galton.org 55
Gregarious and Slavish Instincts
55
brute in a herd makes itself obnoxious to the leader, the leader attacks
him, and there is a free fight between the two, the other animals looking
on the while. But if a man makes himself obnoxious to his chief, he is
attacked, not by the chief single-handed, but by the overpowering force of
his executive. The rebellious individual has to brave a disciplined host;
there are spies who will report his, doings, a local authority who will send
a detachment of soldiers to drag him to trial; there are prisons ready built
to hold him, civil authorities wielding legal powers of stripping him of all
his possessions, and official executioners prepared to torture or kill him.
The tyrannies under which men have lived, whether under rude barbarian
chiefs, under the great despotisms of half-civilised Oriental countries, or
under some of the more polished but little less severe governments of
modern days must have had a frightful influence in eliminating
independence of character from the human race. Think of Austria, of
Naples and even of France under Napoleon III. It was stated
[1]
in 1870
that, according to papers found at the Tuileries, 26,642 persons had been
arrested in France for political offences since 2nd December, 1851 and
that 14,118 had been transported, exiled, or detained in prison.
I have already spoken in Hereditary Genius of the large effects of
religious persecution in comparatively recent years, on the natural
character of races, and shall not say more about it here; but it must not be
omitted from the list of steady influences continuing through ancient
historical times down, in some degree, to the present day, in destroying
the self-reliant, and therefore the nobler races of men.
I hold that the blind instincts evolved under these long-continued
conditions have been ingrained into our breed, and that they are a bar to
our enjoying the freedom which the forms of modern civilisation are
otherwise capable of giving us. A really intelligent nation might be held
together by far stronger forces than are derived from the purely gregarious
instincts. A nation need not be a mob of slaves, clinging to one another
through fear, and for the most part incapable of self-government, and
begging to be led; but it might consist of vigorous self-reliant men, knit to
one
[1]
Daily News, 17th October, 1870.
