chus have succeeded, under the influence of laws and of heredity, in losing the nomad instincts of their races, and in adopting the civilization of the peoples they conquered. Others, the Mongols for instance, have shown themselves incapable of this, after their hour of glory under Gengis Khan and Tamerlane.

Nations destined for social life have early possessed the art of agriculture, together with all that it implies: division of property, agricultural arts and implements, and care for the future. Here would begin the really difficult and delicate part of our task, and this, for lack of a scientific genesis of moral ideas, we cannot attempt. It would be requisite to show how each progressive step of civilization presupposes new conditions of existence; how to those very simple conditions of existence which, as we have said, are the groundwork of morals, succeed conditions of existence more and more complex, which have rendered possible every fresh stage in civilization. Then we should have to show the part played by heredity in the adaptation of successive generations to these new conditions. But we can here merely observe that, the primitive state of mankind being characterized by a lawless individualism, the development of sympathetic tendencies—those called 'altruistic' by the positivist school-becomes more and more necessary in proportion as civilization increases. These tendencies certainly exist, whatever may have been said of them by those who would reduce all our acts to egoism. They are natural, as is proved by psychological analysis. The attempt has even been ingeniously made to demonstrate this physically, by showing that in the lowest grade of the biological scale, where the sexes are not distinct, the individual is restricted to egoistic tendencies alone; whereas, so soon as the difference of sex appears, it necessarily brings with itself tendencies of a different nature, which go beyond the individual. These gross sympathetic instincts of the lower organisms are developed in proportion with the growth of intelli'gence.

There is no doubt that there exist in man natural sympathetic tendencies, which are the germs of those ulterior complex sentiments which we call patriotism, philanthropy, devotion to a society or an idea. From what has been said in the preceding chapter as to the genesis of these complex ideas and sentiments, we can form

some notion of the part played by heredity in the formation of moral habits, the evolution of morals being really but the evolution of intelligence.

Heredity, however, has a reverse side. If by accumulation it aids progress, it at the same time preserves or recalls, in the midst of civilization, sentiments and tendencies that are by no means related to such an environment. We have already given instances of this. It is perfectly natural to recognize facts of atavism in those sanguinary instincts, those savage tastes, that insane and objectless passion for wild pursuits, that insatiable desire for adventure, which we find in certain men who are, as it would seem, 7 highly civilized. No doubt there is in these vices such a groundwork of power and greatness that the utter suppression of them like would be a weakening of the living forces of humanity; and it is fund therefore the office of civilization to regulate these instincts, not to destroy them. It utilizes this troubled activity by directing it into wild lands, against unexplored regions. There, beyond the limits of civilization, these men work for civilization. Those of them who remain within her pale, but have the power of adapting themselves to it, are but a curse to society, for in them primitive humanity reappears, though its natural environment has vanished.

Then science verifies what many religions have discerned indistinctly, and expressed after their own fashion. It is a belief common to them that man is a fallen creature, and that he bears the stain of an original transgression, which is transmitted by heredity. Science interprets this vague hypothesis. Without inquiring what was the original state of humanity, we may confidently hold it to have been lowly enough. Primitive man, ignorant and idealess, the slave of his appetites and instincts, which were simply the forces of nature freely acting in him, rose but very gradually to the conception of the ideal. Art, poetry, science, morality, all those highest manifestations of the human soul, are like some frail and precious plant which has come late into being and been enriched by the long toil of generations. It is as impossible to govern life without the ideal as it is to steer a ship without compass or stars; still the ideal was not revealed to man all at once, but only little by little. Each people has had its own ideal; each generation has enabled the succeeding generation to aspire towards a more

perfect ideal, as, in ascending some lofty mountain, we take in a wider horizon as we climb. And during this gradual conquest, in which humanity endeavours to strip off all that is low and base, primitive instincts, which are indeed an original stain, reappear every moment—indelible, though weakened-to remind us, not of a fall, but of the low estate from which we have risen.

CHAPTER IV.

SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF HEREDITY.

It would be beside our subject and beyond the measure of our powers to examine here in detail the social consequences of heredity. To trace them through the manners, the legislation, the civil and political institutions, and the modes of government of various peoples, would require a separate work. Heredity presents itself to us under two forms, one natural, the other institutional. We have studied the former only, even so restricting ourselves to only one of its aspects, its psychological side; we have but incidentally touched on the ground of physiology, in order to confirm our positions. It will therefore suffice, in order to conclude this work, to show how the institutional heredity derives from natural heredity, and thus to refer the effects to their cause.

Every nation possesses at least a vague belief in hereditary transmission. Facts compel it: and indeed it may even be maintained that in primitive times this belief is stronger than it is under civilization. From this belief springs institutional heredity. It is certain that social and political considerations, or even prejudices, must have contributed to develop and strengthen it, but it were absurd to suppose that it has been invented. The characters which we have already often recognized in heredity -necessity, conservatism, and stability-are logically found in the institutions which spring from it. This a rapid examination of the subject will show. In exhibiting the part of heredity in the institution of the family, of castes, of nobility, of sovereignty, it

will be our special study to throw 'light upon a point which, in our eyes, is of great philosophical importance—namely, the conflict of heredity and free-will.

I.

The family is a natural fact. Numerous works both in France and abroad show this, and have related the history of the family, described its various forms, and arranged the moral relations which subsist between its members. But with this we have here no

concern.

From the stand-point of heredity-too generally overlooked by moralists—it may be said that all forms of the family are reducible to two principal and opposite types, around which oscillate a great number of intermediate forms. The one allows a very large part to heredity, and a very small part to individual free-will. The other allows a very large part to individual free-will, but regards hereditary transmission as the exception, not the law. The former is the rule of strict conservatism; the latter the rule of testamentary liberty.

son,

If we examine the first of these types, we find it under various forms in all primitive civilizations, and it rests on a very firm faith in heredity. The child is regarded as the direct continuation of the parents; and indeed, properly speaking, between father and between mother and daughter, there is no distinction of persons-there is only one person under a two-fold appearance. If this idea be applied to the entire series of generations, we find the case to be thus :-in the first place is a family chief, a mysterious and revered being, usually ranked with the gods; then a succession of generations, each represented by the first-born son, who is the visible incarnation of the first father, and whose part is essentially conservative. He collects together the religious beliefs, the traditions and the possessions of the family, and transmits them in turn. He may not alienate anything or destroy anything. He can alter nothing in the invariable order of succession which wraps him round in its fatality. Under such a régime, individual free-will counts for little, while heredity is supreme. This is a pantheistic organization of the family; heredity being the in

variable and indestructible ground whereon the ephemeral shadow of the individuals is thrown, and over which it flits.

In all primitive civilizations, the family came more or less near to this type wherein heredity is everything and free-will nothing.1 Among the Hindus, Greeks, Romans, and Aryan peoples in general, the family was a natural community, having not only the same possessions, the same interests, the same traditions, but the same gods and the same rites. Religion was domestic, and hence Plato defines relationship to be 'a community of domestic gods.' These gods were of course worshipped by their own family, in their own sanctuary, and on an altar whereon the sacred fire was ever burning. No stranger could offer sacrifice to them without sacrilege.

To this necessary heredity of rites, which it was of obligation to maintain, was added the heredity of property. Originally among the Hindus, property was inalienable. In many Greek cities ancient laws forbad the citizen to sell his plot of land.2 In Greece and in India succession was from male to male in order of primogeniture, and only at a late period in history was any share allowed to the younger sons, or to the daughters. It is probable that primitive Rome in like manner accepted the law of primogeniture.

It is equally instructive to notice that testaments were introduced at a late period, at the time when the state and the family had broken away from the immobility of inheritance, in order to give freer play to individual action. Thus, according to Fustel de Coulanges, ancient Hindu law knew nothing of testaments. The same is to be said of Athenian law prior to Solon. At Sparta testaments do not appear till after the Peloponnesian war; and at Rome they do not seem to have been in use before the law of the Twelve Tables. This allows to them the force of law: Uti egassit (pater familias) super pecunia tutelave sua rei, ita jus esto.

The rule which subordinates the individual to heredity, by making the conservation of property obligatory, exists in a more or less perfect form in the great families of Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Scotland; also over a large portion of Germany,

1 On this subject see Fustel de Coulanges, Le Cité Antique, and Le Play, La Réforme Sociale, ch. ii.

2 Aristotle, Politics, ii. 4.