A Treatise on the Status of Woman and The Origin and Growth of the Family and BY PHILIP RAPPAPORT ་་་ History without political science has no fruit: -Sir John Richard Seeley CHICAGO CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY FOREWORD. This book is written from the standpoint of historic materialism. The theory of historic materialism is young and, so far as I am aware, no economist, sociologist or historian, using the English language, has made any serious attempt toward its application in his investigations. What has been written upon the subjects treated in this book with reference to that theory is scattered in scientific and philosophical books and periodicals, mostly known only to men of learning, and I know of no book in the English language investigating those subjects on the basis of historic materialism popularly enough, so as to be adapted to the needs of the general public. Carlyle would never have called political economy the dismal science, if it had had advanced already to the study of the evolution of economics, of the lines on which it proceeded and does proceed from the beginning of human society up to our own time, and the connection between the economic structure of society and social and political institutions. Instead of that, political economists considered the continued existence of the present economic system with, perhaps, some slight modifications, a matter per se and studied only the inter-relations of causes and effects within the system. Thus, political economy degenerated into a mere science of trade, able to serve only the working out of rules and systems of private economy for individual use. That was a dismal science, indeed. It was unable to kindle a ray of hope, to warm a single soul. A political economy which was unable to develop a higher ideal than buying cheap and selling dear could not possibly awaken response or enthusiasm in any human heart, and could produce nothing but mute resignation among the suffering masses and utter disregard of their woes among FOREWORD. This book is written from the standpoint of historic materialism. The theory of historic materialism is young and, so far as I am aware, no economist, sociologist or historian, using the English language, has made any serious attempt toward its application in his investigations. What has been written upon the subjects treated in this book with reference to that theory is scattered in scientific and philosophical books and periodicals, mostly known only to men of learning, and I know of no book in the English language investigating those subjects on the basis of historic materialism popularly enough, so as to be adapted to the needs of the general public. Carlyle would never have called political economy the dismal science, if it had had advanced already to the study of the evolution of economics, of the lines on which it proceeded and does proceed from the beginning of human society up to our own time, and the connection between the economic structure of society and social and political institutions. Instead of that, political economists considered the continued existence of the present economic system with, perhaps, some slight modifications, a matter per se and studied only the inter-relations of causes and effects within the system. Thus, political economy degenerated into a mere science of trade, able to serve only the working out of rules and systems of private economy for individual use. That was a dismal science, indeed. It was unable to kindle a ray of hope, to warm a single soul. A political economy which was unable to develop a higher ideal than buying cheap and selling dear could not possibly awaken response or enthusiasm in any human heart, and could produce nothing but mute resignation among the suffering masses and utter disregard of their woes among |