248 UNIVERSltY OF COLORADO STUDIES 



pertinent. Neither the science of sociology nor the science of ethical 

 conduct, it is evident, can be drawn from the individual as such. 

 Plato, it seems, saw this when he endeavored to derive the true sig- 

 nificance of justice and righteousness from the state, and not from 

 the individual. 



It seems plain, then, that the individual as such has no rights. 

 The rights he may possess are attained by him through social service. 

 It is through society that he acquires whatever rights he may claim. 

 There was more sociological truth than cynicism in the reply of the 

 French judge to a prisoner who excused his crime on the plea that 

 "a man must live." "Pardon me," came the rejoinder, "but I don't 

 see the necessity." The inalienable rights of the individual are nil 

 excepting in so far as society may grant them. The individual pure 

 and simple, der Mensch uherhaiipt^ is a fiction. All which tends to 

 survive is an organized whole of interacting parts. 



The basis of sociality and the material of the science of sociol- 

 ogy are therefore found in the interaction of parts which constitute 

 a more or less organized whole. The organized whole, or society, is 

 not something different from the interacting parts; the interacting 

 parts are the society. The social is not the product of the inter- 

 action; it is the interaction. Each part is a partner or socius or 

 Theilnehmer^ the service or sociality of one part being complemen- 

 tary to the service of the otlier parts. Thus the social is reciprocal 

 service. The social arises when the Nebeneinander becomes the 

 Miteinandei\ when the anatomical becomes the physiological. The 

 sociality consists in the correlated, co-ordinated activity of the inte- 

 grated parts. Sociality is conduct, service rendered, not a conscious- 

 ness of kind nor a feeling of sympathy, excepting in so far as they 

 may be useful for the conduct of the parts. 



Pitting the individual against society is an instance of crude 

 sociological thought. Its ambiguity is at once manifest when one 

 remembers that society does not exist as something separate from 

 the integrated functions of the parts. It may be said that in the 

 long run only those parts are allowed to exist which contribute to the 

 social or ororanic welfare. The case in which possibly an individual 



