90 EVOLUTION, SOCIAL AND ORGANIC 



on the weakness of reasoning by mere ana- 

 logy and have kept to those general laws 

 which have been worked out separately in so- 

 ciology. 



The principle now about to be applied be- 

 longs to this latter class. It is the most lumin- 

 ous principle ever employed in the interpreta- 

 tion of the phenomena of society. This prin- 

 ciple is that the intellectual life of a people is 

 determined by its mode of wealth production 

 and the social classes arising therefrom. 



Jean Lamarck, the first great modern apos- 

 tle of evolution, died in poverty because he ad- 

 vocated a theory that appeared to contradict 

 the interests of the ruling class of his time. 

 He had against him all that survived of feudal 

 interests, which was intensely theological, and 

 although his theory really favored the bourge- 

 oisie, that class was not yet aware of it. 



Cuvier was the lion of that day, for he man- 

 aged the remarkable feat of adapting science 

 to the ideas, not only of the increasing bour- 

 geoisie, but also of the diminishing feudal 

 power. He pleased the feudal regime, such of 

 it as remained, by denying evolution, and en- 

 dorsing its theology. This made his theories 

 welcome also among those shrewd early capi- 

 talists, as the English, who realized more 

 quickly than their fellows, that religious belief 



