II
The idea of social evolution is admirably expressed in the fine phrase of Leibnitz, "The present is the child of the past, but it is the parent of the future."[60] The great seventeenth-century philosopher was not the first to postulate and apply to society that doctrine of flux, of continuity and unity, which we call evolution. In all ages of which record has been preserved to us, it has been sporadically, and more or less vaguely, expressed. Even savages seem to have dimly perceived it. The saying of the Bechuana chief, recorded by the missionary, Casalis, was probably, judging by its epigrammatic character, a proverb of his people. "One event is always the son of another," he said—a saying strikingly like that of Leibnitz.
Since the work of Lyell, Darwin, Wallace, Spencer, Huxley, Youmans, and their numerous followers—a brilliant school embracing the foremost historians and sociologists of Europe and America—the idea of evolution as a universal law has made rapid and certain progress. Everything changes; nothing is immutable or eternal. Whatever is, whether in geology, astronomy, biology, or sociology, is the result of numberless, inevitable, related changes. Only the law of change is changeless. The present is a phase only of a great transition process from what was, through what is, to what will be.
The Marx-Engels theory is an exploration of the laws governing this process of evolution in the domain of human relations: an attempt to provide a key to the hitherto mysterious succession of changes in the political, juridical, and social relations and institutions of mankind. Whence, for instance, arose the institution of chattel slavery, so repugnant to our modern ideas of right and wrong, and how shall we explain its defense and justification in the name of religion and morality? How account for the fact that what Yesterday regarded as righteous, To-day condemns as wrong; that what at one period of the world's history is regarded as perfectly natural and right—the practice of polygamy, for example—becomes abhorrent at another period; or that what is regarded with horror and disgust in one part of the world is sanctioned by the ethical codes, and freely practiced elsewhere? Ferri gives two examples of this kind: the cannibalism of Central African tribes, and the killing of parents, as a religious duty, in Sumatra.[61] To reply "custom" is to beg the whole question, for customs do not exist without reason, however difficult it may be to discern the reason for any particular custom. To reply that these things are mysteries, as the old theologians did when the doctrine of the Trinity was questioned, is to leave the question unanswered and to challenge doubt and investigation. The human mind abhors a mystery as nature abhors a vacuum. Despite Spencer, the human mind has never admitted the existence of the Unknowable. To explore the Unknown is man's universal impulse; and with each fresh discovery the Unknown is narrowed by the expansion of the Known.
The theory that ideas determine progress, that, in the words of Professor Richard T. Ely, "all that is significant in human history may be traced back to ideas,"[62] is only true in the sense that a half truth is true. It is true, nothing but the truth, but it is less than the whole truth. Truly all that is significant in human history may be traced back to ideas, but in like manner the ideas themselves can be traced back to material sources. For ideas have histories, too, and the causation of an idea must be understood before the idea itself can serve fully to explain anything. We must go back of the idea to the causes which gave it birth if we would interpret anything by it. We may trace the American Revolution, for example, back to the revolutionary ideas of the colonists, but that will not materially assist us to understand the Revolution. For that, it is necessary to trace the ideas themselves to their source, the economic discontent of an exploited people. This is the spirit which illumines the works of historians like Green, McMaster, Morse Stephens, and others of the modern school, who emphasize social forces rather than individual facts, and find the geist of history in social experiences and institutions.
What has been called the "Great Man theory," the theory according to which Luther created the Protestant Reformation, to quote only one example, and which ignored the great economic changes consequent upon the break-up of feudalism and the rise of a new industrial order, long dominated our histories. According to this theory, an idea, developed in the mind of Luther, independent of external circumstances, changed the political and social life of Europe. Had there been no Luther, there would have been no Reformation; or had Luther died before giving his idea to the world, the Reformation would have been averted. The student who seeks in the bulk of the histories written prior to, say, 1870, what he has a legitimate reason for seeking, namely, a picture of the actual life of the people at any period, will be sadly disappointed. He will find records of wars and treaties of peace, royal genealogies and gossip, wildernesses of names and dates. But he will not find such careful accounts of the jurisprudence of the period, nor any hint of the economical conditions of its development. He will find splendid accounts of court life, with its ceremonials, scandals, intrigues, and follies; but no such pictures of the lives of the people, their social conditions, and the methods of labor and commerce which obtained. He will be unable to visualize the life of the period. In other words, the histories lack realism; they are unreal, and, therefore, deceptive. The new spirit, in the development of which the materialist conception of Marx and Engels has been an important creative influence, is concerned less with the chronicle of notable events and dates than with their underlying causes and the manner of life of the people. Had it no other bearing, the Marx-Engels theory, considered solely as a contribution to the science of history, would have been one of the greatest intellectual achievements of the nineteenth century. By emphasizing the importance of the economic factors in social evolution, it has done much for economics and more for history.[63]
III
While the Materialistic Conception of History bears the names of Marx and Engels, as the theory of organic evolution bears the names of Darwin and Wallace, it is not claimed that the idea had never before been expressed. Just as thousands of years before Darwin and Wallace the theory which bears their names had been dimly perceived, so the idea that economic conditions dominate historical developments had its foreshadowings. The famous dictum of Aristotle, that only by the introduction of machines would the abolition of slavery ever be made possible, is a conspicuous example of many anticipations of the theory. It is true that "In dealing with speculations so remote, we have to guard against reading modern meanings into writings produced in ages whose limitations of knowledge were serious, whose temper and standpoint are wholly alien to our own,"[64] but the Aristotelian saying admits of no other interpretation. It is clearly a recognition of the fact that the supreme politico-social institution of the time depended upon hand labor.
In later times, the idea of a direct connection between economic conditions and legal and political institutions reappears in the works of various writers. Professor Seligman[65] quotes from Harrington's "Oceana" the argument that the prevailing form of government depends upon the conditions of land tenure, and the extent of its monopolization. Saint-Simon, too, as already stated, taught that political institutions depend upon economic conditions. But it is to Marx and Engels that we owe the first formulation into a definite theory of what had hitherto been but a suggestion, and the beginnings of a literature, now of considerable proportions, dealing with history from its standpoint. No more need be said concerning the "originality" of the theory.
A word as to the designation of the theory. Its authors gave it the name "historical materialism," and it has been urged that the name is, for many reasons, unfortunately chosen. Two of the leading exponents of the theory, Professor Seligman and Mr. Ghent, the former an opponent, the latter an advocate of Socialism, have expressed this conviction in very definite terms. The last-named writer bases his objection to the name on the ground that it is repellent to many persons who associate the word materialism with the philosophy "that matter is the only substance, and that matter and its motions constitute the universe."[66] That is an old objection, and undoubtedly contains much truth. It is interesting in connection therewith to read the sarcastic comment of Engels upon it in the introduction to his "Socialism, Utopian and Scientific." The objection of Professor Seligman is based upon another ground entirely. He impugns its accuracy. "The theory which ascribes all changes in society to the influence of climate, or to the character of the fauna and flora, is materialistic," he says, "and yet has little in common with the doctrine here discussed. The doctrine we have to deal with is not only materialistic, but also economic in character; and the better phrase is ... the 'economic interpretation' of history."[67] For this reason he discards the name given to the theory by its authors and adopts the luminous phrase of Thorold Rogers, without credit to that writer.