I INTRODUCTORY 5 



social philosophy in contrast with social science. 

 Sociology claims to rank as a science ; Mr. Macken- 

 zie, who is entitled to respect, both on his own ac- 

 count and as representing generally the position of 

 the great Hegelian or Idealist school, conceives that 

 there are philosophical positions presupposed in 

 social science which need separate discussion. In 

 consequence or partly in consequence of this, Mr. 

 Mackenzie's book does not aim at giving us a body 

 of social doctrines, but at vindicating on philosophi- 

 cal grounds what he regards as wholesome social 

 principles. The main significance of this, we think, 

 is as follows, that, in contrast with the school which 

 seeks to reduce social well-being to a problem in 

 science, in analogy as far as may be to physical 

 science and in close connection with it, there is an- 

 other school, not less attached to a doctrine of cor- 

 porate well or ill, which finds the highest authority 

 in regard to human conduct in metaphysics. 



Fourthly : We might speak of the relation of 

 sociology to ethics. But here the floods threaten to 

 break loose and drown us. Here we come face to 

 face with the question already mentioned the ques- 

 tion of the transition from science to art; from 

 noting how things happen to declaring how they 

 ought to happen. Without enlarging further upon 

 that topic at this stage in our discussion, we may 

 at least call attention to the fact that historically there 

 has been a very close kinship between sociology and 

 ethics. Their problem is almost, if not altogether, the 

 same; the answer formulated is sometimes labelled 

 "sociology," at other times "ethics," as on shipboard 

 the jam is sometimes described as raspberry, some- 



