Thomas Carlyle wrote that history is the lengthened shadows of a few
great men. Arnold Toynbee concluded from his _Study of History_ that
religion has been a prime motive force in the building and preservation
of civilizations.
Technology has been a motive force of hard-to-define importance in
revitalizing, changing, expanding and perpetuating civilizations.
Increased productivity, expressing itself as increases in income,
accumulated wealth and various forms of capital investment, have
provided the economic basis for population growth and the more effective
exploitation of natural resources and labor power, advances in the means
for transportation and communication, accounting, planning management
and "defense."
Among the social motive forces responsible for the development of
civilization is the accumulation of wealth in an impoverished world. The
most important single factor in this connection was the development of a
class of businessmen in a society dominated by landlords, churchmen and
soldiers. Landlords, churchmen and soldiers lived during periods of
animal husbandry and primitive agriculture on the very narrow margins
produced during bountiful harvests. When harvests were bad, husbandmen
and farmers were reduced to starvation levels. Lacking means of storage
and refrigeration as well as facilities for transporting heavy materials
such as food, fuel and building materials, pre-civilized society
accumulated wealth slowly in mobile forms (precious metals and jewels)
and made few productive investments.
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