
importance. It is evidence also, in another way, that the religious
idea took strong hold of man at an early period of his existence.
Evidences of man in Britain from the tumuli, or burial mounds, from
rude stone temples like the famous Stonehenge place his existence on
the island at a very early date. Judging from skulls and skeletons
there were several distinct groups of prehistoric man in Britain,
varying from the extreme broad skulls to those of excessive length.
They carry us back to the period of the Early Stone Age. Relics, too,
of the implements and mounds show something of the primitive conditions
of the inhabitants in Britain of which we have any permanent record.
_Battlefields and Village Sites_ (5).--In the later Neolithic period of
man the tribes had been fully developed over a great part of the
earth's surface, and fought for their existence, principally over
territories having a food supply. Other reasons for tribal conflict,
such as real or imagined race differences and the ambition for race
survival, caused constant warfare. {78} Upon these battlefields were
left the implements of war. Those of stone, and, it may be said
secondarily, of iron and bronze, were preserved. It is not uncommon
now in almost any part of the United States where the rains fall upon a
ploughed field over which a battle had been fought, to find exposed a
large number of arrow-heads and stone axes, all other perishable
implements having long since decayed. Or in some instances the wind
blowing the sand exposes the implements which were long ago deposited
during a battle. Also, wherever the Indian villages were located for a
period of years, the accumulations of utensils and implements occurred
which were buried by the action of wind or water. This represents a
source of evidence of man's early life.
_Lake Dwellings_ (6).--The idea of protection is evidenced everywhere
in the history of primitive man; protection against the physical
elements, protection against wild beasts and wilder men. We find along
the lakes and bays in both Europe and America the tendency to build the
dwelling out in the water and approach it from the land with a narrow
walk which could be taken up when not used, or to approach it by means
of a rude boat. In this way the dwellers could defend themselves
against the onslaughts of tribal enemies. These dwellings have been
most numerous along the Swiss lakes, although some are found in
Scotland, in the northern coast of South America, and elsewhere. Their
importance rests in the fact that, like the shell mounds
(Kitchenmiddens), the refuse from these cabins shows large deposits of
the implements and utensils that were in use during the period of
tribal residence. Here we find not only stone implements, running from
the crude form of the Unpolished Stone Age to the highly polished, but
also records of implements of bronze and small implements for domestic
use of bone and polished stone. Also there are evidences that
different tribes or specialized races occupied these dwellings at
different times, because of the variation of civilization implied by
the implements in use. The British Museum has a very large classified
collection of {79} the implements procured from lake dwellings of
Switzerland. Other museums also have large collections. A part of
them run back into the prehistoric period of man and part extend even
down to the historic.
_Knowledge of Man's Antiquity Influences Reflective Thinking_.--The
importance of studying the antiquity of man is the light which it
throws upon the causes of later civilization. In considering any phase
of man's development it is necessary to realize he has been a long time
on earth and that, while the law of the individual life is development,
that of the human race is slowly evolutionary; hence, while we may look
for immediate and rapid change, we can only be assured of a very slow
progressive movement at all periods of man's existence. The knowledge
of his antiquity will give us a historical view which is of tremendous
importance in considering the purpose and probable result of man's life
on earth. When we realize that we have evidence of the struggle of man
for five hundred thousand years to get started as far as we have in
civilization, and that more changes affecting man's progress may occur
in a single year now than in a former thousand years, we realize
something of the background of struggle before our present civilization
could appear. We realize, also, that his progress in the arts has been
very slow and that, while there are many changes in art formation of
to-day, we still have the evidences of the primitive in every completed
picture, or plastic form, or structural work. But the slow progress of
all this shows, too, that the landmarks of civilization of the past are
few and far between--distant mile-posts appearing at intervals of
thousands of years. Such a contemplation gives us food for thought and
should invite patience when we wish in modern times for social
transformations to become instantaneous, like the flash of the scimitar
or the burst of an electric light.
The evidence that man has been a long time on earth explodes the
long-accepted theory of six thousand years as the age of man. It also
explodes the theory of instantaneous {80} creation which was expressed
by some of the mediaeval philosophers. Indeed, it explodes the theory
of a special creation of man without connection with the creation of
other living beings. No doubt, there was a specialized creation of
man, otherwise he never would have been greater than the anthropoids
nor, indeed, than other mammals, but his specialization came about as
an evolutionary process which gave him a tremendous brain-power whereby
he was enabled to dominate all the rest of the world. So far as
philosophy is concerned as to man's life, purpose, and destiny, the
influence of the study of anthropology would change the philosopher's
vision of life to a certain extent. The recognition that man is "part
and parcel" of the universe, subject to cosmic law, as well as a
specialized type, subject to the laws of evolution, and, indeed, that
he is of a spiritual nature through which he is subjected to spiritual
law, causes the philosopher to pause somewhat before he determines the
purpose, the life, or the destiny of man.
If we are to inquire how man came into the world, when he came, what he
has been doing, how he developed, and whither the human trail leads, we
shall encounter many unsolved theories. Indeed, the facts of his life
are suggestive of the mystery of being. If it be suggested that he is
"part and parcel" of nature and has slowly arisen out of lower forms,
it should not be a humiliating thought, for his daily life is dependent
upon the lower elements of nature. The life of every day is dependent
upon the dust of the earth. The food he eats comes from the earth just
the same as that of the hog, the rabbit, or the fish. If, upon this
foundation, he has by slow evolution built a more perfect form,
developed a brain and a mind which give him the greatest flights of
philosophy, art, and religion, is it not a thing to excite pride of
being? Could there be any greater miracle than evolving nature and
developing life? Indeed, is there any greater than the development of
the individual man from a small germ not visible to the naked eye,
through the egg, the embryo, infant, youth, to full-grown man? Why not
the working of the same law to {81} the development of man from the
beginning. Does it lessen the dignity of creation if this is done
according to law? On the other hand, does it not give credit to the
greatness and power of the Creator if we recognize his wisdom in making
the universe, including man, the most important factor, according to a
universal plan worked out by far-reacting laws?
SUBJECTS FOR FURTHER STUDY
1. Evidences of the great antiquity of man.
2. Physical and mental traits of the anthropoid apes.
3. The life and culture of the Neanderthal Race.
4. What are the evidences in favor of the descent of man from a single
progenitor?
5. Explain the law of differentiation as applied to plants and animals.
6. Compare in general the arts of man in the Old Stone Age with those
of the New Stone Age.
7. What has been the effect of the study of prehistoric man on modern
thought as shown in the interpretation of History? Philosophy?
Religion?
[1] See Diagram, p. 59.
[2] See Haeckel, Schmidt, Ward, Robinson, Osborn, Todd.
[3] See Osborn, _Men of the Old Stone Age_.
[4] See Chapter II.
[5] After Osborn. Read from bottom up.
[6] Estimates of Neanderthal vary from 150,000 to 50,000 years ago.
[7] See p. 64.
{82}
CHAPTER V
THE ECONOMIC FACTORS OF PROGRESS
_The Efforts of Man to Satisfy Physical Needs_.--All knowledge of
primitive man, whether derived from the records of cultures he has left
or assumed from analogy of living tribes of a low order of
civilization, discovers him wandering along the streams in the valleys
or by the shores of lakes and oceans, searching for food and
incidentally seeking protection in caves and trees. The whole earth
was his so far as he could appropriate it. He cared nothing for
ownership; he only wanted room to search for the food nature had
provided. When he failed to find sufficient food as nature left it, he
starved. So in his wandering life he adapted himself to nature as he
found it. In the different environments he acquired different customs
and habits of life. If he came in contact with other tribes, an
exchange of knowledge and customs took place, and both tribes were
richer thereby. However, the universality of the human mind made it
possible for two detached tribes, under similar environment and similar
stimuli, to develop the same customs and habits of life, provided they
had the same degree of development. Hence, we have independent group
development and group borrowing.
When nature failed to provide him with sufficient food, he learned to
force her to yield a larger supply. When natural objects were
insufficient for his purposes, he made artificial tools to supplement
them. Slowly he became an inventor. Slowly he mastered the art of
living. Thus physical needs were gradually satisfied, and the
foundation for the superstructure of civilization was laid.
_The Attempt to Satisfy Hunger and to Protect from Cold_.--To this
statement must be added the fact that struggle with {83} his fellows
arose from the attempt to obtain food, and we have practically the
whole occupation of man in a state of savagery. At least, the simple
activities represent the essential forces at the foundation of human
social life. The attempt to preserve life either through instinct,
impulse, emotion, or rational selection is fundamental in all animal
existence. The other great factor at the foundation of human effort is
the desire to perpetuate the species. This, in fact, is the mere
projection of the individual life into the next generation, and is
fundamentally important to the individual and to the race alike. All
modern efforts can be traced to these three fundamental activities.
But in seeking to satisfy the cravings of hunger and to avoid the pain
of cold, man has developed a varied and active life. About these two
centres cluster all the simple forces of human progress. Indeed,
invention and discovery and the advancement of the industrial arts
receive their initial impulses from these economic relations.
We have only to turn our attention to the social life around us to
observe evidences of the great importance of economic factors. Even
now it will be observed that the greater part of economic activities
proceeds from the effort to procure food, clothing, and shelter, while
a relatively smaller part is engaged in the pursuit of education,
culture, and pleasure. The excellence of educational systems, the
highest flights of philosophy, the greatest achievement of art, and the
best inspiration of religion cannot exist without a wholesome economic
life at the foundation. It should not be humiliating to man that this
is so, for in the constitution of things, labor of body and mind, the
struggle for existence and the accumulations of the products of
industry yield a large return in themselves in discipline and culture;
and while we use these economic means to reach higher ideal states,
they represent the ladder on which man makes the first rounds of his
ascent.
_The Methods of Procuring Food in Primitive Times_.--Judging from the
races and tribes that are more nearly in a state of nature than any
other, it may be reasonably assumed that {84} in his first stage of
existence, man subsisted almost wholly upon a vegetable diet, and that
gradually he gave more and more attention to animal food. His
structure and physiology make it possible for him to use both animal
and vegetable food. Primarily, with equal satisfaction the procuring
of food must have been rather an individual than a social function.
Each individual sought his own breakfast wherever he might find it. It
was true then, as now, that people proceeded to the breakfast table in
an aggregation, and flocked around the centres of food supply; so we
may assume the picture of man stealing away alone, picking fruits,
nuts, berries, gathering clams or fish, was no more common than the
fact of present-day man getting his own breakfast alone. The main
difference is that in the former condition individuals obtained the
food as nature left it, and passed it directly from the bush or tree to
the mouth, while in modern times thousands of people have been working
indirectly to make it possible for a man to wait on himself.
Jack London, in his _Before Adam_, gives a very interesting picture of
the tribe going out to the carrot field for its breakfast, each
individual helping himself. However, such an aggregation around a
common food supply must eventually lead to co-operative economic
methods. But we do find even among modern living tribes of low degree
of culture the group following the food quest, whether it be to the
carrot patch, the nut-bearing trees, the sedgy seashore for mussels and
clams, the lakes for wild rice, or to the forest and plains where
abound wild game.
We find it difficult to think otherwise than that the place of man's
first appearance was one abounding in edible fruits. This fact arises
from the study of man's nature and evidences of the location of his
first appearance, together with the study of climate and vegetation.
There are a good many suggestions also that man in his primitive
condition was prepared for a vegetable diet, and indications are that
later he acquired use of meat as food. Indeed, the berries and edible
roots of {85} certain regions are in sufficient quantity to sustain
life throughout a greater part of the year. The weaker tribes of
California at the time of the first European invaders, and for many
centuries previous, found a greater part of their sustenance in edible
roots extracted from the soil, in nuts, seeds of wild grains, and
grasses. It is true they captured a little wild game, and in certain
seasons many of them made excursions to the ocean or frequented the
streams for fish or shell-fish, but their chief diet was vegetable. It
must be remembered, also, that all of the cultivated fruits to-day
formerly existed, in one variety or another, in the wild species. Thus
the citrous fruits, the date, the banana, breadfruit, papaw, persimmon,
apple, cherry, plum, pear, all grew in a wild state, providing food for
man if he were ready to take it as provided. Rational selection has
assisted nature in improving the quality of grains and fruits and in
developing new varieties.
In the tropical regions was found the greatest supply of edible fruits.
Thus the Malays and the Papuans find sufficient food on trees to supply
their wants. Many people in some of the groups in the South Sea
Islands live on cocoanuts. In South America several species of trees
are cultivated by the natives for the food they furnish. The palm
family contributes much food to the natives, and also furnishes a large
supply of food to the markets of the world. The well-known breadfruit
tree bears during eight successive months in the year, and by burying
the fruit in the ground it may be preserved for food for the remaining
four months. Thus a single plant may be made to provide a continuous
food supply for the inhabitants of the Moluccas and Philippines. Many
other instances of fruits in abundance, such as the nuts from the
araucarias of South America, and beans from the mesquite of Mexico,
might be given to show that it is possible for man to subsist without
the use of animal food.
_The Variety of Food Was Constantly Increased_.--Undoubtedly, one of
the chief causes of the wandering of primitive man over the earth, in
the valleys, along stream, lake, and ocean, {86} over the plains and
through the hills, was the quest for food to preserve life; and even
after tribes became permanent residents in a certain territory, there
was a constant shifting from one source of food supply to another
throughout the seasons. However, after tribes became more settled, the
increase of population encroached upon the native food supply, and man
began to use his invention for the purpose of its increase. He learned
how to plant seeds which were ordinarily believed to be sown by the
gods, and to till the soil and raise fruits and vegetables for his own
consumption. This was a period of accidental agriculture, or hoe
culture, whereby the ground was tilled by women with hoes of stone, or
bone, or wood. In the meantime, the increase of animal food became a
necessity. Man learned how to snare and trap animals, to fish and to
gather shell-fish, learning by degrees to use new foods as discovered
as nature left them. Life become a veritable struggle for existence as
the population increased and the lands upon which man dwelt yielded
insufficient supply of food. The increased variety of food allowed man
to adapt himself to the different climates. Thus in the colder
climates animal food became desirable to enable him to resist more
readily the rigors of climate. It was not necessary, it is supposed,
to give him physical courage or intellectual development, for there
appear to be evidences of tribes like the Maoris of New Zealand, who on
the diet of fish and roots became a most powerful and sagacious people.
But the change from a vegetable diet to a meat-and-fish diet in the
early period brought forth renewed energy of body and mind, not only on
account of the necessary physical exertion but on account of the
invention of devices for the capture of fish and game.
_The Food Supply Was Increased by Inventions_.--Probably the first meat
food supply was in the form of shell-fish which could be gathered near
the shores of lakes and streams. Probably small game was secured by
the use of stones and sticks and by running the animal down until he
was exhausted or until he hid in a place inaccessible to the pursuer.
The {87} boomerang, as used by the Australians in killing game, may
have been an early product of the people of Neolithic Europe. In the
latter part of the Paleolithic Age, fish-hooks of bone were used, and
probably snares invented for small game. The large game could not be
secured without the use of the spear and the co-operation of a number
of hunters. In all probability this occurred in the New Stone Age.
The invention of the bow-and-arrow was of tremendous importance in
securing food. It is not known what led to its invention, although the
discovery of the flexible power of the shrub, or the small sapling,
must have occurred to man as he struggled through the brush. It is
thought by some that the use of the bow fire-drill, which was for the
purpose of striking fire by friction, might have displayed driving
power when the drill wound up in the string of the bow flew from its
confinement. However, this is conjectural; but, judging from the
inventions of known tribes, it is evident that necessity has always
been the moving power in invention. The bow-and-arrow was developed in
certain centres and probably through trade and exchange extended to
other tribes and groups until it was universally used. It is
interesting to note how many thousands of years this must have been the
chief weapon for destroying animals or crippling game at a distance.
Even as late as the Norman conquest, the bow-and-arrow was the chief
means of defense of the Anglo-Saxon yeoman, and for many previous
centuries in the historic period had been the chief implement in
warfare and in the chase. The use of the spear in fishing supplemented
that of the hook, and is found among all low-cultured tribes of the
present day. The American Indian will stand on a rock in the middle of
a stream, silently, for an hour if necessary, watching for a chance to
spear a salmon. These small devices were of tremendous importance in
increasing the food supply, and the making of them became a permanent
industry.
Along with the bow and arrow were developed many kinds of spears, axes,
and hammers, invented chiefly to be used in {88} war, but also used for
economic reasons. In the preparation of animal food, in the tanning of
skins, in the making of clothing, another set of stone implements was
developed. So, likewise, in the grinding of seeds, the mortar and
pestle were used, and the small hand-mill or grinder was devised. The
sign of the mortar and pestle at the front of drug-stores brings to
mind the fact that its first use was not for preparing medicines, but
for grinding grains and seeds.
_The Discovery and Use of Fire_.--The use of fire was practised in the
early history of man. Among the earliest records in caves are found
evidences of the use of fire. Charcoal is practically indestructible,
and, although it may be crushed, the small particles maintain their
shape in the clays and sands. In nearly all of the relics of man
discovered in caves, the evidences of fire are to be found, and no
living tribe has yet been discovered so low in the scale of life as to
be without the knowledge of fire and probably its simple uses, although
a few tribes have been for the time being without fire when first
discovered. This might seem to indicate that at a very early period
man did not know how to create fire artificially, but carried it and
preserved it in his wanderings. There are indications that a certain
individual was custodian of the fire, and later it was carried by the
priest or _cacique_. Here, as in other instances in the development of
the human race, an economic factor soon assumes a religious
significance, and fire becomes sacred.
There are many conjectures respecting the discovery of fire. Probably
the two real sources are of lightning that struck forest trees and set
them on fire and the action of volcanoes in throwing out burning lava,
which ignited combustible material. Either one or the other, and
perhaps both, of these methods may have furnished man with fire.
Others have suggested that the rubbing together of dead limbs of trees
in the forests after they were moved by the winds, may have created
fire by friction. It is possible, also, that the sun's rays may have,
when concentrated on combustible {89} material, caused spontaneous
ignition. The idea has been advanced that some of the forest fires of
recent times have been ignited in this way. However, it is evident
that there are enough natural sources in the creation of fire to enable
tribes to use it for the purposes of artificial heat, cooking, and
later, in the age of metals, of smelting ores.
There has always been a mystery connected with the origin and use of
fire, which has led to many myths. Thus, the Greeks insisted that
Prometheus, in order to perform a great service to humanity, stole fire
from heaven and gave it to man. For this crime against the authority
of the gods, he was chained to a rock to suffer the torture of the
vulture who pecked at his vitals. Aeschylus has made the most of this
old legend in his great drama of _Prometheus Bound_. Nearly every
tribe or nation has some tradition regarding the origin of fire.
Because of its mystery and its economic value, it was early connected
with religion and made sacred in many instances. It was thus preserved
at the altar, never being allowed to become extinct without the fear of
dire calamity. Perhaps the economic and religious ideas combined,
because tribes in travelling from place to place exercised great care
to preserve it. The use of fire in worship became almost universal
among tribes and ancient nations. Thus the Hebrews and the Aryans,
including Greeks, Romans, and Persians, as well as the Chinese and
Japanese, used fire in worship. Among other tribes it was worshipped
as a symbol or even as a real deity. Even in the Christian religion,
the use of the burning incense may have some psychological connection
with the idea of purification through fire. Whether its mysterious
nature led to its connection with worship, and the superstition
connected with its continued burning, or whether from economic reasons
it became a sacred matter, has never been determined. The custom that
a fire should never go out upon the altar, and that it should be
carried in migrations from place to place, would seem to indicate that
these two motives were closely allied, if not related in cause and
effect.
{90}
Evidently, fire was used for centuries before man invented methods of
reproducing it. Simple as the process involved, it was a great
invention; or it may be stated that many devices were resorted to for
the creation of artificial fire. Perhaps the earliest was that of
rubbing two pieces of dry wood together, producing fire by friction.
This could be accomplished by persistent friction of two ordinary
pieces of dry wood, or by drilling a hole in a dry piece of wood with a
pointed stick until heat was developed and a spark produced to ignite
pieces of dry bark or grass. Another way was to make a groove in a
block of wood and run the end of a stick rapidly back and forth through
the groove. An invention called the fire-drill was simply a method of
twirling rapidly in the hand a wooden drill which was in contact with
dry wood, or by winding a string of the bow several times around the
drill and moving the bow back and forth horizontally, giving rapid
motion to the drill.
As tribes became more advanced, they used two pieces of flint with
which to strike fire, and after the discovery of iron, the flint and
iron were used. How many centuries these simple devices were essential
to the progress and even to the life of tribes, is not known; but when
we realize that but a few short years ago our fathers lighted the fire
with flint and steel, and that before the percussion cap was invented,
the powder in the musket was ignited by flint and hammer, we see how
important to civilization were these simple devices of producing fire
artificially. So simple an invention as the discovery of the friction
match saved hours of labor and permitted hours of leisure to be used in
other ways. It is one of the vagaries of human progress that a simple
device remains in use for thousands of years before its clumsy method
gives way to a new invention only one step in advance of the old.
_Cooking Added to the Economy of the Food Supply_.--Primitive man
doubtless consumed his food raw. The transition of the custom of
uncooked food to cooked food must have been gradual. We only know that
many of the backward tribes of {91} to-day are using primitive methods
of cooking, and the man of the Stone Ages had methods of cooking the
meat of animals. In all probability, the suggestion came as people
were grouped around the fire for artificial heat, and then, either by
intention or desire, the experiment of cooking began. After man had
learned to make water-tight baskets, a common device of cooking was to
put water in the basket and, after heating stones on a fire, put them
in the basket to heat the water and then place the food in the basket
to be cooked. This method is carried on by the Indians in some parts
of Alaska to this day, where they use a water-tight basket for this
purpose. Probably this method of cooking food was a later development
than the roasting of food on coals or in the ashes, or in the use of
the wooden spit. Catlin, in his _North American Indians_, relates that
certain tribes of Indians dig a hole in the ground and line it with
hide filled with water, then place hot stones in the water, in which
they place their fish, game, or meat for cooking. This is interesting,
because it carries out a more or less universal idea of adaptation to
environment. Probably the plains Indians had no baskets or other
vessels to use for this purpose, but they are found to have used
similar methods of cooking grasshoppers. They dig a hole in the
ground, build a fire in the hole, and take the fire out and put in the
grasshoppers. Thus, they have an exhibition of the first fireless
cooker.
It is thought by some that the need of vessels which would endure the
heat was the cause of the invention of pottery. While there seems to
be little evidence of this, it is easy to conjecture that when water
was needed to be heated in a basket, a mass of clay would be put on the
bottom of the basket before it was put over the coals of fire. After
the cooking was done, the basket could easily be detached from the
clay, leaving a hard-baked bowl. This led to the suggestion of making
bowls of clay and baking them for common use. Others suggest that the
fact of making holes in the ground for cooking purposes gave the
suggestion that by the use of clay a portable vessel might be made for
similar purposes.
{92}
The economic value of cooking rests in the fact that a larger utility
comes from the cooked than from the raw food. Though the phenomena of
physical development of tribes and nations cannot be explained by the
chemical constituents of food, although they are not without a positive
influence. Evidently the preparation of food has much to do with man's
progress, and the art of cooking was a great step in advance. The
better utilization of food was a time-saving process--and, indeed, in
many instances may have been a life-saving affair.
_The Domestication of Animals_.--The time and place of the
domestication of animals are not satisfactorily determined. We know
that Paleolithic man had domesticated the dog, and probably for
centuries this was the only animal domesticated; but it is known that
low forest tribes have tamed monkeys and parrots for pets, and savage
tribes frequently have a band of dogs for hunting game or guarding the
hut. While it may be supposed that domestication of animals may have
occurred in the prehistoric period, the use of such animals has been in
the historic period. There are many evidences of the domesticated dog
at the beginning of the Neolithic period. However, these animals may
have still been nearly half wild. It is not until the period of the
Lake Dwellings of Switzerland that we can discriminate between the wild
animals and those that have been tamed. In the Lake Dwelling débris
are found the bones of the wild bull, or _urus_, of Europe. Probably
this large, long-horned animal was then in a wild state, and had been
hunted for food. Alongside of these remains are those of a small,
short-horned animal, supposed to have been domesticated. Later, though
still in the Neolithic period, remains of short-horned tame cattle
appear in the refuse of the Lake Dwellings. It is thought by some that
these two varieties--the long-horned _urus_ and the short-horned
domesticated animal brought from the south--were crossed, which gave
rise to the origin of the present stock of modern cattle in central
Europe. Pigs and sheep were probably domesticated in Asia {93} and
brought into Europe during the later Neolithic or early Bronze period.
The horse was domesticated in Asia, and Clark Wissler[1] shows that to
be one great centre of cultural distribution for this animal. It
spread from Asia into Europe, and from Europe into America. The llama
was early domesticated in South America. The American turkey had its
native home in Mexico, the hen in Asia. The dog, though domesticated
very early in Asia, has gone wherever the human race has migrated, as
the constant companion of man. The horse, while domesticated in Asia,
depends upon the culture of Europe for his large and extended use, and
has spread over the world. We find that in the historic period the
Aryan people everywhere made use of the domesticated goat, horse, and
dog. In the northern part of Europe, the reindeer early became of
great service to the inhabitants for milk, meat, and clothing. The
great supply of milk and meat from domesticated animals added
tremendously to the food supply of the race, and made it possible for
it to develop in other lines. Along with the food supply has been the
use of these animals for increasing the clothing supply through hides,
furs, skins, and wool. The domestication of animals laid the
foundation for great economic advancement.
_The Beginnings of Agriculture Were Very Meagre_.--Man ha
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