166 SOCIAL HEREDITY AND SOCIAL EVOLUTION 



divine right is an idea that is repugnant to the com- 

 munal nations of the "West. 



This lack of tendency to centralization explains 

 the fact that we hear nothing of the communal na- 

 tions during the period when the patriarchal systems 

 grew into great nations. They failed to advance, 

 and remained for long, long centuries unknown 

 and obscure. Occasionally, indeed, under some excep- 

 tionally powerful leader they became a mighty 

 force which could invade new countries and make 

 themselves powers in civilization. But these were 

 sporadic incidents, for they depended simply upon 

 the personal power of a mighty leader, and the nation 

 thus created usually fell to pieces after his death, 

 failing to preserve the influence it would have had 

 if the leader had been supported by the principles 

 underlying the patriarchal system. There were in 

 the early history of such people no opportunities for 

 centralization. Nothing but expediency united the 

 different tribes under one head; nothing held them 

 long together when they did unite. 



Makes Men Rather Than Nations — Nevertheless, this 

 communal system contained in it the element of 

 greatest permanent strength. After the force of the 

 patriarchal system had spent itself, and the nations 

 it had produced had grown and broken to pieces, or 

 shown that they were doomed to destruction or stag- 

 nation, then slowly these new forces, with their less 

 forcible centralizing power, began to make them- 

 selves felt. Then this communistic race of people 

 began to appear as a power in the world, and from 

 that time on, the history of civilization has been 

 wholly in the hands of nations that have their govern- 

 ment based upon the communal idea. Perhaps a 



