We welcomed kindly the first installment of Mr. Buckle's work,[29]
giving a cursory account of it, and hinting, rather than urging,
the objections which readily suggested themselves against theories
concerning Man, History, Civilization, and Human Progress. But now
it seems a proper time to discuss with a little more deliberation
the themes opened before us by this intrepid writer,--this latest
champion of that theory of the mind which in the last century was
called Materialism and Necessity, and which in the present has been
re-baptized as Positivism.
The doctrines of which Mr. Buckle is the ardent advocate seem to us,
the more thoroughly we consider them, to be essentially theoretical,
superficial, and narrow. They are destitute of any broad basis of
reality. In their application by Mr. Buckle, they fail to solve
the historic problems upon which he tries their power. With a show
of science, they are unscientific, being a mere collection of
unverified hypotheses. And if Mr. Buckle should succeed in introducing
his principles and methods into the study of history, it would
be equivalent to putting backward for about a century this whole
department of thought.
Yet, while we state this as our opinion, and one which we shall
presently endeavor to substantiate by ample proof, we do not deny to
Mr. Buckle's volumes the interest arising from vigorous and independent
thinking, faithful study of details, and a strong, believing purpose.
They are interesting and valuable contributions to our literature.
But this is not on account of their purpose, but in spite of it;
notwithstanding their doctrines, not because of them. The interest
of these books, as of all good history, derives itself from their
picturesque reproduction of life. Whatever of value belongs to Mr.
Buckle's work is the same as that of the writings of Macaulay, Motley,
and Carlyle. Whoever has the power of plunging like a diver into the
spirit of another period, sympathizing with its tone, imbuing himself
with its instincts, sharing its loves and hates, its faith and its
skepticism, will write its history so as to interest us. For whoever
will really show to us the breathing essence of any age, any state of
society, or any course of human events, cannot fail of exciting that
element of the soul which causes man everywhere to rejoice in meeting
with man. He who will write the history of Arabians, Kelts, or Chinese,
of the Middle Ages, the Norman Sea-kings, or the Roman Plebs, so
that we can see ourselves beneath these diverse surroundings of race,
country, and period, and see that these also are really MEN,--this
writer instantly awakens our interest, whether he call himself poet,
novelist, or historian. In all cases, the secret of success is to write
so as to enable the reader to identify himself with the characters
of another age. Great authors enable us to look at actions, not
from without, but from within. When we read the historic plays of
Shakespeare, or the historic novels of Scott, we are charmed by finding
that kings and queens are, after all, our poor human fellow-creatures,
sharing all our old, familiar struggles, pains, and joys. When we read
that great historic masterpiece, the "French Revolution" of Carlyle,
the magic touch of the artist introduces us into the heart of every
character in the motley, shifting scene. We are the poor king escaping
to Varennes under the dewy night and solemn stars. We are tumultuous
Mirabeau, with his demonic but generous soul. We are devoted Charlotte
Corday; we are the Gironde; we the poor prisoners of Terror, waiting in
our prison for the slow morning to bring the inevitable doom. This is
the one indispensable faculty for the historian; and this faculty Mr.
Buckle so far possesses as to make his page a living one. It is true
that his sympathy is intellectual rather than imaginative. It is not of
the high order of Shakespeare, nor even of that of Carlyle. But, so
far as it goes, it is a true faculty, and makes a true historian.
Yet we cannot but notice how the effectual working of this historic
organ is interfered with by the dogmatic purpose of Mr. Buckle; and,
on the other hand, how his theoretic aim is disturbed by the interest
of his narrative. His history is always meant to be an argument. His
narrations of events are never for their own sake, but always to
prove some thesis. There is, therefore, no consecutive narrative, no
progress of events, no sustained interest. These volumes are episodes,
put together we cannot well say how, or why. In the seventh chapter
of the first volume we have a graphic description of the Court life
in England in the days of Charles II., James II., William, and the
Georges, in connection with the condition of the Church and clergy.
From this we are taken, in the next chapter, to France, and to similar
relations between Henry IV., Louis XIII., Richelieu, and the French
Catholics and Protestants. We then are brought back to England, to
consider the protective system there; and once more we return to
France, to investigate its operation in that country. Afterward we have
an essay on "The State of Historical Literature in France from the
End of the Sixteenth to the End of the Eighteenth Century," followed
by another essay on the "Proximate Causes of the French Revolution."
Many very well finished biographic portraits are given us in these
chapters. There are excellent sketches of Burke, Voltaire, Richelieu,
Bossuet, Montesquieu, Rousseau, Bichat, in the first volume; and of
Adam Smith, Reid, Black, Leslie, Hutton, Cullen, Hunter, in the second.
These numerous biographic sketches, which are often accompanied with
good literary notices of the writings of these authors, are very ably
written; but it is curious to remember, while reading them, that Mr.
Buckle thinks that, as history advances, it has less and less to do
with biography.
There is an incurable defect in the method of this work. On the one
hand, the dogmatic purpose is constantly breaking into the interest
of the narration; on the other, the interest of the narration is
continually enticing the writer from his argument into endless episodes
and details of biography. The argument is deprived of its force by the
story; the story is interrupted continually on account of the argument.
Mr. Buckle has mistaken the philosophy of history for history itself.
A history of civilization is not a piece of metaphysical argument, but
a consecutive account of the social progress either of an age or of a
nation. This irreconcilable conflict of purpose, while it leaves to the
parts of the work their value, destroys its worth as a whole.
Mr. Buckle might probably inquire whether we would eliminate wholly
from history all philosophic aim, all teleologic purpose. He objects,
and very properly, to degrading history into mere annals, without any
instructive purpose. We agree with him. We do not admire the style
of history which feels neither passion nor sympathy, which narrates
crimes without indignation, and which has no aim in its narration
except to entertain a passing hour. But it is one thing deliberately
to announce a thesis and bring detached passages of history to prove
it, and another to write a history which, by its incidents, spirit,
and characters shall convey impulse and instruction. The historian
may dwell upon the events which illustrate his convictions, and may
develop the argument during the progress of his moving panorama; but
the history itself, as it moves, should impress the lesson. The history
of Mr. Motley, for example, illustrates and impresses the evils of
bigotry, superstition, and persecution on the life of nations, quite as
powerfully as does that of Mr. Buckle; but Mr. Motley never suspends
his narrative in order to prove to us logically that persecution is an
evil.
Mr. Buckle, in his style of writing, belongs to a modern class of
authors whom we may call the bullying school. It is true that he is far
less extravagant than some of them, and indeed is not deeply tinged
with their peculiar manner. The first great master of this class of
writers is Thomas Carlyle; but their peculiarity has been carried to
its greatest extent by Ruskin. Its characteristic feature is treating
with supreme contempt, as though they were hopeless imbeciles, all who
venture to question the _dicta_ of the writer. This superb arrogance
makes these writers rather popular with the English, who, as a nation,
like equally well to bully and to be bullied.
Buckle professes to have at last found the only true key to history,
and to have discovered some of its important laws, especially those
which regard the progress of civilization.
I. _His View of Freedom._--Mr. Buckle's fundamental position is, that
the actions of men are governed by fixed laws, and that, when these
laws are discovered, history will become a science, like geometry,
geology, or astronomy. The chief obstacle hitherto to its becoming a
science has been the belief that the actions of men were determined,
not by fixed laws, but by free will (which he considers equivalent
to chance), or by supernatural interference or providence (which he
regards as equivalent to fate). "We shall thus be led," he says (Vol.
I. p. 6, Am. ed.), "to one vast question, which, indeed, lies at the
root of the whole subject, and is simply this: Are the actions of men,
and therefore of societies, governed by fixed laws, or are they the
result either of chance or of supernatural interference?" Identifying
freedom with chance, Mr. Buckle denies that there is such a thing, and
maintains that every human action is determined by some antecedent,
inward or outward, and that not one is determined by the free choice
of the man himself. His principal argument against free will is the law
of averages, which we will therefore proceed to consider in its bearing
on this point.
Statistics, carefully collected during many years and within different
countries, show a regularity of return in certain vices and crimes,
which indicates the presence of law. Thus, about the same number of
murders are committed every year in certain countries and large cities,
and even the instruments by which they are committed are employed in
the same proportion. Suicide also follows some regular law. "In a
given state of society, a certain number of persons must put an end to
their own life." In London, about two hundred and forty persons kill
themselves every year,--in years of panic and disaster a few more, in
prosperous years not quite so many. Other actions of men are determined
in the same way,--not by personal volition, but by some controlling
circumstance. "It is now known that the number of marriages in England
bears a fixed and definite relation to the price of corn." "Aberrations
of memory are marked by this general character of necessary and
invariable order." The same average number of persons forget every
year to direct the letters dropped into the post-offices of London and
Paris. Facts of this kind "force us to the conclusion," says Buckle,
"that the offenses of men are the result, not so much of the vices of
the individual offender, as of the state of society into which he is
thrown."
The argument then is: If man's moral actions are under law, they are
not free, for freedom is the absence of law. The argument of Mr. Buckle
is conclusive, provided freedom does necessarily imply the absence of
law. But such, we think, is not the fact.
The actions of man do not proceed solely from the impact of external
circumstances; for then he would be no better than a ball struck with a
bat. Nor do they proceed solely from the impulses of his animal nature;
for then he would be only a superior kind of machine, moved by springs
and wheels. But in addition to external and internal impulse there is
also in man the power of personal effort, activity, will,--to which we
give the name of Free Choice, or Freedom. This modifies and determines
a part of his actions,--while a second part come from the influence
of circumstance, and a third from organic instincts and habitual
tendencies.
Now, it is quite certain that no man has freedom of will enough to
cause _his whole_ nexus of activity to proceed from it. For if a man
could cause _all_ his actions to proceed by a mere choice or effort,
he could turn himself at will into another man. In other words, there
could be no such thing as permanent moral character. No one could be
described; for while we were describing him, he might choose to be
different, and so would become somebody else. It is evident, therefore,
that some part of every man's life must lie outside of the domain of
freedom.
In what, then, does the essence of freedom consist? If it be not the
freedom to do whatever we choose, what is it? Plainly, if we analyze
our own experience, we shall find that it is simply what its scholastic
name implies, freedom of choice, or _liber arbitrio_. It is not, in the
last analysis, freedom to act, but it is freedom to choose.
But freedom to choose what? Can we choose anything? Certainly not. Our
freedom of choice is limited by our knowledge. We cannot choose that
which we do not know. We must choose something within the range of our
experience. And our freedom of choice consists in the alternative of
making this choice or omitting to make it,--exerting ourselves or not
exerting ourselves. Consciousness testifies universally to this extent
of freedom. We know by our consciousness that we can exert ourselves or
not exert ourselves at any moment,--exert ourselves to act or not exert
ourselves to act, to speak or not to speak. This power of making or not
making an effort is freedom in its simplest and lowest form.
In this lowest form, it is apparent that human freedom is inadequate to
give any permanent character to human actions. They will be directed by
the laws of organization and circumstance. Freedom in this sense may
be compared to the power which a man has of rowing a boat in the midst
of a fog. He may exert himself to row, he may row at any moment forward
or backward, to the right or to the left. He has this freedom,--but it
does not enable him to go in any special direction. Not being able to
direct his boat to any fixed aim, it is certain that it will be drifted
by the currents or blown by the winds. Freedom in this form is only
willfulness, because devoid of an inward law.
But let the will direct itself by a fixed law, and it at once becomes
true freedom, and begins to impress itself upon actions, modifying the
results of organization and circumstance. Not even in this case can
it destroy those results; it only modifies them. It enters as a third
factor with those other two to produce the product. The total character
of a man's actions will be represented by a formula, thus: John's
Organization × John's Circumstances × John's Freedom = John's Character.
Apply this to the state of society where the law of averages has been
discovered. In such a society there are always to be found three
classes of persons. In the first class, freedom is either dormant or
is mere willfulness. The law of mind is subject therefore in these to
the law of the members. The will is an enslaved will, and its influence
on action is a nullity, not needing to be taken into the account. From
this class come the largest proportion of the crimes and vices, regular
in number because resulting from constant conditions of society. Of
these persons we can predict with certainty that, under certain strong
temptations to evil, they will inevitably yield.
But in another class of persons the will has learned to direct itself
by a moral law toward a fixed aim. The man in the boat is now steering
by a compass, and ceases to be the sport of current and gale. The will
reacts upon organization, and directs circumstance. The man has learned
how to master his own nature, and how to arrange external conditions.
We can predict with certainty that under no possible influences will
this class yield to some forms of evil.
There is also in each community a third class, who are struggling, but
not emancipated. They are partly free, but not wholly so. From this
class come the slight variations of the average, now a little better,
now a little worse.
Applying this view of the freedom of the will to history, we see that
the problem is far more complicated than Mr. Buckle admits. Man's
freedom, with him, is an element not to be taken into consideration,
because it does not exist. But the truth is, that human freedom is
not only a factor, but a variable factor, the value of which changes
with every variety of human condition. In the savage condition it
obeys organization and circumstances, and has little effect on social
condition. But as civilization advances, the power of freedom to
react on organization and circumstance increases, varying however
again, according to the force and inspiration of the ideas by which it
is guided. And of all these ideas, precisely those which Mr. Buckle
underrates, namely, moral and religious ideas, are those which most
completely emancipate the will from circumstances, and vitalize it with
an all-conquering force.
To see this, take two extreme cases,--that of an African Hottentot, and
that of Joan of Arc. Free will in the African is powerless; he remains
the helpless child of his situation. But the Maid of Arc, though
utterly destitute of Mr. Buckle's "Intellectual Truths" (being unable
to read or write, and having received no instruction save religious
ideas), and wanting in the "Skepticism" which he thinks so essential to
all historic progress, yet develops a power of will which reacts upon
circumstances so as to turn into another channel the current of French
history. All bonds of situation and circumstance are swept asunder
by the power of a will set free by mighty religious convictions.
The element of freedom, therefore, is one not to be neglected by an
historian, except to his own loss.
The law of averages applies only to undeveloped men, or to the
undeveloped sides of human nature, where the element of freedom has not
come in play. When the human race shall have made such progress that it
shall contain a city inhabited by a million persons all equal to the
Apostle Paul and the Apostle John in spiritual development, it will
not be found that a certain regular number kill their wives every year,
or that from two hundred and thirteen to two hundred and forty annually
commit suicide. Nor will this escape from the averages be owing to an
increased acquaintance with physical laws so much as to a higher moral
development. We shall return to this point, however, when we examine
more fully Buckle's doctrine in regard to the small influence of
religion on civilization.
II. _Mr. Buckle's View of Organization._--Mr. Buckle sets aside
entirely the whole great fact of organization, upon which the science
of ethnology is based. Perhaps the narrowness of his mind shows more
conspicuously in this than elsewhere. He attributes no influence to
race in civilization. While so many eminent writers at the present
day say, with Mr. Knox, that "Race is everything," Mr. Buckle quietly
rejoins that Race is nothing. "Original distinctions of race," he
says, "are altogether hypothetical." "We have no decisive ground for
saying that the moral and intellectual faculties in man are likely to
be greater in an infant born in the most civilized part of Europe,
than in one born in the wildest region of a barbarous country." (Vol.
I. p. 127, Am. ed.) "We often hear of hereditary talents, hereditary
vices, and hereditary virtues; but whoever will critically examine
the evidence will find that we have no proof of their existence." He
doubts the existence of hereditary insanity, or a hereditary tendency
to suicide, or even to disease. (Vol. I. p. 128, note.) He does not
believe in any progress of natural capacity in man, but only of
opportunity, "that is, an improvement in the circumstances under which
that capacity after birth comes into play." "Here then is the gist of
the whole matter. The progress is one, not of internal power, but of
external advantage." He goes on to say, in so many words, that the only
difference between a barbarian child and a civilized child is in the
pressure of surrounding circumstances. In support of these opinions he
quotes Locke and Turgot.
It is difficult to understand how an intelligent and well-informed man,
an immense reader and active thinker, can have lived in the midst of
the nineteenth century and retain these views. For students at every
extreme of thought have equally recognized the force of organization,
the constancy of race, the permanent varieties existing in the human
family, the steady ruling of the laws of descent. If there is any one
part of the science of anthropology in which the nineteenth century has
reversed the judgment of the eighteenth,--and that equally among men of
science, poets, materialists, idealists, anatomists, philologists,--it
is just here. To find so intelligent a man reproducing the last century
in the midst of the present is a little extraordinary.
Perhaps there could not be found four great thinkers more different in
their tendencies of thought and range of study than Goethe, Spurzheim,
Dr. Prichard, and Max Müller; yet these four, each by his own method of
observation, have shown with conclusive force the law of variety and
of permanence in organization. Goethe asserts that every individual
man carries from his birth to his grave an unalterable speciality of
being,--that he is, down to the smallest fibre of his character, one
and the same man; and that the whole mighty power of circumstance,
modifying everything, cannot abolish anything,--that organization and
circumstance hold on together with an equally permanent influence in
every human life. Gall and Spurzheim teach that every fibre of the
brain has its original quality and force, and that such qualities
and forces are transmitted by obscure but certain laws of descent.
Prichard, with immense learning, describes race after race, giving
the types of each human family in its physiology. And, finally, the
great science of comparative philology, worked out by such thinkers
and students as Bopp, Latham, Humboldt, Bunsen, Max Müller, and a
host of others, has proved the permanence of human varieties by ample
glossological evidence. Thus the modern science of ethnology has
arisen, on the basis of physiology, philology, and ethology, and is
perhaps the chief discovery of the age. Yet Mr. Buckle quietly ignores
the whole of it, and continues, with Locke, to regard every human mind
as a piece of white paper, to be written on by external events,--a
piece of soft putty, to be moulded by circumstances.
The facts on which the science of ethnology rests are so numerous and
so striking, that the only difficulty in selecting an illustration
is from the quantity and richness of material. But we may take two
instances,--that of the Teutons and Kelts, to show the permanence
of differences under the same circumstances, and that of the Jews,
the Arabs, and the Gypsies, to show the continuity of identity under
different circumstances. For if it can be made evident that different
races of men preserve different characters, though living for long
periods under similar circumstances, and that the same race preserves
the same character, though living for long periods under different
circumstances, the proof is conclusive that character is _not_ derived
from circumstances only. We shall not indeed go to the extreme of
such ethnologists as Knox, Nott, or Gliddon, and say that "Race is
everything, and circumstances nothing," but we shall see that Mr.
Buckle is mistaken in saying that "Circumstances are everything, and
race nothing."
The differences of character between the German and Keltic varieties
of the human race are marked, but not extreme. They both belong to
the same great Indo-European or Aryan family. They both originated
in Asia, and the German emigration seems to have followed immediately
after that of the Kelts. Yet when described by Cæsar, Tacitus, and
Strabo, they differed from each other exactly as they differ now. They
have lived for some two thousand years in the same climate, under
similar political and social institutions, and yet they have preserved
their original diversity.
According to the description of Cæsar[30] and Tacitus[31] the German
tribes differed essentially from the Gauls or Kelts in the following
particulars. The Germans loved freedom, and were all free. The Kelts
did not care for freedom. The meanest German was free. But all the
inferior people among the Kelts were virtually slaves. The Germans had
no priests, and did not care for sacrifices. The Kelts had a powerful
priesthood and imposing religious rites. The Germans were remarkable
for their blue eyes, light hair, and large limbs. The Kelts were
dark-complexioned. The Gauls were more quick, but less persevering,
than the Germans. Ready to attack, they were soon discouraged.
Tacitus, describing the Germans, says: "They are a pure, unmixed, and
independent race; there is a family likeness through the nation, the
same form and features, stern blue eyes, ruddy hair; a strong sense
of honor; reverence for women; religious, but without a ritual;
superstitiously believing in supernatural signs and portents, but
not in a priesthood; not living in cities, but in scattered homes;
respecting marriage; the children brought up in the dirt, among the
cattle; hospitable, frank, and generous; fond of drinking beer, and
eating preparations of milk."
The German and Keltic races, thus distinguished in the days of Cæsar,
are equally distinct to-day. Catholicism, the religion of a priesthood,
a ritual, and authority, prevails among the Kelts; Protestantism among
the Germans. Ireland, being mainly Keltic, is Catholic, though a part
of a Protestant nation. France, being mainly Keltic, is also Catholic,
in spite of all its illumination, its science, and its knowledge of
"intellectual laws." But as France contains a large infusion of German
(Frankish) blood, it is the most Protestant of Catholic nations; while
Scotland, containing the largest infusion of Keltic blood, is the
most priest-ridden of Protestant nations. This last fact, which Mr.
Buckle asserts, and spends half a volume in trying to account for,
is explained at once by ethnology. Wherever the Germans go to-day,
they remain the same people they were in the days of Tacitus; they
carry the same blue eyes and light hair, the same love of freedom and
hatred of slavery, the same tendencies to individualism in thought
and life, the same tendency to superstitious belief in supernatural
events, even when without belief in any religion or church; and even
the same love for beer, and "lac concretum," now called "schmeercase"
in our Western settlements. The Kelt, also, everywhere continues the
same. He loves equality more than freedom. He is a democrat, but not
an abolitionist. Very social, clannish, with more wit than logic, very
sensitive to praise, brave, but not determined, needing a leader, he
carries the spirit of the Catholic Church into Protestantism, and the
spirit of despotism into free institutions. And that physical, no less
than mental qualities, continue under all climates and institutions is
illustrated by the blue eyes and light hair which the traveller meets
among the Genoese and Florentines, reminding him of their Lombard
ancestors; while their superior tendencies to freedom in church and
state suggest the same origin.
Nineteen hundred years have passed since Julius Cæsar pointed out
these diversities of character then existing between the Germans and
Kelts. Since then they have passed from barbarism to civilization.
Instead of living in forests, as hunters and herdsmen, they have built
cities, engaged in commerce, manufactures, and agriculture. They have
been converted to Christianity, have conquered the Roman empire,
engaged in crusades, fought in a hundred different wars, developed
literatures, arts, and sciences, changed and changed again their forms
of government, have been organized by Feudalism, by Despotism, by
Democracy, have gone through the Protestant reformation, have emigrated
to all countries and climates; and yet, at the end of this long period,
the German everywhere remains a German, and the Kelt a Kelt. The
descriptions of Tacitus and Cæsar still describe them accurately. And
yet Mr. Buckle undertakes to write a history of civilization without
taking the element of race into account.
Perhaps, however, the power of this element of race is illustrated
still more strikingly in the case of the wandering and dispersed
families, who, having ceased to be a nation, continue in their
dispersions to manifest the permanent type of their original and
ineffaceable organization. Wherever the Jew goes, he remains a Jew.
In all climates, under all governments, speaking all languages, his
physical and mental features continue the same. This amazing fact
has been held by many theologians to be a standing miracle of Divine
Providence. But Providence works by law, and through second causes, and
uses in this instance the laws of a specially stubborn organization
and the force of a tenacious and persistent blood to accomplish its
ends. The same kind of blood in the kindred Semitic family of Arabs
produces a like result, though to a less striking degree. The Bedouins
wander for thousands of miles away from their peninsula, but always
continue Arabs in appearance and character. The light, sinewy body and
brilliant dark eye, the abstemious habit and roaming tendency, mark the
Arab in Hindostan or Barbary. It is a thousand years since these nomad
tribes left their native home, but they continue the same people on the
Persian Gulf or amid the deserts of Sahara.
The case of the Gypsies, however, may be still more striking, because
these seem, in their wanderings over the earth, to have gradually
divested themselves of every other common attribute except that of
race. Unlike the Jews and Arabs, they not only adopt the language, but
also the religion, of the country where they happen to be. Yet they
always remain unfused and unassimilated.
The Gypsies first appeared in Europe in 1417, in Moldavia, and thence
spread into Transylvania and Hungary.[32] They afterward passed into
all the countries of Europe, where their number, at the present time,
is supposed to reach 700,000 or 800,000. Everywhere they adopt the
common form of worship, but are without any real faith. Partially
civilized in some countries, they always retain their own language
beside that of the people among whom they live. This language, being
evidently derived from the Sanskrit, settles the question of their
origin. It is common to all their branches through the world; as
are also the sweet voice of their maidens, and their habits of
horse-dealing, fortune-telling, and petty larceny. Without the bond
of religion, history, government, literature, or mutual knowledge and
intercourse, they still remain one and the same people in all their
dispersions. What gives this unity and permanence, if not race? Yet
race, to Mr. Buckle, means nothing.
III. _Mr. Buckle's Theory concerning Skepticism._--One of the laws of
history which Mr. Buckle considers himself to have established, if not
discovered, is that a spirit of skepticism precedes necessarily the
progress of knowledge, and therefore of civilization. By skepticism he
means a doubt of the truth of received opinions. He asserts that "a
spirit of doubt" is the necessary antecedent to "the love of inquiry."
(Vol. I. p. 242, Am. ed.) "Doubt must intervene before investigation
can begin. Here, then, we have the act of doubting as the originator,
or at all events the necessary antecedent, of all progress."
If this were so, progress would be impossible. For the great groundwork
of knowledge for each generation must be laid in the minds of children;
and children learn, not by doubting, but by believing. Children
are actuated at the same time by an insatiable curiosity and an
unquestioning faith. They ask the reason of everything, and they accept
every reason which is given them. If they stopped to question and to
doubt, they would learn very little. But by not doubting at all, while
they are made to believe some errors, they acquire an immense amount of
information. Kind Mother Nature understands the process of learning and
the principle of progress much better than Mr. Buckle, and fortunately
supplies every new generation of children with an ardent desire for
knowledge, and a disposition to believe everything they hear.
Perhaps, however, Mr. Buckle refers to men rather than children. He
may not insist on children's stopping to question everything they hear
before they believe. But in men perhaps this spirit is essential to
progress. What great skeptics, then, have been also great discoverers?
Which was the greatest discoverer, Leibnitz or Bayle, Sir Isaac Newton
or Voltaire? A faith amounting nearly to credulity is almost essential
to discovery,--a faith which foresees what it cannot prove, which
follows suggestions and hints, and so traces the faintest impressions
left by the flying footsteps of truth. The attitude of the intellect in
all discovery is not that of doubt, but of faith. The discoverer always
appears to critical and skeptical men as a visionary.
"To skepticism," says Mr. Buckle, "we owe the spirit of inquiry,
which, during the last two centuries, has gradually encroached on
every possible subject, and reformed every department of practical
and speculative knowledge." But this is plainly what logicians call
a ὕστερον πρότερον {hysteron proteron}, or what common people call
"putting the cart before the horse." It is not skepticism which
produces the spirit of inquiry, but the spirit of inquiry which
produces skepticism. It was not a doubt concerning the Mosaic cosmogony
which led to the study of geology; the study of geology led to the
doubt of the cosmogony. Skepticism concerning the authority of the
Church did not lead to the discovery of the Copernican system; the
discovery of the Copernican system led to doubts concerning the
authority of the Church which denied it. People do not begin by
doubting, but by seeking. The love of knowledge leads them to inquire,
and inquiry shows to them new truths. The new truths, being found to be
opposed to received opinions, cause a doubt concerning those opinions
to arise in the mind. Skepticism, therefore, may easily follow, but
does not precede inquiry.
Skepticism, being a negative principle, is necessarily unproductive
and barren. To have no strong belief, no fixed opinion, no vital
conviction for or against anything,--this is surely not a state of
intellect favorable to any great creation or discovery. Goethe, who was
certainly no bigot, says, in a volume of his posthumous works, that
skepticism is only an inverted superstition, and that this skepticism
is one of the chief evils of the present age. "It is worse," he adds,
"than superstition, for superstition is the inheritance of energetic,
heroic, progressive natures; skepticism belongs to weak, contracted,
shrinking men, who venture not out of themselves." Lord Bacon says
("Advancement of Learning," Book II.) that doubts have their advantages
in learning, of which he mentions two, but says that "both these
commodities do scarcely countervail an inconvenience which will intrude
itself, if it be not debarred; which is, that when a doubt is once
received, men labor rather how to keep it a doubt than how to solve
it." It will be seen, therefore, that Lord Bacon gives to skepticism
scarcely more encouragement than is given it by Goethe.
Mr. Buckle says (Vol. I. p. 250) that "Skepticism, which in physics
must always be the beginning of science, in religion must always be
the beginning of toleration." We have seen that in physics skepticism
is rather the end of science than its beginning, and the same is true
of toleration. Skepticism does not necessarily produce toleration. The
Roman augurs, who laughed in each other's faces, were quite ready to
assist at the spectacle of Christians thrown to the lions. Skeptics,
not having any inward conviction as a support, rest on established
opinions, and are angry at seeing them disturbed. A strong belief is
sufficient for itself, but a half-belief wishes to put down all doubts
by force. This is well expressed by Thomas Burnet (Epistola 2, De Arch.
Phil.): "Non potui non in illam semper propendere opinionem, Neminem
irasci in veritate defendenda, qui eandem plene possidet, viditque
in claro lumine. Evidens enim, et indubitata ratio, sibi sufficit
et acquiescit: aliisque a scopo oberrantibus, non tam succenset,
quam miseretur. Sed cum argumentorum adversantium aculeos sentimus,
et quodammodo periclitari causam nostram, tum demum æstuamus, et
effervescimus."
The least firm believers have often been the most violent persecutors.
Nero persecuted the Christians; Marcus Antoninus persecuted them;
but neither Nero nor Antoninus had any religious reason for this
persecution. Antoninus, the best head of his time, was a sufficient
skeptic to suit Mr. Buckle, as regards all points of the established
religion, but his skepticism did not prevent him from being a
persecutor. Unbelieving Popes, like Alexander VI. and Leo X., have
persecuted. True toleration is not born of unbelief, as Mr. Buckle
supposes, but of a deeper faith. Religious liberty has not been given
to the world by skeptics, but by such men as Milton, Baxter, Jeremy
Taylor, and Roger Williams.
So far from general skepticism being the antecedent condition of
intellectual progress and discovery, it is a sign of approaching
intellectual stagnation and decay. A great religious movement usually
precedes and prepares the way for a great mental development. Thus the
religious activity born of Protestantism showed its results in England
in the age of Elizabeth, and in a general outbreak of intellectual
activity over all Europe. On the other hand, the skepticism of the
eighteenth century was accompanied by comparative stagnation of thought
throughout Christendom.
IV. _Mr. Buckle's View of the small Influence of Religion on
Civilization._--Mr. Buckle thinks it is erroneous to suppose that
religion is one of the prime movers of human affairs. (Vol. I. p. 183.)
Religion, according to him, has little to do with human progress.
In this opinion, he differs from nearly all other great historians
and philosophical thinkers. In modern times, Hegel, Niebuhr, Guizot,
Arnold, and Macaulay, among others, have discussed the part taken by
religious ideas in the development of man, laying the greatest stress
on this element. But Mr. Buckle denies that religion is one of the
prime movers in human affairs. The Crusades have been thought to have
exercised some influence on European civilization. But religion was
certainly the prime mover of the Crusades. Mohammedanism exercised
some influence on the development of European life. But Mohammedanism
was an embodiment of religious ideas. The Protestant Reformation
shook every institution, every nation, every part of social life, in
Christendom, and Europe rocked to its foundations under the influence
of this great movement. But religion was the prime mover of it all.
The English Revolution turned on religious ideas. The rise of the
Dutch Republic was determined by them. In one form they colonized South
America and Mexico; in another form, they planted New England. Such
great constructive minds as those of Alfred and Charlemagne have been
benevolently inspired by rational religion; such dark, destructive
natures as those of Philip II. of Spain, Catharine de Medicis of
France, and Mary Tudor of England have been malevolently inspired by
fanatical religion.
On what grounds, then, does Mr. Buckle dispute the influence of
religion? On two grounds mainly. First, he tells us that moral ideas
are not susceptible of progress, and therefore cannot have exercised
any perceptible influence on the progress of civilization. For that
which does not change, he argues, cannot influence that which changes.
That which has been known for thousands of years cannot be the cause
of an event which took place for the first time only yesterday. "Since
civilization is the product of moral and intellectual agencies,"
says Mr. Buckle, "and since that product is constantly changing, it
cannot be regulated by the stationary agent; because when surrounding
circumstances are unchanged, a stationary agent can produce only a
stationary effect." On this principle, gravitation could not be the
cause of the appearance of Donati's comet in the neighborhood of the
sun. For gravitation is a stationary and uniform agent; it cannot
therefore produce an accelerated motion. Mr. Buckle will answer, that
though the law of gravitation is one and the same in all ages, and
uniform in its action, the result of its action may be different at
different times, according to the position in the universe of the
object acted upon. True; and in like manner we may say, that, though
religious ideas are immutable, the result of their action on the
human mind may be different, according to the position of that mind
in relation to them. The doctrine of one God, the Maker and Lord of
all things, was not a new one, or one newly discovered in the seventh
century. Yet when applied by Mohammed to the Arabian mind, it was like
a spark coming in contact with gunpowder. Those wandering sons of the
desert, unknown before in the affairs of the world, and a negative
quantity in human history, sprang up a terrible power, capable of
overrunning and conquering half the earth. Religion awakened them;
religion organized them; religion directed them. The fact that an idea
is an old one is no proof, therefore, that it may not suddenly begin to
act with awful efficiency on civilization and the destiny of man.
The other reason given by Mr. Buckle why religious ideas have little
influence in history is, that the religion of a nation is symptomatic
of its mental and moral state. Men take the religious ideas which
suit them. A religion not suited to a people cannot be accepted by
it; or, if accepted, has no influence on it. This thought, argued at
considerable length by Mr. Buckle, is so perfectly true as to be a
truism. The religion of a people is no doubt an effect. But may it
not also be a cause? It, no doubt, cannot be received by a people
not prepared for it. But does it therefore exercise no influence on
a people which it finds prepared? Fire cannot explode an unexplosive
material, nor inflame one not inflammable. But does it follow that it
effects nothing when brought into contact with one which is inflammable
or explosive? A burning coal laid on a rock or put into the water
produces no effect. But does this prove that the explosion of gunpowder
is in no manner due to the contact of fire?
"The religion of mankind," says Mr. Buckle, "is the effect of their
improvement, and not the cause of it." His proof is that missions and
missionaries among the heathen produce only a superficial change among
barbarous and unenlightened tribes. Knowledge, he says, must prepare
the way for it. There must, no doubt, be some kind of preparation for
Christianity. But does it follow that Christianity, when its way is
prepared, is _only_ an effect? Why may it not be also a cause? Judaism
prepared the way for Christianity. But did not Christianity produce
some effect on Judaism? The Arab mind was prepared for Mohammedanism.
But did not Mohammedanism produce some effect on the Arab mind? Europe
was prepared by various influences for Protestantism. But did not
Protestantism produce some effects on Europe?
It might, with equal truth, and perhaps with greater truth, be asserted
that intellectual ideas are the result of previous training, and that
they are therefore an effect, and by no means a cause. The intellectual
truths accepted by any period depend certainly on the advanced
condition of human culture. You cannot teach logarithms to Hottentots,
trigonometry to Digger Indians, or the differential calculus to the
Feejee Islanders. Hence, according to our author's logic, those very
intellectual ideas which he thinks the only great movers in human
affairs are really no movers at all, but only symptoms of the actual
intellectual condition of a nation.
But it is a curious fact, that, while Mr. Buckle considers religious
ideas of so little importance in the history of civilization, he
nevertheless devotes a large part of both his volumes to proving
the great evil done to civilization by erroneous forms of religious
opinion. Nearly the whole of his second volume is in fact given to
showing the harm done in Spain and Scotland by false systems of
religious thought. Why spend page after page in showing the evil
influence of false religion on society, if religion, whether true or
false, has scarcely any influence at all? Why search through all
the records of religious fanaticism and superstition, to bring up to
the day the ghosts of dead beliefs, if these beliefs are, after all,
powerless either for good or evil?
* * * * *
The second volume, the recent publication of which has suggested this
second review of Mr. Buckle's work, contains much of interest and
value, but suffers from the imperfect method of which we complained at
the beginning of this article. It is chiefly devoted to a description
of the evils resulting from priestcraft in the two countries of Spain
and Scotland. It contains six chapters. The first is on the History of
the Spanish Intellect from the fifth to the middle of the nineteenth
century. The other five chapters relate to Scotland.
In the chapter on Spain Buckle attempts to show how loyalty and
superstition began in this nation, and what has been the result. Of
course, according to his theory, he is obliged to trace their origin to
external circumstances, and he finds the cause of the superstition in
the climate, which produced drought and famine, and in the earthquakes
which alarmed the people. And here Mr. Buckle, following the philosophy
of Lucretius, confounds religion and fear, and puts the occasion for
the cause. But, beside earthquakes, the Arian heresy helped to create
this superstition, by identifying the wars for national independence
with those for religion, and so giving a great ascendency to the
priests. Hence the Church in Spain early acquired great power, and,
naturally allying itself with the government, gave rise to the
sentiment of loyalty, which was increased by the Moorish invasion and
the long wars which followed. Loyalty and superstition thus became so
deeply rooted in the Spanish mind, that they could not be eradicated
by the efforts of the government. Nothing but knowledge can cure this
blind and servile loyalty and this abject superstition, and while Spain
continues sunk in ignorance it must always remain superstitious and
submissive.
Some difficulties, however, suggest themselves in the way of this very
simple explanation. If superstitious loyalty to Church and king comes
from earthquakes, why are not the earthquake regions of the West Indies
and of South America more loyal, instead of being in a state of chronic
revolution? And how came Scotland to be so diseased with loyalty and
superstition, when she is so free from earthquakes? And if knowledge is
such a certain cure for superstition, why was not Spain cured by the
flood of light which she, alone of all European countries, enjoyed in
the Middle Ages? Spain was for a long time the source of science and
art to all Europe, whose Christian sons resorted to her universities
and libraries for instruction. There was taught to English, French,
and German students the philosophy of Aristotle, the Græco-Arabic
literature, mathematics, and natural history. The numerals, gunpowder,
paper, and other inventions of the Arabs, passed into Europe from
Spain. She possessed, therefore, that knowledge of physical laws which
Mr. Buckle declares to be the only cure for superstition. Yet she was
not cured. The nation which, according to his theory, ought to have
been soonest delivered from superstition, according to his statements
has retained its yoke longer than any other.
From Spain Mr. Buckle passes to Scotland, where he finds a still more
complicated problem. Superstition and loyalty ought to go together, he
thinks,--and usually do; but in Scotland they are divorced. The Scotch
have always been superstitious, but disloyal. To the explanation of
this fact Mr. Buckle bends his energies of thought, and of course is
able to find a theory to account for it. This theory we shall not stop
to detail; it is too complex, and at the same time too superficial,
to dwell upon. Its chief point is that the Protestant noblemen and
Protestant clergy quarreled about the wealth of the Catholic Church,
and so there was in Scotland a complete rupture between the two classes
elsewhere in alliance. Thus "the clergy, finding themselves despised
by the governing class, united themselves heartily with the people,
and advocated democratic principles." Such is the explanation given
to the course of history in a great nation. A quarrel between its
noblemen and its ministers (who are of course represented as mercenary
self-seekers) determines its permanent character!
Mr. Buckle, to whom the love of plunder appears as the cause of what
other men regard as loyalty or religion, explains by the same fact the
loyalty of the Highlanders to King Charles. They thought that, if he
conquered, he would allow them to plunder the Lowlanders once more.
This is Buckle's explanation. An ethnologist would have remembered the
fact that the Gaels are pure-blooded Kelts, and that the Kelts _pur
sang_ are everywhere distinguished for loyalty to their chiefs.
Mr. Buckle encounters another difficulty in Scottish history in this,
that though a new and splendid literature arose in Scotland at the
beginning of the eighteenth century, it was unable to diminish national
superstition. It was thoroughly skeptical, and yet did not produce the
appropriate effect of skepticism. So that at this point one of Mr.
Buckle's four great laws of history seems to break down. For a moment
he appears discouraged, and laments, with real pathos, the limitations
of the human intellect. But in the next chapter he addresses himself
again to the solution of his two-fold problem, viz.: "1st, that the
same people should be liberal in their politics and illiberal in their
religion; and, 2d, that their free and skeptical literature in the
eighteenth century should have been unable to lessen their religious
illiberality."
In approaching this part of his task, in the fifth chapter, our
author gives a very elaborate and highly colored picture of the
religion of Scotland. It is _too_ well done. Like some of Macaulay's
descriptions, it is so very striking as to impress us almost inevitably
as a caricature. Every statement in which the horrors and cruelties
of Calvinism are described is indeed reinforced by ample citations
or plentiful references in the footnotes. But some of these seem
capable of a different inference from that drawn in the text. For
instance, he charges the Scottish clergy with teaching, that, though
the arrangements originally made by the Deity to punish his creatures
were ample, "they were insufficient; and hell, not being big enough
to contain the countless victims incessantly poured into it, had in
these latter days been enlarged. There was now sufficient room." He
supports the charge by this reference to Abernethy,--"Hell has enlarged
itself,"--apparently not being aware that Abernethy was merely quoting
from Isaiah. He says that to write poetry was considered by the Scotch
clergy to be a grievous offence, and worthy of special condemnation.
He supports his statement by this reference: "A mastership in a
grammar school was offered in 1767 to John Wilson, the author of
'Clyde'" (a poet, by the by, not found among the twenty John Wilsons
commemorated by Watt). "But, says his biographer, the magistrates and
ministers of Greenock thought fit, before they would admit Mr. Wilson
to the superintendence of the grammar school, to stipulate that he
should abandon 'the profane and unprofitable art of poem-making.'"
This fact, however, by no means proves that poetry was considered,
theologically, a sin, for perhaps it was regarded practically as only a
disqualification. It is to be feared that many of our school committees
now--country shopkeepers, perhaps, or city aldermen--would, apart from
Calvinism, think that a poet must be necessarily a dreamer and an
unpractical man.
A few exaggerations of this kind there may be. But, on the whole, the
account seems to be correctly given; and it is one which will do good.
In the remaining portion of the second volume Mr. Buckle gives a very
vigorous description of the intellectual progress of the Scotch during
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. His account of Adam Smith
as a writer is peculiarly brilliant. His views of Hume and Reid are
ably drawn. Thence he proceeds to discuss the discoveries of Black
and Leslie in natural philosophy, of Smith and Hutton in geology,
of Cavendish in chemistry, of Cullen and Hunter in physiology and
pathology. These discussions are interesting, and show a great range of
knowledge and power of study in the writer. Yet they are episodes, and
have little bearing on the main course of his thought.
We have thus given a cursory survey of these volumes. We do not think
Buckle's philosophy sound, his method good, or his doctrines tenable.
Yet we cannot but sympathize with one who has devoted his strength and
youth with such untiring industry to such a great enterprise. And we
must needs be touched with the plaintive confession which breaks from
his wearied mind and exhausted hope in the last volume, when he accepts
the defeat of his early endeavor, and submits to the disappointment of
his youthful hope. We should be glad to quote the entire passage,[33]
because it is the best in the book, and because he expresses in it, in
the most condensed form, his ideas and purposes as an historic writer.
But our limited space allows us only to commend it to the special
attention of the reader.