596 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ent stages in the evolution of one form : the truth being, rather, that 

 social types, like types of individual organisms, do not form a series, 

 but are classifiable only in divergent and redivergent groups. Nor 

 did he arrive at that conception of the Social Science by which alone 

 it becomes fully affiliated upon the simpler sciences the conception 

 of it as an account of the most complex forms of that continuous re- 

 distribution of matter and motion which is going on universally. 

 Only when it is seen that the transformations passed through, during 

 the growth, maturity, and decay of a society, conform to the same 

 principles as do the transformations passed through by aggregates of 

 all orders, inorganic and organic only when it is seen that the pro- 

 cess is in all cases similarly determined by forces, and is not scientifi- 

 cally interpreted until it is expressed in terms of those forces only 

 then is there reached the conception of Sociology as a science, in the 

 complete meaning of the word. 



Nevertheless, we must not overlook the greatness of the step made 

 by M. Comte. His mode of contemplating the facts was truly philo- 

 sophical. Containing, along with special views not to be admitted, 

 many thoughts that are true as well as large and suggestive, the in- 

 troductory chapters to his " Sociology " show a breadth and depth of 

 conception beyond any previously reached. Apart from the tenability 

 of his sociological doctrines, his way of conceiving social phenomena 

 was much superior to all previous ways ; and among other of its su- 

 periorities, was this recognition of the dependence of Sociology on 

 Biology. 



Here leaving the history of this idea, let us turn to the idea itself. 

 There are two independent and equally-important ways in which these 

 sciences are connected. In the first place, all social actions being 

 determined by the actions of individuals, and all actions of individuals 

 being vital actions that conform to the laws of life at large, a rational 

 interpretation of all social actions implies knowledge of the laws of 

 life. In the second place, a society as a whole, considered apart from 

 its living units, presents phenomena of growth, structure, and func- 

 tion, like those of growth, structure, and function in an individual 

 body ; and these last are needful keys to the first. We will begin 

 with this analogical connection. 



Figures of speech, which very often mislead by conveying the 

 notion of complete likeness where only distant analogy exists, occa- 

 sionally mislead by making an actual correspondence seem a fancy. 

 A metaphor, when used to express a real resemblance, raises a sus- 

 picion of mere imaginary resemblance, and so obscures the perception 

 of intrinsic kinship. It is thus with the phrases "body politic," "po- 

 litical organization," and others, which tacitly liken a society to a 

 living creature : they are assumed to be phrases having a certain con- 

 venience but expressing no fact tending rather to foster a fiction. 



