CHAPTER XVIII 



THE EVOLUTION OF SOCIETY* 



A NY attempt to discover the laws to which 

 /-\ social changes conform must run great 

 -^ -^ risk of being frustrated by the mere 

 immensity of the mass of details which the in- 

 vestigator strives to arrange in orderly sequence. 

 Seemingly numberless as are the phenomena 

 dealt with by the physical sciences, they bear no 

 proportion, either in multitude or in variety, to 

 the facts upon which the student of sociology 

 must build his scientific theorems. Facts con- 

 cerning man in his physical relations to soil, 

 climate, food, and the configuration of the earth 

 blend with facts concerning the intellectual and 

 moral relations of men to each other and to the 

 aspects of nature by which they are surrounded, 

 making up a problem of such manifold com- 

 plexity that it may well have long been deemed 

 incapable of satisfactory solution. The fit ground 

 for wonder is, indeed, not that we are as yet un- 

 able to arrive at accurate prevision amid such a 

 diversified throng of phenomena, but that, con- 

 sidering the meagreness of our knowledge in 

 ^ [See Introduction, §§ 22, 23.] 

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