Originally published under title: Social change and history.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 305-328) and index.

Cover
Half Title
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Table of Contents
Introduction to the Transaction Edition
Preface
Introduction
1. History and Metaphor
2. The Metaphor of Growth
Part I. Civilization as Growth in Time: The Biography of a Metaphor
One The Greeks
1. Being as Becoming
2. Cycles of Genesis and Decay
3. Progress and Degeneration (1)
Two The Christians
1. The Augustinian Metaphor
2. The Repudiation of Cycles
3. Historical Necessity
4. The Two Cities: Conflict and Resolution
5. Progress and Degeneration (2)
Three The Moderns
1. The Metaphor as Progress
2. The Expansion of Metaphor
3. Progress and Degeneration (3)
Part II. The Theory of Social Development
Four The Theory of Natural History
1. Nature versus Convention
2. Natural versus Conventional History
Five The Theory of Social Evolution
1. Sources and Contexts
2. The Elements of Social Evolution
Six The Comparative Method
1. Ethnocentric Foundations
2. Historical Roots
3. The Three Series
Part III. Persistence and Change
Seven The Persistence of Metaphor
1. Cycle, Epic, and Progress
2. Neo-Evolutionism
Eight Reflections on a Metaphor
1. The Uses of Metaphor
2. The Abuses of Metaphor
3. The Irrelevance of Metaphor
Notes and References
Index

The primary purpose of Metaphor and History is to explain the sources and contexts of the Western idea of social development. Nisbet explores the concept of social change across the whole range of Western culture, from ancient Greece to the present day. He does not see the idea of social development as a nineteenth-century phenomenon or a by-product of the idea of biological evolution.