https://archive.org/stream/TheStoryOfCivilizationcomplete/Durant_Will_-_The_story_of_civilization_1#page/n101/mode/2up/search/one+life
"If man began with speech, and civilization with agriculture, industry began with fire."
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"[...] Man did not invent [fire]; probably nature produced the marvel for him by the friction of leaves or twigs, a stroke of lightning, or a chance union of chemicals; man merely had the saving wit to imitate nature, and to improve upon her. He put the wonder to a thousand uses. First, perhaps, he made it serve as a torch to conquer his fearsome enemy, the dark; then he used its warmth, and moved more freely from his native tropics to less enervating zones, slowly making the planet human; then he applied it to metals, softening them, tempering them, and combining them into forms stronger and suppler than those in which they had come to his hand. So beneficent and strange with it that fire always remained a miracle to primitive man, fit to be worshiped as a god; he offered it countless ceremonies of devotion, and made it the center or focus (which is Latin for hearth) of his life and home; he carried it carefully with him as he moved from place to place in his wanderings, and would not willingly let it die. Even the Romans punished with death the careless vestal virgin who allowed the sacred fire to be extinguished."
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"[...] Above all, [primitive man] made himself a stick. It was a modest invention, but its uses were so varied that man always looked upon it as a symbol of power and authority, from the wand of the fairies and the staff of the shepherd to the rod of Moses or Aaron, the ivory cane of the Roman consul, the lituus of the augurs, and the mace of the magistrate or the king. In agriculture, the stick became the hoe; in war it became the lance or javelin or spear, the sword or bayonet. [...]"
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"[...] The ingenuity of primitive men probably equaled -- perhaps it surpassed -- that of the average modern man; we differ from them through the social accumulation of knowledge, materials and tools, rather than through innate superiority of brains. Indeed, nature men delight in mastering the necessities of a situation with inventive wit. It was a favorite game among the Eskimos to go off into difficult and deserted places, and rival one another in devising means for meeting the needs of a life unequipped and unadorned."
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"[Art] began where Nature left off."
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"Since human skills and natural resources are diversely and unequally distributed, a people may be enabled, by the development of specific talents, or by its proximity to needed materials, to produce certain articles more cheaply than its neighbors. Of such articles it makes more than it consumes, and offers its surplus to other peoples in exchange for thier own; this is the origin of trade. The Chibcha Indians of Colombia exported the rock salt that abounded in their territory, and received in return the cerals that could not be raised on their barren soil. Certain American Indian villages were almost entirely devoted to making arrow-heads; some in New Guinea to making pottery; some in Africa to blacksmithing, or to making boats or lances. Such specializing tribes or villages sometimes acquired the names of their industry (Smith, Fisher, Potter...), and these names were in time attached to specializing families. Trade in surpluses was at first by an exchange in gifts; even in our calculating days a present (if only a meal) sometimes precedes or seals a trade. The exchange was facilitated by war, robbery, tribute, fines, and compensation; goods had to be kept moving! Gradually an orderly system of barter grew up, and trading posts, markets and bazaars were -established -- occasionally, then periodically, then permanently -- where those who had some article in excess might offer it for some article of need."
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"[...] There is hardly any thing that has not been employed as money by some people at some time: beans, fish-hooks, shells, pearls, beads, cocoa seeds, tea, pepper, at last sheep, pigs, cows, and slaves. Cattle were a convenient standard of value and medium of exchange among hunters and herders; they bore interest through breeding, and they were easy to carry, since they transported themselves. Even in Homer's days men and things were valued in terms of cattle: the armor of Diomedes was worth nin head of cattle, a skilful slave was worth four. The Romans used kindred word -- pecus and pecunia -- for acttle and money, and placed the image of an ox upon their early coins. Our own words capital, chattel, and cattle go back through the French to the Latin capitale, meaning property: and this in turn derives from caput, meaning head -- i.e., of cattle. [...]"
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
"[...] The advance from token goods to a metallic currency does not seem to have been made by primitive men; it was left for the historic civilizations to invent coinage and credit, and so, by further facilitating the exchange of surpluses, to increase again the wealth and comfort of man."
Will Durant, Story of Civilization, Vol.1: Our Oriental Heritage, Ch.2, Pt. II, 1935
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