PUBLICATIONS OF THE 
 AMERICAN ACADEMY OF POLITICAL AND SOCIAL SCIENCE. 
 
 The Outlines of Sociology. 
 
 LUDWIG GUMPLOWICZ, 
 
 Professor in the University of Graz, Austria-Hungary. 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 FREDERICK W. MOORE, 
 
 Assistant Professor of History and Political Economy in Vanderbilt University, 
 Nashville, Tenn. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA : 
 
 AMERICAN ACADEMY OF POLITICAL AND SOCIAL SCIENCE, 
 1899.
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1899, 
 
 BY THE 
 
 AMERICAN ACADEMY OF POUTICAI, AND SOCIAL SCIENCE.
 
 Annex 
 
 V\fA 
 51 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION 5 
 
 THE HISTORY OF SOCIOLOGY. 
 
 (Comte, Quetelet, Herbert Spencer, Systhne de la Nature, 
 Schaefler, Lilienfeld, DeRoberty, Bastian, Lippert, Mohl, 
 Stein, Gneist, Carey, Post, Rocholl, Historians of civil- 
 ization.) 7 
 
 PART II. 
 FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTIONS. 
 
 The Three Classes of Phenomena 66 
 
 Universal Laws 74 
 
 Concept, Function, Scope and Importance of Sociology . 82 
 
 The Substratum of Social Laws 92 
 
 Concept and Essence of Social Law ... 101 
 
 PART III. 
 
 SOCIAL ELEMENTS AND THEIR COMBINATION. 
 
 The Primitive Horde no 
 
 The State 116 
 
 The State as Industrial Organization 123 
 
 Development of Rank and Political Organization .... 127 
 
 The Two-fold Origin of Classes 134 
 
 Society 136 
 
 Societies 138 
 
 The Group-making Factors 141 
 
 The Social Circles in the Social Struggle 143 
 
 The Field of Combat 145 
 
 The Moral Character of the Struggle 146 
 
 The Struggle for Emancipation 148 
 
 The Growth of States 150 
 
 State and Folk 153 
 
 (3)
 
 4 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE PSYCHO-SOCIAL PHENOMENA AND THE INDIVIDUAL. 
 
 Individualism and Collectivism 155 
 
 The Individual and the Social Group 156 
 
 Influence of Economic Status on the Individual 163 
 
 Morals 168 
 
 Morals and Truth Perception 170 
 
 Rights 177 
 
 Rights and the State 179 
 
 Rights and Morals 182 
 
 Individual Efforts and Social Necessities 190 
 
 PART V. 
 THE HISTORY OF MANKIND AS LIFE OF THE SPECIES. 
 
 Sociology and the Philosophy of History < . 199 
 
 Conformity to I/aw in Development . 199 
 
 The Evolution of Mankind 203 
 
 The Cycle of Development 205 
 
 Progress and Innovation 207 
 
 Justice in History 211 
 
 SUPPLEMENTS. 
 
 Gustave Le Bon . , 214 
 
 Might and Right 219
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY.* 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Gumplowicz's "Outlines of Sociology " is distinguished 
 from all earlier sociological works by the character of the 
 sociological unit upon which it is based, which is the group. 
 The author limits himself to the study of the behavior of 
 social units, and especially to the study of the action of groups 
 on each other and the action of the group on the individual. 
 To compare Gumplowicz's theory with the theory of Gid- 
 dings, and to use a metaphor for brevity, the former begins 
 a whole stage later in the evolution of life; it does not 
 account for but assumes group life. 
 
 Starting with cohesively aggregated life, Gumplowicz 
 makes important use of the principles already accepted con- 
 cerning the influence of environment, and especially of the 
 economic wants and the tendency of desires to grow with 
 the opportunity to satisfy them. To these he adds, as some- 
 thing new, the postulates that the normal relation of unlike 
 groups is conflict and that progress conies through the con- 
 flict of groups. Hence the important sociological phenomena 
 are those relating to the conflict of unlike groups and to 
 their amalgamation and assimilation. 
 
 Sociology is considered the fundamental social science, for 
 it deals with the same subject-matter that all social sciences 
 deal with, and treats of laws and modes of behavior in 
 group life that are common to all the special social sciences 
 alike. If what is general and common to all is set apart as 
 the sphere of a particular science, then what is peculiar to 
 each differentiated class of phenomena may be properly left 
 to a special science working on the principles of the general 
 science as a basis. 
 
 Further, the special social sciences, which have developed 
 in advance of the general science, must submit to a revo- 
 lution in point of view, to a revision of method and a re- 
 statement of accepted laws in harmony with the new ideas 
 
 *[The translator takes pleasure in making public acknowledgement of the im- 
 portant assistance rendered him by his friends Dr. A. R. Hohlfeld, Professor of 
 German in Vanderbilt University, Dr. C. F. Emerick, Instructor in Economics in 
 the same institution, and W. C. Branham, A. M., Co-Principal of Branham and 
 Hughes School, String^ Hill, Tenu. The first named carefully compared the 
 translation with the original and the others assisted in revising the proof.] 
 
 (5)
 
 6 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 in sociology; while for the future, whether new social laws 
 are first detected in general sociology or in one of the special 
 sciences, it must be remembered that the phenomena which 
 the latter study are social also, and that the special laws of 
 their behavior are inherently social and must stand the test 
 of sociological criticism. 
 
 Gumplowicz's sociology is not properly descriptive. 
 Description falls to anthropology, ethnology, politics, his- 
 tory, comparative philology, the comparative study of law, 
 religion, institutions, etc. It is considered the peculiar task 
 of sociology to abstract the laws of the behavior of social 
 phenomena. 
 
 The volitional element plays no part, or a negative one, 
 in Gumplowicz's theory. Man, misled by the idea of human 
 free will and by an anthropomorphic conception of deity, has 
 overestimated his own influence and importance. He is 
 most successful in art and invention, for here he strives to 
 copy nature. In other spheres he is not infrequently found 
 striving to preserve what nature has ordained to decay. But 
 first striving to learn what the laws of nature are, he should 
 next learn to adapt himself to them as best he can and to 
 bear with resignation what cannot be avoided. Nature is 
 unchangeable and so are her laws. The history of mankind 
 is the history of a species as such. The fate which befalls 
 the individual in societ} 7 is not the fate which he merits 
 always, but it is necessarily that which his group makes 
 inevitable. Historic justice is not individual, but social. 
 
 FREDERICK W. MOORE.
 
 ARGUMENT. 
 Part L 
 
 Part I contains a survey of past progress in social science, 
 intended to prepare the reader for the new departure in 
 sociological thought which the author proposes to make. 
 
 He reviews the work of Comte, Spencer, Bastian, I/ippert 
 and others, and the relations of economics, politics, the com- 
 parative study of law, the philosophy of history and the 
 history of civilization to the science of society. 
 
 Incidentally four important propositions are laid down: 
 
 First. Social phenomena are subject to the general law 
 of causation as much as other classes of phenomena which 
 have been successfully treated by the scientific method. 
 This has been asserted or tacitly assumed by all the earlier 
 writers; it is axiomatic. 
 
 Second. Human acts, whether individual or social, are 
 the product of natural forces and they excite reflection. 
 The function of the mind or soul is secondary in point of 
 time. In this the author differs from some of his predecessors. 
 
 Third. Differing radically from other writers, the author 
 denies that society is simply an organism analogous to but 
 as high above man as man is above other organisms in 
 nature. In his conception, society, the social group, the 
 sociological unit, is an organism or organization entirely, 
 (totogenere) , different from any other. Considered as a whole 
 it is unlike any of its parts. Its nature cannot be inferred 
 from their nature, but more probably the nature of the indi- 
 vidual will be influenced by it. His system begins with 
 social elements (swarms, hordes, groups, etc.) , and logically 
 proceeds to the consideration of man, their product both in 
 mind and body; the social process and its products; and 
 finally the ethico-social products of the action of society 
 upon the individual. 
 
 Fourth. The author holds and defends the position that 
 every political organization, and hence every developing 
 civilization, begins at the moment when one group perma- 
 nently subjects another. Subjection of some to others is the 
 source of political organization and political organization is 
 the condition essential to social growth. This proposition 
 and the preceding constitute the corner stone of the author's 
 theory. 
 
 (7)
 
 8 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 Part II. 
 
 Part II is introductory. Beginning with the classification 
 of phenomena and defending the unity of science, the author 
 proceeds to a presentation of the concepts especially con- 
 nected with sociology. 
 
 SECTION i . The author takes up the triple classification 
 of phenomena into physical, mental and social, and justifies 
 it and the corresponding subdivision of the sciences by 
 demonstrating that there are social phenomena subject to 
 laws of a special character. 
 
 SEC. 2. But if science is unitary and the universe of phe- 
 nomena monistic, there must be some laws at once specific 
 enough to be valuable and general enough to apply to all 
 three classes of phenomena alike. 
 
 He enumerates the laws of causality, of development, of 
 regularity of development, of periodicity, of complexity, of 
 the reciprocal action of unlike forces, of adaptation, of 
 the essential likeness and identity of forces and events, 
 and of parallelism, showing that each clearly applies to 
 social phenomena, the only disputable point. 
 
 SEC. 3. Within each class the behavior of the phenomena 
 is capable of reduction to a number of laws which are more 
 specific, which apply to that one sphere (or even to a part 
 of it alone) and are more fully characteristic. It is the 
 function of sociology to find the laws of social phenomena. 
 
 Social phenomena are defined as those arising out of the 
 relations of social groups to each other. Psycho-social are 
 those again which result from the influence of the group 
 upon the individual. 
 
 [*Psycho-social phenomena and psycho-social laws are thus 
 quite distinct from social phenomena and social laws, using 
 the word social in the narrower, more specific sense which 
 the author gives to it here and occasionally elsewhere. But 
 he uses the word in a more general sense also, including 
 social in this narrower sense and psycho-social as correlative 
 subdivisions of it. 
 
 [There would seem to be need also for a third subdivision 
 including phenomena growing out of the relation of the 
 group to its physical environment. Critics who will recog- 
 nize the importance of the group as the social unit and the 
 weighty significance of the antagonism existing between 
 
 *[The brackets, wherever found, indicate that the included matter has been 
 added by the translator.]
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 9 
 
 groups will, nevertheless, show that such factors as food 
 supply affect the size and coherency of groups and the num- 
 ber in a given territory. In some places he seems inci- 
 dentally to allow for them. But his definition by unmis- 
 takable implication excludes them. Had he broadened his 
 conception of sociology so as to include this class of phe- 
 nomena, his dispute with Lippert would have fallen to 
 nothing and his later reference to the origin of groups by 
 differentiation would have been much more natural and 
 easy.] 
 
 Phenomena that have been treated by one or another of 
 the sciences currently called social are nevertheless properly 
 subject to reinvestigation by sociology, for they have been 
 treated from the individualistic standpoint, which is false. 
 To review them from the new social standpoint and to ascer- 
 tain the social laws of their behavior will be of great impor- 
 tance. It will be found that they all take their rise in a 
 common ground, which is the peculiar sphere of sociology. 
 
 SEC. 4. As there must be unlike forces wherever reciprocal 
 action is expected, the author assumes that there must 
 have been a countless number of unlike original primitive 
 groups. This Irypothesis is then supported by arguments 
 proving the polygenetic theory of man's origin. 
 
 SEC. 5. However, if the polygenetic theory is true, it only 
 proves the existence of primitive groups anthropological!}' 
 homogeneous. But as birth and especially training in a 
 group are the factors which make an individual a member 
 of a social group, these primitive anthropological groups 
 must also have been sociological groups; and though 
 anthropological types have become endlessly mixed, each 
 syngenetic group, because its members have had a common 
 birth and training and have acquired the same language, 
 rights and religion, still continues to be a sociological unit. 
 
 Social laws, he adds, are the laws of the action and 
 development of syngenetic groups. 
 
 [Thus, narrow as he seems to make the conception of 
 syngenetic groups and important as such groups seem to be 
 to his theory, he makes allowance here incidentally and 
 specifically later for the origin of fully accredited social 
 groups by differentiation within a given group. 
 
 [Primitive groups are unlike, heterogen, and so are syn- 
 genetic groups, says our author. Now heterogen and homogen 
 are antithetical and should refer respectively to the mutual
 
 io ANNAIS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 unlikeness or likeness of the parts of a given whole. But 
 this is not strictly the way the author uses them and his 
 meaning would still be ambiguous if it were. There are 
 three sets of relations between unlike groups to be distin- 
 guished: those between the differentiating parts of a whole 
 that was beforetime strictly homogeneous ; those between 
 the parts of a whole which is tending toward homogeneity 
 by assimilation and amalgamation of its parts ; and finally 
 those between independent wholes which exhibit antagonism 
 and conflict whenever their spheres of influence overlap. 
 These independent wholes our author refers to as heterogen, 
 unlike (improperly called heterogeneous). Sometimes, how- 
 ever, the adjective seems to refer to wholes whose parts are 
 in conflict with each other and is properly translated 
 heterogeneous. The translator has used his judgment as to 
 the signification of the word in its context but has carefully 
 inserted the German word in parenthesis wherever it occurred. 
 
 [A study of the relations of the several classes to each 
 other will show a logical sequence from the conflict of inde- 
 pendent wholes through the subjection of one to the other 
 even up to the complete homogeneity of the new whole by 
 assimilation or amalgamation. There is also a logical 
 sequence from the condition of homogeneity to the condition 
 of differentiated parts with their proper relations. Now 
 these two tendencies are so antipodal in direction and 
 character that it is unscientific and ambiguous not to dis- 
 tinguish carefully between them. But the author, as said, 
 uses one and the same word heterogen, heterogeneous, to 
 describe the two conditions indicated in the first and second 
 classes of relations indicated above. He does not distinguish 
 the former and therefore omits from his theory of sociology 
 all consideration of the character and behavior of homogene- 
 ous groups.] 
 
 He shows that the failure of earlier sociologists to obtain 
 social laws was due to their failure to start with the proper 
 sociological unit; and incidentally he proclaims it as a t}^pical 
 social law that it is the tendency of every social community 
 to make as much use as possible of every other social com- 
 munity that comes within its reach.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. n 
 
 Part HI. 
 
 In Part III the author treats of social elements, simple 
 and compound, and the cause and manner of their combina- 
 tion. 
 
 SECTION i. Proceeding to consider the nature of the original 
 syngenetic group he concludes that it must have been a 
 horde of human beings of all ages and both sexes living in 
 sexual promiscuity. Further than this he is unable to carry 
 the analysis; as far as this he feels justified in going, since 
 the hypothesis of such a horde enables him to explain the 
 origin of the mother-family which investigators have all but 
 proven to have been universal. Uterine consanguinity is 
 the first force to introduce order into the chaos of primitive 
 promiscuity. 
 
 But the groups are mutually hostile and in particular in 
 the course of their conflicts females are captured who be- 
 come the property of their captors. [The warriors or the 
 group? Are rights of individual property in movable 
 goods recognized respecting them ?]. Then the men, sup- 
 ported by the favorable conditions growing out of their rela- 
 tion to the captives, are able to resist the rule of the women 
 and to substitute an organization controlled by the males in 
 which the various stages of the father- family are developed 
 down to and including the development of the rights of the 
 children to inherit. 
 
 Highly significant in the author's opinion is the inter- 
 mixture of different ethnical races which occurs here. [But 
 this emphasis seems overstrained. Hither the males as a 
 whole subordinated the females of the group as a whole, 
 still keeping them in the group except as they were dis- 
 posed of to other groups by purchase or capture ; or the 
 original group divided, some under the leadership of the 
 women retaining the organization of the mother- family, the 
 rest led by the possessors of the captive females forming a 
 new whole organized as a father-family. In either case 
 the conflict within the original group between the two 
 classes, males and females, with their peculiar interests, is 
 quite as bitter and relentless as the conflict between differ- 
 ent syngenetic groups ; and it is not so important as the 
 author represents that there should be ethnically different 
 groups to antagonize and exploit each other.] 
 
 Not only are females and personal property captured in 
 the raids of group upon group, but whole groups are con-
 
 12 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 quered, reduced to submission and put to work on the soil 
 they occupied, producing supplies for the conquerors. In 
 the relations thus established we have property in land in 
 distinction from personal property (which is a very different 
 thing and arises much earlier), the organization of sove- 
 reignty by one class over the other, and finally the state. 
 
 SEC. 2. The state consists of two parts, the ruling and 
 the subject classes, of which the former is inferior in num- 
 bers but superior in mental power and military discipline. 
 
 There are two sets of activities in the state. One is in 
 the ruling class directed toward external defence and con- 
 quest, and the other arises from the conflicts of the two 
 classes. [The differentiation of interests within each group 
 severally is not an activity peculiar to the state !] So there 
 are but two points essential to the definition of the state. 
 They are the organization of the sovereignty and of the 
 minority. The purposes commonly attributed to the state, 
 like the promotion of justice, are simply the modes of 
 operation appropriate to its several stages of development. 
 
 An important incident is ethnical heterogeneity. The 
 hostile contact of different social elements of unlike strength 
 is the first condition for the creation of rights. The rela- 
 tions established by force, if continued in peace, become 
 rightful. Thus inequality is stamped on every right. 
 
 SEC. 3. The life of the state is summed up in a common 
 industrial enterprise conducted under compulsion in which 
 the greater burden falls on the subject class while the rulers 
 perform services which are no less essential. [Were the 
 author as fully impregnated with democratic ideals as Am- 
 ericans are his language at this point, though not his idea, 
 would be somewhat different. For in a democratic govern- 
 ment the ruling class is the periodically determined majority, 
 or its representatives.] 
 
 Man's material need is the prime motive of his con- 
 duct. Efforts to satisfy wants promote progress and are 
 perpetual; for new wants are constantly arising and social 
 distinctions continue the antagonism between groups which 
 began with ethnical differences. 
 
 But war, if perpetual, would defeat its own end in the 
 utter exhaustion of both parties. Peace is necessary. One 
 party is victor and tries to establish institutions for main- 
 taining the inequalities, while the other tries to reduce them. 
 So apparent peace is only a latent struggle over the body of 
 reciprocal rights.
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 13 
 
 If the rulers are well off the subject class must rise too in 
 order still to be most serviceable. But social facts especially 
 provoke reflection; and the life of the subject classes is the 
 more fruitful in ideas. Well-being and enlightenment are 
 the leaven of progress. 
 
 SEC. 4. The ranks or classes in the state increase in 
 number, and political organization changes to correspond. 
 The third class in order is that of the foreign merchants, 
 catering to material wants chiefly; the fourth is the priestly 
 class arising by differentiation from the others and satisfying 
 spiritual wants. The development of wants and the forma- 
 tion of classes go hand in hand. Material wants may be 
 classed as primary, and intellectual or moral wants as 
 secondary. 
 
 The power of any class in the state can be expressed in 
 terms of human labor which it either commands directly or 
 can purchase through its possession or control of supplies 
 and means of promoting production. If a class can satisfy 
 a social want it will be indispensable, and through the power 
 it acquires in return will participate in government. 
 
 However, habit, a purely mental factor, is also a source 
 cf power; and order, custom and rights belong to the same 
 category. But without the organization of the state the 
 moral powers would not exist and the material possessions 
 would fall to the physically stronger. 
 
 SEC. 5. Some social groups, like the ruling, subject and 
 merchant classes, are original, primary, ethnical and heredi- 
 tary. Others, like the priestly and professional classes, are 
 secondary and evolutionary and arise by differentiation. 
 Though we no longer see primary groups arising, it has not 
 been proven that no groups ever arose genetically; though 
 we see only the differentiation of secondary groups it cannot 
 be asserted that all groups are of that sort. Nevertheless all 
 social groups of whatever origin are alike active as social 
 elements and those of the secondary sort tend by endogamy 
 and otherwise to strengthen their coherence. 
 
 SEC. 6. The word society should properly be restricted to 
 denote a group centering about one or more common 
 interests. As such it may be large or small; local, national 
 or international. The word folk should be used co- 
 extensively with the state to denote the group held together 
 not only by political organization, but also by common terri- 
 tory, language, etc.
 
 14 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 SEC. 7. Societies are numberless; but social relations and 
 the principles underlying social power conform to natural 
 laws. The primary binding tie is association; all others are 
 evolutionary. All are essentially represented in the primi- 
 tive horde: association, with consanguinity, language and all 
 that they imply, and common needs and common interests in 
 satisfying them; and there are no social contrasts which 
 cannot be referred to dissimilarity in one or more of these 
 respects. So we observe the coherence of the heterogeneous 
 and the differentiation of the homogeneous for cause. But 
 social classes overlap and are curiously involved. 
 
 SEC. 8. The group-making factors are classified according 
 to fundamental principles as material, economic and moral. 
 But further, each varies according to the degree of its 
 permanency. Permanent material, economic and moral 
 interests make a group unitary. 
 
 SEC. 9. The power of the group in the social struggle 
 depends on the number of group-making factors uniting its 
 members. The number of possible binding forces increases 
 with civilization but decreases at any time with the number 
 of individuals in the group. 
 
 In the final analysis the intensity of the union depends 
 upon the personal character of the individuals \i. <?., on 
 their sociability. This is one of the rare instances in which 
 the nature of the individual is taken into account] ; and in 
 times of revolution numerical strength is the test, but such 
 times are abnormal with civilized man. 
 
 Groups struggle for their interests group- wise; the result 
 does not depend upon individuals and success is the standard 
 of conduct. 
 
 The means of utilizing power vary infinitely, but generally 
 take the form of an appropriate institution or exclusive 
 right, as e.g., legislation. However it may be with the 
 individual, society never errs in seizing and applying the 
 right means. [This is a paradox. Conscientious scruples 
 which would constrain the action of individuals are in- 
 effective to guide the action of groups. But societies 
 do err; for they perish as the result of their own mistakes, 
 and in those which succeed there are traces, if we look for 
 them, of choices that retarded progress or threatened extinc- 
 tion and therefore had to be abandoned.] 
 
 SEC. 10. The struggle must always be conducted between 
 assemblages and they must adopt a form of organization
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 15 
 
 suited to the situation. So the struggle in the interest of the 
 great mass of the people is most difficult and the slowest to 
 begin. Historically the means which they generally seek is 
 participation in legislation. 
 
 SEC. 1 1. The conduct of the group is in utter disregard of 
 the individual and his code of morals. His moral sense is 
 therefore often seriously injured. [The difference between 
 the individual and the social code of morals demands 
 explanation. A partial explanation will doubtless be found 
 in the current theories of individualism. But this is insuffi- 
 cient. There would be a remnant which can probably be 
 best explained as due to the experience of individuals in the 
 homogeneous group. This will be in harmony with the 
 author's theory of the influence of the group on the 
 individual; but it will at the same time point out an impor- 
 tant omission in his general sociological theory, viz., the 
 failure to give due consideration to the life of the homo- 
 geneous group.] 
 
 SEC. 12. Bvery right ends in an obligation, the right of 
 those who otherwise have no rights. Though rights are 
 constantly changing the idea of right endures and is a fit 
 weapon for the social struggle. But it is applied indirectly. 
 The bourgeoisie appeal to it to enlist the lower classes with 
 them against the upper. With success the lower classes 
 gain some amelioration and experience. This is aptly called 
 the struggle for emancipation. It may lead to revolution or 
 anarchy; but a reaction and a new period of evolutionary 
 rights will follow. 
 
 SEC. 13. The natural tendency of the state is to increase 
 in territory and power. But relative stability within and 
 assimilation of former conquests are essential conditions to 
 continued growth the absence of which will induce a catas- 
 trophe. 
 
 If extreme violence is necessary to subjugation and if 
 assimilation is difficult, morals and the sense of humanity 
 will suffer harm. 
 
 The principle applies as well to other social domains as to 
 the political, e. g., it explains the periodical crises of 
 economic production. 
 
 SEC. 14. Folk-states will arise. But if, falling into opposi- 
 tion, the weaker are subjected by the stronger the struggle 
 for authority in the new composite state will take on added 
 severity. Historically it is apt to centre about the rivalry 
 of different languages for official recognition.
 
 1 6 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 Part IV. 
 
 Part IV treats of the influence of the group on the indi- 
 vidual. The processes involved and the laws are those 
 specifically called psycho-social. 
 
 SECTION i. The historical antithesis between individualism 
 and collectivism disappears upon substituting social or socie- 
 tary egoism and sympathy instead of the alleged individual 
 egoism and sympathy of current philosophy. 
 
 SEC. 2. To establish the claims of a socialistic philosophy 
 over the individualistic the author notes, first, that the 
 source of thought is in the group and not in the individual. 
 The influence of environment on the individual is of funda- 
 mental and not simply of secondary importance; but the 
 individual's environment is almost exclusively his group, 
 and the power that is admittedly strong enough to change 
 his physiognomy is a fortiori strong enough to change his 
 mind. The type produced is not anthropological but social; 
 and the factor producing it is social also. Social thoughts 
 and efforts produce the type; but it is the social life, varying 
 with the habitat, that produces these. Hence also the 
 variety of social types. 
 
 SEC. 3. Pre-eminently it is the economic status which 
 gives character to the social type, making the nobility and 
 peasantry conservative and the merchant class progressive 
 and giving to each of the differentiated classes also a type 
 appropriate to its peculiar interests. But the individual 
 is affected through his moral nature; the transforming force 
 is moral. 
 
 The tenacity and permanence of the type is directly 
 related to the solidarity of the group which is a function of 
 the group-making factors. 
 
 SEC. 4. The first factor in morals is habit and acquired 
 manner of life; the second is the conviction implanted by the 
 group in the individual that the manner of life which it 
 imposes upon him is proper. Thus morals grow out of the 
 relations of the group to its members. But when different 
 groups are united different moral codes contend; all are 
 useless because no one is acknowledged by every individual 
 and a new code has to be formed and enforced by the state, 
 called a code of rights. Thus rights grow out of the union 
 of different social elements. 
 
 There will be important conflicts between the code of 
 rights enforced by the state and the moral code growing up
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 17 
 
 in the complex community on the one hand and the moral 
 codes of the more compact circles comprised within it on the 
 other. The supreme purpose of the state must be to build 
 up a moral code for the state as a whole; indeed the ideal 
 code is international. 
 
 SEC. 5. There are two elements in morals, the natural 
 and the human, the former changeless, the latter changing. 
 Though man acts as natural forces compel him to, it is his 
 nature to reflect on his acts and to believe that he acts freely. 
 When his behavior finally becomes such as the long experi- 
 ence of his social group proves to be best he calls it moral, 
 but seeks a higher sanction for his moral ideas by ascribing 
 events to mythical and generally to anthropomorphic ori- 
 gins. Truth and fiction thus grow up together until it 
 seems impossible to sustain morals without maintaining the 
 truth of what is really supposititious. Thus the conflict of 
 ignorance fighting in the name of morality begins. 
 
 But morals is the ripened fruit of the actual development 
 of civilization; natural science is the basis of morals, and 
 whatever promotes scientific knowledge promotes moral 
 science also. Man's only standard is the visible tendency, 
 the assumed will of nature. 
 
 SEC. 6. Rights are social creations, formed by the conflict 
 of unlike social groups of unequal power. But correspond- 
 ing to each right is a duty or obligation. 
 
 SEC. 7. The theory of ' ' natural rights ' ' is untenable. 
 Rights arise in the state only; and though there is much 
 unavoidable evil in the state, the alternative, anarchy, is 
 worse. 
 
 Neither is justice the source of rights. On the contrary, 
 it is simply an abstraction from political rights and increases 
 in perfection with time. But because rights are relatively 
 fixed in the form of written law and deep seated usage, 
 while political relations and the corresponding sense of jus- 
 tice suffer continuous change, rights fall into formal antithe- 
 sis to justice at times. 
 
 SEC. 8. Considering the nature and form of morals and 
 rights it is not difficult to explain the cases where morals 
 have conformed to rights, and where rights, becoming formal 
 merely, have yielded to well-grounded morals and new 
 rights. 
 
 Though morals are thus changeable the individual treats 
 them as unchanging; for his starting point in morals, though 
 socially caused, is subjective and relatively fixed.
 
 1 8 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 NOTE TO 6, 7 AND 8. Private rights depend on the truth 
 and merits of the claims of the contending parties; public 
 rights on their relative power, on their might. The one 
 relates to individuals, the other to the state. Much confusion 
 has arisen from trying to apply the principles of private 
 rights to political affairs. [After the author's presentation 
 of the omnipotence and omnipresence of social influences, 
 what sphere is left for private rights as distinct from political 
 (social) rights? In the relations, it must be replied, regu- 
 lating the conduct of individuals within a homogeneous class 
 or group. As the tendency of the state is to unity and 
 solidarity in some respects at least, the sphere of private 
 rights is doubtless not small. So a part of the conflict 
 between individual and social codes is due, not so much to 
 the false ideas of free will as to the tendency to apply by 
 analogy the rules suited to one set of relations to another 
 and different set. The author has not made as much of the 
 rules of behavior governing the relations of individuals in 
 the unitary horde as they deserve.] 
 
 SEC. 9. Man's impotency in the contest with social neces- 
 sities is illustrated by the antithesis between his desire to 
 preserve and nature's tendency toward change and decay. 
 Though men admire the ascetic who defies nature and 
 despise those who follow natural necessity, human freedom 
 in science and philosophy, in legislation, statecraft and 
 diplomacy is shown to be merely the necessary oscillation of 
 human choices back and forth across the line of necessity. 
 Only those which coincide with necessity are fortunate; but 
 as oscillation is a necessity, not all can coincide, resignation 
 to necessity is impossible and happiness is always less than 
 the maximum. 
 
 Some amelioration is possible, especially by learning not 
 to overrate the value of human life. But the greatest suc- 
 cess is in technology, science and art, in which the object is 
 to learn what is natural and to copy it or adapt one's self 
 to it. 
 
 Part V. 
 
 Part V treats briefly of the history of mankind as the life 
 of a species sociologically organized. 
 
 SECTION i. The task of sociology is to investigate human 
 group-making; not to give the history of every group, which 
 would be impossible, but to show conformity to law in the
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 19 
 
 process and to study and describe the manner of social 
 evolution . 
 
 SEC. 2. Conformity to law is admitted almost without con- 
 tradiction in the development of art and science ; but, if it 
 is true in these domains, it must be admitted even by those 
 who have hitherto denied it to be equally true of political 
 history in general; and if true of the great general results 
 it must be true of the individuals and of the social structures, 
 for there is a close causal connection between mental de- 
 velopment and social, political and economic conditions. 
 
 SEC. 3. The evolution of mankind must be conceived of 
 not as unitary and not as polygenetic, not as genealogical 
 nor even as having a beginning. But the same things take 
 place according to the same laws whenever the same con- 
 ditions arise. We must conceive of evolution as running its 
 course and stopping when energy is no longer generated. 
 This suggests cyclical development. 
 
 SEC. 4. Cyclical development follows from man's unfree- 
 dom and dependence on physical wants. According to the 
 Malthusian law, in some groups population increases under 
 favorable conditions wihtout the group making progress in 
 any other particular or gaining any strength. Such groups 
 easily fall prey to more developed communities. The states 
 thus formed by conquest will enjoy general progress, in the 
 lower as well as in the higher classes. Then population 
 may stagnate or even decline. Being numerically weak, 
 the states will fall prey to some barbarian, whether external 
 horde or internal proletariat. 
 
 SEC. 5. There is of course progress in particular countries 
 and in particular periods of the cyclical process, but there is 
 no progress in the course of history taken as a whole. 
 History simply repeats itself. There is of course progress 
 in invention and discovery; but it is not to be explained as 
 the result of a perfected human intellect. Intellects of the 
 same general range of power have replaced with interest the 
 accumulations of earlier generations. But even these accu- 
 mulations are reduced by recurrent catastrophes of wide 
 reach. The same is true of morals and philosophy. 
 
 SEC. 6. The current conceptions of justice consider man 
 as its object, and, owing to the belief in human free will 
 and to the anthropomorphic conception of deity, men try to 
 judge historical and natural events by the standards of 
 human justice. This is as wrong as it is harmful, for the
 
 2O ANNAivS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 individual is never considered in these phenomena, only the 
 mass, and there is no criterion of his worth. Fate strikes 
 individuals in proportion not to their own merits, but to the 
 merits of the group. This is historic justice; and the crown 
 of sociology is to recognize in human history a natural 
 process.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Two years ago I published some of my "sociological 
 investigations," under the title of "Der Rassenkampf," 
 diffidently offering them as the ' ' first lispings of a great 
 science of the future, sociology." The favorable reception 
 accorded them by competent authorities at home and abroad 
 has encouraged me to present the following ' ' Outlines of 
 Sociology." From the attention universally accorded to 
 sociological problems it is evident that sociology is not an 
 ephemeral idea, but is actually coming to be a science. I 
 succeeded, as I believe, in laying down a few of its principles 
 in li Der Rassenkampf." In the present " Outlines," I 
 have earnestly striven to project a complete and unitary 
 plan of the science; to show the distinction between it and 
 other sciences, and to call attention to the most impor- 
 tant questions which must hereafter be subjected to socio- 
 logical investigation. May this book meet with the same 
 tolerant criticism as its predecessor. 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
 GRATZ, April, 1885.
 
 I. SKETCH OF SOCIOLOGICAL LITERATURE. 
 
 It is usual before proceeding to the systematic presenta- 
 tion of a science to give a sketch of its literature. A biblio- 
 graphical introduction informs the reader how much effort 
 has been expended on the science, how it has progressed, 
 and what stage of development it has reached. If the 
 sketch is also critical, and it can hardly fail to be so, 
 the reader is also informed of the new writer's attitude 
 toward the work of his predecessors. Such an intro- 
 duction gives a comprehensive view. But it involves dis- 
 advantages of a technical nature. If every system should 
 be described in detail, the introductory sketch would become 
 a history of the science. The reader would have to wander 
 through system after system, each one represented to be 
 more or lessf alse, before learning how the writer would cor- 
 rect them; which is not practicable. Or should the writer 
 make and substantiate his criticisms in the introduction 
 itself, he would anticipate his own system; whatever fol- 
 lowed woula be merely tiresome repetition. This too would 
 be impracticable; especially since the refuting arguments can 
 be used much more effectively as the author proceeds to 
 unfold his own views. Then he is not bound by historical 
 sequence nor need he present the older systems entire. 
 
 Accordingly we shall mention only the most important 
 pioneers in the domain of sociology noting, with all possible 
 brevity, the most prominent and most general points of view 
 in their systems and deferring criticism and refutation niitil 
 we present our own system. 
 
 Young and imperfect as the science of sociology still is, a 
 history of its literature has already been written.* But its 
 author makes the " socialistic " doctrines his starting point, 
 and his failure to distinguish clearly between socialism and 
 sociology greatly diminishes the value of the work. Further 
 bibliographical material may be found in the literature upon 
 the development of constitutional law, politics, political 
 economy, and the philosophy of history. f 
 
 *" Die Spcialurissenschaften." A guide to the modern schools of social sci- 
 ence, by Friedrich v. Baerenbach, Leipzig, 1882. 
 
 t Beside the well-known works of Raumer and Bluntschli, Rocholl's "Philosophy 
 of History," (Philosophic der Geschichte), may be mentioned. 
 
 (22)
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 23 
 
 Probably the first author to cherish presentiments of a 
 " science of the common nature of nations"* was Giam- 
 battista Vico. But he adhered to Biblical tradition and did 
 not emancipate himself from the contemporary theories of 
 natural rights. Neither should we expect to find in St. 
 Simon, the world reformer, an objective science of society. 
 Full justice has been done him when it is recognized that it 
 was from him that Comte received his inspiration. 
 
 To Auguste Comte unquestionably belongs the honor of 
 having been the first to recognize the real character of soci- 
 ology. In his " Positive Philosophy" he declared repeat- 
 edly, plainly and correctly what this science should be. 
 " All that can be rationally proposed in our day," he says 
 in one place, " is to recognize the character of positivity in 
 social as in all other science, and to ascertain the chief bases 
 on which it is founded." f The scientific character of the 
 future sociology is thus indicated. Further, ' ' it is the exclu- 
 sive property of the positive principle to recognize the fund- 
 amental law of continuous human development, represent- 
 ing the existing evolution as the necessary result of the 
 gradual series of former transformations. ' ' J Thus Comte con- 
 ceived mankind to be subject to the law of evolution and the 
 present to be the necessary consequence of the past. 
 Though his conception of mankind was erroneous, as will 
 be shown later, still both ideas are true and important; and 
 the general principle has been maintained firmly in sociology 
 ever since. Moreover, an admonition of broad scientific 
 application was added: " True resignation, that is, a perma- 
 nent disposition to endure steadily and without hope of 
 compensation all inevitable evils, can proceed only from a 
 deep sense of the connection of all kinds of natural phe- 
 nomena with invariable laws. " 1 1 Without such resignation, 
 there can be no sociology. 
 
 * " Principii di una Scienza nuova d'intorno alia commune Natura delle Nazioni," 
 by Giambattista Vico. Secundo Edizione del 1725 pubblicati con Note da Giuseppe 
 Ferrari e la Vita dell" Autore. Milan, 1836. 
 
 t"The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte," freely translated by Harriet 
 Martineau. Ix>ndon, 1875. Two volumes. Vol. ii, bk. vi, cap. i. 
 
 " Cpurs de Philosophic positive" by Auguste Comte. Paris, 1839. Four volumes. 
 Vol. iv, lee. 46. 
 
 "La Philosophie positive" by Auguste Comte, Resume by Jules Rig. Paris, 1881. 
 Two volumes Vol. ii, lee. 46. 
 
 [Generally the quotations are cited in the words of Miss Martineau. But this has 
 not always been possible, as the author's quotations are from the r6sum of Jules 
 Rig. (J. K Rtgolage).] 
 
 \ Martineau, op. tit., Vol. ii, bk. vi, cap. i; Comte, op. tit., Vol. iv, lee. 46; Rig. op. 
 tit.. Vol. ii, lee, 46. 
 
 || Ibid.
 
 24 ANNAI OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 "If there are (as I doubt not there are) political evils which, like 
 some personal sufferings, cannot be remedied by science," he went on, 
 "science at least proves to us that they are incurable, so as to calm 
 our restlessness under pain by the conviction that it is by natural 
 causes that they are rendered insurmountable."* 
 
 Would that he had acted upon this wise principle himself. 
 But he violated it by suggesting plans for the ' ' practical 
 amelioration" of "the condition of the lower classes." f 
 The error is one for which his master, St. Simon, is to 
 blame. It finally forced him out of the path of objective 
 science and into the false ways of subjective politics. 
 
 How clear and precise his statement of the task of so- 
 ciology in contrast with the older doctrines of the philosophy 
 of history! 
 
 ' ' Social science could not exist, ' ' he says, ' ' so long as men were 
 ignorant concerning what constitutes development; for this science 
 studies the laws of development. "J 
 
 Yet he himself failed to apprehend its true nature, 
 for he accepted Pascal's "admirable aphorism " that " the 
 entire succession of men, through the whole course of ages, 
 must be regarded as one man always living,' ' 1 1 and he miscon- 
 ceived the result of sociology most egregiously, saying ' ' that 
 this science fulfills the famous suggestion of Pascal by repre- 
 senting the whole human race past, present and future, as 
 constituting a vast and eternal social unit whose different 
 organs concur in their various modes and degrees in the 
 evolution of humanity." But it is false to conceive man- 
 kind to be a unit as we shall show hereafter. It led Comte 
 into a thousand and one errors. 
 
 In his time, it is true, historical and ethnographical ma- 
 terial was very meagre. His personal knowledge of man- 
 kind was limited; and his investigations into the laws of 
 human development were restricted to the Teutonic and the 
 Latin races of Europe. Indeed, France was often his sole 
 example; the " great revolution " was to his mind the over- 
 turning of all humanity, whereas far the greater part of 
 
 * Ibid. 
 t Ibid. 
 
 \ Rig. op. eft., Vol. ii, lee. 47 ; Comte, op. cit., Vol. iv, lee. 47 ; Martineau, op. eft., 
 Vol. ii, bfc. vi, cap. ii. 
 
 li Ibid. Cf. Pascal's "Penstes," Part i, art i. 
 
 ^ Martineau, op. cit., Vol. ii, bk. vi, cap. iii ; Comte, op. cit., Vol. iv, lee. 48 ; Rig. 
 op. cit., Vol. ii, lee. 48.
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 25 
 
 mankind was not influenced at all by this local European 
 event. 
 
 Not only were his ' ' laws of human development ' ' based 
 on this narrow experience; they were also so distorted by 
 personal predilections that they possess little value. The 
 historical and ethnographical horizon of his time was far too 
 narrow. His sociology was a failure from utter lack of 
 material. The epoch- making character of his work is solely 
 due to the brilliant generalizations {geniale Principieri) upon 
 which he founded it. They are the basis, as we shall see, 
 of all the sociological efforts from his day to ours. 
 
 The prospect of verifying his laws of human development 
 by means of numerical calculations must have been all the 
 more enticing, to a mathematician like Quetelet, from the 
 fact that Comte himself seemed directly to suggest it.* 
 Quetelet' s interest centred in the "Natural History of 
 Society," i. <?., in sociology. Even his earlier work on 
 " Man " has the sub-title " Social Physics," and he states 
 that " it is the body social that we propose to study, "f 
 
 His task is obviousl}" allied to that of Comte's sociology. 
 But the ' ' law of the great number ' ' \ which he relied on to 
 discover the laws of social development was ineffectual. His 
 statistical works afford m aterial for the theory of ' ' man ' ' 
 and the thralldom of human will only. For sociology they 
 could do nothing. He made no distinction between ' ' man- 
 kind " and the unclear concept "society;" and many of 
 his investigations begin with errors current in the social 
 science of his day. He assumes, for instance, that ' ' the 
 simplest and most natural social union among men is the 
 family, which is found in all ages and among all peoples. "|| 
 He did not know that the family, in the modern signification 
 
 * "It is clear that this education [the preliminary sociological training] must rest 
 on a basis of mathematical philosophy even apart from the necessity of mathe- 
 matics to the study of inorganic philosophy. It is only in the region of mathema- 
 tics that sociologists, or anybody else, can obtain a true sense of scientific evidence 
 and form the habit of rapid ana decisive argumentation; can in short learn to ful- 
 fill the logical conditions of all positive speculation by studying universal positiv- 
 ism at its source;" Martineau, op. cit., Vol. ii, bk. vi, cap. iv ; Comte op. ctt., Vol. 
 iv, lee. 49 ; Rig. op. ctt., Vol. ii, lee. 49. However, Comte warns against applying 
 mathematical laws to the " complicated speculations of sociology." 
 
 1["Surr Homnte et le D&veloppement de ses Facultts, ou Essaz de Physique sociale," 
 by A. Quetelet, Paris, 1835. Introduction sec. 3. 
 
 t Quetelet, op. cit., Introduction sees. 2 and 3. 
 
 | " Natural History of Society." Comte makes the same statement: " The family 
 presents the true germ of the various characteristics of the social organism. Such 
 a conception is intermediate between the idea of the individual and that of the 
 species or society." Martineau, op. cit., Vol. ii, bk. vi, cap. v; Comte, op. cit., Vol. 
 iv. lee. 50; Rig., op. cit.. Vol. ii, lee. 50.
 
 26 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 of the word and the sense in which he uses it, is a very late 
 social institution and an adaptation to political ends. Equally 
 ingenuous is his idea that a ' ' nation " " is a body composed 
 of homogeneous elements performing their functions in uni- 
 son and inspired with the same life principle;"* whereas, in 
 truth, every- nation consists of unlike elements performing 
 complementary functions under compulsion. His theory 
 was that social unions originate in the ' ' preponderance of 
 the force of attraction impelling individuals to associate." 
 He frankly conceded, however, that ' ' a nation is not always 
 composed of elements of one sort. Indeed it is quite often 
 the result of invasion and the fusion of conqueror and con- 
 quered."! But this is the "exception;" his theory is not 
 based upon it. No wonder that he failed to get a clear 
 conception of the laws of social development. Phenomena 
 as common as the struggles of nation with nation seem to 
 him against nature; and he concludes his " History of Man- 
 kind " with the enthusiasm of an Elihu Burritt, saying: 
 
 " To the credit of mankind be it told, the nineteenth century is on 
 the point of striking into a new path. It is recognized that there must 
 be laws and tribunals for nations also; and that crimes practiced on a 
 large scale by one people against another are just as much to be hated 
 as crimes of man against man." J 
 
 These are beautiful effusions; but they attest the scantiness 
 of Quetelet's sociological information. Since he wrote them 
 the nineteenth century has witnessed, even in Europe alone, 
 a half dozen wars: the Crimean and the Austro-Italian; the 
 war of Prussia and Austria against Denmark; the Austro- 
 Prussian, the Franco-Prussian and the Russo-Turkish. Ac- 
 cording to him the}'- were all downright " crimes." Yet the 
 victorious nations inscribed them in their annals in letters 
 of gold, and succeeding generations exult at the thought of 
 them. His " new path " is still a good way off. Is it not 
 sociology that should take a new course? 
 
 Herbert Spencer's words on this point are of inestimable 
 importance: 
 
 "Thought and feeling cannot be completely dissociated. Each 
 emotion has a more or less distinct framework of ideas; and each 
 group of ideas is more or less suffused with emotion. There are, how- 
 ever, great differences between their degrees of combination under 
 both of these aspects. We have some feelings which are vague from 
 
 * " Natural History of Society." 
 
 Mbid. 
 
 I Ibid.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 27 
 
 lack of intellectual definition; and others to which clear shapes are 
 given by the associated conceptions. At one time our thoughts are 
 distorted by the passion running through them; and at another time 
 it is difficult to detect in them a trace of liking or disliking. Mani- 
 festly, too, in each particular case these components of the mental 
 state may be varied in their proportions. The ideas being the same, 
 the emotion joined with them may be greater or less; and it is a 
 familiar truth that the correctness of the judgment formed, depends, 
 if not on the absence of emotion, still, on that balance of emotions 
 which negatives excess of any one. 
 
 " Especially is this so in matters concerning human life. There are 
 two ways in which men's actions, individual or social, may be 
 regarded. We may consider them as groups of phenomena to be 
 analyzed, and the laws of their dependence ascertained; or, consider- 
 ing them as causing pleasures or pains, we may associate with them 
 approbation or reprobation. Dealing with its problems intellectu- 
 ally, we may regard conduct as always the result of certain forces; or, 
 dealing with its problems morally, and recognizing its outcome as in 
 this case good and in that case bad, we may allow now admiration 
 and now indignation to fill our consciousness. Obviously, it must 
 make a great difference in our conclusions whether, as in the one 
 case, we study men's doings as those of alien creatures, which it 
 merely concerns us to understand; or whether, as in the other case, we 
 contemplate them as the doings of creatures like ourselves, with 
 whose lives our own lives are bound up, and whose behavior arouses 
 in us, directly and sympathetically, feelings of love or hate." 
 
 " Here let me emphasize the conclusion that in pursuing our socio- 
 logical inquiries, and especially those on which we are now entering 
 [political institutions], we must, as much as possible, exclude what- 
 ever emotions the facts are calculated to excite, and attend solely to 
 the interpretation of the facts. There are several groups of phenomena 
 in contemplating which either contempt, or disgust, or indignation, 
 tnds to arise but must be restrained. "* 
 
 As the English statesman cries ' ' hands off " to the 
 onlookers in political quarrels, so Spencer cries " away with 
 sentiment," whenever a sociological investigation is under- 
 taken. On the portal of this science he writes: " All senti- 
 ment, abandon ye who enter here." This is not merely a 
 practical admonition, it is a conditio sine qua non y a stipula- 
 tion indispensable in sociology, and which moreover forestalls 
 objections raised on moral grounds. 
 
 Fortunately Spencer is in full agreement with Comte in 
 recognizing ' ' the character of positivity in social as in all 
 other science. " It is to him the first principle of method- 
 ology, or rather it precedes methodology. But in accepting 
 the fundamental similarity of sociology and biology he made 
 a well-nigh fatal blunder. 
 
 * Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," Vol. ii, sec. 434.
 
 28 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 Comte affirmed emphatically that this similarity was an 
 essential sociological principle. 
 
 " The necessity, " he says, " of founding sociology upon the whole 
 of biology is obvious." "The subordination of social science to 
 biology is so evident," he continues, " that nobody denies it in state- 
 ment however it may be neglected in fact." "Biology will be seen 
 to afford the starting point of all social speculation, in accordance 
 with the analysis of the social faculties of man, and of the organic 
 conditions which determine its character. But, moreover, as we can 
 scarcely at all investigate the most elementary terms of the social 
 series, we must construct them by applying the positive theory of 
 human nature to the aggregate of corresponding circumstances. 
 .... When the social condition has advanced so far as to exclude 
 this kind of deduction, the second aspect presents itself; and the 
 biological theory of man is implicated with the sociological in a less 
 direct and special manner. The whole social evolution of the race 
 must proceed in entire accordance with biological laws."* 
 
 The whole ' ' theory of the organic state ' ' which flourished 
 so luxuriantly in Germany from Rohmer and Bluntschli to 
 Schaeffle and his " Structure and Life of the Social Body," 
 should probably be traced back to Comte directly or in- 
 directly; and Spencer seemed about to follow him too. 
 ' ' Setting out then with this general principle, that the proper- 
 ties of the units [which it is the province of biology to treat] 
 determine the properties of the aggregate," he also con- 
 cludes 
 
 "that there must be a social science expressing the relations between 
 the two, with as much definiteness as the nature of the phenomena 
 permits;" 
 
 and that 
 
 "in every case [social science] has for its subject-matter the growth, 
 development, structure and functions of the social aggregate, as 
 brought about by the mutual actions of individuals."! 
 
 He is an individualist and endeavors to derive knowledge 
 of social events from the individual and his nature. If this 
 were possible sociology must be a higher order of biology, 
 since we get our knowledge of the individual through the 
 latter. But we may state here that the social commu- 
 nities are the sociological units or elements, and that it 
 is not possible to ascertain their mutual relations from the 
 properties of their constituent parts, i. e. , from the proper- 
 ties of individuals. No one starting from the latter can 
 
 Martineau, op. cii., Vol. ii, bk. vi, cap. iv; Comte, op. cit., Vol. iv, lee. 49; Rig., 
 of. cit., Vol. ii, lee. 49. 
 
 t" The Study of Sociology," pp. 52, 53.
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 29 
 
 reach the nature of the group. Hence biological analogies 
 are worthless in sociology except as illustrations. 
 
 Without saying so in words or even becoming clearly con- 
 scious of it, the English philosopher seems to have felt this. 
 At least his scientific instincts have preserved him from such 
 obvious exaggerations as others have made in consequence 
 of false analogies between biology and sociology. Although 
 he even affirmed such analogies in principle, he never based 
 anything essential upon them, he never went so far but that 
 the core of his sociology remained sound. Whenever he 
 used biological terms, he treated them as similes rather 
 than as analogies. Notice, for example, how he describes 
 the peaceful differentiation of authority in a primitive horde: 
 
 " Setting out with an unorganized horde, including both sexes and 
 all ages, let us ask, ' ' he says, ' ' what must happen when some public 
 question, as that of migration, or of defence against enemies, has to be 
 decided. The assembled individuals will fall, more or less clearly, into 
 two divisions. The elder, the stronger, and those whose sagacity and 
 courage have been proved by experience, will form the smaller part. 
 who carry on the discussion; while the larger part, formed of the 
 young, the weak, and the undistinguished, will be listeners, who 
 usually do no more than express from time to time assent or dissent. 
 A further inference may safely be drawn. In the cluster of leading 
 men there is sure to be one whose weight is greater than that of any 
 other some aged hunter, some distinguished warrior, some cunning 
 medicine-man, who will have more than his individual share in form- 
 ing the resolution finally acted upon. That is to say, the entire 
 assemblage will resolve itself into three parts. To use a biological 
 metaphor, there will, out of the general mass, be differentiated a 
 nucleus and a nucleolus."* 
 
 The passage quoted is typical. Spencer uses biological 
 principles only to a very limited extent in investigating 
 sociological laws. Social facts and phenomena keep remind- 
 ing him of similar biological facts, as is proper; but he 
 always connects the two distinct species by a plain ' ' similarly 
 it happens," without identifying them at all. It is this 
 quiet objectivity which makes him so superior to other 
 sociologists. Schaeffle and I^ilienfeld, for example, took 
 these analogies seriously. They followed these will-o'-the- 
 wisps over treacherous ground. But Spencer does not con- 
 fuse the nature of social and organic phenomena for an in- 
 stant, notwithstanding any thing which the title ' 'Society is an 
 Organism' ' might imply .f Every fact presented as common 
 
 * Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," Vol. ii, sec. 464. 
 id., Vol. i, pt. ii, cap. ii.
 
 30 ANNAiyS OF THE; AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 to both classes of phenomena is so general that we may 
 concede it without detracting from the lucidity of the thought. 
 He finds that societies grow as truly as living organisms do; 
 though this comparison holds only because we have but one 
 expression (growth, Wachstum) for two ideas, organic 
 growth and social enlargement. If there were a special 
 expression for each there would be no temptation falsely to 
 compare or identify them. Likewise, nothing but want of 
 verbal precision makes it possible to say that both an 
 organism and a society increase in ' ' structure ' ' at the same 
 time that they increase in scope. The word ' ' structure ' ' 
 is biological and should be only metaphorically applied to 
 the development of social classes, departments of govern- 
 ment, and the like. In that case, there would not appear 
 to be any common quality. The same criticism is true of 
 Spencer's third comparison, that both in an organism and 
 in society, "progressive differentiation of structures is 
 accompanied by progressive differentiation of functions."* 
 The thought is perfectly clear, if we interpret the words 
 according to the nature of the respective phenomena. His 
 comparisons with biological processes, therefore, do not 
 make our ideas of social processes less precise. 
 
 Although such comparisons are frequent the positive 
 inductive method of natural science is not a mere phrase 
 with Spencer. He really applies it in the domain of soci- 
 ology; whereas Schaeffle and Lilienfeld, as we shall see, 
 misled by biological analogies, deduce sociological laws 
 from a priori biological laws, regardless of consequences. 
 For the real subject-matter of sociology their method sub- 
 stituted a spurious organism from another domain of 
 knowledge.! 
 
 But Spencer attacks social phenomena directly, examines 
 them calmly, with no predilections whatever, and formulates 
 his results in sound doctrines and general laws. His method is 
 correct, but still his results were only partial. He could not 
 cut loose from the unitary conception of mankind, the fable 
 convenue, the old conventional assumption of all former 
 
 *Ibid., sec. 216. 
 
 fin the chapters of Spencer's "Sociology," treating of "Social Structures," 
 " Social Functions," " Systems of Organs," etc. (Part II), the phenomena of organic 
 life are always presented first, then those from social life are described. But the 
 two sorts are kept distinct. There is no confusion. If the reader should omit the 
 biological similes, the presentation of the sociological phenomena would be all the 
 clearer. In the works of Schaeffle and Lilienfeld the two sorts cannot be sepa- 
 rated, for they are made identical. Consequently the description of the sociological 
 phenomena suffers materially.
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 31 
 
 sociologists and philosophers, although ofteu after a cairn 
 examination he is fairly compelled by the logic of facts to 
 attribute the beginning of social development to the mutual 
 effects of unlike (heterogeri} ethnical elements. The " first 
 internal cohesion " of " small hordes of primitive men ' ' is 
 due, he notes, to their " combined resistance to external 
 foes." * Of the "rudiments of political organization," he 
 says: 
 
 "While there exist only small, wandering, unorganized hordes, the 
 conflicts of these with one another work no permanent changes of 
 arrangement in them. But when there have arisen the definite chief- 
 tainships which frequent conflicts tend to initiate, and especially when 
 the conflicts have ended in subjugations, there arise the rudiments of 
 political organizations."! 
 
 And he adduces ethnological facts to illustrate every social 
 phenomenon arising from the contact of social groups. But 
 when he wishes to attribute phenomena to the mutual effects 
 of the individuals of a group, he is forced to fall back on 
 loose logical reasoning and biological similes. Had he ap- 
 preciated this himself perhaps he would have given up 
 attempting individualistic explanations and would have, 
 from the beginning, accepted the plurality of human hordes 
 as not susceptible of further sociological analysis.^ But as 
 it is, there is a perpetual contradiction throughout his socio- 
 logical investigations. On the one hand he tacitly assumes a 
 unitary mankind descended from a common origin; on 
 the other, where he really explains social phenomena, 
 he goes back to a " plurality of primitive hordes. ' ' As we 
 have demonstrated in "Der Rassenkampf" the assumption 
 of primitive plurality of human hordes is the only possible 
 rational basis; the only one upon which all social phenomena 
 can be satisfactorily explained. We have elsewhere made 
 it sufficiently clear that this assumption does not contradict 
 Darwin's theories. Primitive plurality is often the only 
 
 * " Principles of Sociology," sec. 250, et seq. 
 
 t Ibid., sec. n. 
 
 j Though Spencer does not affirm plurality of primitive hordes to be the first 
 natural fact in sociology, he does note incidentally that " social evolution begins 
 with small simple aggregates." Ibid., sec. 257. 
 
 ?[ A part of Section 14 of "Der Rassenkampf " reads as follows: "Darwinism is so 
 fully occupied with the questions of evolution and natural selection that no oppor- 
 tunity is found to consider the question of single or plural descent carefully. Yet, 
 not only must Darwin's theory assume one line, but, naturally and logically, it 
 must admit a number of parallel lines of evolution. Otherwise it must be assumed 
 that at the moment when organic cell life began there was only one cell from 
 which the whole animal world has developed by successive changes. Such a silly 
 assumption is foreign to Darwinism] indeed, it has been expressly emphasized 
 that reference.is made only to the ' original forms ' under which existence began, 
 and that the question whether there were one or more individual forms was con- 
 sidered unessential."]
 
 32 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 possible explanation and we shall adopt it exclusively, thus 
 sparing ourselves the vacillation between the unitary and 
 the plural conceptions of mankind from which Spencer 
 suffers. Had he followed it consistently, he could have 
 still more easily applied his formula of evolution, of which 
 we shall speak later, to the development of social phe- 
 nomena. His universal law is so ill-adapted to the develop- 
 ment of mankind as a unit that the insufficiency of this 
 assumption is manifest at every step. Fortunately the 
 importance of his work is not due to the formulas which 
 he superposes upon the facts; but to his acute observa- 
 tions and his method of treating them. He has com- 
 mand of more material than any one save Bastian; 
 and he is enough of a positivist to test its complicated mass 
 objectively, calmly, without prejudice, drawing conclusions 
 regardless of metaphysical prepossessions. This has made 
 Spencer the real founder of sociology and he will long remain 
 its most powerful champion. Next to him stands Bastian; 
 his superior, perhaps, in knowledge and in calmness of 
 observation, but less skillful in presenting scientific conclu- 
 sions. But before turning to this phenomenal scholar and 
 investigator, we wish to mention several other attempts at 
 sociology. 
 
 Monism is the thought underlying all of them. They 
 culminate in the endeavor to find a universal law for events 
 in the whole domain of nature. They all fail to distinguish 
 between universal and social laws, seeking to explain social 
 events by universal laws which is impossible. They 
 revive the old dispute between spiritualists and materialists. 
 The former attribute everything to the mind's efficiency; 
 the latter, to the effective force of matter. The first grand 
 attempt to explain all events, natural, human and social, by 
 a single universal law of matter, was Holbach's ' ' System of 
 Nature." The author is a skillful reasoner; so we find the 
 demonstration complete in every detail, showing how those 
 two primordial forces, attraction and repulsion, not only 
 sustain the heavenly bodies in their paths and regulate all 
 life and motion on our planet, but also help to establish the 
 relations between man and man and build up every social 
 community. Indeed there would seem to be nothing that 
 attraction and repulsion do not accomplish.* Molecules 
 
 * " The System of Nature or Laws of the Moral and Physical World," by Baron 
 d'Holbach. A new and approved edition with notes by Diderot, translated by H. 
 D. Robinson. Two volumes in one. Boston, 1877. Bk. i, cap. iv.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 33 
 
 attract one another and bodies are formed; they repel one 
 another and bodies are dissolved; by the process of accumu- 
 lation plants and metals, animals and man are made; 
 
 " in short never to separate physical from moral laws it is thus that 
 men, mutually attracted to each other by their reciprocal wants, form 
 those unions which we designate by the terms marriage, families, 
 societies, friendships, connections."* 
 
 ' ' In all the phenomena man presents, " it is said, ' ' from the moment 
 he quits the womb of his mother, to that wherein he becomes the in- 
 habitant of the silent tomb, he perceives nothing but a succession of 
 necessary causes and effects, which are strictly conformable to those 
 laws common to all the beings in nature. All his modes of action 
 all his sensations all his ideas every act of his will every impulse 
 he either gives or receives, are the necessary consequences of his own 
 peculiar properties, and those which he finds in the various beings by 
 whom he is moved. Everything he does everything that passes 
 within himself, are the effects of inert forceof self-gravitation of 
 the attractive or repulsive powers contained in his machine of the 
 tendency he has, in common with other beings, to his own individual 
 preservation; in short, of that energy which is the common property 
 of everything he beholds. Nature, in man, does nothing more than 
 show, in a decided manner, what belongs to the peculiar nature by 
 which he is distinguished from the beings of a different system or 
 order." f 
 
 The idea of explaining all human and natural phenomena 
 by the law of attraction and repulsion has repeatedly reap- 
 peared since Holbach's day; and we shall meet it again in 
 Schaeffle. 
 
 Comte and Spencer, as we have seen, derived sociological 
 laws from the less remote domain of biology. The ' ' theory 
 of the organic state," so-called, which was current in Ger- 
 many for decades, was based on Comte' s ideas until, finally, 
 Schaeffle combined it with Holbach's thought. Everybody 
 will acknowledge Schaeffle's great intellectual power and 
 scholarly ability. But the fundamental thought of his sys- 
 tem, the alleged analogy between the state and an animal 
 organism, is baleful, and all must regret that talent and 
 experience were spent in elaborating an idea so extravagant. 
 It is impossible to go into the details of his comprehensive 
 work here, and it must suffice to quote the leading thought 
 in the author's own words: 
 
 " We have repeatedly observed that not only nature as a whole, but 
 also the several organic and inorganic bodies in it, seem to be great 
 societies or systems whose parts, in turn, are either simple or more or 
 less composite. Then, according to what has preceded, attraction and 
 
 *Ibid. 
 \Ibid.
 
 34 ANNAI^S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 repulsion between the elements and the outside world would impart 
 motion to these atomic kingdoms. Under such circumstances, can it 
 be a misinterpretation to assume that the social body, which is the 
 realm of persons and the most universal and spiritual realm of experi- 
 ence, cannot accomplish the ends of its existence without the mani- 
 festation of the same double force in each of its personal elements ? 
 Some parts would appear to be centripetal in virtue of one force, while 
 others, obeying the other, would seem to assert their independence of 
 the whole. But, as the units of the body-social are neither simple nor 
 irrational, we ought not to consider the two fundamental impulses 
 either simple or irrational; but we can and we must explain the total 
 life of the body-social as the product of the multiform, reciprocal 
 effects of all the active social elements, of all the subjects endowed 
 with volition, of all persons and institutional groups of persons in a 
 state of attraction and repulsion. For ethical movement is not im- 
 parted to the body-social by anything outside; but we see it arise 
 within from the discharge of ethical forces between the constituent 
 parts, both individual and collective. ' ' * 
 
 This language, though not quite clear, is not the mystical 
 language of Kantian metaphysics, beneath which clear 
 thoughts lie, for the illustrations are inapt. Schaeffle analyzes 
 the "body-social," but he leaves us in doubt whether this 
 mystical expression denotes mankind as a whole, or only as 
 a state or folk. It is unclear and intangible as Quetelet's 
 ' ' society. ' ' The latter uses the ' ' great number ' ' to explain 
 his meaning; the former demonstrates that there are social 
 cells, tissues, bones, nerves, etc., which makes the matter 
 worse. It needs a very lively imagination to connect 
 Schaeffle' s lengthy excerpts from anatomy, physiology and 
 psychology with social phenomena and social development. 
 Sober reason turns in despair from the endless limping com- 
 parisons. If they contain a kernel of truth derived from 
 experience and acute observation, as often happens, it is 
 tedious to find it in the confusion of metaphors and analogies. 
 
 Of Lilienfeld, we can, on the whole, say no more than has 
 been said of Schaeffle. He has the same erudition and 
 equally great intellectual power and inventiveness; and he 
 displays the same degree of industry in executing a plan 
 which is fundamentally wrong and in defending a cause 
 which is lost from the start. 
 
 The fundamental thought of his ponderous work is 
 expressed in these words: 
 
 Schaeffle, " Sau und Leben des Socialen Koerpers." Tubingen, 1875. Vol. i, pt. 
 5, cap. 2, concerning "the two principal kinds of effects of reciprocally acting 
 ethical forces, fellowship and self-dependence, love and hate." [The passage 
 quoted does not appear in the second edition.]
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 35 
 
 "There is only one way to make human society the subject-matter 
 of a positive science. It must necessarily (?) be classed (!) among 
 organic beings and regarded as an organism as much above man as 
 man is above all other organisms in nature. On no other condition 
 is it possible to treat human society inductively and to conceive of it 
 as an inseparable part of nature. On no other condition can dogmatic 
 social science become positive. But on this condition it obtains a 
 basis as real as that of natural science."* 
 
 The reverse of all this is true. Social science can never 
 ' ' obtain a basis as real as that of natural science ' ' until the 
 fantastic view that ' ' society " is an " organism ' ' has been 
 thrown overboard and all biological analogies have been 
 cleared away. 
 
 Ijlienfeld's query whether ' ' social organisms do not obey 
 the same laws as all other beings ' ' must be emphatically 
 answered in the negative. The distinction between social 
 organisms and organic beings is something more than a 
 simple ' ' preponderance of the principle of adaptation in the 
 former and of the principle of causality in the latter. ' ' They 
 are distinct species of phenomena and different laws control 
 them. Laws of organic development and laws of social 
 development are toto genere unlike and ought not to be con- 
 founded. When L,ilienfeld further inquires whether ' ' in 
 relation to us, the whole of mankind does not constitute an 
 organic being uniting in itself all social groups and related to 
 them as the whole is to its parts," we may be sure that we 
 are confronted with a wretched scientific blunder. After 
 mankind has been declared to be an " organic being, " what 
 can be expected from any further investigation ? 
 
 Yet in the next chapter, on ' ' Human Society as Real 
 Being, ' ' he solemnly protests that he 
 
 "conceives the analogy to be something more than an allegorical 
 parallel." " If we had considered all the current scientific and popu- 
 lar expressions which point to a relationship between natural and 
 social phenomena to be mere rhetorical figures, we should have trod- 
 den in the footsteps of all the doctrinaires and metaphysicians ; we 
 should have been working over the same barren soil on which in the 
 course of centuries so many capable natural scientists have sacrificed 
 their powers with no sociological results save doubts and contradic- 
 tions." 
 
 Nobly said. But it must be laid to his charge that in spite 
 of all he was no more fortunate than they. 
 
 He seems to think that a metaphor can be made real by 
 
 * Paul von lyilienfeld. "Gedanken ueber erne Socialwissenschaft der Zukunft." 
 "Vol. i, p. 25.
 
 36 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 "conceiving" it to be real. "We must win the convic- 
 tion, ' ' he says, ' ' that this or that social group, this or that 
 state, is a real living organism like every other in nature." 
 He expects a great deal of the reflecting reader. We have 
 not been able to win this conviction even after a most earnest 
 study of his five volumes. There are many true and deep 
 thoughts, but nothing to enforce this conviction. In one 
 place he trenchantry criticises ' ' metapolitics, which is busied 
 with generalizing from allegories, i. ?., from data that are 
 themselves once removed from reality." "Double non- 
 sense ' ' he calls it. We frankly confess that between it and 
 his methods we see no difference. As of SchaefHe, so we 
 must say of L,ilienfeld, that his work contains incidentally 
 admirable observations; but his elaborate system is built on 
 a false foundation and can be of small profit to science."* 
 
 All in all, de Roberty is right when he laments that, not- 
 'withstanding Schaeffle and Ijlienfeld, " social science still 
 lias its proper course to seek."f The period of progress, 
 since Comte clearly outlined the social problem, was only 
 one of incipiency, important though it be. Among other 
 errors of this period, de Roberty specially mentions ' ' setting 
 the phantom light of general analogies to guide the science. ' ' 
 He recommends above all that the "natural history of 
 society " be made the basis of sociology, saying that on it 
 alone could an abstract social science be built, but his work 
 is occupied with the preparatory questions of methodology. 
 As propaedeutics of sociology it has fulfilled its mission; 
 he does not claim more for it. The task which he refers to 
 sociology, the construction of a science of " society," based 
 on its natural history, has since been undertaken with great 
 success by a German ethnographer, Bastian. 
 
 We have already called Bastian a phenomenal character. 
 He has done more for the " natural history of society," as 
 de Roberty called it, than all his predecessors together. The 
 scope of his labors is great and his plentitude of deep and 
 excellent thoughts is beyond any man's power to reckon 
 to-day. We can only make a few fragmentary observations 
 
 * I,llienfeld's first volume appeared in 1873 and Schaeffle's in 1875. Although the 
 latter knew of Lilienfeld's work before his own was published, it is our opinion 
 that the two systems were independently conceived. Without doubt, however, 
 both writers were influenced by the theoryof the "organic" state then prevalent 
 in Germany and very forcibly stated in the popular works of Bluntschli and 
 Ahrens. 
 
 t" La Sociologie, Eisai de Philosophic sociologique," by B. de Roberty. Paris, 
 1881.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 37 
 
 upon them, being wholly unable suitably to exploit the 
 sociological treasures he has stored up. 
 
 Bastian could never succeed in systematizing his knowl- 
 edge; it was too great. ^Whenever he made the attempt, 
 even in his early work on " Man in History," his system 
 was broken down at its very inception and swept away by 
 the flood tide of his information. Significant, however, is 
 the thought contained in the sub-title to this work: " Con- 
 tribution to a Psychological Conception of the World." 
 It recurs in all his works, and is the great philosopher's 
 pole-star on the immeasurable ocean of knowledge, his 
 inspiration in all his labors. 
 
 Probably this thought dates from the time when ' ' race- 
 psychology " first flourished in Berlin. For in his preface 
 he says: 
 
 "Psychology ought not to be limited as heretofore to individual 
 self-observation and the pathological evidence afforded by schools and 
 insane asylums. Man, as political animal, attains full development 
 only in society. Mankind, than which there is no higher concept, 
 must be made the starting point; mankind is the unitary whole in 
 which the individual figures as an integral part."* 
 
 He searches "mankind " far and wide for manifestations 
 of " thought." He considers his task to be psychological. 
 His object is to disclose the soul of the races, which are the 
 parts, and so finally to disclose the soul of mankind, the 
 whole. In the later works, he calls these psychical mani- 
 festations ' ' race-thoughts ' ' ( Voelkergedanke] . 
 
 So he is really not a sociologist; he lays little or no stress 
 on the process of social development. Still the material 
 which he gathers from every nook and cranny to demon- 
 strate "race-thoughts," illustrates social development also. 
 Bastian wanted to be a race-psychologist; but the problem 
 he set himself was falsely proposed and impossible, and the 
 force of facts drove him into another course; he became an 
 ethnographer and built up a system of ethnology. 
 
 Some passages may be cited to show his views. He is a 
 realist from the first and occupies the only correct realistic 
 ground, materialism and idealism combined. 
 
 "If so-called materialists have hitherto vainly attempted to con- 
 struct new systems," says Bastian, " if they have been unable to satisfy 
 public expectations and have found no surcease for that longing of 
 the human heart which has always hovered over the earthly horizon 
 
 *" Der Mensch in der Geschichte. Zur Begrundung einer psychologischen Weltan- 
 schauung," by Adolf Bastian, Leipzig, 1860, Vol. i, p. x.
 
 38 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 of all races like the promise of dawn, it was because they neglected 
 psychology, not knowing how to rescue it from the hands of dialectic 
 speculation and to claim it as their own province. They opposed the 
 idealist on party lines, instead of drawing his objects also within the 
 sphere of scientific investigation. True science recognizes neither 
 materialism nor idealism, for it includes both. Psychology, ' race- 
 psychology,' based on ethnographical studies, had to wait until the 
 other natural sciences developed, because it must build on them. But 
 now that the preliminary work is done, it joins them, proposing to 
 swing a bridge from the narrow circle of sense to the endless realm of 
 ideas."* 
 
 What, then, is his attitude toward the facts of the social 
 world ? 
 
 "No judicious investigator," he says, "will give further heed to 
 enthusiastic utopists and reformers. As soon as we learn that recog- 
 nition of the causes proves development to be according to law, we 
 accept whatever is as right, because it has become what it is.f" 
 
 He is equipped with all the requirements of true objective 
 science. He wishes to ' ' gather up evidence ' ' and ' ' collect 
 psychological statistics" in order "to acquaint the reader 
 with the course of thought peculiar to the various races of 
 mankind." Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately for the 
 future science) Bastian plans a task immeasurabl}- greater 
 than he can manage. His plan is nothing more nor less 
 than ' ' to show by statistics that exactly the same number of 
 original psychological elements have coursed regularly 
 through the heads of all races in all ages of history. ' ' A 
 quarter of a century has passed since this was written and 
 the tireless statistician of race- thoughts has never suspended 
 his labors. That his mind is still fresh and clear is proof 
 of its extraordinary strength ; for his ' ' statistics ' ' have 
 become impenetrable forests wherein ordinary mortals lose 
 their way and become bewildered. 
 
 Future science will be able some day to utilize his 
 labors and will find them invaluable. But it seems to us 
 that the laws of the ' ' regular ' ' course of thought might 
 have been made intelligible at once if he had been a sociol- 
 ogist rather than a race-psychologist. The fundamental 
 characteristic of Bastian' s investigations is the endeavor to 
 attribute all social phenomena to human thought. He 
 accumulates inexhaustible stores of social facts in order to 
 unriddle man's thoughts from them and then to discover the 
 thoughts, the soul, of the races. With him thoughts are 
 
 *Ibid., p. x. 
 
 f Ibid., pp. xvii, zviii.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 39 
 
 always primary and deeds are an emanation from them; 
 thought arises only under the influence of external natural 
 phenomena, and the social world emanates from thought. 
 The scheme of his system is: (a) nature, () man and 
 thought, (V) society and social thought. His scientific 
 structure culminates in the latter; his ultimate object is 
 race-psychology. In sociology the point of view and the 
 object must be totally different. The social process must 
 precede; the social fact is primary. Man disappears from 
 the foreground of consideration since he receives his thought, 
 his soul, from the social fact. Social thought, the concept 
 of social facts, appears in the individual human mind only 
 by reflection. 
 
 Hence, in distinction from Bastian's system, sociology 
 includes: () social elements, swarms, hordes, groups, etc., 
 () man, their product, both in body and mind, (c) the 
 social process and its products, (d ) the ethico-social prod- 
 ucts of the reciprocal action of society and the individual. 
 The social phenomenon is always primary; the thought of 
 the individual and the ethico-social products, such as 
 religion, rights, morals, etc., are derived. An undigested 
 remnant of idealism still troubles Bastian and he continues 
 to be a pronounced individualist (atomist), i. e., he uses the 
 individual and his nature to explain the nature and develop- 
 ment of the whole. 
 
 The first volume of his ' ' Man in History, ' ' treats of 
 psychology (i. e., the psychology of the individual) as 
 natural science;* the second is on psychology and mythology, 
 and treats of the relation of the individual to nature ; and the 
 third is occupied with "political psychology," concluding 
 with a description of society. But this does not seem to us 
 the right method for sociology. It has had little success in 
 political science and has fallen into disrepute as ' ' idealism ' ' 
 and " atomism." Yet he even attributes " property," in the 
 traditional way, to the primitive possessory act of the savage 
 seizing the " fruit from the tree " to still his hunger, f and 
 he adheres to the old idealistic phrase that property is ' ' the 
 necessary extension of the sphere of personality in society." 
 
 Likewise the state, to cite only one more example, is derived 
 
 *[" Als Naturwissenschaft" though a part of the title, is omitted by Professor 
 Gumplowicz.] 
 
 t Ibid., Vol. iii, p. 217.
 
 40 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 from the family, which has gradually "become a race.* 
 But in the later works every suggestion of idealism and the 
 whole rationalistic theory of the state is omitted. He studies 
 the "natural history of society " more and more objectivelj 1 - 
 and finally gives the most striking expression to this ten- 
 dency in a "system " of ethnology. 
 
 In the ethnographical works, f also, here and there in 
 masses of descriptive matter which is invaluable for its own 
 sake, reflections crop out that are not only the results of 
 acute observation and clear reasoning, but are besides really 
 epoch-making in social science. As example we will cite the 
 discussion of the ' ' ethnological conception of descent and 
 relationship ' ' in the introduction to his ' ' Ethnological 
 Investigations, ' ' for we shall often have occasion to refer to 
 it in presenting social development. 
 
 The current use of the terms ' ' native race ' ' and ' ' rela- 
 tionship ' ' is criticised very sharply. It is shown that in the 
 nature of the case they are only relative. If we know any 
 of the circumstances at all our knowledge reaches back such 
 a little way that we can never use these words in their 
 rightful acceptation. 
 
 " When historical analysis is not able to go further the last race may 
 provisionally be called native. Although classical authors described 
 some races as earth-born autochthons which were not known to have 
 had an earlier dwelling-place, in general they applied the term regard- 
 less of historical considerations. Indeed some races called aboriginal 
 were notoriously immigrants, and were on that account connected with 
 the mountains in etymology." 
 
 No criticism could be more destructive of the Biblical 
 theory of descent underlying every system of political and 
 social science than that of Bastian. He shows that 
 
 "every race tries to find the 'first man,' as the redskins call him; the 
 ancestor of man, or father of the race. For, as examples from Asia, 
 Australia, America and elsewhere show, the name of the race always 
 coincides with the general name for man." "No difference of origin 
 is allowed for," he continues, " except that the former race is said to 
 have sprung from the ground, into which it withdrew again before 
 conquerors born of birds and wild animals; or, being the offspring of 
 trees and vines, was not adopted into the family of the proud heaven- 
 descended heroes. ... In Grecian tradition Laos sprang from the 
 stones, and in German the Saxons from a rock. Assyrian traditions 
 
 * Ibid., Vol. iii, p. 265. 
 
 t " Voelker des oestlichen Asiens," 1867; "Ethnologische Forschungen," 1872; 
 "Rechtsverhaeltnisse der Voelker^ 1872, etc.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 41 
 
 are revolutionary; the Lybian repeat the myth of the Moxos,* aud in 
 Scandinavian story the first-begotten were divided into classes. But 
 since Christianity and Islatnism made the Semitic legend prepon- 
 derant over large portions of Europe and Asia all racial diversity is 
 referred to the three patriarchs who survived the flood with their 
 father." 
 
 The passage is typical of Bastian's ability to upset false 
 ideas. By citing notions that recur the world over, so as to 
 show that they are only a form of human thought, he thor- 
 oughly destroys the delusion that they ever contained any 
 truth. 
 
 Next to the Biblical explanation of man's origin nothing 
 is so fatal to sociology as the false views of tribal descent 
 and kinship. By correcting them Bastian rendered sociology 
 another very great service. 
 
 "Kinship and descent, like so many other words, have a figurative 
 as well as a real signification, whereas they ought to be employed in 
 the inductive sciences as technical terms with one well-defined mean- 
 ing. Descent from a common ancestor implies kiuship, but kinship 
 may also arise from a union of races and is therefore the broader 
 term. Strictly, descent should be traced through a limited number of 
 generations, beyond which it is preferable to speak of kinship. The 
 limit might be somewhat extended where endogamic marriages are the 
 rule, as among the Incas, Achimenides and Wanes, and in the aristo- 
 cratic circles of certain mountain peoples. But this practice is extra- 
 ordinarily rare, whereas the marriage regulations among the Australians, 
 Chinese, Abipones and many others must lead to the incessant crossing 
 of families; for the degrees of relationship within which they prohibit 
 marriage are even remoter than those the pope once had much diffi- 
 culty in enforcing in Bavaria. The term ' descent ' should be avoided 
 as much as possible in ethnology, unless one wants to grapple with 
 the fruitless problem of ultimate origin. And yet many an historical 
 clue is afforded by mythical traditions of descent, whether confined 
 to the Teutons, as those given by Tacitus, or made to embrace a wider 
 field, whether Celts, Scythians and Illyrians are grouped under one 
 common ancestor or the equally incongruous Galla, Waknafi and 
 Wakamba, whose languages even are unlike, under another; or 
 whether Grecian eponyms are represented to be brothers, or genea- 
 logical tables are projected for the known and presumptively the 
 whole world at once. ' ' f 
 
 "In general, the more definitely a particular locality is circum- 
 scribed the broader is the sense in which kinship may be used. The 
 recurrence of the same kabong, or brotherhoods, throughout the whole 
 Australian continent gives a clue to the general similarity of type 
 which continual crossing produces among savages at the same time 
 that it prevents individualities from becoming constant." 
 
 *[ The Moxos were a tribe of Bolivian Indians who believed that they originated 
 oil the spot, and who were restrained from migration by a superstitious fear of 
 the mountains, rivers, etc.] 
 
 t" Ethnologische Forschungen," Vol. i, p. viii.
 
 42 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 It is important to bear in mind how relative the ideas 
 " kindred" and " autochthonous " are, but it is equally so 
 to have an objective conception of race and stem. 
 
 "Nationality," says Bastian, "grows out of similarity of interests 
 and views; it is furthered by religious and political union, and espe- 
 cially by the assimilation of language, and attains its greatest perfec- 
 tion within an area enclosed by natural boundaries." 
 
 According to Bastian, the earliest precursor of the nation 
 is the race or stem, which is "earlier than the folk," since 
 the ' ' incorporation ' ' of races ' ' into folk is determined by 
 political boundaries." Important also is Bastian's confirma- 
 tion of the fact that ' ' the most favored regions of civilization 
 are those in which several streams of foreign immigration 
 meet," which amounts to saying that civilization is promoted 
 by their union. Admirable also is his explanation of how 
 the resulting civilization or, what is nearly the same thing, 
 how the ' ' national type ' ' is related to the local conditions, 
 i. e . , to " the local ethnological type, ' ' to the ' ' anthropo- 
 logical province, ' ' to use his own words. 
 
 "A great variety of inhabitants," he says, " may exist in every 
 geographical province. The range of conditions within which life is 
 possible is wide, and circumstances may cause very great differences 
 to arise even between adjacent varieties. Hence the dispute over 
 stability and mutability of races is, for the most part, factitious, for 
 both views are supported by examples, but the conditions which pro- 
 duce them respectively are not accurately distinguished. How far 
 the national type produced by one cause or another shall approximate 
 to the ethnological or territorial type will depend on circumstances. 
 A native stock, though capable of improvement in various ways, will 
 never change much. Even if there should be an influx of strangers 
 indigenous to another climate and permanent political changes should 
 result, the influence of environment would still tend to mould the type 
 into harmony with itself. But for centuries there might be a multiple 
 series of transitional phases; and when growth finally ceased, the 
 resultant type, while bearing the impress of historical and geograph- 
 ical environment, might differ widely from the autochthonous type, 
 which was wholly or principally the product of the geographical 
 province, as the modern Frenchman differs from the Gaul and the pre- 
 Gallic Kelt, or the Spaniard from the Hispanian, etc." 
 
 But, by the ' ' original autochthons ' ' we must understand 
 that he means the type which is the earliest that historical 
 investigation can discover, not an absolutely "original" 
 type. For, as Bastian emphatically declares of the ' ' original 
 representatives of the anthropological province of the 
 Celebes," the Alfores, "our ignorance of any predecessors 
 is not sufficient proof that there were none. ' ' This is the
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 43 
 
 only worthy conception of anthropological history, and 
 Bastian is consistent in contending that ' ' questions of tribal 
 descent have no ethnological meaning, since in the course 
 of a few generations consanguineous relationships become 
 so extended and involved as to obliterate tribal lines." 
 So the ' ' voluminous question whether the Slavs descended 
 from the Illyrians, the Sarmates or the Veneti," seems to 
 him "senseless;" but the point is to learn "the elements 
 composing the tribe" and the processes going on in it. 
 Hence, in summing up the task of this "ethnological" 
 science, he says : "In the ethnological treatment of nation- 
 ality," by which, as we know, he understands an ethnical 
 composite, 
 
 " we must not divert attention into wrong channels by raising un- 
 justifiable questions about descent and preventing insight into the 
 springs of life ; neither may we begin the investigation with an 
 arbitrary hypothesis," 
 
 Biblical tradition, for example, 
 
 " but we must proceed from the given circumstances backward, 
 separating out the elements so long as we have a spark of historical 
 light left, or so long as collateral proof still serves to guide us through 
 the darkness of myth." 
 
 The outlines of the science thus incidentally sketched are 
 not the product of a priori deductions and philosophical 
 speculations. They developed part by part as he pondered 
 over enormous piles of ethnological material collected in the 
 study and on exploring expeditions. He was forced to pro- 
 ceed systematically. First of all, he had to make a critical 
 estimate of similar previous attempts; thus he compiled his 
 "History of Ethnology." Its logical successor, "Race- 
 thought and the Science of Man ' ' was probably intended to 
 be introductory to a systematic outline; but the flood of facts 
 makes the forecast of a system impossible. Finally, in the 
 " General Principles of Ethnology," he is more successful, 
 as much so as is possible with his overflowing information. 
 These three late works* best show his epoch-making 
 importance in sociology. 
 
 Just as Comte assigns sociology a place after biology in 
 the hierarchy of the sciences since it is the youngest, the 
 future science so Bastian begins his ' ' History of Ethnology ' ' 
 by pointing out that this science occupies the last place in 
 
 *"Die Vorgeschichteder Ethnologist 1880; "Die Voelkergedanke im A ufbau einer 
 Wissenschaft vom Menschen," 1881 ; " Allgemeine Grundzuege der Ethnologie," 
 1884.
 
 44 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 order of development. This external coincidence of itself 
 suggests that perhaps both have the same thing in mind. 
 
 Indeed, Bastian calls ethnology the "science of man; " 
 which would also describe sociology. But by ethnology he 
 means a science, or better, that science of man which takes 
 races * and not individuals for the subject-matter of its inves- 
 tigations. A good portion of his scientific program is thus 
 comprised in the name. This ' ' science of man " is to con- 
 sider the individual only as a member of an ethnical 
 group. Its identification with sociology which considers 
 him as a member of a social group is almost complete. 
 Besides, hear what Bastian says of the present position of 
 ethnology : 
 
 1 ' Some inductive natural sciences like botany and chemistry have 
 had a plain and definite field of observation before them; and though 
 they could not have arisen before the new epochal age of discoveries 
 dawned they have since developed systematically, rapidly and fully; 
 whereas ethnology, which as science of man should strive for ultimate 
 conclusions, was incapable of such rapid progress. It had to wait 
 upon the others. First induction must become fully established in 
 chemistry and physics. Progressing from inorganic matter to organic, 
 it must reach the limits of the corporeal in physiology. After that, 
 continually supplementing its gigantic powers by the comparative 
 method, it might venture to invade the mental realm, transforming 
 psychology into a natural science and analyzing race-thoughts in the 
 name of ethnology." 
 
 Thus the object of ethnology in Bastian 's sense is the 
 discovery of race-thoughts, and the means is ethnography. 
 Hence Bastian sees the germs of ethnology in the first of 
 modern geographical discoveries, and its continuation in the 
 ethnographical and anthropological data of the nineteenth 
 century. "Firm footing was first gained" with Adeling's 
 " Mithridates " and Blumenbach's works. " After that the 
 development of the science was only a question of time." 
 It was strongly promoted by a treatise on ' ' Ethnology and 
 the History of Primitive Ages" and by the founding of 
 ethnological museums. Then Prichard, writing in a 
 "religious sense," "to prove the unity of mankind and 
 descent from one pair " gave the science its first handbook, f 
 
 ' " The problem cannot be to find a ' God in history ' until man has been found 
 there. The first problem concerns man in his character of uov TroM.TiK.ov, political 
 animal, in the social state ; whence it appears that the race-thought is primary and 
 that the thought of the individual is secondary, first becoming clear as an integral 
 partof the wholein the exchange of thought through language."" 
 P- 25- 
 t"Die yorgeschichte," p. i, and passim.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 45 
 
 Herder, Rousseau and others contributed by discussing 
 the philosophy of history. Men like Auguste and Aniadee 
 Thierry hastened to adopt the new points of view. Interest 
 grew and ethnological societies were founded in Paris and 
 London and correspondence was opened with societies, 
 journals and museums abroad. Bastian dwells on the sig- 
 nificance of these steps, holding the energetic development 
 of ethnological museums to be indispensable, a conditio sine 
 qua non for his future science. 
 
 "With suitable museums not only will many practical ends be real- 
 ized but especially the basis of induction will be strengthened, which 
 will be a great advantage in psychology where theoretical studies first 
 come in contact with the domain of philosophy."* 
 
 But he does not mean the psychology of Fries, Herbart, 
 Beneke, Fichte, Schopenhauer, Ulrici, and Fischer; nor any 
 "witch's concoction before which the philosophers stand 
 dismayed," but the natural science of psychology. "In it 
 lies our hope; so far as can be seen, the last hope of man- 
 kind."! 
 
 The essential characteristic of the future psychology, 
 which he desires should go hand in hand with ethnology, is 
 that it does not start from the individual man. For he "is 
 nothing, at best an idiot ; only through spoken intercourse 
 in society does he become conscious of thought, is his na- 
 ture realized. The thought of society, social thought, is 
 the primary result and the thought of the individual is won 
 by later analysis from it."| These words are golden and we 
 shall accept them as the motto of sociology. Bastian aptly 
 criticises the current psychology by saying that ' ' systems 
 of philosophy generally begin with the individual and have 
 to patch social thought together out of the tatters that have 
 come into their hands they know not how; whereas, if the 
 social thought were looked upon as an unmutilated gar- 
 ment, each individual thought would be found woven into 
 its right place." Then he unfolds his ethnological plan 
 " to win from social thoughts sufficient material for psycho- 
 logical investigation. ' ' Not satisfied with the consideration 
 of ' ' the thought-structures, or thought- trees of civilized 
 races only," he demands also the assistance of the " eth- 
 nology of the savage races, ' ' of those 
 
 * Ibid., p. 79. 
 t Ibid., p. 83. 
 I Ibid., p. 79.
 
 46 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 " cryptogami c structures, so to speak, in which the processes of cell- 
 life and growth may be more easily observed, in order that the laws 
 discovered in them may be applied to phanerogamic complexes." 
 "The laws governing every organism are firmly fixed within it; even 
 ethical laws are unchangeable. Everywhere in the five continents, 
 we see thoughts springing forth, similar where the conditions are 
 similar or varying with local differences. As the same principles 
 regulate the processes of cell-life in the tropic palm and the arctic fir; 
 as the same plant may have its leaves broad, curled, or dwarfed to 
 needles according to its habutat ; as there are Asiatic, African and 
 American varieties of the lion, so the pantheon of the Indian national 
 mind differs from that of the Grecian and the Scandinavian." 
 
 "In all the psychological creations of society, whether religious, 
 social or aesthetic, there are primitive elementary thoughts indis- 
 putably recurring and passing through the same course of develop- 
 ment, often with truly startling identity, like ghostly doubles of dis- 
 tant acquaintances. The organic bond is so close that one with such 
 sharp eyes as Cuvier had for fossils might reconstruct the whole circle 
 of ideas from the torn fragments and accidental traces."* 
 
 Accordingly, Bastian proposes three specific ethnological 
 problems. The first is 
 
 "to determine the elementary laws of growth in race and national 
 thoughts; to get something which will do for these what the cell- 
 theory does for plant-physiology The second would be to 
 
 study the local influences of environment, to which Buckle in his 
 
 philosophy yields a preponderating importance The last 
 
 is the investigation of what might be compared to grafting or to culti- 
 vating ornamental plants by artificial means. It is chiefly concerned 
 with races just beginning to develop a civilization, before they cross 
 the threshold of history. All changes due to intercourse whether 
 with friends or foes fall under this head; all such phenomena as were 
 formerly supposed to be borrowed. For whenever similarity of ideas 
 was discovered, historical hypotheses were immediately recast accord- 
 ing to that principle; whereas, according to the psychological axioms 
 of ethnology and the methods of comparative etymology, the explana- 
 tion should be first sought in the most general and elementary laws. 
 When there is no longer possibility of finding it in them, resort may 
 be had to historical intercourse so far as it seems reasonably certain. 
 . . . . When the work is begun in earnest, ethnology will have to 
 arrange its investigations according to these three points of view, "f 
 
 Such is Bastian's ethnological method. In his " Race- 
 thoughts ' ' he worked zealously to prepare suitable material 
 and to arrange it properly according to this plan. The 
 methodological and propaedeutic hints of the ' ' History ' ' 
 come out more clearly. Carping criticism might complain 
 of the repetitions; but deeper insight discovers here a hard 
 intellectual struggle from the darkness of intimation to the 
 light of cognition the severe birth-pangs of a new science. 
 
 * rbid., p. 89. 
 
 t Ibid., pp. 90-91.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 47 
 
 Properly rejecting theories ascribing " the preponderating 
 influence to environment," he again lays it down as the 
 problem of inductive ethnology, 
 
 "disregarding the somewhat superficial local phenomena for which 
 an historical or geographical explanation must be sought later, to 
 determine first of all and permanently the uniform laws of the growth 
 of human race thoughts. It can be done most simply by the genetic 
 method, starting with uncivilized peoples as the lowest and most 
 transparent organisms. How development proceeds from such germs 
 to the most exalted mental products, must be discovered by comparing 
 parallel series of phenomena according to universal natural princi- 
 ples." 
 
 This is not mere repetition. Each thought is more fully 
 developed and more clearly expressed. As he progresses he 
 approaches nearer to sociology. He very properly hopes 
 ' ' by observing uncivilized races and gaining an insight into 
 the human mind's processes of growth " to obtain a perfect 
 key to its ' ' higher stages, " " even to its full development 
 in civilized peoples."* It will not always be possible, how- 
 ever, for 
 
 " many primary ideas are so completely eliminated as civilization 
 progresses that their relation to current ideas is lost and they have 
 only an archaic value. . . . But others . . with their offshoots, 
 still permeate modern conceptions." 
 
 He has really projected a complete science of sociology. 
 Indeed in spite of his peculiar views, he penetrates right to 
 its heart as we shall see. 
 
 " Of the many series of conceptions touching the most important 
 interests of life, not a few," he says, " concern the condition of society 
 when it is coincident with the state or when it is promiscuously strati- 
 fied into ranks, castes, guilds, parishes, confederacies, etc. But 
 before ethnology can expect to investigate, methodically and thor- 
 oughly, the ideas prevalent under such circumstane-s, it must first 
 have comprehended the social organism within -\vhich they find 
 expression." 
 
 This organism is the state; 
 
 "and all depends on investigating its structure and biology; for, 
 considering man's immanent social nature, the question of its origin 
 must be postponed temporarily before the fact of its existence. . . . 
 Society, which, morphologically, leads up to family, tribe and state, 
 and, biologically, to kin, race and nation, exists in greater or smaller 
 proportion wherever man does; for the conception of man as a social 
 being is real; but the conception of him as an individual is abstract." 
 
 Thus Bastian stands fully on sociological ground ; the in- 
 voluntary course of his thought proves, better than any 
 logical argument could, the intimate connection between his 
 
 *" Voelkergedanke" p. 17.
 
 48 ANNAI^S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 
 
 ethnology and our sociology. The former is nothing but 
 the necessary basis, the latter is the crown of the ethnological 
 structure. 
 
 So great is the power of thought over man, that often a 
 mere accident is sufficient to awaken a whole system of ideas 
 in the mind. Bastian scarcely graces the portals of sociology, 
 whereupon they open as of themselves; and the whole com- 
 plex mass of problems, overruns him. Once under the 
 influence of the sociological idea he cannot escape a storm 
 of perplexities and doubts. Suddenly he notices that ' ' in- 
 definite terminology leads to various misconceptions, as 
 when 'race' (clan, lineage, band, etc.), is used for tribe 
 andplryle (^^), curia and phratry, fsvo^ and gens, etc."* 
 Suddenly he sees clearly what he did not see when he wrote 
 "Man in History," that the "family, which is the sub- 
 structure of the whole development under prevailing condi- 
 tions, must be abandoned in ethnology," i. e., in sociology. 
 
 " Since our idea of the family is abstracted from actual conditions, it 
 is a particularly definite concept. . . . We have the schematic 
 forms, family and race, and think of the latter as arising out of the 
 former because a race can be analyzed into families; but an actual 
 unit first (?) appears in the kindred, "f 
 
 The adverb "first," seems objectionable here. Sociology 
 does not " first " begin with the kindred or horde, but 
 begins with it as first natural fact; for it is not and 
 cannot be known what might have been earlier. He does 
 not clearly understand how the state arises from the first 
 "actual " or, as we should say, " ultimate " unit, nor what 
 the process of transition is, for he says that " even in the 
 kindred or phratry there are traces of a half-conscious inter- 
 ference, which suggest to some the social contract as the 
 origin of the state; but the state should be attributed to 
 ^ytf'C, to nature. ' ' He discards the social contract, as might 
 be expected, and sets the kindred first, conceding the origin 
 of the state from it problematically. But while emphasiz- 
 ing the natural origin of the state, he gives no clear account 
 of the transitions from kindred to state, which we shall treat 
 of later in the appropriate place. However, when once the 
 state has arisen, he understands its changes perfectly, both 
 
 * We have discussed the ambiguous meaning of " race " in "Das Philosophische 
 Staatsreckt, " sec. 8, and in " Der Rassenkampf, " pp. 186, 200 et seq. 
 
 ^"Voelkergedanke" p. 21. We have expressed the same thought more than 
 once, first in "Das Philosophische Staalsrecht,' sec. 8, and then in " Rechtsstaat und 
 Socialismus," sec. 29.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 49 
 
 as ethnical conglomerates and as social growths. By con- 
 trasting it with the kindred as the " actual unit," he points 
 out that the 
 
 "ideal state is never realized; for the boisterously' waking life of the 
 race-mind [better race minds] grows more boisterous still in the effort 
 to unify and nationalize the currents of ethnical feeling by force of 
 political authority." 
 
 In view of this deeper conception of the state, the ordinary 
 theory of political organizations and of political rights had 
 to be abandoned.* When the Semitic sphere of knowledge 
 was added to the classical, theocracy was added to the chief 
 Aristotelian forms of government, kingdom or monarchy, 
 aristocracy, and city state (besides tyranny, oligarchy, and 
 democracy or ochlocracy). But now that the whole globe 
 is subjected to observation there are so many modifications 
 to be noticed that the previous systems would be radically 
 transformed were the types arranged comparatively. 
 
 Such reflections do not belong in ethnology. Without 
 observing it, Bastian has reached social and political science. 
 Later, in his " Principles of Ethnology, "f he realizes it and 
 sets forth the relation between ethnology and sociology, 
 saying plainly that " ethnology, as ethnical sociology or 
 sociology under many ethnical forms, has to demonstrate 
 the physiological laws of the life of social organisms. " It is 
 in comparing savage races and civilized states that he 
 develops his most interesting ideas and proves the solidarity 
 of ' ' race-thoughts. ' ' But the comparison ought to be con- 
 ducted sociologically and not ethnologically. To obtain 
 positive results it is necessary to treat the natural communi- 
 ties as such. As he says: " Within the ethnical horizon it 
 is the social organism and not its components that counts,"! 
 be that organism the most or the least civilized race. 
 
 "The problems which agitate the life of the most highly developed 
 races should be apparent in embryonic form even among the lowest 
 savages; and since it is so much easier to note all the characteristic 
 points quickly and correctly in such small and transparent organisms, 
 they should help us to understand the more complicated wonders of 
 creation and to reduce legitimate data to law." 
 
 * Cf. "Philosophisch.es Siaatsrecht," sec. 13, 14, where we discussed the unsatisfac- 
 tory nature of this theory, which rests on a one-sided conception of the state. 
 
 t " Grundzueg'en der Ethnologie" 1884. 
 J " Voelkergedanke," p. 71. See " Philosophisches Staatsrecht," sec. 7.
 
 50 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 It would be impossible to comprehend the intellectual 
 genesis of the ' ' more complicated wonders of creation ' ' 
 without resorting to the ' ' smallest organisms. ' ' 
 
 " While modern races, like crystals clear and polished and radiant 
 with beauty, stand out in history in such definite proportions that 
 scientific measurement is quite possible; in the ethnology of savage 
 races, we deal with a chaotic seething mass* which, however, applying 
 a chemical metaphor to race -thoughts, holds primary mental elements 
 in solution." 
 
 These are what Bastian wants. To seek through the 
 great variety of living forms for the earliest germinal stages 
 of the ' ' primary mental elements ' ' and to watch them 
 growing into ' ' race-thoughts ' ' is the task of his ethnology. 
 He has a noble object before him and, with true and justifi- 
 able enthusiasm, he proclaims the way, and the grand 
 visions that will meet the astonished eye when it is reached. 
 
 " After we know the law of development, it is possible to take a per- 
 fected product and trace the stages backwards to the starting point, the 
 relative beginning. Many historical principles have thus been estab- 
 lished. Microscopical analysis may proceed even to the cellular basis 
 of ethnology, wherein reliable facts may be obtained concerning the 
 conditions precedent to existence, concerning the enigma of being and 
 becoming. Hitherto the investigation has been purely philosophical; 
 hereafter psychological inductions will be used." "Diving into the 
 stream of thought, we shall only raise the secrets of mysticism from 
 the dark depths; but having the skeleton race-thoughts objectively 
 before us, we can handle, measure and study them and, by sufficient 
 analysis, reason back to the law of development in thought itself." f 
 
 This law should explain everything, but it can be learned 
 only from the ' ' primary elemental thoughts of savage races 
 and the changes they undergo. ' ' 
 
 "In contrast with narrow ideas of history and the early efforts to 
 attribute religious and social similarities to presumed intercourse in 
 the past, the idea must arise, as the geographical horizon was ex- 
 tended and material increased, that the task of ethnology is to go 
 back to the elementary laws of development in race-psychology; and 
 then to make as much allowance for the admitted causes and only so 
 much as topographical reasons require, "f 
 
 We have perhaps dwelt too long on Bastian 's " History " 
 and "Race-thoughts." Yet the fundamental sociological 
 principles and methodological suggestions contained in them 
 cannot be overvalued. These two works are positively 
 
 * [Et'ne wuest und verworren gaehrende Mutterlauge-] 
 t " Voelkergedanke," p. 76. 
 \ Ibid., p. 119.
 
 THE OUTUNES OF SOCIOLOGY. 51 
 
 epoch-making in sociology. It might have been expected 
 that he would have carried out his ideas in the ' ' Principles 
 of Ethnology," which soon appeared; it might have been 
 expected that, after collecting material for thirty years and 
 after preparing himself by such deep reflections on the 
 character, problem and object of ethnology and "ethnical 
 sociology," he would have given us finally an elaborate 
 presentation of the science. But unfortunately he has not 
 fulfilled this reasonable expectation . Our previous remark 
 is confirmed. The abundance of the material interferes to 
 prevent a clear and complete treatment of the ' ' principles ' ' 
 of the science. 
 
 The most that the later work furnishes seems scanty 
 beside the plan he projected in the two former. Not that 
 the chapters seem deficient in form and matter; but six (!) 
 chapters treating six topics do not comprise all the points 
 which should at least be enumerated among the ' ' principles ' ' 
 of the science. Bastian treats in succession ( i ) geographi- 
 cal provinces, incidentally touching on the question of the 
 unity of the human race; (2) implements, the first vehicle 
 of civilization; (3) property, the foundation of political 
 order; (4) marriage; (5) rights, and (6) religion. But 
 what of phenomena so essential to ' ' ethnical sociology, ' ' as, 
 slavery, sovereignty, state and society, political econ- 
 omy, commerce and the like? Where is there the least 
 intimation of the social development in local centres of 
 civilization ? The development of single institutions, like 
 property, gives no idea of the development of human 
 societies themselves, which in ' ' ethnical sociology ' ' is the 
 most important thing. This is Bastian' s weak point. He 
 is so absorbed with minutiae that he loses sight of the object 
 as a whole. There is also another mistake, mathematical, 
 it might be called. He states the sociological problem incor- 
 rectly, and consequently cannot obtain the correct solution. 
 Starting " from one given point," which is falsely held to be 
 the soul, he wants to explain the social development of 
 human societies as the result of "thought." "In the 
 beginning was the thought." "Thought" grows and 
 develops; all phenomena are but variegated forms of thought, 
 changing with time and circumstances. 
 
 Strange that Faust's misgivings did not warn him.
 
 52 ANNAI^S OF THE; AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 " ' In the Beginuiug was the thought,' 
 This first line let me weigh completely, 
 Lest my impatient pen proceed too fleetly, 
 It is the thought which works, creates, indeed ? " 
 
 Had he taken to heart the deep meaning of the poet's 
 words : 
 
 " Mn the Beginning was the act,' "* 
 
 he would have come closer to the sociological problem. 
 
 Much as he afterwards tried, he never succeeded in eradi- 
 cating idealistic philosophy even from his latest works. At 
 bottom he is always a "race-psychologist," seeking the 
 cause of all social phenomena in the ' ' soul ' ' of each race, 
 but (we speak not as combating idealism with narrow mate- 
 rialism) do we not daily see that it is always the act which 
 excites reflection ? Does not the thought follow ? The act 
 is produced by natural forces that have no connection with 
 the soul. Man acts according to natural law and thinks 
 humanly afterwards, notwithstanding the approved maxim, 
 "first think, then act," the worth of which for the indi- 
 vidual we would never challenge. But social development 
 and the behavior of communities is another thing. Blind 
 natural forces prevail; there is no thought, no reflection, 
 always an onward tendency following eternal laws and 
 manifested in the form of acts. Then the act creates the 
 thought which the idealist refers to the ' ' soul ' ' of the actor as 
 " motive " of the act. As the acts arising from unitary nat- 
 ural laws are harmonious and regular, so are the thoughts; 
 hence the law of the regular growth of ' ' race- thoughts, ' ' Bas- 
 tian's "race-psychology." But we would not in the least 
 depricate Bastian's services by these criticisms. For per- 
 haps no one human being has done so much for science as 
 he, and we hope his services may long be continued. 
 
 We had to say of him that, finding so many trees, he fails 
 to see the forest or, at least, does not let us see it. Now we 
 come to a younger writer, who manages his material mas- 
 terfully and works the great array of scattered ethnological 
 data into great mosaics. Julius I/ippert always presents the 
 whole object in broad lines. 
 
 He began with a special department of sociology, com- 
 parative religion, and has advanced in fact, if not in name, 
 to sociology in the best sense of the word. His first two 
 books, on "Soul Worship" and "Systems of Religion," 
 
 *" Faust." Part I, Scene Hi. Taylor's translation.
 
 THE OUTLINES OK SOCIOLOGY. 53 
 
 were thoroughly reviewed in ' ' Der Rassenkampf. ' ' Let us 
 recall briefly that in them he clearly and convincingly estab- 
 lishes a universal law of the origin and development of 
 religion, thus laying a totally new and a sociological 
 foundation for its scientific stud)^.* 
 
 Undisturbed by the ill-natured criticisms of the Literar- 
 isches Centralblatt , this very productive author has since 
 enriched science, and especially sociology, by two valuable 
 works: the "History of the Family," and the "General 
 History of the Priesthood.''! He possesses a high degree 
 of talent for tracing the development of social or psycho- 
 social institutions through the history of all races and ages. 
 His history of the family is a model of sociological compo- 
 sition. 
 
 "Every man considers his family organization the normal human 
 form and is prejudiced in favor of the writer who thus treats it. But 
 that is not looking at history objectively," 
 
 he says significantly in beginning. Then after gratefully 
 recognizing the services of Bachofen, the discoverer 
 of ' ' mother-right, ' ' and showing us the original mother- 
 family, "organized upon the basis of mother-love," he 
 goes on to show the rising ' ' father-right ' ' and the older 
 father- family, "not resting on the principle of kinship or 
 any consciousness of it, but on the principle of might, sove- 
 reignty and possession."! Finally he shows the latest 
 phase of development, the "younger father-family," "in 
 which the terms father and son have come to imply con- 
 sanguineous relationship." 
 
 He raised Bachofen' s theory of mother-right, which sev- 
 eral writers have since accepted, beyond all further doubt, 
 adducing "rudiments in use and custom," and "allusions 
 in myth and saga. ' ' In this way he threw much light upon 
 primitive groups and the organization of human societies in 
 which ' ' stranger and enemy are synonymous terms ' ' and 
 ' ' all are strangers who are not united by ties of blood or 
 marriage to the same small organization. " 
 
 * " Der Seele ncutt in seinen Beziehungen zur althebraischen Religion." Berlin, 
 1881 ; " Die Religionen der Europaeischen Culturvoelker." Berlin, 1881. 
 
 t "Die Geschichte der_ Familie," Stuttgart, 1884. "Allgemeine Geschichte des Prtest- 
 erthwms," 2 vols., Berlin, 1883, 1884. [The scope of this work includes the study 
 of both the priesthood and priestcraft.] 
 
 J" Geschichte der Familie" p. 5. We developed the same thought in " Rechtsstaat 
 unit Socialism-its," sec. 30. 
 
 g Cf. " Rassenkampf," p. 195 et seq., " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus," sec. 19.
 
 54 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 He discovers that there was a prehistoric variety of the 
 family in Germany ' ' later than the one with maternal suc- 
 cession," one in which the man is "lord of herds and 
 slaves, " " the woman belongs to the man as a part of his 
 possessions ' ' and ' ' her children are his not .simply if and 
 because he begat them, but because the mother is his."* 
 This " ancient family " goes hand in hand with a ' ' developed 
 system of slavery," for the latter " proceeds undeniably 
 from rising father- right " in the older sense, "f 
 
 He shows various stages intermediate between the older 
 and the younger father-family. 
 
 "" Whether the old union shall be preserved or dissolved into separate 
 families, depends on occupation and property -relations largely; but 
 eventually the question arises every where. "J 
 k 
 
 Later, we shall consider whether he has made it perfectly clear 
 that the motives he alleges are sufficient to produce the change ; 
 but it must be recognized that he was the first, so far as we 
 know, to prove that this is the course of development and 
 to attach importance to it. He was the first to call attention 
 to the contrast between the older family and the younger 
 one in which we live. This is no ordinary service, for the 
 problem was a difficult one. ' ' Have we any idea, ' ' he asks 
 justly, " we who are wont to think that family relations 
 are natural and have always existed, have we any idea by 
 what tortuous, weary paths mankind reached this form of 
 existence ?" He has pointed them out with great clearness. 
 The task of the future will be to investigate each stage of 
 the long way in detail. 
 
 Lippert's third sociological problem, the priesthood, sur- 
 passes, if that were possible, both the others in scope and 
 difficulty; for it is intimately connected with almost every- 
 thing that is important sociologically. The priesthood, as a 
 body, has always and everywhere striven to control all 
 spheres of social life ; so that its history necessarily involves 
 consideration of the most important of them : religion, cus- 
 tom, rights, sovereignty, state and society, etc. He did not 
 shrink before the difficulties of the task but has produced a 
 
 *" Geschichte der Famz'lre," p. 95. 
 t Ibid., p. 141. 
 \Ibid., p. 221. 
 \ Ibid., p. 216.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 55 
 
 significant sociological work which is a pioneer in several 
 directions. 
 
 He starts with the same theory that the root of all 
 religions is in " soul- worship ' ' and that religious ceremonies 
 are derived from religious conceptions. 
 
 " Especially is it a fact," he continues, " that the unseen is not 
 thought of as a natural force, even when manifested in a natural 
 effect ; but it is conceived to be a personal spirit analogous to the 
 human soul. The savage is utterly unable to comprehend a natural 
 force; but as soon as he begins to think logically every death sug- 
 
 tests the idea of a personal spirit. It is only by grasping this fact 
 rmly that we can see how religious observances, however complex, 
 originate in human logic and how the unity of the latter explains the 
 essential similarity of the former even to the remotest corners of the 
 earth."* 
 
 This citation indicates the plan of the work and justifies 
 the method of general treatment adopted. At bottom, Bas- 
 tian's thought is the same; but his terms, race-soul and 
 race-thought, are less clear than L,ippert's plain "unity of 
 human logic." Since human logic, when stimulated by one 
 and the same fact, soul-worship, can not conceal its char- 
 acter even in the complex texture of religious observances, 
 it must be universally demonstrable that the principle un- 
 derlying them is unitary; and this I/ippert has succeeded 
 in doing by describing the life of the groups individually. 
 For though soul-worship originated everywhere in the most 
 primitive human logic, its development varied with the kind 
 and degree of social life in each group. It would be impos- 
 sible for us here to present the development of the priesthood 
 in detail, the world over, as he does or discuss the purely- 
 sociological questions involved. But his view on the ques- 
 tion fundamental to all sociology, the origin of political 
 organizations, must be presented because it differs essen- 
 tially from that which we have hitherto defended and upon 
 which we base the present work. While we hold that every 
 political organization, and hence every developing civiliza- 
 tion, begins at the moment when one horde permanently 
 subjects another; and while we do not hesitate to recognize 
 that the most cruel and barbarous conquerors are the blind 
 instruments of human progress and powerfully promote 
 civilization, nay even found it; Lippert sees nothing but 
 the victory of ' ' barbarism ' ' over ' ' civilization ' ' in the un- 
 deniable fact that states are founded by conquest. He holds 
 
 * "Geschichte des Priesterthums" p. 13.
 
 56 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 that civilization begins and grows in ' ' peaceful ' ' compan- 
 ionship within the primitive horde, defending the view 
 warmly and decrying the opposing view attributed to the 
 ' ' school-books. ' ' We are free to confess that his views en- 
 list our sympathies; we would gladly accept them in prefer- 
 ence to our own if we could be convinced of their truth. 
 But we will reserve the discussion until later, simply citing 
 some of his statements here. 
 
 "Mexican history," he says, "is full of tales of invasion, but in 
 every case dominion fell to the rude sons of barbarism; not one of the 
 conquering races, Toltecs, Chichimechs, and Aztecs in turn, brought 
 civilization to the charming land of Anahuac. Rather, the old tragedy 
 was oft repeated. The races which had been hundreds and perhaps 
 thousands of years in rearing a civilization in their upland valleys are 
 the ' good house-wives ' of history, of whom nobody speaks. But the 
 Bedouins, repeatedly breaking in from the wilderness of barbarism, 
 often beaten off, but finally victorious, made civilized man with all his 
 skill their slave, and they are praised as the creators of it all. In the 
 school-books they are called the founders of civilization, as if they had 
 brought it from the wilderness. The sympathizer with those quiet 
 and ceaseless workers, the lineage of peace, must be satisfied if the 
 object of his regard is not accused of the most profligate ' corruption ' 
 which a healthful breeze from the desert must needs blow away. 
 Fortunately the conquerors do not always want to destroy all of it. 
 They are ready to adopt the most serviceable parts and even to increase 
 and extend them by the power of organization."* 
 
 lyippert makes no secret of the fact that his judgment is 
 influenced by sympathy with the conquered; which makes 
 his opinion the less objective. Moreover, he concedes to 
 the ' ' rude sons of barbarism, " a ' ' power of organization ' ' 
 sufficient to ' ' increase and extend ' ' the civilization of the 
 ' ' lineage of peace. ' ' We are thankful for both the confes- 
 sion and the concession. Later we shall have occasion to 
 show that ' ' power of organization " is an invaluable trait 
 of the ' ' ntde sons of barbarism ' ' and that the ' ' lineage of 
 peace," after being powerfully organized, will add not 
 " sand upon sand " but block upon block, " to rear a civili- 
 zation." But reserving the discussion, let us hear further 
 evidence in support of his views. 
 
 Historians have generally followed Garcilasso de la Vega 
 in dating the beginning of Peruvian civilization from the 
 
 * Ibid. , Vol. i, p. 288. [Xippert distinguishes between the nomads and the Bedou- 
 ins. As characteristic of the latter, he mentions "changeable abode, irregular 
 
 ny 
 
 auv null vv.ull.ii rtlUJLllel llcl.n V-Ulll Vrl LCU , HUH L11C L 
 
 " Culturgeschichte," Stuttgart, 1886, Vol. i, p. 182.]
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 57 
 
 time when the lucas conquered the ancient Peruvians and 
 founded a kingdom. I^ippert discards this conception and 
 agrees with the views of the English traveler Hutchinson, 
 who is ' ' convinced from personal inspection that we are 
 here dealing with a civilization that began long before the 
 time of the Incas and progressed gradually . " ' ' This opinion 
 will doubtless gain ground," says L/ippert; and he believes 
 himself justified in considering that the government of the 
 Incas, as well as that of the Toltecs and Chichimecs, was 
 ' ' the dominion of an energetic conqueror over races that had 
 already founded a settled civilization." This may be the 
 case, however, without justifying L,ippert's theory. Every- 
 where we see repeated instances of civilized states subjected 
 by more or less " barbarous " conquerors; as China was by 
 the Mongols and Roman Italy by the Goths and other Ger- 
 man tribes. The Incas were not necessarily the first con- 
 querors, the Anglo-Saxons, of Peru; they may have been its 
 Normans. This argument alone is not sufficient to confirm 
 Lippert's theory of the generatio aquivoca, the problematic 
 genesis, of civilization. 
 
 Again, ancient Egypt is cited. " The historical events " 
 seem to L,ippert not ' ' essentially different from those which 
 welded the Peruvian state together." But they may be 
 explained in more than one way and, it seems to us, justify 
 I/ippert's views less than the Peruvian and Mexican cases 
 cited. 
 
 " As there the low country on the holy lake, so here the rich delta 
 lands of the holy river between desert and wilderness first invited to 
 permanent occupation. The races in the delta, pressed by the 
 nomadic hordes to the border of the sea, had to sustain life in perma- 
 nent settlements by provident labor; they subdued the waters and 
 made the first stride toward civilization, learning to feel their higher 
 human value in comparison with the barbarians." 
 
 Let us not forget that L,ippert is here speaking of the 
 "object" of his "sympathy:" 
 
 " We may assume," he continues, "that there was in antiquity a 
 like number of small tribes leading a pastoral life and cultivating a 
 
 Eiece of land incidentally, as many modern Africans do, yet never 
 saving a certain definite territory. The fertility of the inundated 
 lands permitted such an arrangement and the ' red-land ' of the 
 desert remained the home of the nomads." 
 
 After this rather apodictic description of the settlement of 
 the "lineage of peace " on the lowlands of the Nile, he goes 
 on somewhat doubtfully:
 
 58 ANNAIS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 " Naturally we do not know how the lowland races of antiquity 
 became politically united. But the union might very well be due to 
 the advance of the nomadic hordes which even to-day sweep over the 
 plains and neighboring deserts. Certain it is that in historical times, 
 as well as in prehistoric Mexico, tribes of higher civilization have 
 been united politically under the sovereignty of tribes of younger 
 civilization; among whom the tribes spreading over both plain and 
 desert must doubtless be reckoned."* 
 
 However much we may sympathize with Lippert's theory, 
 is this statement of the facts sufficient to convince us of its 
 correctness ? He is unable to explain ' ' how the prehistoric 
 lowland races became united politically." We should 
 explain, though only by analogy from historical experience, 
 that political union and organization were in all probability 
 due to subjection by the " sons of barbarism. " This is not 
 a pleasant explanation either to Ljppert or to us; but it 
 seems to be the only correct one. We hold that sociological 
 laws prevail unchanged whether we have historical evidence 
 of the fact or not. Applying I,y ell's geological methodf to 
 sociology, we should say that the "sovereignty" of the 
 "rude sons of barbarism " was necessary to organize the 
 " lineage of peace " and to cause the succeeding development 
 of civilization. As Lippert concedes that he knows no 
 explanation, he should not take it amiss when we say that 
 his theory is simply an interpretation of the facts dictated by 
 sympathy with one party and consequent antipathy toward 
 the other. But we leave the question unsettled. It is 
 possible that in some lands civilization arose from the 
 subjection of one tribe to another and that in other lands it 
 was autogenetic in the ' ' lineage of peace. ' ' However, 
 autogenesis is contrary to the experience of historical times 
 and needs to be established beyond a doubt. 
 
 This indication of the contents of L,ippert's work must 
 suffice. It is not possible even to trace the course of his 
 investigations into the development of the priesthood, much 
 less to do justice to the many historical and sociological 
 questions which he treats from new standpoints. He is 
 master of the art of giving life and artistic shape to the 
 sociological material which others have collected; with that 
 we must stop. 
 
 * " Priesterthum" Vol. i, p. 380. 
 
 t Cf. " Der Rassenkampf'' pp. 172 et seg. [Lyell's " Principles of Geology "has 
 the sub-title "An Attempt to Explain the Former Changes in the Earth's Surface 
 by Reference to Causes now in Operation."]
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 59 
 
 Comte, Spencer, Bastiau and L,ippert are the leaders ill 
 sociology. What others have done is of secondary impor- 
 tance and will be mentioned incidentally as the discussion 
 proceeds. But we must speak of several whole branches of 
 science which concern sociology more or less intimately and 
 co-operate to prepare the ground for it in various ways. 
 
 First in order are economics and politics, in which it was 
 very difficult to get an adequate conception of society. What 
 Mohl, Gneist and Stein did in this direction, we have duly 
 commended elsewhere ; * it is only necessary to recall that these 
 scientists conceived society to be preponderantly economic. 
 Especially Stein has only ' ' economic ' ' groups of men in mind 
 though, to be sure, he is thinking of their relation to the state 
 as political power ' ' above society. ' ' This simple economic 
 conception of society, partial as it is in view of social 
 questions, pervades political economy so thoroughly as to 
 make it in common speech the "social science." Carey's 
 " Principles of Social Science," wherein he handles political 
 economy simply, had the same effect. Baerenbach, in his 
 bibliographical sketch of the " social sciences," treats politi- 
 cal economists chiefly, noting their relation to the "social 
 questions ' ' in particular. Likewise Menger, discussing the 
 ' ' Method of the Social Sciences, ' ' treats the method of po- 
 litical economy alone, which he looks upon as pre-eminently, 
 xar' i^oyyv, the social science. In spite of this narrowness, 
 the great sociological importance of political economy should 
 not be overlooked. It was the first science that recognized 
 that men's actions, which alone it considered, were con- 
 trolled by economic laws. Seeing that the regular transi- 
 tions from one economic phase to another were determined 
 by external factors, political economists were forced to accept 
 the idea of development in accordance with law. What is 
 still more important, political economy had in the nature of 
 the case to treat not individuals, who might evade every rule 
 and law, but social groups: landlords, manufacturers, mer- 
 chants, artisans, laborers, agriculturists, etc. So political 
 economy became the best fitting school for sociology; and 
 economic thought led the way to sociological thought. 
 
 The connection between political economy and sociology 
 nowhere appears so prominently as in Carey's works. But 
 this is due to this versatility. His field of view extends far 
 
 *" Philosophisches Staatsrecht,'' sec. 12; " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus," sec. 15- 
 22, 28.
 
 60 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 beyond the merely economic events of social life. The man 
 who defended the unity of science in Comte's sense and 
 strove to demonstrate it in all the phenomena of life, could 
 not be content to consider economic events exclusively. He 
 made very instructive digressions on various sociological 
 matters.* 
 
 The socialists also were pioneers in sociology. They 
 pointed out that the relations between the laboring and the 
 property classes, between large and small industries, etc., 
 develop in conformity to law.f 
 
 Next to political economy, the science of comparative law 
 has accumulated the most valuable sociological material and 
 awakened the most fundamental ideas. Since every domain 
 of social life fashions its own rights, this science embraces 
 the whole social order and every domain may be considered 
 from its point of view. 
 
 Sporadic attempts at scientific comparison long since dem- 
 onstrated that, among the most various peoples of ancient 
 and modern times, similar rights rise and develop analo- 
 gously to a degree that is inadequately explained by assuming 
 historical relationship and transfer of ideas. We have seen 
 how Bastian protests and offers instead an explanation based 
 on race-psychology. In any event reflective comparison 
 must suggest that rights develop according to law; and from 
 this idea it is only a step to a " Natural Law ' ' and a 
 "Natural Science of Rights, "J as Post called his earliest 
 writings. In them he presented the physical idea that ' ' the 
 world's history is the unfolding of material forces b}' the 
 specialization of universal types. ' ' But as he worked at the 
 problem incessantly year after year he emancipated himself 
 from this idea so that, in another series of writings, he made 
 a very objective compilation of interesting material for a 
 comparative science of rights. The subtitles of these works 
 are characteristic of the general course of his ideas. While 
 the first, in 1875 and 1876, were introductory contributions 
 to a " universal comparative science of rights," he offers in 
 
 * " Principles of Social Science," Philadelphia, 1857-67, 3 vols. Cf. Stoepel's intro- 
 duction to the German translation of Carey's " Unity of Law." Berlin, 1878. 
 
 t Cf. " Rechtsslaat und Socialismus" bk. ii. 
 
 \ " Naturgeschichie des Rechts," 1867; " Naturwissenschaft des Rechts" 1872. Cf. 
 " Philosophisches Staatsrechl,' 1 ' p 168 et seq. 
 
 fi " Geschlechtsgenossenschaft der Urzeit," 1875. "Ursprung des Rechts." 1876; 
 " An fang des Staats- und Rechtslebens," 1878; " Bausteine fuer fine Allgemeine 
 Recktswissenschafl," 1880-81 ; "Die Grundlage des Rechts und die Grundzuege seiner 
 En twickelu ngsgesch ich te," 1 884 .
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 61 
 
 1880-81 material for a "comparative ethnological basis" 
 for the science, and in his latest work, in 1884, attempts to 
 construct ' ' a universal science of rights on a sociological 
 basis." Thus we see that from all sides, ethnology, politi- 
 cal economy, and comparative law, scientific ideas tend 
 toward sociology and help to establish it. 
 
 However, traces of his ' ' physical ' ' views of the science 
 still appear. In most of his works he advances the idea of 
 ' ' species-organism, ' ' an order of structure higher than 
 natural organisms. We can not accept any such idea, 
 because there is no reality behind it; but we shall not dis- 
 pute with him, as he uses the term less and less frequently 
 and drops it altogether in his latest work. 
 
 With this correction, we can accept his views of the devel- 
 opment of juridical and political life. " There are definite 
 laws," he writes, "for the development of every organic 
 structure within the human race and above individuals," 
 for the development of human communities, we should say ; 
 
 " and they can be discovered by comparing the corresponding periods 
 of development of all the species-organisms which are living or have 
 lived on the earth. It is the first task of the future political and juri- 
 dical science to determine them."* 
 
 He distinguishes several phases in the history of the 
 "species-organism," the first of which he calls a " kith and 
 kin, "f or "peace" confederation. 
 
 ' ' The most primitive form of organization in the life of the human 
 species is the confederation of kith and kin, a number of men leagued 
 together, on the basis of common blood, for (?) offence and defence." 
 
 This forcibly recalls the " social contract." We should 
 substitute in its stead the simple ' ' primitive horde ' ' as the 
 first natural recognizable fact. It is neither an " alliance," 
 which implies a previous state or act of separation, nor an 
 "offensive and defensive" alliance, which would imply a 
 " social contract." Yet, with a slight correction, the " kith 
 and kin ' ' confederation might stand as the most primitive 
 social formation, if Post's statement of its development into 
 higher social forms could be accepted. But that is difficult, 
 for he neither explains development nor shows on what it is 
 based, but presents it as spontaneously following an inner 
 law. 
 
 * " Ursprung des Rechts" p. 7. 
 
 t [Geschlechtsgenossenschaft=Tsiih and kin con federation. 1
 
 62 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 " Every form of organization," he writes, " proceeds from this and 
 can be traced back to it. The kith and kin confederation is the nor- 
 mal form of organization in hunting and nomadic races and by growth 
 from within outward is often extended beyond the narrow circle 
 originally included until it has become a system of tribes or a race 
 with institutions considerably developed." 
 
 This is not clear. Such development never takes place by 
 ' 'growth from within outward. ' ' Besides Post takes no account 
 of the motives and factors impelling it. " When the kith 
 and kin confederation adopts a settled life its old constitution 
 decays to a certain degree. ' ' * How it becomes settled does 
 not worry him. ' ' It takes place, " " the confederation de- 
 cays, ' ' he says, content that there is some ' ' law ' ' behind 
 the changes. But such statements are unsatisfactory, to 
 the sociologist at least. Although Post's services in the 
 domain of juridical science must be recognized and although 
 he has industriously collected suitable material and tirelessly 
 incited to sociological investigations, his treatment of social 
 development is not thorough; it shows that he has no clear 
 idea of what social development is. Even his latest work 
 on the ' ' Basis of Rights and the History of their Develop- 
 ment, ' ' though clearer and indicating progress in every direc- 
 tion, is still unsatisfactory on this point. We can overlook 
 his old hobby, that ' ' the human race, like every organic 
 race on our planet, constitutes a biological organism;" f but 
 we must reproach him for retaining, even in his latest work, 
 the fundamentally false views of social development criticised 
 above, especially as the literature of the subject ought to 
 have helped him to make many corrections. He says, e. g. , 
 that 
 
 "a number of individuals descended from a common parent or 
 parents, affords a nucleus from which a tribe may arise. As the off- 
 spring grow up, the procreative process is continued and the tribe 
 becomes a union of tribes. After a number of generations, we speak 
 of a race, then of a people, then of allied peoples." 
 
 But what scientific proof does he offer ? The same naive 
 idea underlies the Biblical story and leads with infallible 
 logic back to Adam and Kve. Or is it a scientific explana- 
 tion of development to say that ' ' with the decay of common 
 tribal life the mutual rights and duties of the individual 
 members are differentiated," | and that after the "gradual 
 
 * " Ursprung des Rechts" p. u. 
 
 f " Grundlagen und Grundzuege," p. 16. 
 
 t Ibid., p. 75.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 63 
 
 decay of original universal common life,"* the "human in- 
 dividual by degrees becomes endowed with rights, "f which 
 " slowly develop in times of peace." J These are simply 
 vague propositions about unclear ideas; consequently they 
 make nothing clear. 
 
 But we must be grateful for the material which Post has 
 accumulated, in spite of its defective presentation. He also 
 deserves full recognition for tirelessly disseminating the idea 
 of a " natural science of rights "of a " comparative ethno- 
 logical science of rights," and finally of " social science." 
 
 He conceives the social problem quite in Bastiaii's sense 
 however. 
 
 " The great fundamental thought of modern social science is to discover 
 the essential nature of the human mind from what it has deposited in 
 the several domains of race-life. Sociological jurisprudence searches 
 for the essential nature of the human juridical consciousness in what 
 it has deposited in the juridical views and institutions of all races of 
 the earth." 
 
 With Post as with Bastian, the "mind," "conscious- 
 ness," is the primary, the world-moving principle, so to 
 speak, the object of all investigation ; and social phenomena 
 are only means of exploring this inmost cause of all that 
 happens. We shall soon have opportunity to demonstrate 
 our own view that what happens of natural necessity is 
 primary and emits ' ' mind ' ' as flowers do fragrance. 
 "Juridical institutions" are not the deposit of juridical 
 consciousness. On the contrary, the latter is deposited 
 from the former. History begets the mind, not the mind 
 history. 
 
 Political economy and the comparative study of rights and 
 religion concern particular domains of social life and hence 
 anticipate parts only of sociology. There are other branches 
 of philosophy, however, which have treated the supreme 
 problem of sociology itself, or at least its most important 
 principle, though not under that name. 
 
 Here we will mention only the philosophy of history. It 
 treats of the historical development of mankind; its object 
 is to seek the "philosophical idea." It is clear how close 
 
 *Ibid., p. 76. 
 t Ibid., p. 83. 
 \ Ibid., p. 87. 
 
 oped gradually 
 
 done with sociology at once
 
 64 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 it approaches to the supreme problem of sociology; and the 
 sociological importance of its literature is apparent at once. 
 
 Pretty much everything written on this subject before 
 1876 is summed up in R. Rocholl's prize essay. Rocholl 
 has mastered the art of letting all the philosophers of the 
 world speak through him, while he betrays not a single 
 original thought to the acutest reader. A whole volume, 
 and nothing original ! He understands how prizes are won. 
 Whoever is curious to see all that philosophers would 
 interpret into the history of mankind should read this book. 
 It makes the reader dizzy; or, he thinks that Rocholl is 
 exhibiting a fools' gallery. In fact, the philosophy of history 
 was an untimely birth. The ' ' idea in human history ' ' 
 was spoken of before anyone half understood what human 
 history was. For, what is the bit of Mediterranean history 
 compared with all the actual history of man on this planet 
 which the philosophers knew nothing about ? How childish 
 any opinion of the whole when they knew only the least 
 part! 
 
 Yet the stimulus of their sociological ideas is considerable. 
 The most important difference between sociology and the 
 philosophy of history is that the latter would deliver an 
 opinion on a whole which it did not know; whereas sociology, 
 being aware that the whole can never be known, will judge 
 only of a process which is the same here and everywhere, 
 which transpires in the same way to-day before our eyes as 
 it transpired thousands of years ago. Sociology declines in 
 advance to interpret the whence and the whither and the 
 wherefore. This is its claim to decided pre-eminence over 
 the philosophy of history, from the ill success of which it 
 learns valuable lessons. 
 
 The transition from philosophy of history to sociology 
 was more direct in France than elsewhere. In Germany 
 the so-called history of civilization intervened. The history 
 of human civilization from its beginning to the present day 
 is almost, at least might easily become, sociology. Kolb, 
 Henne am Rhyn, and especially Hellwald, have accom- 
 plished much in this field, correcting many things that the 
 philosophers had spoiled. They introduced a wholesome 
 soberness into the conception of human development. The 
 indefatigable Hellwald makes use of all sorts of anthropo- 
 logical and ethnological material, extending the horizon of 
 the history of civilization even to the ultimate beginning of
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 65 
 
 prehistoric time. The investigations of L,ubbock, Tylor 
 and Caspari in this field are especially helpful; and in 
 anthropology and ethnology Waitz-Gerland, Perty and 
 Peschel have contributed their share of valuable sociological 
 material. 
 
 Thus, there is no lack of sociological material, and Comte, 
 Spencer, Bastian and lyippert have imparted the breath of 
 life to sociology; may it never lack for disciples to labor in 
 it and cherish it unremittingly.* 
 
 * [For a sketch of the sociological writings of Gustave le Bon, see Appendix A.]
 
 II. FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTIONS. 
 
 I. THE THREE CLASSES OF PHENOMENA. 
 
 It is an old saying that division and classification are 
 means to knowledge. The more appropriate the means, 
 the greater is the profit that may be expected from their use. 
 To this end that which has been characterized as the ' ' world 
 of phenomena," all the phenomena that surround us, has 
 been repeatedly classified. But with increasing knowledge, 
 the plan of classification has to be changed ; deeper and 
 deeper grounds of division are discovered, approximating 
 nearer and nearer to the very essence of the phenomena. A 
 superficial examination served to distinguish animate from in- 
 animate nature. According to another very common classifi- 
 cation, the phenomena that were perceived by the organs of 
 sense were put in one class and those that were perceived by 
 the mental faculties were put in another; the former were 
 called material, the latter mental phenomena. 
 
 As knowledge advanced, inanimate nature was divided 
 into inorganic and organic. Then another class, composed 
 of phenomena which were referred to the soul of man as 
 source, was co-ordinated with the organic and characterized 
 as psychic. Thus three classes, inorganic, organic, and 
 psychic,* were obtained. It is apparent from the termin- 
 ology itself what phenomena are included under each class ; 
 and it is just as clear that this classification is intimately 
 connected with a given stage of human knowledge, with the 
 knowledge of the distinction between inorganic and organic 
 matter. It seemed desirable not to call organic matter 
 simply "inanimate ;" for the inorganic inanimate had to be 
 distinguished. But there was also a growing conviction 
 that all of man's actions, his whole behavior, at least all the 
 phenomena affected by him, have their basis in a soul 
 (psyche) which is found in man and is peculiar to him. If 
 convictions change on this point, if it is discovered that 
 there is no such soul, that man's thoughts, and the whole 
 
 *To cite one example among thousands, Ruemelin in his essay on the "Laws 
 of History" ("Jfeden und Aufsaetze," neue Folge, p. 118) speaks of the" phenomena 
 of inanimate nature, of the organic and of the psychic world." We shall recur to 
 this essay later in another connection. 
 
 (66)
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 67 
 
 of his so-called spiritual life, is only a manifestation of the 
 physiological functions of his organism, that basis of classi- 
 fication will be dropped; the psychic phenomena will be 
 included with the organic. 
 
 Thus classification is a means of promoting knowledge; 
 and knowledge acquired is, in turn, the basis of new and 
 more accurate classifications. But it often happens that 
 phenomena are forced upon our attention which we cannot 
 immediately identify with any class hitherto known ; we are 
 not sure how to classify them. In such cases, we include 
 them in some class already constituted, in spite of the differ- 
 ences, or we make a sub-class for them; or, finally, having 
 found some characteristic which is peculiar to them, we pro- 
 ceed to constitute a totally new class. A recent instance is 
 furnished by the " social " phenomena. It was observed 
 that they differed from other phenomena; there were many 
 reasons why they should be recognized as a special class. 
 But nobody knew exactly what to do with them. They 
 could not be included with either the organic or the inor- 
 ganic; they presented the characteristics of neither the 
 animate nor the inanimate; they did not seem to be purely 
 psychic, for they did not emanate from the individual soul; 
 indeed they appeared to sweep whole aggregates of men, in 
 spite of will and consciousness, along with them. So they 
 presented a problem of classification, the solution of which 
 was attempted in various ways. 
 
 It was perceived that especially those phenomena which 
 are manifested in the state, political revolutions, party con- 
 flicts, political endeavors, etc. , are social. Some attempted 
 to class them all with "organic" phenomena. It is really 
 so comfortable in old quarters, where everything is familiar, 
 that people will cramp themselves a little, if necessary, in 
 order to avoid the trouble of moving! Hence arose the 
 " organic " theory of the state. SchaefSe has shown that 
 all the so-called social phenomena are in reality nothing but 
 " organic functions of the social body," which has cells, tissue, 
 nerve, muscle, flesh, bones and blood, just like every animal 
 organism. There are still people, not only in Germany but 
 in France, who accept this literally; we do not. 
 
 There were others who were less imaginative and more 
 reflective, yet abhorred the overthrow of old and familiar 
 arrangements no less than the former. They represented 
 that everything that takes place in connection with the state
 
 68 ANNAI^S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 is manifestly done by man for who else could do it ? But 
 whatever man does issues from the soul within him. Hence 
 social phenomena are psychic. To be sure, a social occur- 
 rence is different from an individual thought or feeling. But 
 the difference can be disposed of by making a sub-class, 
 "psychic" is "psychic." Thus that estimable scholar, 
 Ruemelin (again from many examples citing the one we 
 have first at hand) , treats social phenomena as psychic and 
 "social laws as a special kind of psychic " laws.* 
 
 But we can no more consent to subordinate social phe- 
 nomena under the psychic than we can to reckon them as 
 organic. Rather it seems to us proper to divide the phe- 
 nomena which we perceive into three classes: physical, 
 mental and social. 
 
 We classify social phenomena apart from all others 
 because the ends of scientific investigation will be best served 
 by treating them separatel)*". They constitute a unique 
 group, distinguished by several fundamental traits. 
 
 It is certain that they cannot be perceived by the senses, 
 and there was thus much reason for reckoning them with 
 mental phenomena. But social phenomena happen only 
 through the co-operation of a number of men, of an aggre- 
 gate; whereas mental phenomena, strictly so-called, are 
 inseparable from the mind of the individual. They originate 
 in it and are limited to it. Thus all conditions of the soul, 
 all scientific activity and each artistic manifestation of the 
 human mind, all works in art and science so far as the 
 mind perceives them, all thoughts and ideas which, issuing 
 from the human mind, are perceived by the mind, are 
 mental phenomena. But all relations of men with one 
 another, all their economic, political and juridical relations, 
 for example, are social. A number or aggregate of men is 
 their distinguishing trait. It is not necessarily present in 
 mental phenomena in the real sense, but without it a social 
 phenomenon is unthinkable. 
 
 As the classification of phenomena is only an aid to 
 knowledge, and as the world which envelops us is strictly 
 one and unitary, so, it is conceived, there is only one 
 science. For, as we have shown elsewhere, f the object of 
 science is to discover the laws that control the sequence and 
 
 * " Ueber sociale Gesetze," in the Tuebinger Zeitschrift fur die gesammten Staats- 
 wissenschaften, 1868, pp. 1341 "8. 
 
 t " Philosophisches Slaatsrecht." Vienna, 1887, sec. I. " Rechtsstaat und Socialis- 
 mus." Innsbruck, 1881. Part i, sec. i.
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 69 
 
 the development of phenomena. Yet the division of science 
 into parts devoted to particular classes of phenomena is 
 common and has been recognized as proper. It satisfies the 
 need of a division of scientific labor. The division into 
 "natural" sciences and "mental" (or moral or ethico- 
 political) sciences is the best known and the most usual. It 
 is parallel with the classification of phenomena as physical 
 and mental. 
 
 The natural sciences dealt with the phenomena of organic 
 and inorganic nature and with the physical laws governing 
 them. The mental sciences sought for the laws controlling 
 the human mind. Then, when Comte and Quetelet classi- 
 fied social phenomena apart for scientific study and asserted 
 that they too were controlled by fixed laws, the question of 
 defining social laws arose. It was not easy to explain what 
 they were. Yet, if there is a science of social phenomena, 
 if there is such a thing as sociology, we must be able to give 
 a clear positive definition of social laws. 
 
 In order to define them we must recall what a natural law 
 is. Applying our idea of a natural law in general to social 
 phenomena, we shall get an idea of what a social natural 
 law, or, briefly, a social law is in the abstract. Finally, we 
 shall test the objections commonly raised to the existence 
 of social laws. If they can be refuted we may enter the 
 domain of social science. For to this we must hold fast: 
 without social laws there can be no social science. 
 
 When we find the same phenomena time and again occur- 
 ring together or in the same order, we say that it is due to 
 a law. Obviously, we are using an analogy. When an act 
 of legislation directs how a thing shall be done, it is uni- 
 formly done in the prescribed way. When, in nature, we 
 see a phenomenon repeatedly occurring in the same form, 
 we conceive that it is the result of some higher will incorpor- 
 ated in a " law," and we speak of the law of the phenomena 
 without hesitation. We thus acquire for a series of phe- 
 nomena an easily intelligible expression, a simple formula.* 
 
 The question then arises: Can such laws be stated for 
 social phenomena also; in a word, are there social laws? 
 We ought to answer in the affirmative if there are social 
 phenomena which constantly occur together or in the same 
 order, so that we may ascribe them to an hypothetical higher 
 will, to a "law," as we do physical phenomena. That the 
 
 *Mill, " System of Logic," Bk. iii, cap. iv.
 
 70 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 mutual deportment of social groups, the formation of social 
 communities, their development and their decay so occur, 
 history and experience prove undeniably. Hence, we may 
 direct investigation in the social domain with a view to 
 formulating the social laws of those phenomena. 
 
 This matter is so simple and self-evident that there would 
 seem to be no need of wasting any more words over it. 
 But, unfortunately, it is not acknowledged by everybody. 
 The formulation of social laws, i. e. , natural laws of social 
 development, is violently opposed by some who are anxious 
 to maintain man's free-will in its integrity. For it is feared 
 that a death-blow would be dealt it, if natural laws of social 
 development were generally accepted. 
 
 The struggle between these two principles, whether to 
 apply natural law or free-will to social phenomena, is well 
 portrayed by Ruemelin's experience. His candor deserves 
 special recognition. In his earlier years this scholar was 
 inclined to accept natural law in social phenomena which, 
 as we have seen, he made a sub-class of the psychic. He 
 expressed this view in an academic discourse ' ' On the 
 Concept of Social Law "* in 1868. After defining natural 
 law in general to be "an elementary expression for the 
 uniform behavior of force in each and every case," he 
 questioned ' ' whether this idea of law which is taken origin- 
 ally from the processes of inanimate nature is also applicable 
 to the processes of animate nature," and answered in the 
 affirmative, though with no great assurance. 
 
 " As a result, we have found three kinds of forces," he said, "physical, 
 organic and psychic; no other kind can be conceived co-ordinate with 
 them. Social phenomena are a sub-class of the psychic. There are 
 two kinds of psychic phenomena, the psychological and the social." 
 
 He seems to concede almost without reserve that the phe- 
 nomena of political economy are social. Since this science 
 
 "starts, expressly or tacitly, with the hypothesis that man hasa strong 
 inclination to supply himself plentifully and at the least possible 
 cost with the means of satisfying his desires," it " seems quite proper 
 that the fundamental propositions concerning competition, the move- 
 ments of prices and wages, and the circulation of money should be 
 called laws. They fulfill the requirements exactly. They indicate the 
 elementary and uniform behavior of psychic forces in a mass " or 
 aggregate. 
 
 As to whether the so-called statistical laws should be 
 recognized as social, Ruemelin has serious doubts. 
 
 *' Ueber den Begriffeines socialen Gesetzes." Tuebinger Zeitschrifl, 1868.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 71 
 
 "Psychology," he argues, "considers the psychic forces observable 
 on typical individuals to be characteristic of the class ; social science 
 observes the same forces operating in aggregates of individuals and 
 notices the changes thus produced. Hence social laws should express 
 in elementary form the behavior of psychic forces in aggregates." 
 
 But he is not certain that statistical laws satisfy these con- 
 ditions. Some weighty objections prevent him from recog- 
 nizing that everything proclaimed by the statisticians to be 
 law is social; and he is right perhaps. He sees in the rea- 
 soning of the statistician, Quetelet, especially, "significant 
 truths and serious misunderstandings compactly woven 
 together;" and in that, too, we will agree with him. He 
 closes his "Search for Social Laws" unsatisfied. "The 
 return was not great." But that is no occasion of reproach. 
 4 ' The youngest sciences are always the hardest, " so he com- 
 forts the sociologists. ' ' They treat problems that others 
 had quite overlooked or had not the means to grapple with." 
 He has the " highest opinion of the future of statistics, of 
 the scientific value of a methodical observation of facts, if 
 continued and developed." In short, he does not give up 
 hope that real social laws may thereby be discovered, though 
 he does not conceal his misgivings. This was in 1868. 
 
 Ten years later he spoke again on the ' ' laws of history, ' ' 
 and described the observations he had made in the mean- 
 while. The riper scholar's disappointment is undisguised. 
 The hopes he had cherished a decade before had been com- 
 pletely dissipated. The serious doubts he had entertained 
 had been fully verified. 
 
 " I thought that there must be " social laws, he says almost sadly, 
 "and that statistics would be especially helpful in discovering them. 
 I have had the task constantly in mind for many years ; I have sought 
 for them not simply in statistics and in the theory of society, but in 
 history and in philosophy too. I have fallen upon numerous cases of 
 uniformity, upon rules of experience of comprehensive import, upon 
 positive causal connections ; but never upon any thing answering to 
 the formula for a law, never upon proposition expressing the elemen- 
 tary, uniform behavior of psychic forces in an aggregate." 
 
 Then he explains why his search was futile. He is 
 ' ' inclined ' ' to believe ' ' that the problem was not properly 
 stated and that what he sought is not susceptible of 
 being found. ' ' The ultimate cause of failure he discovers 
 in the fact that " physical and psychic phenomena differ 
 from one another even as incomparable quantities." 
 
 " Between material existence and motion in space on the one hand, 
 and feeling, thought and volition on the other, there is a chasm which
 
 72 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 cannot be filled and has not yet been bridged." Hence, " it would be 
 strange if one and the same concept of law were applicable to both." 
 
 Thus we see Ruemelin coming again in his later years full 
 sail into the sea of dualism; and it ought not to seem remark- 
 able that, in following out the fundamental opposition be- 
 tween mind and matter, he should dispute the possibility of 
 law in the province of the former since "man's free-will" 
 prevails there. Then come the old arguments on the old 
 theme. 
 
 "Whoever denies freedom of the will is bound to show natural laws 
 determining will and excluding choice. It is said by some, for ex- 
 ample, that the strongest motive must of necessity determine the 
 human will. If this were something more than worthless tautol- 
 ogy (?); if it were only explained what beside the will could make a 
 motive the strongest!" 
 
 Strange prepossession! Why should not external circum- 
 stances make a motive the strongest ? and how can a deus ex 
 machina named "will ' ' strengthen a motive, i. e. , an external 
 factor ? The external factor works with the force inhering 
 in it in the given conditions as the steam does in the locomo- 
 tive. Must the will still mediate that the force of the 
 steam may overcome the force of inertia ? No more in the 
 case of man is this putative mediation and assistance of 
 will necessary to strengthen a motive which is in and of 
 itself the stronger already. Man differs from the locomotive 
 only in having consciousness, i. e. , an inner sense which, like 
 an inner eye, sees the internal processes, becomes conscious 
 of them, observes the conflict of motives, and the victory of 
 the stronger. In common experience this perception is 
 mistaken for free-will; the coming consciousness of the over- 
 balance of the stronger motive, for the act of choice. All 
 this was long since known; but it will not for a long time 
 yet convert the adherents of dualism and free-will. The 
 force of mental inertia and conservatism cannot be so easily 
 overcome. 
 
 Those who persistently maintain the dualism of mind and 
 matter cannot possibly accept social laws in the sense of 
 natural laws of social development. Hence Ruemelin is 
 thoroughly self-consistent in discarding them and every 
 "law of history," too. He is perfectly logical when he 
 says: 
 
 " I must characterize the theory as self-contradictory and incompre- 
 hensible which imputes to the individual human soul freedom of the
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 73 
 
 will, in the sense of rational or irrational self-determination within 
 the broad scope of given natural conditions(?), while necessity is 
 recognized in the history of mankind or of single ages and peoples. 
 Psychological indeterminisin and historical indeterruinisni stand and 
 fall together ... If the complex aggregate of social relations into 
 which I have been put determines all my thinking and doing or allows 
 me only the narrowest scope of individual independence, it is of no 
 use to discuss freedom and accountability further. But if I am able of 
 myself to initiate new series of operations, to mould and assert myself 
 in spite of the opinions and usages of others, then no logic can prevent 
 a community as a whole from acting freely and striking into paths 
 which have no causal connection with the past. Necessity will then 
 signify no more than the universal limits of human activity, will be 
 restricted to the unavoidable influence of the community on the 
 individual." 
 
 Persistence in the traditional dualistic view is also largely 
 due to the mistaken idea that ' ' the necessity of natural law ' ' 
 would negative ' ' conscience ' ' and all rational activity. 
 
 "Or we are told," says Ruemelin, further, "that the will is deter- 
 mined by necessity, being the product of two factors: the concrete 
 circumstances and the individual character, which is itself the product 
 of inherited faculties, training and course of life. If conscience and 
 reason are included among the inherited faculties and it is conceded 
 that they co-operate in their way in the act of willing, the answer may 
 be accepted. But then it is merely a quarrel about words to speak 
 of the deterministic character of natural law and the necessity of 
 willing." 
 
 As if reason and mental effort could not be, were not 
 actually the product of natural processes! As if we could 
 not speak of the natural development of reason, mental 
 effort and will, i. e. y of mental effort the product of motives! 
 
 After traversing such errors, Ruemelin reaches the 
 principle which, as a true dualist, he believes he has 
 " established," viz.: " that psychological and physical laws 
 are wholly different in form and nature and cannot be 
 expressed by the same formula. ' ' 
 
 As has been said, the logic is correct; but the premise, 
 free-will and self-determination, is false. Possibly Ruemelin 
 is justified in saying that the constraint exercised by society 
 upon the individual has not yet been demonstrated to him 
 by obvious proofs. 
 
 " I cannot convince myself," he says, " that investigation into the 
 relations between society and the individual has ever led a single step 
 beyond showing an intimate and universal reciprocation of influences, 
 in which each is giving or receiving, active or passive, all the time, in 
 varying degrees."
 
 74 ANNANS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 But insufficient proof does not alter the fact of unfree-will; 
 and it would better have -become a philosopher to take the 
 matter in hand himself than to assume the attitude of 
 defence by throwing the burden of proof on others. 
 
 Had Ruemelin done so without prejudice (his dualism 
 greatly embarrassed him), he would have given up the false 
 premise of free-will and all that it entails; and he would not 
 have discoursed at length on the way men of genius make 
 the world's history. Such things should never have been 
 said at this late day in a German university, and by a lay 
 professor. The standpoint which he occupies is purely and 
 simply theological. 
 
 Dualism of mind and matter is a fundamental principle of 
 religion. Religion is a necessity to the masses; their tem- 
 perament demands it. So free-will and self-determination, 
 the necessary consequences of dualism, are integral compo- 
 nents of every religious system; and we have no thought of 
 combating them here. Moreover modern philosophy and 
 modern natural science have spared us the trouble of estab- 
 lishing monism, which is as correct and true as, for the 
 temperament of most men, dualism is necessary. We are 
 not writing for this majority. They may leave our book 
 unread. We turn to the adherents of monism; our problem 
 is to work out its consequences in the social domain. 
 
 2. UNIVERSAL LAWS. 
 
 Modern natural science has successfully demonstrated that 
 even the "human mind" is subject to physical laws; that 
 the phenomena of the individual mind are emanations from 
 matter. But in the domain of social phenomena unchange- 
 able natural laws have not been completely demonstrated. 
 Between " mental " phenomena subject to the laws of mat- 
 ter, and the social world strode the conception of human 
 freedom to distract and confuse. It seemed to order and 
 control social relations according to its own choice. In the 
 domain of mental phenomena, in the narrower sense of the 
 word, monistic natural science has in part demonstrated the 
 unconditional sway of natural laws and in part shown the 
 presence of other factors to be impossible. Dualism, driven 
 from this domain, has retired to the domain of social 
 phenomena, whence it must be dislodged. To this task the 
 distinction which we have drawn between mental and social 
 phenomena is essential; for it is an old rule of strategy to
 
 THK OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 75 
 
 divide the enemy and grapple with the scattered sections 
 separate!}'. The critical question concerning monism is the 
 existence of universal laws valid for social as well as for 
 physical and mental phenomena. If such laws exist, the 
 monistic theory is true; if such laws cannot be discovered, 
 monism is an unproven hypothesis, like dualism. 
 
 As we have seen, their existence is hotly denied; and 
 doubtless the earliest defenders of monism in the domain of 
 social phenomena gave occasion for the denial. For with 
 great zeal and less discretion some thought it simply neces- 
 sary to transfer to the domain of social phenomena the laws 
 that had been discovered in the domain of physical phe- 
 nomena, the laws of attraction and repulsion, of gravitation 
 and the like. Others seemed to see in the shapes which 
 social phenomena assumed structures similar to animal 
 organisms and they thought that the laws valid for the 
 latter might be accepted as valid for the former also. We 
 have already pointed out the impropriety of these assump- 
 tions and we shall criticise them more in detail hereafter. 
 
 But in spite of such errors, there are universal laws which 
 prevail alike in the physical, the mental and the social 
 domain ; and the existence of the science of sociology can be 
 justified only by proving their existence and validity. 
 
 Before calling attention to some of them, we must answer 
 another question: How far, in general, can we expect to find 
 laws common to phenomena so unlike as physical, mental 
 and social phenomena are ? Plainly we ought not to go too 
 deeply into the characteristics of the species; for where the 
 peculiarities begin the common traits end. Where the 
 physical nature commences the laws common to the mental 
 and social domain cease to apply. 
 
 Of course it may be objected that the universal laws will 
 be taken from such a high sphere of abstraction that every 
 idea beyond the concept of mere existence will have been 
 sacrificed. Such laws, though easily found, would lack 
 significance; and we shall try to find our universal laws 
 close to where the three classes of phenomena become differ- 
 entiated, in the sphere of the modalities of existence. Hav- 
 ing found them here, we shall consider our task complete. 
 It was the great error of our predecessors that they sought 
 universal laws in the lowest sphere of one class alone, even 
 among the differentiated physical phenomena. We ought 
 not to commit the same error; we must not seek to generalize
 
 76 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 the physical laws of organic life and extend them to the 
 domains of psychic and social phenomena as they did. But 
 we may and indeed must discover the universal laws of the 
 modalities of existence of all being. We must be satisfied 
 to possess in them the keys which, to use Bastian's expres- 
 sion, " unlock in all directions. " 
 
 Let us now proceed to give examples of such universal 
 laws. 
 
 (a) The Law of Causation. 
 
 The law of causation is just as true of social as it is of 
 physical and mental phenomena. Every social phenomenon 
 is the necessary effect of anterior causes. No social phe- 
 nomenon, originates in the nothingness of individual whims. 
 The principle of sufficient cause is true also. Every social 
 phenomenon whether political, juridical or economic, must 
 have a sufficient cause in one or more social agencies. The 
 effects must also be equal or at least proportional to the 
 energy of the causes alike in the social, the physical and the 
 mental domain. The deed of an individual will never create 
 a social condition nor change it, however much appearances 
 may deceive us. One social condition is produced by 
 another. The task which falls to the writer of pragmatic 
 history is to point out the true connection in each case. 
 
 (U) The Law of Development. 
 
 Parallel with and perhaps emanating from the law of 
 causation is the law of development. Each social phenome- 
 non is a momentary phase in a period of development; 
 though often the end of the period may be beyond the 
 reach of calculation. Every political organization, all rights, 
 every economic relation suffers change. We can distinguish 
 the beginning, the process of growth and often the decline 
 and decay. 
 
 But of course manifestations of the law in the social and 
 in the physical domain must not be confounded. Cells, 
 germs, stalks and fruit; or eggs, embryo, lungs and digestive 
 organs can not be found in social formations. Such analo- 
 gies lead away from the truth; they becloud scientific vision 
 and give incorrect results. The order of development in 
 the social domain is from one social phenomenon to another. 
 
 If we would obtain reliable scientific results in sociology, 
 this distinction must be observed rigorously. No digression 
 to manifestations of the law in other domains can be allowed.
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 77 
 
 (c) Regularity of Development. 
 
 Development does not in and of itself involve the idea of 
 regularity; the sequence of like or similar phases might or 
 might not be uniform in all cases. But actually progress is 
 regular; it conforms to law everywhere. We admire the 
 regularity of development in the whole compass of physical 
 nature. It dominates mental phenomena. It is found to 
 be true of the state, of rights, of political economy, and of 
 language which must also be included with the social 
 sciences since, according to the definition given above, 
 language is a social phenomenon. The great honor of dis- 
 covering it in the domain of social phenomena is shared by 
 the historical schools in the several departments. 
 
 (</) The Law of Periodicity. 
 
 In all domains of phenomena, regularity of development 
 passes into periodicity. Wherever we can watch the whole 
 process, we find a period of existence extending from the 
 origin through the phases of growth and perfection to decline 
 and fall. Of course the manifestation is different for each 
 class of phenomena. Sap flows, the trunk grows strong, 
 the organs develop, etc. ; or, thought arises, is confirmed, is 
 spread abroad and gains consideration then loses influence 
 and is recognized as nothing; or, a social relation arises in 
 small proportions, is extended over larger aggregates, pro- 
 cures ever greater recognition, exercises decisive influence 
 on great masses, is then broken up and supplanted by other 
 relations and disappears leaving no trace. It is one law 
 valid everywhere and universal. 
 
 (tf) The Law of Complexity. 
 
 In physical nature we always find the elements in combi- 
 nation, never single. Likewise in the mental domain we 
 meet with combinations only. Our conceptions, our 
 thoughts and our mental powers, too, are complex. So 
 also are all the social phenomena about us. They are struc- 
 tures composed of simpler parts. Every state, every peo- 
 ple, every tribe is complex in a great many respects. 
 Bvery principle of right is a composite of views, concep- 
 tions, ideas and principles. Every common economic 
 interest is made up of conditions, activities, relations. In 
 every language there is an endless variety of philological 
 elements.
 
 78 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 But further, what is complex may be analyzed. Analysis 
 of physical phenomena will give the elements of matter. 
 Analysis of mental phenomena will disclose ultimate con- 
 cepts and the simplest mental functions. In the social 
 domain it leads to the simplest social structures thinkable, 
 from state and people to primitive horde; from developed 
 institutional rights to the beginning of actual relations; from 
 the most complex economic interests of the community to 
 the satisfaction of the simplest needs; from a literature in 
 the fullness of bloom to the simplest expression of thought 
 by sound and gesture. 
 
 (/") Reciprocal Action of Foreign (heterogeri} Elements. 
 
 Another result of complexity is that phenomena of every 
 class show the reciprocal action of foreign (heterogeri) 
 reacting elements. Although there is an endless variety of 
 cases in each particular domain, yet the law seems to express 
 the first and most important impulse to development in each 
 and every one of them. The significance of this force in 
 social processes was surmised long ago, but it was erro- 
 neously interpreted by individualists and atomists as the 
 reaction of man upon man and was designated as love or 
 hate, as sociability or mutual hostility (bellum omnium 
 contra omnes) . The error in this conception will appear as 
 we proceed. Specific reciprocal influence of man upon man 
 cannot be affirmed in a universal law. What holds true 
 between man and man in one group is not necessarily true 
 in another group. Here it may be love and sociability and 
 there hate and thirst for strife. First one and then the other 
 relation was assumed to be normal according as attention 
 was confined to one group or directed to the deportment of 
 group toward group; but neither assumption was correct, 
 because neither was universal. To find a law valid in all 
 times and places for the reciprocal forces inherent in social 
 phenomena we must take, not the individuals, but the social 
 groups as the elements. Thus the law of the reciprocal 
 action of foreign (heterogen) elements will be found uni- 
 versal. Social groups exhibit reciprocal effects which are 
 fundamentally the same always and everywhere; they arise 
 from the same exciting causes and obey the same law, 
 though manifested in various forms and ways according to 
 time, circumstances and the peculiar qualities of each. 
 
 A more specific expression for the universal action of
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 79 
 
 foreign (heterogeri) bodies upon each other might seem desir- 
 able, but there would be danger of getting entangled in 
 empty analogies and of falsely generalizing formulas valid 
 only in special domains of phenomena. 
 
 Suppose we desired to speak of the ' ' absorption ' ' of for- 
 eign {heterogeri) elements as a general principle. Perhaps 
 the universal law is manifested in this way on much of the 
 physical domain. But it is not so manifested in social phe- 
 nomena. Applied to them the statement would be an empty 
 analogy. On the other hand, the manifestation of this law 
 on the physical domain, especially in inorganic and vegetable 
 phenomena, has been described as a ' ' struggle for exist- 
 ence." Obviously this is an illustration borrowed from 
 animal and social phenomena. It does not describe physical 
 phenomena. So if we would have a law common to all 
 domains of phenomena we must modestly be content to 
 speak of the reciprocal action of foreign (keterogen) ele- 
 ments. The more precise statement of its manifestation on 
 the respective domains must be left to special formulas. 
 
 () Adaptation to an Obvious End. 
 
 One thing might be affirmed to characterize this law more 
 precisely, and that is universal adaptation to an end, 
 though in a very definite, technical sense. For the univer- 
 sal effect of the reciprocal action of foreign (heterogeri) 
 bodies is to favor further development of the phenomena 
 concerned; which ma3 r be expressed by saying that, univer- 
 sally, phenomena in this state are adapted to the end of 
 further development. 
 
 This law has been abundantly demonstrated throughout 
 the physical domain. The botanist knows " to what end " 
 the leaves serve the plant. The zoologist knows ' ' why ' ' 
 the respiratory organs of birds and, in general, "why" 
 all animal organs have their peculiar qualities. Among 
 mental phenomena, also, the adaptation of means to the 
 ends produced has been recognized in many cases. On the 
 social domain, to be sure, the law is much questioned. The 
 more warmly it is defended by conservatives, Manchester 
 men, and optimists, the more violently is it opposed by 
 revolutionists, socialists and pessimists. But on one point, 
 at least, there seems to be no dispute; every social growth, 
 every social entity, serves a definite end, however much its 
 worth and morality may be questioned. For the universal
 
 8o ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 law of adaptation signifies simply that no expenditure of 
 effort, no change of condition, is purposeless on any domain 
 of phenomena. Hence the inherent reasonableness of all 
 social facts and conditions must be conceded. 
 
 (A) Identity of Forces. 
 
 The reciprocal action of foreign (heterogeri) elements obvi- 
 ously proceeds from forces immanent in them or arising 
 from their contact. These forces never change their char- 
 acter. They are identical, as we wish to say. Those 
 operating in the domain of physical phenomena have always 
 been the same that they are now. So of mental forces; 
 thought, feeling, volition, each has moved man and con- 
 trolled his actions in the same way always. Likewise the 
 social forces, the causes which we must conclude from the 
 effects that follow on the social domain, have ever been the 
 same. Thus the identity of forces is a universal law. We 
 encounter it in every domain of phenomena. 
 
 (z) Similarity of Events* 
 
 A necessary consequence of the last law is the perpetual 
 similarity of events on all domains of phenomena. It has 
 long been recognized of physical phenomena. Nobody 
 doubts that the sun's warming powers acting on moist 
 ground age after age have produced and always will produce 
 the same effects in vegetation that they produce now. 
 Nobody doubts that ocean waves breaking on a rocky coast 
 have always produced the same effects that we see to-day. 
 So, too, nobody doubts that man's mental faculties have pro- 
 duced the same effects in all times and climes. Always and 
 everywhere men feel and think and plan; even the sensible 
 products of these mental processes are the same. They 
 differ only in form with changing time and circumstances. 
 The Kamtschatkan sings his native song, and so does the 
 Frenchman; thousands of years ago the Chinese thinker 
 philosophized just as did more recently the sage of Koenigs- 
 berg; the architect of the pyramids projected his artistic 
 plans and so do the modern European artists. Thus the per- 
 petual similarity of events in the mental domain is obvious. 
 But people are much less conscious of similarity in the social 
 domain, though it is no less a fact. The identity of social 
 forces could not be discovered because individuals instead of 
 
 * Cf. "Der Rassenkampf," pp. 172 et seq.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 81 
 
 natural social groups were taken to be the true elements of 
 social phenomena. But when the true social forces are 
 recognized, the perpetual similarity of social events must 
 also be apparent. Rights, states, languages, religion, etc., 
 have always and everywhere arisen in ways essentially alike. 
 Economic events are controlled by the same forces; they 
 have always been alike in essence, though often differing in 
 form. 
 
 (_/) Law of Parallelism. 
 
 In every domain we find some phenomena which are 
 similar but we do not know the ultimate cause of their 
 similarity. In the physical domain such phenomena are 
 ascribed to identical forces directly. But in the mental 
 domain the tendency is rather to attribute the similarity to 
 some alleged connection between them; and in social 
 phenomena it is considered the result of consanguinity or 
 of some historic relationship. But actually there is some- 
 thing fundamental at the bottom of all these similarities 
 which we must refer temporarily to a law of parallelism, 
 since we do not know more precisely what it is. By resort- 
 ing to this law we guard ourselves against obviously false 
 and erroneous explanations.* 
 
 The reason why parallel physical phenomena are referred 
 without question to identical forces, whereas such an explan- 
 ation of parallel mental and social phenomena is anxiously 
 avoided as long as possible, is partly found in the widely 
 accepted theory of monogenism. The descent of all men 
 from Adam and Kve afforded a very plausible explanation. 
 But if it is rejected as too absurd, the only course left is to 
 refer the countless mental and social parallels also directly 
 to a law of parallelism common to all domains of phenomena. 
 
 The existence of universal laws is one of the most con- 
 vincing proofs that the whole world of phenomena rests upon 
 a single simple principle. It is a weighty argument for mon- 
 ism, a thorough refutation of dualism. Consideration of 
 these laws shows how untenable it is to refer phenomena to 
 two principles, matter and mind, since the modalities of 
 
 *" According to the psychological axioms of ethnology, when cases exhibitiug 
 similarities occur, the strictly universal and elementary laws are first applied. 
 When there is no further possibility of finding the explanation in them recourse 
 is had to such historic relationships as can be established. But the daily swell- 
 
 , 
 sckichte der Ethnologic" p. 91.
 
 82 ANNAI^S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 existence are the same for all and point to one simple prin- 
 ciple only. Whether it be called nature, or God, or the 
 great unknown world-moving principle matters not. We 
 have presentiments that it is omnipotent, omnipresent, per- 
 haps even omniscient. But we are not in condition to 
 know its essence. Since, however, there are laws which 
 are universally prevalent and valid, we must conclude that 
 this one principle pursues, so to say, a consequent and self- 
 consistent policy; that it reveals itself always and every- 
 where in the same form and in the same character for all 
 kinds of phenomena. This necessary conclusion is of 
 unending significance to science. 
 
 3. CONCEPT, FUNCTION, SCOPE AND IMPORTANCE OP 
 SOCIOLOGY. 
 
 It is almost unnecessary to remark that universal laws 
 like these are not a priori cognitions but the result of an 
 exhaustive examination of all spheres of phenomena, induc- 
 tions obtained by long mental exertion. In propounding 
 them at the beginning of our discussion, we are reversing 
 the natural order of cognition, to be sure; but this provi- 
 sional anticipation of the results of an investigation is simply 
 didactic strategy. 
 
 These universal laws govern phenomena of all kinds, it 
 has been said. But for each particular kind they are 
 manifested in a particular way. We might call this quality 
 of special adaptation their " specific energy." An example 
 will make the thought clear. Adaptation to an obvious end 
 is a universal law. It is manifested in plants by the equip- 
 ment of the several organs and the manner of their growth; 
 and the botanist is able to formulate a whole series of 
 special laws for plants. In the social domain the same law 
 will be manifested differently. For example, a horde, before 
 starting on a raid, will organize by choosing a leader; and 
 other illustrations may be given. Hence the sociologist may 
 speak of special social laws to designate the adjustment of 
 universal laws to the peculiar nature and conditions of social 
 phenomena. Obviously special laws will be more numerous 
 than universal; for the latter generalize the conditions 
 common to all phenomena, whereas the former take account 
 of those common to small numbers of phenomena. 
 
 The function of sociology consists in showing that 
 universal laws apply to social phenomena; in pointing out
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 83 
 
 the peculiar effects produced by them in the social domain, 
 and finally in formulating the special social laws. 
 
 As we have to deal with social phenomena exclusively in 
 what follows, we must get a clear idea of what they are; we 
 must distinguish the domain of social phenomena from every 
 other; we must explore it and learn the most important 
 groups upon it. In so doing we shall come in contact with 
 the special sciences which are occupied with the special 
 groups and which are very properly designated the " social 
 sciences " in general. 
 
 By social phenomena we mean the phenomena which 
 appear through the operation of groups and aggregates of 
 men on one another. The aggregates are the social elements. 
 We must assume that the simplest and the original social 
 elements were primitive hordes, of which, for reasons that 
 have been explained elsewhere,* there must have been a 
 great number in remote antiquity. 
 
 The combinations of the simple social elements into greater 
 associations: tribes, communities, peoples, states and nations, 
 are just so many social phenomena. There are also psycho- 
 social phenomena, such as language, customs, rights, 
 religion, etc., arising from the action of social elements 
 with or upon the individual mind. 
 
 The province of sociology embraces them all. Sociology 
 must investigate them and show the social laws of their 
 development. Many groups, it is true, have been isolated 
 and made the subject-matter of independent sciences. But 
 that should not hinder sociology from subjecting them to a 
 new examination from the standpoint of social science, 
 especially since they have generally been studied from an 
 individualistic standpoint. Sociology should make their 
 social origin and development perfectly clear. 
 
 It has just been said that mankind is the substratum of all 
 social phenomena; hence, it is the real subject-matter of 
 sociology. But it is clear that the character of the science 
 will be determined ultimately by our conception of the 
 natural history of mankind. According as our conception 
 is correct or false will sociology be a success or a failure. 
 The smallest mistake in the beginning will avenge itself in 
 hundred and thousand fold greater errors in the end. 
 
 Hitherto a very gross misconception has prevailed in 
 social science concerning the natural history of mankind. 
 
 * Cf. " Der Rassenkampf,'' p. 56 et seq.
 
 84 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 The character of human phenomena has been completely 
 falsified by conceiving mankind to be genealogically a 
 unitary genus, by supposing lineal descent from a common 
 stock, and explaining varieties of race and type as successive 
 offshoots from it. This fundamental misconception set the 
 whole social science on the wrong track. Not only were all 
 right points of view, resulting from the fact of original 
 plurality and variety of races, lost from consideration, but 
 many false ones were presented which produced nothing but 
 errors. 
 
 Closely connected with this, indeed resulting from it, is 
 another error. It was conceived that culture and social 
 relations generally, whether of mankind or of particular 
 peoples, develop spontaneously as a plant or animal develops. 
 It was conceived that one and the same group passed through 
 different stages of culture, from the hunting stage to the 
 pastoral, to the agricultural, to warrior life and so on down 
 to industrialism by simple transitions in virtue of an inner 
 law and tendency to develop. But the law of persistence 
 applies to social groups as much as it does to anything else 
 in nature. Social groups persist in their actual social condi- 
 tion and cannot be made to ' ' pass ' ' into another without 
 adequate social cause. 
 
 Therefore, we must remember not only that contiguous 
 groups are diverse in origin, but also that they have been 
 undergoing different courses of development. We must 
 also remember that every social group persists in a given 
 condition until forced out of it and into another through the 
 action of some other group, and such action is pre-eminently 
 called social. 
 
 In other words, each alteration in the social condition of 
 a group must always have a sufficient social cause, which is 
 always the influence of another group.* This is a law, and 
 can be amply illustrated from history and experience. An 
 important proposition for the methodology of sociology 
 follows from it, viz. , whenever an alteration in the condition 
 of a group is perceived we should inquire what influences 
 exerted by another group produced it. It follows, also, 
 that a rapid and varied development and frequent social 
 changes occur only under the continual reciprocal influence 
 of many foreign (heterogen) groups, that is, in states and 
 systems of states. 
 
 *[Und ein solcher [zureichender Grand] liegt immer in der_ Einwirkung seittns 
 einer anderen Gruppe, f. e., the influence of another group is the only sufficient 
 social cause. 1
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 85 
 
 This brings us very close to the definition of a social 
 event or process. When two or more distinct {heterogen} 
 groups come in contact, when each enters the sphere of the 
 other's operations, a social process always ensues. So 
 long as one unitary, homogeneous group is not influenced by 
 or does not exert an influence upon another it persists in 
 the original primitive state. Hence, in distant quarters 
 of the globe, shut off from the world, we find hordes in a 
 state as primitive, probably, as that of their forefathers a 
 million years ago. Here, very likely, we are dealing with 
 an elementary, primitive, social phenomenon or, better, with 
 a social element, but not with a social process nor with 
 social change. 
 
 But as soon as one group is exposed to the influence of 
 another, the interplay of mutual forces ensues inevitably and 
 the social process begins. When two distinct (Jietcrogen} 
 groups come together, the natural tendency of each is to exploit 
 the other, to use the most general expression. This, indeed, 
 is what gives the first impulse to the social process. This 
 tendency is so inherent in every human group, so natural 
 and indomitable, that it is impossible to conceive of groups 
 coming together without displaying it, without generating 
 the social process. 
 
 The course of the process depends upon the natural con- 
 stitution of ' ' mankind ' ' and the tendencies peculiar to all 
 human hordes and social communities. Since these factors 
 differ only as one individual or, at most, one species from 
 another and everywhere exhibit the same generic character- 
 istics the process is essentially the same everywhere. 
 
 True, the human race is composed of an endless variety 
 of species; the different hordes and tribes are combined in 
 many ways and produce a variety of social formations or 
 collective entities which in turn act upon one another; even 
 the influence of time and place yields a diversity of effects: 
 so that the social process nevertheless presents endless 
 variety and individuality of development. But the differ- 
 ences are transient and local. It is the task of sociology 
 and by no means an easy one in the midst of diversity to 
 find the controlling social laws, to explain the miscellaneous 
 variety of social development by the simplest forces in opera- 
 tion and to reduce the countless shapes it assumes to a 
 simple common denominator. 
 
 All social laws, indeed all universal laws as well, have one 
 characteristic in common: they explain the becoming, but
 
 86 ANNAI,S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 never the beginning of things, the ultimate origin. This 
 limitation must be insisted upon the more emphatically since 
 the human mind is given to inquiring after the genesis of 
 things. It desires knowledge of the first arising, the ulti- 
 mate origin a tendency fatal to science; whereas with all 
 the laws cognizable it can apprehend only the perpetual 
 becoming. 
 
 Hence none of the questions about the ultimate origin of 
 human associations belong in sociology, if indeed they 
 belong in any science whatever ! Sociology begins with the 
 countless different social groups of which, as can be irrefut- 
 ably proven, mankind is constituted. The question how 
 they came to be does not belong within its forum. 
 
 As we begin by limiting sociological discussion to the 
 becoming of things, excluding discussion of ultimate origin, 
 may we be allowed to point out that the discoveries which 
 are recognized as the greatest achievements of science all lie 
 in the same field. The Copernican discovery applies only 
 to the motion of the planets in their orbits, without inquiring 
 how they came to exist. Harvey discovered the circulation 
 of the blood, a process continually going on under our 
 observation. And we certainly do the great Englishman no 
 wrong in expressing the opinion that when, centuries later, the 
 problem of the ' ' origin of man ' ' shall have long since been 
 laid aside, his investigation into the laws of the becoming, 
 into the ' ' struggle for existence, " ' ' adaptation ' ' and ' ' hered- 
 ity," must still be lauded as an imperishable service to 
 science. 
 
 We are unwilling to close this section without emphasiz- 
 ing the importance of the knowledge of social laws to 
 historians and statesmen. 
 
 The view that history can be raised to the level of a science 
 only by taking account of the natural and social laws of 
 development is still violently opposed though the reasons for 
 it have been presented many times. We could cite innu- 
 merable examples to show how very much history has 
 suffered from ignorance of social laws on the part of the 
 most eminent historians. The most common error, one into 
 which almost every historian has fallen, especially if he is 
 treating of a single nation, is to regard the phenomena as 
 peculiar to one people; whereas did he know social laws he 
 would recognize that they are more general. 
 
 How long is it since in every history of Germany, in every
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 87 
 
 treatise on the philosophy of German history, political par- 
 ticularism was ascribed to an individualizing tendency inher- 
 ent in the German people ? Particularism was considered a 
 virtue in its day. But Prince Bismarck has thoroughly 
 counteracted the tendency and violently disputes its virtue.* 
 If the writers were not so absorbed in one aspect of their 
 subject, if they considered the laws governing all historical 
 changes, they would recognize that, as a universal fact, 
 periods of disintegration and particularization alternate with 
 periods of integration. If they recognized that periodicity 
 of development is a natural, necessary and universal law 
 they would come nearer to the truth of many matters, 
 their results would gain in scientific value. 
 
 Or what shall be said when a distinguished historian like 
 Curtius writes: "The acquisitive impulse deeply inherent 
 by nature in the Greeks, excited them at an early period to 
 a many sided activity."f Is this tendency natural to the 
 "Greeks " alone? What of the "Semites," of whom Cur- 
 tius relates that ' ' the Greeks cherished a national hatred 
 against them! ''I Was the "acquisitive tendency" less 
 ' ' deeply inherent by nature ' ' in them ? or had it ' ' excited/ ' 
 them less " to a many sided activity?" Or why did the 
 Spaniards go to America, the English and Dutch to India, 
 if not to "get gain?" Have we not here a general social 
 phenomenon and a general social law? and is it not a scien- 
 tific error to consider general social phenomena peculiar to the 
 people among whom they have been accidentally recognized ? 
 
 Take another example from Curtius: 
 
 "According to the usual conception of the Greeks, who felt the need 
 of assuming an author for every great historical work, without caring 
 to distinguish what had previously existed from what subsequently 
 ensued, the whole political system was regarded as the legislation 
 of lyycurgus. " 
 
 But to ascribe to a single legislator the creation of a body 
 of juridical and political regulations which have been 
 accumulating for centuries is not peculiar to the Greeks. 
 It is a psycho-social phenomenon common to all peoples ; 
 and will not truth and science suffer if no account is taken 
 of the fact ? 
 
 * \Nun, Fuerst Bismarck hatdiesen. . . Individualisirungstricb gruendlich ausgc- 
 trieben (sic) und gehtihm noch immer gewaltig an den Lezb.] 
 
 t"The History of Greece." Translated by Ward. Bk. i, p. 15; Cf. "Griech- 
 ische Geschichte." 6th Edition, Vol. i, p. 123. 
 
 I Curtius- Ward, op. cit., p. 59 ; Cf. Curtius, op. cii., Vol. i, p. 44. 
 
 g Curtius-Ward, op. cit., Bk. i, p. 208 ; Curtius, op. cit., Vol. i, p. 44.
 
 88 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 How much the science of history will improve when his- 
 torians discern that all the alleged individual peculiarities of 
 the peoples they describe are manifestations of general social 
 and psycho-social laws ! Similar examples of false and 
 narrow views could be cited without number from the best 
 historians. But we prefer to give in precise terms the general 
 cause of error in the conception of historical phenomena. 
 
 It is asserted that 
 
 "history, however it may be defined and classified, will never be 
 reduced to a bare natural science or sociological discipline. For it is 
 not simply the product of telluric and anthropological natural forces 
 and the momentum of social masses. There is a third factor, the 
 power of individuality, which is not susceptible of calculation by the 
 rules of either natural science or sociology."* 
 
 In so far as individuals are concerned, to be sure, history 
 can proceed "neither like natural science nor sociology." 
 But in so far as history portrays the individual it is pure 
 art. For art deals only with individuals, in contrast with 
 science which deals with what is universal, what accords 
 with law and is schematic. The individual might be 
 typical; nevertheless the historian is generally in error if 
 he thinks that he finds anything individualistic in the his- 
 tory of a people, a nation or a tribe, or in the actions of 
 social groups, however considered. Only single personali- 
 ties are properly individualistic; when treating them the 
 historian may yield to his artistic impulses. But when he 
 has collective wholes to present, where he has to show how 
 they live and move, the effort to " individualize " is short- 
 sighted and erroneous; the science of history can and should 
 "proceed according to the rules of both natural science and 
 sociology." For the behavior of collective entities is deter- 
 mined by ' ' natural and sociological ' ' laws and not by the 
 motives and natural qualities of individuals. f It will be 
 some time before this is realized; but the recognition will 
 come only through sociology. 
 
 Important as sociology is for historians, its significance in 
 politics is greater still. For though hitherto politics has 
 not been reckoned a science at all sociology will give it a 
 scientific character. 
 
 I may certainly be allowed to cite as typical of the opinion of historians in 
 general the objections made to "history as a natural science" bv the distinguished 
 R. von Krones, in reviewing "Der Rassenkampf." The prevalent conception of 
 the task of historical composition could not be defended more forcibly than it is 
 done in the words quoted. 
 
 t \Individuelle Motive und BeschaffienkeiUn.'}
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 89 
 
 At present politics is strife after power. Each state, party 
 and faction, every man even, is striving after power with all 
 the means at command. Material means are supplemented 
 with as cogent reasons as possible. Such reasons and argu- 
 ments are called the theory of politics. But where is the 
 criterion of their correctness ? From the standpoint of suc- 
 cess, when the fact has been accomplished, the policy which 
 succeeded is recognized as right. Yet it is not so much ideas 
 and arguments as greater might that makes the project pros- 
 perous. So ultimately , greater might is the better policy 
 as things stand now. 
 
 Sociology must give quite another turn to politics; though, 
 indeed, it will develop political science rather than practical 
 politics. That is to say, the social laws which sociology is 
 to formulate from its observations on the processes of history 
 include also the laws of the development of political life. 
 When they shall have been correctly formulated from the 
 past, they must be verified in the present and the future. 
 They must control the course of political development now 
 and hereafter as unequivocally as they have hitherto. But 
 when reliable laws have been formulated, political machina- 
 tions, tavern politics and ignorant gossip will give place to 
 political foresight and sober calculation based upon positive 
 sociological knowledge. 
 
 These words will provoke a sceptical smile and certainly 
 not without some reason. Similar promises have often 
 proved to be vain talk if not charlatanry even; and iisually 
 people who talk of calculating future politics scientifically 
 are not taken seriously, Did not Auguste Comte speak of 
 a politique positive, a positive science of politics, which, 
 " instead of pronouncing absolute judgment and suggesting 
 ameliorations," should rather create "a body of scientific 
 conceptions such as has never been outlined nor even sus- 
 pected by any philosopher before?" Yet how many false 
 and erroneous notions he held ! And Thomas Buckle! How 
 little he recognized the truth about the development of 
 political relations in modern times! Claiming to have 
 obtained final cognition of the "laws of history," he 
 prophesied cessation of war and universal perpetual peace, 
 yet how has his prophecy been verified ? 
 
 In one point, however, the old sociologists were clearly 
 right. With presentient mind they suspected the existence 
 of social laws and asserted the possibility of a social science.
 
 90 ANNAI^ OP THE; AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 It is true they did not pass the point of conjecture. They 
 never advanced to the true principles of the science, much 
 less to a knowledge of social laws. Nay ! they did not even 
 find the starting point of the way which leads to the princi- 
 ples. The point of departure is polygenism. The way is 
 the investigation of the natural relations of distinct (hetero- 
 geri) groups of men to one another. We entered upon it in 
 "Der Rassenkampf" and we wish to continue in it here.* 
 
 Being the science of human society and social laws, soci- 
 ology is obviously the basis of all the special sciences treat- 
 ing of parts of human society, or of particular manifestations 
 of associative life. Anthropology, the science of man as an 
 individual being, falls within the scope of the universal science 
 of society as a species within the genus. So do ethnography, 
 embracing the description and comparison of existing tribes 
 and peoples; political science, the science of the state, 
 treating of social communities which are the result of dis- 
 ciplinary organization; comparative linguistics, or philology; 
 the comparative study of religion, rights, art, etc., sciences 
 of social institutions which satisfy the psycho-social wants of 
 man; finally political economy and other sciences treating 
 of institutions which the material wants of man as a social 
 unit have produced. It is perfectly natural that all these 
 sciences should have taken shape long before the science in 
 which they should afterward find their basis. This is the 
 normal course of man's developing knowledge. 
 
 It was so in natural science in the narrow sense of the 
 word. Botany, zoology and mineralogy took shape before 
 geology and paleontology , though the latter are the foundation 
 
 * It gives me great satisfaction to observe that the reviewers have recognized 
 the great importance of my starting point and have declared it at all events 
 worthy of note. Alfred Koenigsberg writes in the Neue Freie Presse, Vienna, 
 August 9, 1869: " His hypothesis that mankind is descended from many pairs is the 
 egg of Columbus. It explains almost every historical event in the simplest and 
 most unconstrained way, especially that primitive phenomenon, the conquest of 
 a weaker tribe by a stronger; and the organization of society with division of 
 labor. It suggests what Stephenson.the father of railroads, said up_on inspecting 
 a good locomotive: ' how hard it must have been to hit upon it; it is so simple!'" 
 The reviewer for the Rassegna Crtlica, Naples, 1883, No. 9, says: " There are two 
 points in this book which especially deserve praise .... to wit, the unquali- 
 fied assertion of naturalism and the fact that, contrary to custom, neither the indi- 
 vidual nor the psychology of the individual, but the social group, is made the 
 element in the interpretation of history." Similar notices of approval appeared 
 in Globus, 1884, No. 4; Ausland, 1884, No. 2; Journal des Economistes, October, 1883; 
 Ribot's Revue Philosophique^ May, 1884, and in many other critical period- 
 icals. These critics have caught the idea of my book and it cannot be my fault 
 that Professor Alfred Kirchhoff, in Zarncke's LUerarisches Centralblatt, Leipzig, 
 complains that he does not understand what I mean. However, Professor 
 Kirchhoff is a geographer, appears never to have meddled with sociology, and is 
 conversant with neither the literature of the subject nor the questions here under 
 discussion. Judging from the- fact that he notices the book under the rubric 
 "ethnology," he considers sociology a geographical discipline.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 91 
 
 of the former. Similarly the art of healing is earlier than 
 physiologjr. 
 
 The explanation is very simple. Things, institutions, 
 relations encountered in concrete form are the first objects 
 observed and investigated. The most convenient hypothesis 
 or crudest explanation suffices for a time to account for their 
 origin. For instance we live under laws constituting a body 
 of rights. The nature of the phenomenon is investigated; 
 the rights are explained, interpreted, compared with others, 
 and their history is traced out. But provisionally their 
 source and origin was satisfactorily explained by saying that 
 the lawgiver proclaimed them. Similarly the explanation 
 of the origin of religion is that God revealed it to His 
 prophet, the founder. 
 
 With the progress of knowledge and reflection, ideas con- 
 cerning the origin of the subjects-matter of the respective 
 sciences undergo changes. The new conclusions come in 
 conflict with the earlier explanations. Thus the compara- 
 tive study of law showed that rights arise historically in the 
 collective or " folk" mind; and religion, similarly studied, 
 was found to emanate from exigencies of man's spiritual 
 nature, and so on. 
 
 Moreover as knowledge broadened the germs of all the 
 psycho-social institutions were eventually found to be in 
 close proximity to one another and the different social 
 sciences met on a common ground though the common 
 designation was not at once applied. The subject-matter of 
 each science in turn was discovered existing in every people 
 in a greater or less degree, and in a more or less forward 
 state of development. Consequently men were forced to 
 regard the differences in psycho-social phenomena among 
 various peoples and to compare psycho-social products. 
 
 The first step was the comparative study of law, especially 
 of customary law, then of religion, language, art and phil- 
 osophy. This prompted and aided investigation of the 
 common ground whence the fountains of all the sciences 
 seemed to spring. This common ground was at first desig- 
 nated history of civilization, ethnography, or ethnology, 
 Bastian's term. But in fact it may most suitably be called 
 social science. 
 
 It discloses the true source of all those psycho-social pro- 
 ducts that had previously become subjects-matter of special 
 sciences. But it does this only because it comprehends the
 
 92 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 substance of human societies. Hence we must recognize in 
 sociology the philosophical basis of all the sciences claiming 
 to be "social;" and it will fall to the lot of sociology to 
 demonstrate the relation of each of them to their common 
 basis, and their connection with each other upon it. 
 
 4. THE SUBSTRATUM OF SOCIAL LAWS. 
 
 Laws are revealed objectively. Substrata are necessarily 
 presupposed. It is by the forms in which bodies appear, or 
 in which forces manifest themselves in and on bodies, that we 
 are able to discover laws. The law of gravitation cannot be 
 conceived apart from a body which falls on which the force 
 of gravitation manifests itself. To speak of attraction is to 
 call to mind the bodies on which attraction acts. 
 
 So the question arises: What are the substrata of social 
 laws ? What are the media through which force is mani- 
 fested when we infer social laws from its behavior ? Obvi- 
 ously the medium is not the individual, on whom a psychical 
 or a physical law may be manifested, but not a social. It 
 has sometimes been thought that ' ' mankind ' ' was the sub- 
 stratum; but erroneously, for there must be heterogeneous 
 (heterogen) elements wherever reciprocal action and an 
 interplay of forces is expected. 
 
 If mankind is conceived to be a unit, the condition neces- 
 sary for the action of opposing forces is by supposition 
 absent. Besides, nowhere on the earth, and at no time 
 either in the present age or in remotest antiquity has man- 
 kind been found to be a simple substance. It always consists 
 in a countless number of distinct (Jieterogeri) ethnical ele- 
 ments. Hence I was led to seek the starting point of soci- 
 ological investigation in the hypothesis that there was 
 originally an indefinitely large number of distinct (heterogen) 
 ethnical elements;* and it gives me satisfaction to note that 
 good authorities consider the polygenetic hypothesis estab- 
 lished. Indeed, Bastian, the highest authority in this matter, 
 declares that "it is self-evident," and that my efforts, in 
 "Der RassenkampJ '," to "reconcile it with Darwinism," 
 were superfluous. 
 
 *"The concept of force," says Caspari, correctly, "presupposes relations to 
 another foreign opposing force which is called resistance. Force apart from 
 resistance of every sort were a forceless force, unthinkable nothing. Whoever 
 speaks of force must at the same time conceive of mechanical resistance or he 
 contradicts himself. Hence every philosophical investigator who had been edu- 
 cated in natural science, and had studied mechanics, understood that we must 
 continually suppose an original plurality of discrete force-media, force-centres, 
 or force-atoms (Democritus), monads (Leibnitz), reals (Herbart), dynamides 
 (Redtenbacher), etc." "Jfosmos," Vol. i, p. 9.
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 93 
 
 But since the hypothesis is so fundamental to the whole 
 system of sociology it is not enough to state what authori- 
 ties accept it. I must also take pains to bring before the 
 reader as much scientific material as possible in support of it. 
 
 First of all may I be allowed to cite Carl Vogt, another 
 authority of the first rank in natural science, to vouch for 
 the ' ' original plurality ' ' and the ' ' constancy ' ' of human 
 races: * 
 
 "No man would certainly have doubted the specific difference in 
 mankind " says this investigator in his "Lectures on Man," "if the 
 unity of the human species had not to be defended at any price, if a 
 tradition had not to be supported in opposition to the plainest facts 
 a tradition which has been the more venerated because it runs counter 
 to positive science. ' ' | 
 
 "As far as our traditions go, however far back they reach into the 
 remotest antiquity, we observe that wherever peoples migrated and 
 discovered unknown countries, they found human beings, who 
 appeared to them, not less strange than the animals and plants they 
 met with. . . . The larger islands, as well as all parts of the con- 
 tinents under the hottest and coldest climates, were by navigators or 
 conquerors always found inhabited." 
 
 Then Vogt reminds his readers that 
 
 " even religious legends, which have for their object the origin of 
 mankind and the history of a privileged race, even these legends indi- 
 cate that at the creation of the first pair the world was already peo- 
 pled, an indication given even in the Bible. . . . The only fact 
 from which we can start is that of the original dispersion of mankind 
 upon the earth, and the original difference of races spread over the 
 surface of the earth. However much we may indulge in theoretical 
 speculations on the origin and differences of mankind, however 
 weighty proofs may be adduced for the original unity of the human 
 species, this much is certain, that no historical nor, as we have shown, 
 geological data can establish this dream of unity. However far back 
 our eye reaches we find different species of men spread over different 
 parts of the earth. ' ' 
 
 " Not merely the difference of races, but also their constancy in the 
 course of time, is perfectly established. We have endeavored to show 
 that these characters may be traced back beyond the historical period 
 up to the pile-works, the stone-period, and the diluvial formations. 
 The Egyptian monuments show that already under the twelfth 
 dynasty, about 2300 years before Christ, negroes had been imported 
 
 *It may be added that among the earlier natural scientists the following 
 accepted polygenism : Cuvier, Buffon, Lace'pdde and Burdach. The philosopher 
 Whewell in " Traces of Divinity" holds the negroes to be a distinct race, of differ- 
 ent extraction from the other races of men. Bory and Vierey also accepted poly- 
 genism and Perty says : " The far greater probability is that men of diverse 
 natural capacities have arisen in different parts of the earth and at various times, 
 all very remote from ours." " Ethnographic," p. 386 (1859). 
 
 t " Lectures on Man : His Place in Creation and in the History of the Earth." 
 By Dr. Carl Vogt. Edited by James Hunt. London : 1864. Lecture viii, p. 222, 
 "Vorlesungen uebfr den Menschen ; seine Steliung in der Schoepfung und in der 
 Geschichte der Erde." By Carl Vogt. 2 vols., Giessen: 1863. Vol. i, p. 284.
 
 94 ANNAIVS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 into Egypt; that slave hunts had, as now, taken place under several 
 dynasties, as proved by the triumphal processions of Thothmes IV., 
 about 1700 B. C., and Rameses III., about 1300 B. C. There are seen 
 long processions of negroes, whose features and color are faithfully 
 rendered; there are seen Egyptian scribes registering slaves with their 
 wives and children; even the down growing in bunches upon the 
 heads of the latter may be distinguished. There are also seen many 
 heads presenting the characters of negro tribes inhabiting the south of 
 Egypt, and which the artist distinguishes as such by the superadded 
 lotus-stalk. But not only the negroes, but also the Nubians and the 
 Berbers, as well as the old Egyptians, are always depicted with those 
 characteristic peculiarities which have been preserved to this day." 
 
 Vogt also cites the conclusions of Broca, Morton and 
 Jomard, who identify the modern Fellah-type with the 
 Egyptians of the time of the Pharaohs, and then he con- 
 tinues: 
 
 _"The same constancy of characters can be traced in the other races 
 with which the Egyptians came in contact. The Jews are as easily 
 recognizable as the Tartars and Scythians with whom Rameses III. 
 was at war. 
 
 " In the same way we observe upon the Assyrian and Indian monu- 
 ments the characters of such races as still inhabit these regions, so 
 that the constancy of race characters is everywhere rendered evident. "* 
 
 Though Vogt concedes a ' ' certain flexibility ' ' to the 
 ' ' natural races ' ' of mankind in virtue of which they ' ' show 
 certain changes when transplanted into different media," 
 yet the change never exceeds a very small maximum and 
 does not obliterate the essential race-marks. Hence Darwin 
 is not justified in concluding from single demonstrable 
 examples of unimportant alterations due to change of 
 environment that they will continue until eventually the 
 essential traits have been lost and the race has been changed. 
 
 "We thus infer that all instances which have been cited of change 
 in races of pure descent by the mere influence of changed media, 
 immigration into foreign countries, etc., are insignificant and do not 
 affect the essential race-characters. These modifications, therefore, 
 which we by no means entirely deny, do not in any way explain the 
 differences in the human species. . . . In accordance with the facts," 
 says Vogt finally, " we must assume a fundamental difference of races 
 as our starting-point, "f 
 
 We must confine ourselves to these quotations from Vogt. 
 It would lead us too far should we follow the forcible argu- 
 ment in which he not only shows the harmony between 
 Darwin's theory and polygenism but also demonstrates that 
 the latter follows necessarily from the former. 
 
 * " Lectures on Man," I,ec. 15, pp. 423-26. 
 t /*?., Lee. 15, pp. 435-36.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 95 
 
 His two most important theses, the constancy and the 
 original "plurality and diversity" of human races, have 
 found striking confirmation in the progress that has since 
 been made in anthropological and craniological investigation. 
 
 Kfforts were made to find the types of all the known races. 
 It had been assumed upon superficial examination, that 
 each race represented a genealogical unit in which a fixed 
 anthropological type was transmitted from generation to 
 generation. But when scientists undertook to determine 
 the typical peculiarities exactly, it was found impossible to 
 assign a single type exclusively to any one historical race 
 whatever. The investigators would then have been content 
 with a "mean type" for each race. But, says Virchow, 
 ' ' such a variety of individual differences was accumulated 
 among the civilized peoples of Europe that to many it seemed 
 impossible to set up even a mean type for each."* 
 
 In his embarrassment he proclaimed, a decade ago, that 
 ' ' science demanded ' ' that the ' ' original type ' ' of each race 
 be discovered; and he spared neither labor nor pains in the 
 search. If after all he did not find it among the Germans, 
 where he looked first, it was not his fault. The simple fact 
 is that not a single historical race ever consisted in a genea- 
 logical unit. 
 
 After laborious and unsuccessful investigation he concludes 
 that 
 
 "the assumption of a simple original Germanic type is as yet entirely 
 arbitrary. Nobody has proved that all Germans once had the same 
 shaped skull, or, otherwise expressed, that they were from the begin- 
 ning one nation (!), the Suevi and Franks being its purest types. If 
 Germans and Slavs belong to the same Indo-Germanic stock, if 
 Slavic brachycephaly and Germanic dolichocephaly do not prevent 
 assuming the common descent (?) of Slavs and Germans, it might 
 seem that mesocephaly and even brachycephaly among the admittedly 
 pure Germans would be a favorable circumstance. The great hiatus 
 becomes filled and original relationship is more easily comprehended 
 after actual intermediate members have been discovered. If the 
 Germanic nation once had a common fatherland in the far East, it is 
 very probable that these differences were brought thence into the 
 later home." 
 
 We see with what reserve and reluctance Virchow notes 
 that the German race lacks anthropological unity. He 
 demands further investigation. 
 
 " Perhaps it will appear that, as the measurements in our schools in 
 my judgment indicate, different Germanic stocks have in fact existed 
 
 * " Beitraege zur physischen Anthropologie der Deutschen,'' 1877.
 
 g6 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 here in Germany for ages, moving side by side from east to west, and 
 spreading out towards the west." 
 
 To the sociologist the ''different stocks" which the 
 anthropologist's craniological material leads him to conjec- 
 ture seem plain and natural from the beginning. To call 
 them "Germanic" is simply national prejudice. There 
 were many different stocks all about; and in time a "Ger- 
 manic ' ' unit arose as they came into closer contact and took 
 on a common civilization. 
 
 But the anthropologist's concession that "the common 
 type ' ' of the Germans ' ' is not so simple as it has hitherto 
 been assumed to be " is of value to us. 
 
 The farther craniological investigations were pursued, the 
 stronger grew the conviction that there was nothing which 
 could be called a ' ' unitary type, ' ' even in the remotest 
 tribes, whom the current of migration does not touch, who 
 have no intercourse with others, and who are apparently 
 beyond the reach of every other agitating force of history. 
 Among the old Frisians, even, there are several types; and 
 Virchow is forced to assume that ' ' possibly other tribes 
 were there before them, whom they subjected and whose 
 blood was mingled with theirs. ' ' Whether the craniologist 
 examines modern Finns and Lapps, or wild Veddas from 
 the interior of Ceylon, or the skulls from old Trojan graves, 
 the fact of intermixture appears with equal clearness.* 
 
 But while Virchow, who started to find an original uni- 
 tary type, reluctantly notes that there is none and, with 
 disillusioned resignation, concedes an original plurality of 
 types for all the tribes he has investigated, the distinguished 
 craniologist, Kollmann, has proved with scientific certainty 
 that original plurality is universal. 
 
 As early as 1883 it was apparent to him that " traces of 
 different anthropological elements can be shown in every 
 race. Many centuries have elapsed since the peoples of 
 Europe were racial units, and now no dale, however remote, 
 contains a pure race. ' ' But the latest results prove abund- 
 antly that racial differences are not due to a later process 
 of differentiation. It has existed unchanged since diluvial 
 times. 
 
 "An extended comparison of diluvial and modern skulls," writes 
 Kollmann, "shows that osteological race characteristics have not 
 
 * Virchow. " IVeddes und Altlrojanische Schaedel und Graeder."
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 97 
 
 changed. Siiice diluvial times the influence of natural selection has 
 not caused man to ' vary ' in the Darwinian sense. His race-marks 
 have withstood external influences with great tenacity, persisting in 
 spite of them. These important conclusions contradict the current 
 view that man is undergoing a continuous process of change. But it 
 must be conceded upon closer examination that the evidence I have 
 adduced admits of the construction I have given it, to say the least." 
 
 Then lie cites the opinions of prominent naturalists to 
 show that not only do many animals have permanent types, 
 but unquestionably the men of the Nile valley also, according 
 to Cuvier, and even mankind since the flood, according to 
 Ruetimeyer. 
 
 "All the evidence man has left in his burial places," he continues, 
 " shows that he belongs to the latter class of beings, having a perma- 
 nent type. The osteological characteristics of race and even of variety 
 have not changed in all the time he has wandered over Europe. . 
 The universality of this rule is forcibly illustrated by the difference 
 between Papuans and Malays, to mention only one example. Since 
 time immemorial they have lived side by side in similar regions with- 
 out change of habitat. Yet they are different still. As for Europe, 
 both prehistoric and modern, it can be shown that the number of differ- 
 ent races has always been rather large and that they have always been 
 intermixed." "Owing to penetration," says Kollmann, "representa- 
 tives of many races live and, for thousands of years have lived, side 
 by side everywhere in Europe. Hence, each people and state contains 
 different races in different proportions. This conclusion I drew after 
 comparing more than 3000 European skulls. ' ' 
 
 Indeed craniologists who are moved to defend the unity 
 and "purity" of their own races cannot withstand the 
 undeniable facts. Hoelder, for example concedes five 
 different "types" within the "Germanic stock." That 
 is, he finds five among his specimens to-day. It is not 
 impossible therefore that once there was a greater number 
 and that other investigators may be able to recover more of 
 them.* 
 
 " Hiss and Ruetimeyer, using rigorous scientific methods, have 
 shown that at least three different races have lived in Switzerland 
 since the period of the lake-dwellers began, "t 
 
 * To social science it is a matter of indifference that craniologists like Koll- 
 mann compromise with the alleged Darwinian doctrine of unitary descent by 
 granting that a period of dispersion and of differentiation from a " common 
 stock " may have " occurred in pre-glacial times." It is enough for social science 
 to start with the facts of the post-diluvial period. It gladly leaves the pre-glacial 
 hypothesis to the defenders of an alleged Darwinian standpoint to save the 
 " common stock." 
 
 Ar 
 
 Schools, ... . 
 
 Value of Pithecoidal Forms and the Effect of Correlation on the Face of the 
 
 Human Skull," 1883.
 
 98 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 These same ' ' anthropological differences, ' ' to use Koll- 
 mann's term, may also be noted among the American 
 aborigines. 
 
 "Formerly it was believed that a single race extended over the 
 whole continent from Cape Horn to the great northern lakes. . . . 
 Decisive facts to the contrary were first adduced by Andreas Retzius. 
 . . . He showed that there were two different races in America, a 
 brachycephalic in the west and a dolichocephalic in the east." 
 
 In Virchow's opinion, also, the evidence shows " that the 
 autochthonous population of America is not a racial unit. ' ' 
 Kollmann showed from his investigations on American 
 skulls that 
 
 "the various cephalic indices, from extreme dolichocephaly to 
 extreme brachycephaly, are scattered ever the whole continent. . . . 
 The autochthonous population, north and south, is composed of the 
 same races, though their relative proportions differ. . . . Hence 
 we must speak of American races. . . . 
 
 " I will add that there is no prospect of finding racial unity even 
 within a smaller region. It might be thought that individual tribes 
 in the north or the south would consist of dolichocephalic or brachy- 
 cephalic persons only. . . . But the Mound-builders and Cliff- 
 dwellers in their day were composed of the same races that occur 
 later. Even they consisted of several races, like the men of the 
 first diluvial period in Europe, or the Reindeer-hunters, Lake- 
 dwellers, Germans and Celts." 
 
 Kollmann 's theory of "penetration" is thoroughly con- 
 firmed by the observation of his disciple Passavant in west 
 Africa.* The first place he visited on the African continent 
 was the French possession of Goree, the black population 
 of which belongs to the Seres and Joloff tribes. 
 
 " It is extremely hard for the beginner to distinguish the blacks by 
 their physiognomies, " writes Passavant of his first experience there. 
 "At first all the faces appeared alike. Only after several weeks of 
 practice did I really succeed in taking account of individual differ- 
 ences." 
 
 This accords with the well-known fact that the countless 
 differences really to be found in men escape superficial 
 observation almost completely. It also explains the whole 
 previous history of anthropology, especially the circum- 
 stance that mankind was at first divided into only three or 
 four races, distinguished by the crudest, most striking 
 traits, such as the color of the skin, whereas, after a more 
 intimate acquaintance, we become conscious of countless 
 differences. 
 
 * " Craniologische Untersuchungen der Neger und Negervoelker."
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 99 
 
 Cuvier, as is well known, divided mankind into three 
 races: Mongolians, Negroes and Caucasians. Blumenbach 
 distinguished five types and made five races to correspond. 
 Lacepede and Dumerit added a sixth. Bory discovered 
 fifteen races even and Desmoulins sixteen. But Waitz found 
 this number insufficient and declared that theoretically there 
 ought to be no division into races lest he be compelled, in 
 spite of ethical scruples, to recognize a great number 
 several hundred in fact. Fortunately the American investi- 
 gators were not influenced by such insipid considerations. 
 They carried the subdivision courageously forward uncon- 
 cerned about the Bible and Kuropean ethics. 
 
 The catalogue of human races accepted by Morton, Nott 
 and Gliddon ran into the hundreds without being complete; 
 there is nothing to prevent the increase of the number as 
 anthropological knowledge increases. Passavant's investi- 
 gations among the negroes afford further proof that this may 
 be expected in the nature of the case. 
 
 The first subdivision of the African Negroes into four 
 grand races: Negritos, Congo Negroes, Kaffirs and Hotten- 
 tots, he says 
 
 "is the fruit of our exploring expeditions; it is connected with the 
 progress of ethnographic knowledge." " Undaunted explorers have 
 gradually brought a population which may be estimated at 151 
 millions so far within our knowledge that we can now distinguish 
 several large ethnical groups." 
 
 There are " at least three Negro races " in Africa, he says, 
 besides the Berbers and the Bedjas or Ethiopians. 
 
 " There are, besides, some tribes intermediate between the Negroes on 
 the one hand and the Berbers and Bedjas on the other. There are some 
 also in which different stocks and types are so mingled that they can- 
 not longer be ascribed to any one in particular." 
 
 According to Passavant, instead of the one black race, we 
 should have seven ethnical groups in Africa. But what of 
 the material of each group ? The Negritos ' ' differ so among 
 themselves," says Hartmann, " that the current conception 
 of the negro with woolly hair, flat nose, thick lips and raven 
 black skin must be entirely disregarded. ' ' 
 
 Endless differences still ! But it is well understood what 
 they consist in and why closer observation makes it necessary 
 to increase the number of ' ' races. " " Racial characteristics 
 are pre-eminently anatomical," says Kollmann. "... Physi- 
 cal or material traits must be apparent on the bones."
 
 ioo ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 Relatively few races were recognized by scientists because 
 ' ' laborious investigation is needed in order to show specific 
 characteristics on the bony framework of the skull. ' ' * 
 
 But is it worth the trouble ? Are not all these ' ' differ- 
 ences ' ' capricious sports of nature, endless and ever changing, 
 without rule or law ? Modern craniology answers the ques- 
 tion decisively. 
 
 " The skeleton," says Ruetimeyer, " seems to preserve its acquired 
 shape more tenaciously than any other organ; so much so that a cross 
 does not produce a third form, but the two elements persist side by 
 side. The effect of crossing on the skeleton might be called mechani- 
 cal rather than chemical." 
 
 Vogt also maintains that race characteristics are perma- 
 nent on the skeleton, and Passavant considers the "shape 
 of the skull to be a constant and inheritable race-character- 
 istic." 
 
 " There is a mass of evidence," he says, "showing that race-types 
 are maintained continuously or reappear by reversion." 
 
 " If the characteristics of different varieties did not resist external 
 influences with such extraordinary obstinacy," says Kollmann perti- 
 nently, " complete uniformity must have long since prevailed among 
 men everywhere; for intermixture has been continuous and prolific. 
 But craniological evidence shows that there is no uniformity and every 
 unprejudiced observer confirms it." 
 
 Elswhere he says: 
 
 " Life in the drawing-room may reduce the ligaments and the mus- 
 cular strength and make the hands and feet small; but the character- 
 istics of his race, which the individual bears in himself as heir to an 
 ancient heritage, remain undisturbed in spite of tall hat and patent 
 leathers." 
 
 If, then, race-characteristics are constant and the number 
 of human races or varieties is still undetermined, it follows 
 obviously that when man's existence on earth began and 
 before races had mingled and "penetrated," there were 
 countless distinct (heterogen) human swarms, severally repre- 
 senting the various race-characteristics which have persisted 
 unchanged in penetration. 
 
 The conclusion is imperative. If race-characteristics pass 
 from generation to generation only by inheritance; if no new 
 ones arise and only the old ones appear over and over again ; 
 if they are countless to-day and penetration and inheritance 
 are still spreading them (though many may have disappeared 
 forever) ; if they prove to be as permanent and ancient as the 
 
 * "Craniologische Graeberfunde in der Schweiz," 1883.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 101 
 
 tombs; must we not conclude that there was in the beginning 
 a countless number of distinct human hordes, each one an 
 individual race or society ? Only a mind warped by Biblical 
 traditions and modern conceptions of the family would insist 
 on substituting first ' ' pairs ' ' instead of hordes. 
 
 It may be said that it is exaggeration to speak of count- 
 less hordes since even the anthropologists and craniologists 
 who accept polygenism use modest numbers. But to how 
 few traits they limit themselves or are confined by necessity ! 
 Who will believe that the race-characteristics are all confined 
 to the skull and the skeleton though that is almost the only 
 place where anthropologists may look ? 
 
 Obviously there should be corresponding differences even 
 in the finest features of the face and in the minutest convo- 
 lutions of the brain, which are as yet wholly unknown. 
 Some are entirely inaccessible to such investigations as we 
 apply to the bones; others are too delicate for our sense- 
 perceptions; others still are on organs and parts of the body, 
 like the nose and ears, which suffer complete decay so that no 
 comparison can be made with the past. Yet nobody doubts 
 that the racial differences in these members are important. 
 So it is not too rash to suppose that a far greater number of 
 human varieties now exists and, since types are permanent, 
 always has existed than anthropology has any means of 
 knowing. These considerations, we hope, will still further 
 justify us in starting upon our sociological investigations 
 with the polygenetic hypothesis.* 
 
 5. CONCEPT AND ESSENCE OP SOCIAL LAW. 
 
 The facts cited show plainly that existing "races" are 
 not simple and mutually exclusive in the anthropological 
 sense; moreover every means of investigation fails to dis- 
 close racial purity in prehistoric times. Yet, reasoning 
 deductively from the mixed to the unmixed and from the 
 composite to the simple, we must infer that races once were 
 pure. The logical conclusion must be accepted as the work- 
 ing hypothesis, at least, of a scientific investigation. But 
 anthropological changes have not affected the social relations 
 
 * It has already been stated that Bastian considers such a justification super- 
 fluous since polygenism is "self-evident." But the fact that Alfred Kirchhoff, a 
 professor of geography who calls himself a "wicked Darwinian," writing in the 
 Literarisches Centralblatt, declares this theory irreconcilable with Darwinism, 
 
 K roves that the correct conception of Darwin's theory has not been so widely dif- 
 jsed as could be wished. Hence the above explanation seems to me still neces- 
 sary.
 
 102 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 of either the ancient or the modern human groups of which 
 we treat. Sociologically they are distinct groups still. 
 Sociological dissimilarities are independent of the structure 
 of the bones and skull. They consist in very different fac- 
 tors. Once the distinction between native and alien may 
 have answered to differences purely anthropological. But 
 ever since the dawn of history the native has been distin- 
 guished from the alien simply by social status and relations 
 which he and everybody else recognizes as necessarily cor- 
 relative with and consequent upon sociological or, really, 
 social factors. 
 
 Birth and training are social factors. The latter, espe- 
 cially, imparts the language, morals, ideas, religion and 
 usages of the group and causes the individual to appear to 
 himself and to others to belong to it. All together bind the 
 members to each other by a common interest, which is 
 patriotism in its earliest form. 
 
 The simple syngenetic groups are affected by a great 
 variety of interests, political, economical, national and 
 intellectual in such ways that several elementary groups 
 become united in one; primary social complexes are fol- 
 lowed by secondary and these by others of successively 
 higher orders. The same regular processes which took 
 place in the simple groups in virtue of their social nature 
 occur in all the others; combinations and cultural changes 
 only modify or complicate them. These processes, which 
 we shall call social since their source is in social elements, 
 are the content, as the groups, simple and compound, are 
 the agents of social history. 
 
 Social processes exhibit great uniformity. Though time 
 and circumstances modify them they remain essentially the 
 same. So for each instance of uniformity in the social 
 domain, as elsewhere, we formulate a law of the cause and 
 call the law social.* Hence a social law is an inference 
 from concrete social occurrences presenting the norm of the 
 
 * De Tocqueville was impressed by the thought that peoples, however distant and 
 unrelated, must develop according to some law. " When I perceive the resem- 
 blance,' 1 he says, " which exists between the political institutions of our ancestors, 
 the Teutons, and the wandering tribes of North America, between the customs 
 described by Tacitus, and those of which I have sometimes been the witness, I 
 cannot help thinking that the same cause has brought about the same results in 
 both hemispheres; and that, in the midst of the apparent diversity of human 
 affairs, certain primary facts may be discovered, from which all the others are 
 derived."" Democracy in America," translated by Henry Reeve, edited by 
 Francis Bowen, Cambridge. 1862. Cap. xviii, pp. 441-42. The ethnographical hon-
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 103 
 
 development and reciprocal influence of social elements, i. e., 
 of the syngenetic groups. 
 
 The only way to prosecute social science is to discover 
 social laws where ethnical or social elements come in contact 
 and to demonstrate their validity. So long as the investiga- 
 tion was conducted in any other way, no attempt to discover 
 or found a social science could succeed. 
 
 It was recognized that there must be regularity of develop- 
 ment and that the laws of development must be demon- 
 strated, were a philosophy of history or a social science to be 
 founded. Comte and Carey insisted upon this repeatedly. But 
 no one knew where to look for conformity to law. Some, 
 like Voltaire, sought for laws of the development of man- 
 kind. But if mankind is taken as a unit, it is obvious that 
 development must be either upward or downward; that 
 there must be either progression or retrogression. Rous- 
 seau and others accepted the latter alternative. Assum- 
 ing a primitive happy state of nature, they w 7 ent on to prove 
 man's growth in corruption. But the greater part, including 
 nearly every writer on the history of civilization, taught the 
 contrary, laboring to show upward progression from original 
 savagery to successively higher forms of civilization. Both 
 parties were wrong; both erred in treating "mankind" as 
 a unit of development. The mistake was general; but the 
 position cannot be maintained unless the field of view is 
 materially limited. Generally it is confined to the narrow 
 stream of European civilization running through Greece 
 and Rome to France or Germany. The development dis- 
 covered here is attributed to mankind as a whole. Comte, 
 for instance, locates a period of polytheism between primitive 
 fetichism and modern(!) monotheism and asserts that " it 
 was under its reign that mankind(!) rose to settled monog- 
 amy. " * It is clear what a tiny fraction of mankind the 
 statement applies to. Comte took no thought of the rest; 
 it would have vitiated the orderly development of ' ' man- 
 kind " and its elevation to monogamy. 
 
 But a few sagacious statisticians led by Quetelet escaped 
 the self-deception. Unsatisfied by this fancied regularity, 
 they sought to discover laws of orderly development by 
 
 Ausland, No. 4, 1881, " that certain phenomena of associative life are perfectly 
 similar among peoples who are entirely unlike and who have never been related 
 in any demonstrable way whatever. Hence . . . the nature of the human race 
 (species) is manifestly one and universal in spite of all differences." 
 
 * Comte-Martineau, op. cit.,Vo\. ii, p. 195; Comte, op, cit., Vol. v, p 220; Conite- 
 Rig., op. cit., Vol. ii, p. 230.
 
 104 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 other means. Quetelet is conscious that there can be no 
 science of man unless man's whole conduct depends on fixed 
 laws just as the phenomena of natural science do; and he 
 regrets that philosophers have never perceived it. 
 
 "Either from a distrust in their own strength," he says, " or a 
 repugnance in supposing it possible to reduce to fixed laws what 
 seemed to flow from the most capricious of causes, it has hitherto been 
 deemed expedient by learned men to abandon the line of inquiry 
 employed in the investigation of the other laws of nature as soon as 
 the moral phenomena of mankind become the object of research."* 
 
 He also surmises correctly that if we would discover the 
 laws controlling man's behavior we must disregard the 
 individual. 
 
 " It is of primary importance to keep out of view man as he exists 
 in an insulated, separate, or in an individual state, and to regard him 
 only as a fraction of the species. In thus setting aside his individual 
 nature, we get quit of all which is accidental, and the individual 
 peculiarities, which exercise scarcely any influence over the mass, 
 become effaced of their own accord, allowing the observer to seize 
 the general results." 
 
 After giving the well-known illustration of the particles 
 of chalk-dust which form a circle only when seen from a 
 distance, he continues: "it is in this way that we propose 
 studying the laws which relate to the human species: for, by 
 examining them too closely," by examining the individuals, 
 he means, ' ' it becomes impossible to apprehend them 
 correctly, and the observer sees only individual peculiarities, 
 which are infinity, "f That is, in place of the false and 
 discarded subject-matter, the individual, he substitutes a 
 vague and incomprehensible "human species," "society," 
 or ' ' social body. ' ' This is his error. He never discovered 
 what the real subject-matter of observation should be; and 
 consequently all his efforts to found a science were a failure, 
 as we shall see. 
 
 How could Quetelet discover conformity to law ? His 
 concept suggests nothing concrete, nor even anything meas- 
 urable. But every concrete object in nature is limited, and 
 none but limited objects can be observed scientifically. His 
 terms suggest something unlimited, undefinable, as unfit for 
 concrete observations the foundation of all science as time 
 
 * " A Treatise on Man and the Development of His Faculties." Edinburgh, 1842, 
 P. 5- 
 f/Wrf.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 105 
 
 and space. It must be resolved into concrete units first. He 
 wisely discarded the " individual," but he failed to find the 
 real unit. 
 
 He had recourse to the " great number," as has been said. 
 It is the magician's wand with which he conjures a finely 
 plastic scientific subject-matter out of the unyielding 
 " human species," " society, " or " social system." Using 
 a " great number " of cases, he finds laws prevalent where 
 formerly blind confusion reigned. The operation is very 
 simple; if it were only as sound ! 
 
 Any convenient phenomenon may be observed and a 
 record made of the frequency of its recurrence in equal 
 periods of time. If the several totals are compared, either 
 they will seem to conform to law or they will not, one or the 
 other. In the former event, the statisticians proclaim the 
 " law of the great number;" in the latter they keep silence. 
 Generally some law is discoverable; for everything in the 
 world is amenable to number. Anything can be counted. 
 At some limit, which must eventually be attained, numbers 
 always give certain proportions; and this property of num- 
 bers seems to have been communicated to the enumerated 
 articles. 
 
 Take any rare occurrence in ordinary life. Say a lunatic 
 climbs a tower and jumps to the street. Within the memory 
 of man the like had not happened in that locality. It 
 stands alone. No law can be discovered on it. If it is never 
 repeated it eludes all statistical treatment. But possibly it 
 may re-occur. If we could find only one other instance in a 
 long series of years, even that would be enough to show 
 "conformity to law;" the event will occur once in so and so 
 many years. 
 
 Obviously the opportunity for making ratios is far greater 
 when the events enumerated occur daily and hourly, as 
 many in human life do. Births, marriages, deaths, in fact 
 the majority of demographical phenomena must occur with 
 great regularity; and statistics win an easy triumph. But 
 have the laws governing natural phenomena been explained 
 when the regularity of their occurrence is confirmed ? Here 
 number is an indication or proof that there is conformity to 
 some law; and that is all. 
 
 Statistical results are wholly insufficient for formulating 
 and explaining the least law of "mankind," "society," 
 ' ' the social system. " In a word the ' ' law of the great
 
 106 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 number " is a law of number and not of the phenomena 
 enumerated; whereas social science wishes especially to learn 
 the laws of social phenomena. Granted that statistics are a 
 very important means of investigation; yet counting phe- 
 nomena and computing ratios is a process purely arithmetical. 
 It has no identity with the discovery and explanation of the 
 laws of the behavior of phenomena. 
 
 Quetelet 's statistical investigations are a great boon to 
 science. But he did not demonstrate social laws as he pro- 
 posed. He mistook the laws of number for the laws of social 
 phenomena. His self-deception originated in his unclear 
 concept of the subject-matter of social science. His indefi- 
 nite and incomprehensible ' ' mankind ' ' could not be sub- 
 jected to rigid and exact scientific treatment. 
 
 In one of his later works, the ' ' Natural History of 
 Society," he tried to improve by distinguishing several 
 social communities from one another. But he got no clear 
 idea of "race," " nation, " and " state. " On the contrary 
 he did what would not have been expected of him: he 
 assumed the individual to be their source and so prevented 
 apprehension of their true substance as effectually as the 
 individualistic and atomistic tendency in politics does. 
 
 Spencer's philosophy and sociology is, as we have said, a 
 significant advance upon Quetelet, Comte and the historical 
 philosophers. He too argues that social science is both 
 necessary and possible. * But he does not insist, as Comte 
 does, that the subject-matter of social laws is mankind de- 
 veloping as a unit; rather he always speaks of the develop- 
 ment of social aggregates. Nor does he, like Quetelet, use 
 the ' ' great number ' ' to solve the problem of regular 
 development. He thinks he has found the solution in his 
 formula of evolution. 
 
 As evolution stands in a certain though distant relation 
 to social phenomena, it might be accepted as a " universal 
 law." But we cannot accept it as a "social law." In 
 every science, according to Spencer's theory, if we trace 
 the history of particular things backward we shall find that 
 their constituent parts were once in a state of diffusion. And 
 if we trace their history forward from any point we shall 
 find concentrated conditions instead of diffuse. Hence he 
 concludes that the formula for the law of evolution must 
 include both processes, concentration and diffusion. Every 
 
 * Spencer, " Study of Sociology." International Science Series, caps ii-iii.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 107 
 
 perceivable thing, as he states it, is in a state of continuous 
 change; it is either becoming or passing away. The former 
 state consists in the integration or concentration of matter 
 and the dissipation of motion, which he calls evolution. 
 The latter consists in the disintegration of matter and the 
 absorption of motion, which he calls dissolution.* 
 
 He demonstrates its validity for all classes of phenomena 
 with great acumen. But the connection between the univer- 
 sal formula and the concrete phenomena is so loose that we 
 gain no explanation of them from it. Applying to every- 
 thing it explains nothing. It is not really a law of the 
 phenomena. It says no more, at bottom, than that motion 
 is universal without disclosing why. 
 
 In the social domain, especially, the defect is glaring. 
 The formula fits the social processes in a certain figurative 
 sense, but does not explain them. 
 
 " While there exist nothing but small, wandering assemblages of 
 men, devoid of organization," he says for instance, "the conflicts of 
 these assemblages with one another cannot work changes in structure. 
 But when once there have arisen the definite chieftainships which 
 these conflicts themselves tend to initiate, and especially when the 
 conflicts have ended in permanent subjugations, then arise the rudi- 
 ments of political organization."! 
 
 The process uniting social aggregates into political organ- 
 izations is remotely analogous to his law of evolution to be 
 sure; but we must still have recourse to the law that ' ' solici- 
 tude for the means of subsistence' ' J forces each social aggre- 
 gate to try to make every other social aggregate coming 
 within its reach serve that supreme end. This law fully 
 explains why the stronger of the ' ' small wandering hordes ' ' 
 aim to subject the weaker and get their services; and it 
 shows the necessity for all the ' ' structures ' ' or variety of 
 organization which culminate in the ' ' state. ' ' The ' ' uni- 
 versal law" of evolution applies to the process; but Spencer 
 fails to emphasize the ' ' social law ' ' which explains it. 
 
 But Spencer offers many just observations upon social 
 phenomena and processes. The formula of evolution does 
 not prevent a correct conception of them and in so far it is 
 harmless and superior to other universal formulas. The 
 most significant part of Spencer's sociology however is his 
 demonstration that psycho-social phenomena develop with 
 
 * " First Principles," sees. 94, 97. 
 
 t " The Principles of Sociology." Vol. i, sec. n. 
 
 I [Lebensfuersorge. * Solicitude for the means of subsistence."]
 
 io8 ANNAI<S OF THE; AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 regularity. Herein he displays a natural talent and master- 
 ship unequaled save by Bastian. I^et us notice this feature 
 of his social psychology briefly. 
 
 Ethnographical and prehistoric investigations conducted 
 in all climates and regions of the earth have established the 
 remarkable fact that changes in social phenomena from 
 period to period are consequent and logical, in a word, are 
 evolutionary. Thus the investigation of the prehistoric 
 material showed a developing series of utensils from bone to 
 stone, to bronze and to iron. The entire series could not be 
 illustrated in the history of one people but had to be con- 
 structed out of the relics of peoples from all regions of the 
 globe. Many groups, moreover, had continued permanently 
 on some one stage without any development whatever. In 
 all the domain of social life, religious, moral, juridical or 
 cultural, it is the same. 
 
 The philosophizing human mind finds a logical and 
 strictly regular development from fetichism through anthro- 
 pomorphism, polytheism, monotheism to the atheism of 
 free thinkers. But scarcely would any one group illustrate 
 the whole series; and how many groups still pray to fetiches, 
 conceive their God in human form, people their heaven with 
 throngs of deities or recognize only one Jahve as they did 
 thousands of years ago! while, on the other hand, there 
 were occasional free-thinkers and atheists even in antiquity. 
 
 Spencer's sociological and Bastian's "ethnological" 
 works abound in examples of apparent psycho-social develop- 
 ment reconstructed out of the contributions of various 
 peoples, times and lands. The first available explanation 
 might seem to be the hypothesis that mankind is a unit; 
 and this explanation has often been offered. But man's 
 actual condition is unlike the constructed development. 
 Take any series of psycho-social phenomena whatever and 
 the several phases prevail as generally to-day as at any time 
 in the past. Yet how inviting it is to a nineteenth century 
 European to construct a ' ' social development ' ' from the 
 condition of unregulated "free love" to polyandry, poly- 
 gamy and, finally, to the " most beautiful flower of human 
 development," monoganry. 
 
 Not only is this method relied upon by Spencer repeatedly 
 and used by Bastian in compiling his "manifestations of 
 race-thoughts;" even IJppert uses it in his thoughtful pre- 
 sentation of the family and the priesthood, etc. Indisputably
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 109 
 
 such series exhibit logical sequence and (logical !) " con- 
 formity to law." But the development is not social and 
 must not be taken for it. The development of social institu- 
 tions ought not to be confounded with the development of 
 mankind itself, with social development in the stricter sense. 
 Psycho-social progress never takes place uniformly through- 
 out mankind. Rather there is always such a great variety 
 of human conditions that types may always be found for a 
 logical series. Not only thousands of years ago but to-day 
 there are communities living in unregulated free love, 
 and tribes and races in which polyandry, polygamy and 
 monogamy did and do prevail. Bastian wants to found a 
 ' ' science of man ' ' upon a law of the manifestation of ' ' race- 
 thought," upon a case of psycho-social development, as we 
 should call it; and Spencer constructs his sociology out of 
 similar cases.* To a certain extent they are justified. 
 Psycho-social investigation furnishes valuable material. 
 The ' ' examination of the mental creations of aggregates to 
 find the laws of the human mind's growth," may be con- 
 sidered an integral part of sociology, or ethnology, the word 
 Bastian prefers. "Whenever the local surface colorations 
 are penetrated and analysis is vigorously prosecuted, uni- 
 form fundamental conceptions are disclosed, "f But sociol- 
 ogy, the " science of man," is something more. Social and 
 psycho-social must be sharply distinguished. The former 
 comprehends the relations between groups and communities 
 of men. The latter the manifestations of "race-thought" 
 in the domain of religion, morals, rights and civilization. 
 Only the laws of the relations of distinct aggregates of 
 human material to each other are social. In distinction, 
 the laws of the "mental creations of aggregates," to use 
 Bastian' slanguage, may be suitably designated psycho-social. 
 
 * Bastian, " Der Voelkergedankc " passim, especially the conclusion, 
 t Ibid., p. 178.
 
 III. SOCIAL ELEMENTS AND THEIR 
 COMBINATIONS. 
 
 THE PRIMITIVE HORDE. {Promiscuity , Mother-right, 
 
 Marriage by Capture, Paternal Family, 
 
 Property, Sovereignty?) 
 
 As individual consciousness, long dormant, does not 
 awaken until the mind has passed through the early stages 
 of development, so also political reflection is not aroused 
 until after stock and folk and other complex social phe- 
 nomena have been developed. In natural science we are 
 confronted at the outset with composites which have to be 
 analyzed, and so, too, modern social science has to work 
 laboriously back to the primitive horde, reconstructing the 
 originals of modern social communities out of scattered ves- 
 tiges in traditions and survivals, but deriving great assistance 
 from living examples of wild, " uncivilized " hordes.* 
 
 The so-called " mother-right" is an instance. There are 
 vestiges of it still among civilized peoples, and its former 
 diffusion is confirmed by its presence among contemporary 
 uncivilized races. It is the Ariadne's thread of sociology, 
 leading through the complex social communities of present 
 and historic times back to the primitive horde. 
 
 The type of "family" presided over by the "father" 
 existed in Europe even at the dawn of history. The Greeks 
 and the Romans considered it the primeval form, established 
 by nature, the true germ of all later social forms. They 
 followed the tradition of the Asiatic races and European 
 science accepted the current view. 
 
 Only recently has ripened reflection and acute observation 
 discovered that the ' ' father-family ' ' was preceded by a 
 period in which a very narrow consanguineous group flocked 
 about the mother as its founder. The evidence collected by 
 
 * Darwin _gives the foltowing graphic picture, from personal observation, of a 
 horde politically unorganized : " The astonishment which I felt, as I first saw a 
 troop of Terra-del-Fuegians on a wild and rugged coast, I shall never forget ; for 
 the thought flashed through my mind at once : Thus were our forefathers. These 
 men were absolutely naked of clothing and covered only with paint. Their long 
 hair was twisted together, their mouths bedriveled from excitement, and their 
 expression wild, amazed and suspicious. They possessed scarcely any skill at all, 
 and lived like wild beasts' on whatever they could catch. They had no govern- 
 ment, and had no mercy toward those not of their own race." " Descent of Man," 
 Vol. II, p. 356. Cf. " Rassenkampf," p. 195 et seq. 
 
 (HO)
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. in 
 
 Bachofen, Giraud-Teulon, McLennan,* and more recently 
 by Lippert, Dargun and Wilken, must be considered con- 
 clusive. Even in the Germanic law Dargun has recently 
 shown undoubted traces of a former ' ' mother-right. ' ' 
 
 Hitherto it has sufficed to prove that historically, or rather 
 prehistorically, there was a " mother- family " and result- 
 ing ' ' mother-rights, ' ' which survived for centuries. But it 
 is more important, in our opinion, to show that the 
 ' ' mother-family ' ' is the necessary consequence of the con- 
 stitution of an earlier group. Not only is this necessary to 
 a proper conception of the "mother-family," it will also 
 help us to understand the nature of what for the present we 
 must assume to have been the primitive horde. The very 
 fact that the former existed confirms the existence of the 
 latter. 
 
 Such a horde cannot be conceived of simply as new, or as 
 proceeding directly from the hands of " a creator; ' ' for in dis- 
 tant parts of the world there are hordes that are primitive 
 still. It is a group of men who are still dependent upon 
 the simplest animal impulses, whose conditions of life and 
 social constitution show no social change. Its life moves 
 upon the plane of the simplest and most common impulses 
 inherent in man. 
 
 The satisfaction of hunger and thirst, the first necessity, 
 engages the men of the primitive horde and constitutes a 
 great part of their life work. The satisfaction of the sexual 
 impulses is the next strongest factor. 
 
 The simplest form of sexual relations is promiscuity, 
 transient connection within the horde according to accidental 
 encounter or stronger momentary attraction. It is still 
 exemplified in the conduct of contemporary uncivilized 
 tribes, f 
 
 No fathers are recognized because, as a rule, they are 
 unknown. The bond of kinship between the men and their 
 own children is lacking and the only tie of blood other than 
 kinship with the common stock, which binds the whole 
 horde together, is through the mother. Under this primi- 
 tive system there could be no other family than the "mother- 
 family. " The children were hers; she exercised authority 
 over them and over the " family " hence " mother-rule " 
 and ' ' mother-right. ' ' 
 
 * " Kinship in Old Greece." 
 
 t For historical cases see Post, " Geschlechts-Genossenschaft der Urseit," pp. 16 et 
 seq., where the earlier literature on this subject is cited.
 
 ii2 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 This type of family organization had nearly disappeared 
 at the dawn of history. But numerous traces of it persist- 
 ing in tradition have been collected; and further proof is 
 furnished by the aetiological explanation of the subordinate 
 position of woman where the opposite system prevails. 
 
 A conspicuous case is the Biblical narrative, which treats 
 the woman as a secondary creation of God since she was 
 made of the rib of the man; a circumstance tending to 
 justify his authority. 
 
 This is perhaps one of the earliest examples showing that 
 no actual ruler is ever at a loss for a theoretical explanation 
 of his "right." When woman lost her authority, she also 
 had to make the best of a descent from the insignificant rib 
 of a man, as the political philosophers in the new order of 
 society alleged. They who suffer the injury must also 
 endure the ridicule. L,ater the subject classes were traced 
 to an inferior descendant of Noah; while the ruling classes 
 were called the descendants of his privileged, first-born, son. 
 These are all genealogical tricks and aetiological lies of the 
 historian. 
 
 It is recognized that mother-rule everywhere gave place to 
 father-rule; but the natural forces which produced this revo- 
 lution in the original constitution of society have never been 
 pointed out so far as we know. Yet marriage by capture or, 
 more exactly, exogamic connection explains it fully. 
 
 The universality of woman-stealing both in the present 
 and in the past is fully established, and the custom has 
 been well described by ethnologists. But too little weight 
 has been given to the circumstance which constitutes its real 
 essence: the wife must always be stolen from another horde. 
 
 This is self-evident when we consider the condition of a 
 horde living in primitive promiscuity. Within the horde 
 woman-stealing is impossible. It must be from without; and 
 to this form of it the gynecocratic constitution gives 
 abundant incentive. 
 
 In the raids of unrelated hordes the woman has been and 
 in many cases still is more valuable than cattle or any other 
 form of food-supply. In the gynecocratic horde an excep- 
 tional position can be claimed for her, for the captor can hold 
 her as his individual property ; whereas the native women are 
 common and occupy a ruling position protected by custom. 
 
 The foreign woman has no share in their privileges; 
 belonging exclusively to her "lord," she must serve as his
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 113 
 
 slave. This is greatly to his advantage; it was the begin- 
 ning of his ' ' emancipation ' ' in the primitive horde. No 
 wonder that the advantages which this innovation secured 
 caused it to spread so that, when the historical period 
 opened, traditions of woman-stealing are universal. Recol- 
 lect, for example, the rape of the Grecian Helen by a prince 
 from Asia Minor, with which Grecian history begins; and 
 the rape of the Sabine women, from which Roman history 
 starts. Herodotus, the father of European historiography, 
 begins characteristically by reciting the rape of Asiatic 
 women by the Greeks, and of Grecian women by the 
 inhabitants of Asia. 
 
 Woman-stealing readily developed into the institution of 
 marriage by capture, the universality of which is fully 
 attested by the countless survivals still persisting.* 
 
 But as the custom spread the mother-family and mother- 
 right necessarily declined; the native women could not 
 maintain their position in competition with the foreign. 
 The charm of the new and strange alone would have 
 assured the latter a certain preference; but it also afforded 
 the man an opportunity, certainly not unwelcome, to escape 
 from a condition which had become unnecessary, burden- 
 some and "unreasonable," though the innovation must have 
 been a rude offence against old and sacred customs. 
 
 Thus mother-rule was overthrown, and with it fell 
 mother-right and the mother- family, while the sovereignty 
 of the men was extended over the native women also. They 
 had to adapt themselves to the inevitable; the good old 
 custom disappeared and a new ethico-legal institution pre- 
 vailed: father-hood, father- family, father-right. 
 
 But its significance for the social development of mankind 
 was increased by one of the attending circumstances, the 
 mingling of unlike [heterogen] ethnical groups. The process 
 has been continuous and universal and the intermixtures 
 are interminable in number, variety and degree. Together 
 with political, judicial and other institutions, they have pro- 
 duced an endless number of differentiated social unities. 
 
 However, rape was not the only occasion of early inter- 
 tribal hostilities; the plunder of property must also have 
 been an incentive just as it always has been and still is, not 
 among the uncivilized tribes alone. 
 
 Simple plundering raids are carried on at irregular intervals 
 
 *Post op. ctt., p. 54 et seq. Dargun, " Mutterrecht und Raubehe," p. 78 et seq.
 
 ii4 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 as necessity dictates and circumstances allow. But they 
 generally lead to expeditions for the permanent subjec- 
 tion of the foreign horde and the acquisition of territory.* 
 
 These latter conditions are the most favorable for the 
 development of civilization, as has been explained else- 
 where.f Yet the proximate basis of the evolution is the 
 institution of property which develops in connection with 
 them also. 
 
 We have already seen that property developed concur- 
 rently with the control of one group of men over another 
 and, in fact, as a means to uphold it.f But a few remarks 
 must be added here, partly for the sake of greater clearness, 
 and partly because of some recent works which were writ- 
 ten in ignorance of our explanation. 
 
 In the first place property in land is, in our opinion, the 
 only form which serves as an instrument of control. "Prop- 
 erty " in movable goods should be distinguished from 
 property in immovable goods. What is there in common 
 between the unlimited possession and free disposal of chat- 
 tels and that juridical relation in virtue of which a person 
 may keep a piece of land exclusively for his own benefit? 
 Yet for these fundamentally different conceptions the Euro- 
 pean languages use but one term, with consequent indistinct- 
 ness and confusion of ideas in science. 
 
 Common property {Eigentum, proprium) is a contradic- 
 tion in terms; yet even separate or private " property " has 
 been discussed as a simple concept and what might be true 
 of property in movable goods has been applied without dis- 
 tinction to property in land, a very different thing. This is 
 certainly a great mistake. 
 
 To justify private property as the natural right of the 
 individual to the fruit of his own exertions sufficiently 
 explains property in movable goods, including the product 
 of the land which a man's own labor has tilled, but does not 
 explain property in land or in the fruit of another's 
 labor; while to trace its origin to the actual possession of 
 weapons, ornaments, etc., an attempt which Dargun has 
 
 * Some idea of the behavior of primitive stocks can be gotten from the modern 
 Bedouins who, however, have made considerable progress. A recent French 
 traveler writes : " To fall upon caravans of strangers, to drive off flocks, capture 
 goods, kill and massacre the defenders, especially if they are inhabitants of cities, 
 such are the virtues which he rates highest. All these ignoble heroes of Bedouin 
 legend we would send to the galleys as highway robbers." Gabriel Charms, 
 " Voyage en Syrie." Revue des deux Mondes, August 15, 1881. 
 
 r Der Rassenkatupf," p. 231. 
 
 j " Rechtsstaat una Socialismus," p. 344.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 115 
 
 recently renewed, leaves a gap between movable goods and 
 immovable which no analogy can bridge over, for they are 
 totally different. No doubt individual property in movable 
 goods has always existed, for the conditions of human life 
 require it. But the conditions of property in land are quite 
 different. L,and is not the product of human labor, and its 
 use is temporary; it can be occupied, detained or possessed 
 only in a limited and figurative sense; it might be possible to 
 defend a small portion of land against trespassers; but it 
 would be impossible to defend the larger tracts which alone 
 are under consideration here. Property in land is not a 
 physical fact and cannot be explained by physical facts: 
 occupation, labor, etc. To say that land is occupied or pos- 
 sessed, as is currently done, is to use a metaphor or a legal 
 fiction. Land, by its nature, admits of only one relation to 
 man, the enjoyment of its use, the common enjoyment of 
 many. 
 
 Hence the first form of property in land must have been 
 its common use, and further, it must have been used by such 
 a group or horde as we meet with everywhere in the begin- 
 ning of social evolution. The evidence supporting this 
 conclusion is abundant. Even the primitive hordes of 
 modern times use land in common.* 
 
 Thus, in the nature of the cases, common property in 
 movable goods is impossible, but so-called common property 
 in land is real and original. What is commonly called 
 private property in land is never real, much less original; it 
 is purely a legal relation ; presupposing a complicated social 
 organization. It presupposes, first of all, an organized con- 
 trol, with power to compel obedience. This is necessary 
 that the individuals of the ruling class may procure from the 
 subject class the labor power to till their lands and make 
 them useful; thus they prove their property. Without power 
 to dispose of the labor force of others it would be merely a 
 name, with that power it becomes valuable. 
 
 A second presupposition is the possibility of excluding 
 some from the enjoyment of the product in favor of others. 
 The organized whole must protect the movable goods thus 
 acquired; for if they were left exposed to every aggressor 
 it would not be worth while to raise them. In a word, 
 property in land is a legal relation which necessarily presup- 
 
 *"Man does not have property in immovable things upon this stage." Lip- 
 pert, " Prtesterthum," vol. i, p. 35.
 
 n6 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 poses governmental organization and the guarantee of legal 
 protection. 
 
 Thus the ' ' common property ' ' which the primitive horde 
 is said to enjoy in the land on which it has settled is simply 
 common use and not real ownership, for the word "own" 
 contains originally the idea of separateness. Laying aside 
 our complex, advanced legal relations, and speaking of 
 primitive conditions, we must take ' ' ownership " to be 
 separate ownership and its antithesis is uuseparated, not- 
 own, i. e., common. It was a much later and over-refined 
 jurisprudence which transferred the idea of separate owner- 
 ship to a juristic person composed of a number of natural 
 persons, and it would be an unseemly transfer of modern 
 legal conceptions to speak of the common property of the 
 primitive horde. 
 
 Passing on from the use of the land in common, we first 
 recognize the beginnings of separate immovable property 
 when one horde has overpowered another and uses its labor 
 force. As soon as there are subjects who are excluded from 
 the enjoyment of certain goods which their own labor con- 
 tributed to produce, in favor of the ruling class, and when 
 the members of the ruling class are protected in their enjoy- 
 ment of them by the well-organized whole, then there arises 
 separate or private property in immovable goods. Not only 
 did this form of property arise with the organization of con- 
 trol and by means of it, it was at first the sole object of the 
 organization, which, moreover, contains the germ of the 
 state. So long as the organization continues in a nomadic 
 condition, and lords and slaves alike have no abiding place, 
 we do not call it a state. We apply that term only when a 
 permanent dwelling place has been adopted and the organi- 
 zation asserts its sovereign right of property over the land 
 it occupies against all other social communities. 
 
 THE STATE. 
 
 The state is a social phenomenon consisting of social 
 elements behaving according to social laws. The first step is 
 the subjection of one social group by another and the estab- 
 lishment of sovereignty; and the sovereign body is always 
 the less numerous. But numerical inferiority is supple- 
 mented by mental superiority and greater military disci- 
 pline. There is a double life in the state; we can clearly 
 distinguish the activities of the state as a whole, as a single
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 117 
 
 social structure, from those emanating from the social 
 elements. 
 
 The activities of the state as a whole originate in the 
 sovereign class which acts with the assistance or with the 
 compulsory acquiescence of the subject class. The move- 
 ment is from within out; it is directed against other states 
 and social groups. Its object is always defence against 
 attacks, increase of power and territory, that is, conquest in 
 one form or another; and its motive, in the ultimate analysis, 
 lies in human providence, in the impulse to secure condi- 
 tions favorable for existence [in Lebensfuersorge\ to use 
 Uppert's apt expression. 
 
 The activities within the state are seen in the several 
 social elements and arise naturally from the positions which 
 they occupy in the state and to each other. 
 
 The motive of each is essentially the same as that which 
 animates the state as a whole. They seek conditions favor- 
 able to existence and therefore endeavor to increase their 
 power. In particular, the superior class seeks to make the 
 most productive use of the subject classes; as a rule this 
 leads to oppression and can always be considered as exploit- 
 ation. The subject classes strive for greater powers of 
 resistance in order to lessen their dependence. 
 
 These are the simplest and most fundamental efforts and 
 they account for the internal and external development 
 of the state; while differences in the history of different 
 states are due to different local and ethnical conditions. 
 
 As the commonest things of life are often the most diffi- 
 cult to understand, so it is that political scientists to this 
 day have no clear conception of the state; each has his own 
 definition and scarcely one is correct. 
 
 Modern scholasticism has made the theory of the state 
 endless and fruitless. "Volume I" of a work on the 
 definition of the state has appeared in Berlin * already and 
 there is a "history" and a methodology of the subject. 
 Who will write a theory of the theory of the state ? Some 
 use general terms, calling the state a " politically organized 
 national person "f or the "highest form of personality," or 
 the " organism of freedom." Others solve the problem by 
 using a metaphor, by calling it a " living being, " an" organ- 
 ism,' ' etc. But Knies justly remarks that " it is a sad proof 
 
 * Von Rotenburg, "Ueber den Begrijff des Staates." 
 
 fBluntschli, " The Theory of the State." (Clarendon Press) bk. i, cap. i, p. 23.
 
 n8 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 of unclear thinking to discuss scientific conceptions in meta- 
 phors. ' ' * Schulze made great progress in the method of 
 defining the state by insisting that ' ' it is a question of 
 separating the essential from the unessential in the pleni- 
 tude of social phenomena;" f and after methodically 
 searching for its historical characteristics he concluded that 
 it is the ' ' association of a settled folk in an organic 
 community under a sovereign power and a definite constitu- 
 tion for the purpose of securing all the common ends of a 
 folk's existence, above all for the establishment of law and 
 order. J 
 
 But his definition can be improved by eliminating super- 
 fluous parts. The idea by no means clearly expressed in 
 the words ' ' an organic community ' ' is included in the pre- 
 ceding phrase; for a " folk," and much more, a "settled 
 folk," is "an organic community." Indeed a "settled 
 folk " is a state; no further ' ' association " is needed to make 
 it one. It is superfluous also to mention a " constitution," 
 for a written constitution is not essential and an unwritten 
 constitution is a prerequisite of a " settled folk." 
 
 If nothing but the universal and essential characteristics 
 of every state were incorporated into the definition, an 
 agreement could be easily reached for there are but two. 
 First, there are certain institutions directed to securing the 
 sovereignty of some over the others; secondly, the sove- 
 reignty is always exercised by a minority. A state, there- 
 fore, is the organized control of the minority over the 
 majority. This is the only true and universal definition; it 
 is apt in every case. 
 
 But many definitions of the state predicate its end, 
 declaring it to be a union or community for securing the 
 common weal, for realizing justice, etc. All this is wholly 
 inadmissible. No state was ever founded with one of these 
 
 *Knies, " Statistik als Wissenschaft,'" 1850, p. 90. 
 
 t Schulze, "Einleiung in das Deutsche Staatsrecht" 1865, p. 116, sec. 25. 
 
 \Ibid, sec. 32. 
 
 \ Elsewhere in his book Schulze gives almost the same definition. In section 41 he 
 says that " it is observable that in all actual states men are subject to a sovereign 
 power and that, as members of the body politic, they are even held by physical 
 compulsion to certain lines of activity." And in section 49 : "The presence of_a 
 supreme controlling power is essential to the notion of a state." Von Ihering, in 
 "Zweck im Recht," Vol. I, p. 130, defines the state to be " society as possessor of an 
 orderly and disciplined power of compulsion." But he tries to define the " state " 
 by the less clear term " society " and, besides, adopts the untenable French view 
 of " popular sovereignty." Continuing the argument, he again defines the state 
 as "organized social compulsion." Properly understood this is nearly correct. 
 But we had already (" Philosophisches Staatsrecht," 1876) defined the state to be 
 "the organized sovereignty of some over the others;" and as " sovereignty " is 
 more specific than "compulsion," our definition is the clearer of the two.
 
 THE; OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 119 
 
 ends in view; and there are many which are states though 
 they have never exhibited even a trace of such a purpose. 
 The truth is that in the course of time under favorable con- 
 ditions every sovereign organization necessarily acts in 
 harmony with these ends; thus any state may serve them, 
 indeed after reaching a certain stage of development every 
 state does endeavor to advance justice, welfare, etc. But 
 the definition must not be confined to states at one stage of 
 development only; it must apply regardless of the stage 
 which has been or ever will be attained. Moreover, the 
 affirmation of such ends conceals the fact that the single 
 object in organizing a state was to establish the sovereignty 
 of some over the others, and that the results which neces- 
 sarily followed were not foreseen, much less intended; they 
 cannot be referred to the intention of the founders who fol- 
 lowed their own immediate advantage, as all men do. High 
 above egoistic human efforts social development is the prod- 
 uct of natural law. 
 
 There is still another universal characteristic of the state, 
 although it has hitherto been wholly overlooked; there are 
 always ethnical differences between the ruling class and 
 the ruled. 
 
 We called attention to it for the first time in our former 
 publications; "authorities in political science" solemnly 
 ignored it; but they could not refute it. The world moves, 
 nevertheless.* States have never arisen except through the 
 subjection of one stock by another, or by several others in 
 alliance. 
 
 This is not accidental; it is essential, as we have already 
 proven. No state has arisen without original ethnical hete- 
 rogeneity [Hetetogeneitaei] ; its unity is the product of social 
 development. 
 
 Spencer without specially emphasizing ethnical hetero- 
 geneity confirms our position when he says that ' ' no tribe 
 becomes a nation by simple growth." Instead of the naive 
 conception that a family gradually grows to be a tribe and 
 the tribe becomes a folk, he holds that there must be a com- 
 bination of several tribes; to which we add that, with per- 
 haps a few unknown exceptions, tribes are united only by 
 the forcible subjection of one to the other. Spencer also 
 goes on to say that " no great society (nation) is formed by 
 
 [* Playing on the words attributed to Galileo while under ecclesiastical sentence 
 for his astronomical views. E pur si tnuove.]
 
 I2O ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 the direct union of the smallest societies ; " * by which he 
 evidently means that a great nation necessarily comprises 
 several smaller ones and includes a multitude of ethnically 
 compound groups; it is a group of the nth power, so to 
 speak. 
 
 I/et us observe the necessary result of founding a state, 
 i. e. t of subjecting one community to another or to a union 
 of several others. It has already been pointed out that it is 
 due to the effort to secure conditions favorable for existence. 
 But the efforts which men naturally make to better their 
 condition require the services of other men; if this were not 
 so, states would never have been founded and mankind 
 would have developed along quite different lines or not at all. 
 It will be readily conceded that civilized men cannot live 
 without the services of others. But there is no man 
 known to history nor can any be thought of so uncivilized as 
 to be able to renounce the co-operation of his kind. 
 
 The services which are needed are not easy; and the 
 farther back we go the heavier they necessarily were. Their 
 alleviation is an infallible characteristic of progressing civil- 
 ization; we can observe it in the development of current 
 industrial relations, and the struggle for it is the real subject- 
 matter of so-called social legislation (Social poliHk) . How 
 men must have had to labor and indeed must still labor 
 without the knowledge and the means of civilization! f 
 
 Many governments still commute death sentences to labor 
 in the mines expecting to profit by this act of grace; and 
 once the conquered were similarly condemned to slave-labor 
 in the interest of the victors. Men never have treated their 
 fellow-men (using that word in its most primitive sense) so 
 severely; and why should they do violence to their natural 
 feelings when strangers have never been lacking whom it 
 has always been meritorious to prey upon. United under 
 the leadership of the eldest and the mightiest they have 
 imposed the yoke of servitude upon the stranger in hard- 
 fought battle. 
 
 * " Principles of Sociology." Vol. i, sees. 257, 260. 456; cf. sees. 448, 451. 
 
 fThe naval captain, PanteroPantera, said of labor in the galleys in "ISArmata 
 Navale," 1614: " High wages will supply a galley with soldiers and sailors, but free- 
 men cannot be persuaded to submit to service at the oars, to be fastened to the 
 chain _and to take without possibility of resistance the bastinading and other 
 inflictions incident to labor in the galleys." Yet, if the galley was to move with 
 
 Erecision, the rowing must be controlled by chain, bastinado and all. Therefore 
 e advised that convicted criminals be sentenced to this slave's work. Such was 
 labor in the galleys even so late as the seventeenth century. "Za Fin tfune grande 
 Marine," by Jurien de la Graviere, "Revue des Deux Afondes," November i, 1884.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 121 
 
 Thus nature laid the foundation of ethnically composite 
 states in human necessities and sentiments. Human labor 
 being necessary, sympathy with kindred and tribe and 
 deadly hatred of strangers led to foreign wars. So conquest 
 and the satisfaction of needs through the labor of the con- 
 quered, essentially the same though differing in form, is the 
 great theme of human history from prehistoric times to the 
 latest plan for a Congo state. 
 
 Notice the condition thus established. The one party 
 commands; the other labors and accommodates itself to 
 superior force. As every war must cease raging and the 
 weaker party must give up fruitless opposition, so nature 
 helps to make the situation peaceful and lasting. But peace 
 and permanence are the elements of order, out of which 
 come habit, custom, rights. 
 
 The hostile contact of different \heterog eri\ social elements 
 of unlike strength is the first condition for the creation of 
 rights ; the conditions established by force and accepted in 
 weakness, if peaceably continued, become rightful. Inequal- 
 ity of power is essential, for contestants of equal strength 
 would wear themselves out in mutual conflict or, more natu- 
 rally , would unite and subject a weaker. Moreover inequality 
 is stamped on every right; the husband orders his wife, the 
 parent in the strength of his years commands his minor 
 children, the owner excludes all others from enjoying the 
 fruit of his property: all these are rights expressing the 
 orderly relations of unequals. It is an error and a delu- 
 sion to think that rights have been or can be equally 
 distributed. They arise only in the relations which 
 exist in the state; they express them and measure their 
 inequality. 
 
 Let us now examine more closely the nature of political 
 relations. Universally there is a ruling minority and a sub- 
 ject majority, this is the essence of the state as it is the 
 essence of sovereignty. 
 
 But what is the ruling minority disposed to do ? There is 
 but one thing it can wish, viz.: to live in better circum- 
 stances with the services of the subject majority than it could 
 without them. The result is a common industrial enter- 
 prise conducted under compulsion in which the greater 
 burden, all the unfree service, falls upon the subject class 
 though the rulers freely contribute their no less valu- 
 able share in support of the political community. Thus
 
 122 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 compulsory labor is organized through the organization of 
 sovereignty and the whole body of rights. 
 
 The kind of industrial labor depends upon the nature of 
 the soil, the climate and the material resources of the state. 
 If the subjected population was roving over rich agricultural 
 lands it will be compelled to till the soil and the conquerors 
 will settle among them so as to exploit both land and people 
 to the best advantage. The agricultural states of Europe 
 still bear traces of such a compulsory organization of labor 
 wherever an exclusive nobility has settled among a numer- 
 ous agricultural population, spreading itself like a net over 
 the whole land. 
 
 But a huge swarm inhabiting an extended prairie and 
 pasture land will adopt a different social organization. The 
 captives taken on many a plundering raid will be distributed 
 among the members to perform the heavier work of tending 
 cattle, transporting tents and the like. The nomadic state 
 thus organized will fulfill its political functions as truly as 
 the settled state of the large property owners. In the latter 
 case the lord upon his manor or in his castle manages the 
 peasants ?nd vassals settled about him, satisfying their simple 
 necessities from the produce of the fields and reserving the 
 surplus for himself. In the nomadic state the master from 
 his chieftain's tent rules over his numerous following, who 
 tend his herds and enjoy a simple subsistence out of the 
 increase; the rest of which, after the richer subsistence of 
 his family is deducted, is added to his accumulated wealth 
 and capital. 
 
 The organization will be different still where a narrow 
 strip of coast like Phoenicia, or a group of islands like 
 Venice, make agricultural or pastoral pursuits impossible. 
 The superior speculative talent of the ruling class must 
 suggest another method of utilizing the services of the sub- 
 ject class; they will be put to ship-building and employed 
 as sailors, so that the rulers may seek distant coasts and win 
 wealth and power in navigation and foreign trade. 
 
 Labor must always be organized under compulsion; the 
 training and the discipline of the state are necessary. It 
 demands of the laboring class, in the beginning at least, 
 untold sacrifice of life and health; but finally in a rising civil- 
 ization they become participants in the material and moral 
 possessions. 
 
 The life of the state is summed up in this common though
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 123 
 
 unequal labor. In it the state performs its task and fulfills 
 its mission, if task and mission can be spoken of where 
 blind impulse rules on every hand; out of it comes the highest 
 moral possession of mankind, civilization.* 
 
 THE STATE AS INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION. 
 
 The motive force in the establishment of primitive politi- 
 cal relations was economic as has been seen; higher material 
 welfare was sought. But this force never fails; the inner- 
 most nature of man keeps it in ceaseless operation, promot- 
 ing the development of the state as it laid its foundation. 
 Investigate the cause of any political revolution and the 
 result will prove that social progress is always produced by 
 economic causes. Indeed it cannot be otherwise since man's 
 material need is the prime motive of his conduct. f 
 
 This necessity incited men to exploit the services of their 
 fellows, and nature supplied a great many different groups 
 whose natural antagonism is still an important factor in 
 developing political relations; for human labor could not be 
 exploited without violence, and ethnical and social contrasts 
 promote the disregard of all human considerations, facilitat- 
 ing the satisfaction of human needs and maintaining the 
 everlasting struggle. Thus the two fundamental social 
 processes are satisfaction of needs and exploitation of the 
 services {Dienstbarmachung) of foreigners, two apparently 
 unimportant means with which nature accomplishes so much. 
 Moreover the evolution cannot cease; for nature has pro- 
 vided that man's needs shall not stand still; higher and 
 " nobler " wants are constantly awakened; while at the 
 point where natural ethnical distinctions \Heter ogenit(Bten\ 
 would disappear artificial ' ' social ' ' distinctions arise to per- 
 petuate the antagonism of human groups. Human desires 
 never fail and there are groups differing in stature, color and 
 odor, in diet, morals and religion, or in possessions, condi- 
 tions, calling, occupations and interests. 
 
 Only in the course of social development they rise to 
 higher stages and meet us in new forms as the need for 
 the bare means of subsistence with the most primitive is trans- 
 formed in the higher stages into the necessity for satisfying 
 
 * In addition see " Organized Sovereignty and Civilization." "Der Rassenkampf," 
 pp. 231 et seq. 
 
 f " The real motive force is the actual need. The only reason for formulating it 
 in fixed law is to give it recognized legal basis," says Bruns on the Development 
 of the Roman Law, in Holtzendorff 's " Encyclopesdie," p. 91.
 
 124 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 ambition, love of glory, the interests of a dynasty and 
 various other ideals; and the life and death struggle between 
 hordes anthropologically different \heterogen\ becomes a con- 
 test between social groups, classes, estates and political par- 
 ties. The great sociological difficulty in describing the course 
 of development arises from the fact that there can be no 
 leaps. Though social development like every other case of 
 evolution is gradual, the transitional phases are innumerable 
 and imperceptible and overtax the resources of science. The 
 only alternative is to treat a small number of examples 
 chosen more or less arbitrarily, which is all we can endeavor 
 to do here. 
 
 It must riot be forgotten that here, as elsewhere, the same 
 phenomena are found sometimes contemporaneously, some- 
 times in sequence. There is a social development in time 
 from the simplest satisfaction of necessities and the rudest 
 struggle for existence up to the highest needs of a refined 
 civilization and the system of rights developed in political 
 strife; while its counterpart with all the imperceptible gra- 
 dations and vivid contrasts can be seen in the cross-section, 
 so to speak, of a state on the highest plane of development; 
 for if we look at its inner structure we see the proletarian 
 toiling for his daily bread in the sweat of his brow, and all 
 the countless stages to the uppermost rung of society, to the 
 statesman struggling for position or for principle. Moreover, 
 what is true of the desires is true also of the means of 
 satisfying them. 
 
 This in passing. I^et us now turn to a closer analysis of 
 the social evolution founded upon and promoted by organ- 
 ized sovereignty. Equality prevails only in the most primi- 
 tive hordes. In them alone are needs satisfied without the 
 subordination of one man's labor to another's ends; in them 
 alone there is neither command nor obedience, lordship nor 
 dependence, chieftain nor subject. Equal misery is the lot of 
 all. 
 
 ' ' When Rink asked the Nicobarians who among them was 
 the chief they replied, laughing, how could he believe that 
 one could have power against so many ? ' ' And there are 
 many similar examples. Among the Haidahs ' ' the people 
 seemed all equal;" Among the California tribes "each 
 individual does as he likes; " among the Navajos, '' each is 
 sovereign in his own right. ' ' * 
 
 * [Add "as warrior."] See Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," Vol. il< sec. 471 
 and sec. 466.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 125 
 
 " Groups of Esquimaux, of Australians, of Bushmen, of Fuegians, 
 are without even that primary contrast of parts implied by settled 
 chieftainship. Their members are subject to no control but such as is 
 temporarily acquired by the stronger, or more cunning, or more expe- 
 rienced, not even a permanent nucleus is present." * 
 
 Plainly the subjection of some to the service of others is 
 opposed to the feeling of equality, of solidarity, of consan- 
 guineous relationships. Even the ruling classes of Europe 
 exhibit the same feeling. ' ' The nobleman in a peasant's 
 cottage is the peer of the commander of the Palatine's army" 
 ( ' ' Szalchcic na zagrodzie rbwny wojewodzie " ) , say the Poles. 
 This is the equality of the syngenetic group, f 
 
 The primitive horde emerges from this condition of uni- 
 form independence and uniform misery only when a strange 
 horde comes within its reach as the result generally of 
 migration or a plundering raid. If it subjects the strangers 
 its wants are more easily satisfied and its economic life is 
 raised above the primitive condition; the "extra" labor of 
 some for others begins. 
 
 If the rulers should remain content with the higher stage 
 of economic life; if they could isolate their state from 
 external influences, development would cease. But Lycur- 
 gian plans can never be realized; states can never be "iso- 
 lated " even with Chinese walls about them. 
 
 Stagnation in development is prevented by the steady 
 growth of the wants of both rulers and subjects, for the law 
 that wants increase with the opportunity to satisfy them is 
 universal, and the isolated state is also an object of desire to 
 its neighbors near and remote, so that as they grow power- 
 ful it must increase its means of offence and defence. Even 
 the least aggressive state will be drawn in spite of itself into 
 the stream of "history;" evolution cannot stop. As wants 
 increase, the state, which was called into being to satisfy 
 them, is driven to further conquests of territory and power. 
 But the same tendency which animates the state as a whole 
 animates also each social division within it. The only dif- 
 ference is that its manifestation is confined by established 
 political relations to a struggle for control by peaceful 
 means; while outside the state it breaks out in bloody and 
 destructive wars. 
 
 But, however unavoidable war may be, it cannot last 
 always; for it produces physical and mental exhaustion; 
 
 * Spencer, "Principles of Sociology." Vol. i, sec. 228; Vol. ii, sec. 456. 
 tSee " Der Rassenkampf" p. 40.
 
 126 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 and if it becomes chronic the end for which it is undertaken 
 is thereby defeated. 
 
 Peace is as necessary as occasional war, for both are the 
 result of a natural law of strife; and so it was possible to 
 establish states, since otherwise the more powerful must 
 have had to exterminate the weaker. But peace is useless 
 without the opportunity to satisfy the wants which war was 
 undertaken to secure. However, only one party can be 
 victor; one party secures the better satisfaction of its wants; 
 and the other is circumscribed and oppressed. Some force 
 is necessary to maintain the unequal condition in peace; 
 suitable institutions must be set up and sedulously sus- 
 tained. This the ruling and possessing class does while the 
 other class accommodates itself to the law of the victors. 
 But it jealously guards the established limits, now staking 
 everything on preventing any further circumscription, now 
 striving to enlarge them. 
 
 So apparent peace is only a continuous latent struggle. 
 What is its object ? What are the means employed ? What 
 is its essential characteristic ? The immediate object of 
 dispute is the body of reciprocal rights. The less privileged 
 oppose every limitation whatever asserted in the interest of 
 sovereignty: restricted connubial rights, exclusion from 
 office and positions of honor, incapacity for holding landed 
 property and others only relatively less important and less 
 common. Sovereignty cannot be maintained without them, 
 and the peaceful struggle of the unprivileged is directed to 
 breaking them down and removing them eventually. 
 
 In the common interest, the subject class must be assigned 
 some privileges and functions, for Spartan severity cannot 
 be rigorously enforced. Even the superfluous Helot popu- 
 lation was not always exterminated; neither do the Aus- 
 tralian colonists hunt down the natives everywhere. In 
 Sparta, to be sure, the contest of the Helots could not be 
 conducted by peaceable means, but the sovereignty over 
 them was not shortlived on that account; it succumbed to 
 another course of development. 
 
 But wherever in the interest of the whole the least con- 
 cession is made to the subject class it serves as a lever to 
 enlarge their privileges. Two conditions, however, are neces- 
 sary to success: well-being and enlightenment. When the 
 ruling class is well off the condition of the subject class will 
 necessarily rise too; otherwise the desires of the sovereign
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 127 
 
 class cannot be fully satisfied. But appetite comes with 
 eating and the first progress creates the desire for more. 
 
 Thoughts cannot be hermetically sealed, and as social facts 
 even more than any other facts provoke reflection, the sub- 
 ject class, if relieved from external press ue and direct need, 
 will experience mental growth. The ruling class is influ- 
 enced less by the outside world and by the social relations; 
 their life is easier and they are lulled to sleep mentally. But 
 it is otherwise down in the seething mass of the ' ' people. ' ' 
 Huge numbers of them may succumb to the hard conditions 
 of life and languish in ignorance and stupidity; but if the 
 pressure ever relaxes, or if it falls on unusually strong 
 natures, the mental reaction is all the more violent. On the 
 whole the life of the subject classes is more fruitful in ideas. 
 
 Some degree of well-being and some ideas is the neces- 
 sary leaven, as even Aristotle knew. It only needs a favor- 
 able opportunity, an external danger or defeat, a permitted 
 popular gathering, a tumult of unusual dimensions, to make 
 the first breach ; further development in the market-place 
 and on the forum is unavoidable. The same factors are active; 
 the method is the same; the result is the same. Woe to the 
 conquered, was the cry in the beginning and woe to the con- 
 quered is often the cry to the last. 
 
 DEVELOPMENT OF RANK AND POLITICAL 
 ORGANIZATION . 
 
 But the social struggle is not so simple as it is here repre- 
 sented. Economic development and historical facts create 
 a multitude of classes equally endowed with political tend- 
 encies and the result is a complexity of political rights. 
 Intermediate classes intervene between the master and the 
 slave which may hold the lower classes in dependence and be in 
 subjection to the upper, or be superior to all in certain spheres 
 of activity and dependent in others. They may be both 
 rulers and ruled. 
 
 The simplest political organization consisting of lords and 
 vassals, the simple civitas of the Romans, receives the first fatal 
 shock from the foreign merchants. The effect of their visits 
 upon the primitive political constitution is vividly portrayed 
 by Caesar in his ' ' Commentaries. ' ' The Belgians were the 
 bravest of all the Gallic tribes, he says, ' ' because they are 
 farthest removed from the civilization and culture of the Prov- 
 ince and the merchants visit them least often bringing
 
 128 ANNAI3 OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 things which tend to effeminate. ' ' The merchants seeking 
 gain penetrate the primitive political organization and dis- 
 turb its monotonous course, for their "fine articles " charm 
 the uncultivated man. 
 
 But these ' ' missionaries of commerce ' ' are the pioneers 
 of culture. They visit the most inhospitable shores and 
 impenetrable regions of unknown lands, staking both prop- 
 erty and life; and the thousands who fall are followed by 
 other thousands fearless of death all for the sake of ' ' busi- 
 ness. ' ' This is a universal fact, attested by classical witnesses, 
 by the history of European colonization in all quarters of 
 the globe, and, above all, by the living present. The clever 
 Hansa-man, the trader with his wares seeking gain, is the first 
 to enter the Congo and the Niger valleys, braving the diffi- 
 culties of the dark continent and visiting tribes who receive 
 the stranger as they would a wild beast; then, if his venture 
 succeeds, come the " chivalrous lords " and " patriotic states- 
 men." 
 
 The merchant, coming as guest and offering his wares for 
 sale, is personally free and knows how to maintain his free- 
 dom. Identified neither with the lords nor with their vassals, 
 he soon becomes necessary to both, for the " articles " which 
 he brings from a distance delight them and awaken new 
 desires which must be satisfied. The one class labors more, 
 the other saves more in order to get the new means of satis- 
 fying the new wants. They begin to grow " effeminate;" 
 but it must be added that they also grow in " civilization " 
 and " culture." * 
 
 They learn to value and to tolerate the stranger, and he 
 in turn discovers the virgin treasures of the land. Things 
 are gladly given to him which before his time had no worth 
 and without him would still have none. Occasional visits 
 are followed by permanent settlements and the first settlers 
 are followed by more numerous followers. A middle class 
 forces itself in between lords and vassals; personally free and 
 having no direct share in the government; instituting its 
 own corporation in its own quarter the later city; by com- 
 promise with the lords creating for itself rights within an 
 assured sphere limited and defined both from above and 
 
 * Tacitus also understood that civilization is promoted by trade; and it is clear 
 that he meant trade with foreigners. Thomas Aquinas speaks of the merchants 
 as strangers in the state. He considered it desirable that the citizens should 
 refrain from mercantile pursuits leaving them to ' ' foreigners " lest ' ' by the prac- 
 tice of trade " they " grow covetous." Thomas d'Aquin. " Opusculac Vemtiis" 
 1587, p. 298. (" De Regemine Prina'pum.")
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 129 
 
 below.* Thus a new factor arises in political evolution and 
 social strife. Changes proceed more rapidly than before; 
 foreign commerce makes domestic labor more productive and 
 awakens handicraft and industry, while those who follow 
 the new branches of economic labor are consolidated by their 
 common interests into compact groups demanding their 
 rights. 
 
 But such rights are only the realization, the unhindered 
 exercise of acquired power, i. e.> supremacy within politi- 
 cally recognized limits, which, however various the means 
 of acquiring it, consists essentially in the free and disposable 
 possession of whatever will satisfy human wants. 
 
 Prominent in the list is the possession, or better, the dis- 
 posal of human energy and labor. Without human services 
 every other possession is valueless unless indeed by means 
 of it human labor can be instantly secured, which reduces 
 to the same thing. The power varies in greatness with the 
 coefficient of disposable human energies and not with the 
 amount of other possessions, though generally the former is 
 proportional to the latter. 
 
 There is one method of utilizing human services directly, 
 that is without the intervention of other possessions; it is 
 the one by which the founders of political order assure 
 themselves of the services of their vassals and slaves. They 
 rely upon physical and mental superiority, strict military or- 
 ganization and discipline and innate tact in governing. Power 
 thus acquired may be strengthened by various material and 
 moral means; or it may fall into decay through weakness, 
 lack of discipline and energetic opposition. 
 
 Other means of facilitating and assuring the uninterrupted 
 application of human services is the possession of supplies 
 and of institutions for promoting production. But the most 
 powerful moral means is a purely natural factor, habit. 
 Having elsewhere f emphasized its overwhelming power in 
 political and legal relations, it is a great satisfaction to us to 
 find our views confirmed in a recent work. J 
 
 "The power of habit is mysterious as witchery," it is said. "It 
 sways the insignificant life of the individual and the great history of 
 mankind. The dark impulse of all material things is in the midst of 
 change to pause; in the midst of ceaseless motion to become stable for 
 
 * For historical evidence that the European merchant class began in this way, 
 see " Der Rassenkampf." p. 332. 
 
 J" Das Philosopkische Staatsrechi," sec. 23. 
 " Gegen die Freiheitsstrafen," by Mittelstaedt.
 
 130 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 a moment; by the pendulum's uniform swing to give to constant 
 vibration the appearance of regular motion; and essentially the same 
 impulse gives equipoise to all the mental activities of our race. First 
 the natural inclination to repeat the same act, then the incorporation 
 of the repetitions in regular habit: how much conscious thinking and 
 willing thus gradually becomes the unconscious function of an un- 
 thinking machine ! . . . . Rule and order and custom and law 
 transmitting civilization from generation to generation would be unin- 
 telligible without the incessant action of this mysterious force," 
 
 Thus nature itself is the strongest ally of the rulers. 
 Habit becomes an element of their power and its incessant 
 action produces the other moral factors, order, custom, 
 rights, and also the moral bonds that unite men of the same 
 language and religion. For however unlike the rulers and 
 ruled in these respects the former have understood how to 
 adapt themselves to the latter, at least outwardly, in both 
 respects an end to which, moreover, the force of circum- 
 stances directly tends.* 
 
 Thus do the founders of sovereignty sustain their power, 
 but the power of the new middle class is built up differently. 
 It starts from the possession of material goods and the more 
 necessary they are the greater is the equivalent offered for 
 the surrender of them whether in labor, services and goods 
 or in the right to demand services. In any case the equiva- 
 lent can be reduced to terms of human labor; and so the 
 middle class also acquires political power. By labor, 
 industry, inventiveness, speculation and thrift it can even 
 attain to the balance of power in the state. 
 
 That the possession of material goods can be a source of 
 power only in the state is so self-evident as scarcely to need 
 mentioning; for where club-law and anarchy prevailed they 
 would fall to the physically superior; no power-producing 
 energy is inherent in them. Within the state however the 
 purely economic power, as we may briefly call it, has se- 
 cured recognition and has its part in sovereignty. 
 
 I^et us consider how the middle class exercises its authority ; 
 who perform the services to which their authority, like every 
 other, may eventually be reduced. The rulers as a class do 
 not perform them; they must be performed either by the 
 subjects as a class or by wage-laborers drawn from other 
 sources. The rulers therefore cannot recompense the mid- 
 dle class directly by them. They offer treasures of the land 
 over which they exercise "eminent domain," products of 
 
 * For the process of assimilation, see "Der Rassenkampf;* p. 253.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 131 
 
 the fauna which are also the " lord's property," agricultural 
 products produced by the labor of the subject people, and 
 finally the concession of rights to have the exclusive sale of 
 articles of universal necessity, to hold markets, to claim 
 certain services from the unfree, etc. In so far as the lords 
 must acquiesce as a class and each can be compelled by law 
 and right, it is proper to speak of the power of the middle 
 class over the rulers, although up to a certain point in 
 political evolution the balance of privileges, prerogatives and 
 power is decidedly with the latter. The power of both can be 
 expressed in services of the ruled class which, being superior 
 in numbers, represents the greatest amount of human energy 
 in the state and is the great reservoir from which the whole 
 political apparatus is fed. In a word the whole state is 
 supported by its lowest and most numerous stratum. 
 
 L,ater we shall inquire whether the burden becomes 
 greater as the classes increase in number and variety; at 
 present we must consider the course of political evolution. 
 Though material wants created the middle class, even in the 
 very beginning of social life wants of quite another character 
 laid the foundation for another class which should some 
 time mightily affect the evolution of the state. 
 
 We have elsewhere shown how the human temperament, 
 worried by the riddle of its own existence, peremptorily 
 demands pacification; how this is found in religious ideas; 
 and how these lead to religious ceremonies.* We will not 
 here enlarge upon the psycho- social process involved ;f but 
 it is a fact that universally these religious needs sooner or 
 later produce a priestly caste inspired with the desire to sus- 
 tain and increase its power. 
 
 Now its power also must consist in the ability to com- 
 mand men's services. The only difference is in the form of 
 the power and the manner of securing it corresponding to 
 its peculiar means of satisfying human wants. 
 
 While the nobility commands human services immedi- 
 ately by its superiority; while by establishing an organiza- 
 tion it confers an undeniable benefit upon the whole; while 
 further the merchant brings material goods to both the lords 
 and the subject receiving an equivalent from both: the 
 priestly caste conducts the religious ceremonies, thereby 
 satisfying a peremptory need of human nature, and fortifies 
 
 * " Der Rassenkampf" p. 137 et seq. 
 
 t " Cf. I,ippert's " Geschichte des Priesterthums."
 
 132 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 its position by acquiring material goods and human ser- 
 vices. 
 
 The classes differ only in their functions; the equivalents 
 received by all can be reduced to the same terms: a greater 
 or less sum of human services rendered in kind or in goods 
 or in the grant of privileges, rights and " royalties." 
 
 The rationalist might object that the services of the 
 priest are imaginary and no real equivalent for what the 
 recipient of them gives in the sweat of his brow. The 
 same might also be said of the services of the ruling class. 
 But what are these objections against the fact that men's 
 religious wants are as peremptory as their material, and that 
 the ruling class also fulfills its function in social economy 
 and has no substitute ! 
 
 Besides sociology must avoid criticising nature. It is 
 interested only in facts and the laws of their behavior and 
 it cannot raise the question whether the thing could not be 
 accomplished differently or better. Social phenomena follow 
 necessarily from and must be the requirements of the nature 
 of men and their relations. 
 
 Sociology is coming to recognize that there would be no 
 rulers if there were no servants; no priests if there were no 
 believers; no traders if they could find no buyers. The 
 phenomenon of class-building can be referred to a universal 
 law: each want produces its own means of satisfaction. In 
 so far as a class is able to satisfy a social want it first is 
 indispensable, and, secondly, receives an equivalent which 
 can be expressed in terms of human services, the instrument 
 of power. But in exercising its acquired power it partici- 
 pates in government. 
 
 As new wants produce new professional classes and castes, 
 the more progressive a state is and the higher its civiliza- 
 tion the more numerous they are and the more complex 
 must be the mutual dependence of the several social circles 
 which jointly possess the elements of power. 
 
 Material and intellectual (moral) wants, it has been seen, 
 are rooted and grounded in human nature; they might be 
 called primary. But civilization keeps on developing 
 others which may be called secondary, such as the unciv- 
 ilized and those on lower stages of culture do not feel; 
 such as men become sensible of only as a result of their 
 higher culture. 
 
 On a low stage of culture, for instance, the priest is at
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 133 
 
 the same time medicine-man, and no need of a lay 
 (weltlich) physician is felt. By a process which might be 
 called a differentiation of wants, there arises out of the reli- 
 gious needs a demand for medical care and treatment which, 
 on the higher stages of culture, is supplied by the medical 
 profession which is organized, has social standing and 
 enjoys legal protection. 
 
 The necessity of legal assistance has grown out of the 
 intercourse and the legal relations of men in the civilized 
 state. It is well known what great influence the legal profes- 
 sion wields in the modern state. But its power is no greater 
 than the great and universal need it satisfies. 
 
 The necessity for an administrative department as the state 
 becomes large, for distributing governmental duties among 
 a number of functionaries and maintaining facility of com- 
 munication between them and the people has produced the 
 official class, which has its own interests, possesses power 
 and exerts a controlling influence in its own sphere. 
 
 The trading and industrial class has been subdivided into 
 very many different classes and callings, because a division 
 of labor became necessary as the demand increased for 
 many products which commerce brought to hand or trade 
 and industry supplied. 
 
 In the modern civilized state large industries are opposed 
 to the small, the laboring class to the capitalist and the under- 
 taking classes, agriculture to manufactures, and so forth. 
 Each has its own interest which it represents, its own power 
 which it strives to increase, and each bears down upon the 
 others according to its strength and their resistance. In 
 other words each participates in sovereignty solely and 
 exactly in proportion to its power. Wherein this power 
 consists we have already seen. 
 
 Just as the middle class was subdivided to correspond with 
 the division of labor and the development of specialties so 
 also a military class was differentiated from the simple ruling 
 class as the method of warfare changed. It assimilated por- 
 tions of other classes and developed into the modern military 
 profession, and though in deference to passing doctrines, 
 some efforts have been made to sink this independent pro- 
 fession in the universal obligation of all citizens to bear arms 
 it is a question whether they can succeed, whether nature 
 will not prove stronger than doctrine, finally producing in 
 spite of them a separate military class.
 
 134 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 We have seen that some classes, the ruling, the peasant 
 and the merchant classes for instance, arose from the union 
 \Zusammentreffen\ of different \heterog eri\ ethnological 
 elements; that their characteristic differences are original. 
 Such classes antedate the state and are the more easily main- 
 tained in it because their differences are both anthropological 
 and moral. 
 
 But there are others, as we have seen, the priesthood, large 
 industry as contrasted with small, scholars, jurists, officials 
 and so forth, which arise from the others by a process of 
 differentiation. When they have become fully separated 
 they in turn devote their whole conduct both active and 
 passive to guarding their peculiar interests and take on the 
 nature of the original classes. 
 
 These phenomena depend upon a universal law which we 
 must explain before we can show its application in the social 
 domain. Corollary to the distinction between original and 
 derived classes is that between heredity and adaptation. 
 Organic types seem to arise in two distinct ways and the 
 solution of the whole anthropological problem depends upon 
 setting aside the one or harmonizing the two. Is the principle 
 of perpetual growth in organic bodies heredity, or adapta- 
 tion, or what? 
 
 The wisdom of the ages which must not be despised an- 
 swers heredity; radical modern materialism answers adapta- 
 tion: ' ' The man is what he eats; ' ' Darwinism to reconcile 
 the difference says: Both. Let us see which answer is nearest 
 the truth. A superficial glance at organic structures is 
 enough to show that heredity is the mightiest principle of 
 their growth. It is clearly the rule that such structures are 
 as their progenitors were. However there are some excep- 
 tions, for which the cleverest and at present the most widely 
 accepted explanation is Darwin's theory of adaptation; what 
 cannot be explained by heredity must be referred to the prop- 
 erty of adaptation to external conditions, which organisms 
 possess and to which the struggle for existence forces them 
 to resort. 
 
 This theory would scarcely have found acceptance if 
 Darwin's genius had not pointed out many cases which 
 show that organisms do adapt themselves to external condi- 
 tions in their growth and so change the hereditary type,
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 135 
 
 though he was less successful in showing that changes pro- 
 duced by adaptation would become hereditary. 
 
 So the law of adaptation is still an hypothesis in spite 
 of the particular instances cited in support of it, though 
 the law of heredity is established beyond a doubt, we 
 believe. 
 
 It is a fact however that natural structures arise in two 
 ways; they are either primary or secondary. There are two 
 universal and so to speak opposing tendencies in nature: 
 one we might call originality, the other imitation. That is 
 to say, what nature made originally in some unknown, 
 "creative" way, is also frequently produced under the 
 influence of external circumstances which may be easily 
 comprehended. The latter origin is called by Darwin's 
 school evolutionary.* 
 
 Autogenesis and evolution always co-operate; and we are 
 often in doubt whether a particular organism is genetic or 
 evolutionary; while in many cases in fact it may be either. 
 
 Nature's processes are after all one and the same, like those 
 by which an artist produces an original and a replica. As it 
 is not impossible for a painter to produce an original because 
 he has made copies so it is a fallacy to conclude with the 
 Darwinians that the many instances of evolution prove all 
 organisms to have originated in that way. 
 
 Some human types originated in adaptation and evolution; 
 but not necessarily all. If the geographical character of the 
 habitat is sufficient still to modify a type of organism how 
 much greater must its influence have been upon the origin 
 of varieties, for once it produced, so to speak, genetic differ- 
 ences, but though still active the original genetic effect 
 proves to be more permanent. This might seem to justify 
 one argument used in support of evolution, viz. , that if the 
 period be indefinitely extended the supposition of an original 
 method becomes superfluous. But this is only arithmeti- 
 cally correct, it is insufficient to refute the supposition of an 
 original genetic origin when so many other considerations 
 support it. 
 
 Both forms of origin, the primary and the secondary, the 
 genetic and the evolutionary, are common in social as well 
 
 * We are able to comprehend the secondary or evolutionary origin while that 
 which is original in the realm of organic nature is incomprehensible to our facul- 
 ties. Accordingly we are always inclined to prefer the former process; as Darwin 
 and Haeckel do in the domain of organic and the sociologists in the domain of 
 social phenomena. But it does not follow that because this is the only way we can 
 explain there is no other.
 
 136 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 as in organic phenomena. Social inequality arises origi- 
 nally from the union \zusammentreffen\ of distinct \hetero- 
 %eri\ ethnical elements of unlike power; and it also arises by 
 evolution, by the slow development of some elements at the 
 cost of others which sink in power owing to unfavorable 
 conditions. 
 
 Though the original method of forming states is by sub- 
 jugation, it might happen (?) as an exception that a period 
 of peaceful development should result in the differentiation 
 of the population into classes, the stronger gradually sepa- 
 rating themselves from those who were weaker and needed 
 protection. Asa rule classes rise original!)', i. e., out of 
 different \heterogen\ ethnical elements, or by the permanent 
 organization of such as are at different stages of development 
 at the time of their union. But there are instances of sec- 
 ondary origin also; since as we have seen some turn to this 
 calling, some to that, according to conditions and inclina- 
 tions; and those of each calling congregate in a class. 
 
 But whether a social group arise in one way or the other, 
 its character as a group, as a factor in social development, is 
 not affected. It tends in the direction of its own interests, 
 it tries to protect and further them, to increase its power and 
 to acquire a corresponding influence in the state. 
 
 These efforts are always the same and all groups neces- 
 sarily had to adopt the same policy respecting them. The 
 natural differences between the original classes and the 
 syngenetic coherence within them helped in maintaining and 
 extending their power; and the secondary groups in turn 
 must needs acquire like differences and coherences. Hence 
 comes the strong tendency to divide into classes and to 
 maintain the power of each by endogamy; or by celibacy to 
 sunder all connection with other social groups and prevent 
 the weakening of power by division. 
 
 SOCIETY. 
 
 The great number and variety of mutually related groups 
 within the state considered as a whole is called society in 
 contrast with the state. In this wider sense society is not 
 different from the state; it is the same thing viewed from 
 another point. But in the narrower and more accurate 
 sense of the word each group centering about some one or 
 more common interests is a society. This double meaning 
 often leads to confusion which is made worse because social
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 137 
 
 groups are not always separated by a hard and fast line. 
 The} 7 overlap and intertwine so that the same men are 
 bound to one group by one set of interests and to another 
 by another set. Thus a government official may own a 
 large estate, be a zealous adherent of a religious sect, and 
 be a sugar manufacturer also. In the social struggles over 
 material and moral questions his position will be finally 
 determined by his relative interests. 
 
 On the other hand with the development of civilization, 
 certain interests have become broader than the borders of a 
 single state and some societies embrace the subjects of 
 several states. Religious beliefs, the ties of kindred, social- 
 ism, e. g.> have produced international groups. 
 
 Until these relations are thoroughly and scientifically 
 analyzed the notion of a society will remain confused. Such 
 unclear Hegelian definitions as von Ihering offers explain 
 nothing. 
 
 "Society," he says, " may be defined as the actual organization of 
 Mfe on the plan of mutual assistance; and since the individual is at 
 his best only through the others it is at once indispensable per se and 
 in reality the universal form of human life. ' ' * 
 
 For society substitute state, political economy or anything 
 else and the definition is equally good and equally bad; in 
 fact the state has actually been called ' ' the form " or " the 
 organization of human life:" general phrases fitting any- 
 thing and explaining nothing. Ihering's use of them is 
 not surprising perhaps for instead of seriously studying the 
 phenomena themselves he inquires, as Romanist, what the 
 Roman jurists say about them and frames his definition to 
 correspond. His meaningless definition of society is derived 
 from sodetas. But others have failed without this excuse. 
 
 How helpful in contrast is Spencer's clear explanation of 
 society considered as a unit. 
 
 "It is the permanence of the relations among component parts," 
 he says, "which constitutes the individuality of a whole as dis- 
 tinguished from the individualities of its parts." f 
 
 The "permanent relations" between men unite them 
 into a society, and since there are different kinds of rela- 
 tions there are different kinds of societies and a man may be 
 bound to several at once, as we have seen. 
 
 * von Ihering, "Zweck im Recht," Vol. 1, p. 95. 
 
 t Spencer, "Principles of Sociology," Vol. i, sec. 212.
 
 138 ANNAI OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 Much would be gained if we could use ' ' society ' ' simply 
 to designate a concrete number of men united by ' ' perma- 
 nent relations, ' ' for it is perfectly clear. The broader use 
 suggests nothing real; it is only another way of looking at 
 folk-life. Schaeffle, who calls these narrower social circles 
 " cohesive masses or tissue " {Massenzusammenhcenge oder 
 Bindegewebe), remarks that it is 
 
 " singular that social philosophy has as yet been unable to assign even 
 the most insignificant place in its system to these elementary tissues 
 which are neutral (?) as a rule, but at certain times extremely sensi- 
 tive. They are thrown with much other rubbish into a heap called 
 'society,' which is alleged to lie midway between the state and the 
 individual. In reality no such miscellaneous society exists. ' ' * 
 
 He fails to note that a " society," something less than the 
 State and more than the individual, had necessarily to be 
 assumed as the starting point of a social philosophy which 
 began with Schloezer's and Hegel's " society of burghers," 
 and later was powerfully influenced by the broader concep- 
 tions advanced by Mohl, Stein and Gneist.f But nowa- 
 days when people ought to know that there is no concrete 
 reality behind the idea the use of the word in its broader 
 signification has no further justification. If it should be 
 objected that all the social groups in the state are united by 
 " permanent relations," such as those of common territory, 
 government, etc. , and hence in turn form one ' ' society, ' ' we 
 reply that the word ' ' folk " is a sufficient designation. 
 There is no further use for this expression in its wider sig- 
 nification. It should only be applied to the simple social 
 groups in the state or to those united by interests which 
 transcend state limits. 
 
 SOCIETIES. 
 
 We cannot be expected to enumerate all the societies 
 which occur in the state and still less to discuss the histori- 
 cal development of each. Lippert in his ' ' History of the 
 Priesthood " has described one successfully; to do as much 
 for every other would take us far outside the limits of this 
 sketch. We can only explain the social " relations " which 
 bind the members of the several groups together and the gen- 
 eral principles underlying their power in the state, for here 
 
 * Schaeffle, " Bau und Leben," Vol. i, p. 292, jier Hauptabschmtt, zte Abtheilung, 
 I"DieJormlosen Zusammenheenge oder Bindegewebe." 
 
 t " Philosophisches Staatsrecht," sec. 12; " Rechlsstaat und Soctalismus," pp. 158 
 et seq.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 139 
 
 also the description of what is individual must be reserved for 
 history; sociology can only state the general modes of be- 
 havior, the laws of the phenomena. It is clear that the 
 societies both in their origin and in their development are 
 controlled by ' ' laws ' ' since human nature is the same 
 everywhere and social differentiation corresponds to the 
 growth and development of human wants as we have seen. 
 Social structures thus arising from a common basis must be 
 the same in essence; must have the same life-principle, make 
 the same efforts and have the same aspirations. Whether 
 they shall develop power and sovereignty depends simply 
 on the greater or less resources they have at the beginning 
 or acquire later. They differ in degree; they are alike in 
 plan and tendency. 
 
 To discover what ties bind a number of men into a society 
 we must start, as elsewhere in sociology, with an original or 
 primary condition, one which we cannot analyze further, 
 the origin of which we cannot observe. Such a bond is 
 association in the horde .* It seems to be natural and, in 
 contrast, all others are evolutionary arising with social 
 development. Of course they are natural too in a sense; 
 the difference is that we know their origin and do not know 
 that of the former. t To those who feel this bond it suggests 
 a contrast with the " stranger;" later reflection based on 
 experience adds the aetiological explanation of common 
 descent from some god or hero. 
 
 Analysis shows that the positive binding force is associa- 
 tion and simple consanguinity with the resultant community 
 of language, religious ideas, customs and mode of life, 
 while the contrast with the stranger lies in his lack of par- 
 ticipation in them. 
 
 In reality all the social binding forces are represented in 
 the primitive horde: association and consanguinity, similar 
 material and intellectual needs and similar interests in 
 satisfying them; and there are no social contrasts which 
 cannot be referred to dissimilarity in one or more of these 
 respects. 
 
 Social development presupposes the junction of hetero- 
 geneous or the differentiation of homogeneous elements. In 
 
 * Spencer too has recognized the necessity of this point of departure in socio- 
 logical studies; for he says that: "Social evolution begins with the small simple 
 aggregates." "Principles of Sociology," Vol. i, sec. 257. 
 
 f For the distinction between "natural" and " artificial " social institutions, 
 see " Rechtsstaat und Soctalismus," p. 329.
 
 140 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 the former case the combining elements are united by com- 
 mon interests and fall into social opposition for lack of them. 
 In the latter the differentiating group develops certain 
 common interests which hold it together and separate it 
 from the rest. The first is the case when political re- 
 lations are established between foreign elements or a 
 middle class is gradually developed; the latter, when the 
 various priestly, military and professional classes slowly 
 appear. 
 
 The establishment of the first political relations calls two 
 social classes into existence at once: the lords and the slaves 
 or serfs. The social bonds which unified each group and 
 created feelings of tribal loyalty will be strengthened by 
 the common interest of rulers and the common lot of 
 subjects respectively. Class feeling will be added to tribal; 
 but it does not follow that mutual opposition will be intensi- 
 fied. The centrifugal factors will be offset by local associa- 
 tion and all the ties which habit and adaptation develop 
 under such circumstances. The psycho-social functions: 
 language, customs, religious ideas and ceremonies will 
 gradually become assimilated. 
 
 The subject class may even acquire a feeling of respect 
 for the other; and all the factors together may be strong 
 enough to make the two classes at times appear as one in 
 contrast with outsiders. But the difference in rank, the 
 separate consanguineous circles (while intermarriage is 
 prohibited), and the difference in political interests will 
 keep them permanently apart. 
 
 So when a foreign merchant class takes its place beside the 
 others all are strangers at first in every respect. Language, 
 customs, religion, descent, every thing which binds the mem- 
 bers of one group together separates it from the others. 
 Some of the dissociating factors may disappear in time; local 
 association may develop love of home and folk; and assimi- 
 lation of language, customs and ideas may follow. But in 
 spite of all and in addition to differences in descent, rank, 
 customs, and class ethics, the interest of the traders will be 
 permanently opposed to the interests of the other classes. 
 
 When classes are differentiated from a homogeneous ele- 
 ment the course of events is different. There is simply 
 some one interest which distinguishes the dissociating class 
 from all the others and brings its members together. Besides, 
 such classes are not composed of the members of one class
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 141 
 
 exclusively but generally attract members from different 
 sources. The sacerdotal, military, official and learned 
 classes are recruited from the older classes indiscriminately 
 for the inclination, fitness and capacity for such callings is 
 not distributed with regularity. 
 
 Though the peculiar interest of one calling distinguishes 
 all who follow it from all others, still the individuals stand in 
 the greatest variety of relations to the classes whence they 
 sprang. Hence new complications arise and social classes 
 become curiously involved, crossing or coinciding in part, or 
 becoming wholly exclusive. These conditions often exert a 
 decisive influence upon their position and power in the state; 
 upon the results of the social struggle. 
 
 THE GROUP-MAKING FACTORS. 
 
 Let us now attempt a scheme of the forces or ' ' relations ' ' 
 which classify and unite men in societies. On a former 
 occasion* I distinguished " three natural " bonds: consan- 
 guinity, local association and common interests. They are very 
 comprehensive, especially the last; but I now think a double 
 classification according to fundamental principles and per- 
 manency is plainer and more to the point. 
 
 According to fundamental principles they may be 
 divided into material, economic and moral. The material 
 factors are common place of residence, sociableness or 
 common social life, consanguinity and relationship. The 
 economic factors are similar and equal possessions and like 
 callings: agriculture on large or on small estates, tenancy, 
 manufacturing, skilled trades, commerce and so forth. The 
 grouping into nobility, burghers, priests, artists, scholars, 
 writers, etc., is partly economic and partly moral; that ac- 
 cording to language, religion, political allegiance, nativity, 
 citizenship and nationality wholly moral. Accidentally 
 sharing the same fate, as in a common migration, is a 
 moral factor also. 
 
 But most of these factors are of varying duration and 
 their permanency must be considered. The influence of a 
 common place of residence may continue from generation to 
 generation or no longer than a visit at a watering-place and 
 its effects vary accordingly. The effect of common re- 
 ligious views is different according as they have been 
 
 * "Das Philosophische Staatsrecht.'"
 
 1 4 2 
 
 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 inherited generation after generation or are the result of 
 recent proselyting. 
 
 The following table illustrates the double classification 
 showing that each relation enumerated may endure for a 
 longer or shorter period: 
 
 I 
 
 .2^ 
 O 
 
 MATERIAL. 
 
 ECONOMIC. 
 
 MORAI,. 
 
 ^Common place of residence (in immediate or re- 
 mote neighborhood). 
 Common social life. 
 Consanguinity. 
 Relationship. 
 
 Rank Nobility. 
 Burghers. 
 Peasantry. 
 Priesthood, etc. 
 'Possessions In the country. 
 
 In the city. 
 
 Occupation Landowners, Tenants. 
 Manufacturers. 
 Merchants. 
 Artisans, etc. 
 
 Language. 
 
 Religion. 
 
 Science. 
 
 Art. 
 
 Accidental fate (emigrants, etc.). 
 
 The greater the number of group-making factors binding 
 men together the more intimate is the social bond and the 
 greater its cohesive force and power of resistance. Strongest 
 of all is a community united by permanent material, eco- 
 nomic and moral forces. It is a unitary race, and in the 
 struggle for existence is superior to all lesser social combina- 
 tions in endurance if not in power. 
 
 In the primitive horde, in the " small simple aggregates " 
 with which, according to Spencer, social evolution begins, 
 we find all three classes of factors permanently acting: 
 common place of residence, common blood, common means 
 of subsistence, common language, religion, and customs
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 143 
 
 generation after generation. When such social groups are 
 politically organized they retain their compactness and 
 cohesion. But the union grows weaker as language, 
 religion and other factors became common to several social 
 groups. Membership in the same political system is sure to 
 produce this result in the course of time. 
 
 Without doubt consanguinity is the strongest group- 
 making factor. The consanguineous social group always 
 retains something of the elemental power of primitive 
 hordes, treating all strangers as hostile beings. The divi- 
 sion of European nations into lords, middle class and 
 peasants would not have produced such rigid social dis- 
 tinctions if the three classes had not, generally speaking, 
 represented distinct consanguineous groups, for economic 
 differences would have been counteracted by the assimilation 
 of language and religion. However it is also the tendency 
 of each economic group to become a consanguineous unit. 
 
 THE SOCIAL CIRCLES IN THE SOCIAL STRUGGLE. 
 
 It has already been pointed out that it is not the size of 
 the social group which determines its power. The lords were 
 always in a minority, and in modern states with millions 
 of inhabitants the power rests with the ' ' upper ten thousand. ' ' 
 The intimacy of the union and the resultant organization 
 and discipline together with mental superiority complement 
 numerical inferiority giving the minority the preponderancy. 
 The minority applies the strategical maxim: march as indi- 
 viduals, strike as one. The masses always lack unity and 
 organization as the result partly of their great bulk, partly 
 of indolence. Since the result of the social struggle depends 
 on discipline the minority has the advantage because it is 
 small. Besides there will be greater intimacy and more 
 common interests; the group-making factors will be more 
 numerous, more intense and more permanent. 
 
 The more indolent a man is the less appreciation he has 
 for the ideal goods of life. As he has fewer wants he has 
 fewer interests in common with other men and is less ener- 
 getic in defending them. 
 
 The power of a social group increases with the number of 
 common interests among its members irrespective of its size. 
 When success depends on numbers it relies on uniting with 
 other social groups. This is very important; it is the key
 
 144 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 to social politics. The number of common interests necessa- 
 rily varies inversely with the number of individuals in the 
 social group. For though the number of interests increases 
 as conditions improve, it is the condition of the minority 
 especially that improves since the majority must labor and 
 serve to produce it. 
 
 Prosperity is the natural lot of the minority; with im- 
 proved conditions the number of interests increases; with 
 these the intensity of social cohesion; and this gives more 
 social power. 
 
 In the final analysis the intensity of the union depends 
 upon the personal character of the individuals. But as their 
 mutual intercourse is made easier by custom, and as good 
 customs grow with common welfare and culture the union is 
 strengthened too. 
 
 The highest and smallest aristocratic circles are mightier 
 than all the other social groups in the state though a thou- 
 sand times larger. The masters united in a guild are stronger 
 than the journeymen and laborers. 
 
 In times of revolution everything may depend on numeri- 
 cal strength and then the small groups are at a disadvantage. 
 Their power can be realized only under normal conditions of 
 political organization. But this must be considered the 
 normal condition of civilized man. 
 
 Each group exerts whatever power it normally possesses 
 and tries to have its relative position recognized in the state 
 in the form of rights. But every right is made the basis of 
 renewed efforts. Human desires are constantly growing and 
 no social group ever rested content with what it had obtained; 
 on the contrary present attainments are used to increase 
 power and satisfy new desires. 
 
 From this fundamental law the conduct of each social 
 group can be definitely predicted in every case. It will 
 strive, like the state, to increase its power. But the result 
 of the struggle does not depend on the individual. Though 
 there are always individuals who deviate first one way 
 and then the other, they, like meteoric stones which are 
 loosened from their planet and fly off in all directions, are 
 abnormal, and do not influence the behavior of the group 
 as a whole. 
 
 In its political actions each social group is a perfect unit. 
 It opposes other social groups in behalf of its own interest 
 solely and knows no standard of conduct but success.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 145 
 
 The struggle between social groups, the component parts 
 of the state, is as inexorable as that between hordes or states. 
 The only motive is self-interest. In " Der Rassenkampf" 
 we described the conflict as a " race- war ' ' for such is its 
 inexorable animosity that each group that is able tends to 
 become exclusive like a caste, to form a consanguineous 
 circle, in short to become a race. 
 
 What is the character of the struggle between the social 
 groups ? What are the methods and the means ? No general 
 answer can be given; for they differ with the position which 
 the groups occupy in the state, with the amount of power 
 and the instruments which they possess. 
 
 The refusal to perform religious rites is an instrument in 
 the hands of the priesthood. The higher nobility can make 
 certain lucrative and influential offices exclusive. The 
 guild- masters require ' ' proof of competency. ' ' Attorneys 
 restrict the privileges of practicing law. Manufacturers 
 insist on free trade in grain. Laborers strike, etc., etc. 
 The social struggle consists in establishing appropriate insti- 
 tutions for increasing the power of one social group at the 
 expense of the others. However it may be with the indi- 
 vidual the society never errs in seizing and applying the 
 right means; its instincts are always right. 
 
 If this seems to be a contradiction consider the actual 
 experience of history. At every step it shows the mistakes 
 of even the cleverest individuals and the demoniaca?! 
 cleverness of society infallible as natural law.* Theories 
 and passions often confuse the individual; but society never 
 fails for it never reflects and never chooses but naturally 
 follows the powerful attraction of its own interests. 
 
 THE FIELD OF COMBAT. 
 
 It is a peculiarity of the social struggle that it must be con- 
 ducted by a collective whole. Previous organization into 
 assemblages is necessary, and every society must secure some 
 suitable organ for conducting the social struggle. Thus the 
 ruling classes through their parliaments exercise the legis- 
 lative power and are able by legal institutions to further 
 their own interests at the cost of others. 
 
 In the cities the middle class very early resorted to the use 
 
 *See below. Part iv, sec. ix, " Individual Efforts and Social Necessity."
 
 146 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 of guilds and representatives. The priesthood also organ- 
 ized into hierarchies and created synods and councils, con- 
 sultative and representative bodies. The fact that the great 
 mass of the people in the very nature of the case could not 
 thus organize made the conduct of the struggle in their 
 interest more difficult. It is in consequence of having 
 entered upon this struggle that laborers now organize and 
 wily agitators even found peasant unions; the procedure is 
 logical. 
 
 Yet the difference must not be overlooked. The prosper- 
 ous and property-holding classes perfect their organization 
 more easily because the greater number and intensity of their 
 common interests make it easier to unite and act as a body or 
 by representatives. The weaker social connection of the 
 masses prevents a sound and strong organization. Such as 
 occurs is generally the ephemeral artificial work of selfish 
 leaders seeking selfish ends. But this much is certain: 
 without organization, without united collective action the 
 social struggle is impossible. 
 
 The proximate end of organization is to establish a legal 
 norm for the mutual relations of the groups, to confirm by 
 right the commanding position which has been acquired or 
 is striven for. Hence it is clear that the society which has 
 already acquired the right of legislation in the state occupies 
 the most powerful position, and that it is the aim of every 
 other society to participate in the same right. 
 
 It is well known that the history of European politics 
 generally turns upon the struggle of the lower classes for 
 participation in legislation; that it has been partly successful, 
 and that it is still in progress. Indeed, it can never end, 
 for after the third estate comes the fourth. The real object 
 is to be able to conduct the social struggle with equal 
 weapons. 
 
 THE MORAL CHARACTER OF THE STRUGGLE. 
 
 Nothing impresses thinking men so seriously as the con- 
 templation of the social struggle, for its immorality offends 
 their moral feelings deeply. Individuals can consider 
 ethical requirements, they have consciences, but societies 
 have none. They overfall their victims like avalanches 
 with irresistible destroying power. All societies, large and 
 small, retain the character of wild hordes in considering 
 every means good which succeeds. Who would look for
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 147 
 
 fidelity, veracity and conscience in the intercourse of the 
 ' ' most civilized ' ' states of the world ? Lying and deceit, 
 breach of confidence and betrayal is on every page of their 
 history; and saddest of all, no one can foresee whether it 
 will ever be different, though the noblest men may stand at 
 the head of affairs, with the highest intentions. What self- 
 deception it is to believe that monarchs rule the social world ! 
 They are not responsible for all the moral lapses that occur 
 daily in politics. 
 
 How trivial are royal assurances that the friendliest rela- 
 tions exist with all the neighboring states! Often they have 
 scarcely been uttered before bloody war breaks out. They 
 were not really perfidious. The current of history, the 
 rivalry of states, is not under the arbitrary control of 
 rulers. 
 
 However cordial the personal relations of the monarchs 
 not one will cease arming. It is felt instinctively that with 
 the first favorable opportunity any state will pounce like a 
 wild beast upon a defenceless victim. Indeed, it is gene- 
 rally recognized that states oppose each other like savage 
 hordes; that they follow the blind laws of nature; that no 
 ethical law or moral obligation, only the fear of the stronger, 
 holds them in check; and that neither right nor law, treaty 
 nor league, can restrain the stronger from seeking its own 
 interests when the opportunity is offered. 
 
 The same is true of the struggle of the social groups in 
 general. It is conducted not by individuals but by socie- 
 ties and communities. 
 
 The lack of moral principle is nowhere more conspicuous 
 than in the leagues into which societies unite for the sake 
 of assuring success. The overmatched horde makes terms 
 with its recent enemy in order to fall with superior force 
 upon the present foe; civilized states consider only their own 
 advantage in making alliances. No consideration of prin- 
 ciples, intimacy of relations or community of ideas avails; 
 republican France and America ally themselves with Russia 
 without scruple; constitutional and liberty -loving England 
 upholds Turkish rule and aids American slaveholders, and 
 social units behave in the same way. The extreme con- 
 servatives fight side by side with the social democrats to-day 
 for the sake of defeating the middle classes, and to-morrow 
 perhaps will join their defeated foe to overcome their 
 quondam ally.
 
 148 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 But these ' ' perfidious ' ' struggles do not show the indi- 
 viduals to be utterly base. They only prove that in the 
 struggle of the wholes individual opinions play no part, that 
 here social groups struggle inexorably to satisfy their own 
 interests, to demonstrate their own power. Blind natural 
 law controls the actions of savage hordes, of states and of 
 societies. 
 
 THE STRUGGLE FOR EMANCIPATION. 
 
 Though the exercise of legislative power, as we have said, 
 is indispensable in conducting the social struggle those who 
 do not possess it are not condemned to perpetual passivity. 
 The unique method which they employ against the ruling 
 classes is aptly called the struggle for emancipation. The 
 might of ideas is on their side, a significant statement which 
 needs careful explanation. 
 
 The superior classes, as we have seen, cannot rest content 
 with the fact of superiority; political relations need to be 
 confirmed; might must be turned into right. It seemed 
 simple enough for them to say : Let this be right. But every 
 right has its obverse obligation; however comprehensive, it 
 has its limits at which obligations begin, the rights of those 
 who hitherto have had none. So the rights of the rulers 
 produced the rights of the ruled. The germ was there and 
 it must develop. 
 
 But more than this; the human mind probes to the foun- 
 dation of things seeking the principle of causation and 
 analyzing the changing phenomena to find their eternal 
 unchanging essence. Now in the changing phases of right 
 the enduring principle is the idea. Thus rights not only led 
 to obligations but also to the idea of right. 
 
 If the obligation could be called the consequence of right 
 in space, the idea was its consequence in time. Whoever 
 asserts his rights can not escape their consequences. Thus 
 the rulers themselves forge weapons with which the ruled 
 and powerless classes successfully attack them and complete 
 the natural process. The egoism of the powerful prepares 
 the way for the uprising of the weak. 
 
 The idea of right is not a purely fanciful conception. It 
 has power to influence men and can be practically applied. 
 Men grow accustomed year by year to submit to rights; they 
 use legal forms constantly and learn to respect rightful 
 limitations, until finally the conception, the very idea, of
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 149 
 
 rights pervades and controls them. In this way the idea 
 of right becomes the fit weapon for those who have no 
 other. 
 
 But its application is not simple. The legal bulwarks of 
 the powerful will not yield to a simple appeal to ideas as 
 Jericho's walls fell at the blast of trumpets; and, besides, the 
 propertyless and powerless are unable to use such mental 
 weapons immediately. Again we see the egoism of one 
 class promoting the social evolution of the whole. The 
 bourgeoisie in the struggle with the other property classes is 
 the first to appeal to universal human rights, to freedom and 
 equality. It claims to be contending not for itself alone 
 but for the good of the whole folk. And it succeeds not 
 without the support of the masses whom it flatters and 
 to whom it discloses the resplendent goal of freedom and 
 equality. Its might like that of the higher class is now 
 based on right, and though for the moment what it has won 
 seems to be clear gain, it has found the yoke of legal logic 
 about its neck and must submit to its ideas. 
 
 For the lowest classes participation in the struggle was a 
 profitable experience. Even the slight amelioration of their 
 condition was an advantage. It taught them many a lesson. 
 But it is hard for them relying simply on ideas to undertake 
 the social struggle, for political regulations are firmly based 
 on the possession of material goods and are defended by the 
 middle class also, and moreover as time goes on some of 
 their ideas prove false and indefensible. But in spite of 
 exaggerations they are logical consequences of principles 
 which the ruling class asserted in its own interest and from 
 which the middle class profited declaring them at the 
 time to be universal. They cannot be wholly eradicated; 
 they aid the struggle for the emancipation of the fourth class 
 powerfully. They inspire the masses with fanaticism and 
 the struggle for emancipation succeeds. 
 
 Meanwhile, however, an unsocial compound of societies 
 has taken the place of the primitive horde. The principles 
 suited to one condition are unsuited to another and cannot 
 be permanent. The false consequences must be corrected 
 step by step back to the point where might of its ' ' own 
 right ' ' as spontaneous factor of public life undertakes the 
 control of a society tired of revolution. This completes the 
 period of evolution in the social struggle: from the freedom 
 and equality of the anarchic horde through might and
 
 150 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 inequality, right and law to the freedom and equality of 
 revolution and state-destroying anarchy; and from this 
 unbearable condition to the despotic might of reaction and 
 the beginning of a new period of evolution. 
 
 THE GROWTH OF STATES. 
 
 Semper Augustus, always augmenting the empire, the 
 characteristic title of honor borne by the Roman and Ger- 
 man emperors, is a naive recognition of the nature of the 
 state; for its most natural tendency (here predicated of the 
 ruler) is incessant increase of power and territory. 
 
 It is inherited from the horde and characterizes every 
 social community. A roving horde subjects strangers and 
 uses as many of them as possible for servants and slaves. 
 After permanent settlements have been made and states 
 founded the object of the raids must be either to levy con- 
 tributions and exact tribute or to annex territory. As the 
 latter is the most successful way of augmenting the state it 
 is the most frequent and desirable; it is the general rule of 
 history, and all great states have attained most of their 
 greatness in this way. So long as inherent strength and 
 external circumstances allow the process is continued; but 
 there must be some natural limit to the tendency, otherwise 
 the whole inhabited world would long since have become 
 one state. 
 
 The first condition precedent to external growth is rela- 
 tive stability of political authority within. If the political 
 authority is not firmly established; if there are no firm 
 bonds of reciprocal interest between rulers and ruled, or of 
 common interest in the state the rulers cannot undertake 
 foreign conquest without risking their position, as many 
 historical examples show. 
 
 A state can undertake foreign conquest with prospect of 
 success only when by shrewd and strong political organiza- 
 tion or through community of interests it has succeeded 
 outwardly at least in giving its constituent parts the nature 
 of a social element. It must come into action as a unit. 
 
 Hence follows the social law that a state's ability to under- 
 take foreign activity grows as the process of unification 
 proceeds within it. Since every new conquest adds a new 
 element no conquest can be undertaken successfully until 
 the spoils of the former have to some degree been assimilated 
 and social unity is re-established.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 151 
 
 It is a simple consequence of this social law that states- 
 men have always looked upon internal divisions in neighbor- 
 ing states as security against attack upon their own. For 
 as soon as the state is strong internally it must utilize its 
 power externally, though in some cases an enterprise which 
 promises advantage to all will even relieve considerable in- 
 ternal friction. So necessary and so strong is the tendency to 
 foreign conquest that no state can escape it what ever may 
 be the feeling of the ruler at the time. The method will 
 vary with the circumstances; and unfavorable circumstances 
 will be circumvented or overcome. 
 
 So long as a compact and powerful body politic finds 
 itself in the midst of weaker states it will continue its 
 policy of conquest and annexation to the last possible limit, 
 as Rome did in Italy and as Russia is doing in the East 
 where its neighbors are weak and loosely organized. 
 
 If all are equally powerful so that no one can hope to 
 overthrow any other one then two or more will form 
 alliances in order to conquer the selected object of attack. 
 If a weaker state happens to be neighbor to several more 
 powerful it must supplement its strength by alliances or 
 they will not fail to partition it among themselves. No 
 code of private morals can successfully oppose; even the 
 men who are individually the most exemplary are forced to 
 act in harmony with their surroundings. The scruples of 
 individual feeling and sentiment are unknown in politics; as 
 Emperor Francis said: " The state has no daughter." 
 
 Political conditions are peremptory. Natural law pre- 
 vails though the will of the individual seems to be " free. ' ' 
 Those who suffer speak of " crimes." As well call an earth- 
 quake by which thousands have perished a crime, for the 
 only difference is that in the one case we think we see the 
 responsible agents while in the other we can find none. 
 
 But the conditions of the party attacked may present ser- 
 ious obstacles to the policy of conquest. For a folk, which 
 is the product of a long period of development, is such an 
 exclusive unit that the attempt to incorporate it must tax 
 the strength of the conquering state and leave it for a long 
 time incapable of future external activity. That is to say, 
 it is not easy neither does it promote humanity nor good 
 morals to subject a foreign folk by violence. Though 
 simple conquest and annexation cannot be treated as 
 ' ' crimes ' ' without characterizing the whole history of
 
 152 ANNAI<S OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 mankind as one long crime, yet every violent attempt to 
 destroy a folk, which is a product of history, is after all 
 immoral and inhuman. 
 
 To profit by the conquest of a neighboring folk a state 
 must sometimes resort to war indemnities. Plundering 
 expeditions, conquest, annexation, incorporation and war in- 
 demnities: these are the various forms in which the natural 
 tendency of the state to augment its power and extend its 
 authority is manifested.* 
 
 It would not be hard to set a limit to the increasing size 
 of a state. But in fact the tendency is ceaseless and may 
 lead on to destruction as history proves. Every great state 
 has striven to increase its authority and the greatest have 
 striven to rule the world; the end has come only in their 
 sudden downfall, in an historical catastrophe. 
 
 The social law thus illustrated is not peculiar to the 
 growth of states but is manifested in all other social 
 domains. The periodical crises of economic production, for 
 instance, are due to it. Each lucrative process of produc- 
 tion is repeated until the limits of present need have been 
 far exceeded and business breaks down for lack of demand. 
 The experiment though often tried is constantly repeated. 
 Admonitions avail nothing and ' ' wise moderation ' ' will at 
 most influence a few individuals; the tendency of social 
 communities knows no limit but the "crash." In trade 
 and commerce, everywhere, social strife for power or for 
 wealth and property lasts until all energy is exhausted. 
 Disruption, crisis, panic are then unavoidable. 
 
 So long as the state has aggressive power it strives to 
 augment, to increase its territory, to conquer, to colonize, 
 
 * To illustrate the whole range from the most primitive to the most modern 
 manifestations of this tendency I compared (" Der Rassenkampf '," p. 166) the 
 Apaches and the Kirghese, who are content to capture a few horses or asses 
 or a herd of cattle, with the modern " European victor '* who knows how straight- 
 way to force the payment of several milliards. This passage offended some of 
 my honored German reviewers, though it is plain that no exception could be 
 taken save on the supposition that Bismarck was referred to. But he is neither 
 the first nor the only "European victor *' who has won his milliards. But if he 
 were the only one still the insinuation is unjustifiable considering my contention 
 that historical events are subject to natural laws and independent of individuals. 
 But they should not have applied to the German war, of which I said nothing, 
 what should be applied to false idealism which I have always attacked. I confess 
 that in politics I fully accept the realistic standpoint of Prince Bismarck, He 
 has never spoken of the great indemnity with false pathos, and in his report to 
 Herr von Manteuffel, from Frankfort in July, 1853, he said: "The other German 
 states have the same interests that we have, to be left in peace where there is 
 nothing to be gained," and weighing the chance of war he added: "If we can 
 profit by it then the case is difierent." If those who to-day write upon politics 
 would study the works of Prince Bismarck there would be much less pathos, 
 fewer Chauvinistic phrases and fewer political quarrels.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 153 
 
 etc. This continues until strength fails from internal or 
 external causes; or until it is surpassed by other states and 
 crippled. Only when strength fails does strife cease. 
 
 STATE AND FOLK. 
 
 Since each political organization creates a civilization and 
 each localized civilization is with the aid of such spon- 
 taneous moral agencies as language, religion, custom and 
 rights* transformed into a folk, it follows that with the 
 development of a number of states side by side a number of 
 folk must arise also. If the mere fact of common allegiance 
 is sufficient to bind the subjects into a social unit it is clear 
 that as the number of mutual relations between the subjects 
 increases the unity will be more pronounced. In this way 
 the folk-state acquires greater offensive and defensive 
 power. But in the course of time the folk-states will fall 
 into opposition; the original contest will be repeated in 
 higher form; and as the perpetual strife for power animates 
 them also it cannot fail to happen that some are disrupted 
 and others grow. 
 
 As the impulse to increase power is not checked by the 
 establishment of any political or national relations whatever, 
 a great variety of social and political combinations are 
 bound to arise in the course of history and it cannot fail to 
 happen that there will be political organizations consisting 
 of different folk and parts of folk. 
 
 The greater difficulties which the conquering state must 
 encounter and the scruples it may entertain at annexing 
 foreign folk in whole or in part we have already discussed. 
 But if the margin of superiority is not too narrow the 
 foreign folk-elements will eventually be assimilated by the 
 conquering race and blended into a social unit, a new folk. 
 There have always been composite folk-states; they are the 
 necessary result of the historical process which is constantly 
 breaking down the old and establishing the new. To deny 
 their right to exist or to justify them less fully than folk- 
 states would display crass ignorance of history. Social 
 relations tend to develop; and as surely as history produces 
 only what is reasonable this higher order of political organi- 
 zation will overcome the internal struggle of the composite 
 folk and justify itself. 
 
 * For an explanation of this process, see "Der Rassenkampf" pp. z^etseq. and 
 253 et seq.
 
 154 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 The struggles are severe; they are, so to speak, higher 
 powers of the simple social struggles. To the social con- 
 trasts of the unitary folk-state the contrasts between the 
 different folk are added. As the most conspicuous difference 
 is in language the contest centres about the right of one or 
 the equal right of several in official business. But the 
 essential point is the struggle for authority; the contest over 
 the language is only an excuse to make the tendency seem 
 plausible. 
 
 The question at issue is whether the authority shall be 
 monopolized by a privileged folk speaking a privileged mother- 
 tongue. The struggle becomes justified when the unprivi- 
 leged folk-elements possess sufficient social and political 
 power and have acquired sufficient mastery of the official 
 language to oppose the ruling folk successfully. Other 
 things being equal the folk which can use more than one of 
 the competing languages will win, the polyglots will over- 
 come the ruling class which remains monoglot. 
 
 But when the victory has once been secured the unpracti- 
 cal idea of the equality of tongues must yield to the real 
 needs of the state. Either there must be one official lan- 
 guage or the whole people, or at least the ruling classes, 
 must speak several. In a composite folk -state there can be 
 no serious question which should be the official language. 
 As it is simply the means for promoting general intercourse 
 throughout the state plainly the most available one must be 
 chosen, and this must be the one most generally used or 
 rather the one most widely diffused among the educated 
 classes of all the different folk-elements. Generally this will 
 be the language of the older civilization. Only living 
 tongues of course can be considered. But its rank will be 
 questioned so long as its natural representatives enjoy any 
 political advantage or other folk-elements suffer political 
 prejudice. In a word the struggle which begins with the 
 battle-cry ' ' no discrimination on account of language ' ' will 
 continue until the actual relations are so altered that the com- 
 plete equality before the law of all the elements is no longer 
 imperiled by the official preference accorded to the language 
 of the oldest civilization; or a general polyglottous condi- 
 tion of all the folk-elements may end the struggle.
 
 IV. THE PSYCHO-SOCIAL PHENOMENA AND THE 
 INDIVIDUAL. 
 
 INDIVIDUALISM AND COLLECTIVISM. 
 
 The point of view from which social phenomena are con- 
 sidered has oscillated between two opposite principles 
 individualism and collectivism. Not only the attempts at 
 explaining "the social world," but also all propositions 
 that aimed at shaping it in virtue of its accepted nature, and 
 all the differences and disputes in the domain of social 
 science turn upon the antithesis between "mankind" and 
 the individual. There was no third standpoint, no middle 
 way known to the theorists. 
 
 While Smithianism and materialistic philosophy consid- 
 ered egoism and self-interest the source of social develop- 
 ment and the sole motive of human behavior; others pointed 
 to the self-sacrifice of the individual and contrasted egoism 
 and self-interest with " charity " and "altruism." While 
 some sought to explain social phenomena by the egoistical 
 nature of the individual, the statisticians pointed to the 
 "community," "society," "mankind" and its nature and 
 " development according to law " for explanation. The real 
 truth was overlooked. Neither one alone and neither to the 
 degree supposed is the cause and motive of social develop- 
 ment. If we prefix to each the adjective " social," giving 
 it the meaning not of the abstract whole but of the limited 
 social circle, like the syngenetic group, we shall have found 
 the middle way which social philosophy has hitherto missed. 
 
 Not personal but social egoism is the motive of social 
 development; not devotion to the world at large, nor 
 ' ' charity ' ' in the broad universal sense of Christian theory, 
 not fellow feeling with mankind; but social sympathy, self- 
 sacrificing, loving devotion to the natural social community. 
 Man is not so bad as crass materialism pictures him; neither 
 is he so large hearted as Christian philosophy in vain 
 requires him to be. He is neither devil nor angel, simply 
 human. Fettered to the community by natural ties of 
 blood, habit and mode of thought, his egoism is social, his 
 sympathies are social; to demand more than social sympathy 
 is to demand something unnatural and superhuman and to 
 credit him with less than social egoism is to do him wrong. 
 But social egoism includes social sympathy, social sympathy 
 is social egoism. L^et us call their union syngenism and we 
 
 (i55)
 
 156 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 have identified the motive of all social development and the 
 key to its solution. 
 
 Those who conceive the whole social world from the indi- 
 vidualistic standpoint, who explain all development by 
 reference to the individual and look upon his development 
 as the highest goal and simple object of all that transpires 
 in society, want to heal all the hurts and ills of the social 
 world by freeing the individual and proclaiming his rights.* 
 
 Doctrinaire liberalism and abstract constitutionalism both 
 occupy this position. Every individual as such must have 
 every possible right and enjoy every privilege of the " most 
 favored" individual that it may be well upon the earth. 
 The plan has been tried in Europe repeatedly and has failed, 
 for the individual profited nothing from all these rights; 
 relying upon them alone he hurled himself against the 
 unyielding barriers of social institutions which no proclama- 
 tion of individual liberty can force. 
 
 At the opposite pole is socialism, communism and every 
 other form of collectivism. The collective whole, preferably 
 the largest at hand, must labor for and protect the indi- 
 vidual; the worry and the care fall upon it; the labor must 
 be performed in common; the individual must be directed 
 and utilized: but also supported. 
 
 Unfortunately the legislative conditions have never been 
 adequate for an experiment or it would appear that a collec- 
 tive whole caring for the individual so providently is as 
 Utopistic as a self-determining individual. 
 
 In truth, everywhere and from the very beginning the 
 social world has moved, acted, fought and striven only by 
 groups. Legislation to be wise and true must take account 
 of the actual conditions, neither being blind to them like 
 the ' ' constitutionalist ' ' nor imagining with the collectivist 
 that it can change them. The only possible solution of the 
 social question lies in the harmonious co-operation of the 
 social groups so far as that is possible. 
 
 THE INDIVIDUAL AND HIS SOCIAL GROUP. 
 
 The great error of individualistic psychology is the suppo- 
 sition that man thinks. It leads to the continual search for 
 the source of thought in the individual and for the reason 
 
 _* Marx was quite right when he said: "The real insignificance of the indi- 
 vidual is in strong contrast with the importance conceded to him in scientific 
 speculations. His insignificance is apparent, not only in political affairs but in 
 economic." "Capital " pp. 235, 236.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 157 
 
 why the individual thinks so and not otherwise; and prompts 
 naive theologians and philosophers to consider and even to 
 advise how man ought to think. A chain of errors; for it is 
 not man himself who thinks but his social community; the 
 source of his thoughts is in the social medium in which he 
 lives, the social atmosphere which he breathes,* and he can- 
 not think ought else than what the influences of his social 
 environment concentrating upon his brain necessitate. There 
 is a law of mechanics and optics by which we compute the 
 angle of refraction from the angle of incidence and in the realm 
 of mind there is a similar law though we cannot observe it so 
 exactly. Every ray of thought falling in on the mind is 
 reflected in our views. What we think is the necessary 
 result of the mental influences to which we have been 
 subjected since childhood. 
 
 The individual simply plays the part of the prism which 
 receives the rays, dissolves them according to fixed laws and 
 lets them pass out again in a predetermined direction and 
 with a predetermined color. 
 
 The influence of environment upon the human mind has 
 always been recognized by psychologists and philosophers; 
 but it has been considered a secondary factor. On the 
 contrary the social medium which the child enters at birth, 
 in which he lives, moves and has his being, is fundamental. 
 Toward this environment the individual from childhood to 
 ripest old age is more or less receptive; rarely can the 
 maturest minds so far succeed in emancipating themselves 
 from this medium as to undertake independent reflection 
 while complete emancipation is impossible, for all the organs 
 and modes of thought, all the organs for constructing 
 thoughts, have been moulded or at least thoroughly imbued 
 by it. Granted that very mature and independent thinkers 
 have passed the age of receptivity, still it is questionable 
 whether the most eminent and original philosopher in the 
 world can so far dissociate himself from the acquired modes 
 and organs as to substitute independent creations in their 
 place. 
 
 Consider the mental make-up of the ordinary or ' ' average ' ' 
 man. The child gets his first impressions from his earliest 
 surroundings. His earliest ethical ideas come from the con- 
 duct of his nurses and early tutors! Praise and blame, 
 
 * " To think is to be conscious ot the growth of psychological activity. ..." 
 Bastian, " Ethnologic," xii.
 
 158 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 reward aiid punishment, the hopes and fears that are raised, 
 the frights which he is given, all go to make up his first 
 impressions and educate his mind. Before it is noticed the 
 little world-citizen has become the exact mental image of his 
 "family," giving the word its broadest Roman meaning. 
 His childish mind corresponds exactly to the many-sided 
 mould in which it was cast; it bears the impress on every 
 hand stamped upon it. 
 
 Thus prepared the youngster comes in contact with the 
 " world " in the shape of a troop of playmates and compan- 
 ions for the most part cast in the same mould. Their im- 
 pressions are much the same; all have been inspired with 
 the same admiration for certain things and persons, and 
 filled involuntarily with the same hate and abhorrence for 
 others which prevailed about them. Even for food and 
 drink they have received the same tastes and distastes. 
 They are mere clockwork, which runs as it is regulated. 
 Who is it who feels, thinks, tastes; not the individual but 
 the social group. Its thoughts, feelings, tastes, impressions, 
 hence also its plans and purposes, its objects and its conduct 
 re-live again; as the elders sung so chirrup the young. 
 
 Who can comprehend all that has been accumulated in the 
 mind of this new individual ? The mental precipitate of 
 generations long gone is condensed in the mind of one 
 person. There are experiences thousands of years old which 
 have been inherited for generations as completed intuitions; 
 destinies historic, and prehistoric, with their effects upon 
 mental character and inclination, with their forms of thought 
 and mode of reasoning; sympathies, prejudices and prepos- 
 sessions deeply seated and concentrated in the mind of the 
 " free " individual like countless rays in a focus. They live 
 in him as thought, though the crowd imagines that he thinks 
 freely; and as feeling, though the crowd imagines that 
 whether right or wrong, praiseworthy or blameworthy, it is 
 he that cherishes them. 
 
 For the great majority of men intellectual development, 
 strictly so-called, ends with this; the educative impressions 
 of childhood and youth suffice for the whole life. Only an 
 insignificant minority continue their education by receiving 
 mental impressions and influences from without their social 
 group as they have opportunity. How much we overrate 
 the efficacy of classical antiquity and the accumulated culture 
 of other nations in this particular ! How insignificant it is in
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 159 
 
 comparison with the inherited and inculcated culture in 
 which the spirit of the social group is manifest! 
 
 Unprejudiced consideration will convince us that all the 
 "education," especially that of our schools, is scarcely 
 sufficient to varnish over the mental heritage which each has 
 received. None of it ever penetrates into the depths of the 
 soul unless the pre-existing conditions are favorable. 
 
 What do the so-called educated men, doctors, teachers, 
 officials, etc., generally get from their education, whether 
 acquired in school or not, save a little knowledge ? But 
 knowledge is not thought, neither is it feeling. What does 
 knowledge profit if it cannot alter thought or influence 
 temperament? and it can do neither. Hence the sad 
 sight of people who with a little knowledge so much the 
 more easily conceal from the world the vulgarity of their 
 ideas and their inborn baseness; who varnish over rudeness 
 by pretending special knowledge and vainly cloak a coarse 
 nature in ' ' education. ' ' 
 
 Even if it were as Buckle contends in his great work that 
 mankind is improved by knowledge and by that alone; it 
 must first improve the mass or at least the group which in 
 turn would ennoble the individual. 
 
 Though paradoxical it is true that the knowledge of the 
 mass, of the social environment, benefits the individual, 
 while the knowledge which he acquires comes too late to 
 affect him. Like a piece of coin he is complete when he 
 steps out into the world. 
 
 A mature young man is bound to his family, class, or 
 social group by ties of common interest. He is treated by 
 the world, that is by the other social groups, simply as a 
 member of his syngenetic circle and so feels that his identity 
 with it is involuntary and often a misfortune. However 
 much he may know he is only what his social medium 
 makes out of him, subject however to modification by the 
 heterogeneous social elements that confront him. Though 
 there are rare and exceptional cases where individuals, 
 whether living in isolation or separated from their own circle 
 by force, have been thoroughly absorbed by a strange group 
 or have of purpose submerged their identity in it, a com- 
 plete transformation of character taking place, they simply 
 confirm the rule. 
 
 The fate of the youth determines the destiny of the man 
 in his broader sphere. Hard conflicts of interests arise and
 
 160 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 struggles with powerful currents which the individual can 
 neither cause nor control, but by which he is tossed to and 
 fro, with which he must swim lest he sink. Does he 
 choose ? 
 
 The current beats him back; of what avail is his knowl- 
 edge? He must struggle, but if he would not sink he must 
 swim with the favoring tide; and his freedom consists only 
 in holding himself as much above it as possible and warding 
 off the opposing flood as best he may. To get into an 
 entirely different current, or to change his course is a matter 
 of accident, not of choice. 
 
 The struggle of life brings the individual to self-conscious- 
 ness indeed and he obtains an unobstructed view of the field 
 of conflict; he has acquired personal knowledge, not simply 
 adapted another's. But it cannot transform him for he is 
 at the end of his career and cannot begin life anew. lyike 
 the youth of Sais he has drawn the veil, and knows the 
 secret; he knows what he was and must make his exit. 
 His own knowledge is his only comfort or disappointment. 
 
 Between the cradle and the grave one thread is spun 
 which breaks not and cannot be reunited; a chain is 
 extended whose every link is wrought into the preceding. 
 Man may choose to break it by violence, but not to re-weld 
 it. He may die by his own hand, but can never be born 
 again, though even the self-determination to die must be 
 conditioned in the whole preceding life. 
 
 The whole belief in the freedom of human action is rooted 
 in the idea that man's conduct is the fruit of his thoughts 
 and that his thoughts are exclusively his own. This is an 
 error. He is not self-made mentally any more than he is 
 physically. His mind and thoughts are the product of his 
 social medium, of the social element whence he arose, in 
 which he lives. 
 
 Those who doubt whether the influence of the social 
 medium can be so powerful must consider what is more 
 remarkable, that the social element in which a man moves 
 exercises an undeniable influence upon his physical features. 
 The fact is well known to physiognomists and is too appar- 
 ent to be seriously contradicted. Who does not recognize 
 an Englishman, a Frenchman, an Italian, a north or a south 
 German among a hundred different nationalities? It is diffi- 
 cult to say exactly how we recognize them; only the artist's 
 crayon can express it; but we recognize John Bull, the
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 161 
 
 "honest Swabian," the Frenchman polite and tractable and 
 even the Parisian, the Italian somewhat uncanny and 
 Mephistopheliau, and so on. 
 
 Who has not observed how living for years among a peo- 
 ple of a pronounced type of culture conforms a foreigner's 
 whole external appearance and bearing to theirs ? 
 
 Does not the German become a perfect John Bull after 
 living a decade or two in England ? Who has not observed 
 the remarkable orientalizing effect of life in the Hast upon 
 the European ? We have known Poles, offspring of old 
 Polish families, who after a long residence in Turkey have 
 assumed the oriental type completely. But it is useless to 
 cite further instances. Those who have no experience can 
 neither comprehend nor believe it; but those who have will 
 certainly corroborate us. 
 
 To these alone we turn with a logical demonstration. That 
 which works the greater may also work the less; if the 
 social element changes a man's physical features surely it 
 has already changed his mind, has more easily transformed 
 his thoughts and opinions and exerted upon his feelings and 
 disposition an influence which betrays itself in his whole 
 outward bearing; for this is nothing but the expression of 
 the mental man, the mirror in which his soul is reflected. 
 
 Human speech may never be sufficiently discriminating 
 nor our thoughts clear enough to express what we recog- 
 nize as characteristic in the different types, though the 
 artist's crayon already does it in the illustrated comic 
 papers. Still we must confirm the fact that there is some- 
 thing by which we recognize the members of various nations, 
 peoples and social groups, etc. , that it is transferable to the 
 individual by means of the social influence regardless of 
 descent or relationship; that this influence seizes upon and 
 transforms the human mind quicker and easier than the 
 body, but that after a while it seizes this also and transforms 
 it by its power. 
 
 While we are considering the action of the social factor on 
 the individual whom it surrounds, we must not fail to notice 
 that the character of a social group is developed by the con- 
 tinuous assimilating action of the whole on its parts. We 
 distinguish different nationalities not so much by physiog- 
 nomy, figure, complexion or proportions, for our eye is not 
 sensitive enough to perceive all this without practice and 
 without the aid of scientific apparatus. But what strikes us
 
 1 62 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 is the type something inexpressible and indefinable which 
 is the effect of social influence, z. <?., of the influence of the 
 social factor. 
 
 It is of the utmost importance that this should be fairly 
 appreciated for it shows us that the character of the social 
 group depends more on its mental than on its physical con- 
 stitution. In a word the type or physiognomical character 
 of a folk or social group is not anthropological but social. 
 On the one hand this explains how it is possible for a 
 foreigner to assume the type of the group into which he has 
 fallen; while on the other the transformation of the indi- 
 vidual by the group proves that we are dealing with purely 
 social and sociological facts; for if the type were anthropo- 
 logical the transformation and assimilation of the individual 
 through the group would be inconceivable. 
 
 After the influence of the social medium upon the indi- 
 vidual has been established it only remains to investigate 
 the nature of the factor which exercises it. If it is not 
 anthropological what is its character? 
 
 After what has been already said no one will expect a 
 precise answer. The most that can be said is this: Between 
 each thought or desire and the accompanying act intervenes 
 man's <pu<Ji<Z. We know that violent thoughts and efforts 
 are expressed externally in the ^w<C, because we see it 
 daily and hourly in cases of sudden anger, joy, pain or 
 despair; the effect follows the cause immediately. But a 
 natural result which is real and true where we can observe 
 it is no less so where our eye is too weak to notice it. If an 
 internal emotion, thought or effort exercises an influence 
 upon our body, upon our deportment and bearing, it may 
 exercise it in such infinitesimal degrees that our sense is 
 too weak to perceive the separate and distinct effects. Our 
 perception does not begin until, after a long series of effects, 
 the completed type confronts us. 
 
 But can we designate the effective agents more exactty ? 
 Thoughts and desires produce the type, we said. Life in 
 turn, social life, produces them. As it differs from zone to 
 zone and land to land among men of different races and dif- 
 ferent ethnical composition so their thoughts, their entire 
 conceptions and their efforts, are different and difference of 
 type follows necessarily. As a people's conceptions and 
 thoughts stand also in the perpetual stream of evolution and 
 alter from time to time, there arises the well-known variety
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 163 
 
 of type among members of the same folk in successive 
 generations. 
 
 INFLUENCE OF ECONOMIC STATUS ON THE 
 INDIVIDUAL. 
 
 Our assertion that thoughts and opinions are created by 
 the social life can be made still more specific. A man's 
 behavior is determined immediately by his economic status, 
 which constrains him to follow a certain mode of life and 
 awakens the corresponding mental conditions within him. 
 In all freely organized states amid the multitude of divisions 
 and subdivisions there are, as we have seen, three grand 
 social circles distinguished by economic status: the ruling 
 class, the middle class including merchants and tradesmen, 
 and the peasantry. They bring up their members differently 
 by accustoming them to their respective opinions, customs, 
 legal usages and principles and, by offering them and even 
 imposing upon them a particular calling, compel them 
 through self-interest to continue in the path traversed by 
 the whole circle. 
 
 Thus the nobleman is accustomed to rule and command 
 and to have his life made comfortable for him by others in 
 the hereditary way. Higher appreciation of personality 
 arises naturally, and self-assurance, depreciation of others 
 and the thousand and one traits which, independent of 
 land, folk, nation, religion, race or individual peculiarity, 
 characterize aristocracy universally. 
 
 The peasants and slaves of every land and people cherish 
 deep, suppressed ill-will towards the lords. It is inherited 
 from generation to generation, and is held in check by the 
 consciousness of mental inferiority and economic weakness; 
 but when opportunity offers it bursts into flame with the 
 wildness of a barbaric horde. 
 
 Neither persuasion, kindness nor advances can uproot it. 
 In stolid resignation the peasant closes his social circle to 
 the higher classes which however do not open theirs to 
 him, hears the consolations of religion as a matter of habit 
 without the least reflection, and throws the blame for all the 
 misery of his life upon the lords. Yet habit and inherited 
 notions have taught him to bear his hard lot calmly, and 
 acquired feelings of respect make it easier for him to do so; 
 though all together they would be insufficient to maintain
 
 164 ANNAI<S OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 the political organization were it not protected by the strong 
 arm of the state's power. 
 
 The member of the middle class is educated in ' ' busi- 
 ness ' ' traditions. Trade, commerce and business profits 
 are his ideals from childhood on and he sees many examples 
 of accumulated riches. Fortune-hunting, an idea that the 
 peasant never knows and which seldom incites the noble- 
 man, is the great object which attracts the middle class. 
 They soon learn that skillful labor and inventiveness lead to 
 success and every thought turns in that direction. 
 
 Seldom can the peasant, bound to the soil by law or by 
 the force of circumstances, think of leaving his hereditary 
 pursuit. As a rule he is unable to conceive of such a thing. 
 So overwhelming are the legal and political regulations that 
 it does not even occur to him to oppose them. As a result 
 of his inertia his horizon grows narrower and narrower, not 
 extending beyond the neighboring village; he must either 
 give up and labor and adapt himself to the circumstances or 
 pine away and die in misery or in prison; there is no 
 alternative. 
 
 It is otherwise with the townsman. Trade extends his 
 horizon; the world lies open before him; his plans are 
 ambitious; but the narrow limits of political regulation hold 
 him in check. What is more natural in such circumstances 
 than the attempt to break through or circumvent them! 
 This it is which causes the social fermentation and starts the 
 social struggle. In such an atmosphere as this the quick- 
 witted townsman's thoughts and opinions germinate and 
 grow; and his eternal discontent opposes the contented con- 
 servatism of the ruling classes. He it is also who first stirs 
 up the resigned conservatism of the " masses." 
 
 Lord, townsman, peasant: these would be the three types 
 of individuals if the state had not progressed beyond the 
 primitive stratification of society. But we know how com- 
 plex the social structure has become and how the different 
 types have multiplied. 
 
 It is impossible for the scientist to distinguish them all; 
 art alone can present the typical and the sociologist must 
 yield to the delineator. We will only add that as civiliza- 
 tion advances and the sphere of the state enlarges the ruling 
 class subdivides into the civil class, the military class and 
 the large landholders and transfers its various functions to 
 particular organs.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 165 
 
 Each of these smaller circles has its particular interests, 
 its peculiar calling and its corresponding views and manner 
 of life. The subdivision into classes determines also the 
 method of participating in the government of the state. 
 Compare the general who remains a soldier and stakes his 
 professional honor on fulfilling the royal orders even against 
 his own convictions; the minister who feels in honor bound 
 to hand in his resignation on account of some difference of 
 opinion with his monarch, or incident which does not please 
 him; and the " great lord " who will accept a royal invita- 
 tion to hunt but will politely decline a minister's portfolio in 
 order not to sacrifice his freedom. How different the views 
 of life's duties and principles! What different ideas in one 
 and the same ruling class through the social differentiation 
 of pursuits ! 
 
 With the middle class it is the same. How different is the 
 artisan's line of thought from that of the merchant or ship- 
 owner! How different the type of mind among merchants 
 themselves according as one stays in a shop, another is 
 engaged in foreign trade, and a third trades on the 
 exchange! Yet these are not individual fortunes, but social 
 destinies, social fates. 
 
 What must be the mental character of the workman's 
 child, accustomed to uninterrupted labor in the family, 
 meagre earnings and the monotony of the small tradesman's 
 life; and how different in the circle of the traders on 
 exchange with the abrupt alternations of wealth and misery 
 and the continual excitement of speculation where success 
 depends on the turn of events the world over. 
 
 How many educated professions are differentiated in the 
 middle class: doctors, attorneys, judges, teachers, officials, 
 master mechanics, engineers. Each circle creates its own 
 peculiar spirit, so to say, a moral atmosphere of principles, 
 ideas, views and conceptions, in which its members live and 
 in which their posterity is born and educated. 
 
 The number of types is endless. But it must be pointed 
 out that in every case the individual's thought and conduct, 
 feeling and effort is not created in him but in his social 
 circle. Least of all is it created by him freely and independ- 
 ently; it is laid upon him without his knowing it; and soci- 
 ology must emphasize some of the fundamental factors in 
 the process. 
 
 It follows from what has been already said that it is the
 
 1 66 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 moral force alone which transforms the individual. The 
 group affects him through his moral nature, his thoughts 
 and views; he is only a part of it, growing up in its moral 
 atmosphere, drawing his intellectual life from it. In this 
 process bodily descent and long lineage is not the decisive 
 factor. Whatever the anthropological material, if it comes 
 early enough into a group however strange, if it is unin- 
 fluenced by any other and is treated like the other members 
 it will be as completely assimilated as though it had been 
 born there. Hence it is that while anthropologists assure 
 us that no race in the world is pure; and while expe- 
 rience daily shows us the greatest variety of anthropologi- 
 cal types in one and the same society, the members of each 
 group show a unitary moral type. Anthropological variety 
 and moral unity is characteristic of every social community, 
 not simply in Europe, but of the whole world. Yet so pre- 
 dominant is the impression made upon us by the latter that 
 the impression of the former disappears in comparison. As 
 we are in general more impressed by what is human in man, 
 /'. e. , by his intellectual and moral faculties, than by what is 
 animal, so we are most impressed with a man's social type 
 and the anthropological escapes our observation. Thus 
 when an individual has certain outward marks denoting 
 membership in a group, such as costume, head-dress and the 
 like, the moral type of the group is still more striking in 
 him and we do not notice his anthropological type or deceive 
 ourselves about it unless it is very conspicuously unusual. 
 
 The notorious fact that all Chinese seem alike to us is due 
 to the fact that, being struck with the well-known outward 
 characteristics, queue, clean-shaven crown and the like, we 
 observe nothing else except the moral type, although there 
 are as different anthropological types among them as in any 
 other folk. Similarly, to a negro all the soldiers in a regi- 
 ment of European grenadiers will look exactly alike because 
 in addition to the similarity of costume, head-dress, etc., he 
 notices only the moral type, the expression, mien and bear- 
 ing. Nevertheless an anthropologist or craniologist would 
 certainly find in such a regiment sufficient data for a classifi- 
 cation into many races and anthropological types. 
 
 But some social circles, as we have seen, are very firmly 
 bound together, compact and cohesive, while others are 
 loosely connected and less cohesive. The degree of cohe- 
 sion depends, as we have further seen, on the number of
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 167 
 
 group-making factors, on the interests holding the group 
 together and on their permanency; for some are inherited 
 and will endure while others are temporary, ephemeral and 
 momentary. 
 
 The difference in the degree of social cohesion has great 
 influence upon the creation and the endurance of moral 
 types, and we do not hesitate to formulate a sociological 
 law that the tenacity and endurance of a moral type is 
 directly related to the degree of cohesion and firmness of 
 social structure, and so to the number of group-making factors. 
 
 It is as if their greater number put the individual under 
 better control; for highly cohesive social circles are well 
 adapted to create firm characters. The individual members 
 seem to be cast from one mould, to be flesh of its flesh and 
 blood of its blood; nothing more nor less than pieces of it. 
 Hence the elemental moral power of men contending for 
 their class, their rank their folk, to which every group- 
 making factor and every heartstring binds them. 
 
 Contrast with this the vacillation and unsteadfastness 
 when one of the forces binding a man to his own is dissolved; 
 and the unnaturalness and artificiality of the individual who 
 presumes to represent a group with which he has only a 
 loose, ephemeral connection, the most of the group-making 
 factors being absent. Therein lies the perpetual ridiculous- 
 ness of the parvenu, which meets us not only where the 
 ' ' upstart without family connections' ' puts on airs on account 
 of his intimate relations with counts and princes (who is not 
 familiar with this type) but also where the townsman among 
 peasants would demean himself like a peasant or the aristo- 
 cratic candidate explains his political and industrial program 
 to his agricultural constituents. The ridiculous effect in 
 every case lies in the absence of every natural bond of 
 union between the individual and the group which he would 
 have it appear he belongs to or represents, for unnaturalness 
 is always ridiculous. With such comical figures compare 
 the man who represents his own social group. His ap- 
 pearance commands respect everywhere; its very naturalness 
 is imposing. Kven an individual of little importance must 
 be taken seriously for his coming is natural and in good 
 character. 
 
 But social life is not confined within the exclusive social 
 circles. In the very nature of political and social develop- 
 ment there is an incessant movement of individuals back
 
 1 68 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 and forth, up and down, so that the social circles lap and 
 overlap in the greatest confusion and individuals stand in 
 the greatest variety of relations to their own and to foreign 
 groups. 
 
 Thus life is richly provided with every degree of varia- 
 tion from cheerful pleasantry to bitter earnest, from delight- 
 ful comedy to shocking tragedy. But it is a barren task 
 for science to distinguish the countless shades of individual 
 form and situation, though not for history and art. 
 
 MORALE. 
 
 We have tried to explain how the moral type of the 
 individual is produced by the group and have already 
 pointed out that the social group not only creates the indi- 
 vidual's thoughts and opinions, sentiments and feelings but 
 builds up what we call morals also. For morals is nothing 
 but the conviction implanted by the social group in the 
 minds of its members of the propriety (Statthaftigkeif) of 
 the manner of life imposed by it on them. This conviction, 
 the individual's innermost thought concerning his whole 
 conduct and that of others, is the second factor in the 
 development of morals. The first is the acquired and cus- 
 tomary habits, the manner of life and conduct. There are 
 certain rules and principles which the individual receives 
 from his group applicable to all spheres of life and to all 
 possible situations. 
 
 Consider a man who is firmly rooted in his group. In no 
 situation which is accessible to it considering its nature and 
 position is he in doubt how he should proceed. He has 
 acquired a standard of conduct and possesses a moral code 
 which guides him everywhere. 
 
 While the simple unitary group (Spencer's "small and 
 simple aggregate" ) constitutes the individual's whole world, 
 in the primitive horde and wild natural stock, he knows what 
 is right, proper and permissible toward his fellows and toward 
 strangers. 
 
 But as soon as two or more groups have been united and 
 sovereignty has been organized the different moral views 
 begin to contend in the larger social circle. The primitive 
 moral codes are useless and a new one must be formed if 
 the union is to continue. Not only do the relations of sove- 
 reign and subject peremptorily demand this, but they pro- 
 vide it for themselves. The members of the new union
 
 THE; OUTUNKS OP SOCIOLOGY. 169 
 
 become habituated to the new institutions which become 
 necessary to sustain sovereignty; and new conceptions of 
 what is right, proper, allowable and good grow up; and as the 
 new political organization grows and is perfected the new 
 moral code gives forth rights, i. e., statutes promulgated by 
 the state the transgression of which is punishable by the 
 state. 
 
 Hence there is a fundamental difference between rights 
 and morals. The former is a product of the union \Zusam- 
 mentreffen\ of different social elements, the latter is the 
 product of the relations between the simple social group and 
 the individual. Rights never arise except in a union of 
 societies however simple it may be; organized sovereignty 
 is always presupposed. Morals arise in the most primitive 
 social element, in the simple aggregate or horde. 
 
 Every complex community, consisting of parts which are 
 united by certain group-making bonds, constitutes in so far 
 a social unit aside from the social circles comprised within it. 
 Necessarily the very fact of the existence of this social 
 community will create a common moral code binding on all 
 its members. But on account of the weaker cohesion of 
 the whole it will of course not have the effective power and 
 intensity of the moral codes of the several social elements 
 and will frequently come in conflict with them and some- 
 times be broken down by them. It may be confidently 
 asserted that probably the greater part of the crimes and 
 offences occurring in the state arise from the conflict between 
 the general and the particular moral codes. Thus the 
 poacher does not offend against the morals of his group 
 when he hunts game in the mountains although in so doing 
 he violates not only the rights but also the moral code of 
 the political whole. 
 
 Many infractions of right in the mercantile world, such as 
 usury and the like, result from the antagonism between its 
 moral code and that of the political whole and prove that 
 the higher unity, the state, has not succeeded in reducing 
 the social elements to a homogeneous community and imbu- 
 ing every individual with that higher morality which is as 
 needful for the welfare of the whole as the primitive morality 
 of the horde is for its welfare. 
 
 It is the state's supreme object to do this. Consciously or 
 unconsciously it strives toward it and though it should 
 never be quite accomplished, no higher sanction or more
 
 170 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 complete justification of the state can be given than the 
 determination to educate mankind to a higher moral plane. 
 But the ideal moral code must never be limited to national 
 sentiment which is nothing more than a potentialized love 
 of the horde. It should at least embrace mankind so far as 
 it is civilized or capable of civilization. The way to its 
 realization has been entered upon by the construction of 
 political systems like the European, which will in time 
 reduce Europe to a social unit, however loose; the process 
 may then be extended to other portions of the world. Al- 
 though its realization may lie in the unseen future, civiliza- 
 tion must hold fast to it if it would- be anything more than 
 a blind natural process; and it is certainly the noblest func- 
 tion of social science to point out the wearisome way along 
 which mankind, dripping with blood yet pants for the 
 distant goal. 
 
 MORAI,S AND TRUTH PERCEPTION. 
 
 It has undoubtedly already become clear that morals are 
 not the result of human reflection, the conscious product of 
 the human will and understanding; but are, like all social 
 institutions, the result of natural development, a product of 
 the natural and necessary feelings and thoughts of man in 
 connection with the active impelling forces of life, the result- 
 ant as it were of the mutual action and reaction of nature 
 and human life. 
 
 Hence we can distinguish two elements in the result, the 
 natural and the human. The former is everlasting and 
 unchangeable and is constantly and universally repeated. 
 The latter is perpetually changing because it represents the 
 ways in which individuals react upon natural realities and 
 forces. 
 
 Hence it is that in the morals of all ages and peoples we find 
 something similar and typical and also something changing 
 and individual, for while the social process that produces 
 morals is always the same, its various contingencies make 
 the psycho-social result different. 
 
 Placed by nature in a sequence of necessities which he 
 cannot alter, man strives naturally to adapt himself to them 
 as best he can and to make life as pleasant as possible; habit 
 helps him over the worst difficulties by deadening his sensi- 
 bilities. He gets accustomed to the rack on which he is 
 stretched and ceases to feel it. He attributes his sufferings
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 171 
 
 to a higher necessity and, knowing the uselessness of pro- 
 test, gives up the futile fight and looks instinctively for 
 means to alleviate his hard lot. 
 
 In following this natural tendency, or rather in being 
 driven to do whatever his nature and conditions compel, he 
 reflects (which again is a part of his nature) and believes 
 that he acts freely, finding a proof of his freedom in the 
 individual shading of his acts, though this happens simply 
 because reflection, in essence the same, is individualistic in 
 form. 
 
 If, acting as he must though reflecting as he acts, he hits 
 upon a mode of behavior which long experience proves to be 
 the most suitable and appropriate to his conditions, he takes 
 this to be the right, the only good and the moral way; the 
 contrary is to him immoral. 
 
 Thus the man acquires moral ideas which correspond 
 to the larger or smaller extent of his needs and experi- 
 ences, the higher or lower stage of his civilization, the more 
 or less complex relations of his life, growing, broadening 
 and developing with them. 
 
 But, as we have seen, an individual's moral feelings all 
 develop within the sphere of his social group through its 
 influence upon him. 
 
 Take a primitive savage, a gregarious human being; what 
 are his moral ideas? He is bound to his fellows by the 
 natural feeling of connection. They help him in his need; 
 to hold to them, help them and stand by them loyally 
 is one of his moral ideas. But strangers from another horde 
 waylay them, try to get their property, invade their hunting 
 ground, slay them occasionally and steal them; therefore to 
 kill these strangers and rob them is another of his moral 
 ideas. 
 
 Now the element in these ideas which is natural and 
 eternal inheres in the mind of man, surviving savagery and 
 appearing in changing garb and more refined form through- 
 out the whole period of human existence. To-day as thou- 
 sands of years ago there is the struggle with the foreigner 
 for lordship. Between strange social groups to-day as always 
 there are only two possible relations: conflict or alliance 
 against a third. After century upon century of develop- 
 ment, in the midst of high civilization, the primitive moral 
 idea of the savage meets us in the form of patriotism, hero- 
 ism and bravery.
 
 172 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 The savage feels more keenly than the civilized man that 
 he is only a part of the community; for without his own 
 horde his life is every moment exposed to the superior force 
 of hostile beasts and alien hordes. 
 
 It cannot appear to the savage immoral to satisfy hunger 
 and thirst; and to feed the helpless children of his own horde 
 must seem to him good, profitable and a moral duty. 
 
 Between young and old, helpless and strong, arises a 
 mutual relation of protection and gratitude which with the 
 changes of years becomes reversed; protection of children 
 and the infirm creates a moral idea. But if times and cir- 
 cumstances and also individual dispositions cause a horde to 
 put an end to the misery of old age by violent death, this 
 practice also becomes, locally and temporarily, a moral act; 
 and the same is true, locally and temporarily, of fostering or 
 exposing children. The essence of the moral idea is the 
 same: practices springing from natural tendencies take on 
 one form or another; whichever one lasts and proves to be 
 suitable comes to be considered moral. 
 
 The relation of the sexes and the division of industrial 
 labor between them is regulated by time and circumstances, 
 the temperament of the particular horde, and its physical 
 and mental constitution. Whether the result is promiscuity, 
 polygamy or polyandry, whatever practice persists and is 
 recognized as suitable becomes a moral duty and command, 
 a part of morals. 
 
 When one horde establishes lordship over another, when 
 two make offensive or defensive alliance against a third, or 
 finally when captured aliens are reduced to servitude and 
 slavery, the circle of life's relations broadens, a new series 
 of practices begins and a new sphere of moral ideas arises. 
 
 The best method of handling captives, slaves and ser- 
 vants, and the best conduct toward allies offer new grounds 
 for moral opinions; and the most reasonable and appropriate 
 government of subjects becomes the only moral one. 
 Fidelity towards allies produces a new moral idea. The 
 different treatment of members of different social circles 
 makes in time moral principles, conforming to the usage, 
 which eventually settle into rights. 
 
 As a different treatment seems wise and appropriate for 
 each condition of life, so different moral standards grow up 
 according to the different social position of the younger or 
 older generation, of able-bodied or infirm men, of women
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 173 
 
 in different periods of life, of masters and dependents, of 
 the rich and the propertyless. Unconditional obedience is 
 recognized as moral in servants and slaves; inflexible energy 
 and strict discipline in masters. The killing of a master is 
 recognized as immoral conduct in a slave, the killing of a 
 slave is by no means immoral in a master. 
 
 Now men are never satisfied with actual occurrences 
 simply; it is a peculiarity of the reflecting human mind to 
 ascribe them to causes which have no relation whatever to 
 the natural causes and to give the most far-fetched expla- 
 nation possible. A myth-maker and poet by nature, man 
 ascribes poetical and generally anthropomorphic significa- 
 tions and derivations to natural phenomena and he treats 
 social occurrences in the same way. 
 
 As man at first ascribes his own existence to the creation 
 of a supersensual being so he traces all social differences to 
 different creative acts of the same being. Social organiza- 
 tions which the force of circumstances has produced he pre- 
 fers to ascribe to an original arrangement of the creator of 
 the world, being led by an unconscious desire to give a 
 higher sanction to his various moral ideas. Thus when 
 social relations have been so far developed that murder is 
 interdicted and to spare a fellow- being's life is a moral com- 
 mandment, the myth-making mind has a god appear in 
 flames and deliver to the law-giver in the midst of thunder- 
 ings and lightnings a table on which stand the words: Thou 
 shalt not kill. 
 
 Every code of human morals from the earliest times to the 
 present day has this thoroughly characteristic peculiarity; 
 the product of actual occurrences and real relations is 
 everywhere explained by and derived from imaginary cir- 
 cumstances, and men cannot comprehend a moral idea 
 otherwise. 
 
 Whether theologians base morals upon divine command- 
 ments, or philosophers derive them from ideas inherent in 
 man, fact and fancy are blended together until one seems 
 incapable of existing without the other. As moral ideas 
 take root in men's hearts, get control of their dispositions 
 and become a part of their mental ego, the myths which 
 support them take root there also; until it appears as if 
 morals could not be maintained without myths and every 
 attack on the latter must cause the former to fall. 
 
 Socrates was accused of undermining virtue and morality,
 
 174 ANNALS OF THE; AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 the real forces of life, because he questioned the existence of 
 those creatures of the imagination, the Olympian gods. 
 And so to-day, whoever ventures to criticise and doubt one 
 of the myths which have been put forward as the explana- 
 tion and foundation of our morals, whoever denies the 
 "universal and eternal truth of inherent, moral ideas," 
 and seeks to represent them as the product of actual social 
 relations changing with them and taking manifold forms and 
 shapes, is considered a dangerous enemy to them. 
 
 This fight of nai've ignorance against truth in the name 
 of morality is observable in very many spheres still. 
 
 Advanced moral sentiment seeking to explain and sup- 
 port the idea and the feeling of brotherly love produced the 
 mouogenetic myth of the descent of all men from one pair 
 of parents; and so polygenism, which is thought to menace 
 the myth, is immoral, though brotherly love might just as 
 plausibly be founded upon the unity of species in a polygen- 
 etic mankind. Its real explanation, however, is quite dif- 
 ferent: the development of human society. 
 
 The history of sectarianism presents the same spectacle 
 under countless different forms. The simplest religious 
 ceremonies are connected directly with certain moral ideas 
 and an attack on the former is denounced as an attack on the 
 latter, when in truth they do not need to stand in any con- 
 nection whatever. Every new system of philosophy, every 
 hard- won scientific acquisition has the same contest against 
 the alleged ' ' guardians of morals. ' ' 
 
 When the intellectual revolution and the materialistic 
 philosophy of the eighteenth century overthrew some of the 
 prevailing prejudices the Jesuitical alarm cry was every- 
 where raised that morals were being undermined. Because 
 in a certain age the stock of moral ideas corresponded to a 
 certain degree of scientific knowledge; because at a given 
 time the opinion was universal that the soul is a temporary 
 occupant of the human body and after its decay will rise 
 straight to heaven and begin a new life there: the whole 
 moral and ethical code was thought to depend upon the 
 maintenance of this belief. Whoever dared to doubt the 
 immortality of the soul was thought to have sinned against 
 morality and virtue as though immortality and the dualism 
 of soul and body were the only conditions on which they 
 could thrive. Many a time indeed have men sought to 
 uphold the existing moral order by this fable; and when no
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 175 
 
 one knew better the effort was praiseworthy. But every 
 such prop is ready to fall the moment advanced knowledge 
 lays bare its untruthfulness; though it by no means follows 
 that morality is undermined and threatened by the removal 
 of the alleged prop; for the basis of morals is truth and not 
 fiction and all these pious fictions have not prevented the 
 grossest immoralities, the horrors of the inquisition and 
 trials for witchcraft, the greatest crimes mankind has ever 
 committed. 
 
 The alleged descent of man from lower animals is 
 denounced by the church as undermining the whole ethical 
 and moral code; as if this had some connection with the 
 alleged creation of man by a god or was indeed the result 
 of it. 
 
 Following natural and necessary tendencies the human 
 state has grown up and has become in civilized regions what 
 it is to-day, the guardian of right and custom, the promoter 
 of welfare and culture. Corresponding to this fact a moral 
 theory of the state has been produced in the human mind, a 
 pretty myth, according to which the state sprang from a 
 social contract which the citizens once made for protecting 
 rights and securing justice; and it gives adequate expres- 
 sion to the ideas which the actual evolution of the state has 
 produced. 
 
 But when it is announced as the result of modern objec- 
 tive investigation that the state arose by violence and owes 
 its existence to the superiority of some over others, the 
 " moral" heresy-hunters {Angstmeier) and hypocrites raise 
 the alarm that the moral idea of the state is undermined, right 
 is uprooted and public morals corrupted. It is the policy 
 of stupid parents, who expect to inculcate morals and a 
 sense of obligation in a child by telling him all sorts of 
 ghost stories. Science should not be misled by such ungen- 
 erous and narrow views. Morals is the ripened fruit of 
 the actual development of civilization and cannot be harmed 
 by the scientific investigation of its real foundation ; on the 
 contrary the truth will certainly be much more wholesome 
 for its promotion than the stupid lie upon which it has been 
 sought hitherto with little success to base it. 
 
 As the origin of moral ideas is a very difficult problem 
 and a dark region in human knowledge, it has always been 
 easier to explain it in poems and fairy tales. Nevertheless 
 it is not difficult to see that every progress in the perception 
 of truth, and especially of nature, must promote morals.
 
 1 76 ANNAI OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 For as nature's sway and the acts of man go to make up 
 the events of life, human acts are reasonable when they 
 correspond to natural tendencies and complement them; and 
 unreasonable if they mistake these tendencies and oppose 
 them. 
 
 There can be but one principle of human rationality and 
 of human morals and ethics: to be governed by the import 
 and tendency of nature's sway. Hence knowledge of 
 nature, natural science in its full scope, embracing every 
 department of human life, is the only and the necessary 
 basis of the science of morals and ethics. 
 
 Without natural science no moral science. Hence the low 
 state of morals where natural science is neglected, and the 
 higher and purer morality with greater progress in the 
 knowledge of nature's sway. 
 
 The explanation is simple. Nature has all the character- 
 istics which oriental monotheism ascribes to its god: omni- 
 presence and omnipotence; everything everywhere happens 
 as nature wills, according to nature. Indeed at bottom the 
 idea of god is only a symbol of nature, perhaps unconscious 
 and poetical at first, later misunderstood and misinterpreted. 
 
 As man himself is subject to nature, is constrained by her 
 demands, must satisfy his natural needs, lives according to 
 the measure of the strength and capacity she has given him, 
 and following her commands must close it, so his mind is 
 deeply impressed by her omnipotence and the resulting 
 course of events. He can scarcely conceive another mode 
 of existence; and this one seems right and just, reasonable 
 and moral (sittlicK). He has no other standard for the 
 events of life than the assumed will, i. e. , the visible tend- 
 ency, of nature; while "unnatural" is synonymous with 
 unreasonable and immoral. Man's ethical sense has been 
 engrafted upon nature's sway. Her norms even in social 
 life have been transformed and condensed in his mind into 
 moral ideas. By nature the parents and elders assume 
 direction of the rising generation and the honor and respect 
 which the younger pay the elder accords with our moral 
 ideas. Whatever is natural is moral. Therein lies the 
 eternal, fixed and unchangeable basis of all ethics and 
 morals. 
 
 Hence there is really but one code of ethics and morals 
 which has been and always will be as fixed and unchange- 
 able as the forces of nature. But if nevertheless there have
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 177 
 
 been temporary and local differences in ethical views it is, 
 first, because knowledge of nature has not everywhere 
 reached the same stage of advancement and men often yield 
 to the grossest self-deceptions in respect of it; secondly, 
 because there are whole spheres of human life, like the 
 social sphere, which on account of meagre knowledge are 
 not considered natural, in which the sway of nature is not 
 conjectured or presupposed, in which therefore a correction 
 of inherited moral conceptions in accord with the recognized 
 " will of nature, " or a concession to nature's tendencies is 
 entirely out of the question. 
 
 By searching for truth, therefore, and by investigating 
 nature and her sway, in the social sphere as well as 
 elsewhere, science labors in the service of morals and breaks 
 the way for its progress, although incidentally old and 
 cherished idols may be overthrown and the wail of the 
 " moralists ' ' aroused. 
 
 RIGHTS. 
 
 Heretofore rights have always been treated from the stand- 
 point either of individualism or of a very indefinite collecti- 
 vism. As these two extremes contended against each other, 
 progress swayed from one to the other in literature. But 
 since neither was true, it ought not to be surprising that 
 neither the philosophy of rights nor the prevailing scientific 
 treatment of them is satisfactory, and that the schools of 
 the philosophers have produced nothing but disgust and 
 rancor after centuries of labor. 
 
 Let us briefly review the dreary maze. The original rules 
 of human conduct receive their sanction in part from prece- 
 dent and custom and in part by reference to the will of the 
 gods. Belief and custom are the earliest sources of right, 
 of that which is the standard of conduct. As reflection 
 awakens it distinguishes between these precepts of religion 
 and morals and the laws which the rulers set up, and hence 
 the earliest jurisprudence could consider political law alone 
 to be the source of right. Upon further scientific investi- 
 gation this naive conception was found unsatisfactory; and 
 then began the argumentation in a circle. Some sought the 
 source of right in man immediately, in his nature, in his 
 social instincts or in similar characteristics which were 
 ascribed to him. Others believed that they had found the
 
 178 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 source in the community, the folk, in society and its 
 ' ' common will. ' ' * 
 
 The truth lies between the two, as we have shown. f 
 Rights are not the product of the individual and his nature 
 and constitution, nor are they the creation of the folk or of 
 a common will or national spirit invented ad hoc. Rights 
 are a social creation, a form of communal life produced by 
 the conflict (Zusammenstoss) of unlike social groups of 
 unequal power; such unlikeness and inequality is the neces- 
 sary precondition of all rights. In the primitive horde, a 
 homogeneous, simple, undifferentiated group, there are no 
 rights, nor are they necessary. Complete equality prevails; 
 it is not the soil in which rights are wont to grow. There 
 are neither family rights (promiscuity prevails) nor property 
 rights hence no rights of inheritance; nor any sort of 
 rights in personalty where there is no trade and commerce. 
 Life is not regulated by published ordinances; whatever is 
 is holy. The forms of life produced in the course of time 
 to satisfy wants, which we call custom, are fully sufficient 
 to regulate the life of the primitive horde. No one marks 
 their gradual rise and they are generally ascribed to the will 
 of the gods. Custom and a few religious precepts suffice 
 for men in such a state. 
 
 But when unlike groups come together and different ethni- 
 cal elements have to live side by side the custom of neither 
 is sufficient, for it is not recognized by the other. One sub- 
 jects the other, sovereignty is organized, and the superior 
 power of the stronger makes existence side by side possible 
 by regulating the manner of life. The regulations thus 
 built up for the existence of unlike elements side by side 
 are reduced by practice to rules and principles which create 
 rights. 
 
 Thus, as we have seen, by the rape of women from 
 another tribe arose the first family right, the right of the 
 man over his wife; thus also by reducing the foreign element 
 to servitude arose the right of the lord over his slave; and 
 from the resulting distinction between the lord to whom the 
 fruits of the soil belong and the slave who cultivates the soil 
 for his master arose the right of property. The soil together 
 with the acquired sovereignty passed from father to son in 
 
 * Cf. " Philosophisches Staatsrecfit," sees. 4 and ai; " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus," 
 I^sec. 4 et seg. 
 
 t See Part IV, sec. i above.
 
 THE; OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 179 
 
 the father-family hence the right of inheritance arose. If 
 an alien trading element invaded this primitive sovereign 
 organization the exchange of goods produced other property 
 rights, first of all the rights of debtor and creditor with all 
 the complications to which the development of trade and 
 commerce give rise. 
 
 Rights are always due to the contact of unlike social 
 elements and every right bears evidence of such an origin. 
 There is not one which does not express inequality, for each 
 is the mediation between unlike social elements, the recon- 
 ciliation of conflicting interests which was originally enforced 
 by compulsion but has by usage and familiarity acquired the 
 sanction of a new custom. 
 
 Thus family right subjects the wife and children to the 
 control of the father and compels the reconciliation of oppos- 
 ing interests until in time usage and familiarity substitute 
 new customs and new morals for the original constraint. 
 Property rights regulate the inequality between owner and 
 non-owner in respect of the thing owned; the rights of 
 inheritance regulate the inequality between the heir and the 
 non-heir in respect of the inheritance; the rights of debtor 
 and creditor regulate the inequality between them in 
 respect of the object of the obligation. In short every 
 right arises from an inequality and aims to maintain and 
 establish it through the sovereignty of the stronger over the 
 weaker. In this respect every right is a true reflection of 
 the state to which it owes its existence, and which also aims 
 only at the maintenance and regulation of the life of unlike 
 elements side by side through the sovereignty of one over 
 the other. And since the maintenance of inequality is the 
 soul and real principle of every right, corresponding to each 
 there is a duty; corresponding to each one entitled to 
 receive there are one or more obligated to give; just as in 
 the state by its nature there are rulers and ruled. 
 
 RIGHTS AND THE STATE). 
 
 Thus it is plain that rights can arise only in the state and 
 nowhere else for they are eminently political institu- 
 tions, flesh of the state's flesh and blood of its blood, 
 containing as it were a particle of political sovereignty. 
 For whence comes the grain of sovereignty in every right if 
 not from the great reservoir of sovereignty which we call the
 
 i8o ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 state's power ? From this great reservoir political sove- 
 reignty flows like water through an aqueduct into a network 
 of rights. It is only necessary to turn the cock of execu- 
 tion, and political sovereignty, the state's power, is there. 
 In civilized states a small fee is paid, generally in the form 
 of a stamp tax, for the privilege of drawing upon political 
 sovereignty. Rights can no more be conceived without the 
 state than an aqueduct without a reservoir and pipes and 
 cocks. 
 
 Nevertheless scholasticism succeeded in building up count- 
 less systems of ' ' natural rights ' ' which were alleged to 
 exist without the state, beyond its borders and superior to 
 its authority. Fortunately they are all overthrown, dead 
 and buried. But their spirit hovers over the sea of juris- 
 prudence where ' ' innate ' ' human rights are still spoken of; 
 in addition to those " proclaimed by the French revolution," 
 such as freedom and equality, other " inalienable rights " 
 also, such as the right "to live," "to work" and so on. 
 They are deduced either from the ' ' conception of man ' ' as 
 a "free, sentient and reasonable " being or more generall}' 
 from the "conception of justice." We have elsewhere 
 shown the arbitrariness and insipidity of these deductions.* 
 They are simply deductions from natural rights though 
 every premise is false and the whole system is buried in its 
 grave. That man is a " free ' ' being is pure imagination, 
 still less is he a " reasonable" being, if by " reason" we 
 mean the peculiarity that a person is led in his action by 
 reason and not by blind impulse. 
 
 The premises of ' ' inalienable human rights ' ' rest upon 
 the most unreasonable self-deification of man and overesti- 
 mation of the value of human life, and upon complete mis- 
 conception of the only possible basis of the existence of the 
 state. 
 
 This fancied freedom and equality is incompatible with 
 the state and is a direct negation of it. But the only choice 
 for men here below is between the state with its necessary 
 servitude and inequality, and anarchy. 
 
 There is much unavoidable evil in the former; but on the 
 other hand it promotes and protects the greatest good that 
 man can experience on earth. Anarchy raises to infinity 
 the evil which is unavoidable in the state without affording 
 
 *'' Philosophisches Staatsrechi," sec. 21-23;" " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus," sec. 
 33 et seg.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 181 
 
 even the least of its advantages, for the greatest human 
 evil here below is human stupidity and baseness. Scarcely 
 can the state hold it in check; in a condition of anarchy it 
 rages without restraint heaping horror on horror. There is 
 no third choice, for it is impossible to return to the primi- 
 tive horde;* and between these two modes of social existence: 
 the state and anarchy, it is not hard to choose. 
 
 It is no less an error to deduce rights from "justice" or a 
 " feeling of justice," to place them above the state and to 
 propose their realization in the state. This procedure rests 
 on an optical illusion. For what is justice? Whence do we 
 get our conception of it ? It is created only by the actual 
 rights as they exist in the state. Our conception of justice at- 
 taches itself to political rights; our receptivity, our sense 
 and feeling of it have no other source. It is no contradiction 
 that occasionally we have reason to acknowledge that a 
 political right is wrong and violates justice; for the develop- 
 ment of our sense of justice, which takes place under the 
 influence of political rights, may apparently outrun their 
 development in that all institutional rights exist only in 
 virtue of written law or deep-rooted usage and tradition while 
 political relations together with our sense of justice go 
 right on developing. In such a case our yearning for justice 
 is only the forerunner of a new statutory right which has 
 been previously grounded in the conditions and in the 
 degree of the state's development and which it might be 
 said is already recognized though as yet unwritten. In a 
 word we must distinguish between justifiable reform move- 
 ments based in the nature of the state and mere Utopias. 
 The former spring of themselves from its whole previous 
 development; the latter are separated in thought from the 
 state and stand upon ground upon which no political institu- 
 tion has ever stood such as freedom, equality and absolute 
 justice, apart from the state and based on " natural rights." 
 
 What "justice " in this sense is and how it is found we 
 do not and cannot know. To us justice is the simple abstrac- 
 tion of political rights and it stands and falls with them. If 
 we imagine our past apart from political development and 
 political rights the conception of justice vanishes utterly 
 from our mind. Plato recognized this, and as he was about 
 
 * Enijels, in his " Ursprung der Familfe, des Pnvateigenthums und des Staates." 
 and Marx too, has in mind such a return to the "gentile constitution." It takes 
 a large amount of naivete to conceive of the return of forms of social existence 
 Joug since surmounted. It is as though an old man would become a youth again.
 
 182 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 to explain in the "Republic" what a "just man" and 
 what "justice " were he began by describing the founding 
 of the state out of heterogeneous unequal elements. Pre- 
 supposing that each part would assume the most fitting role 
 that befell it in the state he called this organization of the 
 state and of political sovereignty just; hence this normal 
 condition of the state in which each accommodates himself 
 to the role that befalls him is his type of justice. By this 
 shift, starting from the state, which is really the only pos- 
 sible way, Plato reaches his conception of justice which he 
 then applies as a standard to the individual.* 
 
 The words of Thrasymachus in the same dialogue: " My 
 doctrine is that justice is the interest of the stronger," 
 (338) might be applied to justice in the state, for in fact 
 the weaker must accommodate himself to the stronger; the 
 state can be regulated by no other rights than such as are 
 most agreeable to the stronger. Indeed this is relatively 
 best for the weaker, and in this sense political order presents 
 the only conceivable idea of justice, the only source from 
 which we can draw conceptions of the just and justice. 
 But it is universally the very contrary of freedom and equality 
 and indeed naturally must be. In fact justice has universally 
 been the real expression of the relative power of the social 
 elements in the state. With changing conditions and espe- 
 cially with progressive development of the state in agricul- 
 ture and industry, in science and art the relations gradually 
 became more humane and lenient. Rights and legal regula- 
 tions are humanized and the idea of justice in the abstract 
 grows more perfect. But to-day no less than in Plato's time 
 the state is the only standard of justice. The necessary 
 conditions of its perpetuation determine the concept. What 
 the state must do is right and that can never be "justice" 
 which the state cannot do. 
 
 RIGHTS AND MORALS. 
 
 We have seen that rights arise at the point where the new 
 whole composed of unlike social elements cannot longer be 
 held together merely by customs and morals since the cus- 
 toms and morals of one party are not the same as those of 
 
 *Let us complete the investigation which we undertook in the belief that, if we 
 first endeavored to contemplate justice in some larger object which contains it, 
 we should find it easier to discern its nature in the individual man." Plato, 
 " Republic," Bk. iv, p. 434, Jowett's Translation. 
 
 This greater object was wisely chosen. Only by starting from the state was it 
 possible to arrive at a conception of justice.
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 183 
 
 the other. Into this discord in moral views, with which 
 social unity is incompatible, rights first entered in the form 
 of the commands of the rulers; but in time, as we said, they 
 are transformed into customs and morals so that, being 
 rights, they become the substance of new moral ideas. The 
 apparent contradiction between morals that precede rights 
 and morals that in turn are produced by them needs some 
 elucidation. 
 
 The customs and morals of the primitive horde come from 
 the necessities of life and the common wants of the primi- 
 tive social unity; but needs change in the new social whole 
 composed of two or more unlike elements. At first indeed 
 because there are no common customs and morals, force, 
 compulsion and political rights must bind the new whole 
 together; but usage, habit and all the forces which conduced 
 to fixed customs and morals in the primitive horde will not 
 fail of their effect in the new social unity also. 
 
 The new rights only indicated the line along which the 
 forms of life necessary in the new social unit must be devel- 
 oped. In time they will enter into the moral consciousness, 
 for plainly the new social unity will consolidate. In one 
 way or another certain modes of peaceable communal exist- 
 ence will be discovered; people will adapt themselves to their 
 necessities and by recognizing and accepting them create new 
 customs and morals to which rights gave the first impulse. 
 
 The old morals of the respective social elements must 
 necessarily be subordinated to the new morals of the com- 
 plex whole, for while the former insures the existence of 
 the simple group only the latter preserves the complex com- 
 munity. 
 
 For example, to a primitive horde and an unmixed stock 
 alien and enemy are synonymous terms; its morals command 
 the sparing of fellow members and the ruthless destruction 
 of aliens. But as soon as any foreigners become a part of 
 the community, whether received as slaves or allies or to 
 serve some other interest of the new whole (the relation will 
 be determined by a treaty from which rights will arise), 
 instantly the interest of the new community which produces 
 the new right begins to set aside the old morals which made 
 "alien and enemy" equal and prepares the way for new 
 ones which give the slave, the ally and whoever else has 
 been taken into the social union a claim to protection and 
 respect. However long rudiments of the old morals may
 
 184 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 persist in opinions and sentiments the new interest of the 
 new whole has framed new morals which prove victorious 
 over the old. 
 
 Wherever there are rights the process is the same. 
 Although in primitive times, or even in the feudal state of 
 Mediaeval Europe, the wealth of tolerated classes such as the 
 traveling merchants may have been good booty to the ruling 
 classes and robber knights, the theft of which did not offend 
 against the old morals or detract from knightly honor, yet 
 the new rights which protected the property of the burghers 
 in the interest of all prepared the way gradually for the new 
 morals which to-day forbid the nobility to seize the property 
 of other classes. With difficulty and after centuries of trial, 
 but with final success, political rights have provided new 
 morals concerning property and it is now inconceivable that 
 in the Middle Ages knights and noblemen, who made so 
 much of honor, did not scruple to surprise a city and rob 
 its citizens of their hard-earned goods. 
 
 The displacement of the old morals by new rights due 
 to the wants and interests of the new whole is seen most 
 plainly in the development of patriotism. The original 
 tribal consciousness of the respective social elements of the 
 state is changed in time into a folk or national consciousness. 
 While the old morals recognized only the duty of the indi- 
 vidual to sacrifice himself for the narrowest syngenetic group 
 the common interests of the new whole have created new 
 morals which demand his unconditional sacrifice for a whole 
 which is ethnically and socially complex. 
 
 If we must cite examples at least we shall not need to go 
 far afield for them. What was the nature of that patriotism 
 to which every German was morally bound not many 
 decades ago ? If we characterize it in one word as ' ' par- 
 ticularism ' ' we shall at the same time have indicated the 
 powerful change through which morals have passed in this 
 respect as the result of events and new rights. The Rhenish 
 Union was commensurate with the older morals, though the 
 same thing to-day by the same people in the same land 
 would be called the height of immorality, treason and 
 infamy. These moral changes have taken place since the 
 events of Jena and the war for freedom, since the rights of 
 the German Union and the new German Empire. The 
 former morals of the parts must yield to the new morals of 
 the new whole to the making of which the new rights gave
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 185 
 
 the impulse. As the new rights paved the way for the new 
 morals and made them, so now the new morals will con- 
 tinue to be the strongest prop of the new rights until in 
 the perpetual change of earthly things new events and cir- 
 cumstances make new rights again to which existing morals 
 must be sacrificed. 
 
 The objections that can be made to our presentation of 
 the relation between rights and morals are easily foreseen, 
 for frequently the relation is apparently reversed. Even in 
 the present century how often have we seen decayed rights 
 swept away by the powerful current of "public morals;" 
 and yet it was only apparently so, for in fact every such 
 right was merely a screen behind which other conditions 
 came into existence peremptorily demanding recognition as 
 rights, and although existing written rights seemed to pre- 
 vent the realization of the demand nevertheless moral ideas 
 were created which, exerting a powerful influence and taking 
 possession of the consciousness of the masses, suddenly 
 rose like a tornado overthrowing the old rights as though 
 they were paper; whereupon the rights which the conditions 
 had long since demanded and which had already entered 
 the moral consciousness procured legal expression and 
 validity. 
 
 If I might use a somewhat questionable metaphor to 
 illustrate I should say that behind the regular rights legiti- 
 mately wedded to the nation and known as such there appeared 
 secretly, from the force of circumstances, illegitimate rights 
 which shunned the light and in illicit intercourse with the 
 nation begat morals; and as these, still illegitimate, came 
 into the world and grew up they helped to set the betrayed 
 old rights, which had lost their force and justification, 
 violently aside; whereupon the legitimation of the new 
 morals followed by subsequent marriage, per subsequens 
 matrimonium. 
 
 "So there was an unwritten natural right based in 
 reason," cries some supporter of natural rights triumph- 
 antly. Not so fast. It is true that in such moments of 
 development rights rise through hard birth pains from the 
 dark womb of actual conditions into the light of existence. 
 But they are not natural rights, based on reason and inde- 
 pendent of time and conditions. On the contrary they are 
 always conditioned in the actual circumstances. In the 
 sense that they correspond to the conditions from which they
 
 186 ANNAI^ OF THE; AMERICAN ACADEMY 
 
 spring they are natural and reasonable, but not in the sense 
 that their source is in a natural consciousness of right or in 
 reason and that they always remain the same. The require- 
 ments which arise from actual conditions according to time 
 and place, which correspond to them and are therefore 
 natural and reasonable, being formulated into laws, become 
 rights after having struck deep root, as has been said, in 
 moral consciousness. 
 
 Thus the objection that the source of rights is moral is 
 based on a misconception of the actual forces. Equally 
 unfounded also is the doctrine of natural rights. But there 
 is another objection which seems to be supported by the 
 facts. Political rights do not always enter into the moral 
 consciousness of the community. However long they may 
 endure they have public morals against them and eventually 
 must succumb. This frequently occurs and though it seems 
 to establish the moral source of rights, in truth it does not. 
 
 We often see valid political rights stand like dead 
 machines in spite of the application of the state's whole 
 power, never operating without the display of the political 
 force, disliked and repudiated by public morals, unable to 
 create new morals and finally ending their burdensome 
 existence somehow unregretted. Upon closely examining 
 what sort of rights these are which cannot produce a moral 
 ground into which they may strike firm root, we observe 
 that there was no pressing need for them, that they arose 
 from the momentary caprice of one party, from false ideas 
 and theories, from misconceptions of the actual conditions, 
 etc. Such rights always hang in the air without footing 
 and are powerless, valid only through external support and 
 protection, without internal living force, a stranger and an 
 enemy to public morals, unable to create new morals and 
 hence from the start ordained to perish. Such rights are 
 not rights at all. They have no vital force, they are still-born. 
 
 All that has been said of the mutual relation of rights and 
 morals applies to private as well as to public rights and 
 morals. The former generate their own moral atmosphere 
 as well as the latter and are equally dependent on it for 
 existence. 
 
 For example, take the changes in interest (usury laws) 
 during the last three decades in certain states of Europe, 
 especially Austria. First, the severe old usury laws accord- 
 ing to the intent of the canonical law (Rechf), dating
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 187 
 
 from the period of industrial servitude and guilds. Over- 
 stepping the minimum rate of five or six per cent was not 
 only made punishable by the state, but was also contrary 
 to public morals. The industrial conditions, the restraints 
 upon trade, commerce and agriculture fully justified the laws 
 of usury. The severe right was the outcome of actual con- 
 ditions and produced in public opinion a moral consciousness 
 of the objectionable character of usury. Meanwhile indus- 
 trial development went ceaselessly forward, economic bar- 
 riers fell; trade, commerce and land became free; productive 
 industry felt an expansion hitherto unknown; productivity 
 far exceeded former limits, and the old interest right was 
 felt to be oppressively narrow. Behind the screen of this 
 written right the need for a new one more commensurate 
 with the conditions made itself felt and began to undermine 
 the morals based on the old. The latter lost its footing and 
 was overthrown and a new right complete freedom was 
 proclaimed, which soon made way with the old morals and 
 created new which saw nothing immoral in the free contract 
 of the parties about the rate so long as no other immoral 
 factor was involved such as taking advantage of youth, 
 inexperience, necessitous predicament and the like. Then 
 the state permitted and even incited the erection of institu- 
 tions of credit which, even when lawfully managed, brought 
 such rates of interest as two decades before had been repu- 
 diated and denounced by both rights and morals, while 
 prominent men of spotless character who esteemed honor 
 and morals highly competed for their management. 
 
 Meanwhile the industrial boom wore itself out for accord- 
 ing to economic laws a relapse must come. Trade, commerce, 
 industry, agriculture again declined and their productivity 
 fell off. Again safety was sought in erecting old barriers 
 and returning to the former restraints and unfreedom. But 
 above all else the new right of unlimited freedom in interest 
 rates contrasted with the industrial decline and lost footing 
 in the actual conditions which demanded something else. 
 The need of change became manifest; the new morals wav- 
 ered; the new rights had to fall and the old restrictions on 
 the rate of interest became statutory rights again. At first 
 the newly resurrected rights struggled with the vanishing 
 remnants of the morals which were based on the fallen 
 rights. But they were victorious, " for only the living is 
 right," and soon morals will be completely transformed,
 
 1 88 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 especially as political power and criminal courts pave the 
 way for the new rights in public morals. 
 
 In every department of private rights examples may be 
 multiplied at will of rights arising from actual conditions 
 and shaping morals. Permit us further to point to the 
 many changes in the law (Recht} of marriage and the result- 
 ing change in morals. Wherever for centuries the marriage 
 tie has been indissoluble by statutory right a taint of immor- 
 ality is attached to divorce; and if the law is compelled by 
 actual conditions and the freer development of modern 
 society to sanction the dissolution of marriage, as recently 
 in France, the new rights have still to struggle a long while 
 with the old morals. A recent article in the Paris Figaro 
 occasioned by the new law read somewhat as follows: 
 "Divorce well; but remarriage? Public morals will not 
 endure that in France (!)" The Figaro need not worry. In 
 Europe and even in France public morals have at times 
 endured worse things than that in marriage rights; for 
 example the jus primes noctis. They will soon, if they have 
 not already, come to terms with the new rights, divorce and 
 remarriage, which, supposing them to last, are reasonable 
 because they take account of existing needs and conditions. 
 
 One more question in conclusion. If morals are constantly 
 changing and follow almost slavishly the rights which 
 originate in actual conditions, why do men always conceive 
 of them as changeless in the midst of change, the unvary- 
 ing source of rights and the eternal idea throned high above 
 all transitory things of earth ? Why do they thus appeal to 
 them and regard them as the standard of rights and political 
 institutions ? 
 
 The explanation is very simple. The changeableness 
 of rights and political institutions is visible and appreci- 
 able; they cannot possibly pass as changeless. Official 
 announcements annul to-day the rights of yesterday. A 
 ministerial ordinance suspends an existing political institu- 
 tion and substitutes another. But the change in morals is 
 slow and unmarked as the progress of the hour hand of a 
 clock. A generation is often but a minute on the moral 
 dial who can detect such a slight progression ! Generations 
 later the historian and the philosopher notice that the pointer 
 has moved. The average man ' ' hears it told indeed but lacks 
 believing faith." Naturally so, for in the flowing stream of 
 events man must lay hold on something fixed and
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 189 
 
 unchanging or lose his bearings. Until Copernicus, the earth 
 at least stood fast under his feet; since then it moves in a circle 
 and not even the sun stands still. What wonder that men 
 grow dizzy and look hither and thither for some fixed point 
 by which to direct their unsteady course in the ocean of life ! 
 It is an absolute necessity of human temperament to have 
 such fixed points like stars on the horizon. To it all the 
 ' ' eternal powers ' ' which man worships owe their existence, 
 nor will they pass away while man lives on earth. Among 
 them are found the moral ideas; for in them man seeks and 
 hopes to find a firm point of support for all his actions, a guid- 
 ing star by which to regulate all his acts and undertakings, 
 a fixed standard by which to judge between good and bad, 
 noble and ignoble; and indeed lie finds in the moral idea 
 what he seeks. It is really a basal point and a guiding star 
 for the whole life. The error lies in each one believing his 
 moral ideas are the only ones, changeless and the same for 
 all times and peoples. It is no more true than that the 
 earth is a fixed point in the universe. But just as the earth 
 in spite of its ceaseless revolutions affords a firm enough 
 ground for human efforts, so the individual's moral ideas 
 afford him a solid support upon which to base his character, 
 his efforts and his will. What cares the landlord or the 
 houseowner that the soil he tills or the ground on which he 
 builds revolves with the whole globe ! It is just as little 
 concern to the individual that his morals will seem immoral 
 to future generations; to him it is the one possible fixed 
 ground which he can cultivate and build upon. 
 
 For the individual, however transient he himself is, ulti- 
 mately finds in himself the firm support to which he can 
 cling in the wild tumult of life for protection and woe to 
 him if he does not find it ! It is only shortsightedness and 
 pardonable weakness in man to believe that it is external to 
 himself, for he seeks it there in vain. "It is not from 
 without that it conies, thine inner self creates it." Thus 
 whether it be purely personal feelings like real love and 
 friendship which accompany man through life, or true faith 
 to which pious temperaments devote themselves, or higher 
 ideas like enthusiasm for folk and fatherland, for truth and 
 science, to which the individual unselfishly sacrifices himself, 
 every feeling and every idea is a ' ' fixed pole-star in the flood 
 of events" which shines before him, consoles and comforts 
 him and ennobles him, too, though after all it is purely
 
 1 90 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 subjective and passes away with him. So it is with 
 morals. 
 
 Thus though philosopher and sociologist inquire how 
 morals arose, what changes they have undergone, whether 
 they are justified or not, the individual finds it sufficient for 
 his life that he has them. But whether he has any and 
 what they are depends upon the degree of development of 
 his social group, upon the family in which he was born and 
 brought up, upon his environments, upon the impressions 
 received in tender years, upon the experiences he has passed 
 through, perhaps also upon the knowledge he has gathered, 
 but certainly to a high degree upon the rights which the 
 state has maintained and to which he has had to conform. 
 
 INDIVIDUAL EFFORTS AND SOCIAL NECESSITIES. 
 
 Thus by observing the social world and its phenomena we 
 come to perceive that there is a necessity immanent in the 
 condition of things according to which they move, by which 
 they act and which sooner or later reaches fulfillment. 
 
 It is not in man's power to suspend or check it. He is 
 himself a part of that world and an element in those phe- 
 nomena and all his actions are subject to this all-embracing 
 and universally immanent necessity. His alleged and 
 apparent freedom cannot alter or prevent its fulfillment. 
 
 The common understanding recognizes indeed that the 
 so-called ' ' natural laws ' ' are fulfilled on a grand scale. 
 But in the fine, microscopical details of individual action it is 
 not so easily apparent. 
 
 Concede for a moment the beautiful illusion that the 
 individual acts "freely," and consider what significance it 
 has in view of the fulfillment of natural necessity in indi- 
 vidual life and human society. All of man's " free acts " 
 may be reduced to a universal concept and a common 
 denominator: preservation. likewise all the processes in 
 nature and human life which take place of immanent neces- 
 sity may be reduced to a universal concept and common 
 denominator: change and decay. In the realm of nature all 
 is perishable. Man would preserve everything. 
 
 This fundamental antithesis lies like a curse on all of 
 man's " free acts," which are condemned to be exhausted in 
 fruitless struggle against nature's necessities. Human 
 " freedom " is but the freedom of the captive lion, to run to
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 191 
 
 and fro in his cage and to follow the menagerie, cage and 
 all, hither and thither through city and country. 
 
 But the general perception that human freedom accom- 
 plishes nothing against natural necessity, that it dashes like 
 waves against a rock-bound coast only to be broken and 
 scattered in spray, is of little worth. It is more important 
 from the universal relation between human freedom and 
 natural necessity to gain some insight into the essence and 
 character of human actions. This we will now attempt. 
 
 We said that the whole tendency of man's so-called free 
 activity was to preserve what is by nature perishable and 
 must pass away to make room for the new. We try to 
 preserve our health while nature works quietly and inces- 
 santly for its decline. We try to prolong our life as long 
 as possible even when nature has made its destruction 
 necessary; and as it is with these " personal " goods so it is 
 with all the rest of life's goods. Men try to preserve 
 economic goods beyond the end of their lives for their 
 descendants, and under favorable circumstances their efforts 
 are successful for generations. Nevertheless the wealth of 
 the Croesuses of antiquity has fallen a victim to the all- 
 powerful law of natural decay and perpetual change and the 
 Rothschilds of our century will leave as little trace in the 
 future. 
 
 Man tries also with his whole thought to preserve ' ' for- 
 ever " all the social institutions which he, the blind instru- 
 ment and means of natural impulses and inclinations, creates 
 and all the mental products for making life tolerable, beau- 
 tiful and noble, while natural and necessary decay labors to 
 overthrow them, undermines them, gnaws at and devours 
 them. We would preserve the social community in which 
 we are well off ; but it must end as surely as the life of the 
 individual. We would preserve our language, religion, 
 customs, nationality and do not notice how they daily waste 
 away like rocks under dripping water. 
 
 Self-sacrifice to preserve what is inevitably destined to fall 
 is considered noble and heroic; but it is cowardly and 
 ignoble to submit to natural necessity. To oppose natural 
 impulses is asceticism, which men do not refuse to admire. 
 To follow natural impulses and necessities is generally con- 
 sidered low "materialism." Fanatics who have neither 
 eye nor mind for the omnipotence of natural conditions are 
 our heroes in art in whom we delight. The more fanatical
 
 192 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 the ' ' greater ' ' they are. The founders of univeral empires, 
 the Cyruses, Alexanders, Caesars and Napoleons won our 
 admiration because they perished trying to accomplish the 
 impossible and unnatural. The simple man who adapts 
 himself to the natural and necessary conditions of his envi- 
 ronment is not worth consideration. 
 
 Our freedom of action and heroism may make the inevit- 
 able fulfillment more painful for us, but it cannot prevent it, 
 or delay it a single moment. The necessity immanent in 
 things and natural conditions is fulfilled however much we 
 oppose it; and it is quite proper to picture human life as a 
 perpetual struggle against nature though it is false to believe 
 that man could ever at any point be victorious. What is 
 fulfilled is always and exclusively natural necessity, never 
 man's ' ' free will. ' ' Man's efforts vacillate from side to side 
 until finally they fall into the line of necessity that is 
 decisive for fulfillment. If we may be allowed to use a 
 trivial illustration, let us suppose that from a number of 
 stoppers of different sizes we have to select one for an open 
 bottle. The relation between the open bottle and the pile 
 of stoppers is controlled by an immanent natural necessity in 
 consequence of which only one stopper, of suitable size, will 
 fit it. This necessity will be fulfilled if we cork the bottle 
 from the supply of stoppers at hand, and it will be fulfilled 
 in spite of our ' ' free acts, ' ' which consist in applying a 
 number of stoppers, some too small, some too large, to the 
 mouth of the bottle and convincing ourselves that they do 
 not fit. Eventually one will fit, the one of proper size, and 
 when we find it we cork the bottle with satisfaction, proud 
 of our "free action." A trivial illustration to be sure, in 
 which other openings might be found besides the one in the 
 bottle. But let us pass to a more serious example, better 
 fitted for scientific investigation. 
 
 Probably human freedom seems under less restraint in the 
 sphere of scientific and philosophical thought than any- 
 where else. "Thoughts are free " and the field not subject 
 to censorship nor made unsafe by the state's attorney is 
 large enough. Free man may gambol there at will and 
 enjoy his freedom, and he has always done so to the fullest 
 extent. But the object of intellectual labor is the discovery 
 of truth or knowledge; and what has been the result of 
 these " free" efforts for thousands of years? It is the old 
 story of the bottle and the stoppers. After thousands of
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 193 
 
 failures somebody makes a lucky grab and seizes the right 
 stopper for the philosophical hole. But is that the work of 
 a free mind or of meritorious intellectual labor ? The neces- 
 sity immanent in things and conditions was simply fulfilled. 
 Groping in the dark we hit upon a truth. 
 
 Scientific and philosophical investigation, that noblest 
 occupation of "free minds," is a pure game of chance. 
 Philosophical and scientific truths stand like rare prizes 
 among thousands of blanks in a wheel of fortune revolving 
 about us. We ' ' free thinkers, ' ' so proud of our ' ' intellec- 
 tual labors," grab awkwardly like innocent children and lo! 
 among a million blanks somebody gets a prize. This makes 
 him a thinker of great renown whose " merits " are praised. 
 Yet he is not at all accountable for the result of his intellec- 
 tual labor. He is no more and no less meritorious than the 
 "dunces," scorned and ridiculed, who had the misfortune 
 to draw nothing but scientific and philosophical errors. No 
 more meritorious, we say! Indeed "the great philosopher" 
 who appears once in ' ' thousands of years ' ' is less meritorious 
 than the crowd of little philosophers who by drawing count- 
 less blanks made it possible for him to win the great prize. 
 
 Ivet us go to another field of ' ' free ' ' human actions, leg- 
 islation, and see what relation human freedom there bears to 
 the necessity immanent in things and conditions. How 
 proud and self-conscious the gentlemen of the majority are, 
 whether of the parliamentary right or left. They make the 
 laws for the state to-day. They stake their best knowledge, 
 they would apply all their wisdom, they appoint their best 
 minds on the committees and entrust their shrewdest jurists 
 with the drafting of the bills; and then the amendments by 
 sections! Every one bestirs himself to furnish the greatest 
 acuteness his cranium can supply and what is the result 
 of all this application of " mind " and " free " thought? 
 
 For the most part a miserable botch which the real con- 
 ditions of life and the necessity immanent in them must 
 correct in order to meet the wants of the case and be endur- 
 able. Savigny denominated it inaptitude {Mangel an Beruf} 
 for legislation and ascribed it to " our times. ' ' As to the 
 inaptitude he was right; but no period has been or ever will 
 be better than our own in this respect. Only by adapting 
 themselves to immediate wants and taking account of real 
 interests, in short by bending to social necessities, can law- 
 givers make useful laws and it has always been so. But
 
 194 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 as. soon as they mount the high horse of theory, set up ideal 
 principles and deduce laws to bring about ideal right and 
 justice; when instead of submitting to social necessity they 
 enter the sphere of free intellectual activity in order to make 
 laws in accordance with ideas and not in accordance with 
 real needs and interests, the inaptitude is clearly demon- 
 strated. 
 
 This inaptitude for ' ' free ' ' origination is manifested in a 
 still higher degree in politics. Every institution ' ' freely ' ' 
 made is a wretched experiment which must be thoroughly 
 transformed by the powerful currents of real interests and 
 needs in order to answer to social necessities and gain any 
 permanence at all. Human freedom (diplomatic) is the 
 worst sort of bungler and must be forced into the right 
 course by social necessity. 
 
 What makes the institutions of human freedom especially 
 frail in the sphere of politics is the fact that the fundamental 
 tendency of all free human action, preservation and acquisi- 
 tion, is most pronounced right here where the natural neces- 
 sity of eternal change and decay holds most inexorable 
 sway. 
 
 The aspirations of statesmen are directed toward political 
 and national preservation and expansion. The natural 
 necessity to perish and decay can go on only by violently 
 overthrowing every free human institution. Hence no new 
 political institution can come to light without force and 
 destruction, struggle and bloodshed. Here human freedom, 
 bent on preservation and acquisition, plays a most lament- 
 able part; and social necessity, tending to change and decay, 
 is revealed in its most awful sublimity. 
 
 There is still another important question to be decided. 
 What is the relation of this pernicious human freedom to 
 man's happiness in life ? and can a better insight into its 
 nothingness and vanity help him in avoiding evil and being 
 happier ? Let us see. 
 
 Certainly if men always recognized inevitable necessity 
 in advance they might escape much evil fortune by quietly 
 resigning to it. But this is impossible, first because such 
 knowledge is never vouchsafed to mankind as a whole, at 
 most to exceptional individuals, and again because human 
 freedom, that oscillation back and forth on both sides of the 
 line of necessity, is based in human nature and is therefore 
 a necessity.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 195 
 
 Although it is thus impossible for mankind as a whole to 
 avoid the disappointments and escape the evil results of the 
 opposition of individual freedom and social necessity still it 
 is worth while to inquire whether a more correct knowledge 
 of necessity does not in many relations of life and spheres 
 of human -activity lessen the sum of evil allotted to man 
 here below, or better expressed, whether through such 
 knowledge much superfluous evil due to human freedom 
 might not be avoided. Let us see how far this is possible. 
 
 It has already been pointed out that we can never con- 
 ceive of man as an isolated being : for he never has existed 
 and never can exist in isolation. If then we conceive of 
 him as having always been a member of a swarm or horde 
 and we cannot reasonably do otherwise his life and well- 
 being depend upon his environment and is conditioned by 
 it. Now the impulse of self-preservation, the source of the 
 most powerful motive of human efforts and ' ' free' ' activi- 
 ties, is by origin not simply individual but social. It finds 
 expression in attachment for one's own and desire to subdue 
 others. 
 
 This social impulse of self-preservation, the reverse side 
 of which is the necessary desire to subdue and exploit the 
 alien, opens new fields for human desires and activities, for 
 example the economic and the political, the technical, the 
 scientific and even the artistic. In most of them individual 
 desires come in conflict with social necessities and since, as 
 is self-evident, the latter assert themselves over the former 
 there is a preponderance of ' ' misfortune ' ' and ' ' evil ' ' in 
 human life. If now man could know the necessities imma- 
 nent in things and conditions and had strength to reduce his 
 desires to their measure his life would surely be much happier. 
 Generally this is impossible for reasons both subjective and 
 objective. However let us consider in what spheres it is 
 possible to subordinate individual desires to social necessi- 
 ties, to adapt and accommodate one's self to the circum- 
 stances. 
 
 Now the sphere of human efforts best adapted for this 
 will be the one in which knowledge of natural necessity is 
 farthest advanced, the sphere of personal life. Here men 
 are least deceived and have long since learned to subordinate 
 their efforts. Every half-way reasonable man suppresses the 
 desire to preserve his life beyond the limits set by nature and 
 submits to the natural necessity of death.
 
 196 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 One thing, however, many people have not yet learned, or 
 perhaps an artificially cultivated trend of thought has made 
 them forget: the low value of life. Its overvaluation is the 
 source of great personal ill, especially is it an unfortunate 
 conceit of the ' ' civilized ' ' nations to place too high value 
 upon the " good " of life. 
 
 Yet if man would measure the ' ' natural ' ' worth of human 
 life by nature's forbearance and by the productiveness which 
 she allows play to in this realm, how low the value would 
 be set. A subterranean quake and thousands of human 
 lives are sent to destruction. Thousands perish in every 
 storm at sea. A plague here to-day and there to-morrow 
 and hundreds of thousands fall victims. A bad summer, 
 the failure of harvest and hunger frequently snatch off mill- 
 ions in overpopulated regions. 
 
 But on the other hand nature can indulge in lighter play 
 with human life millions of children see the light daily 
 and nature has shrewdly provided that this productivity 
 should not cease. 
 
 Considering these natural conditions is there any sense 
 or justification in overestimating the worth of an individual 
 life as civilized nations do? How much misfortune and 
 evil men might be spared if all the social, political and jurid- 
 ical institutions which follow from such an exaggerated 
 estimation of human life should fall away. 
 
 Next to the preservation of life the satisfaction of natural 
 wants is the most important content of human endeavors. 
 Here too the wants produced by man's freedom are 
 directly opposed to natural necessities and fill the life of 
 civilized man especially with useless torment and strife. 
 Nature directs man to an unhampered satisfaction of these 
 material wants according to his physical powers. An un- 
 natural trend of thought produced forms of life which 
 increase the sum of evils incident to life and run counter to 
 natural necessity without being able to check it. 
 
 The impulse to satisfy wants forces man into the economic 
 eld. How hard his struggle with nature is needs no 
 lengthy explanation. Natural necessities press him hard and 
 close. He endeavors to make head against the embarrassments. 
 Apparently he succeeds frequently, but at last succumbs. 
 His efforts are expended in two chief directions. He strives 
 greedily for possessions which he must ultimately leave 
 behind, and he endeavors to get still more in order to be
 
 THK OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 197 
 
 equal with the more opulent, whereas economic inequality 
 is a natural necessity. 
 
 The economic wants lead men into the political sphere; 
 for the state is expected to furnish to some the means of 
 satisfying their higher economic and cultural wants at the 
 expense, though not to the harm, of others. But the state, 
 like all human institutions, is perishable, and the older, 
 already in decline, must give place to the new, developing in 
 power; and yet how much energy will be devoted to checking 
 the uncheckable, to preserving alive what is doomed to perish. 
 
 In the internal organization of states also human freedom 
 overshoots the limit of natural necessity either to force the 
 natural development of social relations prematurely or to 
 suppress it unduly and cause stagnation. Hence comes that 
 perpetual oscillation in the inner life of a state which Comte 
 supposed to be the result of two opposing principles, the 
 theological and the metaphysical, and which he expected 
 would disappear with the dawn of positive political science, 
 but we consider it simply the natural process of " human 
 freedom." 
 
 But human freedom celebrates its greatest triumphs in the 
 sphere of technics, science and art. For the simple reason 
 that it is only a question of discovering what are the natural 
 necessities, the actual facts and the laws of nature or (in 
 art) of reproducing her productions. Men need only to sniff 
 about in technics or science until they discover how; or to 
 experiment in art until they strike it right; and this they do 
 with great patience and with assurance of ultimate success. 
 
 Technics and science have no higher task than to discover 
 nature and learn her laws. Since she is always the same 
 and the stream of mankind flows ceaselessly and man's 
 thirst for knowledge is always the same, he must eventually 
 succeed in learning her secrets from her. But the whole of 
 man's freedom here consists in submitting to nature's neces- 
 sity his great success is in recognizing what it is; in adapt- 
 ing himself to it in technics and learning it in science. Thus 
 human endeavors are in no wise opposed to natural necessi- 
 ties here; hence their greatest success and man's greatest 
 good lie in this sphere. likewise in art. Free reproduction 
 is the highest aim. The impulse thereto lies in human 
 nature and hence its satisfaction, like that of every other 
 impulse, yields human pleasure. But the better he succeeds 
 in reproducing, the more faithfully he clings to nature and
 
 198 ANNAJLS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 
 
 her necessities, the truer the expression, so much the greater 
 his triumph and his good fortune. He meets with success 
 all the oftener because he does not act contrary to nature 
 but rather takes her for his chief example and teacher. 
 
 The result of our investigations is indeed not very com- 
 mendatory of mankind in general. For since the sum of 
 human ill increases in the degree that ' ' free ' ' human 
 endeavors are shattered fruitlessly on natural necessities it 
 follows from what precedes that real success and good fortune 
 can be found only in the domains of technics, science and 
 art, which is accessible to only a small minority of mankind; 
 whereas in the sphere of economic and political life, where 
 these endeavors run powerlessly to waste against natural 
 necessities, very little real happiness is to be obtained, and in 
 the sphere of personal life only discreet resignation can 
 ameliorate the necessary evil at all.
 
 V. THE HISTORY OF MANKIND AS LIFE OF 
 THE SPECIES. 
 
 SOCIOLOGY AND THE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY. 
 
 The relation between sociology and the philosophy of his- 
 tory is similar to that between statistics and history. The 
 former has been called a cross-section of the latter. That 
 is to say, statistics is occupied with a given condition, while 
 history would embrace the entire course of human destiny 
 (die Geschicke) as a whole. But it is very plain that this 
 is an impossible task; so far as its accomplishment is con- 
 cerned, statistics has a great advantage in the temporal and 
 local limitations which it assumes. 
 
 So with sociology and the philosophy of history. The 
 latter would give us the idea of human history in its entirety, 
 would set forth the theory of the whole course; and hence 
 it must fail through inability to survey it all, for the idea of 
 a part conceived to be the whole always falsifies the idea of 
 the whole. 
 
 On the other hand, the task of sociology is more capable 
 of solution because of the limitations which it assumes. It 
 disclaims embracing the history of mankind as a whole. It 
 is content with investigating the process of human group- 
 making, the constant repetition of which makes up the 
 content of all history. Without inquiring the import of 
 the whole course of history, which it does not know, it is 
 content to show its conformity to law, to investigate the 
 manner of social evolution, in a word to describe the pro- 
 cesses which regularly arise from a certain contact of human 
 societies and the mutual effects displayed. We would treat 
 the principal questions of sociology: conformity to law in 
 the course of political history, the way societies develop, and 
 the problem whether in historical periods of considerable 
 length we meet with certain ideas, general tendencies (like 
 progress, improvement, and so on), or even general forms of 
 social process. 
 
 CONFORMITY TO LAW IN DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 Conformity to law in the events and developments of polit- 
 ical history has been often suspected and much discussed, 
 and even positively asserted. But, as we have pointed out 
 
 (199)
 
 200 ANNAI<S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 elsewhere,* no one has succeeded, so far as we know, in 
 demonstrating it concretely and clearly; while, on the con- 
 trary, the shallow objections of antagonists who denied its 
 existence and spoke of free will and the guidance of Provi- 
 dence seemed to be growing more formidable. 
 
 But it is a very interesting fact that in spheres which are 
 very near to political and social life and which, though not 
 identical, are connected with it by an intimate bond of 
 causal relation, such conformity is so plain and apparent 
 that it cannot be questioned by even the most zealous adher- 
 ents of free will and of the guidance of Divine Providence; 
 and yet they have never realized that by conceding develop- 
 ment according to law, independent of the will of the indi- 
 vidual, in art and science for example, they concede it 
 eo ipso in these deeper, fundamental domains. 
 
 Let us therefore consider those spheres in which con- 
 formity to law is doubted by no one, in order next to show 
 the intimate connection between this conformity to law and 
 that in the social and political sphere upon which this 
 depends. 
 
 Is it not a scientific commonplace to speak of the evolu- 
 tion of a people's art, science and philosophy? What do the 
 modern historians do but demonstrate their development in 
 conformity to law in each several nation; an evolution in 
 which plainly the individual must, and unconsciously and 
 involuntarily does, accommodate himself to the law of the 
 whole and the movements of the community ? What does 
 it signify that for example the connoisseur can tell almost 
 exactly when a work of art was created, the school to which 
 it belonged and almost the place whence it must have come, 
 without knowing the artist ? What but that it is not the 
 individual fashioning according to his own arbitrary will 
 but the community and its evolution, whose slave he is born 
 to be, as whose slave he works and creates ? The individual 
 does not compose; it is the poetic mood of his age and social 
 group. The individual does not think; it is the spirit of his 
 age and social group. Otherwise the connoisseur could not 
 tell whether the picture exhibited belonged to the school of 
 Tintoretto or Rubens; whether a rediscovered Latin poem is 
 classic or post-classic; whether a philosophical fragment 
 belongs to the Aristotelian or Alexandrian age. That the 
 connoisseur can tell is the best proof that the individual's 
 
 * See " Rasstnka mpf," p. 6 et seq.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 201 
 
 thoughts, feelings and actions are influenced and determined 
 by his age and social environment. 
 
 Thus we recognize these facts generally and without con- 
 tradiction, while refusing to draw the necessary conclusions 
 from them elsewhere. But we have seen that the mode of 
 a man's feeling, thought and action simply result from the 
 stage of social and political development upon which he 
 happens at the time to be.* Can it still be doubted that the 
 social and political situation exercises a determining, con- 
 structive influence on the mental constitution and endow- 
 ments of men which are on the whole always equal ? 
 
 The peasant boy with artistic talents will draw rude figures 
 in the sand or carve in wood with a pocket knife all his life 
 long. Raised upon a higher social plane, educated in an art 
 school in a cultivated community, he will become a repre- 
 sentative of his time and people, that is, of the educated 
 classes that stand at the top of the historical development of 
 the nation. What he has become is due not only to his 
 natural endowments but especially to the social environment 
 in which he was educated and its degree of development. 
 But he cannot arbitrarily be anything; he can be only one 
 stone more in the mental structure which the community 
 and its grade of development necessarily determine, a stone 
 whose place is assigned to it by the development of the 
 whole. 
 
 There is therefore no doubt and it will be generally con- 
 ceded that the joint mental development, or, as it is also 
 called, the development of the human mind, or of the mind 
 of mankind, follows fixed laws and that the individual so far 
 as he participates in it, actively or passively, must patiently 
 endure, doing nothing, thinking nothing which does not of 
 necessity follow from the given historical premises of the 
 evolution. There is therefore no individual freedom of will 
 here; only all-controlling law. 
 
 But how is this mental evolution related to evolution in 
 the social sphere ? That the former is not possible or even 
 conceivable without the latter conclusively follows from the 
 close causal connection between mental development and 
 social, political and economic conditions which we have else- 
 where demonstrated.! 
 
 Man's mental character, his mental evolution and so also 
 
 *Cf. Part IV, sec. 2. 
 ^"Rassenkampf," p. Betsey,
 
 2O2 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 his mental activity is conditioned upon the stage of his 
 political and social evolution. The nomad wandering about 
 with his horde has one set of thoughts; the hunter pursuing 
 game in the forests has another; the subjected slave has 
 another; the townsman living by trade and commerce 
 another; the member of the ruling caste another; and the 
 priest whose power is in the mysterious charm of religion 
 another. Their thinking is determined by the place which 
 they occupy in society and by the degree of its evolution. 
 
 But though we can comprehend how collective mental life 
 and activity is connected in a general way with the stage of 
 social evolution, we lack the microscopical insight to see 
 how each individual is connected with it and how his 
 thought, feelings and behavior are influenced by it. 
 
 Similarly the physicist is able to explain the appearing of 
 the rainbow from the position of the sun and the stratifica- 
 tion of the clouds; but he has not the means to show how 
 each atom of steam and water acts in relation to each ray 
 of sunlight, nor how the refraction of the prismatic colors 
 arises from the action of each ray of sunlight on each atom 
 and drop. Nevertheless after the general demonstration of 
 the necessity of the phenomenon who would doubt that the 
 same necessity which sways the collective whole constrains 
 each little part to take its appropriate place! 
 
 We see and know the whole mental evolution to be, like 
 the rainbow in the heavens, a matter of necessity; we know 
 that a condition of society, like a particular position of the 
 sun, must deflect culture and civilization just so and not 
 otherwise, and that with a given degree of social evolution 
 we must meet with one set of mental colors in art and 
 science and not another, although we lack the means to 
 show microscopically, so to speak, the necessary influence 
 and effect of the passing social conditions upon each indi- 
 vidual's acts, thoughts and feelings. Who can consider the 
 necessary total effect and doubt that it is the sum of neces- 
 sary individual influences and effects which no man can 
 escape? 
 
 Intermediate between the individuals and the general 
 mental effect are social structures whose necessary evolution 
 in conformity to law must be concluded from the necessity 
 and the conformity to law of the total effects though there 
 were no more direct or immediate indications of it. 
 
 Thus whoever concedes conformity to law in the evolution
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 203 
 
 of art and literature, science and philosophy (and who will 
 deny it?) must grant the same conformity to law in the 
 evolution of social structures and the consequent restraints 
 upon the individual. 
 
 THE EVOLUTION OF MANKIND. 
 
 We have learned that social evolution is always partial, 
 local and limited in time; and it has been especially empha- 
 sized that we can form no conception of the evolution of 
 mankind as a unitary whole because we have no comprehen- 
 sive conception of mankind as a whole. But, let us ask, 
 can we not form a conception, broader than the evolution of 
 individual groups and social communities, of mankind so far 
 as known to us; and if so how should we have to conceive 
 this relative whole (relative, i. e., to our knowledge) ? 
 
 For we know that Biblical naivete, corresponding to a 
 ' ' theological way of looking at things, ' ' to quote Comte, 
 likened the evolution of man to a genealogical tree spring- 
 ing from Adam and Kve; and it has been repeatedly pointed 
 out that the same view still prevails in the domain of social 
 science, in which Comte rightly recognizes the persistence of 
 the theological phase down to the present. 
 
 The polygenetic view which prevails quite generally at 
 present necessarily does away with the conception of a uni- 
 tary genealogical evolution. But the change only involves 
 assuming several or innumerable starting points; precisely 
 speaking it is a change of form only, or rather of number, 
 that is, there is the evolution of several genealogical trees 
 instead of one. There is assumed to be a steady progress, as 
 before, along a line of evolution from simple to complex, 
 from rudimentary leaf to full grown tree, from primitive to 
 refined and, what is decisive in evolution, from some given 
 original point of incipiency to our time ' ' of great progress, 
 the summit and climax " of all. 
 
 It is plain that such a conception is irreconcilable with a 
 duration of life upon the earth that surpasses comprehension. 
 Starting from the idea which the results of the modern 
 investigation of nature make clearer and clearer we dare not 
 liken the social evolution described above to any such single or 
 even multiple genealogical scheme. For such a scheme 
 proceeds only from our inclination to investigate beginnings 
 above all else, while in the nature of the case we are only 
 capable of knowing the becoming.
 
 204 ANNAI,S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 True science, or, again to quote Comte, ' ' positivism ' ' 
 begins only when we overcome the desire to know the begin- 
 ning of things and are content with a knowledge of their 
 becoming. If we keep in mind the two ideas of the eter- 
 nality of life upon the earth and our inability to know the 
 origin of things, we shall obtain an entirely different scheme 
 of social evolution. We have a conception of its becoming 
 formed upon the basis of facts; if now we banish all thought 
 of the unity and the commencement of evolution, we have 
 left, as concrete remnant, a process of evolution going on at 
 different times and in different places but always according 
 to the same laws. Thus those transitions which we described 
 above, from what is to us the primitive horde with promis- 
 cuity and the mother-family to woman -stealing and marriage 
 by capture, and then to a simple organization of sovereignty, 
 to property, state and " society," must not be conceived to 
 be processes which befall mankind developing, as it were, 
 from a certain point of beginning onward whether along 
 single or multiple lines, but processes which are always 
 being completed and renewed wherever the requisite ante- 
 cedents occur. With such a conception only , and in no wise 
 with the contrary one named, can we reconcile the fact that 
 the primitive stages of this process are still observable in 
 distant parts of the world as fresh and original as they 
 must once have been in our own past. 
 
 Evolution as we have presented it is no chronological or 
 local verity and applies to no particular subject; it is a typi- 
 cal truth in so far as it presents a process which is always 
 true of human species wherever groups of men are found in 
 the proper social condition. 
 
 It is erroneous and entirely false to speak of the " evolu- 
 tion of mankind" ("/<? dSveloppement de I'humanitS"} as 
 Comte does. For we can speak only of social evolution 
 within the compass of the human species. It always begins 
 wherever and so soon as suitable social conditions are at 
 hand and it runs in conformity to law to a conclusion, dying 
 out and disappearing because there is no further manifesta- 
 tion of necessary social energy. It is impossible to doubt 
 that evolution really dies out and becomes extinct in view 
 of the countless sites of whilom culture and mighty social 
 evolution which now lie waste and barren. There are many 
 examples in Asia, America and Africa of extensive regions 
 from which all life has now disappeared, yet upon which
 
 THE OUTLINES OP SOCIOLOGY. 205 
 
 social development once brought forth the most magnificent 
 results of civilization. 
 
 These facts are calculated to support the idea of a cyclical 
 course of social development in general, an idea which gains 
 a foothold just from the cyclical development of states. I 
 have discussed this point often and must here return to it 
 again. 
 
 THE CYCLE OF DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 It sounds like Hegel or Schaeffle to assert that the life of 
 every people runs in a cycle, that once it has arrived at its 
 highest stage of development it hastens to its decay; and 
 that the first best barbarians will make ready its extinction. 
 Sober minds are not inclined to take it seriously. 
 
 Nevertheless it is not difficult to show the causes of this 
 cyclical motion in the natural, economic and social conditions 
 of folk-life. The causes are so plain, their operation so very 
 powerful and general and at the same time so obvious and 
 indisputable that the knowledge of them ought to convince 
 that their effects will fitly and necessarily follow; for they 
 are economic and demographic and thus lie in the region 
 where man's unfreedom and his dependence on physical 
 wants are wholly undeniable; where irrefutably men must 
 be reckoned with as blind natural forces pursuing their 
 courses in conformity to law. 
 
 Men's wants and desires, as we have seen, cause them to 
 raise themselves by groups and societies from a primitive 
 condition to a condition of culture and civilization; and, 
 having once attained it, so to conduct themselves that their 
 fall necessarily follows through other groups and societies 
 in a progressive state. 
 
 In a primitive political body, which is economically poor, 
 men have only one want beyond the desire of self-preserva- 
 tion, the reproduction of the species. On this stage many 
 children are begotten and population grows with great 
 rapidity. The wish, which emerges on a higher 'plain of 
 culture, so far as possible to insure a better material exist- 
 ence for the descendants is not effective to check the increase 
 of births for the reason that future members will be no 
 worse off than the present so far as property goes while 
 every living human being represents one more unit of labor, 
 which of itself may conduce to betterment of condition.
 
 206 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 For this reason political bodies in the lower stages of cul- 
 ture and welfare increase rapidly and so make a great rela- 
 tive gain in numerical strength which can be sustained by 
 increasing productivity and economic prosperity at home. 
 A population in such a state of progressive development is 
 very likely to lay the foundation for a body politic over 
 which a highly civilized and cultivated minority will rule. 
 
 But if, with the development of the body politic, the lowest 
 classes also rise to a higher degree of civilization and become 
 prosperous, and it cannot be otherwise, anxiety for the 
 future welfare of posterity begins to exert a restraint upon 
 the natural increase of the people. The former heedlessness, 
 companion of poverty, gives way to a "wise care" and 
 population begins to stagnate and finally to decline. Thus 
 the collective body becomes numerically weaker than those 
 which have not yet reached this degree of " refinement, " 
 and this further conduces to economic weakness and political 
 decline; while the community that still stands lower in 
 development, that still has a poor proletariat in process of 
 sound development, carries off the victory through its 
 numerical strength. 
 
 These are the real, ever active causes which bring about 
 the cyclic movement in the life of folk and state and which 
 explain why it is always the highly cultivated state that is 
 destroyed by " barbarian hordes." 
 
 But such hordes are not necessarily external, and if they 
 were they alone would not be able utterly to destroy power- 
 ful civilized states. But unfortunately every state conceals 
 in its own bosom, and the higher it rises in the scale of 
 civilization so much the more, barbarian hordes enough who 
 only await the given signal, the critical moment of civil or 
 foreign war, to begin the work of destruction. The fall of 
 many a powerful civilized state under the assault of rather 
 small barbarian hordes could not be comprehended if it were 
 not known that domestic social enemies of the existing order 
 let the secretly glimmering hatred of the property and ruling 
 classes burst into bright flame in the moment of danger; 
 and this alone is often sufficient to turn the toilsome labor of 
 centuries into dust and ashes. This inner enemy necessarily 
 increases with the development of civilization so that every 
 centre of civilization, apart from the danger threatening 
 it from without, fosters the seeds of destruction within 
 itself.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 207 
 
 PROGRESS AND INNOVATION. 
 
 But the fact of cyclical development in state and folk is also 
 decisive of the question of ' ' progress ' ' in the sphere of human 
 activity. Two assertions which I made in " Rassenkampf' 1 
 have given considerable offence and provoked lively contra- 
 diction, viz. , that there is no progress and that there can be 
 nothing essentially new in the realm of mental knowledge. 
 
 That I of course recognize progress in the development of 
 an isolated centre of civilization, each time beginning and 
 running to its end, has been brought out conspicuously by 
 the briefest of my reviewers in the English periodical 
 "Mind." "The general conclusion to which he finally 
 comes," it reads, " is that there is no such thing as either 
 progress or regress in the course of history taken as a whole, 
 but only in the particular periods of a process that is going 
 on forever in a circle in particular countries where the social 
 process is forever recommencing." It is indeed remarkable 
 that the English critic who reviewed my book in fourteen lines 
 caught my thought correctly while so many German critics 
 who made extended reviews of it are of the opinion that I 
 deny all progress whatsoever.* However I see from this 
 
 *On the other hand Maurice Block, in the "Journal des Economistes" was inclined 
 to accept the complete negation of progress (though I do not go so far) if I had 
 made a reservation in respect of science and its technical application. The pas- 
 sage is so remarkable that I quote it. " One of the author's views," says M. Block in 
 concluding his discussion of the " Rassenkampf; " "will meet with many objections: 
 it is the negation of progress. Things change apparently but not in reality. The 
 vesture changes, so to speak, but not the body nor the spirit; and yet there is some 
 truth in the proposition and if the author had taken the oratorical precaution to 
 except science and its industrial applications I should have been persuaded 
 that he was right, for I have asked myself more than once whether it could be 
 proven that there were in Memphis, Babylon and Nineveh less good men in pro- 
 portion to the whole population than in Paris, London or Berlin." I readily assent 
 to the reservation in favor of science and art which M. Block requests, only how- 
 ever with the counter reservation set forth in the text above respecting the unin- 
 terrupted development of human civilization. Who will guarantee that its 
 thread, and even the thread of mental development, will not be completely sun- 
 dered from time to time so that for later generations trying to rise again nothing 
 will remain of all the former achievements? What profit did the entire European 
 Middle Ages draw from the astronomical knowledge of the Chaldeans and old 
 Egyptians, thorough as it doubtless was? Was not the thread completely sundered ? 
 ana if we compare the grotesque sculpture of Christian Europe in the Middle 
 Ages with the works of Greek art must we not confirm the fact that the stream of 
 development of human civilization from time to time disappears in the earth 
 without trace only to reappear after a long while in some far distant place, work- 
 ing; its way laboriously up through rifts and fissures? Or is the opinion justified 
 perhaps that such catastrophes, suddenly destroying results of civilization hun- 
 dreds of years old and causing them to disappear utterly were only possible in 
 " earlier times " but that we, armed with the printing press and the steam engine, 
 are entirely free from them and that our mental labor will not perish ? We would 
 gladly share this opinion if only the authorities will set us at rest upon one point, 
 the cosmic stability of our planet. For to judge from some very recent indica- 
 tions the forces seething under our feet in the interior of our planet seem to have 
 very little respect for our mental and our artistic productions and to care as little 
 for laws of the development of human civilization. Indeed human civilization is 
 threatened by two distinct anarchistic forces: social and cosmic. The former we 
 may indeed resist may gracious destiny long preserve us from the latter. Then 
 would we be assured of endless progress in science, art and technics.
 
 208 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 circumstance that I could not have expressed myself clearly 
 enough on this point and therefore feel bound to carry out 
 my views further or rather to express myself more clearly. 
 
 As I consider man to be a permanent type not only phys- 
 ically, with Kollman,* but mentally, I am of the opinion 
 that there is a fixed upper limit to his mental activity also, 
 to which individual natures fortunately endowed have 
 always been able to attain, but which no man can ever pass. 
 
 Man's physical strength in the nature of the case can 
 never exceed a certain maximum, which of course certain 
 individuals have at all times attained to. In morals there 
 have always been good and noble natures everywhere; and 
 low and bestial ones too in the greatest variety of grada- 
 tions; and it is recognized that a real improvement in men 
 is scarcely to be noticed here and that an apparent improve- 
 ment is brought about locally and temporarily only by con- 
 ditions, institutions and measures introduced from the out- 
 side. It is quite the same in intellectual matters. 
 
 Man's intellect is ever the same it moves in a sphere 
 having a fixed and inexpansible upper limit which has been 
 reached from time to time by individual geniuses. But 
 there is an apparent progress arising from the fact that from 
 place to place and time to time an intellect of equal power 
 finds footing upon the total accomplishments of his prede- 
 cessors and uses them as the starting point for further suc- 
 cesses; not that later generations work with higher or more 
 complete intellects but with larger means accumulated by 
 earlier generations, with better instruments, so to speak, 
 and so obtain greater results.f So it is of course impossible 
 to deny progress in the field of invention and discovery but 
 it would be a mistake to explain it from the greater perfec- 
 tion, or the progress of the human intellect. An inventive 
 Greek of ancient times, if he had followed Watt, would have 
 invented the locomotive and if he could have known the 
 arrangement of the electrical telegraph, it certainly might 
 have occurred to him to construct a telephone. 
 
 Between human intellect four thousand years ago and 
 
 * See above, Part II, sec. 4. 
 
 tQuetelet, vol. ii, p. 393. "Newton deprived of all the resources of science 
 
 ition ; ii only a part ot science, greater or less, had been put within nis reacn 
 he would have been a Pythagoras, an Archimedes or a Kepler; but with all the 
 resources which his century presented to him he was, and he had to be, a 
 Newton."
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 209 
 
 to-day there is 110 qualitative difference nor any greater 
 development or perfection only the completed labor of 
 all intervening generations inures to the advantage of the 
 modern intellect, which with this accumulated supply to-day 
 accomplishes apparently greater ' ' miracles ' ' than the like 
 intellect four thousand years ago did without it. But in 
 fact, laying aside the advantages of the former, the latter 
 accomplished no less wonderful things. 
 
 Fortified with this, one could object to my assertion that 
 progress is relative and appears only in separate periods of 
 development by saying that it only needs such a continuity 
 of mental labor to lead mankind into unsuspected and indefi- 
 nitely prolonged progress. 
 
 The conclusion would be impregnable if the premise, the 
 uninterrupted development of human civilization in general, 
 were equally certain; but it is to be doubted, for, first, we 
 find proof in well-known history of the continual recurrence 
 of catastrophes which send centres of civilization precipi- 
 tately to destruction. What happened in India, Babylon, 
 Egypt, Greece and Rome may sometime happen in modern 
 Europe. European civilization may perish, overflooded by 
 barbaric tribes. 
 
 But if any one believes that we are safe from such 
 catastrophes he is perhaps yielding to an all too optimistic 
 delusion. There are no barbaric tribes in our neighborhood 
 to be sure but let no one be deceived, their instincts lie 
 latent in the populace of European states. The deeds of 
 anarchists are only scattered flashes of lightning who will 
 guarantee that the storm will not some time break ? The 
 barbarians do not live so far from Europe as appears to be 
 generally assumed and the insurance of Europe against 
 these infernal powers would not be entirely free from risk. 
 
 Thus the proposition that the development of civilization 
 is perpetual and uninterrupted, as premise to the conclusion 
 that progress may be indefinitely prolonged, could have 
 only a potential value. 
 
 But it must also be considered a proof of the stability of 
 the human intellect that in spheres which have no connec- 
 tion with invention and the discovery of natural forces, in 
 moral and social philosophy, not only is there no indication 
 of progress but nothing new whatever has been said for 
 thousands of years. "There is nothing new under the 
 sun " and nothing new can be " invented. ' ' Our cognitions
 
 210 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 respecting virtue and custom, human happiness and social 
 relations are no more mature than those of the oldest peo- 
 ples of antiquity; on the contrary we often become aware 
 that we are behind them in many things. Though brotherly 
 love has been taught at different times to very different peo- 
 ples by individual law-givers and founders of religions, our 
 attitude toward relatives and kinsfolk is just as different 
 from our attitude toward strangers as ever. To make war 
 upon strangers and overpower them is a virtue; to betray 
 one's fellow citizens is a crime. Respecting the value of 
 life, the mutual relation of the sexes, the institution of 
 marriage and the like the individual centres of civilization 
 continue to revolve in the same vicious circle, from every 
 particular point of which the point opposite seems the 
 lower. Whatever strikes us as new and original is only a 
 new combination of very old thoughts and opinions a com- 
 bination springing of course from a new individual concep- 
 tion, for in nature only individuality is endlessly varied. 
 
 Individuality is always producing new combinations from 
 the ancient store of human thought, and if it were possible 
 for a man to know all the thoughts of past ages, if he could 
 even know all the philosophers and thinkers of olden times 
 and peoples, he could easily reproduce his own most original 
 systems and his most characteristic conceptions of the world 
 merely by citing from his predecessors. In fact Bastian does 
 something similar; we often find his phenomenal mind 
 working out entirely original ideas with simple citations 
 from other authors. The whole is the most original product 
 of his individuality; but his remarkably comprehensive 
 memory enabled him to gather up the ready cut stones for 
 his system from the works of thinkers of all ages and peo- 
 ples. 
 
 The individual conception is new, but the material is 
 exclusively old. Consciously or unconsciously it is con- 
 stantly repeated, never newly created. For here where no 
 invention or discovery in the field of natural forces is 
 involved the human intellect has from the first traversed the 
 whole sphere of perception possible in the nature of its 
 organization and can never rise beyond. 
 
 The conceptions of the human mind in this sphere are just 
 like kaleidoscopic views. Philosophers and thinkers have 
 been turning the kaleidoscope for ages, and it is impossible 
 but that particular portions have often been exactly repeated
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 211 
 
 though probably the whole picture never will be, since the 
 combinations are infinite. The difference in the picture we 
 ascribe to the difference in individuals, and perhaps cor- 
 rectly. 
 
 JUSTICE IN HISTORY. 
 
 Nothing so shakes the conception of a " just providence " 
 in simple devout souls as the perception of the " world's " 
 "injustice" obtruding itself at every step in human life. 
 In spite of toilsome theological explanations and justifica- 
 tions simple faith in God is disturbed and pious hearts are 
 stung by the doubt whether all the injustice with which 
 human life overflows can be the work of a good and just 
 God ? It is the necessary and inevitable consequence of an 
 anthropomorphism which conceives of God in the likeness 
 of man and hence ascribes to him human "justice." But 
 that which comes to pass in the world and in life, or properly, 
 in life and history is in no sense human justice, rather it is 
 historical justice which to man's mind must seem to be 
 harsh injustice; though here again the fault is due to that 
 false individual standard which man applies to the events of 
 life whereas they come to pass according to an entirely 
 different, so to say, a great social standard by which they 
 must be judged. If we measure them with individual 
 human measure we suffer. 
 
 What is commonly meant by justice ? A certain standard 
 in the distribution of material and moral goods in fact 
 there are two conceptions of justice. One starts from the 
 complete equality of all men and hence requires an equal 
 measure of rights and possessions for each individual. The 
 other takes into consideration the unequal value of individuals 
 and their powers and doings and is content with a propor- 
 tional distribution. Both take the individual as the object 
 and standard in exercising justice and in every transaction 
 having man for its object ask whether it is commensurate 
 with the value of the object. If so it is pronounced just; if 
 not, unjust. There is no opportunity for variety of judg- 
 ment save as difference of opinion prevails concerning the 
 value of the object or the proper conception of justice. 
 
 These conceptions of justice start from the consideration 
 of man's conduct toward man to construct their criteria of 
 judgment, which have a certain justification in themselves. 
 But men are not content to apply them to human conduct
 
 212 ANNAIvS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 alone, but transfer them to historical events also and even to 
 natural events in general. 
 
 In the case of historical events the transference is due to 
 the false hypothesis that they are brought about by men 
 through their free will; and in the case of natural events it 
 is due to an anthropomorphism which represents God as act- 
 ing after the manner of men and bringing them about. 
 
 No elaborate proof is necessary to show how incongruous 
 such an idea is. Historical events are not brought about 
 by men any more than natural events by God; and if they 
 have no author whose conduct can be regulated according 
 to the value of the objects affected nothing can be said about 
 justice or injustice in connection with them. 
 
 In a somewhat different sense, however, without regard 
 to the subject acting, the question could be raised whether 
 the course of history and of natural events strikes individuals 
 according to their merits, i. e. , whether the good are spared 
 or rewarded, the bad fallen upon and punished; hence 
 whether there be justice or not in history and nature. But 
 even in this form such a question is inadmissible because the 
 individual is never the object of history or nature; with 
 them nothing depends upon him, and we have no criteria 
 of his worth even if we should conceive him to be the sub- 
 ject of the historical and the natural process. 
 
 History and nature are visible and recognizable only 
 through their effects on masses indeed they may be said to 
 occupy themselves only with certain natural groups and 
 quantities consisting of a number of individuals that is with 
 folk, stems or families existing either together or in the rela- 
 tion of successive generations. But the only possible relation 
 which is perceivable between the effects and the existence of 
 the objects is that of causality, the connection between their 
 natural constitution and the fate that falls to their lot. 
 
 In other words, these natural human groups under the 
 action of history and nature play precisely the part of any 
 other natural objects exposed to the workings of natural 
 forces. Natural forces will produce effects upon them 
 according to their character rotten limestone will yield to 
 the process of weathering quicker than hard granite; rain 
 will change a treeless declivity into a bare rock, while a 
 wooded slope will gain fresh strength and luxuriance from it. 
 In this interplay of cause and effect, of occasion in the objects 
 and action by the natural forces can we speak of justice and
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 213 
 
 injustice ? No more can we in the destinies of a folk or an 
 individual. They are the results of causes lying partly in 
 the object, partly in the natural forces of history and nature. 
 Hence there is no justice in history unless we wish to apply 
 this category to the conformity of results to causes. Such 
 justice as this we always find everywhere realized with 
 inexorable rigor. 
 
 In life and in history every man suffers whatever fate is 
 conditioned by his natural constitution. Yet his natural 
 constitution depends not on him, but, as we have seen, upon 
 the social medium from which he emerges. This is to blame 
 if individual fates are so seldom proportional to individual 
 merits. For fate strikes the individual in proportion to the 
 merits of the species, so to speak. His own merits may be 
 different. Historical development cares nothing for that. 
 
 Hence the individual often suffers wrongs which he does 
 not deserve, but which are the natural results of causes lying 
 in the past of his social medium, as when the children atone 
 for the ' ' sins ' ' of their ancestors, of which there are so 
 frequent examples in history. It is quite natural; for the 
 development of the natural forces of history depends upon 
 the character and the conditions of its subjects. But the 
 subjects are, as we have seen, not the individuals, but the 
 social media in which the individuals are included as results. 
 
 The course and the events of history are commensurate 
 with the character and conditions of the social media; and 
 this we must recognize as historical justice. There is none 
 other in history or even in nature. 
 
 Hence the alpha and omega of sociology, its highest per- 
 ception and final word, is: human history a natural process; 
 and even though, shortsighted and captivated by traditional 
 views of human freedom and self-determination, one should 
 believe that this knowledge derogates from morals and 
 undermines them yet it is on the contrary the crown of all 
 human morals because it preaches most impressively man's 
 renunciatory subordination to the laws of nature which alone 
 rule history. By contributing to the knowledge of these 
 laws sociology lays the foundation for the morals of reason- 
 able resignation, higher than those resting on imaginary 
 freedom and self-determination and resulting in the inordi- 
 nate overestimation of the individual and those unreason- 
 able aspirations which find expression in horrible crimes 
 against the natural law of order.
 
 SUPPLEMENT. 
 ADDENDUM TO PART I. HISTORY OF SOCIOLOGY. 
 
 GUSTAVB LB BON. 
 
 The rise of sociology in our day from anthropology, eth- 
 nography, the study of prehistoric times, and the history of 
 civilization, is easily explainable. First anthropology 
 treated physical man simply, and the chief races of mankind. 
 Ethnography constantly added new material from the living 
 human world and raised the number of varieties almost to 
 infinity. Then prehistoric man was studied in order, from 
 his condition, to explain the phenomena of historic man. 
 Making the phenomena of prehistoric civilization the subject 
 of their investigation, scholars passed unexpectedly from 
 this introduction into the history of civilization as a whole, 
 treating also the later period of the same subject. But at 
 last it appeared that all four disciplines were merely descrip- 
 tive, furnishing material for a science of man which, if it 
 would be a science, must for the reasons above laid down 
 be occupied not with the individual, but with social groups 
 and societies. In this way it becomes sociology. But the 
 principal difference between these four disciplines and 
 sociology is that the latter is in no sense descriptive; but, 
 supported upon material from the former, undertakes scien- 
 tific investigation in order to establish scientific laws. 
 
 While various authors have severally set forth the disci- 
 plines named with more or less significant digressions into 
 neighboring spheres, Gustave Le Bon, in a noteworthy 
 book, " L* Homme etles Societh, leurs Origines et leur His- 
 toire,"* gives the chief features of them all, together with a 
 thoughtful presentation of sociology (in Part II) based upon 
 them, so that his work presents to view the entire course of 
 scientific development beginning with anthropology and 
 ending with sociology. 
 
 In the first part Le Bon simply gives short sketches of the 
 sciences preliminary to sociology. After an ' ' Introduction ' ' 
 upon the changes in our knowledge and opinions, in which 
 the author shows that he is at once monist and positivist in 
 
 Paris, 1881. 
 
 (214)
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 215 
 
 the best sense of the word, he subjects the " Universe," in 
 Book I, to a rigid realistic examination. In Book II ' ' The 
 Origin and Evolution of Living Creatures " is portrayed 
 according to the theory of Darwin and Haeckel. Book III, 
 entitled "The Physical Evolution of Man," gives a descrip- 
 tion of anthropology and prehistory. It treats of primitive 
 man, the formation of races and the several prehistoric 
 ages according to the usual divisions. Book IV, "The 
 Mental Evolution of Man," gives a sketch of psychology 
 on a physiological basis. Upon the broad foundation of 
 such disquisitions upon these broad sciences which have to 
 do with the universal and the individual, Le Bon constructs 
 his sociology which occupies the second part of his work. 
 
 Aside from Book I of Part II, which simply contains a 
 special introduction to sociology ("Sociology and its 
 Limits, Uses and Methods "), the substance of what he has 
 to say falls into two books: " Factors of Social Evolution," 
 Book III, and "The Development of Societies," Book IV. 
 However excellent all that Le Bon offers us in these two 
 books, however willing we are to subscribe to the most of the 
 sociological views and considerations which he advances, 
 still we must say that in spite of the broad foundation which 
 he has given to his .sociology, there is a very serious mistake 
 in the superstructure. He has missed the real subject- 
 matter of sociology and has not really found a single socio- 
 logical law although he set out with that purpose. A 
 detailed examination will confirm our judgment. 
 
 Le Bon first treats ' ' The Factors of Evolution. ' ' What he 
 understands them to be appears from the titles to the several 
 chapters on the influence of milieu, of intelligence and feel- 
 ings, of the acquisition of language, of commercial rela- 
 tions, of the progress of industry, of literature and art, of 
 the struggle for existence, of the development of military 
 institutions, of the knowledge of agriculture and the growth 
 of population, of stability and variation, of race, of the 
 past and heredity, of illusions and religious ideas, of politics 
 and administration, of education and instruction. With- 
 out doubt these are very important questions touching the 
 sphere of sociology. But these ' ' influences " are in no sense 
 " factors of social evolution." They are all simply " influ- 
 ences" acting on them. The factors of social evolution, as 
 has been shown above, are the social groups themselves, and 
 they are influenced by the physical and moral agencies
 
 216 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 surrounding them, which L,e Bon, as shown, enumerates 
 correctly. But it is a mistake to confuse these conditions, 
 these influences and agencies, with the real factors or sub- 
 jects. So Le Bon in the chapter on ' ' Factors of Evolution " 
 really says nothing that he had not already said in Part I 
 where, speaking of the development of the individual, he 
 showed the influence of all these same agents and circum- 
 stances upon it. Hence the repetitions which the author 
 cannot escape in spite of his great literary skill and his 
 evident pains to present the same thing in different lights 
 and to illustrate it by a great variety of examples, because 
 they follow necessarily from the false plan of his sociology, 
 false because too limited and scanty. Thus for example, he 
 treats, in Part I, page 190, of " The Physical Condition of 
 the First Human Beings." In Part II, Book II, on " The 
 Factors of Social Evolution," he is forced to return to the 
 same theme and treats of the "Existence of the First 
 Human Beings ' ' again in connection with the ' ' Influence 
 of Milieu upon Social Evolution. ' ' To be sure he strives 
 here in Part II to relate other details about primitive man; 
 but the subject is the same and what is said in Part II could 
 have been said pertinently at the appropriate place in Part I. 
 
 Again another illustration: In Part II L,e Bon treats the 
 " Past and Heredity" as a factor of social evolution. But 
 he treated the same thing in Part I in connection with the 
 "development of instinct" in the individual, where he 
 speaks of ' ' habits gradually modified and preserved by 
 heredity." In short Le Bon knows no " factors of social 
 evolution ' ' to present other than the same agents and forces 
 which influence the individual. 
 
 In the second half he does not fare much better. Here 
 too the contents do not correspond with what the title 
 promises. The latter reads, as has been mentioned: 
 " Development of Societies;" and what do the several 
 chapters offer us instead? First comes "development of 
 language." Is language a society? No doubt language 
 has great influence upon the development of society. But 
 can the development of language for that reason be regarded 
 as the development of society ? 
 
 The same is true of the chapters on the development of 
 religion (chapter iv), morals (chapter v), rights (chapter 
 vi) industry and agriculture (chapter vii). The last is an 
 economic phenomenon; the others are simply psycho-social.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 217 
 
 Their development is conditioned upon that of, societies; 
 their development presupposes social development and in 
 turn exerts a certain influence upon it. Yet the develop- 
 ment of religion, morals, rights, etc., is not the development 
 of societies. So L,e Bon has not offered us here what he 
 wished to offer and what sociology ought to offer. He 
 undoubtedly came nearer solving the real problem in the 
 two chapters on the development of the family and of prop- 
 erty (chapters ii and iii). For as we shall see both these 
 institutions are eminently social and immediately connected 
 with social development, rising directly from it, forming 
 indeed an essential part of it; only he should have presented 
 them in this connection as we shall demonstrate and insist 
 below. He has indeed done so in part but not entirely. 
 For though he does not present each phase in the develop- 
 ment of these institutions as the direct result of the contact 
 and reciprocal effect of unlike social groups, yet he makes a 
 beginning of seeking the cause of changes in these institu- 
 tions in such transformations as alterations in the relations 
 of the social ingredients to each other. For example he 
 inquires (pt. ii, p. 294) how maternal kinship passed into 
 paternal kinship? how the father became the head of the 
 family? and answers the question correctly on the whole. 
 " It seems to me," he says, " that it (this transformation) 
 must have come to pass at the time when man began the 
 pastoral and agricultural life and had need of slaves to aid 
 him at his work. Instead of killing his prisoners he kept 
 them to aid him and became the sole proprietor of those he 
 had conquered, of the women especially." Here L,e Bon's 
 acumen led him aright, even though he did not take for his 
 starting point the reciprocal action of unlike \heterogen\ social 
 groups as the only impelling factor in all social development as 
 we shall. Indeed had he done so too, he would not only have 
 struck that transformation in the form of the family correctly, 
 but he would also have had in hand the right key to solve 
 the not less difficult problem of the changes in property. 
 But as it is he stands helpless and at a loss before it, for this 
 time the lucky idea did not occur to him. He knows that 
 ' ' property has not always existed in the form in which we 
 know it to-day. The idea that soil, air or light could belong 
 to any one could not have been comprehended by our first 
 ancestors and mankind had to run the greater (?) part of 
 its cycle before this notion could arise. ' ' But in what way,
 
 2i8 ANNAI,S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 from what impelling causes the change in property, or better 
 the establishment of private property, took place L,e Bon 
 cannot explain. He is confronted with a conception that 
 arose in the human brain one fine day, an idea that sprang 
 up suddenly. " When agriculture had become known and 
 mankind already had an immense past behind it, a very 
 long time had still to elapse before the idea of personal 
 property appeared. The ground, like the women, belonged 
 at first to all the members of a community. Only very 
 slowly did it become the property, at first temporarily and 
 then permanently, of a family and then of an individual." 
 Thus we see that without any attempt whatever to explain 
 the causes of these changes in property, he here simply 
 takes refuge in that phrase with which we have become 
 acquainted * that it " arose gradually." Doubtless every- 
 thing arose gradually, but how? in what way? It is the 
 task of sociology to explain. 
 
 The fundamental failure in the construction of his soci- 
 ology of which we spoke is to blame for his failure to give 
 us the explanation. If he had comprehended that the first 
 and most important sociological task was to investigate the 
 mutual relations and reciprocal effects of unlike social 
 groups, he would himself necessarily have found out that 
 changes in the family and in property are nothing but the 
 result of these reciprocal relations and effects. He would 
 have reached another result also which in the beginning of 
 his undertaking he confessedly strives for but completely 
 fails of in consequence of the entirely wrong path into 
 which he struck. We mean the discovery of those " invari- 
 able laws knowing no exceptions," those " fixed and inex- 
 orable laws" (Part I, chapter viii), which, as he quite 
 correctly assumes, control historical events as well as the 
 evaporation of a drop of water or the movement of a grain 
 of sand. We find indeed the recital of events and develop- 
 ments conforming to law in the psycho-social sphere (lan- 
 guage, religion, rights, morals, political economy and so 
 forth), but of real social laws, of such laws as control the 
 relations and reciprocal connections of social elements, we 
 find no trace with him. 
 
 In view of this it is certainly characteristic of Le Bon 
 that he treats all the secondary social phenomena, like lan- 
 guage, religion, rights, etc., at great length; but has not 
 
 *Cf. p. 63 note.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 219 
 
 devoted a single chapter of his " social science " to the most 
 important and primary social phenomenon, the state. This 
 is indeed a gross and obvious omission, but it is also merely 
 a consequence of the entirely mistaken plan of his sociology. 
 Nevertheless it must be recognized that L,e Bon's sociology 
 is one of the most valuable achievements of scientific labor 
 in this field. He is distinguished for thorough knowledge 
 of all pertinent disciplines, comprehensive view and above 
 all for a sober unprejudiced mind. His work unquestionably 
 forms an important landmark in the development of soci- 
 ology; and we greatly regret that in the foregoing discus- 
 sions we have not been able to appeal to his coinciding views 
 frequently. He would have afforded us welcome support on 
 many a hazarded point. 
 
 ADDENDUM TO PART IV. MIGHT AND RIGHT. 
 
 There are several omissions in the " Outlines " before us. 
 For example I have not treated the psycho-social phenomena 
 of language and religion because I discussed them at length 
 in my " Rassenkampf" to which I must refer the reader, 
 especially as I should like to have the ' ' sociological investi- 
 gations " appearing under that title considered preliminary 
 in part, and in part also supplementary to these ' ' Outlines. ' ' 
 For a similar reason I have given no space in the statement 
 before us to the special question concerning the relation of 
 might and right, because in the first place I treated it at 
 great length in my ' ' Rechtsstaat und Socialisrmis ' ' and so 
 would have to repeat here, and moreover the criticisms made 
 on many sides failed to make me change my views. Further, 
 my position on the question is sufficiently characterized in 
 the present ' ' Outlines ' ' in the thorough treatment of the 
 origin and development of rights as also in the examination 
 of the essence of the state and the social struggle. 
 
 Nevertheless I should consider it a serious omission if I 
 failed at this point to consider the criticism made upon my 
 position in this question by a highly esteemed scholar and 
 juristic philosopher, Professor Merkel, of Strassburg, who 
 did me the honor to review my book in Schmoller's Jahr- 
 buch* 
 
 This review refers me to an article by my honored critic 
 on ' ' Right and Might ' ' in the preceding number of the 
 
 * 1881, Heft iv, p. 301.
 
 220 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 same magazine, and I am probably not mistaken in believ- 
 ing that that article was written after he knew the contents 
 of my book, l * Rechtsstaat und Sotialismus " and with refer- 
 ence to it; and that I am justified in considering it an integral 
 part of the review.* In fact Merkel has so divided his 
 critical material as to enumerate concisely in the short notice 
 in Heft IV his doubts about my position, but to put the solid 
 reasons for them in the previous article on ' ' Right and 
 Might. ' ' This appropriate division of the material greatly 
 facilitates my reply to the objections made. 
 
 First of all I notice with satisfaction that Merkel's posi- 
 tion is in fact not so far from mine as it might seem from his 
 " notice," for between my discussions and his " article " I 
 can discover no essential difference. I shall therefore confine 
 myself to showing that the objections which are made in the 
 ' ' notice ' ' are considerably weakened if not entirely removed 
 by the concessions made in the previous article. 
 
 The first objection is that I assert an " essential " differ- 
 ence between political and private rights whereby ' ' the dif- 
 ferences really existing between these subdivisions of rights 
 are in part expressed correctly, though generally with exag- 
 gerations;" but that I do not recognize "what they have in 
 common." 
 
 The objection is correct in so far as the entire plan and 
 economy of my work aimed at proving the essential differ- 
 ence, toto genere, between public and private rights; to which 
 end I was in that place only interested in emphasizing the 
 prevailing differences. I have not denied ' ' what they have 
 in common ' ' and it would be hard ' ' not to recognize ' ' it 
 after the whole juridical literature had based the identity of 
 the two ' ' rights ' ' on it. But it could not fall into the plan 
 of my work to enumerate it for the hundredth time, because 
 it would be superfluous. However, that the really essential 
 
 * " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus " appeared in the summer of 1880 and shortly 
 after a copy was sent to Schmoller's Jahrbuch for review. A year later, in the 
 summer of 1881, appeared a double number (2 and 3) of the fahrbuch with Merkel's 
 article on " Right and Might" at the head. At the same time my book was men- 
 tioned among the "books received" with the remark that the " next number 
 would contain a notice of it from the pen of Professor Merkel." Thus, plainly, he 
 had knowledge of the contents of my book at that time. Besides I think that I 
 find in the article unambiguous allusions to it: e. g., p. 16, where it reads; "Schol- 
 ars of former and of quite recent times have thought that they could prove that 
 the sovereign power in the state could not be surrounded with effectual barriers 
 and restraints," etc.; a_nd again, p. 18: " The arguments just recently urged with 
 especial emphasis against the possibility of such progress (in the sphere of inter- 
 national law)," and so forth. The attempts and the arguments mentioned are 
 in fact contained in " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus" which Professor Merkel should 
 have had in hand some time before this number appeared.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 221 
 
 -differences which I asserted exist, in spite of what there is 
 in common between these two subdivisions of rights, can be 
 proven from Merkel's article on "Right and Might "by 
 showing, in particular, that the statements and assertions 
 concerning rights therein contained are inexact and incorrect 
 just because the author does not make the distinction which 
 I demand; but rather formulates his propositions upon 
 "rights" in general. In consequence it happens that he 
 asserts something false about the one subdivision every time 
 that he states something true about the other. Thus, for 
 example, at the very beginning of the article cited, Merkel 
 says: "Rights in their origin, their stability and their 
 changes, as witnessed by history, appear to be dependent 
 upon might in many respects and questions of right not 
 infrequently find their solution in the guise of decisions by 
 might which combine the effects of the proof of the better 
 right with the proof of the greater strength. Events of that 
 sort are difficult to harmonize with the prevalent ideas of 
 right." What Merkel says here is only true of public 
 rights, for whenever anywhere "private rights " are settled 
 by the " decision of might, " we speak not of " rights " but 
 of caprice and wrong. Public rights alone may be settled 
 in this way without sacrificing their character. 
 
 In view of such an assertion as this, intended to hold of 
 both "subdivisions of rights," but really true of only one, 
 shall I withdraw my proposition that the difference between 
 private and public rights is fundamental ? I think not. So 
 much the less as I see my honored reviewer, in consequence 
 of falsely grouping two fundamentally different things under 
 one concept, ensnared in a net of doubts and contradictions 
 from which he tries very hard to escape without success; 
 though in my humble opinion they disappear upon holding 
 fast to the essential distinction between public and private 
 rights as I formulated it in " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus" 
 possibly with somewhat too much bias but correctly in the 
 main. Thus, let us hear Merkel's lament over the impossi- 
 bility of reconciling the concept of " rights " with the solu- 
 tion of questions of right by appeals to might. 
 
 " It is hard to bring such events into consonance with the 
 prevailing ideas of right. Right is here determined by 
 factors which seem foreign and even contradictory to our 
 ideas of its nature, since according to them questions of 
 right are not questions concerning the relative power of the
 
 222 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 contending parties but rather concerning the truth and merits 
 of their assertions and the value of their claims before a higher 
 forum." 
 
 What Merkel here says of ' ' rights ' ' applies only to pri- 
 vate rights. For only questions of private rights concern 
 ' ' the truth and merits of the assertions of the contending 
 parties and the value of their claims before a higher forum ' ' 
 and not rather " their relative power." 
 
 But questions of public right are different, even though 
 they are often put in this form. One example among many : 
 Shall the Duke of Cumberland succeed his uncle in the 
 government of Brunswick ? Is that a question ' ' of the truth 
 and merits of the assertions of the contending parties and 
 the value of their claims before a higher forum ?" 
 
 By no means, because it is not a question of private rights; 
 because it therefore does not depend upon the ' ' truth and 
 merits of the assertions;" because there is herein fact no 
 ' ' higher forum, ' ' for the German Empire is at once party 
 and judge. Thus it is in fact a question of public rights, a 
 question which will undoubtedly be determined by factors 
 which are foreign to the nature of "rights" (political 
 interests) ; a question undoubtedly ' ' of the relative power of 
 the contending parties, ' ' one of whom, the German Empire, 
 does not need to recognize a higher forum over it, because 
 within the sphere of its operations it is itself the highest 
 forum. Whoever insists upon grouping public and private 
 rights together under one general concept will never escape 
 from doubts and obscurities and is necessarily forced into the 
 delicate situation of setting himself, for the sake of ' ' rights," 
 in opposition to the most vital interests of his folk and state 
 in questions of public rights. Now I consider this false 
 doctrinarian ism, and perceive the occasion of the error in 
 the incomplete distinction between public rights and private 
 rights. Though they have much in common it is only in 
 form; in principle they are fundamentally different. But 
 Merkel' s whole argument rests on their identity and he pro- 
 cures the appearance of confirmation for his view only by 
 alluding to private rights, which of course do not stand 
 under the criterion of might, to prove the inadmissibility of 
 that criterion, and then appealing from the arbitrary vacilla- 
 tion of the decisions of might to the higher idea of right 
 which unfortunately avails nothing in questions of public 
 right.
 
 THE OUTUNRS OF SOCIOLOGY. 223 
 
 The consistent disregard of this essential difference runs 
 through the entire article and even leads to absolutely incor- 
 rect statements of fact. When, for example, it is said that 
 " statesmen have always shown an inclination, seldom unre- 
 servedly confessed however, to treat questions of right as 
 questions of might . . .," the statement is incorrect 
 when referred to private rights. It is correct only when 
 applied to public and international rights. 
 
 They would be strange ' ' statesmen ' ' who threw the 
 weight of their influence and power on the side of private 
 rights. I should not be able to name a single one, and 
 they would certainly not deserve the title. But even Merkel 
 is not thinking of such a meddling with private rights here 
 for he immediately adds as example that these statesmen 
 1 ' generally stand in the position of the Athenians of old 
 whom Thucydides makes to say in a dispute with the 
 Medians: ' As to the Gods we believe and as to men we 
 know that of necessity every one lords it over whomsoever 
 he has power. . . . ' " 
 
 Thus "rights" in the broader sense, including private 
 rights, are not brought in question here, only public rights. 
 Sovereignty {Herrscheri) alone is spoken of, not doing 
 justice or acting the judge. But if, as Merkel says later on, 
 ' ' theory in the greater number of its advocates affirms the 
 independence of rights and the essential difference between 
 right and might," in the first place theory has been largely 
 and chiefly occupied with private rights, a field in which the 
 state has left it full authority (juristic rights, responsa pru- 
 dentum, etc. ) , and if there are isolated cases in which it has 
 drawn public rights into the scope of its discussion it was 
 still only theory and we know what that signifies in relation 
 to public rights, for whose advocates, the statesmen, no 
 reproach can be more bitter than "doctrinarianism." 
 
 Thus after all there has never been any contradiction 
 within the several subdivisions of right; for the statesmen 
 never troubled themselves about private rights; and their 
 assertions, like those of the Athenians of Thucydides, 
 applied only to public rights. But the jurists have always 
 been up to the ears in the latter and still have the most 
 narrow views of the state; so that their opinions and 
 assertions are serviceable only for private rights; for public 
 rights they have never given anything but "theory," 
 " precious material for the waste-basket." In fact there is
 
 224 ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 no real contradiction because people did not have the same 
 thing in mind. 
 
 Just so I find that there is no real contradiction after all 
 between what I said in ' ' Rechtsstaat und Socialismus ' ' upon 
 public rights and what Merkel says in his article on the 
 same subject. Though, where he speaks of "rights" in 
 general without distinguishing public and private rights, our 
 assertions appear indeed to contradict but only in so far as 
 they do not apply to the same thing. 
 
 So if Merkel makes the essential distinction between 
 public and private rights a reproach against me, it would be 
 easy for me to show that his discussion would have gained 
 much in clearness and verity had he maintained the same 
 distinction throughout. He would not have been forced to 
 limit every proposition upon ' ' rights ' ' in general as soon 
 as it was expressed and to restrict it in respect first of public 
 and then of private rights. 
 
 For example when he says: 
 
 "Where this might [of objective right] is appealed to in the 
 struggle over subjective right, it is presupposed that its activity will 
 issue from a position lying outside the conflicting claims and interests 
 and appearing to hold a neutral relation to them. . . ." (p. 5), 
 
 the statement holds good of private, but not at all of public 
 rights. For of the latter he himself concedes that 
 
 "the conditions for establishing and extending the sovereignty of the 
 neutral factor [that ' neutral position '] are less favorable. ... in 
 public rights. . . ." (p. 16). "That factor [objective right as neu- 
 tral might] ," he says further on, "finds itself confronted with more 
 powerful forces in the struggle for sovereignty in the state and for 
 limiting or extending it while the sources of its own might flow more 
 sparingly and far greater hindrances are opposed to the development 
 of its organs than in the sphere just considered. The question here 
 is to surround the supporters of sovereign power, whom right itself 
 furnishes with superior weapons, with barriers and hinder the misuse 
 of its weapons. To many this appears a self-contradictory problem, 
 which must therefore simply be abandoned. Scholars formerly and in 
 quite recent times have thought they could show that the supreme 
 power in the state could not be surrounded with barriers because, as 
 they say, there can be but one supreme power within one and the 
 same sphere." 
 
 The last expression seems to imply that Merkel does not 
 share their view. 
 
 Is it really so ? We would not venture to affirm it; if 
 there is any difference between his view and theirs it is
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 225 
 
 certainly not fundamental. We will show from his article 
 presently that he is not so very far from those ' ' scholars ' ' 
 and that there is only a slight shade not so much of opinion 
 as of scientific tendency separating him from their position 
 and ours. 
 
 Merkel is wrong in charging the opposite view with over- 
 looking the fact 
 
 "that the force of the neutral factor itself, rooted iu common and 
 deep-seated convictions and usages, as for example in the form of 
 traditional constitutional law supported by a feeling of right and a. 
 lively sense of need in all classes, may conceivably be the highest 
 force within a community." 
 
 Without overlooking this and other considerations enumer- 
 ated by him, it is possible to maintain that all these substi- 
 tutes for the ' ' neutral factor ' ' will not suffice in a given case 
 of public rights to take the place of that higher might 
 which stands neutral above party. For even Merkel him- 
 self who overlooks none of these factors speaks of a ' 'remnant 
 which no progress [in the development of rights] can over- 
 power " and more than that I have not asserted; only I 
 located it unequivocally where it always has and always 
 must appear, that is, in the highest sphere of public and 
 national rights. But it is plain from more than one state- 
 ment in his article that even he, though reluctantly and 
 with evident regret, makes the unconditional sovereignty of 
 rights cease in that sphere where we, without circumlocu- 
 tion and with well-founded resignation, substituted might 
 for it. He freely concedes that 
 
 "in the field of international rights, down to the present, the original 
 connection between subjective rights and subjective might " has been 
 retained "in respect not only of the acquisition but also of the 
 enforcement of the former in its broadest scope." " In this field," it 
 is said again, "in consequence of the weakness and slight develop- 
 ment of the neutral factor the competition for more favorable condi- 
 tions of life still maintains in part its primitive form. Still the 
 existence of the former is manifested even here in many ways that 
 will be referred to later, among others, in the mutual recognition of 
 rights between civilized nations. But this is frequently associated 
 with plain decisions of might made in the most primitive way and 
 does not prevent the contest for rights from finding its solution, in 
 the most important 'cases even, in the form or upon the basis of 
 elementary decisions by might." 
 
 " Acquisition through power here takes the form of acquisition by 
 rights, in so far as this is affirmed, without the necessity for a direct 
 genealogical line between him who ' has taken possession" [playing on 
 Goethe's words: "Whence did grandpapa get them? He took
 
 226 ANNALS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 them!"] and him who establishes right to possession. . . . War 
 here proves to be a continual and abundant source of new rights, the 
 rule for whose creation is not to be sought in some higher principle 
 but in the result of the test of strength which war imposes upon the 
 struggling parties." 
 
 Thus there is no disagreement between our position and 
 Merkel's in reference to international rights. With reference 
 to national (state) rights, likewise, he concedes, as stated 
 above, that "the conditions for founding and developing 
 the sovereignty of the neutral factor are little favorable;" 
 and he does not allow himself to be led astray by the 
 favorite formula of public rights which speaks of ' ' sove- 
 reignty in virtue of one's own right." 
 He says explicitly: 
 
 " Whenever sovereignty over another or any right of decision in 
 public affairs is exercised ' in virtue of one's own right ' we have to do 
 in truth with the principle of might" 
 
 But thereby he too strikes ' ' rights ' ' from the supreme 
 position in the state. We expressed the same thought by 
 saying that between public and private rights there is an 
 essential difference. He objects to the form of expression 
 but plainly agrees to the fact. For however much he points 
 to progress in the idea of rights, with which the neutral 
 factor acquires an ever higher and more dominating position 
 in the state, which we do not deny, he has to concede at last 
 that " the problem of saving right from its dependence on 
 might through progressive development will continually 
 present itself anew as still unsolved in spite of all progress. ' '* 
 
 Will Merkel in spite of this concession reproach me fur- 
 ther because I grant the possibility of " limiting the state's 
 power through judicial decisions " only to a very limited 
 degree and certain extent ? Does he mean that what I say 
 "still remains a simple assertion ? ' ' But if such a limitation 
 of the state's power through "constitutions and judicial 
 decisions" were possible, as Merkel asserts in the review, 
 would not the problem of " saving right from its dependence 
 on might" be solved, which, he says in the article, "will 
 continually present itself as unsolvable in spite of all 
 progress ? ' ' 
 
 Merkel should not have referred me to his article; for in 
 it he takes away the ground from the objections which he 
 
 P. 30.
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 227 
 
 makes against me in the review. Moreover he concedes, 
 even in the review, that "it is true that the dependence of 
 right upon might appears more palpable, intensive and direct 
 in the sphere of public rights than in that of private rights;" 
 only he considers ' ' that no ground for denying the existence 
 and even the possibility of the existence of real rights in the 
 former sphere." 
 
 Well, that depends entirely upon the view a man has 
 formed of " rights." Whoever looks upon right as object- 
 ive, throned high above the strife of parties, proclaiming its 
 will in the form of statutory norms, must deny its existence 
 and even the possibility of its existence where, even as Mer- 
 kel concedes, ' ' the problem of saving right from its depend- 
 ence on might presents itself as unsolved." 
 
 As I hold the view mentioned I must of necessity draw 
 the conclusion that public rights are entirely different from 
 private rights. Whoever on the contrary holds fast to the 
 conception of ' ' rights ' ' even when ' ' dependent on might ' ' 
 may, of course, discard my distinction. 
 
 But I think it has been proven in what precedes that there 
 is at bottom no difference between the actual conception of 
 the matter itself in Merkel's mind and in mine, between his 
 conviction as to the real state of the case and mine, and that, 
 throughout, the difference between us is not one of cognition 
 but of tendency, in consequence of which Merkel lays more 
 stress upon the fact that rights must tend to complete 
 "release" (Erloesung} from might, while in my book, 
 " Rechtsstaat und Socialismus" stress was laid on the fact 
 that "release" was impossible and that we must make 
 terms with the dependence of national right on might. 
 
 But whence, I ask myself, considering the similarity in 
 the knowledge and conception of the matter itself, whence 
 comes the difference of standpoint and emphasis, right in 
 Merkel's case, might in mine ? I do not think I am wrong 
 in referring it simply to the difference in the political situa- 
 tions of Germany and Austria in the seventh decade of the 
 present century for finally every political writer unavoid- 
 ably reflects the political situation surrounding him however 
 objectively he wishes and proposes to proceed. 
 
 No German of the seventh and eighth decades of this 
 century has had need to be anxious about might under the 
 regime of the Iron Chancellor. On the other hand he has 
 no doubt had some apprehension about "rights." What
 
 228 ANNAI.S OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
 
 is more natural than that both teachers of public law and 
 philosophers in Germany have emphasized the pre-eminence 
 of right over might and postulated the independence of the 
 former from the latter. 
 
 Not so in Austria. We did not need to worry over 
 "rights." They throve like an obtrusive weed in every 
 path even where the direction ' ' reserved for might ' ' was to 
 have been expected. At the helm sat a party calling itself 
 the constitutionalist and fancying that the entire state could 
 be subjected to the regime of right. In particular it 
 expected to be able to attain this object by holding ready 
 the universal remedy, a special tribunal constituted ad hoc 
 for every possible political crime. It was content with this 
 for indeed the ' ' eye of the law ' ' in the form of a court 
 of justice watched over the state. Recently this party has 
 even proposed to submit certain actions of parliament, e. g. , 
 those relating to election cases, to the jurisdiction of a par- 
 ticular court of justice created ad hoc. 
 
 This effort, which is certainly well meant, proceeds from 
 the erroneous assumption, is controlled by the delusion we 
 would like to say, that an ordinary mortal at once becomes 
 an angel or at least an infallible pope upon sticking a judge's 
 commission in his pocket. It needs but little experience, 
 however, to learn that every judge above all else is and 
 remains a man, and in spite of all the conscious objectivity 
 which he industriously cultivates (and even that not always) 
 is quite as much the slave of blind impulses, prejudices and 
 efforts which have their source in his social, political, reli- 
 gious and national position as every other mortal and certainly 
 not less than every representative of the people. 
 
 It must not be ignored that at some point in the state right 
 must cease and might begin. The creation of a court for 
 constitutional cases would only transfer the point from the 
 representative body to the court. Would this be better ? 
 
 The constitutionalists, so-called, who ought really to be 
 called the ' ' national rights ' ' party {Rechtsstaatliche) , because 
 from the first they have labored under the delusion that the 
 whole state could be represented in a juristic formula, have 
 deeply atoned for their error. The power suddenly fell 
 from their hands for mere right's sake; and nothing else 
 could have happened, for the state belongs to might and not 
 to right although it creates and forms the latter, develops 
 and promotes it. This latter thought I have discussed in 
 ' ' Rechtsstaat und Socialismus. ' '
 
 THE OUTLINES OF SOCIOLOGY. 229 
 
 It is possible that this witches' Sabbath of ' ' national rights, ' ' 
 which raged in Austria in the same decade that Germany 
 got a taste of the ' ' might before right ' ' theory of the Iron 
 Chancellor, has a share in the Austrian's somewhat different 
 standpoint in the question of might and right. The Ger- 
 man reacts perhaps unconsciously against the all too power- 
 ful interposition of might. The Austrian, because right 
 has been so emphasized, may have become a little anxious for 
 national might. I can see no other difference between 
 Merkel's standpoint and mine.
 
 THE ACADEMY AND ITS WORK. 
 
 THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF POLITICAL AND SOCIAL SCIENCE was formed 
 in Philadelphia, December 4, 1889, for the purpose of promoting the political 
 and social sciences, and was incorporated February 14, 1891. 
 
 While it does not exclude any portion of the field indicated in its title, yet 
 its chief object is the development of those aspects of the political and social 
 sciences which are either entirely omitted from the programs of other societies, 
 or which do not at present receive the attention they deserve. Among such 
 objects may be mentioned : Sociology, Comparative Constitutional and Admin- 
 istrative Law, Philosophy of the State, Municipal Government, and such por- 
 tions of the field of Politics, including Finance and Banking, as are not 
 adequately cultivated by existing organizations. 
 
 In prosecuting the objects of its foundation, the Academy has held meetings 
 and engaged extensively in publication. 
 
 MEMBERSHIP. 
 
 "Any person may become a member of the Academy who having been 
 proposed by a member shall be approved by the Council." Constitution, 
 Article IV. 
 
 Persons interested in the study of political, social and economic questions, 
 or in the encouragement of scientific research along these lines, are eligible 
 to membership and will be nominated upon application to the Membership 
 Committee of the Council, American Academy, Station B, Philadelphia. 
 
 There is no Initiation Fee. Annual Dues, $5. Life Membership Fee, $100. 
 
 MEETINGS. 
 
 Public meetings have been held from time to time at which the members of 
 the Academy and others interested might listen to papers and addresses touching 
 upon the political and social questions of the day. The meetings have been 
 addressed by leading men in academic and practical life, a wide range of topics 
 has been discussed, and the papers have generally been subsequently published 
 by the Academy. 
 
 The first scientific session of the Academy was held on March 14, 1890 ; 
 three other sessions were held in 1890 ; seven in 1891 ; five in 1892 ; five in 1893 ; 
 six in 1894 ; four in 1895 ; six in 1896 ; eight in 1897, and eight in 1898, or fifty- 
 three in all. 
 
 PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 Since the foundation of the Academy, a series of publications has been 
 maintained, known as the ANNAI^S of the American Academy of Political and 
 Social Science and the Supplements thereto. These publications have brought 
 home to members accurate information and carefully considered discussions of 
 all the questions embraced within the field of the Academy's interests. The 
 ANNAI,S is sent to all members of the Academy. 
 
 ANNALS. 
 
 The ANNAiyS was first issued as a quarterly, but since the second volume 
 it has appeared as a bi-monthly. At the present time, the ANNAI^S comprises 
 two volumes of about 500 pages each per annum. The thirteen volumes thus 
 far issued comprise 52 numbers, constituting with the supplements 9,302 pages 
 of printed matter which have been distributed to the members of the Academy. 
 
 Besides the larger papers contributed by many eminent scholars both at 
 home and abroad, especial attention has been directed to the departments. All 
 important books are carefully reviewed or noticed by specialists. The depart- 
 ment of Personal Notes keeps the reader informed of movements in the academic 
 and scientific world. Notes upon Municipal Government and Sociology preserve 
 a careful record of events and other matters of interest in these subjects, 
 which at the present time claim so large a share of public attention. 
 
 To persons not members of the Academy, the price of Vols. I.-V., 
 including supplements, is $6.00 a volume, and of yols. VI. XIII, $3.00 each. 
 Separate numbers 1.00 each. Special rates to Libraries, Vols. I.-V., $5.00 
 each; Vols. VI. -XIII, $2. 50 each. 
 
 Members are entitled to discounts varying from 16% per cent to 20 per 
 cent on orders for back numbers or duplicate copies of publications. All cur- 
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 Essays in Economics and Sociology 
 
 BY 
 
 SIMON N. PATTEN, PH. D. 
 
 Professor of Political Economy in the University of Pennsylvania 
 
 COST AND UTILITY Price, 25 cents 
 
 COST AND EXPENSE Price, 25 cents 
 
 THE FORMULATION CTF NORMAL L^vs Price, 25 cents 
 
 THE FAILURE OF BIOLOGIC SOCIOLOGY Price, 25 cents 
 
 RELATION OF SOCIOLOGY TO PSYCHOLOGY Price, 25 cents 
 
 THE ECONOMIC BASIS OF PROHIBITION Price, 15 cents 
 
 OVER-NUTRITION AND ITS SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES Price, 25 Cents 
 
 THE ECONOMIC CAUSES OF MORAL PROGRESS Price, 25 cents 
 
 ECONOMICS IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS Price, 25 cents 
 
 THE THEORY OF SOCIAL FORCES . Price, Paper cover, $1.00 ; Cloth, SI. 50 
 
 A new and complete catalogue of over 24O publications on political, 
 social and economic topics will be sent free on application. 
 
 American Academy of Political and Social Science 
 Station B, Philadelphia
 
 Discussions of 
 
 Social Questions 
 
 Sociology and Philanthropy. 
 
 By DR. F. H. WINES Pp. 9. Price, 15 Cents. 
 
 Study of the Negro Problems. 
 
 By DR. W. E. BURGHARDT DuBois .... Pp. 29. Price, 25 Cents. 
 
 The Place of the Political and Social Sciences 
 in Modern Education. 
 
 By PROF. EDMUND J. JAMES ...... Pp. 30. Price, 25 Cents. 
 
 The Shiftless and Floating City Population. 
 
 By DR. EDWARD T. DEVINE Pp. 16. Price, 15 Cents. 
 
 The George Junior Republic. 
 
 By PROF. WIU.IAM I. Huu, Pp. 14. Price, 15 Cents. 
 
 Social Basis of Proportional Representation. 
 
 By DR. J. W. JENKS Pp. 16. Price, 15 Cents. 
 
 Relief Work at the Wells Memorial Institute. 
 
 By Miss HELENA S. DUDLEY Pp. 21. Price, 25 Cents. 
 
 The Economic Function of Woman. 
 
 By DR. EDWARD T. DEVINE Pp. 16. Price, 15 Cents. 
 
 Future Problem of Charity and the Unemployed. 
 
 By DR. JOHN GRAHAM BROOKS Pp. 27. Price, 25 Cents. 
 
 Complete List of Publications Sent on Application 
 
 American Academy of Political and Social Science 
 
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