xi SOCIAL DEVELOPMENTS 221 



the form of the City State of antiquity and the Middle 

 Ages, and of the Nation State of modern times. But the 

 Nation State in turn is expanded by the federal principle, 

 and federal states and federal or quasi-federal empires begin 

 to foreshadow the possibility of a true international Society. 

 Now in detail this movement does not correspond to the 

 line of ethical advance. The principle of force is the very 

 antithesis of the principle of social ethics. Yet the rise of 

 a higher authority had its advantages as well as its dis- 

 advantages. It imposed order and was essential to the 

 beginnings of impartial justice. What is more to our 

 purpose, however, is that the net result, the establishment 

 of the state system in the modern world, provides not, 

 indeed, in its completeness, but in a degree hitherto un- 

 approached the constitutional basis required by the ethical 

 conception of society. 



6. Taking the institutions that mainly concern ethics one 

 by one, we find, broadly speaking, analogous phases of evo- 

 lution. Thus to begin with what lies at the foundation, the 

 method of maintaining social obligations, we have already 

 seen that in the lowest forms of society, apart from certain 

 exceptional cases, scarcely any provision is made. The 

 injured party retaliates if he can, but that is all. As the 

 principle of kinship develops revenge becomes organised, 

 and is the duty of the family or clan. But most ordinary 

 injuries are still matter for vengeance, which pays little 

 regard to circumstances or intentions, rather than for 

 punishment proper. In the authoritarian societies the 

 scope of punishment is extended. The superior maintains 

 impartial justice, and enforces order by severity and even 

 cruelty. On the other hand, it is difficult, and may be 

 impossible, for an inferior to obtain redress from a superior. 

 In the justice of the state the rule of law becomes uni- 

 versal. Differences of rank or position cease to be relevant. 

 But for the maintenance of order reliance is placed less on 

 punishment and more on police efficiency, and in the end 

 on the improvement of social conditions. Crime becomes 

 a disease to be guarded against or cured, and the principles 

 of severity or repression and of purification by suffering 



