268 ADAPTATION AND PROGRESS 



struggles," Carlyle's Great Man theory, James' teaching concern- 

 ing " Energies of Men," and Ross' Social Control. This will pre- 

 pare the way for a discussion of idealization and religion or 

 " active spiritual adaptation " in the narrower use of the term. 



Jacques Novicow (1849- ) 

 Social Progress by Cultural Attraction and Expansion 



Although Novicow is given scant recognition by American 

 sociologists, his writings, especially Les Luttes are deserving of a 

 prominent place in this book for two reasons: (i) He antedated 

 by many years the four-fold analysis of adaptation worked out 

 independently by Professor Carver which has formed the basis of 

 this present discussion, and (2) his analysis of the European 

 situation with its inter-group rivalry for territorial and commer- 

 cial expansion is especially worthy of recall now that this rivalry 

 has resulted as he feared and as he tried to prevent by turning 

 the thoughts of cultured men and leaders in social progress to that 

 highest form of conflict, struggle for excellence. His suggestion 

 of a federation of nations is not far removed from that advocated 

 at present by such American exponents of peace as ex-President 

 Taft and Senator Lodge, but he stands almost alone in his 

 emphasis on growth of nations by cultural attraction and expan- 

 sion rather than by territorial or even commercial. This last 

 point is particularly noteworthy in our present discussion and 

 warrants his consideration in this division of our subject rather 

 than earlier where the date of his writing and his biological and 

 psychological postulates would otherwise cause him to be placed. 



Novicow begins his study of " conflicts " by showing that 

 struggle and alliance are twin phenomena in all cosmic evolution, 

 — that " the universe is a totality of systems being continually 

 formed and broken up." He holds, moreover, that " the group- 

 ings which we consider as irreducible units, the molecule, cell, 

 individual, state, for example, are pure subjective categories of 

 the mind " ^ as are also the divisions between the sciences.^ 



Passing from the domain of the inanimate to that of the ani- 

 mate, he shows that there are struggles not only between associa- 



* Les Luttes, p. 5. * Ibid., pp. 7 f. 



