Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 4.djvu/851

 REVIEWS '8 3 1

AN EXAMINATION OF PROF. PATTEN'S HISTORY AND ECONOMICS.

Every epoch has given to the world its own philosophy of history, or attempt to interpret events of the past and present in the light of the Zeitgeist. This interpretation has always been determined by the peculiar circumstances and dominant thought of the period. Conse- quently, since Josephus the content of the term " philosophy of history " has changed many times. Nor is this strange, for civilization in its triumphant march impresses its character upon all the vital ideas of the race, widening the thoughts of men from age to age. Montes- quieu gives the theme for all our modern philosophies of history, upon which there have been many variations in these latter davs. For he affirms the authority of law in human events and seeks to connect historical periods through the relations of cause and effect. One of the latest contributions to the field is Earth's Philosophie der Geschichte als Sociologie, which seeks to identify the two subjects, philosophy of history and sociology. .4nd now we have before us another achieve- ment along the same line.

Dr. Patten's Development of English Thought is an interpretation of history from the economist's standpoint. This we learn from the title : "The Development of English Thought — A Studv in the Economic Interpretation of History." And the author, moreover, informs us in the preface that it is his aim to present a theory of history through concrete illustrations. An economic interpretation of history is not new, for we discover it in the writings of St. Simon and Louis Blanc at the beginning of this century, and again in Emile dc Laveleye's Political Economy, where the following statements appear :

The power of states is proportional to their population and their wealth. The development of population and wealth depends upon economic causes. These, therefore, are the ultimate source of the great events of history."

Dr. Patten's economic bias is decidedly shown in his treatment of the French Revolution, which he attributes solely to the rise in the price of wheat. According to him, the revolution was a veritable bread riot. The people were not crying for food, but for comfort, for wheat bread had become the standard of comfort in the eighteenth century. The oppressions of the poor, the outrages they were forced to endure at the hands of the nobles, all the woes of the peasants with which we have become familiar through the graphic pen of Taine, would never

^Tht Elements of Political Economy, translated by Alfred \V. Pollard, pp. 12 and 13.