GENERAL 



of all philosophic and scientific thought before 

 Spencer's time; for it is the essence of the evolu- 

 tionary philosophy that it discusses the dynamics 

 of all entities whatsoever, and their statics in the 

 light of their dynamics, whereas pre-evolutionary 

 thought has been superseded exactly because it 

 dealt with statics alone and therefore imperfectly 

 even with that. 



As in the last section, it is not my purpose to 

 discuss, either in general outline or in full detail, 

 the Spencerian sociology. I am concerned rather 

 to ask what current problems of the twentieth- 

 century evolution the master-key can solve, or 

 help to solve, in our service. Once we have ad- 

 mitted the possibility of sociology, it is evident 

 that politics is no more than a particular branch 

 of applied sociology; and infinite profit is to be 

 obtained by the study of political questions in 

 the light of evolution. For such a study I am 

 certainly quite incompetent, and I therefore do 

 not propose to undertake it. 



Rather would I briefly refer, in this chapter, to 

 the now familiar phrase "the social organism"; 

 and thereafter I must attempt to outline, as a 

 typical case, the Spencerian theory of the origin 

 of my own profession. I have chosen this because 

 it bears on the origin of religion, which, with edu- 

 cation and marriage three subjects of high import 

 I propose to consider in the subsequent chapters 

 of this section. 



225 



