causes of which might entirely escape us at first, we should be convinced that our ignorance was merely temporary; we should know that such causes did exist, and that sooner or later they would declare themselves. Thus the world in which we live is, as it were, intellectualized beforehand. . . . Our daily activities, even in their minutest details, imply calm and complete confidence in the immutability of natural laws. Nor are the emotions, those presumably most personal and internal of all our experiences, free from the influence of the group. When shall we feel grieved, insulted, elated, disturbed, insensate, and how shall we give vent to these feelings? Our culture has developed formulæ which tell us when and how to be moved, and without being distinctly aware of the fact we usually follow its rules. It is not that we should be entirely without feelings except for cultural indoctrination-an infant can exhibit a perfectly respectable rage in absolute independence of any training-but that the feelings we do have, with their accompanying behaviors, are in large measure socially determined. The virtues we praise and the vices we abhor are similarly described and classified for us by our culture. Oftentimes one group will admire the very thing that another group will despise. We assimilate these preferences and aversions, and seldom work our way around them. Aristotle, for example, is the author of the greatest treatise on ethics ever produced in the western world, and yet, following a very characteristic Greek ideal, he elaborates the following picture of one type of virtuous man: *13 This man rightly regards himself as worthy of high honors, and he possesses the greatness appropriate to every virtue. He will be only moderately pleased when honors are bestowed upon him, for they are really less than he deserves; but he will accept them for lack of something better. He is little interested in wealth, political power, or success, and must often appear disdainful. But his contempt is justified, for he estimates other people at their real worth. He will face great dan *I have taken the liberty of condensing Aristotle's description somewhat, without, however, altering its general content. gers gladly, for this brings in honor, but small dangers do not interest him. He will confer benefits, but is ashamed to receive them, for that would make him feel inferior. And so he remembers those whom he has helped, but forgets those who have helped him; and he likes to be reminded of his benefactions, while he cannot bear to be told of those who have benefited him. He is open in word and deed, and does not hesitate to say whatever he thinks. He admires but few things. He will speak evil of his enemies only in order to insult them. He will not easily cry out for help, nor be always bustling around. This certainly does not seem to us a very attractive sort of fellow, and we may even be inclined to believe that the passage is satirical. But the fact would remain that Aristotle here describes a highly esteemed Greek ideal-witness Achilles and many other Homeric heroes. In the same manner our culture holds before us certain standard types, and after them we model our lives. Our sensitiveness to group pressures does not leave us when we are quite alone, for it is reflected in our most private natures. We may have been pretending to be something that we are not, and may shed our hypocrisies like a cloak when once we have left the crowd; but we do not thereby divest ourselves of the patterns of our culture. The very notions that we frame of ourselves in large measure were shaped for us by the activities of our group. That inner citadel of personality about which we center our thoughts and actions is itself a culture product. At one time men realize their innermost natures by renouncing the world, at another by mastering it; at one time by shutting their hearts to all the voices of love, at another by opening them to every gust of that windy passion; at one time by turning the other cheek, at another by exacting an eye for an eye. The most original man in this respect can hardly be distinguished from the dullest conformer. Even the genius can break but few of the slender threads that bind him to the past. Few men have ever stepped even a pace or two beyond the boundaries of their own culture; and of these the greater number quickly come to rest within the confines of another already existing pattern. This is possible because, as we have seen, cultures are not absolutely distinct units. They overlap, so that an individual may be offered advantages in a number of cultures which are in contact with one another. Quite a few persons, for example, are more or less dissatisfied with modern industrial civilization, and some have tried to disown it. Such persons almost invariably associate themselves in spirit with some other existing or historic culture. They find peace and contentment in an idealization of ancient Greece, or they learn to sing the praises of primitive life, and advocate a return to its simplicities. Such cultural expatriates almost inevitably carry into their ideal realm a poignancy of regard which the culture they idealize probably did not usually evoke from its own members; and in this and in many other ways they betray their basic affiliations. On this point a study of the world's Utopias is instructive. From Plato's down to those of H. G. Wells, they one and all clearly reveal the time and place of their origins. They were in every instance provoked by existing conditions, and their suggestions for change, however original and daring, were likewise drawn from the stock of conceptions available to the enlightened members of their milieu.14 No man ever invented an absolutely independent culture. In this respect cultures are like languages; they must grow in order to be of significance. Every great period in human history has been richly fertilized by the past. Without the help of many men who have gone before, even the greatest genius can do but little. REFERENCES 1 See Clark Wissler, Man and Culture (N. Y., Crowell, 1923) for a detailed but somewhat schematic elucidation of the anthropological meaning of “culture.” 2 Garrick Mallery, Manners and meals, Amer. Anthrop., Vol. 1 (1888), 196. 3 Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, Vol. 4 (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1912), 1. Thorstein Veblen has more than once in his numerous writings emphasized the importance of "habits of thought" in maintaining the social order. 5 E. L. Walton and T. T. Waterman, American Indian poetry, Amer. Anthrop., Vol. 27 (1925), 35, 50. G. K. Chesterton, The Victorian Age in Literature (Home Univ. Library), 170; Walton and Waterman, 43. 'R. M. MacIver, Community (3 ed., London, Macmillan, 1924), has written very forcefully upon the importance of association. In this connection, see William James, Pragmatism (N. Y., Longmans, Green, 1907), Lecture 5, Pragmatism and common sense. The reader who remains skeptical that these things may be human constructs is also invited to read L. LévyBruhl, Primitive Mentality, trans. by L. A. Clare (N. Y., Macmillan, 1923). • MacIver, 7. 10 See Clark Wissler, The American Indian (2 ed., N. Y., Oxford Univ. Press, 1922), for numerous maps showing the probable distribution of culture traits in the New World prior to the coming of the white man. 11 Cf. Otto Jespersen, Language, Its Nature, Development, and Origin (London, Allen and Unwin, 1922), esp. Chaps. 14 and 15. 12 Lévy-Bruhl, 35. 13 Aristotle, Ethics, Book 4, Chapter 3. Translators often turn Aristotle's name for this man into the English, "high minded man"! 14 See Lewis Mumford, The Story of Utopias (N. Y., Boni and Liveright, 1922), and the imaginary kingdoms referred to therein. -END Chapter III WESTERN CIVILIZATION Civilization-meaning of the term In this chapter we shall attempt to describe our own culture; and then in Part II we shall investigate the processes of individual development which finally lead to our admission into full membership in that culture. Nothing is clearer, perhaps, than that we are civilized. Much as we dwell on this fact, however, few persons think of anything specific when they utter the word "civilization." It is often vaguely used in any one of a considerable number of rather complimentary senses. An effort must be made to clear the term of some of its confusions if it is to justify its place in the body of sober speech. The chief difficulty, perhaps, is that civilization has been regarded primarily with reference to its real or supposed superiorities over other forms of culture. It should be possible, instead, to list the traits which are shared by the cultures commonly called civilized; and when this is done we discover at least the four following items, which may accordingly be taken as characteristic of a civilization:1 (1) Urban life. This seems to follow from the etymology of the word itself, for "civilization" suggests the mode of life associated with a civitas or city. For once etymology sets us on the right track. In a civilization the population is larger and the density of population is greater than in noncivilized cultures, and the people are clotted or aggregated together into fairly large groups which maintain a distinct life of their own. The members of a civilization are for the most part sedentary-they no longer roam from place to place, but have settled down, and in addition there has developed at least the beginnings of that contrast between town and country which still remains to perplex us at the present day. |