But man finally overcame this obstacle. “He has,” to quote Darwin, “invented and is able to use various weapons, tools, traps, &c., with which he defends himself, kills or catches prey, and otherwise obtains food. He has made rafts or canoes for fishing or crossing over to neighbouring fertile islands. He has discovered the art of making fire, by which hard and stringy roots can be rendered digestible, and poisonous roots or herbs innocuous.”[35] In short, man gradually found out new ways of earning his living and more and more emancipated himself from direct dependence on surrounding nature. The chief obstacle to a gregarious life was by this means surmounted, and the advantages of such a life were considerable. Living together in larger groups, men could resist the dangers of life and defend themselves much better than when solitary—all the more so as the physical strength of man, and especially savage man, is comparatively slight. The extension of the small family group may have taken place in two different ways: either by adhesion, or by natural growth and cohesion. In other words, new elements whether other family groups or single individuals may have united with it from without, or the children, instead of separating from their parents, may have remained with them and increased the group by forming new families themselves. There can be little doubt that the latter was the normal mode of extension. When gregariousness became an advantage to man, he would feel inclined to remain with those with whom he was living even after the family had fulfilled its object—the preservation of the helpless offspring. And he would be induced to do so not only from egoistic considerations, but by an instinct which, owing to its usefulness, would gradually develop, practically within the limits of kinship—the gregarious instinct.
[35] Darwin, Descent of Man, p. 48 sq.
By the gregarious instinct I understand an animal’s proneness to live together with other members of its own species, apart from parental, conjugal, and filial attachment. It involves, or leads to, pleasure in the consciousness of their presence. The members of a herd are at ease in each other’s company, suffer when they are separated, and rejoice when they are reunited. By actual living together the instinct is individualised,[36] and it is strengthened by habit. The pleasure with which one individual looks upon another is further increased by the solidarity of interests. Not only have they enjoyments in common, but they have the same enemies to resist, the same dangers to encounter, the same difficulties to overcome. Hence acts which are beneficial to the agent are at the same time beneficial to his companions, and the distinction between ego and alter loses much of its importance.
[36] In mankind we very early recognise the child’s tendency to sympathise with persons who are familiar to it (Compayré, L’évolution intellectuelle et morale de l’enfant, p. 288).
But the members of the group do not merely take pleasure in each other’s company. Associated animals very frequently display a feeling of affection for each other—defend each other, help each other in distress and danger, perform various other services for each other.[37] Considering that the very object of the gregarious instinct is the preservation of the species, I think we are obliged to regard the mutual affection of associated animals as a development of this instinct. With the pleasure they take in each other’s company is intimately connected kindliness towards its cause, the companion himself. In this explanation of social affection I believe no further step can be made. Professor Bain asks why a more lively feeling should grow up towards a fellow-being than towards an inanimate source of pleasure; and to account for this he suggests, curiously enough, “the primary and independent pleasure of the animal embrace”[38]—although embrace even as an outward expression of affection plays a very insignificant part in the social relations of gregarious animals. It might as well be asked why there should be a more lively feeling towards a sentient creature which inflicts pain than towards an inanimate cause of pain. Both cases call for a similar explanation. The animal distinguishes between a living being and a lifeless thing, and affection proper, like anger proper, is according to its very nature felt towards the former only. The object of anger is normally an enemy, the object of social affection is normally a friend. Social affection is not only greatly increased by reciprocity of feeling, but could never have come into existence without such reciprocity. The being to which an animal attaches itself is conceived of as kindly disposed towards it; hence among wild animals social affection is found only in connection with the gregarious instinct, which is reciprocal in nature.
[37] Darwin, op. cit. p. 100 sqq. Kropotkin, Mutual Aid, ch. i. sq.
[38] Bain, op. cit. p. 132.
Among men the members of the same social unit are tied to each other with various bonds of a distinctly human character—the same customs, laws, institutions, magic or religious ceremonies and beliefs, or notions of a common descent. As men generally are fond of that to which they are used or which is their own, they are also naturally apt to have likings for other individuals whose habits or ideas are similar to theirs. The intensity and extensiveness of social affection thus in the first place depend upon the coherence and size of the social aggregate, and its development must consequently be studied in connection with the evolution of such aggregates.
This evolution is largely influenced by economic conditions. Savages who know neither cattle-rearing nor agriculture, but subsist on what nature gives them—game, fish, fruit, roots, and so forth—mostly live in single families consisting of parents and children, or in larger family groups including in addition a few other individuals closely allied.[39] But even among these savages the isolation of the families is not complete. Persons of the same stock inhabiting neighbouring districts hold friendly relations with one another, and unite for the purpose of common defence. When the younger branches of a family are obliged to disperse in search of food, at least some of them remain in the neighbourhood of the parent family, preserve their language, and never quite lose the idea of belonging to one and the same social group. And in some cases we find that people in the hunting or fishing stage actually live in larger communities, and have a well-developed social organisation. This is the case with many or most of the Australian aborigines. Though in Australia, also, isolated families are often met with,[40] the rule seems to be that the blacks live in hordes. Thus the Arunta of Central Australia are distributed in a large number of small local groups, each of which occupies a given area of country and has its own headman.[41] Every family, consisting of a man and one or more wives and children, has a separate lean-to of shrubs;[42] but clusters of these shelters are always found in spots where food is more or less easily obtainable,[43] and the members of each group are bound together by a strong “local feeling.”[44] The local influence makes itself felt even outside the horde. “Without belonging to the same group,” say Messrs. Spencer and Gillen, “men who inhabit localities close to one another are more closely associated than men living at a distance from one another, and, as a matter of fact, this local bond is strongly marked…. Groups which are contiguous locally are constantly meeting to perform ceremonies.”[45] At the time when the series of initiation ceremonies called the Engwura are performed, men and women gather together from all parts of the tribe, councils of the elder men are held day by day, the old traditions of the tribe are repeated and discussed, and “it is by means of meetings such as this, that a knowledge of the unwritten history of the tribe and of its leading members is passed on from generation to generation.”[46] Nay, even members of different tribes often have friendly intercourse with each other; in Central Australia, when two tribes come into contact with one another on the border-land of their respective territories, the same amicable feelings as prevail within the tribe are maintained between the members of the two.[47] Now it seems extremely probable that Australian blacks are so much more sociable than most other hunting people because the food-supply of their country is naturally more plentiful, or, partly thanks to their boomerangs, more easily attainable. A Central Australian native is, as a general rule, well nourished; “kangaroo, rock-wallabies, emus, and other forms of game are not scarce, and often fall a prey to his spear and boomerang, while smaller animals, such as rats and lizards, are constantly caught without any difficulty by the women.”[48] Circumstances of an economic character also account for the gregariousness of the various peoples on the north-west coast of North America who are neither pastoral nor agricultural—the Thlinkets, Haidas, Nootkas, and others. On the shore of the sea or some river they have permanent houses, each of which is inhabited by a number of families;[49] the houses are grouped in villages, some of which are very populous;[50] and though the tribal bond is not conspicuous for its strength, there are councils which discuss and decide all important questions concerning the tribe.[51] The territory inhabited by these peoples, with its bays, sounds, and rivers, supplies them with food in abundance; “its enormous wealth of fish allows its inhabitants to enjoy a pampered existence.”[52]
[39] Westermarck, op. cit. p. 43 sqq. Hildebrand, Recht und Sitte, p. 1 sqq.