[7] Traité de Sociologie Générale, passim. The author's term "derivations" seems to be his precise way of expressing what we have called the "good" reasons, and his "residus" correspond to the "real" reasons. He well says, "L'homme éprouve le besoin de raisonner, et en outre d'étendre un voile sur ses instincts et sur ses sentiments"—hence, rationalization. (P. 788.) His aim is to reduce sociology to the "real" reasons. (P. 791.)
[8] Recently a re-examination of creative thought has begun as a result of new knowledge which discredits many of the notions formerly held about "reason". See, for example, Creative Intelligence, by a group of American philosophic thinkers; John Dewey, Essays in Experimental Logic (both pretty hard books); and Veblen, The Place of Science in Modern Civilization. Easier than these and very stimulating are Dewey, Reconstruction in Philosophy, and Woodworth, Dynamic Psychology.
[9] Trotter, op. cit., p. 45. The first part of this little volume is excellent.
* * * * *
III
Nous étions déjà si vieux quand nous sommes nés.—ANATOLE FRANCE.
Simia quam similis, turpissima bestia, nobis?—ENNIUS.
Tous les homines se ressemblent si fort qu'il n'y a point de peuple dont les sottises ne nous doivent faire trembler.—FONTENELLE.
The savage is very close to us indeed, both in his physical and mental make-up and in the forms of his social life. Tribal society is virtually delayed civilization, and the savages are a sort of contemporaneous ancestry.—WILLIAM I. THOMAS.