January 6, 1899.] 



SCIENCE. 



21 



pathy becomes a function of the perception 

 of resemblance ; and sympathy becomes, to 

 a certain extent, reflective. Even in mob 

 action the reaction of the perception of 

 kind may be seen with the utmost clear- 

 ness. When, for example, a mass of men 

 simultaneously respond to a party^ cry or 

 symbol the action for the moment is merely 

 a like responsiveness to the same stimulus. 

 An instant later, when each man perceives 

 that his fellow-beings are, in this respect, 

 resembling himself in feeling and in action, 

 his own emotion is enormously intensified. 

 It is this which gives to all symbols and 

 shibboleths their tremendous social impor- 

 tance. The phenomenon has been very well 

 described in the concluding pages of Dr. 

 Boris Sidis's ' Psychology of Suggestion.' 



Let us pass, now, to the conception of the 

 psj'chical stuff or substance of society. 



Professor Baldwin's thesis, as we have 

 seen, is that " the matter of social organiza- 

 tion consists of thoughts, all kinds of knowl- 

 edges and informations." He thus places 

 himself in definite opposition to those writers 

 who have made sympathy, or any kind of 

 emotitm, the psychological stuff of society. 

 It is for this reason that he makes a sharp 

 distinction between animal ' companies ' and 

 human societies. Criticism of this thesis 

 may be made from two points of view : one, 

 the historical, supported by observations 

 from animal communities ; the other, the 

 psychological, supported by those analyses 

 of the relations of sympathy and perception 

 which I have sketched above. From the 

 standpoint of the observer of animal and 

 primitive human societies it is difficult, if 

 not impossible, to establish a line of demar- 

 cation between the more highly organized 

 bands of animals, like troops of monkeys, or 

 herds of elephants, or bands of wild horses, 

 and the simplest hordes of human beings, 

 like Bushmen or Australian Blackfellows. 

 No one can say when, in the development 

 of man from brute, sympathy ceased to be 



the chief stuff or substance of the social re- 

 lationship, and thoughts in the form of in- 

 ventions and knowledges began to assume 

 that important place. In like manner, when 

 modern human society is looked at from the 

 psychological view-point, it is often, indeed 

 usually, impossible to say whether sympathy 

 or thought predominates in the intercerebral 

 action of the associating individuals. Pro- 

 fessor Baldwin's thesis would compel him 

 to maintain that the same individuals are a 

 ' society ' one day and merely a ' company ' 

 another. At one time they are thoughtful 

 and self-controlled ; at another time they are 

 an audience swept by emotion, or a mob 

 given over to fury. Shall we, then, say that 

 the stuff of society is thought merely, or feel- 

 ing merely, or some combination of the two ? 

 Surely the last of these possibilities is the 

 one that is most consistent both with evolu- 

 tionary hypotheses and with psychological 

 conclusions. The substance of society at 

 first is sympathy and instinct mainly. At 

 its best estate society may rise to a level 

 where thought has for the moment com- 

 pletely subordinated feeling. But usually, 

 and throughout the greater part of its career, 

 society is sj'mpathy and instinct more or 

 less organized, more or less directed, more 

 or less controlled, by thought. When the 

 thought element appears society has become 

 reflective, and a better way to mark the dis- 

 tinction between the lowest and the highest 

 societies than that which restricts the word 

 ' society ' to the latter and calls the former 

 ' companies ' is one which indicates this ele- 

 ment of reflection. Animal and primitive 

 human communities are, for the most part, 

 sympathetic or non-reflective societies ; pro- 

 gressive human communities in general are 

 reflective societies. The reflective stage cor- 

 responds to the appearance of the perception 

 of kind and to reflective sympathy. 



But even if we were to accept the thesis 

 that the social stuff is exclusively intellec- 

 tual we could not possibly admit that it 



