Page:The Hero in History.djvu/169

Rh causes in the objective conditions of the times. But we wish to discuss not the causes of these ideas about history but their validity. What assumptions are involved, and are they true?

To begin with, let us note that those who believe that the future of human society is determined by laws already known set great store on our knowledge of these laws. It makes a difference, they insist, whether we know them or ignore them. Why? Because the knowledge of these laws gives us power to direct the future. But this admission means that a considerable area of social history, the area affected by man’s knowledge or ignorance, is not determined by the original set of laws but by other laws that come into operation as a consequence of what we know, value, and do. As long as we grant, then, that knowledge makes a difference, we cannot really believe that the future is fixed to a degree where there are no alternatives.

What, after all, shall we understand by historical laws whose iron sway is supposed to determine our future? Roughly speaking, a law in history is a determinate relation between classes of events which we discover can be relied on in solving a problem, overcoming an obstacle, or predicting the future. This covers, however, physical and biological laws, too. Distinctive of historical laws is that the classes of events which they relate designate the behaviour patterns of human beings as members of organized social groups. As members of social groups, the behaviour of individuals is marked by ideals, habits, traditions, and other ways of acting associated with the anthropological term “culture.”

The subject matter, then, of historical laws always involves reference to the associated, interacting behaviour of human beings as members of a society or culture. This remains true even when we seek to explain historical activity by reference to conditions and to events that are themselves controlled by physical laws, like the presence or absence of precious metals or oil in the soil, or the occurrence of drought, floods, and earthquakes. These physical conditions and events have great significance in history and social affairs, but not as physical elements. It is only in relation to some activity or interest of men that they assume significance. That is why the presence of coal and iron and oil in America explains nothing about the history and social life of the American Indians, and so much about the