MONEY AND INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 223
‘{)
| -
1€
mn
ad
If
nt
1S.
1d
ie
3S.
in
es
8.
fe
of
he
nt
Ale
d-
AP
oq
N=
»f
it
he
en
at
1al
y-
If -
al.
The mental life of primitive men and of children does
not distinguish between the objective or the logical truth
and the subjective, psychological structure. For the child
and the savage, the psychological content of the moment,
be it imagination or fantasy, is immediate reality. The
differentiation in contrasts and opposites is the result only
of a slow process of development. This development which
creates the individuality on the one hand and the objec-
tivity on the other hand is the genesis of freedom and lib-
erty.
The concept of individuality develops as the opposite
and correlative of the concept of factualness and parallel
with the latter. A great development in the latter also
leads inevitably to a great development in the former.
This is illustrated in the history of thought in the last three
centuries. On the one hand there has been a growing feel-
ing of the factual order of things, of the objective necessity
of occurrences, and an extension of the concept of natural
law. On the other hand there has been a growing emphasis
on the self-sufficiency of the individuality, on its liberty
and independence over and against all those external natu-
ral forces. Whatever difficulty metaphysics may have in
reconciling the objective determination of things with the
subjective freedom of individuals, as cultural contents the
development of these two conceptions is the result of one
single process.
The same occurs within the economic world. Here also
there is originally no differentiation between the personal
and the factual aspect of a service. Gradually there occurs
a differentiation between the production and the product,
and finally the personal element withdraws. This process
also means the beginning of individual liberty. And here,
too, individual liberty increases with the increasing objec-
tivation and depersonalization of the economic world. On-
