Darwinian principles applied to History :>:;7 



The operation of these principles cannot be denied Man is Mill 

 an animal, subject to zoological as well as mechanical lawn. The 

 dark influence of heredity continues to be effective ; and psychical 

 development had begun in lower organic forms, — perhaps with life 

 itself. The organic and the social struggles for existence are mani- 

 festations of the same principle. Environment and climatic influence 

 must be called in to explain not only the differentiation of the great 

 racial sections of humanity, but also the varieties within these sub- 

 species and, it may be, the assimilation of distinct varieties. Hitter's 

 Antliropogeography has opened a useful line of research. But on 

 the other hand, it is urged that, in explaining the course of history, 

 these principles do not take us very far, and that it is chiefly for the 

 primitive ultra-prehistoric period that they can account for human 

 development. It may be said that, so far as concerns the actions and 

 movements of men which are the subject of recorded history, physical 

 environment has ceased to act mechanically, and in order to affect 

 their actions must affect their wills first ; and that this psychical 

 character of the causal relations substantially alters the problem. 

 The development of human societies, it may be argued, derives a 

 completely new character from the dominance of the conscious 

 psychical element, creating as it does new conditions (inventions, 

 social institutions, etc.) which limit and counteract the operation of 

 natural selection, and control and modify the influence of physical 

 environment. Most thinkers agree now that the chief clews to the 

 growth of civilisation must be sought in the psychological sphere. 

 Imitation, for instance, is a principle which is probably more signifi- 

 cant for the explanation of human development than natural selection. 

 Darwin himself was conscious that his principles had only a very 

 restricted application in this sphere, as is evident from his cautious 

 and tentative remarks in the 5th chapter of his Descent of Man. He 

 applied natural selection to the growth of the intellectual faculties 

 and of the fundamental social instincts, and also to the differentiation 

 of the great races or "sub-species" (Caucasian, African, etc.) which 

 differ in anthropological character 1 . 



16. But if it is admitted that the governing factors which 

 concern the student of social development are of the psychical order, 

 the preliminary success of natural science in explaining organic 



1 Darwinian formulae may be suggestive by way of analogy. For instance, it || 

 characteristic of social advance that a multitude of inventions, schemes and plans are 

 framed which are never carried out, similar to, or designed for the same and 

 invention or plan which is actually adopted because it has chanced to suit better the 

 particular conditions of the hour (just as the works MW Om pHwhftd by U indivi dual 

 statesman, artist or savant are usually only a residue of the numerous projects 001 

 by his brain). This process in which so much abortive production occurs is analogous to 

 elimination by natural selection. 



