animals [it should be said like the greater part of the animals], and
follows his egoistical appetites. Society, in whatever manner it has
managed to constitute itself, transforms him and his "becoming" commences.
From the sexual instinct it makes marriage, from capture it forms regulated
proprietorship, out of defence against violence it makes legal punishment,
etc. Hence-forth, and all his evolution tends to that, man proceeds to
substitute in himself the general will for the particular will; he tends to
disindividualize himself. The general will, founded upon general utility,
is that the man be married, father, head of a family, good husband, good
father, good relative, good citizen. All that man ought to be in
consideration of the general will which he has put in the place of his own,
and which he has made his own will. That is the first advance.

It is realized (always imperfectly) in the smallest societies, in the
cities, in the little Greek republics, for example.

Here is the second advance. By war, by conquest, by annexations, by more
gentle means when possible, the stronger cities subdue the weaker, and the
great State is created. The great State has a more important part than the
city; it continues to substitute the general will for the particular wills;
but, _in addition,_ it is an idea, a great civilizing idea,
benevolent, elevating, aggrandizing, to which private interests must and
should be sacrificed. Such were the Romans who considered themselves, not
without reason, as the legislators and civilizers of the world.

THE IDEAL FORM OF STATE.--Putting aside for a while the continuation
of this subject, what political form should the great State take to conform
to its destiny? Assuredly the monarchical form; for the republican form is
always too individualist. To Hegel, the Greeks and even the Romans seem to
have conceded too much to individual liberty or to the interests of class,