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ARISTOCRACY AND EVOLUTION
By W. H. MALLOCK
_BY SAME AUTHOR_
LABOUR AND THE POPULAR WELFARE
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CLASSES AND MASSES
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ARISTOCRACY & EVOLUTION
A STUDY OF THE RIGHTS, THE ORIGIN,
AND THE SOCIAL FUNCTIONS OF
THE WEALTHIER CLASSES
BY
W. H. MALLOCK
AUTHOR OF ‘IS LIFE WORTH LIVING?’ ‘A HUMAN DOCUMENT,’
‘LABOUR AND THE POPULAR WELFARE,’ ETC.
Toute civilisation est l’œuvre des aristocrates.
RENAN.
’Tis thus the spirit of a single mind
Makes that of multitudes take one direction,
As roll the waters to the breathing wind,
Or roams the herd beneath the bull’s protection,
Or as a little dog will lead the blind,
Or a bell-wether form the flock’s connection
By tinkling sounds, when they go forth to victual,
Such is the sway of your great men o’er little.
· · · · · ·
There was not now a luggage-boy but sought
Danger and spoil with ardour much increased;
And why? Because a little—odd—old man,
Stript to his shirt, was come to lead the van.
BYRON.
LONDON
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK
1898
PREFACE
The word _aristocracy_ as used in the title of this volume has no
exclusive, and indeed no special reference to a class distinguished
by hereditary political privileges, by titles, or by heraldic
pedigree. It here means the exceptionally gifted and efficient
minority, no matter what the position in which its members may
have been born, or what the sphere of social progress in which
their exceptional efficiency shows itself. I have chosen the word
_aristocracy_ in preference to the word _oligarchy_ because it means
not only the rule of the few, but of the best or the most efficient
of the few.
Of the various questions involved in the general argument of the
work, many would, if they were to be examined exhaustively, demand
entire treatises to themselves rather than chapters. This is
specially true of such questions as the nature of men’s congenital
inequalities, the effects of different classes of motive in producing
different classes of action, and the effects of equal education on
unequal talents and temperaments. But the practical bearings of an
argument are more readily grasped when its various parts are set
forth with comparative brevity, than they are when the attention
claimed for each is minute enough to do it justice as a separate
subject of inquiry; and it has appeared to me that in the present
condition of opinion, prevalent social fallacies may be more easily
combated by putting the case against them in a form which will render
it intelligible to everybody, and by leaving many points to be
elaborated, if necessary, elsewhere.
I may also add that the conclusions here arrived at, with whatever
completeness they might have been explained, elaborated, and
defended, would not, in my opinion, do more than partially answer the
questions to which they refer. This volume aims only at establishing
what are the social rights and social functions, in progressive
communities, of the few. The entire question of their duties and
proper liabilities, whether imposed on them by themselves or by
the State, has been left untouched. This side of the question I
hope to deal with hereafter. It is enough to observe here that it
is impossible to define the duties of the few, of the rich, of the
powerful, of the highly gifted, and to secure that these duties
shall be performed by them, unless we first understand the extent of
the functions which they inevitably perform, and admit frankly the
indefeasible character of their rights.
CONTENTS
BOOK I
CHAPTER I
THE FUNDAMENTAL ERROR IN MODERN SOCIOLOGICAL STUDY
Science during the middle of this century excited popular interest
mainly on account of its bearing on the doctrines of Christianity • 3
Its popularity is now beginning to depend on its bearing not on
religious problems, but on social • 3
Science itself is undergoing a corresponding change • 4
Its characteristic aim during the middle of the century was to deal
with physical and physiological evolution • 4
Its characteristic aim now is to deal with the evolution of society
• 5
Social science itself is not wholly new • 5
What is new is the application to it of the evolutionary theory • 6
This excites men by suggesting great social changes in the future, • 7
which will give a speculative meaning to the history of humanity, • 8
or secure for men now existing, or for their children, practical
social advantages • 8
Men have thus a double reason for being interested in social science,
and sociologists a double reason for studying it; • 9
and it has attracted a number of men of genius, who have applied to
it methods learned in the school of physical science • 9
Yet despite their genius and their diligence, all parties complain
that the results of their study are inconclusive • 10
Professor Marshall and Mr. Kidd, for instance, complain of the fact,
but can suggest no explanation of it • 10
What can the explanation be? • 11
The answer will be found in the fact just referred to—that social
science attempts to answer two distinct sets of questions; • 12
and one set—namely, the speculative—it has answered with great
success; • 12
it has failed only in attempting to answer practical questions • 13
Now the phenomena with which it has dealt successfully are phenomena
of social aggregates, considered as wholes; • 13
but the practical problems of to-day, with which it has dealt
unsuccessfully, arise out of the conflict between different parts of
aggregates • 15
Social science has failed as a _practical_ guide because it has not
recognised this distinction; • 16
and hence arise most of the errors of the political philosophy of
this century • 16
CHAPTER II
THE ATTEMPT TO MERGE THE GREAT MAN IN THE AGGREGATE
Whatever may be done by some men, or classes of men, sociologists are
at present accustomed to attribute to _man_ • 17
Mr. Kidd’s _Social Evolution_, for instance, is based entirely on
this procedure • 17
He quotes with approval two other writers who have been guilty of it;
• 18
who both attribute to _man_ what is done by only a few men; • 19
and the consequences of their reasoning are ludicrous • 20
Mr. Kidd’s reasoning itself is not less ludicrous. The first half of
his argument is that religion prompts the few to surrender advantages
to the many, which, if they chose to do so, they could keep • 21
The second half is that the many could have taken these advantages
from the few, and that religion alone prevented them from doing so
• 21
This contradiction is entirely due to the fact that, having first
divided the social aggregate into two classes, he then obliterates
his division, and thinks of them both as “_man_” • 22
Mr. Kidd’s confusion is the result of no accidental error. It is the
inevitable result of a radically fallacious method; • 24
and of this method the chief exponent is Mr. Herbert Spencer, • 24
as a short summary of his arguments will show • 25
Mr. Spencer starts with saying that the chief impediment to social
science is the great-man theory; • 25
for, if the appearance of the great man is incalculable, progress, if
it depends on him, must be incalculable also; • 26
but if the great man is not a miraculous apparition, he owes his
greatness to causes outside himself; • 27
and it is these causes which really produce the effects of which he
is the proximate initiator • 27
These effects, therefore, are to be explained by reference not to the
great man, but to the causes that are behind the great man • 28
The true causes, says Mr. Spencer, of all social phenomena are
physical environment and men’s natural character • 29
The first physical cause of progress was an exceptionally fertile
soil • 29
and an exceptionally bracing climate • 29
All the conquering races came from fertile and bracing regions • 30
There were other regions more fertile, but these were enervating; and
hence the inhabitants of the former enslaved the weaker inhabitants
of the latter • 30
Again, division of labour, on which industrial progress depends, was
caused by difference in the products of different localities, • 31
which led to the localisation of industries • 32
The localisation of industries in its turn led to road-making; • 33
and roads made possible the centralisation of authority and
interchange of ideas • 33
Next, as to men’s natural character, which is the other cause of
progress, • 33
their primitive character did not fit them to progress, • 34
till it was gradually improved by the evolution of marriage and the
family—especially of monogamy • 34
Monogamy represents the survival of the fittest kind of sexual union
• 35
It developed the affections and the practice of efficient
co-operation • 35
The family being established, the nation gradually rose from it • 36
One family increased, and gave rise to many families, which were
obliged, in order to get food, to separate into different groups; • 36
and the recompounding of these groups, for purposes of defence or
aggression, formed the nation; • 37
all government being in its origin military • 37
But as the arts of life progress, industry emancipates itself from
governmental control, and becomes its own master, and also forms the
basis of political democracy • 37
Now, if we consider all these conclusions of Mr. Spencer’s, • 39
we shall find them to be all conclusions about aggregates as wholes,
not about parts of aggregates • 39
The only differences recognised by him between men are differences
between one homogeneous aggregate and another, • 40
and differences between similar men who happen to be occupied
differently • 41
But, as has already been said, the social problems of to-day arise
out of a conflict between different parts of the same aggregate;
therefore the phenomena of the aggregate as a whole do not help us
• 42
The conflict between the parts of the aggregate arises from
inequalities of position • 43
of which Mr. Spencer’s sociology takes no account • 44
Social problems arise out of the desire of those whose positions are
inferior to have their positions changed; • 45
and the practical question is, is the change they desire possible?
• 45
To answer this question we must examine into the causes why such and
such individuals are in inferior, and others in superior positions
• 46
Are inequalities in position due to alterable and accidental
circumstances? • 47
Or are they due to congenital inequalities which no one can ever do
away with? • 47
Social inequalities are partly due to circumstances; • 48
but most people will admit that congenital inequalities in talent
have much to do with them • 48
Why then insist on this fact? • 49
Because this fact is precisely what our contemporary sociologists
ignore, • 49
as Mr. Spencer shows us by his distinct admissions and assertions, as
well as by the character of his conclusions • 50
His condemnation of the great-man theory is a removal of all
congenital inequalities from his field of study; • 51
and he actually defines an aggregate as being composed of
_approximately equal units_ • 52
His failure and that of others, as practical sociologists, arises
from their building on this false hypothesis • 53
CHAPTER III
GREAT MEN, AS THE TRUE CAUSE OF PROGRESS
The ignoring of natural inequalities is a deliberate procedure. Let
us see how it is defended • 55
Let us examine Mr. Spencer’s defence of it • 55
He defends it in two ways; • 55
(1) by saying that the great man does not really do what he seems to
do; • 55
(2) by saying that what he seems to do is not really much • 56
He admits that the great man does do something exceptional in war;
• 57
but denies that he does anything exceptional in the sphere of
peaceful progress • 57
But how does the great man fulfil his function in war? By ordering
others • 58
The great man, in peace, does precisely the same thing • 59
Mr. Spencer, for example, orders the compositors who put his books
into type • 59
The inventor orders the men by whom his inventions are manufactured
• 60
The great man of business orders his employees • 61
The hotel-keeper orders his staff • 62
All these men resemble the great military commander; and if the
latter is a social cause, so are the former • 63
Next, as to the contention that the great man is the proximate cause
only, and not the true cause— • 63
This, as Mr. Spencer and three popular writers of to-day show us, • 64
resolves itself into four arguments: • 65
(1) That every first discovery involves all that have gone before it;
• 66
(2) that the discoverer’s ability itself is the product of past
circumstances; • 66
(3) that often the same discovery is made by several men at once; • 66
(4) that the difference between the great and the ordinary man is
slight • 66
Simultaneous discovery only shows that several great men, instead of
one, are greater than others • 67
The extent of the great man’s superiority depends on how it is
measured • 68
It may be slight to the speculative philosopher, but to the practical
man it is all-important • 69
As for the two other arguments, which admit the great man’s
greatness, but deny that it is his own, • 71
they are both true speculatively, but are practically untrue, or
irrelevant; • 71
just as statements of averages and classification of goods may be
true and relevant for one purpose, and false and irrelevant for
another • 72
Thus the argument that the great man owes his faculties to his
ancestors, and through his ancestors to the society which helped to
develop his ancestors, though a speculative truism, • 73
leads to nothing but absurdities if we apply it to practical life • 74
For if the great workers owe their greatness to the whole of past
society, the men who shirk work owe their idleness to it; and if the
former deserve no reward, the latter deserve no punishment • 75
The same argument applies to morals; and if accepted, we should have
to admit that nobody really did, or was really responsible for,
anything • 76
Finally, let us take the argument that most of what the great man
does depends on past discoveries and past achievements, to which he
does but add a little • 77
If this argument means anything, it must mean that greatness is
commoner than it is vulgarly thought • 78
But is this the case? Does Shakespeare’s debt to his antecedents make
Shakespeares more numerous? • 79
Shakespeare’s contemporaries had the same national antecedents that
he had; but they could not do what he did • 80
Men inherit the past only in so far as they can assimilate it • 80
Socialists say that inventions once made become common property • 81
This is absolutely untrue • 81
The discoveries and inventions of the past are the property of those
only who can absorb and use them • 82
Thus the introduction of the past into the question leaves the
differences between the great man and others undiminished • 82
If the ordinary man does anything, the great man does a great deal
more • 83
and in practical reasoning he is a true cause for the sociologist • 83
And, curiously enough, Mr. Spencer unconsciously admits this • 84
He declares that the Napoleonic wars were entirely due to the
maleficent greatness of Napoleon • 84
He defends patents because they represent the _very substance of the
inventor’s own mind_; • 86
and he attributes the modern improvement in steel manufacture to Sir
H. Bessemer • 87
So much, then, being established, we must consider two difficulties
suggested by it • 88
CHAPTER IV
THE GREAT MAN AS DISTINGUISHED FROM THE PHYSIOLOGICALLY FITTEST
SURVIVOR
It may be objected that modern sociology does not, as here asserted,
neglect the great man, for it adopts the doctrine of the survival of
the fittest • 89
It may be asked, on the other hand, what place the great man has in
an exclusively evolutionary theory of progress • 90
The fittest survivor is not the same as the great man • 90
He plays a part in progress, but not the same part • 90
The fittest men, by surviving, raise the general level of the race,
and promote progress only in this way • 91
The great man promotes progress by being superior to his
contemporaries • 92
The movement of progress is double; • 93
one movement being very slow, the other rapid • 93
The survival of the fittest causes the slow movement • 93
The rapid movement is caused by the great man • 95
Next, as to evolution—what does the word mean? • 95
Its great practical characteristic, as put forward by Darwin, is that
it is opposed to the doctrine of design, or divine intention; • 96
and yet, according to Darwin, species resulted from the intention of
each animal to live and propagate • 96
Species, therefore, according to the evolutionist, is the result of
intention, but not the result intended • 97
Evolution, in fact, is the reasonable sequence of the unintended • 97
This is as true of social evolution as it is of biological • 97
Many of the social conditions of any age result from the past, but
were intended by nobody in the past; • 98
for instance, many of the social effects of railways and cheap
printing • 98
Therefore, whenever any great man produces some change intentionally
he has to work with unintended materials • 99
We can see this in the progress of dramatic art; • 99
also in the progress of philosophy • 100
And yet in each case the intended elements are equal or are greater
than the unintended • 100
We see the same thing in the history of the _Times_ printing press
• 101
It was the result of many kinds of unintended progress, constantly
recombined by intention • 102
Evolution, in fact, is the unintended result of the intentions of
great men • 104
The unintended or evolved element in progress is what concerns the
speculative philosopher • 105
The intended element, which originates directly in the great man, is
what is of interest for practical purposes • 106
BOOK II
CHAPTER I
THE NATURE AND THE DEGREES OF THE SUPERIORITIES OF GREAT MEN
The causality of the great man being established, we must consider
more precisely what greatness is • 111
Mr. Spencer will help us to a general definition of it • 112
He divides the human race into the clever, the ordinary, and the
stupid • 113
Now if all the race were stupid, it is plain there would be no
progress; • 114
nor would there be any if all the race were ordinary; • 114
therefore progress must be due to the clever, who are, as Mr. Spencer
says, a “_scattered few_” • 115
This is the great-man theory reasonably stated • 115
For great men are not necessarily heroes, as Carlyle thought, • 116
nor divided absolutely from all other men • 116
Greatness is various in kind and degree, • 117
but, at all events, there is a certain minority of men who resemble
each other in being more efficient than the majority • 117
We see this in poetry • 118
in singers, • 118
in the scholarship of boys at the same school, • 119
and similarly in practical life • 119
Enough men, as it is, have equal opportunities, to show how unequal
men are in their powers of using them • 120
No doubt a man may be ordinary in one respect and great in another;
• 120
but the majority are not great in any • 121
The measure of a man’s greatness as an agent of social progress is
the overt results actually produced by him • 121
A selfish doctor, if successful, is greater than a devoted doctor, if
unsuccessful • 122
The fact that many men who produce no social results seem better and
more brilliant than many men who do produce them, makes some argue
that these results require no greatness for their production • 122
But the most efficient forms of greatness have often nothing
brilliant about them • 123
A lofty imagination is often the enemy to practical efficiency; • 124
and great efficiency is often independent of exceptional intellect
• 125
Intellect _is_ required for progress, _e.g._ in invention; • 125
but the inventor by himself is often helpless, • 125
and has to ally himself with men whose exceptional gifts are
unimpressive and even vulgar • 126
Greatness is not one quality, but various combinations of many • 127
Greatness, then, is merely those qualities which, in any domain of
progress, make the few more efficient than the many • 127
The great-man theory, then, merely asserts that if some men were not
more efficient than most men, no progress would take place at all
• 128
But great men, in spite of these differences, all promote progress in
the same way • 128
CHAPTER II
PROGRESS THE RESULT OF A STRUGGLE NOT FOR SURVIVAL, BUT FOR DOMINATION
In order to see how the great man promotes progress, we must consider
that whilst the fittest survivor only promotes it • 130
by living, whilst others die, • 130
the great man promotes progress by helping others to live • 131
He promotes progress not by what he does himself, but by what he
helps others to do • 132
We can see this by considering the progress of knowledge which, as J.
S. Mill says, is the foundation of all progress • 132
But all progress in knowledge is the work of “_decidedly exceptional
individuals_,” • 134
as Mill admits, though in curiously confused language • 135
Now how do the exceptional individuals, when they acquire knowledge,
promote progress by doing so? • 136
They promote progress by conveying their knowledge to, and imposing
their conclusions on, others • 137
A similar thing is true of invention, which is knowledge applied • 138
Invention promotes progress only because the inventor influences the
actions of the workmen who make and use his machines • 139
The man of business ability promotes progress also only by so
ordering others that the precise wants of the public are supplied
• 140
And the same principle is obviously true in the domain of war,
politics, and religion • 141
Greatness, however, is not in all cases equally beneficial • 142
The influence of some great men is more advantageous than that of
others • 143
Progress, then, involves a struggle through which the fittest great
men shall secure influence over others, and destroy the influence of
the less fit • 143
We now come to another point of difference between the fittest great
man and the fittest survivor • 143
The social counterpart to the Darwinian struggle for survival is to
be found in the struggle of labourers to find employment • 144
But this is not the struggle to which historical progress is due • 145
For the most rapid progress has taken place without any increased
fitness in the labourers • 145
The progressive struggle in industry is confined entirely to the
employers; • 146
and in every domain of progress it is confined to the leaders, to the
exclusion of those who are led • 146
In the progressive struggle between great men, the mass of the
community play no part whatever • 147
Let us take, for instance, two rival hotel-keepers • 148
One becomes bankrupt, and the other takes over his hotel and his
staff • 148
The sole struggle is between the employers, not the employed • 148
The staff of the unsuccessful hotel-keeper gain, not lose, by being
employed by the successful • 149
Historical progress, then, results from a struggle not for
subsistence, but for domination • 149
CHAPTER III
THE MEANS BY WHICH THE GREAT MAN APPLIES HIS GREATNESS TO
WEALTH-PRODUCTION
All gain by the domination of the fittest, except the few who fail to
secure power for themselves • 151
We must consider, however, that the great men who struggle for
domination would not do so without some strong motive; • 152
and also that they cannot dominate others except by some particular
means • 153
Now the question of motive we will treat of hereafter. At present we
will confine ourselves to the question of means • 153
These vary in each domain of social activity • 153
In some they are too obvious to need discussion • 154
We need consider what they are only in the domains of politics and
wealth-production • 155
The question is most important in its bearings on wealth-production
• 156
The great man in wealth-production can influence the actions of
others by two means only—by the slave-system and the wage-system • 157
The slave-system secures obedience by coercion, the wage-system by
inducement • 157
Wage-capital, not fixed capital, gives the primary power to
capitalism as a productive agent • 158
Wage-capital is an accumulation of the necessaries of life, • 159
owned or controlled by a few persons, • 159
and apportioned by them amongst many, on certain conditions • 160
Karl Marx entirely misunderstood what these conditions are • 160
The essence of these conditions is that the many shall be technically
directed by the few • 161
The question of how much the few appropriate of the product is a
separate question altogether • 162
The _corvée_ system or slavery would make wage-capital superfluous;
and this shows what the essential function of wage-capital is • 162
So-called “co-operation” is merely the wage-system disguised • 163
There are, then, only two alternatives—the wage-system and the
slave-system; • 164
as we shall find by considering how the socialists can only escape
the wage-system by substituting slavery • 165
For they would secure industrial obedience by coercion, • 166
not through the worker’s desire to earn his living. And this is the
essence of slavery • 166
Next let us consider the means by which the great directors of
industry compete against one another • 167
Under capitalism they do so, owing to the fact that the man who
cannot direct industry so as to please the public loses his capital,
and with it the means of direction • 167
The wage-system is the only efficient means of competition of this
kind • 168
The socialists, though they affect to be opposed to competition
altogether, • 168
re-introduce it into their own system, • 170
the only change being that it is associated with the slave-system,
which is very cumbrous and inefficient • 170
Competition between employers, then, is a part of every system that
permits of progress; • 172
and since the re-introduction of slavery is practically impossible,
we must regard the wage-system as a permanent feature of progressive
societies • 172
We might reduce society to ashes, but this system and capitalistic
competition would arise out of them; • 173
for capitalistic competition means the domination of the fittest
great men • 174
The industrial obedience of the many to the few is the fundamental
condition of progress • 174
CHAPTER IV
THE MEANS BY WHICH THE GREAT MAN ACQUIRES POWER IN POLITICS
In discussing the means by which the great man wields power in
politics, the debatable question differs from the question raised by
his power in industry; • 176
for the points that are debated in the case of the great
wealth-producer are admitted by all in the case of the governor • 176
The greatest democrat admits that the governor must be an exceptional
man, • 177
and also that he must be chosen by elective competition • 177
There is a competitive element even in autocracies, • 178
and democracies are essentially competitive • 178
All parties also agree that laws must be enforced by pains and
penalties • 179
Democrats are peculiar only in their theory that the sole greatness
required in their governors is a perceptive and executive greatness,
which will enable them to carry out the spontaneous wishes of the
many • 179
This is the only point in which the democratic theory differs from
the aristocratic • 180
The democratic ruler is, theoretically, a balance for weighing the
wills of the many, • 181
or a machine for executing their “mandates”; • 182
and there are signs which might suggest that the few in politics are
really becoming the mere instruments of the many • 182
But these signs are deceptive; for what seems the will of the many,
really depends on the action of another minority • 183
Opinions, to derive power from the numbers who hold them, must be
identical; • 184
but they seldom are identical till a few men have manipulated them
• 184
Thus what seems to be the opinion of the many is generally dependent
on the influence of a few • 185
The many, for instance, would never have had any opinions on Free
Trade or Bimetallism if the few had not worked on them • 185
Popular opinion requires exceptional men, as nuclei, round which to
form itself • 187
Thus even in what seems extremest democracy the few are essential
• 188
Democrats, however, may argue that under democracy the few do, in the
long-run, carry out the wishes of the many • 188
Even were this true, the current formulas of democracy would be
false, for unequal men would be essential to executing the wishes of
equals • 189
Now in reality the few are never mere passive agents; • 189
but nevertheless the many do impress their will on them to a great
extent • 190
The question is to _what_ extent? • 191
This introduces us to a new side of the problem—the extent of the
power of the many • 191
This is greater in politics than in industry; • 192
and yet when we think it over we shall see that it is great in most
domains of activity • 192
We had to take it for granted at starting. We must now examine it
• 193
BOOK III
CHAPTER I
HOW TO DISCRIMINATE BETWEEN THE PARTS CONTRIBUTED TO A JOINT PRODUCT
BY THE FEW AND BY THE MANY
Mill declares that when two agencies are essential to producing an
effect, their respective contributions to it cannot be discriminated
• 197
Mill argues thus with special reference to land and labour; • 198
but he overlooks what in actual life is the main feature of the case
• 198
The labour remaining the same, the product varies with the quality of
the land • 198
The extra product resulting from labour on superior land is due to
land, not labour • 199
This is easily proved by a number of analogous illustrations • 199
Mill errs by ignoring the changing character of the effect • 201
The case of labour directed by different great men is the same as the
case of labour applied to different qualities of land. The great men
produce the increment • 202
Labour, however, must be held to produce that minimum necessary to
support the labourer, • 203
both in agriculture • 203
and in all kinds of production • 204
The great man produces the increment that would not be produced if
his influence ceased • 204
Labour, it is true, is essential to the production of the increment
also; • 205
but we cannot draw any conclusions from the hypothesis of labour
ceasing; • 205
for the labourer would have to labour whether the great men were
there or no • 206
The cessation of the great man’s influence is a practical
alternative; the cessation of labour is not, • 206
as we see by frequent examples • 206
Thus the great man, in the most practical sense, produces what labour
would not produce in his absence • 208
An analysis of practical reasoning as to causes generally will show
us the truth of this • 208
For practical purposes _the_ cause of an effect is that cause only
which may or may not be present; • 209
as we see when men discuss the cause of a fire, • 210
or of the accuracy of a chronometer, • 210
or the causes of danger to a man hanging on to a rope • 211
But there is another means of discriminating between the products of
exceptional men and ordinary men • 212
This is by an analysis of the faculties necessary to produce the
product • 213
Are these faculties possessed by all, or by a few only? • 213
CHAPTER II
THE NATURE AND SCOPE OF PURELY DEMOCRATIC ACTION, OR THE ACTION OF
AVERAGE MEN IN CO-OPERATION
Carlyle was wrong in his claim for the great man because he failed
to note that his powers were conditioned by the capacities of the
ordinary men influenced by him • 215
The socialists are wrong because, seeing that the many do something,
they argue that they do everything • 215
What the many do is limited. We must see precisely what the limits
are • 216
If a Russian conspirator employs a hundred workmen to dig what they
think is a cellar, but is a mine for blowing up the Czar, • 216
the conspirator contributes the entire criminal character of the
enterprise • 217
When a choir sings Handel’s music, Handel contributes the specific
character of the sounds sung by them • 217
Let us turn to the facts of progress, • 217
and begin with economic progress and progress in knowledge • 218
In the case of economic progress we must apply the method of
inquiring what is produced by labour with and without the assistance
of the great man • 218
To the question of progress in knowledge we must apply the method of
inquiring what faculties are involved in it • 219
These are faculties entirely confined to the few • 219
And now let us turn to political government • 220
What can the faculties of average men do when left to themselves?
• 220
They can accomplish only the simplest actions, • 220
and formulate only the simplest demands • 221
The moment matters become at all complex the faculties of the
exceptional man are required • 221
Now in any civilised country few governmental measures are really
simple • 222
Exceptional men must simplify them for the many • 222
Thus the voice of the many, in all complex cases, echoes the voice of
the few • 223
This, however, is not the end of the matter; • 224
for the details of governmental measures are not the whole of
government • 224
The true power of democracy is to be seen in religious and family
life • 224
Though the influence of the great man in religion is enormous, • 225
yet religions have only grown and endured because they touch the
heart of the average man • 225
Christianity exemplifies this fact, • 225
and especially Catholicism • 226
The doctrines formulated by the aristocracy of Popes and Councils
originated among the mass of common believers • 227
Theologians and councils merely reasoned on the materials thus given
them • 228
Catholicism shows the great part played by the many so clearly,
because the part played by the few is defined by it so sharply • 228
Catholicism, however, is only alluded to here because it illustrates
the essential nature of truly democratic action • 229
Thus enlightened by it, let us turn back to family life • 230
Catholicism shows that democracy is a natural coincidence of
conclusions • 231
The home life of a nation depends on the same coincidence, or on
spontaneously similar propensities • 231
This truly democratic coincidence forces all governments to
accommodate themselves to it • 233
The same democratic power determines the structure of our houses,
• 233
and the furniture and other commodities in them, • 234
and indeed all economic products • 234
For though in the process of production the many are dependent on the
few, • 235
(a fact which the powers of trade unionism do but make more apparent)
• 235
yet it is the wants and tastes of the many which determine what shall
be produced • 238
and though great men elicit these wants by first supplying them, • 239
the wants themselves must be latent in the nature of the many, and
when once aroused are essentially democratic phenomena • 239
Thus though economic supply is aristocratic, economic demand is
purely democratic • 240
The most gifted brewer cannot make the public drink beer they do not
like • 241
Now in politics also there is a similar demand and supply; • 242
but the truly democratic demand in politics is not for laws • 242
The demand for laws is not the counterpart of a demand for
commodities, for commodities are demanded for their own sake, laws
for the sake of their results • 243
The demand for laws is like a demand that commodities shall be made
by some special kind of machinery • 243
No one makes this latter demand. Economic demand is single; political
demand is double • 244
Political democracy is vulgarly identified with the demand not for
social goods, but for machinery • 244
But in so far as democracy is a demand not for goods but for
machinery, it is not purely democratic • 245
The demands of the many are manipulated by the few • 245
Why, then, is democracy especially associated with the demand in
which its power is least? • 246
Because it is the only sphere of activity in which the many can
interfere with the machinery of supply at all; • 246
and they can interfere with it here because the effects of political
government on life are less close and important than the effects of
business management on business; • 247
and in any case the apparent power of the many is even here
controlled by the few • 247
The power of the many is a power to determine the quality of
civilisation and progress, not to produce them • 248
CHAPTER III
THE QUALITIES OF THE ORDINARY AS OPPOSED TO THE GREAT MAN
It will be objected that the conclusions reached in the last chapter
derogate from the dignity of the average man • 250
But they do not really do so; • 251
for since the great man, as here technically defined, is the man who
influences others so as to promote progress, • 251
the ordinary man, as opposed to him, need not be stupid • 252
He is merely the man whose talents do not increase the efficiency of
other men • 252
Poets, in this technical sense, are ordinary men • 252
So are the most skilful manual workers, • 253
for very great manual skill does not promote progress or influence
others, • 254
unless it can be metamorphosed into the shape of orders given to
others • 256
Again, brilliance or charm in private life does not promote progress
• 256
Therefore ordinary men, who do not promote progress, are not asserted
to be lacking in high qualities • 257
Indeed, what is really interesting in human nature is the typical
part of it, not the exceptional, • 258
as we may see by referring to art and poetry • 258
Average opinion also on social matters is for each class the wise
opinion; • 259
and the average faculties shared by all are in one sense the test of
truth • 259
Therefore in denying to the average man the powers that promote
progress • 260
we are not degrading the average man. We are merely asserting that
these powers form but a small part of life • 260
Socialists can object to this conclusion only because it establishes
the claim of exceptional men to exceptional wealth • 262
They cannot have any theoretical objections to it, for they are
beginning to recognise the importance of the exceptional man
themselves, • 263
and only obscure the fact for purposes of popular agitation • 264
So far, however, as the reasoning of this book has gone already,
no claim has been made for the great man to which socialists need
object; • 264
for we have assumed that he keeps none of the exceptional wealth he
makes, for himself, • 265
but that he works exactly on the terms the socialists would dictate
to him • 266
It now remains to consider whether he would really do so • 266
BOOK IV
CHAPTER I
THE DEPENDENCE OF EXCEPTIONAL ACTION ON THE ATTAINABILITY OF
EXCEPTIONAL REWARD, OR THE NECESSARY CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE
MOTIVES TO ACTION AND ITS RESULTS.
Great men differ from ordinary men in degree only, not in kind, • 271
and the use of exceptional powers is conditioned like the use of
ordinary powers • 272
Now let us take the most universal powers possessed by man, viz.
those used in acquiring the simplest food • 272
Man’s powers in agriculture would be latent unless man wanted food
and the earth’s surface were cultivable • 272
Thus the exercise of the simplest faculties depends on the want of
some certain object, and the possibility of attaining it • 273
If this is true of the commonest faculties which aim at supplying
necessaries, much more is it true of rare faculties which aim at
producing superfluities • 273
Society, then, if great men are to work in it, must be so constituted
as to make the reward they desire possible • 274
In so doing society makes a contract with its great men; • 274
and this is a contract which is being constantly revised • 275
The great men themselves are the ultimate fixers of their own price
• 276
Here is the final proof that living great men, not past conditions,
are the causes _practically_ involved in progress • 276
Thus living great men are masters of the situation • 277
because no one can tell that they have exceptional powers till they
choose to show them • 277
They cannot, therefore, be coerced from without, like ordinary
workers • 278
They must be _induced_ to work by a reward • 278
which they themselves feel to be sufficient • 279
Hence the great man’s character and requirements impress themselves
on the structure of society • 279
This is what socialists constantly forget • 280
and they propose to equalise matters by not offering great men any
exceptional reward • 281
They forget to ask whether, under these circumstances, great men
would exercise or reveal their exceptional powers at all • 281
Exceptional rewards are essential to exceptional action • 282
We must inquire what the required exceptional rewards are • 283
CHAPTER II
THE MOTIVES OF THE EXCEPTIONAL WEALTH-PRODUCER
Socialists, though often forgetting the necessity of exceptional
motives, often remember it, • 284
and endeavour to show that socialistic society would have sufficient
rewards to offer to its great men, • 284
such as the pleasure of doing good, of excelling, and of receiving
honour • 285
The fundamental question is, will such rewards as these stimulate
great men to wealth-production? • 285
Is the enjoyment of exceptional wealth superfluous as a motive to
producing it? • 286
If it is so, it is for the socialists to prove that it is so; • 286
for they themselves admit that it has not been so in the past, and is
not actually so now • 287
Are there any signs, then, that the desire for exceptional wealth is
beginning to lose its power? • 288
We shall find that the socialists themselves maintain just the
contrary; • 288
for they appeal to the desire of each producer to possess all he
produces as the most universal and permanent desire in man; • 289
and never questioned this so long as they believed that the sole
producer was the labourer • 289
They questioned the doctrine only when they came to see that the
great man is a producer also; and they confine their questioning to
his case • 290
But if the labourer desires to possess what he produces, much more
will the great man do so; • 290
for even if he gives away what he produces, he desires to possess it
first • 291
There is no sign, therefore, that the desire for exceptional wealth
is losing force as a motive • 292
Are, then, other desires acquiring new force as motives to
wealth-production? • 292
Are the joys of excelling, of benefiting others, or of being honoured
by others, doing so? • 293
The desire of these joys is a motive to certain kinds of exceptional
conduct • 293
It is a motive to benevolent action and religious work; • 293
But neither of these is the same thing as wealth-production • 294
It is a motive to artistic production, certainly, • 294
and also to scientific discovery; • 295
and works of art are wealth, and scientific discovery is the basis of
industrial progress; • 296
but great art forms but a small part of wealth, • 296
and artistic effort other than the highest is motived by the desire
of pecuniary reward, • 297
whilst scientific discoveries, though made generally from the desire
for truth, are applied to wealth-production because the men who apply
them desire wealth • 297
What, however, of the fact that the desire for honour makes the
soldier work harder than any labourer? • 298
Why, the socialists ask, should not the same desire make the great
wealth-producer work? • 299
Mr. Frederic Harrison has urged a similar argument • 299
The answer to this is that the work of the soldier is exceptional;
• 300
and we cannot argue from it to the work of ordinary life • 301
The fighting instinct is inherent in the dominant races, • 302
in a way in which the industrial instinct is not • 303
And even in war those who make the prolonged intellectual efforts
required, ask for themselves other rewards besides honour • 303
Still more will the great wealth-producers do so • 304
There is therefore nothing to show that these other motives will
supersede the desire of wealth • 304
What they really do, and what socialists fail to see, is to mix with
the desire for wealth, and add to its efficiency • 304
As the desire of wealth has mixed with other desires in men like
Bacon, Rubens, etc. • 305
For in saying that the desire of wealth is essential as a motive to
wealth-production we do not mean the desire of wealth for its own
sake, • 305
or for the sake of physical gratification • 306
This forms a small part of its desirability • 306
It is desired mainly as a means to power, and to those very pleasures
which socialists offer instead of it • 307
The great wealth-producers, susceptible to the motives on which
socialists dwell, will desire exceptional wealth all the more because
of them • 308
It is argued, however, by semi-socialists that the actual producer
may be allowed the income he produces, but that this must end
with his life, and not be passed on to his family as interest on
bequeathed capital • 309
It is claimed that this arrangement would coincide with abstract
justice, • 310
for it is argued that all wealth which is not worked for must be
stolen • 310
This is utterly untrue, as the case of flocks and herds shows us;
• 311
but the chief producer of wealth that is not worked for is capital,
which is past productive ability stored up and externalised • 311
The dart of a savage hunter, • 312
the manure heap or cart horse of a peasant, • 312
are forms of capital which actually produce, and the product belongs
to those who own them • 313
The same is the case with such capital as engines and manufacturing
plant • 313
These implements are like a race of iron negroes, and are producers
as truly as live negroes would be • 314
Indirectly, wage capital is also a producer in the same way • 314
And indeed, till they saw that this argument could be turned against
themselves, it was strongly urged by the socialists • 315
Practically, however, the justification of income from capital • 316
rests on the fact that the power of capital to yield income is what
mainly makes men anxious to produce it; • 316
since if income-yielding capital could not be acquired and amassed,
wealthy men could make no provision for their families, • 317
nor could wealth give pleasure to those who might at any moment be
beggars • 318
Moreover, if incomes were not heritable, wealth would produce none of
those social results, such as continuous culture, etc., which make it
valuable • 319
The wealth that ceased with the men that actually made it would
produce a society of beasts • 319
Wealth is desirable because it is the physical basis of an enlarged
life; • 320
and there must thus be continuity in the possession of wealth • 320
Hence the great wealth-producer demands the possession not only of
what he produces directly, but of what he produces indirectly through
his past products • 321
The majority not only may, but do, acquire a share of the increment
produced by the great man; • 322
but whatever this share may be, it can never be such as to make
social conditions equal • 322
CHAPTER III
EQUALITY OF EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITY
The wealthy class, owing to inheritance, is always much more numerous
than the great men actually engaged at any given time in production
• 324
But though inheritance gives a certain permanence to the wealthy
class, the families belonging to it are constantly, if slowly,
changing, • 325
and new men are constantly forcing their way into it • 326
Indeed the wealth of the country depends on the men potentially great
as producers actualising their talents and producing the wealth that
raises them • 326
It is therefore obvious that the wealth will increase in proportion
as these potentially great men have the opportunity of actualising
their productive powers • 327
It is impossible, however, to make opportunities absolutely equal
• 328
The question is how near we can approach to equality • 328
In a country where these opportunities have been made artificially
unequal there will be room for a great deal of equalisation • 329
But removing artificial impediments is only a negative kind of
equalisation • 329
It is probable, however, that for the development of genius of the
highest order this is all that is needful, • 330
and will secure the development of all the genius of the highest kind
that exists • 331
But genius of a lesser kind, which would else be lost, may, no doubt,
be elicited by positive educational help from the State; • 332
though the amount of such genius is overestimated by reformers,
because they confuse talents rare in themselves with accomplishments
that are only rare accidentally • 332
The latter can be increased indefinitely, the former not • 333
For real productive genius there is always room, • 333
but the economic utility of mere accomplishments is limited by the
conditions of production at the time • 333
Thus to produce more possible clerks than are wanted merely lowers
the wages of those employed, without increasing the utility of those
who are not employed • 334
Still, within limits, educational help from the State does much to
increase the supply of exceptional, though not great, talent • 335
But the main difficulty involved in the equalising of educational
opportunity is not the production of good results, but the avoidance
of bad • 335
The bad results are the stimulating of discontent, not in average
men, but in men who are really exceptional • 336
but those exceptional gifts are ill-balanced or have some flaw in
them • 337
For if education sets free and stimulates sound intellectual powers
• 337
it will similarly stimulate intellects that are not sound, • 338
or wills, with no intellect to match, and will generate a desire for
wealth in men who are not capable of creating it, • 338
and thus will merely produce needless misery and mischief • 339
Education, again, stimulates faculties that can really produce
exceptional results, but not results that are complete • 339
The progressive struggle requires that the intellects of some should
be stimulated, whose efforts fail • 340
But those failures that promote progress are failures that partially
succeed • 340
But there are abortive talents which produce failures that have no
relation to success. Those talents are purely mischievous; • 341
for example, the failure of the would-be artist, • 341
or that of the man who popularises wrong medical treatment • 342
But the commonest example of this kind of man is the socialistic
agitator, • 342
who demands the redistribution of wealth, whilst absolutely powerless
to produce it, • 343
and who consequently invents false theories about its production,
which do nothing but demoralise those who are duped by them • 343
(though even these theories can be discussed with profit under
certain circumstances) • 344
Men like these embody the two chief dangers of the equalisation of
educational opportunity, • 345
namely, the rousing in the average man wants he cannot satisfy, and
the stimulating of talents that are constitutionally imperfect • 345
The latter of these dangers is the source of the former • 346
It cannot be completely avoided, but the present theories of
education tend to heighten, not to minimise it • 346
The current theory that all talents should be developed is false,
• 347
so is the theory that all tastes should be cultivated in all alike.
The education proper for the rich is not a type but an exception • 347
These false theories rest on the false belief that equal education
could ever produce equal social conditions • 348
The majority of each class will remain in the class in which they
were born • 348
Only the efficiently exceptional can rise out of their own class,
• 348
and it is the ambition of the efficiently exceptional only that it is
really desirable to stimulate • 349
The average man should be taught to aim at embellishing his position,
not at escaping from it • 349
CHAPTER IV
INEQUALITY, HAPPINESS, AND PROGRESS
The radical politician will object to the foregoing conclusions in
terms with which we are familiar • 351
The radical theorist will put the same objections more logically.
If the desire of exceptional wealth is really the strongest motive,
he will say that it follows that most men, since they cannot all be
exceptionally rich, must always remain miserable • 352
Now the first answer to this is that the fact that all men will never
be equally wealthy does not prevent the conditions of all men from
improving absolutely • 353
Another answer is that if inequality in the possession of the most
coveted prizes of life implies misery amongst the majority, this evil
would be intensified rather than mitigated by socialists, who would
substitute unequal honour for unequal wealth • 354
The final answer is that the unequal distribution of wealth has no
natural tendency to cause unhappiness; • 357
for men’s desires vary. There is equality of desire for the
necessaries of life only; for this desire rests on men’s physical
natures, which are similar; • 357
but the desire for superfluities depends on their mental powers,
which vary • 358
The special appeal of luxury is mainly to the mind and the
imagination— • 358
the luxury, for instance, of a large house, • 359
or sleeping accommodation in a train • 359
Consequently the desire for luxury and wealth, like the pleasure they
give, depends on peculiar mental powers or peculiar mental states
• 360
Amongst most men the desire for wealth is naturally a speculative
desire only • 361
It implies no pain caused by the want of wealth • 361
The desire ceases to be speculative and becomes a practical craving
only when the imagination is exceptionally strong, and a strong
belief is present that the attainment of wealth is possible • 362
The desire for wealth, in fact, is in proportion to each man’s belief
that by him personally it is attainable • 364
This belief is naturally confined to men with exceptional
imaginations and exceptional productive powers • 365
It only becomes general by the popularising of false theories which
represent wealth as attainable by all, without exceptional talent or
exceptional exertion • 366
It is roused, for instance, in a man who suddenly is told that he
has a legal right to an estate which previously he never thought of
coveting • 366
The socialistic teaching of to-day creates a spurious desire for
wealth by its doctrines of impossible rights to it • 367
The practical craving for wealth is naturally confined to those who
have some talent for creating it, and the pain caused by its absence
is naturally confined to such men • 368
The socialistic theories merely cause a barren and artificial
discontent, • 368
which interferes with that harmonious progress on which the welfare
of the many depends • 369
These theories make enemies of classes who would otherwise be allies,
and the cause of true social reform suffers incalculable injury • 370
The object of the present work is to show the fallacy of the
theoretic basis of existing socialistic discontent and socialistic
aspirations; • 371
and to show that the many are not a self-existent power, • 372
but depend for all the powers they possess on the co-operation of the
few, • 373
whose rights are as sacred, and whose power is as great, as their own
• 375
The recognition of the fact that the relations and positions of
classes can never be fundamentally altered • 376
(especially when we consider the facts of history to which Karl Marx
drew attention) • 376
shows us not only how chimerical are the hopes of the socialists, but
what solid grounds there are for the hopes of more rational reformers
• 378
BOOK I
{3}
CHAPTER I
THE FUNDAMENTAL ERROR IN MODERN SOCIOLOGICAL STUDY
The interest with which the world in general, throughout the middle
portion of this century, has watched the progress of the various
positive sciences, would, when we consider how abstruse these
sciences are, seem strange and almost inexplicable if it were not
for one fact. This fact is the close and obvious bearing which
the conclusions of the sciences in question have on traditional
Christianity, and, indeed, on any belief in immortality and the
divine government of the world. The popular interest in science
remains still unabated, but the most careless observer can hardly
fail to perceive that the grounds of it are, to a certain extent,
very rapidly changing. They are ceasing to be primarily religious,
and are becoming primarily social. The theories and discoveries of
the _savant_ which are examined with the greatest eagerness are no
longer those which affect our {4} prospects of a life in heaven,
but those which deal with the possibility of improving our social
conditions on earth, and which appeal to us through our sympathies,
not with belief or doubt, but with the principles which are broadly
contrasted under the names of conservative and revolutionary.
Such being the case, it is hardly necessary to observe that science
itself has been undergoing a change likewise. The character of
the change, however, requires to be briefly specified. From the
time when geologists first startled the orthodox by demonstrating
that the universe was more than six thousand years old, and that
something more than a week had been occupied in the process of its
construction, to the time, comparatively recent, during which the
genius of Darwin and others was forcing on the world entirely new
ideas with regard to the parentage, and presumably the nature of
man, there was a certain limit—a certain scientific frontier—at
which positive science practically stopped short. Having sedulously
examined the materials and structure of the universe, until on the
one hand it reached atoms and molecules, it examined, on the other,
the first emergence of organic life, and traced its developments
till they culminated in the articulate-speaking human being. It
brought us, in fact, to man on the threshold of his subsequent
history; and there, till very recently, positive science left him.
But now there are signs all round us of a new intellectual movement,
analogous to that which accompanied the rise of Darwinism, {5} and
science once again is endeavouring to enlarge its borders. Having
offered us an explanation of the origin of the animal _man_, it
proposes to deal with the existing conditions of society very much
as it dealt with the structure of the human body, to exhibit them
as the necessary result of certain far-reaching laws and causes,
and to deduce our civilisation of to-day from the condition of the
primitive savage by the same methods and by the aid of the same
theories as those which it employed in deducing the primitive savage
from the brutes, and the brutes in their turn from primitive germ
or protoplasm. In other words, the great triumph of science during
what we may call its physical period has been the establishment of
that theory of development which is commonly spoken of as Evolution,
and the application of this to the problems of physics and biology.
The object of science in entering on what we may call its social
period is the application of this same theory to the problems of
civilisation and society.
It is true that, if we use the word science in a certain sense, the
attempt to treat social problems scientifically is not in itself
new. Political economy, to say nothing of utilitarian ethics, is a
social science, or it is nothing; and political economy had already
made considerable advances when modern physical science had hardly
found its footing. But before long physical science passed it, with
a step that was not only more rapid, but also immeasurably firmer,
and was presently giving such an example of what {6} accurate
science is, that it was thought doubtful whether political economy
could be called a science at all. The doubt thus raised cannot be
said to have justified itself. In spite of all the attacks that have
been made against the earlier economists, their principal doctrines
survive to the present day, as being, so far as they go, genuine
scientific truths. But whenever the thinker, who has been educated
in the school of modern physical science, betakes himself now to
the study of society and human action, and begins to apply to these
the developed theory of evolution, though he does not reject the
doctrines of the earlier economists, he sees them in a new light,
by which their significance is profoundly changed. The earlier
economists took society as they found it, and they reasoned as though
what was true of the economic life around them must be absolutely and
universally true of economic life always. Here is the point as to
which the thinker of to-day differs from them. He does not dispute
the truth of the deductions drawn by them with regard to society as
it existed during their own epoch; but, educated by the methods and
discoveries of the physical and biological evolutionist, he perceives
that society itself is in process of constant change, that many
economic doctrines which have been true during the present century
had little application to society during the Middle Ages, and that
centuries hence they may perhaps have even less. Thus, though he does
not repudiate or disregard the economic science of the past, he {7}
merges it in a science the scope of which is far wider and deeper.
This is a science which primarily sets itself to explain, not how a
given set of social conditions affects those who live among them,
but how social conditions at one epoch are different from those
of another, how each set of conditions is the resultant of those
preceding it, and how, since the society of the present differs from
that of the past, the society of the future is likely to differ from
that of the present.
What political economy has thus lost in precision it has gained
in general interest. So long as it merely analysed processes of
production and distribution which it was assumed would always
continue without substantial modification, political economy was
mainly a science for specialists, and was little calculated to arouse
any keen interest in the public. But now that it has been merged in
that general science of evolution, which offers to an unquiet age
what seems a scientific licence to regard as practically producible
some indeterminate transformation in these processes, political
economy has come to occupy a new position. Instead of being ignored
or ridiculed by the more ardent school of reformers, and even
neglected by conservatives as a not very powerful auxiliary, it has
now been brought down into the dust of the general struggle, and is
invoked by one side as the prophetess of new possibilities, and by
the other as an exorcist of mischievous and mad illusions. And what
is true in this respect with regard to political economy is {8} also
true with regard to evolutionary social science as a whole. Social
science as a whole, just like this special branch of it, is being
brought into vital contact with the lives and hopes of man, and is
exciting a popular interest strictly analogous to that which had been
excited by physical and biological science previously.
It is doing this in two ways, which, though closely connected, are
distinct. In the first place, it is directing our attention to
the human race as a whole, and is showing us how society and the
individual have developed in an orderly manner, growing upwards
from the lowest and the most miserable beginnings to the heights
of civilisation, intellectual, moral, and material, and how they
contain in themselves the potency of yet further development. It
thus offers to the mind a vast variety of suggestion with regard to
the significance of man’s presence upon the earth, and is held by
many to be supplying us with the materials of a religion calculated
to replace that which physical science has discredited. The second
way in which it excites popular interest is the way which has been
just illustrated by a reference to political economy. For besides
offering to our philosophic and religious faculties the vision of
man’s corporate movement from a condition of helpless bestiality
towards some “far-off divine event,” which glitters on us in the
remote future, social science is suggesting to us changes which are
of a very much nearer kind, and which appeal not to our speculative
desire to discover some {9} meaning in the universe, but to the
personal interest which we each of us take in our own welfare—such,
for instance, as a general redistribution of wealth, the abolition
or complete reorganisation of private property, the emancipation of
labour, and the realisation of social equality.
This distinction between the speculative and practical aspects of
social science has a special importance, which will be explained and
insisted on presently. But it is here mentioned only to show the
reader how strong a combination of motives is impelling the present
generation—the conservative classes and the revolutionary classes
equally—to transfer to social science the interest once felt in
physical; and how strong is the stimulus thus applied to sociologists
to emulate the diligence and success of the physicists and
biologists, their predecessors. Nor have diligence, enthusiasm, or
scientific genius been wanting to them. As has already been observed,
they have transformed social science altogether by applying to it
the doctrines of evolution which physical science taught them, and
have thus organically affiliated the former study to the latter. This
is in itself a triumph worthy of the enterprise that has achieved
it. But they have done far more than borrow from physics this mere
general theory. They have established between physical phenomena and
social an enormous number of analogies, so close that the one set
assists in the interpretation of the other. They have borrowed from
the physicists a number of their subsidiary theories, their methods
of grouping facts, and, above {10} all, their methods of studying
them. In a word, they are endeavouring to follow the masters of
physical science along the precise path which has led the latter to
such solid and such definite results.
We have now, however, to record a singular and disappointing truth.
Though men of science have, in the manner just described, been
engaged for years in the field of sociological study; though the way
was prepared for them by men like Comte, Mill, and Buckle; though
amongst them have been men like Mr. Spencer, with capacities of
the highest order, and though certain results have been reached of
the kind desired, complaints are heard from thinkers of all shades
of opinion that these results are singularly unsatisfactory and
inconclusive when compared with the efforts that have been made in
reaching them, and still more when compared with the results of
corresponding efforts in the sphere of physics.
No one complains more loudly of this comparative failure than some
of the most distinguished students of social science themselves.
Professor Marshall, for instance, who has done more than any other
English author to breathe into technical economics the spirit of
evolutionary science, admits that Comte, who laid the foundation of
sociology, and Mr. Spencer, who has invested it with a definitely
scientific character, have brought to the study of “_man’s actions
in society unsurpassed knowledge and great genius, and have made
epochs in thought by their broad surveys and suggestive hints_”; but
neither of them, he proceeds to say, has succeeded {11} in doing
more than this. Mr. Kidd, again, whose work on _Social Evolution_, if
not valuable for the conclusions he himself desires to substantiate,
is curiously significant as an example of contemporary sociological
reasoning, repeats Professor Marshall’s complaint, and gives yet
more definite point to it. Having observed that “_despite the great
advance which science has made in almost every other direction, there
is, it must be confessed, no science of human society, properly so
called_,” he justifies this observation by insisting on what is an
undoubted fact, that “_so little practical light has even Mr. Herbert
Spencer succeeded in throwing on the nature of the social problems of
our time, that his investigations and conclusions are, according as
they are dealt with by one side or the other, held to lead up to the
opinions of the two diametrically opposite camps of individualists
and collectivists, into which society is rapidly becoming organised_.”
Now what is the reason of this? Here is the question that confronts
us. That the methods adopted by the scientist in the domain of
physics are applicable to social phenomena, just as they are to
physical, has been not only established in a broad and general way,
but demonstrated by a mass of minute and elaborately co-ordinated
facts. Why, then, when we find them in the sphere of physics solving
one problem after another with a truly surprising accuracy, do they
yield us such vague and often contradictory results when we apply
them to the solution of the practical problems of society? {12}
Those who complain so justly of the failure of social science and
who yet show themselves altogether at a loss to account for it,
might have seen their way to answering this question had they
concentrated their attention on a point that was just now alluded
to. It was just now observed that the problems which social science
aims at answering, and is popularly expected to answer, are of two
distinct kinds—the philosophic or religious, and the practical; the
former being concerned with the destinies of humanity as a whole,
with movements extending over enormous periods of time, and with the
remote past and future far more than with the present; the other
being concerned exclusively with the present or the near future, and
with changes that will affect either ourselves or our own children.
Now it will be found that social science, whilst busying itself with
both these sets of problems, has met with the failures which are
alleged against it, only in dealing with the latter, and that, so
far as regards the former, it has successfully reached conclusions
comparable in precision and solidity to those of the physicists
and biologists whose methods it has so conscientiously followed.
Professor Marshall’s own treatise on _The Principles of Economics_,
and that of Mr. Kidd on _Social Evolution_ likewise, abound in
admissions that this statement of the case is correct. Professor
Marshall’s account of the rise and fall of civilisation as caused
by climate, by geographical position, and the influence of one race
and one civilisation on another,—an account of which he {13} places
in the very forefront of his elaborate work—is professedly merely a
summary of conclusions already arrived at; and the manner in which
he states these conclusions is itself evidence that sociologists,
when dealing with certain classes of social phenomena, have given
us something more than “_surveys_” and “_suggestive hints_.” Social
science, in fact, cannot be properly called a failure except when
it ceases to deal with the larger phenomena of society, which show
themselves only in the long course of ages, and descending to the
problems of a particular age and civilisation, endeavours to deduce,
from the general principles it has established, propositions minute
enough to be applicable to our immediate conduct and expectations. As
practical inquirers, therefore, the real question before us is not
why social science has failed, where physical science has succeeded,
but why social science has succeeded like physical science in one
direction, and, unlike physical science, failed so signally in
another. If we concentrate our attention on the subject in this way,
and thus realise with precision the nature of the failure we desire
to explain, we shall find that the explanation of it is not only far
simpler than might have been supposed, but also that the remedy for
it is far more obvious and more easy.
It has been said that sociology has succeeded in dealing with those
social phenomena which extend themselves through vast periods of
time, and has failed in dealing with those whose interest and {14}
existence is limited to lives of a few particular generations. Now
between these two sets of phenomena, as thus far described, the most
obvious difference is, no doubt, the difference in their magnitude.
This difference, however, is altogether accidental, and does nothing
to explain those curiously contrasted results which the study of
one set and the other has yielded to the modern sociologist. The
difference, which will explain these, is of quite another kind, and
may briefly be stated thus. The larger social phenomena—those which
interest the speculative philosopher, and with which sociology has
dealt successfully, are phenomena of social aggregates, or masses
of men regarded as single bodies; the smaller phenomena—those
which interest the practical man, and with which sociology has
dealt unsuccessfully—are essentially the phenomena not of social
aggregates, but of various parts of aggregates.
Let us illustrate the matter provisionally by two rudimentary
examples. As an example of the larger phenomena let us take the
advance of man from the age of stone to the ages of bronze and
iron. Of the smaller, we may take the phenomena referred to by Mr.
Kidd—namely, the appearance in the modern world of the socialist or
collectivist party, and the antagonism between it and the party of
private property and individualism. Now the first of these two sets
of phenomena—the use by men of stone implements, and the subsequent
use of metal implements—consist of phenomena which, so far as the
{15} sociologist is concerned, are manifested successively by
humanity, or some portion of humanity, as a whole. They are not
referred to individuals or small classes. No question is asked as to
what particular savage may rightly claim priority in the invention
of metal implements, or whether flint or bronze were the subjects
of any prehistoric monopoly. Those races amongst which the use of
the metals became general are regarded as a single body, which had
made this advance collectively. They are, indeed, as we shall again
have occasion to observe, habitually described under the common
name of _Man_. But let us turn to such phenomena as the antagonism
between individualists and collectivists, and the case is wholly
different. It is true that here also, as in the case we have just
been considering, our attention is called to a portion of the human
race, namely, the Western or progressive nations, which we may, for
certain purposes, regard as a single aggregate; but it is fixed, not
on the phenomena which this aggregate exhibits as a whole, but on
those exhibited by unlike and conflicting parts of it—the part which
sympathises with individualists on the one hand, and the part which
sympathises with collectivists on the other.
Thus the subject-matter of sociology, regarded as a speculative
science, consists of those points in which the members of any
given social aggregate resemble one another. The subject-matter of
sociology, regarded as a practical science, consists of those points
in which the members, or {16} certain groups of members, of any
given social aggregate differ from one another. And here we come to
the reason why sociology, as a practical science, has failed. It has
failed because hitherto it has not realised this distinction, and has
persisted in applying to the phenomena, involved in practical social
problems, the same terminology, the same methods of observation
and reasoning, which it has applied to the phenomena involved in
speculative social problems. By so doing, though it has dissipated
many popular errors, it has, in the most singular manner, given a
new vitality to others. It has indeed supplied a pseudo-scientific
sanction to the most abject fallacies that have vitiated the
political philosophy of this century; and it has thus been
instrumental in keeping alive and encouraging the most grotesquely
impossible hopes as to what may be accomplished by legislation,
and the most grotesquely false views as to the sources of social
and political power. To expose these fallacies, and the defective
reasoning on which they rest, is the object of the present volume.
The nature of that peculiarity in the procedure of modern sociology
which has just been described, and to which all its errors are due,
forms a very curious study, and it will be essential to exhibit
it with the utmost plainness possible. In the following chapter,
therefore, the reader shall be presented with examples of it.
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