Chapter 10

proliferation of parasitism throughout the body social, consisting of individuals and social sub-groups whose contribution in the form of goods produced and services rendered was less than the cost of maintaining the participants.

d. Economic stagnation. Public spending in excess of public income; higher levies and taxes to replenish the empty treasury; rising prices due to excess of demand over supply; public borrowing with no means for repayment; the issue of money without corresponding reserves; degradation of currency through decrease of its metal content; unemployment among citizens due chiefly to increase in forced labor of war captives and other slaves; public insolvency due to territorial over-expansion; excessive overhead costs; nepotism, bribery, corruption in public service; an over-large bureaucracy feeding at the public trough.

e. Revolution in the nuclear center and fierce suppression. Provincial revolt. Revolt in the colonies. Endemic civil war.

f. Migration toward the central honey-pot; invasion by rivals and adventurers seeking to control it, plunder it and guzzle its contents.

g. Dissolution of the society; boredom; ennui; loss of purpose and direction; growing dissension; power struggle and avoidance of responsibility for trends that were little understood and generally beyond the control of existing officialdom.

Histories of individual nations and empires and histories of civilizations and civilization assemble and present a great body of factual information which support and substantiate this factual summary. The present study aims to organize the facts, to compare them and to draw conclusions as to the benefits and detriments; the practicality or futility; the wisdom or folly of building empires and merging them into civilizations.

These conclusions are based on several thousand years of experiment and experience with the civilized life pattern. Time after time, in age after age, human beings by the millions have poured faith, hope and unbounded energy, devotion and dedication into the upbuilding of the urban nuclei of successive civilizations. Details have varied. Ultimate conclusions have been the same. One civilization after another has passed into the limbo of history leaving, sometimes, splendid ruins as a testimonial to its evident inadequacy to meet the survival needs of oncoming generations.

Such conclusions, based on history, are underlined by current experience with the over-ballyhooed, over-priced variant of the life pattern which signs itself western civilization. Dating from the Crusades a thousand years ago, western civilization has been promoted, built up and carried forward by the blood, sweat and tears of credulous, hopeful, eager human beings. Its promises have been wonderful; its performance, especially since 1900, has been pitifully inadequate, superficial and unsatisfying.

_Part II_

A Social Analysis of Civilization