40 LEISURE-TIME STUDIES. 



cannot but admire his deft way of showing how the welfare 

 of a nation depends unconsciously on the use it makes of 

 scientific and other kinds of knowledge. No one can doubt 

 the innate truth and applicability of Mr. Spencer's argument, . 

 that the life of every organism, the human being included, is 

 strangely analogous to that of the compound organisation 

 we know as society at large ; and that the fuller knowledge 

 we possess of the former, the better shall we be able to 

 legislate for the welfare of the latter. In other words, the 

 better a biologist any social reformer is, the more likely will 

 his influence and work in society be of a beneficial kind. 



As Mr. Spencer ably remarks, "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 social actions implies 

 knowledge of the laws of life." In the second place, 

 " society as a whole, considered apart from its living units, 

 presents phenomena of growth, structure, and function like 

 those of growth, structure, and function in an individual 

 body; and these last are needful keys to the first." Or 

 again, " that everything thought and felt and done in the 

 course of social life, is thought and felt and done in 

 harmony with the laws of individual life, is also a truth 

 almost a truism, indeed ; though one of which few seem 

 conscious." " The Science of Life," he concludes, " yields 

 to the science of society certain great generalisations, 

 without which there can be no science of society at all." 



With these remarks I dismiss, and think I may fairly 

 claim to have illustrated and proved, my second proposition, 

 namely, that natural-science studies become correlated in 

 the most intimate manner with the health, and also with the 

 commercial well-being and social interests, of mankind. 



I have left myself but a few moments in which to 

 hurriedly dispose of my last proposition, namely, that my 

 subject has important bearings on matters connected with 

 those varied beliefs which, under the common term of 

 religion, belong to the natural estate of man, wherever that 



