177 ) 



XL On the supposed Progress of Human Society from Savage to Civilized Life, 

 as connected mill the Domestication of Animals and the Cultivation of the Ce- 

 realia. By JOHN STARK, Esq. F.R.S.E. &c. 



(Read 1st March 1841.) 



I. SUPPOSED PROGRESS OF HUMAN SOCIETY. 



IT is a general belief that Man, in his supposed progress from Savage to 

 Civilized Life, has passed through three distinct stages or periods, each one lead- 

 ing a step forward in the road to social improvement. These stages are asserted 

 to be, 1. The Hunter State; 2. The Pastoral State; and, 3. The Agricultural State. 

 Allusions to these different stages crowd the pages of the historian, the philosopher, 

 and the poet ; and arguments are founded on, and deductions drawn from, these 

 states of existence, as if they were ultimate truths, neither to be discussed 

 nor dissented from. It is the object of this paper to question the existence of 

 these separate states, their necessary connection with one another, and the end to 

 which ultimately they are supposed to lead. 



Among the earliest writers who treat of the first ages of the world. is HESIOD, 

 the Grecian poet, a contemporary of HOMER, who li ved about a thousand years 

 before the present era. His story of PROMETHEUS and PANDORA, as well as his de- 

 tail of five different periods which had preceded the time when he wrote, are evi- 

 dently taken from some of the floating traditions of the early history of the world 

 met with in all countries. The first period is termed the Golden Age, referrible, 

 it is supposed, to the state of man in Paradise ; the second is entitled the Silver 

 Age, which may allude to the antediluvian period ; the third is the Brazen Age, 

 which, from some of its characteristics, would seem to refer to the state subse- 

 quently termed the Hunter's State ; the fourth is the Age of Heroes ; and the fifth 

 the Iron Age, or Agricultural period.* 



LUCRETIUS, the Roman poet and philosopher, follows in describing the early 

 stage of man's existence as little better than that of the beasts. But afterwards, 

 according to the same authority, men built huts, clothed themselves with skins, 

 and learned the use of fire ; the power of forming sounds and language followed ; 

 and, finally, towns were erected and governments established.! 



* Works and Days, Book I. translated from the Greek by THOMAS COOKE. 

 t T. LUCRETIUS CARUS, De Natura Rerum, lib. v. 

 VOL. XV. PART I. 3B 



