We may, then, with advantage distinguish between the social organisation and the civilisation of a people. In doing so we are of course making an effort of abstraction, which, though it results in an artificial separation of things intimately related, is nevertheless useful and therefore justifiable. In a similar way the progress of civilisation may be distinguished from social evolution. Social evolution is profoundly affected by the progress of civilisation, and in turn reacts powerfully upon it; for any given social organisation may greatly favour or obstruct the further progress of civilisation. There could have been no considerable advance of civilisation without the evolution of some social organisation; but that the two things are distinct is clear, when we reflect that there may be a very complex social organisation, implying a long course of social evolution, among a people that has hardly the rudiments of civilisation. Extreme instances of social organisation in the absence of civilisation are afforded by some animal societies—for example, societies of ants, bees, and wasps. Among peoples, the native tribes of Australia illustrate the fact most forcibly. They are at the very bottom of the scale of civilisation; yet it has been discovered that they have a complex and well-defined social organisation, which can only have been achieved by a long course of social evolution. These people are divided into totem clans, which clans are grouped in phratries, each individual being born, according to well recognised rules, into a clan of which he remains a life-long member; and his membership in the clan and phratry involves certain well-defined rights and obligations, and well-defined relations to other persons, especially as regards marriage; and these rights, obligations and relations are recognised and rigidly maintained throughout immense areas. On the other hand, although no people has attained any considerable degree of civilisation without considerable social organisation, nevertheless we can at least imagine a people continuing to enjoy a high civilisation, practising and enjoying much of the arts, sciences, philosophy, and literature, which we regard as the essentials of civilisation, yet retaining a bare minimum of social organisation. And this state of affairs is not only conceivable, but is held up as a practicable ideal by philosophical anarchists such as Tolstoi and Kropotkin; and it is, I think, true to say that the American nation presents an approximation to this condition.