Physics and Politics, or, Thoughts on the application of the principles of "natural selection" and "inheritance" to political society
Bagehot, Walter, 1826-1877
English
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PHYSICS AND POLITICS
OR THOUGHTS ON THE APPLICATION OF THE PRINCIPLES OF 'NATURAL
SELECTION' AND 'INHERITANCE' TO POLITICAL SOCIETY
BY WALTER BAGEHOT
NEW AND CHEAPER EDITION (also published in the International
Scientific Series, crown 8vo. 5s.)
CONTENTS.
I. THE PRELIMINARY AGE
II. THE USE OF CONFLICT
III. NATION-MAKING
IV. NATION-MAKING
V. THE AGE OF DISCUSSION
VI. VERIFIABLE PROGRESS POLITICALLY CONSIDERED
No. I.
THE PRELIMINARY AGE.
One peculiarity of this age is the sudden acquisition of much
physical knowledge. There is scarcely a department of science or art
which is the same, or at all the same, as it was fifty years ago. A
new world of inventions--of railways and of telegraphs--has grown up
around us which we cannot help seeing; a new world of ideas is in
the air and affects us, though we do not see it. A full estimate of
these effects would require a great book, and I am sure I could not
write it; but I think I may usefully, in a few papers, show how,
upon one or two great points, the new ideas are modifying two old
sciences--politics and political economy. Even upon these points my
ideas must be incomplete, for the subject is novel; but, at any
rate, I may suggest some conclusions, and so show what is requisite
even if I do not supply it.
If we wanted to describe one of the most marked results, perhaps the
most marked result, of late thought, we should say that by it
everything is made 'an antiquity.' When, in former times; our
ancestors thought of an antiquarian, they described him as occupied
with coins, and medals, and Druids' stones; these were then the
characteristic records of the decipherable past, and it was with
these that decipherers busied themselves. But now there are other
relics; indeed, all matter is become such. Science tries to find in
each bit of earth the record of the causes which made it precisely
what it is; those forces have left their trace, she knows, as much
as the tact and hand of the artist left their mark on a classical
gem. It would be tedious (and it is not in my way) to reckon up the
ingenious questionings by which geology has made part of the earth,
at least, tell part of its tale; and the answers would have been
meaningless if physiology and conchology and a hundred similar
sciences had not brought their aid. Such subsidiary sciences are to
the decipherer of the present day what old languages were to the
antiquary of other days; they construe for him the words which he
discovers, they give a richness and a truth-like complexity to the
picture which he paints, even in cases where the particular detail
they tell is not much. But what here concerns me is that man himself
has, to the eye of science, become 'an antiquity.' She tries to
read, is beginning to read, knows she ought to read, in the frame of
each man the result of a whole history of all his life, of what he
is and what makes him so,--of all his fore-fathers, of what they
were and of what made them so. Each nerve has a sort of memory of
its past life, is trained or not trained, dulled or quickened, as
the case may be; each feature is shaped and characterised, or left
loose and meaningless, as may happen; each hand is marked with its
trade and life, subdued to what it works in;--IF WE COULD BUT SEE
IT.
It may be answered that in this there is nothing new; that we always
knew how much a man's past modified a man's future; that we all knew
how much, a man is apt to be like his ancestors; that the existence
of national character is the greatest commonplace in the world; that
when a philosopher cannot account for anything in any other manner,
he boldly ascribes it to an occult quality in some race. But what
physical science does is, not to discover the hereditary element,
but to render it distinct,--to give us an accurate conception of
what we may expect, and a good account of the evidence by which we
are led to expect it. Let us see what that science teaches on the
subject; and, as far as may be, I will give it in the words of those
who have made it a professional study, both that I may be more sure
to state it rightly and vividly, and because--as I am about to apply
these principles to subjects which are my own pursuit--I would
rather have it quite clear that I have not made my premises to suit
my own conclusions.
1st, then, as respects the individual, we learn as follows: 'Even
while the cerebral hemispheres are entire, and in full possession of
their powers, the brain gives rise to actions which are as
completely reflex as those of the spinal cord.
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