520 PROGRESS OF SCIENCE IN THE CENTURY. 



sociological theory. Independently of Darwin, in 

 1859 Mr. J. S. Stu art-Glenn ie laid emphasis on the 

 sociological importance of the conflict of races, a 

 process in which the conquerors were often the con- 

 quered, becoming merged in and modified by those 

 whom they had physically subdued. 



The same general idea has been more recently 

 worked out in detail by Gumplowicz in his Rassen- 

 Jeampf (1883) and Orundriss der Sociologie 

 (1885), who, while rejecting biological analogy, has 

 an essentially Darwinian outlook. He emphasises 

 the ceaseless struggle, alike in peace and in war, and 

 the resulting re-adjustments of social groups, the 

 strong becoming barons, captains of industry, or a 

 cultured caste; the weak becoming serfs, wage- 

 earners, or " the uneducated." But the antagonism 

 ends in some mutual re-adjustments; the weaker are 

 rarely eliminated, at least not rapidly; they are 

 subjected by the stronger to new ends ; and the struc- 

 ture of society becomes more complex. " The great 

 merit of Gumplowicz's work is that he constructs his 

 sociology out of strictly sociological materials." 



The use of the selection-formula in accounting for 

 social evolution has been denounced by many as il- 

 legitimate, but, so far as we can judge, the objections 

 mainly refer to the mistake that some biological so- 

 ciologists have made in supposing that the form of 

 the selective process in mankind might bo inferred 

 a priori from the form of the selective process in 

 plants and animals. As Prof. D. G. Ritchie says: 

 " Biological conceptions are certainly less inadequate 

 than mathematical, physical, or chemical conceptions 

 in the treatment of the problems of human society; 

 but an uncritical use of them in a more complex ma- 



