Originally, sanctification and lustration not only employed the same means but also followed identical methods. The need frequently came to be felt, however, of an external distinction between these two cult practices. Ablution thus came to be regarded as the proper method of actual purification, whereassprinklingwas adopted in connection with sanctification. This also indicates the antithetical positions which the two hold with respect to magic and counter-magic. Lustration aims to remove moral, or, in the last analysis, demoniacal impurity; sanctification furnishes him who seeks its blessings with water possessed of magical powers. For this reason purification water fell into disuse with the disappearance of belief in demoniacal impurity. On the other hand, it was believedthat sanctification water must remain as available as possible to him who stands in need of its virtues. Just as baptism is a cult agency whose purpose is intermediate between purification and sanctification, so also does the priest who conducts it lay emphasis, now on the one, and now on the other of these phases. When sprinkling comes to be employed as a means of sanctification, the magical significance of the act leads to a further change. Ordinary water, such as is generally used in lustration, no longer suffices—the water itself needs sanctification if it is to serve the purpose for which it is designed. Even in the ancient mystery cults, therefore, one of the chief elements in the ceremonies of sanctification consisted in sprinkling the members with water from sacred springs. The Jordan festival of the Greek Catholic Church still employs water from the river after which it is named, or ordinary water that has magically been converted into Jordan water. The relation of the burning of incense to lustration by fire is the same as that of sprinkling to lustration by water. And yet, in the case of incense, the idea of sanctification has almost entirely suppressed the earlier aim of purification. The purpose of sanctification finds its specific expression in the belief that the smoke cannot have a sanctifying effect without the addition of certain other elements. Balsamic substances were therefore used. First and foremost among these, even in ancient times, was incense resin, whose exciting and narcotic odour enhances the magical effect. The herbs and resins that were thrown into the flames, however, were also generally regarded as sacrificial gifts to the gods, whose delight in the ascending odours would, it was thought, render them favourably disposed toward the offerer.
Thus, sanctification ceremony and sacrifice become merged. The highest form of sanctification, moreover, originates in sacrifice itself. It appears as soon as the idea of intercourse with the deity becomes elevated to that of communion with him. This occurs especially in thesacrificial feast. When the sacrificial food is sanctified by virtue of the fact that the deity partakes of it, this sanctification is impartedto those human individuals who receive a share of the sacrifice. In proportion as the worth of the sacrifice increases, so does also the degree of sanctification. The latter reaches its culmination inhuman sacrifice, where the person sacrificed is the representative both of the sacrificial community and of the deity himself. Sanctification here becomes deification for every participant in the sacrifice. Following the disappearance of human sacrifice, this idea was maintained in connection with the sacred animal that was substituted for man, and finally, after bloody sacrifice was entirely abandoned, in connection with the bread which constituted the sacrificial food. In the most diverse cults of the Old and of the New World, this bread was moulded into the form, sometimes of a human being and sometimes of an animal. In this case again, the sacrificial cult of Christianity unites the various elements. When taken as a whole, the different interpretations that have been given to sacrifice in the Christian world include conceptions representing all the various stages of development. The bread and wine of the sacrament perpetuate the memory of the most exalted human sacrifice known to religious tradition, since, in this case, the idea of the unity of the sacrificial person with the deity continues to survive in the cult of the redeeming deity. In this sacrificial meal, moreover, elements of related sacrificial cults survive—the idea of the paschal lamb, borrowed from the Jewish Passover, and the substitution of wine, as in the Dionysian mysteries, for the blood of the sacrificed god. To the Christian, moreover, this sacrificial sanctification has hadthreedistinct meanings, though these, of course, have frequently been intermingled. There have been magical, mystical, and symbolical interpretations—a series of stages through which all sanctification ceremonies pass. To the uncritical mind, he who receives the bread of the sacrament partakes of the actual body of Christ. Following upon this stage of miracle and magic, is the idea that the cult act effects a mystical union with the Redeemer, a union that is not corporeal but spiritual. At the third stage, the cult action finally becomes the symbol of a religious exaltation of spirit.This exaltation is regarded as possible in itself without the external manifestation; nevertheless, it is reinforced by the latter, in accordance with the general relationship that obtains between inner needs and external actions. Moreover, in each of these three cases, participation in the common sacrificial meal is evidence of membership in the religious society—a feature common to all firmly organized religious associations. Such membership must be attested by participation in the cult celebrations. Of the ceremonies in which expression is given to one's religious affiliations, the sacrificial meal has been regarded, from early times on, as the most important. The end of the development thus returns to its beginning. The meal, enjoyed in common at fixed times, differentiates cultural man from the man of nature. Among all meals in which a relatively large community unites, however, the sacrificial feast is probably the earliest, just as the cult festival is the earliest festival celebration.
A survey of the various phases of human interest will show that they are all present from the very beginning in the mental organization of man. Moreover, they are throughout so interconnected that an advance in one field of interest will lead to progress in general. Nevertheless, we are unable to escape the further observation that, in the life of the individual, certain capacities develop earlier than others. Precisely the same is true of the life of humanity. The phenomena in which the character of ages and peoples receives its chief expression differ in each of the periods through which the development of mankind passes. The secondary phenomena, in each case, either occur only in their beginnings or, where we are dealing with later stages of culture, are being perfected along lines already established. In this relative sense, we may doubtless say of the three eras following that of primitive man, that totemism is the age of thesatisfaction of wants, the heroic age, that ofart, and the succeeding period of the development to humanity, that ofscience. Of course, there were many art productions, some of them admirable, even in the totemic age—we need mention only the artistic cult dances, or the high perfection to which the semi-cultural peoples of the period attained in the decoration of the body and of weapons. It must be admitted also that the heroic age already laid imperishable foundations for science. Nevertheless, the main achievements of the totemic age relate exclusively to the satisfaction of the external needs of life. The modes of procuring and preparing food, and the forms of clothing, adornment, implements, and weapons—all originated in the totemic age, and, however great may have been the advances made by succeeding eras along these several lines, the beginnings had nevertheless been made. A manner of dress suitable to the climate had been developed. The preparation of food by means of fire, the manufacture of the fundamental and permanent implements and weapons—the hammer, the axe, the saw, the chisel, the knife—and, finally, the differentiation between weapons of close and of long range, had all been introduced. Moreover—and this is perhaps most significant of all—art itself was governed absolutely by the motive of satisfying needs. Articles of adornment, tattooing, the dance, song, and music, were first of all means of magic, and as such they served the most urgent needs, such as man by himself was unable to satisfy. These needs were protection against sickness and success in the chase and in war. Only gradually, through a most remarkable heterogeny of ends, were many of these agencies of magic transformed intopure means of adornment. Such transformations, of course, occurred also in the heroic age. But by this time the necessities of life had in part changed and, of the new interests, those connected with cult and with political organization gained an increasing importance. Æsthetic value came to be more and more appreciated as an independent feature of objects. As a result, articles were produced of a nature such as to minister both to the needs of life and to æsthetic enjoyment. But, again, this occurs pre-eminently within the field of spiritualneeds, particularly in connection with deity cult, on the one hand, and in the glorification of human heroes, on the other. The construction of the temple, the plastic reproduction of the human form and its idealization into the divine image, and, finally, the forms of literature—the epic, the hymn, and the beginnings of the religious drama, with their accompanying music—all of these spring from the spiritual needs of this age, among which needs cult is the foremost. With these various activities, art begins an independent development, gaining a value of its own, and conquering fields that had previously been untouched by æsthetic influences. This conquest of new fields by the higher forms of art is indicative also of an increasing appreciation of the æsthetic, and, along with this, of a spiritualization of life as a whole, such as results, in a particular measure, from art, and only partly, and at a much later period, from science. The first subjects of this art are heroes and gods—that is, those figures which the imagination creates at the threshold of the heroic age, under the influence of the new conditions of life. Gradually art then concerns itself with the human personality and with the objects of man's environment. In correspondence with a change which transpired in the totemic age, in which means of magic were transformed into articles of adornment, the objects of nature and culture are now more and more stripped of their mythological significance and elevated into pure objects of æsthetic appreciation. Thus, the heroic age includes the two most important epochs in the entire history of art. These are the origin of a true religious art, and the attainment of an æsthetic independence which allows art to extend its influence to all departments of human life. Religious art made its appearance with the beginning of the heroic age; æsthetic independence represents a later achievement. This explains why the totemic age seems to us a vanished world, no less with regard to its art than in other respects. It can arouse our æsthetic interest only if we attribute the final product of this period—namely, decoration freed from its original magical significance—to the motives that really underlie artistic activity. Theart with which we are still familiar and whose motives we can all still appreciate, begins only with the heroic age. The tattooing of the man of nature and the amulet about his neck are to us adornments of low æsthetic value. A Greek temple, however, may even to-day arouse the mood of worship, and the battles of the Homeric heroes and the tragedy of a Prometheus overtaken by the wrath of the gods may still impress us as real. However remote the age may be which these products of art represent, the general spirit which animated it has not vanished. The greatest turning-point in the spiritual history of man consists in the stupendous achievement which inaugurates the heroic age. I refer to the creation of the ideal man, the hero, and of the god in whom heroic characteristics are magnified into the superhuman and demoniacal. Here lies the beginning of a real history of art; everything earlier is prehistoric, however important it may be for a psychological understanding of art—an importance greater than is generally supposed, since it is only these earliest phenomena that can disclose the conditions underlying the first manifestations of the artistic imagination. Since we may assume that the facts of the history of art are generally familiar, it may here suffice to consider these originating factors and their relation to the general character of the heroic age.
The first and most striking characteristic of the new era is the development ofarchitecture. This is a new art, not to be found in the preceding age, or at most only in very meagre beginnings. The gabled and the conical hut, as well as the tent and the wind-break from which they developed, are not artistic creations, but are products of the most urgent needs of life. The impulse to erect a building for any higher purpose than this, manifested itself first of all when, here and there, the need of the living was attributed also to the dead. For the shelter of the dead, soul and ancestor cults demanded the erection of more permanent structures. Hence there appeared the burial chamber, built of solid stone. Its walls, designed to afford protection from without, were likewise constructed of stone,and constantly became more massive. This stimulated a sense of the sublime and eternal, which reacted on the construction of the monuments and gave them a character far transcending the need that called them into being. The development of the gigantic Egyptian pyramids out of the simple walled tomb, the mastaba, tells us this significant story in pictures that impress the imagination more vividly than words. But the cult of the dead, which this history records, was itself intimately connected with deity cult. The preservation of the mummy involved every possible protection of the corpse from the destructive agencies of time. This fact reveals a concern relating to incalculable ages, and thus gives evidence of an idea of a beyond into which the deceased is supposed to enter. Besides the house of the dead, therefore, there is the house belonging to the deity, and this is even more directly and universally characteristic of the age. This edifice, into which man may enter and come into the presence of the deity, stimulates the incomparably deeper impulse to build a structure worthy of the deity for whom it is erected. Thus, then, we have thetemple, designed at the outset for the protection of the sacrificial altar, which had originally been erected in the open, upon consecrated ground. Since it is located at the seat of government, at the place where the citizens assemble for the conduct of political affairs and for purposes of trade, the temple is indicative also of the city and of the State. Secular interests likewise begin to assert themselves. Hence there appears a second mark of the city, thecastle, which is the seat of the ruler and of the governing power, and is generally also the final defence, when hostile attacks threaten the city and State. Closely connected with the castle, in all regions in which the ruler lays claim to being a terrestrial deity—as he did, for example, in the ancient realms of the Orient—is theroyal palace. In harmony with the twofold position of the ruler, his dwelling is architecturally intermediate between the castle and the temple. Thus, it is the temple, the castle, and the palace, whose development not only awakens the æsthetic sense forarchitectural forms, but also gives impetus to the other arts, especially to sculpture and to ornamentation. The latter had previously found material for its expression in the utensils of daily use. Enriched through its connection with architectural forms, it now recurs to the miniature work of utensils and implements, where it more and more serves a purely æsthetic need. Of the works of architecture belonging to the early part of this period, it is the temple which proves the greatest æsthetic stimulus. This is due not only to its more exalted purpose, but also to the impetus derived from the fact of the multiplicity of gods. The castle represents the unity of the State. Hence the State contains but one such structure, erected, whenever possible, upon a hill overlooking the city. The temple, from early times on, is the exclusive possession of a single deity. The idea of harbouring several deities in a single structure could arise only later, as a result of special cult conditions and of the increasing size of the sacred edifices. Even then, however, the need for unity in the cult generally caused each temple to be dedicated to a specific deity, the chief god of the temple. Hand in hand with this went a striving for richness and diversity in architecture. The temple, therefore, expresses in a pre-eminent degree not only the character of the religious cult, but also the mental individuality of the people to whom the gods and their cult owe their origin.
Closely connected with temple construction issculpture, for, in it, the importance which the human personality receives in this age finds its most direct expression. Sculpture, moreover, clearly exhibits the gradual advance from the generic to the individual, from a value originally placed on man as such to absorption in the particular characteristics of the individual. The early, 'generic' figure is generally a representation of the divine personality who has inspired the artist to create an image for the sacred shrine. Art does not aim at the outset to copy man himself; it transfers his characteristics to the deity, and only thus, and after laborious efforts, does it attain its mastery overthe human form. True, the gods are conceived as human from the very beginning. So long, however, as the sacrificial stone and the altar stand in the open field, this humanization leads but to inartistic images, similar to fetishes. While these images indicate the presence of the gods at the sacred places, they are not intended as likenesses of the deities themselves. In their external appearance, therefore, the fetishes of early deity cult still impress one as survivals of the totemic age, even though the gods are no longer represented after the fashion of demons, namely, as subhuman, possessing animal or grotesque human forms. The conditions obtaining in life generally were repeated in the realm of art. For the transference of purely human characteristics to the image took place in the case of the hero—or, what amounts to the same thing in the great Oriental civilizations of antiquity, in that of the ruler—earlier than in the case of the deity. The ruler is glorified by means of drawings which represent processions of the hunt and of war, and which are executed on the walls of his palaces. Similarly, the religious impulse expresses itself in the erection of an anthropomorphic image of the deity. This image is placed either in the temple, which is regarded as the dwelling-place of the deity, or in some commanding part of the city which reverences the god as its protector. Here, however, we come upon a noteworthy proof of the fusion of the hero with the demon as described above. From Babylonian and Egyptian monuments we learn that the ruler and his retinue were already represented in human form at a period when deity cult still retained hybrid forms of men and animals, sometimes of the nature of animal demons with human faces, or again as human figures with animal heads. Thus, art strikingly confirms the view that the gods arose from a fusion of the hero personality with the demon. When these external characteristics, due to the past history of gods and their connection with demon beliefs, came to be superseded, the divine image at first reproduced only the typical features of man. In addition to overtowering size, external marks, such as dress, weapons, and sacred animals, were the only evidences of deity.The first step in the transition from the generic figure to the gradual individualization of personality occurs in connection with the facial expression. It is surprising to note the uniformity with which, in all the civilizations of the Old World, the images of the gods, as well as those of the heroes and rulers, acquire an expression of kindliness and gentleness. This trait, however, is again of a generic nature. The stiff, expressionless form has indeed disappeared, but the expression that supervenes is uniform. Though we have referred to this transition as universal, this is true at most as regards the fact that, on the one hand, the expression of complete indifference gives way to one manifesting emotion, and that, on the other, this emotion, though pronounced, again exhibits uniformity. In the quality of this feeling, differences in the character of peoples may come to light, just as they do in myth and religion, with which sculpture in its first stages is closely connected. In the two great cultural regions of the New World, Mexico and Peru, there is a similar transition. The cults of these peoples, however, emphasize the fear-inspiring character of the gods. Hence, in their art, the terrifying grimace of the earliest divine images becomes moderated into an expression of gloomy, melancholy seriousness—a change such as the art of the Old World approximates only in occasional productions that fall rather within the province of the demoniacal, such as the image of the Egyptian sphinx or the gorgon's head of the Greeks. Thus, the transition from features that are entirely expressionless to such as are generic, and then to those that characterize the individual personality, occurs in connection with a change in the quality of the emotions. To illustrate the relative uniformity of this development we might likewise refer to the early Renaissance. Here again it was necessary to seek a path to the concrete wealth of personality that had been lost. Art reached this goal by way of the pathetic expression of humble submission. As soon as plastic art departs from the typical form, we find not only that a change occurs in the expressions of the face, but also that the entirebody becomes more lifelike. Along with this, the themes of plastic art pass from the gods, rulers, and heroes to the lower levels of everyday life. Even here art at first continues to be fascinated by the great and conspicuous, though it later gains more and more interest in thesignificant. This striving for reality in its wealth of individual phenomena is characteristic not only of sculpture, however, but also of painting. Disregarding the bodily form in favour of the portrait, painting first acquires new means of characterization in colour and shading; then, passing from man to his natural environment, it wins from nature the secrets of perspective, and thus gains a far greater mastery over the depths of space than was possible to sculpture.Landscape painting, moreover, unlocks for art that rich world of emotions and moods which man may create from the impressions of nature, and which attain to purity of expression in proportion as man himself disappears from the artistic reproduction of his environment. Thus, the final product of pictorial art, together with such paintings as those of still life and the interior, all of which are psychologically related inasmuch as they express moods, represent the most subjective stage of art, for they dispense with the subject himself whose emotions they portray. All the more, therefore, are these emotions read into nature, whose processes and activities now constitute the content of personal experience. Once it attains to this development, however, landscape art is already far beyond the borders of the heroic age. Indeed, the Renaissance itself advanced no farther than to the threshold of this most subjective form of pictorial art. This art represents the hero—however broad a conception of him we may form—as in all respects a human individual. Thus, art again returns to the being whose ideal enhancement originally gave rise to the hero.
The changes which the forms of æsthetic expression undergo within the field of formative art, are paralleled, on the whole, by those of themusicalarts. By this term, as above remarked, we wish to designate all those arts which depend from the outset upon theexternalfactorsof tone and rhythm ultimately employed most freely in music (cf. p. 262). In the preceding age, onlyoneof these arts, thedance, really reached any considerable development. Of the two elements of the musical arts, rhythm was as yet predominant. The dance received but little melodic support from the voice; noise instruments had the ascendancy over musical instruments. The further development of these arts leads to continued progress, particularly with respect to the melodic forms of expression. These begin with the language of speech, and gradually pass on to the pure clang formations produced solely by manufactured instruments. Corresponding with this external change is an inner change of motives, influenced, of course, by the varying materials which enter into the creations of the musical arts. From the very beginning, the character of this material is involved in constant change, as is also language, which is the basis of all these arts, and whose rhythmical-melodic forms cannot be arrested at any moment of its living development. The attempt to render permanent some of the movements of this flowing process, by means of literary records or definite symbols, is but an inadequate substitute for the enduring power with which the mute creations of sculpture and of architecture withstand the destructive influences of time. Just because of this plasticity of their working material, however, the musical arts are enabled all the more faithfully to portray the thoughts and feelings that move the artist and his age. Particularly where these thoughts and feelings are directly reproduced in language, the work, even though coming down from a long-departed past, has an incomparably greater power to transport us to its world than is ever possible to plastic art. How much more vividly do we not experience the life of the Homeric heroes while reading the Iliad than when viewing the Mycenian art of that period!
Of all the products of the verbal arts, it is the epic that most faithfully mirrors the character of the heroic age as a whole. The human hero here stands in the forefront of action. His battles and fortunes and a laudatory descriptionof his qualities constitute the main themes of the poem. In the background, appears the world of gods. It receives no attention apart from its relation to the action. The gods, it is true, take a hand in the destinies of the heroes—they quarrel about them, or, when the need is greatest, descend to the earth and, though unrecognized, assist them in battles. As for the rest, however, their life lies outside the sphere of the epic narrative; it appears to be an even and undisturbed course of existence into which change enters only in so far as there is a participation in the affairs of the terrestrial world. Such is the epic at the zenith of its development and as it receives expression in the Homeric poems. Though such poetry be traced back to its beginnings, the gods will not be found to play any greater rôle, as we should be led to expect were the theory of many mythologists true that the hero saga developed out of the deity saga and, correspondingly, the heroic epic out of the deity epic. In confirmation of our assertion, we might point to the Russian and Servian romances, and also to the songs of the Kara-Kirghiz and to the Finnish Kalewala, though the Kalewala has not come down to us in quite its original form. The Norse Edda, which has been at the basis of certain misconceptions regarding this question, should not here be drawn into consideration, though, were it examined, it would substantiate, if anything, the opposite of what is supposed. It dates from a later period, which no longer believed, as we may assume that the Homeric rhapsodists did, in the gods and heroes of which it sang. The Norse skalds dealt, in their songs, with a departed world, whose memory they endeavoured to renew; they drew their material from märchen-myths and from folk-sagas. If, now, we turn to that poetry of the Slavic and Turkish tribes which is really preparatory to epic poetry, we find certain radical differences. Here also, of course, there are imaginary beings who either take a hand in the battles and destinies of the heroes or, through the magic over which the human hero as yet still frequently disposes, come to identify themselves with heroes. These beings, however,are not gods, but demons. They possess no personal traits whatsoever. Such traits are lacking also to the hero in proportion as he makes use of magical powers rather than of an enhanced measure of human ability. Thus, it is theworld of demons, not that of gods, which forms the background of the early epic. As regards the hero himself, it is apparent from his characteristics that he is on the border-line between the hero of märchen and the epic hero. This development of the epic again mirrors the development of the hero saga described above. But, since epic poetry gives permanence to the unstable characters of the folk-saga, and thus, in turn, reacts upon the saga itself, its development is all the more capable of presenting a clear picture of that fusion of demon with human hero which gave rise to the god. It is by virtue of his human characteristics that the hero of the early epic is distinguished from the demons whose world as yet always forms his scene of action. These human characteristics are then more and more transferred to the demons. Throughout all these changes of environment, the hero remains the central figure of epic poetry, and continues to develop purely human characteristics. Hence it is that, at a later period, the gods again completely disappear from the action, and the destinies of human heroes come to be the exclusive concern of the epic. At this stage, it is no longer external factors that determine the destiny of the hero, as they did when demons and, later, gods were supreme; inner motives, whose source lies within the hero himself, are of paramount importance. When this occurs, however, epic poetry, has already passed beyond the boundaries of the heroic age.
At one time it was held that the Homeric epic, so far from marking the climax of a development in which the world of heroes was brought into relation with that of the gods, really inaugurated epic poetry. During this period, the rhythmic-melodic form of Homer was regarded as the beginning of all narrative. Indeed, at times it has been thought to represent the beginning of language. Following the view of Jacob Grimm, it wasmaintained that poetry was the earliest form of speech, and that prose came through a process of deterioration analogous to that by which prehistoric deity and hero sagas passed into the märchen. This theory, of course, is just as untenable for the history of language and poetry as it is for that of the saga. The original narrative is the märchen-myth that passes artlessly from mouth to mouth. The transition to a form which is at first loosely constructed and then more strictly metrical, is clearly bound up with the transition from the hero of the märchen to the hero of the saga. Coincident with this, gods also gradually gain a place in epic poetry. This development is accompanied bytwoimportant external changes. The first of these involves the transformation of the everyday prose, in which the märchen-myth had been expressed, into rhythmic-melodic forms. These are reinforced by a simple musical accompaniment that gives to the diction itself the character of a recitative melody. The second change consists in the fact that separate narratives are joined into a series, the basis of connection being, in part, the heroes who participate in the action and, in part, the content of the action itself. Thus, a romance-cycle arises, which, when supplemented by connecting narratives, finally develops into a great epic. As might be supposed, it is primarily the first and the last stage of this development that are accessible to direct observation—the romances of the early epic, preserved in folk-poetry, and the perfected poems, such as the Homeric epics and theNiebelungenlied. As regards the formation of these epics out of their separate elements, we can do no more than to frame hypotheses on the basis of somewhat uncertain inferences relating to differences in style and composition. There can be no doubt, however, that the more important step as regards the form of the epic, namely, the development of rhythmic-melodic expression, was directly bound up with its very first stage, namely, with the appearance of the earliest form of the heroic narrative—a form resembling the romance.
But how may we account for this origin? Does the narrative of itself rise to song because of the more exaltedcharacter of its content? Or, is the rhythmic-melodic form imposed upon it from other previously existing types of poetry? Such poetry exists. The simple songs of primitive man we have already come to know; besides these, there are the cult-song, whose conjurations and petitions were addressed to demons prior to the advent of gods and heroes, and, finally, the work-song. This at once indicates that we must postulate a transference from the lyric type of song, taken in its broadest sense, to the narrative. Nevertheless, the first of the above-mentioned factors must not be disregarded. The heroic hero, of course, arouses far greater admiration and enthusiasm than did the märchen-hero. Here, as in the case of the song, the intensification of mental excitement causes its verbal expression to assume rhythmic forms, precisely as the dominance of festive and joyous emotion in the dance transforms the external movements of the body into rhythmical pantomime. Doubtless, therefore, it was primarily from the cult-song, and under the influence of a related poetic ecstasy, that a sustained rhythmical form was carried over to the portrayal of the hero personality and his deeds. And so, as is clearly shown by the romance-like beginnings of epic composition, the metrical form of the epic first follows current song-forms, and then gradually adapts these to the specific needs of the narrative. Now, the earliest characteristic of the song, and that which at a primitive stage constitutes almost its only difference from ordinary speech, is the refrain. In the epic, the rhythm becomes smoother. The refrain disappears entirely, or occurs at most in the case of regularly recurring connective phrases or of stereotyped expressions relating to the attributes of the gods and heroes. These aid the rhapsodist in maintaining an uninterrupted, rhythmic flow of speech, and also continue to be used as means for intensifying the rhythmic impression.
Epic poetry thus develops out of the earlier forms of lyric composition, through a process by which the exalted mood of the song is transferred to the portrayal of the hero personality. Finally, however, the epic itself reacts upon the lyric.Here again the cult-song occupies the foreground. When it reaches the stage of the hymn, its most effective content is found in narratives that centre about divine deeds which far transcend human capacities, or about the beneficent activity of the deity toward man. The tendency to incorporate such narratives is particularly marked in the song of praise and thanksgiving, which comes to occupy the dominant place in religious cult for the very reason that the mood which it expresses is at the basis of the common cult. At this point, cult acquires a further feature, the preconditions of which, however, date back to the age of demon cults. Even in the case of demons, aid was sought not merely by means of conjurations but also by means ofactionsthat imitated, in dances and solemn mask processions, the activities of demons. In the great vegetation festivals of New Mexico and Arizona, which are intermediate between demon and deity cults, there were imitative magical rites connected with the subterranean demons of the sprouting grain, with the rain-giving cloud demons above the earth, and also with the bright celestial gods who dwell beyond the clouds. After having originated in this sequence, these elements became united into a cult dance whose combination of motives resulted in the mimetic play, the imitative and pantomimic representation of a series of actions. Thus, the mime itself is the original form of thedrama, which now takes its place beside the epic as a new form of poetry. What the epic portrays, the drama sets forth in living action. This accounts for the fact that, even in its later independent development, dramatic literature draws its material principally from the epic, or from the saga which circulates in folk-tradition as an epic narrative. Moreover, as may be noticed particularly in the history of the Greek drama, the transition was made but slowly from the individual rhapsodist, who sufficed for the rendering of the epic song, to the additional players necessary for setting forth the narrative in action.
How essentially uniform this transition is, in spite of widely divergent conditions, is illustrated by the origin ofthe religious plays which grew out of the Christian cult. In reading the gospel, the priest assigned certain passages, originally spoken by participants in the particular event, to sacristans or priests associated in the ceremony, and the chorus of worshippers represented the people present at the event. In spite of, or, we might better say, because of their more recent origin, these Easter, Passion, and Christmas plays represent an early stage of development. In them, we can still follow, step by step, the growth of dramatic art out of church liturgy, and the resultant secularization of the religious play. Heightened emotion results in an impulse to translate the inner experience into action, and thus dramatic expression is given to certain incidents of the sacred narrative that are particularly suited for it. This tendency grows, and finally the entire scene is acted out, the congregational responses of the liturgy passing over into the chorus of the drama. Common to the responses of the congregation and the chorus of the dramatic play, is the fact of an active participation in that which is transpiring. Though this participation is inner and subjective, in the one case, and objective, in the other, the response of the congregation to the priest in the liturgy is nevertheless preparatory to the chorus of the drama. It is inevitable, however, that this change should gradually lead to a break with liturgy. The portrayal of the sacred action is transferred from the church to the street; the clergy are supplanted by secular players from among the people. Even within the sacred walls folk-humour had inserted burlesque episodes—such, for example, as the mimic portrayal of Peter's violence to the servant Malchus, or the running of the Apostles to the grave of Christ. These now gained the upper hand, and finally formed independent mimetic comedies. The serious plays, on their part, also drew material, even at this time, from sources other than sacred history. The newly awakened dramatic impulse received further stimulus from various directions. The old travelling comedy, wandering from market to market with its exhibitions, now of gruesomely serious, now of keenlyhumorous, action, was a factor in the creation of the modern drama, no less than were the amusing performances of the accompanying puppet-show. Added to these, as a new factor, was the short novel, a prose narrative cultivated with partiality particularly since the Renaissance; there was also its elder sister, the imaginary märchen, as well as the epic of chivalry in its popular prose versions, and, finally, that which more clearly approximates to the religious starting-point, the saint legend—all of these united in giving impetus to the modern drama.
Now, the similarity of this development to that of the ancient drama is so marked that, even where details are lacking, we may regard the nature of the transitions as identical so far as their general features are concerned. Indeed, we should doubtless be justified in assuming that in whatever other localities a dramatic art was perfected, as, for example, in India, the course of development was essentially the same as that which has been described. True, the development cannot proceed to its termination apart from an advance in cult and poetry such as was attained but rarely. Its sources, however, are always to be found in universal human characteristics which were operative in the very beginnings of art and cult. The two factors upon which the later drama depends may be detected even in the corroboree of the Australians. The corroboree is a cult dance whose central feature is a regulated imitation of the actions of totem animals, accompanied by song and noisy music. This imitation of animals also leads to the insertion of humorous episodes. Indeed, even in the corroboree, these episodes are frequently so numerous as to crowd out completely the cult purpose—an early anticipation of the secularization which everywhere took place in the art that originated in cult. In numerous other details as well, the continuity of development is apparent. Suggestions of the animal dance occur in the satyric plays of the Greeks. This same satyric drama took over the phallus-bearing choral dancers from the vegetation festival. In striking correspondence, as K. Th. Preuszhas pointed out, and indicative of analogous customs, are the phallephoric representations found in ancient Mexican cult pictures. The puppet-show, which was perhaps not the least among the factors leading to the secularization of the drama, was not only universally to be found during the Middle Ages, but in India it made its appearance at an early period. It occurs even among peoples of nature, as, for example, among the Esquimos. Among these peoples, the doll and its movements always represent an imitation of man himself and of his pantomimes. But, though the tendencies to dramatic representation and, in part, even the beginnings of the drama, reach back to the early stages of art, the developed drama was the product of a later period, and was dependent for its rise upon almost all the other verbal and mimetic arts. The drama, however, may always be traced back to deity cult. The religious hymn which extols the deeds of the gods is a direct incentive to the translation of these deeds into personal action. The motives for the dramatic elaboration of liturgy were present particularly in those deity cults which combined soul cults with ideas of a beyond, and which centred about the life, the sufferings, and the final salvation of the gods, and the transference of these experiences to the human soul. The development of the mediæval Easter and Passion plays may be traced, step by step, from their origin. It is this development, particularly, that throws clear light upon early Greek and Indian drama, whose beginnings in the mystery cults are rendered obscure by the secrecy of the cults. These latter dramas, in turn, clearly indicate that the original source of dramatic representations is to be found in the very ancient vegetation ceremonies, which, in part, were transmitted to the heroic age from a period as early as that of demon cults. After the dramatic performance has been transferred from the temple to the market-place and the drama has become secularized, the further course of development naturally differs both with the conditions of the age and with the character of the culture. Nevertheless, however, the epicnarrative, the mimetic representation, and the older forms of the song may have co-operated in the development of the drama, the latter, like the epic, steadily descends from the lofty realms of the heroes and gods, down to the dwellings of men. In the portrayal of human strivings and sufferings, moreover, the centre of interest shifts from the mysterious course of external events to the secrets of the human soul. But herewith again the drama transcends the boundaries of the heroic age. Its beginnings grow out of early deity cult. In its final stages, dramatic art, with its insight into human life as it is directly lived, becomes the vehicle of the idea of humanity in the entire scope of its meaning, comprehending both the heights and the depths of human life.
Closely bound up with the psychological motives underlying the development of the drama is the last of the musical arts—namely,music. We may refer to it as the last of these arts for the reason that it attained to independence later than any of the others. As a dependent art, however, accompanying the dance, the song, or the epic recital, it dates back to the age of primitive man. Musical art, also, received its first noteworthy stimulus from cult, as an accompaniment of the cult dance and the cult song. The strong emotions aroused by the cult activity caused a constantly increasing emphasis to be placed on the musical part of the ceremony, leading particularly to the development of melody. The polyphonic song of the many-voiced chorus of the cult members, and the music of the accompanying instruments which gradually assumed the same character, eventually developed into harmonic modulation. This introduced musical effects of a novel sort, such as were not possible for the accompaniment of the reciting rhapsodist and were attained only imperfectly by the common song. Thus, dramatic and musical art both sprang from the same religious root, the liturgic ceremonial, thence to pursue different directions of development. Later they again united in the case of certain particularly emotional parts of the dramatic action, first of all in the choral song, which is thus reminiscent of their common origin in liturgy.With this exception, however, the emancipation of dramatic and of musical art from their common cult origin was succeeded by a long period in which they remained distinct. Hence it is certainly not without significance that the creator of the modern art-synthesis, the music drama, himself felt his achievement to be religious in character. Whether or not this may be affirmed as regards the content of the music drama, it is true so far as the fact of combining the two arts is concerned. But it is no less noteworthy that in this case also the separation of itself engenders the motives for the reunion. When the drama was transferred from the temple to the public market-place and then descended from the sphere of gods and heroes to the reality of everyday life, it lost, first its musical-melodic form, and then its elevated rhythm, thus giving way to prose. The liturgic song that survived in the cult, however, entered into reciprocal relations with the secular forms of the song, and a copious interchange of melodic motives ensued. With the same justification, perhaps, as in the case of the origin of the dramatic play in general, we may interpret the older developments by reference to the interchange between sacred and secular songs that took place in Christendom during the Middle Ages. The endeavour to combine dramatic with lyric and musical enjoyment gave rise to hybrid forms of art, to the musical play and the opera. This prepared the way for the further attempt to transcend these composite forms of art by creating a new unity of drama and music. Thus, the aim was to restore the original synthesis on a higher plane, not limited to particular religious cults but taking into account universal human emotions. Yet the entire development of this later art, as well as that of its component elements, the drama and the song, again carries us far beyond the limits of the heroic age. It extends over into a period in which, on the one hand, man supplants the hero and, on the other, the religious advance to a superpersonal god displaces those deities who suffer from the defects which they have inherited from their humanprototypes and their demon ancestors—namely, the personal gods.
Along with the above-mentioned development of musical art there is also a second change, which appears on the surface to be antithetical to the former, but which in reality supplements it. This change consists in the separation of musical expression from the various elements with which it was originally connected, and in its entrance upon a free and independent development. In the recitative of the rhapsodist, in the liturgy of the temple service, in dance and song, the rhythmic-melodic elements are, to a certain extent, limited by the rhythmic-melodic possibilities of language. In part, it is true, they have freed themselves from this limitation—namely, in the instrumental accompaniment—and yet they fail to attain to independence so long as they are but means for intensifying the expression which emotion receives in language and mimicry. From this double bondage to the rhythmic-melodic powers of human expressive movements and to the thought content of language, musical art finally frees itself. While the musical instrument was at first a means designed to assist man in his endeavour to give direct expression to his emotions, man's activity in the case of 'absolute music' becomes limited to the mastery of the instrument itself. This renders available a wealth of new tonal possibilities, and adds an inexhaustible supply of new motifs for the expression of feelings and emotions. Musical art thus becomes purely a language of emotions. Free from connection with specific ideas, it in no wise restricts the experiences which the hearer may enjoy. It affects these experiences only in so far as the musical production is itself a portrayal of pure emotions. Inasmuch as music is not bound by concepts or ideas, its effect upon the hearer will be the purer and the more intense according as he is the more receptive to the particular emotions in question. In the form of the instrumental composition, therefore, music is the most subjective of the musical arts, as are landscape-painting and its related forms, though not in so pronounced a degree, of the plasticarts. Like these arts, and even more so, music is the expression of purely subjective feelings. Hence, it, as well as they, far transcends the boundaries of the heroic age, whose fundamental characteristic is attachment to the objective world. In the heroic age, the individual may indeed transfuse the outer world with his emotions, but he is never able to isolate his emotions from objects. Consequently, though art places its media at his disposal, he is unable to utilize them in giving expression, in its independence, to the inner life of personality.
The question, Do we live in an enlightened age? was answered by Kant, with reference to his own time—which, as is well known, laid claim to the distinction—flatly in the negative. He added, however, that the age was doubtless one of increasing enlightenment. One might, perhaps, be even more justified in raising a similar question with reference to the relation of our own and of preceding ages to a universally human culture, and in answering: We are on the way to this goal, but are still far from having actually reached it. Indeed, in view of human imperfection, it may be doubted whether we will ever be able to reach it, unless the imperfection itself be included as an element in such a culture. The ambiguity of the word 'humanity' is such that it may signify human weaknesses as well as human sympathy and other virtues. It was in the latter, the more favourable, sense of the term that Herder, even in his day, attempted, in his "Ideas," to portray the history of mankind as an "education to humanity." This expression suggests that history manifests only a ceaseless striving toward true humanity; the goal itself lies beyond the reach of possible experience.
Now, a survey of the course of progress described in the preceding chapters may well cause us to doubt whether the presupposition from which Herder set out in his reflections on the philosophy of history is correct. The assumption that factors preparatory to the developmentto humanity are already to be found in the original nature of man—indeed, even earlier than this, in the general conditions of his natural environment—is not beyond question. Neither primitive nor totemic man shows the faintest trace of what we should, strictly speaking, call humanity. He gives evidence merely of an attachment to the nearest associates of horde or tribe, such as is foreshadowed even among animals of social habits. In addition, he exhibits but occasional manifestations of a friendly readiness to render assistance when danger threatens at the hands of strangers.
It is not until the heroic age that we encounter phenomena such as might properly be interpreted to indicate the gradual rise of feelings of humanity. But if we take into account the entire character of this age, we are more inclined to contrast it, precisely when it reaches its zenith, with all that we to-day understand by humanity. Consider, for example, the sharply demarcated State organizations of the heroic era, its depreciation of strange peoples, and its repudiation of universal human ties, brusquely expressed during times of war in its treatment of the enemy and, during times of peace, in slavery. The question as to whether and in how far the beginnings of our ideas of humanity reach back into the past and prevail at lower levels of culture, is confronted with a serious difficulty. Conceptions such as these are obviously themselves products of a long development and have been in constant flux. The concept 'humanity' suffers from an ambiguity which has attached to it ever since the time of its origin, and which has in no wise diminished as the word has acquired broader meanings. The wordhumanitas, which in later classical Latin was practically equivalent to our concept 'human nature,' in both its good and its bad connotations, acquired an additional meaning in the language of mediæval scholars. During this period of strong partiality for abstract word formations, the term came to be used also for the collective concept 'mankind,' that is, the Romangenus hominum—a concept independent of value judgments of any sort. Thus, the word passedover into our more modern languages with a twofold significance. Although the German language developed the two wordsMenschlichkeitandMenschheit, corresponding to the conceptual distinction just indicated, the two meanings were again combined in the foreign wordHumanität. This is exemplified by Herder's phrase,Erziehung zur Humanität(education to humanity). For, in using this phrase to sum up the meaning of history, Herder meant that the striving which underlies all history was not merely for the development of the qualities of humanity (Menschlichkeit), in the highest sense of the term, but also essentially for their gradual extension to the whole of mankind (Menschheit).
But, whatever our opinion concerning the possible success of such striving and concerning the relation of its two phases, there can be no doubt that the concept 'humanity,' which has become common property among civilized peoples, combines an objective with a subjective aspect. On the one hand, 'humanity' means thewholeof mankind, or, at any rate, a preponderant part of it, such as may be regarded as representative of the whole. On the other hand, 'humanity' is a value-attribute. It has reference to the complete development of the ethical characteristics which differentiate man from the animal, and to their expression in the intercourse of individuals and of peoples. This latter thought incorporates in the term 'humanity' the meaning both of 'mankind' and of 'human nature,' although it ignores the secondary implication of human imperfection which 'human nature' involves and takes into account only its laudable characteristics. Humanity, when predicated of an individual, means that he transcends the limits of all more restricted associations, such as family, tribe, or State, and possesses an appreciation of human personality as such; in its application to human society, it represents a demand for an ideal condition in which this appreciation of human worth shall have become a universal norm. This ideal, however, is subject to growth, and, like all ideals, is never completely realizable. Hence the following sketch of the conditionswhich succeed the age of heroes and gods cannot undertake to do more than point to the phenomena that give expression to the new motives that dominate this later period. Sharp demarcations are in this instance even less possible than in the case of the earlier stages of human development. The more comprehensive the range of human strivings and activities, the more gradual are the transitions and the more fully are the underlying motives—precisely because they involve the universally human—foreshadowed in the natural predispositions and impulses of man. Tendencies to esteem man as man, and a willingness to render him assistance, are not foreign even to the primitive mind. Even at the beginnings of human culture there are present, dimly conscious, those tendencies out of which the idea of humanity may finally develop. Moreover, every later advance seems to lead in the direction of this conception. The transition from tribe into State, the changing intercourse of peoples, and the spread over wide regions of the mental creations of a single people, of language, religion, and customs—all these phenomena are obviously steps on the way to the idea of humanity and to its permanent incorporation into all departments of human endeavour. Neither in its rise nor in its further changes, moreover, does this new idea entail the disappearance of previous conditions or of the psychical factors involved in their development. On the contrary, humanitarian culture takes up into itself the creations of preceding eras, und allows them to take firmer root. Thus, the idea of a cultural community of peoples has not weakened, but, so far as we may conclude from the past course of history, has strengthened and enriched, the self-consciousness of separate peoples and the significance of the individual State. The dissemination of cultural products has not resulted in their decrease. National differences have led rather to the increase of these products, and have thus enhanced the value attaching to the spiritual distinctiveness of a people and of the individual personality. That we may here, even more than in the case of the earlier periods of culturalhistory, speak only ofrelativevalues, needs scarcely be remarked. Humanitarian development includes a vast number of new conditions, in addition to those that underlie the preceding stages of culture. Since, moreover, the synthesis at which this development aims is everywhere still in the process of becoming, the way itself is for the time being the attainable goal. We may neither be said to be on the waytohumanity, if we mean by this a condition in which none but humanitarian interests prevail, nor does a humanitarian age, in the sense of the exclusion of more restricted human relations, appear at all within the field of vision disclosed to us as a result of past history. As a legacy from the primitive era, man has permanently retained not only the general needs of individual life but also the most restricted forms of family and tribal organization. In like manner, it will be impossible for an age of humanity ever to dispense with the more limited articulations of State and society that have arisen in the course of cultural development. Scarcely any general result stands out as more certain, in a retrospective survey of our investigations, than the fact that, while every period discards as worthless a vast number of products, some of which were valuable to an earlier age, there are other products which prove to be imperishable. From this point of view, that which precedes is not merely preparatory to the further course of development but is itself the beginning of the development. The immediate beginning, however, is veiled in obscurity. The earlier age is ever unconsciously preparing the way for one that is to come. The clan of primitive tribal organization had no idea of a coming State, nor had the ancient demon worshipper any notion of a cult of rewarding and punishing celestial deities, yet State and deity cult could not have arisen except for clan and demon-belief. Similarly, the earlier modes of collective life possessed the idea of humanity only in the form of a hidden germ. Hence we may not properly describe these preparatory stages, which exhibit phenomena of a different and, in part, an entirely dissimilar sort, asa development to humanity. The term applies rather to an age in which the idea of humanity, having come to clear consciousness, exercises an influence upon the various phases of culture, and is entertained by a sufficiently large portion of mankind to insure its permanent effectiveness. But even with this limitation the development may not be regarded as one of uninterrupted progress. However widely disseminated the humanitarian idea may come to be, there will remain localities and levels of culture to which it has not penetrated. But, inasmuch as peoples of very different cultural stages enter into relations with one another, the possibility is open for such a turn of events as will obscure the idea of the development to humanity for long periods. That such deviations from the path of progress have frequently occurred in the past is certain; that they are never to occur in the future is scarcely probable. For this reason one can scarcely hope to do more than to show that, in spite of such retrogressions, the development to humanity forms a generally connected whole, and that here also psychological law is regnant.
That such law prevails is at once evident from the fact that of the two conceptions which we have found to be involved in the idea of humanity, theexternaland objective concept expressed by the collective term 'mankind' is historically the earlier; the concept referring toinnercharacteristics, and associated in the consciousness of the individual with clearly defined value-feelings, follows only gradually. We might express this relationship by the phrase, Mankind must prepare the way for human nature. This does not imply that isolated manifestations of the latter might not long precede the rise of the idea of mankind—indeed, must necessarily have preceded it, in so far as a predisposition is concerned. It means merely that human nature did not, as a matter of fact, attain to its complete development, nor was it able to do so, until after the idea of the unity of mankind had progressed beyond the stage of vague impulses or of recognition on the part of but a few individuals in advance of theirage. In other words: The collective concept 'mankind,' as representing, not merely a generic term created by the intellect, but a real totality ultimately uniting all its members in a social whole, preceded the concept 'human nature,' as connoting a recognition of universal human rights to which each of the members of the human race may lay claim, and of duties which he, in turn, owes to human society. The case could not be otherwise. Unless the idea of mankind were already present in some form, even though this be at the outset inadequate, the requirement that an individual give expression to humanitarian sentiments would be impossible, since there would be no object of the activity. If we consider the sequence of the various phenomena involved in the development to humanity, we find a striking agreement between history and the results to which our analysis of the concept 'humanity' has led us. The earliest of the phenomena here in question dates far back to the beginnings of the events known to us through historical monuments, and consists in the rise ofworld empires. Though the term 'world empire' is sometimes used to refer merely to a great kingdom that results from the absorption of a number of separate States, such a use of the word does not do justice to its meaning. The idea of world empire really comes into existence only at the moment when such a kingdom lays claim to embracing the terrestrial part of the universe, and therefore the whole of mankind, however much this claim may represent a mere demand which has never, of course, actually been realized. The very fact of the demand, however, itself involves the conscious idea of a unity embracing the whole of mankind. Moreover, the endeavour to realize this ambition follows with inner necessity in the case of all political organizations that call themselves world empires, particularly at the period of their zenith and of an increasing consciousness of power. This leads to further important results, which, though at first doubtless not consciously sought, nevertheless later increasingly become the object of voluntary endeavour. Though externally retaining the traditional political organization, the worldempire required an extension of the institutions of law and of administration that had thus far prevailed in the more limited State. A similar change gradually took place in connection with intercourse and its fostering agencies, and subsequently in connection with language, customs, and religious beliefs. Thus, it was the world empire that first prepared the way forworld culture, only meagre beginnings of which existed in the period of a more restricted political life. The extension of wants and of the means of their satisfaction was first evident in the field of commerce, though a similar tendency came more and more to prevail in the various departments of mental life. Pre-eminent among these interests was the one which is the most universal and is based on the most common needs, such as are experienced by all members of human society, namely,religion. Thus, as one of the last of the creations possessing universal human significance,world religionmakes its appearance. The preceding age did not progress beyond national religions. However much the mythological elements of cult, in particular, may have travelled from one people to another, these elements were assimilated by the national religions. Inasmuch as these religions continued, on the whole, to preserve their own identities, the fact that any elements were of foreign origin very soon disappeared from the folk-consciousness. Not until the period which we are now discussing do we find religions that lay claim to being universal. Even though this claim may remain a mere demand, just as in the case of the world empire, it is precisely as such that every historical world religion has asserted its influence. This striving for universality is far keener in connection with world religion than it is in the case of world empire and world culture. In comparison with this endeavour to become universal, the fact that no period ever witnessed merely a single world religion is relatively unimportant, though not to be overlooked in considering the spiritual needs of mankind. Disregarding subordinate religions and such as are of less significance for culture as a whole, there are at leasttwogreat world religions, Christianity and Buddhism. These have asserted themselves side by side, and will presumably continue further to maintain themselves, inasmuch as they correspond to sharply defined characteristics of universal world culture. Finally, world culture and the world religions form the basis ofworld history, a third element in the collective consciousness of mankind. If we understand by 'world history,' not the political or cultural events that simultaneously run their independent courses, but the historic consciousness of mankind itself, combining the idea of mankind as a unity with that of the development of this unity in accordance with law, then world history, in this, the only accurate meaning of the term, is the last of all the factors involved in the idea of humanity. Since the individual who is developing in the direction of the ideal of humanity mirrors all other aspects of human nature, world history ultimately becomes for him the gradual realization of the idea of humanity. Thus, world empires, world culture, world religions, and world history represent the four main steps in the development to humanity.
Even in the midst of the spiritual forces dominating the heroic age there are phenomena that foreshadow a development transcending the limits of this period. Of these phenomena, none is more prominent than the striving for world dominion. The first battles of early political organizations, and the victories over conquered peoples, led to an enhanced consciousness of power on the part of the individual State. This consciousness found expression, first in strife between neighbouring dominions, and later, as soon as one of these had gained the supremacy, in the establishment of an empire including many separate States. Such an impulse to transcend the limits of the single State is so natural and so directly prefigured in the motives to individual action that we come upon it wherever any historically active politicalorganizations have arisen. In the realms of western Asia, such attempts are to be found from the time of the Sumerian and Accadian States down to the struggle of Babylon and Assyria for the rulership of the world. Egypt had a succession of dynasties which at first glance might seem to simulate a unified history, but which in reality represents the transference of supreme power from one State or city to another, and along with this the growing ambition for a single all-embracing dominion. The same phenomenon appears in the struggle of the Greek and Latin tribes for hegemony, and also in the foundation of the great Persian kingdom of the Achæmenidæ; the latter gave way to the world empire of Alexander, which, though of short duration, was never again equalled in magnitude; succeeding it, came the world empire of the Romans, the last that could properly lay claim to the name.
It is in Egypt, on the one hand, and in the succession of West-Asiatic kingdoms, on the other, that the first stages of this development of a world kingdom out of the dominance of one powerful State over a number of vassal States are clearly exhibited. The struggle for supremacy, in which vassal might elevate himself to the position of ruler and lord be reduced to vassal, and in which newly immigrant peoples often took a decisive part, immeasurably enhanced the striving to extend the sphere of dominion. This development reached its culmination when the supreme ruler of a power that dominated a very considerable number of vassal States expressly asserted the claim of beingruler of the world. The fact that such a claim was made wherever a supremacy of this sort came into existence under conditions of relatively limited intercourse, testifies to the immanent necessity of the development. Wherever the domain of such an empire approximated the limits of the known world, the universal State was conceived as including also the rest of the inhabited earth. This conception came to expression in the title which the ruler regularly assumed. He laid claim to being the king of kings, the overlord of the world, the ruler of the 'four quarters of the earth.'Through a reversal of that process of transference by which the characteristics of the terrestrial State were carried over, in deity cult, to the divine State, the ruler of the terrestrial State now himself became a god. This accounts for the surprising uniformity with which the idea of a god-monarch arose wherever that of a world monarch was developed. In the pre-Babylonian realms of the Euphrates and Tigris valleys, the ruler erected his own image, as an object of worship, in the temple; in the land of the Pharaohs, the heads of the sphinxes placed in front of the temples bore the features of the monarch. Even Alexander the Great commanded that the Egyptian priests greet him as a son of the god Amon Re; after acquiring the authority of the great Persian kings, he demanded from those about him the external signs of divine adoration. Similarly, the Roman emperors of the period from Diocletian down to Constantine. In spite of their inclination toward republican offices and customs, which by their very nature militated against such ceremonial, these emperors accepted the idea that the world ruler should be worshipped in cult. As the god-idea gained increasing power, however, deity cult itself presented a counteracting influence to the fusion of the ideas of world ruler and deity. A rivalry arose between god and ruler. The king whose omnipotence led to his deification repelled the ruler of heaven, and the ruler of heaven and earth, on his part, refused to tolerate any rival of earthly origin. This led to a temporary compromise in which the ruler, though not himself regarded as a deity, was nevertheless held to be the son of a god, as well as the agent who executed the divine will. Or, after the pattern of hero myths, and in remote resemblance to ancestor cult, the ruler was believed to enter into the heaven of gods upon his death, so that it came to be only the deceased ruler who received divine adoration. The later rulers of Babylon, for example, called themselves the sons of Marduk, who was the chief god of Babylonia, and the features of this deity were given to the image of Hammurabi. The Roman emperors, on the other hand, from the time of Augustus on, were accorded divine reverence after death. Whenthe king, realizing the exalted character of divine majesty, finally came to feel himself entirely human, these practices vanished. The emperor now became either the mere representative of the deity or one who was divinely favoured above other men. Hence the development terminates in a formula of royalty which has even yet not disappeared—the formula, "by the grace of God."
The development which we have described progressed continuously from beginnings that were almost contemporary with those of States until it eventuated in the world State. What, we must now ask, were its motivating forces? We cannot ascribe it to a craving for power which overmasters the ruler of the single State as soon as he has successfully conquered a foreign territory and a foreign people. Doubtless this factor was operative, yet it was obviously an effect rather than a cause, although an effect which, in the reciprocal relations of impulses, itself forthwith became a cause. But the immediate and decisive factors that led to the idea of establishing a world State, are to be found only partly in the motives underlying the extension of the single State into a world State, and in the results connected with the attainment of this ambition. These motives and results were, in the first instance, of an external nature. They consisted in the fact that the world State enjoyed increased means of subsistence and power by reason of the tribute which it received from subjugated provinces or from vassal States. Tributes of grain and cattle, of precious stones and metals, and especially of valuable human material, were placed at the command of the Pharaoh, or of the Babylonian or Persian monarch, for the building of his canals, his temples, and his palaces, for military services, and for an officialdom more directly subject to his will than were free-born natives. Everything which the single State required for its maintenance was demanded in a heightened degree by the world empire. Thus, it was the concentration of the means of subsistence and power that led to the displacement of the single State by the world empire, just as it was the same influence, on a smaller scale, that gave to the State itsascendancy over the earlier tribal organization. In extending its authority over wider and wider territory, the world empire itself finally perished as a result of the increasing difficulty in unifying its forces. It either broke up into separate States or a similar process of expansion started anew within the same boundaries, beginning now with one of the erstwhile vassal States and now with a new tribe that migrated into the territory. The first of these changes is illustrated by the Babylonian-Assyrian empires; the other, by the catastrophes suffered almost contemporaneously by the realm of the Pharaohs, through the influx of the Hyksos, and by Babylon, at the hands of the conquering hordes of the Hittites. The same phenomena recur in the partition of the empire of Alexander the Great and in the downfall of the Roman world empire. Unless world empires degenerate into a mere semblance of universal dominion, as did the Holy Roman Empire, they obviously become the more short-lived in proportion as history comes to move the more rapidly. Hence the Napoleonic attempt to revive the old idea in a new form became a mere episode. The single State finally triumphed over the world empire, and everything goes to show that the idea of an all-embracing world empire is little likely to recur unless the continuity of history is to be seriously interrupted.