ABSTRACT
One sociological phase passes into another gradually and without sharply-cut demarcations or ultimate catastrophes. Among the sociologists who believe that development must ebb backward to earlier conditions to survive the excess of recent tendencies, one of the greatest was Herbert Spencer—a name for ever honourable, and one of the founders of sociology. The slaves and proletarians of the Roman Empire resigned themselves to despair of this world far too soon. They fell victims to other-worldly, anti-human, anti-vital Christianity. The analogy between our age and Imperial Rome, which has been so often cited, is therefore essentially incomplete. The main difference consists in our enormous superiority in industry and technique, with all its implications, in politics, science, ethics, and geneonomy. Education has to hand on to the rising generation the cultural achievements in knowledge and standards of conduct of the race—their “traditional values”.
