Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 50.djvu/182

"The second form in which the characteristic error of sociological classifications appears is that of the overworked biological analogy. Mr. Spencer's essay on 'The Social Organism' made a lasting impression. At present the greater part of sociological literature is written in terms of a biological nomenclature. . . . Sociology will have to discard this classification and nomenclature. . . . In certain fundamental things social organization is like vital organization, but in all that justifies Mr. Spencer's own phrase of 'super-organic evolution' it is peculiar, and not to be classed with organisms. Were this not true, sociology would be a mere division of biology." (Pp. 62-63.)

Most readers will, I think, carry away from these sentences the impression that I am supposed to have dwelt too much on this analogy in my sociological interpretations. But any one who reads through The Principles of Sociology, or even reads the titles of its chapters, will see that this analogy plays but a relatively inconspicuous part. I must be excused if, to make clear the way in which I conceive and use the analogy, I go back to the origin of it. In a chapter of Social Statics entitled "General Considerations" (pp. 451-3 in the edition of 1850) occur the following passages:—

"Hence we are warranted in considering the body as a commonwealth of nomads, each of which has independent powers of life, growth, and reproduction; each of which unites with a number of others to perform some function needful for supporting itself and all the rest; and each of which absorbs its share of nutriment from the blood. And when thus regarded, the analogy between an individual being and a human society, in which each man, while helping to subserve some public, want absorbs a portion of the circulating stock of commodities brought to his door, is palpable enough.

"A still more remarkable fulfillment of this analogy is to be found in the fact, that the different kinds of organization which society takes on, in progressing from its lowest to its highest phase of development, are essentially similar to the different kinds of animal organization. Creatures of inferior type are little more than aggregations of numerous like parts—are molded on what Prof. Owen terms the principle of vegetative repetition; and in tracing the forms assumed by successive grades above these, we find a gradual diminution in the number of like parts, and a multiplication of unlike ones. In the one extreme there are but few functions, and many similar agents to each function: in the other, there are many functions, and few similar agents to each function. . . .

"Now just this same coalescence of like parts, and separation of unlike ones—just this same increasing subdivision of functions—takes place in the development of society. The earliest social organisms consist almost wholly of repetitions of one element. Every man is a warrior, hunter, fisherman, builder, agriculturist, toolmaker. Each portion of the community performs the same duties with every other portion; much as each portion of the polyp's body is alike stomach, skin, and lungs. Even the chiefs, in whom a tendency toward separateness of function first appears, still retain their similarity to the rest in economic respects. The next stage is distin-