156 SOCIAL HEREDITY AND SOCIAL EVOLUTION 



leading to despotism or stagnation which character- 

 izes the nations of the East ; the other was the com- 

 munal relation, tending to democracy and the energy 

 which characterizes the nations of the West. 



It must not be assumed, however, that the types 

 of civilization referred to have always been clear and 

 sharply distinct. They represent two principles, one 

 of which has, as a rule, been adopted by different 

 types of man and different nations. But frequently 

 the two types are mixed, and not infrequently over- 

 lap each other. In many of the great nations, these 

 two principles of government have been in competi- 

 tion with each other, first the one and then the other 

 gaining the supreme control. In some of our modern 

 nations we can see clear evidence that a nation orig- 

 inally founded upon the communal system has had 

 ingrafted upon it later the patriarchal system of 

 government. But although these two systems of 

 government are thus more or less mingled with each 

 other in late history, they are nevertheless quite dis- 

 tinct from each other, and have marked two types of 

 social development. 



The Patriarchal System and its Development 



Based upon the Family. — The foundation of this 

 system is the fact that the chieftain and the head of 

 the tribe owes his position to his hereditary rights,! 

 and that the power is transferred from parent to son J 

 by the simple process of descent. This is nothing 

 more than an expansion of the system of the original 

 family. In the primitive family the father was the 

 ruler; the wife and children belonged to him as a 

 kind of property. Their lives were in his hands, and 

 he had absolute power. No one in the early days 



