RELATION OF BIOLOGY TO SOCIOLOGY. zc 7 



general understanding of the laws and processes of biological 

 growth as they are related to and distinguished from those exem- 

 plified in the evolution of inorganic structures. 



On the other hand, theorists of the socialistic school have 

 eagerly seized upon the assertion made by evolutionary writers 

 that " society is an organism," and, by exaggerating the analogies 

 between social and biological processes, have thence logically 

 deduced their own doctrine of the supremacy of the state over 

 the individual, claiming for it scientific and evolutionary sanc- 

 tion. Though Mr. Spencer has carefully guarded himself against 

 this misapprehension, and his own philosophy of society is dia- 

 metrically opposed to that of socialism, it is often claimed by 

 writers of this school, and even by those who are of quite another 

 way of thinking,* that it is only by a breach of logical sequence 

 that he escapes socialistic conclusions. 



Mr. Spencer, however, early noted the important fact that so- 

 ciety differs from the higher products of biological evolution in 

 that no social sensorium is discoverable; and in Justice he re- 

 affirms and emphasizes this distinction in discussing the nature 

 of the state. " The end to be achieved by society in its corporate 

 capacity that is, by the state," he declares, " is the welfare of its 

 units ; for the society having as an aggregate no sentiency, its 

 preservation is a desideratum only as subserving individual sen- 

 tiencies." He subsequently repeats this statement with renewed 

 emphasis, evidently regarding it as of great importance. 



In organic structures the unit or cell exists for the sake of the 

 completed organism ; its individual sentiency, if it possesses such 

 a psychic quality, is subordinate to the sentiency of the organic 

 whole. In society, however, the fact is the reverse : the social 

 organism exists for the sake of the individual, or social unit. 

 This relation of the individual to the social structure is one un- 

 questionably which should be borne in mind and given its due 

 weight in the application of biological analogies to the solution 

 of the problems of society. Mr. Spencer's recognition of it com- 

 pletely absolves him from the logic of socialistic conclusions. 



The ' resemblances between social and organic structures, how- 

 ever, are more notable and important than their differences, and 

 are recognized not only by philosophical students of society, on 

 the one hand, but also by eminent biologists on the other. Prof. 

 Haeckel, speaking of the structure of animal tissues, says : " All 

 the numerous tissues of the animal body, such as the entirely dis- 

 similar tissues of the nerves, muscles, bones, outer skin, mucous 

 skin, and other similar parts, are originally composed of cells ; 

 and the same is true of the various tissues of the vegetable body. 



* Cf. Mr. George Gunton, in The Principles of Social Economics, pp. 298-810. 



