Cataclysmic Theory of Progress 139 



the murders, and other extraordinary events are 

 featured, precisely because they are out of the 

 ordinary and therefore news, while the daily life 

 of the people, the unceasing labour and construc- 

 tive efforts, the slow and invisible forces of social 

 progress, are almost completely ignored. 



The slightest consideration of the actual facts of 

 social life suffices to show how untenable is the 

 cataclysmic theory that the physical struggle 

 between men is the sole cause of social progress. 

 It would be difficult to deny, for example, that the 

 invention of fire, of the wheel, of the sail, of the 

 wagon, of the steam engine and the locomotive, of 

 the telegraph and telephone, of the automobile, 

 of all those common things which play so important 

 a part in our daily life, such as bread, cooking, and 

 clothing, have contributed immensely to the 

 progress of the human race. However, none of 

 these inventions, nor any of a thousand others, 

 which constitute the instruments of production 

 and of our economic life, have been made for the 

 purpose of combating the members of our own 

 species. (Curiously enough, not even gunpowder 

 was invented for the purpose of war.) All these 

 inventions were made solely to aid in the struggle 

 against the physical universe. Many of the 

 inventions have of course been used in war; 

 militarism uses every instrument which it can 

 adapt to its purposes. But none of them have 

 been made for the purpose of war or with a view 

 to their use in the struggle between men. 



