BEL ATI ox OF SOCIOLOGY TO BIOLOGY. 325 



Reichert. Formerly in Hesse the pay of parsons was attached to the 

 cure. The result was, that good parishes always fell only to worn-out 

 parsons, deserving, indeed, of promotion, but who could no longer ren- 

 der much service. Berlin is steadily approaching the same state of 

 affairs. It is a pity that German universities cannot be dissolved every 

 thirty years and manned anew ! Perhaps some life would then flow 

 into those places of refuge, where the scientific big-wigs rest from the 

 toils of their youthful years ! 



SCIENTIFIC EELATION OF SOCIOLOGY TO 



BIOLOGY.' 



By Peofessoe JOSEPH LE CONTE. 



THE HiEKAPtCHT OF SciEXCE. — There is a well-recognized scale in 

 the hierachy of sciences. In the ascending order thestej^s are 

 — mathematics, mechanics, physics, chemistry, biology, and geology. 

 Mathematics deals only with space and time, number and quantity ; 

 and is therefore independent of matter and force. All other sciences 

 deal also with matter and force, and are therefore properly called 

 natural sciences, but they individuall}^ deal with different forms of mat- 

 ter and different grades of force. For example, the physical sciences 

 deal only with those universal phenomena produced by physical forces ; 

 chemistry, in addition to these, deals also with a higher but more lim- 

 ited and special group of phenom^ena, determined by a peculiar force 

 — chemical affinity; biology, in addition to all the preceding, deals also 

 with a still higher and far more limited and special group of phenomena 

 produced by a still more characteristic force — life. 



The order of forces and phenomena-groups given above is, as we 

 see, the order of increasing complexity and of increasing specialty, and 

 therefore is also the order of their appearance in the evolution of the 

 cosmos. There can be no doubt that physical forces and their associ- 



' The views here presented were first embodied in the form of a lecture in 1859, and 

 published in the Southern Presbyterian, Review in April, 1860. They are now rewritten 

 and condensed, the order of presentation entirely changed, and some new thoughts added. 

 I mention this only to show that they are larjrely the result of independent thought — 

 for they antedate the recent literature on the subject of sociology, as also Darwin's 

 work on " Origin of Species." This re-presentation has been afiPected by Darwin's work 

 only in one point, viz., the introduction of the principle of survival of the fittest. To 

 two authors only I acknowledge large indebtedness. To Comte I am indebted for the 

 general idea of a scientific connection between sociology and biology. To Agassiz I am 

 indebted for a clear conception of the characteristic doctrines and methods of biology. In 

 fact, all i\\(i formal laws of evolution, as now recognized, were announced by him, although 

 he did not accept the origin of species by derivation. For the application of these laws 

 to sociology, and for the mode of presentation, I am alone responsible. 



