CLEVER FISHES. 529 



and eventual retreat ; his various negotiations, alliances, treaties of 

 peace and breaches of them ; and so on with details of his various 

 campaigns in Germany, Spain, Russia, etc., including accounts of his 

 strategy, tactics, victories, defeats, slaughters, etc., etc. ; for how, in the 

 absence of such information, is it possible to judge what institutions 

 should be advocated and what legislative changes should be opposed ? 

 Still, after due attention has been paid to these indispensable mat- 

 ters, a little time might, perhaps, with advantage be devoted to the 

 natural history of societies. Some guidance for political conduct would 

 possibly be reached by asking, What is the normal course of social 

 evolution, and how it will be affected by this or that policy ? It may 

 turn out that legislative action of no kind can be taken that is not 

 either in harmony with, or at variance with, the processes of national 

 growth and development as naturally going on; and that its desirable- 

 ness is to be judged by this ultimate standard rather than by proxi- 

 mate standards. Without claiming too much, we may at any rate 

 expect that, if there does exist an order among those structural and 

 functional changes which societies pass through, knowledge of that 

 order can scarcely fail to affect our judgments as to what is progres- 

 sive, and what retrograde what is desirable, what is practicable, what 

 is Utopian. 



To those who think such an inquiry worthy to be pursued, will be 

 addressed the chapters that are to follow. There are sundry consider- 

 ations important to be dwelt upon, before commencing Sociology. To 

 a clear idea of the nature of the science have to be added clear ideas 

 of the conditions to successful study of it. These will henceforth oc- 

 cupy us. 



* 



CLEYER FISHES. 



Bt feancis feancis. 



WHETHER we owe many of the matters we are about to glance 

 at to fishes or no, it is certain that the fishes possessed them long 

 before we did, and though man may be said to have invented them, 

 yet in his savage state he must have taken more or less of hints from 

 Nature, and have adopted the methods which Nature pointed out to 

 him as the most effective in hunting or war (which were his principal 

 occupations) whenever they could be adapted to his needs and appli- 

 ances. However this may be, it is certainly singular that we should 

 find so many existing similarities of a peculiar kind between the habits 

 and attributes of men and fishes. For example, there is scarcely a 

 sport we practise or a weapon of offence that we use which has not a 

 34 



