Social EvolutionMacmillan and Company, 1894 - 348 pages |
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Common terms and phrases
Alfred Milner altruistic feelings amongst ancient appear attained become beginning belief character characteristic coloured conception conflict continue doctrine effect England equality ethical European evidence evolutionary science evolutionist existence fact feature forces forms France French Revolution future gradually Grant Allen Greek growth Herbert Spencer highest human evolution human society immense increase individual influence instinct intellectual development interests J. P. Mahaffy kind labour large number laws living look masses ment mental mind modern movement nations natural selection nature nineteenth century observe opinion organisation party past perceived period political population possession power-holding classes prevailing principle produced progress rational sanction realise reason recognised regarded religion religious remarkable result rivalry Roman Roman Empire Royal Statistical Society significance slavery slowly social democracy social development social efficiency social evolution social organism social phenomena socialist stage struggle tendency tending throughout tion ultra-rational undergoing Vide Western civilisation whole writers
Popular passages
Page 229 - ... grows the mass of misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, exploitation; but with this too grows the revolt of the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disciplined, united, organized by the very mechanism of the process of capitalist production itself.
Page 96 - But the thing a man does practically believe (and this is often enough without asserting it even to himself, much less to others) ; the thing a man does practically lay to heart, and know for certain, concerning his vital relations to this mysterious Universe, and his duty and destiny there, that is in all cases the primary thing for him, and creatively determines all the rest.
Page 34 - I happened to read for amusement ' Malthus on Population,' and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on from long-continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new species.
Page 230 - With the seizing of the means of production by society, production of commodities is done away with, and, simultaneously, the mastery of the product over the producer. Anarchy in social production is replaced by systematic, definite organization.
Page 34 - ... it at once struck me that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new species. Here, then, I had at last got a theory by which to work...
Page 80 - If, therefore, the choice were to be made between Communism with all its chances, and the present state of society with all its sufferings and injustices; if the institution of private property...
Page 77 - I take it to be a mere plain truth that, throughout industrial Europe, there is not a single large manufacturing city which is free from a vast mass of people whose condition is exactly that described; and from a still greater mass who, living just on the edge of the social swamp, are liable to be precipitated into it by any lack of demand for their produce.
Page 289 - Yet they seldom lose oxen : the way in which they discover the loss of one, is not by the number of the herd being diminished, but by the absence of a face they know.
Page 4 - I do not hesitate to express my opinion that, if there is no hope of a large improvement of the condition of the greater part of the human family; if it is true that the increase of knowledge, the winning of a greater...
Page 84 - The central fact with which we are confronted in our progressive societies is, therefore, that the interests of the social organism and those of the individuals comprising it at any time are actually antagonistic; they can never be reconciled ; they are inherently and essentially irreconcilable.