Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 10.djvu/555

 INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY 539

numerous defiles which were historic routes of communication and invasion. Toward Thibet and China physical obstacles appear still more impassable; first, the course of the Ganges; then behind that rise the highest mountains of the globe. Communica- tion seems almost impossible. But nevertheless by that route Buddhism with its missionaries was scattered from India into China. The same difficulties are presented in the interior. The whole maritime circumference is traversed by chains of mountains which are prolonged toward the interior, and of which some advance from west to northeast entirely across the country. There are not alone jungles (in Sanskrit jungala, "deserts") interposed between the populations. There are, as in Greece, moun- tains and morasses as great obstacles to unification ; nevertheless the Aryan invasion was able to extend above and beyond all the obstacles. Tribes were transformed into principalities, and these into kingdoms, and the kingdoms into vast empires. None of these obstacles positively or historically constituted a natural or insurmountable obstacle, for in fact the tribes and principalities generally occupied opposite slopes of the mountains, the two banks of rivers and creeks, and the circle of the jungles. In spite of accessory variations, the general evolution and that of the frontiers were analogous to the evolution which was accomplished in the great regions of the plains, as in Russia. And even today do we not see India carried along in the great world-movement by the tow of English imperialism? However, the interior and exterior configuration of India partly explains its present inferior- ity as compared to Europe. It is necessary, however, to remark that in the eighteenth century its industry was not inferior to that of England. But the latter was better constituted as an oceanic and intercontinental power. In this respect India is inferior to Europe considered in its entirety. It is especially inferior to Greece, while surpassing Asia by the extent of its coasts relatively to the territorial mass.

The geographic structure of India and the nature of its territory were elements which entered naturally, like the ethnic characteristics of its populations, into the formation of its interior and exterior frontiers. But these latter are altogether sociological,