68 SOCIAL SCIENTIST thoughts and with independent entities, developing independently and subject to their own laws.8 Thus, ideology develops not only on the basis of a geneial historical law according to which social being gives rise to and determines social consciousness, but also on the basis of a specific law by virtue of its inner logic.9 Each new ideological system, being in content a reflection of society's economic relations, in its form is a continuation of the preceding development of thought and dependent on the accumulated share of knowledge, ideas and concepts. Social ideas and theories do not arise from scratch in every new epoch. They develop on the basis of the ideological material of the preceding epochs, under the impact of the preceding stages of ideological development, and are directly related to them. Thus there is an uninterrupted line of ideological development in all the spheres of social consciousness—in philosophy, art, morals, science etc.10 This position is affirmed by Engels who has observed that the ideologue who deals with history "possesses in every sphere of science material which has formed itself independently out of the thought of the previous generations and has gone through its own independent process of development in the brains of these successive generations.'511 The successive development of ideology is not isolated from economic development of society and in the final count is based on it. But the history of ideological development and the periods of its rise and decline do not fully coincide with those of economic development Ideological continuity is also linked with the class character of society. Various social classes draw diverse ideological material from the thought of previous generations.12 The relative independence of ideology also finds expression in tlie fact that social ideas and theories can outpace economic development of society. Social consciousness, however, has a tendency to lag behind social being. The survivals of the past persist with special tenacity in the sphere of social psychology, where customs and traditions, deep-rooted opinions, sentiments and conceptions play a big role. They possess a tremendous force of inertia.13 As Marx has put it: The tradition of all the dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living.14 The lag of social consciousness behind social being is not confined to the sphere of social psychology alone. It is also inherent in ideology, particularly in the ideas and theories of the outgoing social classes. The main forms of social consciousness—political ideology, morality, religion, art, philosophy—arose in the process of historical development on the basis of definite social requirements. Each form of