BUCKLE AND GEOGRAPHIC SOCIAL THOUGHT
It has long been observed that climate, fertility of soil, rainfall,
and similar factors have had a powerful influence upon human nature
and upon the development of civilization. The chief founders of this
line of thought were Buckle and Ratzel. In recent years Semple and
Huntington have become well-known authorities. Many other thinkers
have contributed to the present knowledge concerning the interactions
between geographic factors and human development.
One of the first writers to elaborate a climatic theory of social
evolution was Bodin (1530–1596). Hot climates, he observed, further the
rise of all kinds of superstitious beliefs. Cold climates produce brute
will-power. Temperate climates constitute an essential basis for the
development of reason. In the ideal commonwealth which Bodin described,
all three types of climate are represented.[XV-1] The northern zone
furnishes the fighters and the workers. The southern zone produces
poets, priests, and artists. The temperate zone is the parent of
legislative, judicial, and scholarly leaders.
In the _Spirit of Laws_ to which reference was made in Chapter XI,
Montesquieu accentuated the importance of environmental influences on
social processes. He attempted to show the effects of climate upon
social institutions. Montesquieu did important pioneer work in what is
now known as the field of anthropo-geography.
By way of contrast, the attitude of Hume, whose contributions to social
psychology have already been noted, stands out sharply. According to
Hume, physical causes have no particular effect on the human mind. No
geographic factors influence either the temperament, disposition, or
ability of people. Hume was led to this extreme position by his staunch
faith in the subjective and psychological factors of human nature.
The distinguished German scientist, Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859),
travelled extensively throughout the world, observing the physical
geography of many lands in conjunction with the meteorological
conditions of each. At the same time von Humboldt was a careful
observer of the customs, manners, and standards of the various
peoples with whom he came in contact. In these travels and studies,
von Humboldt was careful to note relationships between soils and
civilizations. His contributions to social thought were of this
descriptive nature, based on first-hand observations in many parts of
the world.
The writings of Henry Thomas Buckle (1821–1862) contain an extensive
and detailed explanation of the ways in which geographic and natural
factors modify human life. Buckle starts with a decidedly dualistic
universe--a dualism which is disjunctive. The dualism consists of
nature and mind, each subject more or less to its own laws. Rejecting
both the doctrine of free will and of predestination, Buckle concludes
that the actions of men are determined solely by their antecedents
and that they have a character of uniformity.[XV-2] Man modifies
nature, and nature modifies man, but in the past in many parts of the
world the thoughts and desires of men are more influenced by physical
phenomena than they influence such phenomena. Because of this dominant
activity of the physical forces, these should be studied as a basis for
understanding the history of man.
The physical factors which have powerfully influenced men are four:
climate, food, soil, and the general aspects of nature. By the fourth,
Buckle refers to those appearances which are presented chiefly through
the medium of sight and which produce their chief results by exciting
the imagination and suggesting superstitions. The three first-mentioned
factors do not operate on the mind directly.[XV-3]
The first effect of climate, food, and soil upon man that may be
noted is that they lead man to accumulate wealth. These accumulations
permit that degree of leisure from “making a living” which enables
some members of society to acquire knowledge. Upon these acquisitions
of knowledge, particularly of socialized knowledge, civilization
depends. This progress in the early stages of civilization rests on
two circumstances: “First, on the energy and regularity with which
labor is conducted, and second, on the returns made to that labor
by the bounty of nature.”[XV-4] Both these causes are the results
of physical antecedents. The returns which are made to labor are
regulated by the fertility of the soil. Moreover, Buckle asserted, the
energy and regularity with which labor is conducted will be entirely
dependent on the influence of climate.[XV-5] When heat is intense, men
will be indisposed and partly unfitted for active industry. Climate
also affects the regularity of the habits of laborers. In very cold
climates, the weather interferes with regular habits and produces
desultoriness. In southern countries regular labor is likewise
prevented--this time by the heat. Thus, in the early stages of
civilization the fundamental law may be stated: the soil regulates the
returns made to any given amount of labor; the climate regulates the
energy and constancy of labor itself.[XV-6]
Of the two primary causes of primitive societary growth, the fertility
of the soil is more important than the climatic influences. It is only
where soil fertility exists that civilization can arise at all.[XV-7]
But in Europe, climate has been more effective than soil fertility. In
Europe a climate has existed which has stimulated human activities.
Since the mental powers of man are unlimited they are more important,
once they get started, than the powers of nature, which are limited
and stationary. Man has endless capacity, through his dynamic mental
tendencies to develop the physical resources of the earth.
The birth rate depends on food supply. In hot countries, where
less food per capita is required than in cold countries, and where
an abundance of food exists, the birth rate is very high. In cold
countries highly carbonized food is necessary, but this food is largely
animal in origin and great risk is involved in procuring it. Hence the
people of cold countries become adventuresome.[XV-8]
By the study of physical laws it is possible to determine what the
national food of a country will be. In India, for example, the physical
conditions are decidedly favorable to the growth of rice, which is the
most nutritive of all cereals, and which, consequently, is a causal
factor in a high birth rate.
But where there is a cheap national food, the increase in population
becomes very great. As a result, there are multitudes of people who are
able to keep just above the subsistence level. A few individuals who
understand the operation of these physical laws are able to manipulate
the multitudes in such a way as to make themselves immensely wealthy.
Since wealth, after intellect, is the most permanent source of power,
a great inequality of wealth has been accompanied by a corresponding
inequality of social and political power.[XV-9] It produces classes
and even castes. Poverty provokes contempt. Class conflict results. The
poor are ground low, murmur, and are again subjected to ignominy. Under
such conditions democracy has a hard struggle. When physical conditions
favor one class, that class will constitute itself the government and
bitterly oppose the extension of government to all other classes. In
Europe there was no cheap national food, no blind multiplication of
population, and hence no such disparity between classes as in India. In
Europe it has been easier for democratic movements to spread.
Early civilization developed in the Euphrates valley, the Nile valley,
and in the exceedingly fertile regions of Peru, Central America, and
Mexico. Modern civilization is found largely in fertile river valleys,
such as the Thames, Seine, Rhine, Po, Danube, Hudson, Mississippi. But
in the Amazon valley, the fertility of soil has not invited the growth
of a large population. The trade winds have brought in a superabundance
of moisture, producing torrential rains, and a luxuriance of plant life
and a complexity of virile animal life which thus far have defied the
skill of man to overcome.
The fourth physical factor which Buckle presents is the general aspects
of nature. Of these the first class excites the imagination and the
second stimulates the rational operations of the intellect.[XV-10]
In regard to natural phenomena it may be said that whatever inspires
feelings of terror, of the vague and uncontrollable, and of great
wonder tends to inflame the imagination and to cause it to dominate
the intellectual processes. Where nature is continually exhibiting its
power, man feels his inferiority. He assumes a helpless attitude. He
ceases to inquire or to think. His imagination, rather than his reason,
reigns. On the other hand, where nature works smoothly and quietly, man
begins to assert his individuality. He even essays to dominate nature
and other men. His cognition develops and his volition expresses itself
vigorously.
All early civilizations were located in the tropics or sub-tropics.
In these regions nature is dangerous to man. Earthquakes, tempests,
hurricanes, pestilences prevail. Consequently, the imagination of man
takes exaggerated forms. The judgment is overbalanced; thought is
paralyzed. The mind is continually thrown into a frantic state. These
reactions throw human life into feeling molds, into poetic rather
than scientific forms. Religious feelings are promoted. The leading
religions of the world originated in the sub-tropical and tropical
regions of the earth.
East Indian literature and thought illustrate the effect of nature upon
the feelings and the imagination. The works of the East Indians on
grammar, law, history, medicine, even on mathematics, geography, and
metaphysics are nearly all poems.[XV-11] Prose writing is despised.
The Sanscrit language boasts of more numerous and more complicated
metres than can any European tongue. The East Indian literature is even
calculated to set the reason of man at defiance.[XV-12]
The imagination, for example, in India has produced an exaggerated
respect for the past; it is this situation which has led poets to
describe a Golden Age in the remote past. In the literature of India
there is recorded the statement that in ancient times the average
length of life of common men was 80,000 years. There are instances of
poets who lived to be half a million years old.
In Greece, on the other hand, nature is more quiet and the mind of man
functioned in a reasoning way. In the North Temperate zone science
developed. “The climate was more healthy; earthquakes were less
frequent; hurricanes were less disastrous; wild beasts and noxious
animals less abundant.”[XV-13] Buckle, in other words, insists that
everywhere the hand of nature is upon the mind of man.
The work of Buckle, the chief exponent of the influence of physical
nature upon mental man, accentuates important phases of the growth
of civilization. Buckle over-emphasized his anthropo-geographic
observations. However, they constitute a part of the whole picture of
human progress, and when seen in the light of modern mental growth and
control of environment they shrink into proper proportions.
The field which Buckle opened has been developed extensively by
Friedrich Ratzel (1844–1904). This German scholar, traveler, and
geographer is generally credited with putting anthropo-geography on a
scientific basis. Miss Ellen Semple attempted to translate his work on
_Anthropo-Geographie_ into English, but found the German constructions
so difficult to handle accurately that it was necessary for her to put
Ratzel’s observations into her own words. She also points out in Buckle
a lack of system and an undue tendency to follow one generalization
after another. Her own _Influences of Geographic Environment_ has now
become a standard work on the ways in which physical nature affects
mankind.
Miss Semple, following but improving upon Ratzel, has shown in turn the
influences of geographical location, area, and boundaries upon people.
She indicates the various ways in which oceans, rivers, and coast lines
have molded human minds; she distinguishes between mountain, steppe,
and desert effects upon mankind. She describes man as a product of
the earth’s surface. She stresses unduly the physical influences; she
considers nature the dominating force. Even where civilized man has
developed inventive powers and spiritual prowess, nature is given
the credit.[XV-14] Nevertheless, Miss Semple has marshalled facts in
powerful array and increased their force by literary skill. No student
or teacher can afford to neglect Miss Semple’s extensive survey of the
interactions between physical nature and human progress.
Among the many other writers upon the relation of geographic factors
to civilization the investigations of Ellsworth Huntington are
significant.[XV-15] He has described the climatic conditions that
are most favorable to mental stimulation and growth, and then has
classified all districts of the earth according to the degree in which
they stimulate or arrest mental advance.
In this same connection William Z. Ripley has investigated the relation
of climate to races.[XV-16] After analyzing races and distinguishing
between them and the geographic influences upon pigmentation, head,
form, stature, and other traits, mainly structural, he classifies
climatic elements in order of importance, as follows: humidity, heat,
and monotony. A high humidity, excessive heat, and long series of
sunshine or of cloudy weather produce mental enervation, stagnation,
and retrogression.
Acclimatization of races is a very slow process, according to Ripley.
It requires centuries. Perhaps the white race can never become truly
acclimated in the tropics. Racial differences he shows are due to
environmental factors far more than is ordinarily supposed.
In conclusion, it may be said that physical forces have operated
strongly on man. But when man has developed modern mental tools,
he has been able to escape a part of the enslaving environmental
influences. The history of the relation of geographic factors to human
progress indicates a fundamental but a proportionate decrease in those
influences.