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SPENCER, HERBERT. 



" to show that this law of organic progress is the 

 law of all progress." 



Satisfied that he had now reached not only a law 

 of evolution, but also the law of evolution, Mr. 

 Spencer, when he began work on the " Synthetic 

 Philosophy," proceeded to elaborate his thesis in 

 " First Principles." Further thought convinced him 

 that he had fallen into error that the transfor- 

 mation of the homogeneous into the heterogeneous 

 does not sum up the whole of evolution, but only the 

 most conspicuous part of the secondary redistribu- 

 tion of matter and motion constituting it. When, 

 then, does increase in complexity mean evolution? 

 The answer to this question is, when increase of 

 complexity is accompanied by more and more com- 

 plete interdependence among the specialized parts 

 by increase in organic unification. Evolution, 

 therefore, in Mr. Spencer's world-famous formula, is 

 " an integration of matter and concomitant dissipa- 

 tion of motion ; during which the matter passes from 

 an indefinite incoherent homogeneity to a definite 

 coherent heterogeneity, and during which the re- 

 tained motion undergoes a parallel transformation." 



While the Spencerian system presents us with a 

 history of the knowable universe in empirical gen- 

 eralizations, it also affiliates these all-embracing 

 generalizations upon ultimate principles, derives 

 them from its final dictum, and thus furnishes a 

 rational history of the knowable universe as well. 

 Undertaking, therefore, the task of presenting the 

 phenomena of evolution in synthetic order. Mr. 

 Spencer arrives at the law of the instability of any 

 finite homogeneous aggregate owing to the unequal 

 exposure of its parts to incident forces. 



The simple nucleus of his philosophic system first 

 made its appearance in "Social Statics," where, in 

 the chapter entitled "General Considerations," 

 mention is made of the biological truth that low 

 types of animals are composed of many like parts 

 not mutually dependent, while higher animals are 

 composed of parts that are unlike and are mutually 

 dependent. The essays that followed " Social Stat- 

 ics " were marked by the establishment of various 

 separate inductions in which other groups of phe- 

 nomena were brought under this large principle, 

 while in the first edition of the " Psychology " not 

 only was this same principle shown to comprehend 

 mental phenomena, but there was also recognized the 

 primary law of evolution integration and increase 

 of definiteness. What followed may best be given in 

 Mr. Spencer's own words : " Then 'it was that there 

 suddenly arose in me the conception that the law 

 whicli I had separately recognized in various groups 

 of phenomena was a universal law applying to the 

 whole Cosmos : the many small inductions were 

 merged in the large inductions. And only after this 

 largest induction had been formed did there arise the 

 question Why ? Only then did I see that the uni- 

 versal cause for the universal transformations was the 

 multiplication of effects, and that they might be de- 

 duced from the law of the multiplication of effects. 

 The same thing happened at later stages. The gen- 

 eralization which immediately preceded the publica- 

 tion of the essay on ' Progress : Its Law and Cause ' 

 the instability of the homogeneous was also an 

 induction. So was the direction of motion and the 

 rhythm of motion. Then having arrived at these 

 derivative causes of the universal transformation, it 

 presently dawned upon me (in consequence of the 

 recent promulgation of the doctrine of conservation 

 of force) that all these derivative causes were se- 

 quences from that universal cause. The question 

 had, I believe, arisen, Why these several derivative 

 laws? and that came as the answer. Only then did 

 there arise the idea of developing the whole of the 

 universal transformation from the persistence of 

 force. The process began by being inductive, and 



ended by being deductive ; and this is the peculiar- 

 ity of the method followed. 



To the exposition and elaboration in their broad- 

 est aspects of the truths above epitomized. Mr. 

 Spencer devotes the initial volume of his series 

 " First Principles." Such a presentation of argu- 

 ments and results constitutes what he defines as 

 " General Philosophy." The nine following volumes 

 of the system are devoted to " Special Philosophy " 

 that "is, to the task of carrying these universal 

 truths into the particular phenomena which form 

 the subject-matter of biology, psychology, sociology, 

 and ethics, and of interpreting such particular phe- 

 nomena by them. 



The application of the fundamental principles 

 already established should first of all be made to 

 inorganic Nature. But this great division is passed 

 over entirely, " partly because, even without it, the 

 scheme is too extensive ; and partly because the in- 

 terpretation of organic Nature after the proposed 

 method is of more immediate importance." We 

 thus enter at once, in 'The Principles of Biology,' 

 the field of organic life ; the purpose of the two vol- 

 umes composing this work being, as stated in the 

 preface, " to set forth the general truths of biology 

 as illustrative of and as interpreted by the laws of 

 evolution." 



From the historical point of view no part of this 

 masterly work is of greater interest than the clos- 

 ing division of the first volume, in which Mr. Spen- 

 cer, after dismissing the special-creation theory of 

 things as untenable, displays at length the a priori 

 and a posteriori evidences of organic evolution. To 

 appreciate the full significance of his arguments, it 

 is necessary to remember that at the time when the 

 chapters containing them were written, the doc- 

 trine of development was currently regarded, even 

 by t lie large body of naturalists, as" a fantastic hy- 

 pothesis. While thus presenting the case for evo- 

 lution in its inductive and deductive aspects, Mr. 

 Spencer showed that the processes observable in the 

 world of organic life are but phases of the universal 

 cosmical processes formulated in " First Princi- 

 ples " ; and that thus the deepest laws of morpho- 

 logical and physiological development are, deduc- 

 tively viewed, necessary corollaries from the doc- 

 trines already established. Even the Darwinian 

 principle of natural selection (or, as Mr. Spencer 

 called it, the survival of the fittest in the struggle 

 for existence) is exhibited as falling into its place 

 as a single manifestation of a far wider law the 

 law of equilibration. 



Life is defined by Mr. Spencer as " the continu- 

 ous adjustment of internal relations to external 

 relations " ; and he shows that the degree of life 

 varies as the correspondence varies between organ- 

 ism and environment ; the highest point being 

 reached where the correspondence exhibits a maxi- 

 mum of complexity, rapidity, and length. 



In " The Principles of Psychology," the massive 

 superstructure is reared on the general foundations 

 already laid. Life at large is the genus: what we 

 distinguish as bodily life and mental life respec- 

 tively are species ; and though if, after the ordinary 

 fashion, we insist on contemplating only the ex- 

 treme forms of the two, it would appear that the 

 hardest line of demarcation is to be drawn between 

 them, such line necessarily vanishes the moment the 

 evolutionary point of view is assumed. 



As in the " Principles of Biology " the general 

 truths of life were interpreted through the funda- 

 mental laws of evolution so in the " Principles of 

 Psychology" the general facts and problems of 

 mind are elucidated in the same way. The " Prin- 

 ciples of Sociology" as actually completed exhibit 

 the only important departure of the author from 

 the prospectus issued thirty-six years ago ; for the 



