Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 9.djvu/820

 7QO THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

ought not to refer social variation to the progressiveness of the human intellect or social stagnation to its sluggishness. The difference noted in the response of different societies to the same stimulus is not to be explained by a universal trait like mental inertia. Various factors may be recognized which counteract the forces that make for transformation. There are, therefore, causes of social immobility to be set forth as well as causes of social change.

Peculiarities of environment or of race may neutralize stimuli and so preserve a social form intact. Beyond a certain point in development, harsh climate, barren soil, absence of wood and minerals, and lack of natural waterways may interpose a bar which no amount of inventive genius can avail to break. Again, impassable barriers such as mountains, deserts, and seas may prevent a group rinding other groups to stuggle against, combine with, or borrow from. Nor are all races equally capable of ascent. Those varieties of mankind cradled in the happy climes where Nature spreads the table, having never been sifted by hunger and cold, or disciplined to toil and forethought, lack the energy to avail themselves of the treasures civilization showers into their lap. What is stimulus to some races is no stimulus to them. They can perish, but they cannot change.

There are, moreover, social processes which accumulate effects of a static tendency. Such are all those experiences which exaggerate the collective ego at the expense of the individual. This may take the form of a concrete organization which ruth- lessly crushes out criticism, discussion and innovation. In the course of prolonged warfare the state may acquire such a prestige and come to inspire such a loyalty that it can trample on the rights of the individual and break the spirit of question and initiative. In a prolonged struggle to curb and civilize barbarians a priesthood may attain such an authority that it is allowed to destroy the bolder spirits and to terrorize innovators. Often, however, a society becomes immobile from collective suggestion rather than from the violences of state and church. China and India have become ossified by public opinion rather than by the persecutor. Vast ocean-like collections of humanity inhabiting a