But things had changed—chances gone are gone forever, and he was told that opportunity knocks but once at each man's door. Sadly he returned home—not disappointed in himself, but depressed that he should disappoint others. His inventions languished—nobody was interested in them.
To get a living was the problem, and writing seemed the only way. And so he prepared a series of articles for "The Non-Conformist," and there was enough non-conformity in them so he was paid a small sum for his work. It proved this, though—he could get a living by his pen.
In these "Non-Conformist" articles, Spencer put forth a daring statement concerning the evolution of the soldier, that straightway made him a few enemies, and gave his clerical uncle gooseflesh. His hypothesis was this: When man first evolved out of the Stone Age, and began to live in villages, the oldest and wisest individual was regarded as patriarch or chief. This chief appointed certain men to punish wrongdoers and keep order. But there were always a few who would not work and who, through their violence and contumacious spirit, were finally driven from the camp. Or more likely they fled to escape punishment—which is the same thing—for they were outcasts. These men found refuge in the mountain fastnesses and congregated for two reasons—one, so they could avoid capture, and the other so they could swoop down and "secure their own." Robbery and commerce came hand in hand, and piracy is almost as natural as production.
Finally, the robbers became such a problem to industry that terms were made with them. Their tribute took the form of a tax, and to make sure that this tax was paid, the robbers protected the people against other robbers. And then, for the first time, the world saw a standing army. An army has two purposes—to protect the people, and to collect the tax for protecting the people.
At the headquarters of this army grew up a court, and all the magnificent splendor of a capitol centered around the captains. In fact, the word "capitol" means the home of the captain.
Herbert Spencer did not say that a soldier was a respectable brigand, and that a lawyer is a man who protects us from lawyers, but he came so close to it that his immediate friends begged him to moderate his expressions for his own safety.
Spencer also at the same time traced the evolution of the priest. He showed how the "holy man" was one frenzied with religious ecstasy, who went away and lived in a cave. Occasionally this man came back to beg, to preach and to do good. In order to succeed in his begging, he revealed his peculiar psychic powers, and then reinforced these with claims of supernatural abilities. These claims were not exactly founded upon truth, but once put forth were in time believed by those who advanced them.
This priest, who claimed to have influence with the power of the Unseen, found early favor with the soldier—and the soldier and the priest naturally joined hands. The soldier protected the priest and the priest absolved the soldier. One dictated man's place in this world—the other in the next.
The calm way in which Herbert Spencer reasoned these things out, and his high literary style, which made him unintelligible to all those whose minds were not of scientific bent, and his emphatic statement that what is, is right, and all the steps in man's development mean a mounting to better things, saved him from the severe treatment that greeted, say, Charles Bradlaugh, who translated the higher criticisms for the hoi polloi.
Spencer's first essays on "The Proper Sphere of Government," done in his early twenties for "The Non-Conformist" and "The Economist," outlined his occupation for life—he was to be a writer. He became assistant editor of the "Westminster Review," and contributed to various literary and scientific journals.