Society And its Purpose
Book 3 - Determining the End of Civil Societies
CHAPTER 6
A provident law governing the dispersion and vicissitudes of peoples
371. We can now turn our gaze from these sublime considerations to the historical data still available about the dispersion, increase and diminution of primitive peoples, and about the unceasing development of human civilisation. It will not be difficult to discover a providential law which unknown to nations leads them towards universal human good.
372. The whole complex of historical knowledge that we possess, especially after recent discoveries, clearly shows that the different populations covering the earth set out from Asia. The most ancient and noble of books tells us unambiguously that the clan which re-peopled the earth had its seat on the mountains of Armenia. It is probable that the Noachians increased after living there for some time(140) and then came down from Ararat to feed their flocks along the courses of the Tigris and the Euphrates. They would have arrived at Shinar about a century after the flood. Their first mass movement would have been towards the south-west.
From Shinar, the tribes would have dispersed more regularly,(141) moving in two directions, south and north. Obviously the southern regions, with their better climate and lands, were the more attractive. Moreover, the families and tribes who migrated to the north soon came up against the great chain of the Taurus, Tibetan and Himalayan mountains which separate southern and northern Asia. It is probable, therefore, that the first peoples to form civil societies were, besides the Babylonians, Chaldeans and smaller races, the inhabitants of Egypt and India. China would appear to have been inhabited a little later.
Families which were pushed towards the north as a result of the peaceful division of land (probably by lot) or of the violence inflicted upon the weaker families, must first have increased in number, and then penetrated the sinuous valleys along the rivers. They would also have crossed the mountain barrier and descended into the northern plains, which they would have populated. These new peoples gave the name `fathers’ to the mountains and rivers from which their ancestors had come; the mountains became for these peoples the dwelling place of the gods who generated both heroes and human beings.
Families who moved northwards in Asia occupied Asia Minor at different periods before passing by sea into Europe. They peopled the territories around the Black Sea and Caspian whence perhaps they later arrived again in Europe by land and settled in Germany. Finally, they peopled the immense region known in antiquity as Scythia. It could well be that much later America received its populations from this region. As I said, this distribution of families is especially indicated by the course of the great mountains, and the rivers which flow from them.
373. Our aim, however, is to discuss the provident law that distributes amongst various peoples, with extraordinary equity and wisdom, the events natural to them. Take, for example, the families whose lot it was to inhabit the finest territories of Asia. As we have seen,(142) they passed rapidly from the first stage, the foundation of civil society, to the third stage of wealth. This impeded their national development. The families who migrated towards the north, that is, towards less rich territories, set up civil society more slowly, and passed regularly from the first stage, foundation, to the second, power.(143) This explains why northern nations must have been at the height of their national development and power when southern nations had arrived at the final corruption proper to luxury and pleasure. When the mutual position and state of nations is expressed in these terms, corrupt nations are in continual danger of conquest(144) from their powerful neighbours who abound with social life. The slightest occasion, which is never lacking, is sufficient to guarantee conquest.
Corrupt people, whose moral virtue and intelligence is exhausted, become daily more immobile and static until they are punished by Providence and at the same time buffeted and renovated by an incorrupt people whose hard way of life, agile intelligence and less fertile lands are rewarded and repaid by the acquisition of better territories, and of other peoples. These nations are handed over to them not simply to serve but rather to re-learn what they have forgotten, and even more, under their new masters’ instructions.
374. Perhaps all the conquests of antiquity are explained by this single law. The Assyrians, Chaldeans, Medes and Persians perished only when they had each in turn arrived at ultimate corruption in the face of conquerors who showed themselves more lively and powerful. The Greeks, more to the north than these monarchies, reached the stage of power later than the others, whom they overcame. The Romans, more to the north again than the Greeks, subjected the latter. The second stage of civil society, in which a nation is totally engaged in acquiring power, was longer among the Romans than in any other nation. As a result, Rome had greater leisure in which to construct a more perfect civil government.
375. The peoples who expanded into the northern regions of Asia are divided into two classes, western and eastern. The facts we have noted show that amongst the western peoples, world dominion passed step by step ever further northwards. The peoples of north-east Asia can be seen to bear down continually on those of the south as forcefully as those of the east. There appear, from amongst the Scythians or Tartars, the Huns, who were devastators rather than conquerors, the Turks, founders of the Ottoman empire in countries which they conquered, the Mongols, who overwhelmed Persia, and the Manchus, who took possession of China and reigned there.
Generally speaking, therefore, the peoples of the north are kept by Providence to conquer the south. This is the result of the extraordinary law by which southerners develop more rapidly than northerners, and are thus always at a social stage of weakness and advanced age when northerners are still at the stage of youth and virility. Nevertheless, there is a great difference between eastern and western northerners.
376. The line persistently followed by civilisation does indeed move north-west.(145) The north-eastern peoples have always shown signs of strength without losing their native barbarity. This may depend on peoples in the north-west being the first to have civil government. The north-eastern peoples, on the other hand, preserved the ways of life proper to domestic society, living as they did in tribes or great families. Peoples which have entered civilisation strong in body and spirit but without entirely abandoning domestic society can conquer, but not established totally civilised empires. An individual’s ambition, supported and aided by the love of valour and courage produced in the masses, brings about great conquests. The people are strongly united under a chief in time of war. Nevertheless they are not subject to him to the same degree in peace. Their leader can, when he leads them to victory, do anything with them, but is leader only in name when he tries to order their peaceful, common life. The enduring Tartar empires, for example, had their centre in lands they conquered, not in their native territory: Persia, Turkey and China show this, and indicate how the victors were themselves overcome by the civilisation of the peoples whom they subjected by force. Thus China became mistress of a large part of Tartary after the nephew of Genghis Khan had overrun China and the conquerors had set up their seat of government there.
377. We still have to explain why the peoples of the north-east, although participating in the social stage of power, did not establish fully civil governments in the same way as the north-western peoples. As we said, it is characteristic of the social stage of power to override domestic limits and bring to birth totally civilised societies.
378. It is not difficult to see, however, that the stage of power can only bring about perfect government provided that the power aimed at is profitable for the society as a whole, not for a single person or a few leaders. In the west, society showed itself as an association of individuals; it was the republic as such which wished to conquer; dominion of this kind was destined for the benefit of all the people.(146) In the east, however, society appeared as an association of tribes, not of individuals. The tribes gave their allegiance to an absolute ruler in time of defensive and offensive war. The conqueror, however, made war for himself; the tribes shared the glory rather than the dominion. Individuals took almost no part in the division of booty, and even less in the expansion of government. They were subject to the heads of particular tribes whom they obeyed on the basis of custom, principles or religion without thinking of empire or the conditions proper to a social state. The stage of power in eastern peoples is not, therefore, a truly social stage; the masses do not want power for their own sake, but for the sake of their leaders. Such a disposition on the part of the masses cannot produce any compact and strongly established civil government. This can only occur when perfect government is seen as a necessary means to national power, that is, a power in which all the members of the association participate, as in Greece and Rome.
379. We can, however, take the question further. Why are north-western peoples constituted in well-united republics and civil governments when those of the north-east have never been able to unite in true civil communities?
Let us begin with datum provided for us by the very nature of the fact we wish to explain: north-eastern peoples maintained domestic affections and ways of life more strongly than north-westerners. Careful consideration of this datum leads us to an hypothesis fully capable of answering our question. The hypothesis itself, corrected and modified by the historical information we have about these ancient populations, illustrates the truth of the matter.
380. The hypothesis we use to explain the fact under discussion supposes that populations migrating towards the north-east were composed of various families which moved peacefully in that direction either because they received those portions of land in the first or later divisions of territories or because they were forced to expand in that direction for the necessities of life or through the desire to hunt. Migration north-west, on the other hand, would not have been undertaken by complete, well-established families, but only by individuals gathered together to attempt some enterprise. If this were the case, we would have an explanation for the conservation amongst north-easterners of domestic ways of life and customs; north-westerners, on the other hand, freed from these bonds, would have been able to associate freely in totally civil communities. This explanation, considered as a hypothesis, becomes historical truth, we said, when modified by reflection and the memories extant amongst ancient peoples.
Certainly, it seems hardly possible that the first human beings to move north-west were individuals associated simply for some undertaking. At that time the world was still unpopulated and empty; there was no reason to go in search of military conquest. We have to believe, therefore, that the first dispersal of peoples took place in families, not as a result of individual action. Historically, moreover, we know that after the first dispersal of peoples over the earth new colonies were sent from south to north. These later colonies were indeed composed of individuals, that is, of adventurers in search of glory and a new country which would replace the limitations of their old land. History also tells us that the colonies we are describing went north-west. We do not hear of any which went north-east.
381. The geographical situation of Egypt and Phoenicia seems to explain why these colonies of adventurers, coming in large part from these countries, did not proceed north-east. Egypt is very much to the west, and both territories had open before them the Mediterranean which naturally drew them to Greece and Italy. Moreover, Asia is blocked towards the north-east by the great Gobi desert which makes expansion in that direction very difficult. It also forces peoples desiring to dwell in north-eastern regions to move great distances towards the Pole in order to find pasture or fertile lands. They arrive in lands which, especially in comparison with north-western areas, are cold and inhospitable. I believe that the great impediment provided by the desert, the lands unsuitable for cultivation and the harsh climate in that part of Asia, brought people to Scythia later than to Asia minor or Greece. As a result, immigration to Scythia took place only after domestic society had already developed into tribes, and time had allowed domestic ways of living, which were perhaps already sanctioned by ancestor-religion and civil-family laws, to be strengthened.
This would also explain why in the north-west itself, Germany never seems to have associated in true civil unions under well-united governments. A part of the populations which lived on the coasts of the Caspian and Black Seas seems to have poured into the Germanic regions from Asia, and arrived late in Europe after the long journey taking them over the Ural, Caucasus, Taurus or Emodi ranges and the Balkans. In other words, they arrived only when they were already ordered and established in tribes, each of which had its own unchangeable customs — customs which impeded progress and prevented those families from fusing into a single people.(147)
382. Let us return now to the western migrations. The very first populations travelling towards the north-west did not arrive at any greater state of civilisation than those who travelled north-east. If the information we have about the Pelasgi in Greece is to be believed, they seem to have returned to savagery. A recent author writes:
| This social state of the Pelasgi is lower than that of any of the inhabitants of Asia, of the blacks of Africa who have crafts and agriculture, and of all the pastoral peoples of these two parts of the world who, despite conditions in their regions which impede agriculture, have brought civil society to a high level. It is also lower than the state of hunters in America who are at least familiar with maize and potatoes, and know how to make certain kinds of cloth. It can only be compared with the social condition of Australian aborigines.(148) |
This was the miserable state of the first families who came to dwell in Greece. They were raised from such barbarity by the work of individual adventurers who abandoned family restrictions and founded colonies. Sismondi continues:
| Nevertheless, the Egyptian colonies(149) led the inhabitants of the land to the highest degree of civilisation. The colonies taught the local population every useful craft and how to dominate nature. The inhabitants were not driven out or exterminated; they were admitted to the new societies formed by the colonists and united within the colonists’ cities where they became more Greek than Egyptian. Everything was Greek: religion, language, customs, clothes — everything belonged to the new country, not to the old. This was particularly true of the political organisation which also was Greek. Here alone is the source of freedom and love of country; here was lit the flame that was destined to illuminate the universe. |
383. Note, however, that this is not altogether exact. It is not right to say that `everything, especially the political organisation, was Greek.’ How could it be Greek when Greece was inhabited by populations whose degree of civilisation was on a par with that of Australian aborigines? It would be more appropriate to say that nothing was Greek, and that the political organisation above all was not Greek. Up to this point, Greece contained only a family, not a political element. Everything in Greece was itself foreign, or at least new; the political organisation in particular was entirely imported by those who colonised that land. Greece’s sole contribution was a germ of domestic society, helpful to the new people which was to arise there, if it were not to develop excessively harsh, military forms of government.(150) This seed was dominated by the power of the colonies which possessed knowledge and energy, and contemporaneously provided laws accompanied by sanctions.
384. The formation of compact, strong civil governments which appeared in the midst of the north-western peoples, and then served as the focus of universal civilisation, is dependent on the association of individuals, not on the first association of families. Individuals, having renounced and left their own families, made up an artificial family, the true beginning of civil governments. This occurred principally in Greece, and was repeated in the surrounding regions so that political association was extended along with the good things of civilisation. As our author says:
| As soon as Greece had fused into a single people the aborigines (autocqoneV) and the colonists arriving from Egypt, she began in her turn to extend the civilisation she had received along all the Mediterranean coastline. The colonies of Ionia, Helos and Doris turned to Asia Minor. Others came to found new city-states in Italy, Sicily, along the shores of Pontus Euxinus, and the coast of Africa and Provence. Everywhere these colonies exercised the beneficial influence on the natives that Egypt had exercised on Greece; everywhere the colonies civilised, taught the art of living, and allowed the original inhabitants to mingle with them. The resulting union soon led the colonies to outdo the local metropolitan centres in population, power, wealth, crafts of all kinds and even in the development of intelligence. |
385. Here we have to note once more that the adventurous Egyptian and Phoenician colonies mark the most vigorous stage of development in their countries of origin. As I have said, these countries either had not completed or had rapidly passed through the social stage of power. It is, of course, in the nature of things that civil societies should attain the stage of power. Nevertheless, in some countries this stage either comes to grief or does not attain full growth, although the natural effort of the peoples to reach it is obvious even when unsuccessful. I contend that this stage corresponds to the time when new colonies were composed of youth who felt the need to conquer, dominate and expand in greatness and power, but were blocked in their endeavour by the unbreakable yoke of family ties. At this moment, they left their homeland to satisfy their desires elsewhere.
386. The colonists, therefore, were the liveliest, most agile and intelligent section of the country which they had left; it was they who heard more clearly the voice of nature, and felt more deeply the need of complete development. It will be useful here if I quote more at length from Sismondi, especially as his intention is to prove exactly the opposite of what I want to establish. These observations, or rather this historical information, prove that what mattered most to the ancient colonies was not the acquisition of wealth, which they still despised, but the attainment of power and glory. Consequently, it shows that the colonies were animated by the spirit proper to the second social stage which aims at domination and glory and, as we said, presupposes a greater use of understanding.
| The Greek colonies were made up of free men coming from all degrees of society. In heroic times, they were led by the king’s sons, and later by the enpatridi or citizens of the most noble lineage. Nevertheless, a necessary consequence of their undertaking was the need to establish extreme equality amongst the colonists who enrolled for these ventures without wealth or any desire to acquire it. |
This is the contempt for wealth which characterises the state of the masses in the second social stage.
| This does not mean that they were without ambition, but that they wanted to excel their compatriots in counsel or in war. They never thought of growing great through wealth, but by eloquence, prudence or valour. They could not expect to find in their new land any food other than that provided by the work of their own hands; like all the others, they received their share of the fields of the colony and had to cultivate them without domestic servants, daily labourers or slaves. This new society, surrounded by enemies or jealous neighbours, refused to harbour domestic enemies in its midst. As long as the lesser peoples of antiquity were mutually independent, slavery amongst them was simply an accident arising from the right of war; it was not an industrial organisation. Work was therefore still held in honour. The chief citizens of the colony did not baulk at manual labour. It was agreed that such work would not occupy all their time, of which a great part had to be spent in civic administration, instruction and defence. Nevertheless, rural industry produces far more than is needed for the maintenance of those who exercise it in countries where the labourer has no rent to pay and the State has no debts, where no part of the production of succeeding generations is mortgaged by fathers to their debtors, where customs are simple and luxury is unknown.(151) Today the labourer lives on half his crop and hands over the other half to the owner; at other times, however, the person who worked his own land lived on half a week’s labour and could devote the other half to public service. |
387. All this shows that the colony was simply an association of approximately equal individuals whose common will was necessarily interested in government. This gradually became the single aim of their thoughts and inevitably constituted a true political society, not simply a communal way of life for masters and servants.
| All social interests were debated in the Agora, every example was open to common view; all characteristics, however they developed, were public. The study of mankind, the philosophical study of human passions and interests, was accessible to rich and poor alike. Polished language and refined accents were not a sign of social standing because everyone endeavoured to speak with the same purity of tongue. Any book which occasionally increased the fund of common instruction had a popular influence; Herodotus read his history to the assembled Greeks. — The interests they had in common, the proximity of all the citizens and their constant mutual interaction made the colonies of antiquity a school where all learned from one another.(152) |
388. Clearly, peoples in circumstances such as these, no longer separated by family walls as it were, were strictly united under a single, public, civil government. There were, however, other circumstances that favoured the bonding of the citizens, above all, the city-states which were founded, in such a way that each was like an ample, common home for all.
| The colonists were weak, small in number and left totally to themselves (their mother country gave no thought to their defence). All were eager to build their houses, therefore, within the restricted confines of the city. At night, they slept under a common guard, and went out only at daybreak to their work in the fields. These conditions marked their agriculture in a way similar to that of Provence or Spain where no houses are scattered through the fields, and the peasants all return with their beasts to the village. Certainly, this type of agriculture has serious disadvantages: the labour of peasants and animals is increased, the farmworker cannot take stock of his land or expect abundant harvests, there is no encouragement to lay down plantations, to keep fields tidy or love the soil. The influence of this system on mankind is, however, more important than the production of wealth. For the colonists the feeling for social and civil life was the most important thing to preserve. Country people in villages become more civilised than those scattered over the lands. |
389. Moreover, the need for defence also helped to bring about equal conditions for all and remove the danger of wealth accumulating in a few families.
| The colonist who depended only on himself and his companions in the venture did not want fields where he was unable to hear the sound of the war-trumpet calling him to the defence of his city. This was the principle used by the colonial authority to divide lands that had been acquired. It was necessary, therefore, that all should have approximately equal shares so that no one was too far from the walls. The divided lands spread out like concentric circles. The cultivated fields were nearest the fortified precinct; further out, the colony had its pastures where the advancing enemy could easily be spotted. In this way the higher interest of common security brought about territorial equality, whatever the inequalities of wealth amongst the associates. |
When we examine Romulus’ robber band, we find exactly this kind of association amongst individual rogues without families. The abduction of the Sabine women confirms this.(153)
390. It is clear, therefore, that the most robust civil governments took their origin from the very ruins of family societies. In this we see the law of compensation, which Providence posits in the fortunes of mankind. By this law nations are renewed even while experiencing fair punishment and reward. Finally, we see why the constant route of progress followed by civilisation is the same as that of power organised under perfect civil governments. It sets out from a centre in Asia, moves towards the north-west and across this hemisphere to continue in the Americas.
391. I do not want to stop to consider the present state of civil societies in Europe. I do not want to speak of England or Russia, the two most northern nations to arrive at social power. It is enough to note that the struggle which is about to start is a totally new case in history, and in part perhaps a step back from the law we have posited.(154) It is clear to all that the north is divided, that the west joins with the south and the east with the north. Civilisation prevails in the first coalition; force in the second. Whatever the outcome of the great, inevitable struggle, the process of civilisation will remain, conquering or conquered.
Notes
(140) Cf. Josephus, The Jewish Antiquities etc., bk. 1, c. 5.
(141) Moses signals the epoch of the institution of ownership when he says that `the earth was divided' (at the time of Peleg, Gen 11 [10]: 25), that is, parts of the land were assigned to the different heads of families. Initially, granted the abundance of land and the small population, territory could be used by anyone.
(142) c. 13.
(143) Many other circumstances must have influenced the development of these different conditions among contemporaneous peoples. 1. The southern inhabitants of Asia did not experience the needs which normally cause wars. Moreover, they did not feel any necessity for a very active, vigilant government. The family regime provided sufficiently for every desirable comfort. Consequently, the rulers of these nations were never able to acquire the minimum unity and force necessary for active rule. I have already noted that the absolutist forms in the East do not prove the presence of unity and force in the ruler. They are only indications of overwhelming ambition in the supreme authority and lazy indifference to public affairs on the part of subjects. 2. The climate, and the abundance of things necessary to life and affluence, must have played their part in enervating and weakening the peoples of southern Asia. Inactivity itself must have given them greater affection for domestic ways of life, and rendered such ways unalterable. 3. If the land was divided not by lot but by free choice, it is probable that the more courageous, adventurous and perhaps less cultured, knowledgeable peoples were content to move towards the mountains. Others, endowed with crafts and greater development, remained as owners of the places they inhabited, and only moved through territories more suitable for cultivation.
(144) Cf. SC, c. 9.
(145) Notice that the north-western movement of civilisation continues into the next hemisphere.
(146) The republican principle present in those colonies which moved north-west found the greatest possible expansion in the origin of these colonies. Let me recall something that pleases many English and French women today. In very ancient Athens, at the time of Cecrops, women were present at public gatherings and voted with men about matters concerning the republic (Cf. Varro, quoted by St. Augustine in De C. D., bk. 17, c. 9). It is also true, however, that Cecrops, first king of Athens, who was responsible for the stability of marriage, expelled women from matters of state when he had the opportunity, as we can see in Varro (op. cit.). I want to ask a single question about this: can we rightly call social progress a return to customs which prevailed before Cecrops' time? This is the kind of progress crabs make!
(147) During Augustus' reign, Maraboduus established a powerful kingdom in Germany, while Decebalus, king in Dacia, became famous under Domitian and Trajan. The kingdoms, however, were only `groupings of peoples, the effect of superiority achieved by a warlike tribe under a famous leader. — Weaker tribes were compelled to recognise the sovereignty of the strong tribe, and received territory or a guarantee about the territory they possessed if they provided military service.' — For the rest, Germany was characterised by about forty more or less extended peoples.
(148) I-C-L. de Sismondi, Les Colonies des anciens comparées à celles des modernes sous le rapport de leur influence sur le bonheur du genre humain.
(149) And the Phoenician colonies, we may add, especially those founded by Cadmus who gave literacy to Greece (16th century B. C.). — Greece had its finest colonies contemporaneously with the expulsion of the Canaanites from Palestine and Phoenicia under Joshua. The defeats inflicted on these soft, corrupt peoples by this condottiere shook them to the core and dispersed them throughout the world. They founded other colonies in Asia, Africa, Europe, and it seems probable that their ships even reached America. We are all aware of the two famous Tingitane columns which could still be seen in Africa five hundred years after Christ. They commemorated, in Phoenician script, the arrival in Africa of colonies fleeing `from before Joshua, son of Nave, thief' (Procopius, De Regno Vandalico, bk. 2, c. 10). Bochart in his famous book, De coloniis Phoenicum, gives a fine description of this incident which forced the Phoenicians to leave their native land and migrate to foreign parts. — Thus Providence, in moving the Hebrew people against the Canaanites, did not simply intend that the Jews should enter the promised land. It also aimed at the good of the Canaanites themselves, when it chastised them, and of the whole human race.
The Canaanites were growing more and more corrupt. Providence shook them, forcing them to abandon their own vice-infected homes and to break with their families amongst whom they lived under the insoluble bondage of domestic superstitions and blind, narrow customs. Some perished, the rest fled by any available escape-route to exile. In such tragic circumstances, individuals, not families, are the operative force; individuals have to associate, and think of new things and new undertakings. The more knowledgeable and courageous person is better fitted for such conditions. When the fugitives reach barbarous regions, however, a happy mixture takes place between these fallen, civilised peoples and the totally uncivilised native population. The latter learn the principles of human living, and the former, through intermingling with their uncultured neighbours, absorb simpler ways of life together with an example of work and activity in the face of need. The ancient civilisation-process of the human race moves forward. God has never forgotten any people on earth.
(150) It is essential to preserve intact an element of domestic society in the midst of civil society. Establishing the extent of this element and its weight in the balance of power is, however, one of the great questions capable of various answers according to the stages and particular conditions of nations. The solution of such questions illustrates to a great degree the wise skill of legislators. It would seem that until our days civil laws have continually weakened paternal authority as the family is gradually absorbed to an ever greater degree by government. This should be considered carefully by those to whom Providence has entrusted the duty of making laws.
(151) Especially where the soil is fertile and the weather very good.
(152) Sismondi, op. cit. — Num 35, with its description of the form of the city the Hebrews had to build after conquering Canaan, is worth reading from this point of view. It is the oldest document we have which allows us to see the form of the cities built by the ancient colonies in the countries they conquered.
(153) A proof of the prevalence in Rome of supreme love of country and its laws is found in Brutus' decision to condemn his own children to death, and in similar facts. This spirit of civil association became almost the principle of morality amongst the Romans; it caused Cicero to assign the principle of sociality as a source of morals and of natural right, although on occasion his basic common sense told him that this was insufficient (De Off., bk. 1).
(154) The reason modern societies do not obey the providential laws presiding over the societies of antiquity is the new element in our societies, that is, Christianity which creates new, more sublime laws for the progress of Christian nations.