PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 491 



ascribed to the fundamental similarity of the workings of the human mind all 

 over the world, so that, given similar conditions, similar customs and institutions 

 will come into existence and develop on the same lines. 



In France we find that, as among ourselves, the chief interest is in evolution, 

 and the difference is in the principles upon which this evolution is to be studied. 

 It is to the psychological basis of the work of British anthropologists that objec- 

 tion is chiefly made. It is held that the psychology of the individual cannot be 

 used as a guide to the collective actions of men in early stages of social evolu- 

 tion, still less the psychology of the individual whose social ideas have been 

 moulded by the long ages of evolution which have made our own society what 

 it is. It is urged that the study of sociology requires the application of principles 

 and methods of investigation peculiar to itself. 1 



About America it is less easy to speak, because it is unusual in that country 

 to deal to any great extent with general theoretical problems. The anthropolo- 

 gists of America are so fully engaged in the attempt to record what is left of 

 the ancient cultures of their own country that they devote little attention to 

 those general questions to which we, more unfortunately situated with no ancient 

 culture at our doors, devote so much attention. There seems, however, to 

 be a distinct movement in progress in America which puts the evolutionary 

 point of view on one side and is inclined to study social problems from 

 the purely psychological point of view, the psychological standpoint, how- 

 ever, approaching that of the British school more nearly than that of the 

 French. 2 



It is when we come to Germany that we find the most fundamental difference 

 in standpoint and method. It is true that, in Adolf Bastian, Germany produced 

 one who was thoroughly imbued with the evolutionary standpoint, and the 

 Elementargedanke of that worker forms a most convenient expression for the 

 psychological means whereby evolution is supposed to have proceeded. In re- 

 cent years, however, there has been a very decided movement opposed to Bastian 

 and the whole evolutionary school. In some cases this has formed part of that 

 general revolt not merely against Darwinism which is so prominent in Germany, 

 but it seems even against the whole idea of evolution. In other cases the objec- 

 tion is less fundamental, and has been not so much to the idea of evolution 

 itself as to the lines upon which it has been customary to endeavour to study 

 this evolution. 



This movement, which by those who follow it is called the geographical move- 

 ment, but which, I think, may be more fitly styled ' ethnological,' was originated 

 by Ratzel, who was first led definitely in this direction by a study of the 

 armour made of rods or plates or laths which is found in North America, 

 northern Asia, including Japan, and in a less developed form m some of the 

 islands of the Pacific Ocean. 3 Ratzel believed that the resemblances he found 

 could only be explained by direct transmission from one people to another and 

 was led by further study to become an untiring opponent of the Elementarge- 

 danke of Bastian and of the idea of independent evolution based on a community 

 of thought. 1 He has even suggested that the idea of independent origin is the 

 anthropological equivalent of the spontaneous generation of the biologist and 

 that anthropology is now going through a phase of development from which 

 biology has long emerged. • 



The movement initiated by Ratzel has made great progress, especially through 



1 I refer here especially to the work of the ' sociological ' school of Durkheim 

 and his followers. For an account of their principles and methods see L' Annie 

 sociologique, which began to appear in 1898; Durkheim, Les Bdjles de la Mithode 

 Sociologique, Paris; and Levy-Bruhl, Les fonctions mental,-* dam les societes in- 

 firiewres, Paris, 1910. 



2 See especially A. L. Kroeber, ' Classificatory Systems of Relationship,' Journ. 

 R>y. Anthr. Inst., 1909, xxxix., 77; and Goldenweiser, ' Totemism : An Analytical 

 Study,' Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1910, xxiii. 



8 Sitzber. d. Akad. d. Wiss. Milnchen, Hist. CI., 1886, p. 181. 

 4 See especially Anthropogeographie, J 891, Th. ii., 705, and 'Die geographische 

 Methode in der Ethnographie,' Geograph. Zeitsch., 1897, iii., 268. 



