CHAP, ix MR. SPENCER'S THREE DOCTRINES IOI 



ity, not complexity. It is the nature of reason to 

 invent short-cuts and to retrench needless labour. 

 The most advanced is not necessarily the most elabo- 

 rately organised ; it is not so, if Mr. Spencer is right, 

 in society. Moreover, the sources of authority are 

 different. One appeals to the cosmic process; one 

 to the experience and tendency of human history; 

 and one direct to consciousness. In Martineau's lan- 

 guage, Spencer's ethics, technically so-called, are 

 "psychological ethics" though "heteropsychological." 

 Surely we have reason to fear that the promised uni- 

 fication of knowledge is still sadly to seek. Vast 

 masses of knowledge have been collected. They 

 fairly bristle with suggestions highly interesting, 

 extremely divergent suggestions ; but neither within 

 the four corners of Mr. Spencer's own system, nor 

 when we bring his teaching into comparison with 

 that of other votaries of fact, do we find science still- 

 ing the metaphysical strife, or giving clear guidance 

 in human things. 



One part of Mr. Spencer's teaching, held by him 

 like some others in common with Comte, has not yet 

 been referred to ;^ his doctrine of the analogy between 

 society and an animal organism. 7 I have omitted this, 

 because I regard ifCas an ornamental excrescence on 

 Spencer's teaching, not as an essential or even a sig- 

 nificant part. Whatever function the appeal to biol- 

 ogy played in Comte, it seems to play very little part 

 in Spencer. "The social organism" is an outplayed 

 authority a god emeritus a depotentiated deity 

 on Mr. Spencer's pages. " The social organism " is 

 a metaphor with him and only a metaphor. The indi- 

 vidual cells are asserting themselves, and the unity of 



