The Summary Cause for the
Stability or Downfall of Human Societies
CHAPTER 8
Societies are judged according to practical and speculative
reason.
— Application of the political criterion to the practical reason of
the masses
50. It would be interesting and useful to ask here: `What are the laws according to which the political criterion we have mentioned gradually loses its importance in the eyes of people until completely forgotten?’ In other words, `What are the laws according to which societies move from careful attention to their existence, a characteristic of their first stage, to the three other successive stages which we have indicated?’
51. This investigation can be conducted from two points of view because civil societies are moved by two forces which, although never entirely separate, never work with equal efficacy. Sometimes one, sometimes the other is prevalent. In this way, they characterise and constitute two different states in civil society.
These two forces are the practical reason of the masses, and the speculative reason of the individuals who direct society.
52. The practical reason of a society, by which the masses are guided, could also be called, although improperly, social instinct. It resembles instinct in the sense that difficulties arise when we try to indicate the precise reasons leading the masses to operate socially. These reasons are undoubtedly present and serve as a secret guide to what the masses do, although even the masses themselves are unable to express or formulate them. However, they are not the object of reflection on the part of the masses. Such reflection would be necessary if the people as whole are to be capable of explaining and expressing them. We also have to consider that these reasons are neither general nor result from great foresight. Remoter effects and even universal effects never enter the heads of the general run of people who are motivated to act by present, immediate advantage, which constitutes the practical reason we are discussing.
53. At this point, a question arises: `If the masses do not act according to some prevision of distant effects, nor calculate the general effects, how is it that they sometimes give signs of possessing an infallible instinct? Why is their action often far more sensible than that of high-ranking politicians, and their tendency such that it has often formed the greatness of nations and kingdoms?’
This an important question, and forms part of our investigation: `What are the laws by which societies pass from directing themselves according to the rule about substance and accident, which we have mentioned, to the point at which they totally lose sight of this faithful guide?’
54. We note, in fact, that the infallible instinct of the masses is not always evident. It shows itself only at certain times and in certain states of society, and depends on the following contingency: `The people act socially to strengthen and maintain their society if, in their eyes, the immediate good which constitutes the stimulus and motive of their activity is one with the good itself of the society, and especially with the good which makes it subsist. At this point, the action of the masses appears to possess great foresight and wisdom because it brings in its wake highly beneficial, long-term and universal effects. These, however, are not the effects of foresight and calculation on the part of the people because the very nature itself of the situation has led and forced them to act in that way.
In this case the present, particular good, at which the people are aiming, is per accidens the self-same good forming the support of the society and containing the seed of its development. In such an event, it is usual to attribute to the wisdom of the people what is simply the wisdom of nature. We normally speak about an instinct of foresight only in the case of excellent, long-term, universal effects. These, however, are obtained not in fact by human foresight, but by a natural connection between what human beings do and the consequences of their action. There is no need for people to have seen the connection, natural forces act even if unseen.’
55. We shall understand the circumstances and laws according to which the activity of the masses first conforms to the criterion we have explained, and then gradually departs from it, if we ask: `What are the immediate benefits presented as desirable to the eyes of the masses at different times and in different states of society?’
56. Here it would be easy to note how, in the beginning, the very existence of the society is the good seen immediately and vividly by all, just as the destruction of the society is the immediate evil present to the masses. In fact, the infancy of a society is always an eminently patriotic epoch, as it were. The good of each person, considered as a member of the social unit, is equivalent to the elementary good itself of society.(31)
57. Secondly, we can note how this good of existence becomes remote rather than immediate when the foundation of a society is complete and its existence secure. At such a moment the immediate, obtainable benefits are those which pertain to the development of the society itself, and its power and glory. Love of one’s country changes because the country’s glory and dignity are more obvious than its existence.
58. After a society has developed and gained prestige, while enjoying these benefits at length, and exhausting the forces it has devoted to their acquisition, the desire of its members — always eager for novelty — turns naturally to love of tranquil, peaceful pleasures. This is the period of luxury and enjoyment, which now become the immediate good to which the masses tend and according to which they operate.
This period of decadence does at first preserve a kind of patriotism which desires peace, wealth and pleasure for the country. Such patriotism is as yielding as its object, and as weak as the will from which it sprang. Soon, patriotism is accompan-ied by inertia, which increases along with luxury and the abuse of pleasures. Finally, this voluptuous inertia takes forms indicat-ive of selfishness which first threatens and then suffocates patriotism. All generous feeling subsides in the spirit, given over now to contempt for those who have gone before. The nation, which has entirely lost sight of the rule that we have posited, is blind to every good proper to the country and devotes its attention to individual good alone, around which it girates briefly before its final collapse. Poets, who always express the state of a society, sing as Ovid once did, not without presumption but certainly without shame:
| Let others turn back for help to our origins; I am so glad to be born now. This age suits me Not because pliant gold is drawn from the earth, And the sea-shell vessels we behold have come from other lands; Nor because mountains shrink as we excavate our marble, And our jetties hold back the blue waters — No! We have our own style of living And the pitiful rustic life of our ancestors has gone.(32) |
This state comes to an end along with that in which the ultimate, single thought of the people is directed to `bread and circuses’. Everyone can see that history supports all that I have said.
Notes
(31) This explains why patriotism is more strongly asserted and augmented in times of war when the existence of nations is endangered.
(32) De A., 3: 121-128.