Culture and Civilization

"A culture is a common way of life--a particular adjustment of man to his natural surroundings and his economic needs..." xiii

There are four main influences which form and modify human culture, the first three of which are the same as in the case of the formation of animal species, the forth is specific to man which gives him freedom.

1. Race: the genetic factor
2. Environment: the geographical factor
3. Function or occupation: the economic factor
4. Thought: the psychological factor: intellectual knowledge and the religious outlook

"The great stages of world-culture are linked with changes in man's vision of Reality." xx

"The dawn of true civilization came only with the discovery of natural laws, or rather of the possibility of man's fruitful co-operation with the powers of Nature": first Elam, Babylonia and Egypt; then the age of the Hebrew Prophets and the Greek Philosophers, and of Buddha and Confucius. Ibid.

Christopher Dawson, The Age of the Gods, New York: Sheed and Ward, 1934.