414 THE NATURE OF TRADITION 



among primitive races where the conditions are even more 

 favourable for transmission by this means. Thus, in order that 

 the products of conceptual thinking of former generations should 

 be transmitted, it is not necessary that there should be convic- 

 tions based on logical grounds or that formal language should 

 be employed. Tradition can be, and is to a large extent, 

 * absorbed '. 



5. Tradition, having thus passed on, is retained, and in the 

 process of retention habit plays an important part. Habit applies 

 to all forms of mental process and to all forms of action. Once 

 something has been performed in one way, it is easier to do it 

 again in that way than in any other. ' This is the great principle ', 

 says McDougall, ' by which all acquisitions of the individual 

 mind are preserved 'j 1 whatever the mode of acquisition may be. 



6. The products of the thinking of past generations are thus 

 stored up, transmitted, and retained. Additions are made to the 

 store, and improvements are made in the method of storing. 

 Tradition, by which is meant this store, is thus cumulative. 

 The acquirements of past generations are passed on to the present 

 generation and, modified in some degree, are transmitted to 

 future generations. New generations, therefore, so far as acquired 

 knowledge is concerned, begin at the point where the former 

 generation left off. It does not, of course, follow that additions 

 are always being made to tradition ; it may be for all practical 

 purposes stagnant or much that has been acquired may be lost. 2 

 It does, however, permit of accumulation, and this fact introduces 

 an element of vast importance into the life of man as compared 

 with his pre-human ancestors. 



It is not, however, correct to say that this is a wholly new 

 element. Tradition may be and is present before the level of 

 conceptual thinking has been reached. Many animals, for 

 example, live in herds and instinctively take shelter when one 

 member of a herd utters a warning cry. If at some past time a new 

 enemy has appeared, they will have learnt by experience to take 

 shelter. Subsequent generations will raise the warning cry on the 

 appearance of the enemy, because what we may think of as a tra'di- 

 tion has grown up concerning the hostile nature of the species 

 with which past generations were brought into contact. Thus 



1 McDougall, Social Psychology, p. 111. a See on this subject, Rivers, 



' Disappearance of Useful Arts ', Festskrift tilleguad Edward Westermarck, 1912. 



