cyclicality of social destruction (harrison)

An inner law of dissolution drives the system to order. This entropic drive becomes clear when we consider the correlates of Vico's axiom: "The nature of peoples is first crude, then severe, then benign, then delicate, finally dissolute" (CS 242). And in the same context: "Men first feel necessity, then look for utility, next, attend to comfort, still later amuse themselves with pleasure thence grow dissolute in luxury, and finally go mad and waste their substance" (S 241).

- from Forests: The Shadow of Civilization by Robert Pogue Harrison