838 SOCIAL STRUCTURE 



which all substances of commodities are changed, and which nour- 

 ishes again the social brain and social muscles; that is to say, men 

 and women who perform mental and physical work; in conse- 

 quence of which analogy banks, and their correspondence by let- 

 ters and bills and checks, would, more than railways, resemble 

 arteries and veins. Of course, it would be small trouble to adduce 

 a number of similar ambiguities, which make sociological inquiries 

 of this kind appear as a matter of rhetoric and poetry, but not of 

 science. 



Is there no other, no philosophical truth at least in the com- 

 parison of a corporation to a living body? If there is, it can, ac- 

 cording to the present view, be only in this respect, that a corpora- 

 tion may be thought and felt as an organic whole, upon which 

 the members think and feel themselves dependent in such a way 

 that they consider their own individual existence as subservient 

 to the life of the whole. The question whether a " society" is an 

 organism must be kept apart from the question whether there 

 are "societies" the relations of which to their members are so 

 qualified as to imply thoughts and feelings of that kind on the 

 part of their members. We are well aware that social systems, 

 which have been called by some eminent authors "ancient soci- 

 ety," truly exhibited this characteristic trait. Why is not modern 

 society and, above all, the modern state an organism in this 

 peculiar sense? 



I believe, indeed, that there is strong reason for controverting 

 the theory in its application to these collective beings as they act- 

 ually are. We live, as everybody knows, in an individualistic age, 

 and we seek each other's society chiefly for the benefit that accrues 

 from it; that is to s&y, in a comparatively small degree from mo- 

 tives of sentiment, and to a comparatively great extent from con- 

 scious reflection. It is this which makes us regard the state also 

 as an instrument fit for serving our particular interests, or those we 

 have in common with some or with all of our fellow citizens, rather 

 than as an organism, ideally preexistent to ourselves, living its 

 own life, and being entitled to sacrifices of our life and property in 

 its behalf. It is true that in extraordinary times we live up to this 

 view, but then we do not speak so much of society and of the state 

 as of the fatherland which puts forward its claim to what we call 

 our patriotism. A feeling of brotherhood and fellowship, of which 

 in ordinary times the traces are as sadly scarce among compatriots as 

 among those who are foreigners to each other, rises in moments of 

 public danger from the bottoms of our souls in effervescent bubbles. 

 The feeling, to be sure, is more of the nature of an emotion than 

 of a lasting sentiment. Our normal relations toward our present 



