SPIRITUAL ORGANISATION DEPENDS ON ORGANIC FITNESS 551 



of those classes whose multiplication is most valuable to society, 

 or of the effects of the economic system in disturbing the nor- 

 mality of the death-rate, the marriage-rate, and the birth-rate — 

 the sociologist, we may add, will come to the same conclu- 

 sion, strengthened by further evidence. 



We have stated, in the last chapter, that the stability of the 

 social structure is dependent on the stabihty of the spiritual 

 organisation of society ; this may seem in contradiction with our 

 conclusion that traditional progress — which implies the develop- 

 ment of a coherent spiritual organisation — cannot be efEected 

 except by a race possessing organic fitness. And yet this 

 latter affirmation is but a completion of the former. The 

 spiritual organisation, so necessary iu order to efiect and to 

 maintain the integration of society, is itself a fruit of organic 

 superiority. The inferior races are incapable of attaining to 

 that degree of social cohesion which is imphed by the formation 

 of a spiritual organisation. Social progress is ultimately de- 

 pendent on biological fitness ; and iu order to maintain a position 

 once attaiued, it is necessary to prevent the conditions of social 

 evolution acting in such a manner as to impair the biological 

 fitness of the race. The effort impUed by the continuous main- 

 tenance of bio-social efficiency can be accompHshed only by a 

 society possessing integration and stabiUty ; and those latter 

 qualities are engendered by the existence of an adequate spiritual 

 organisation. 



The truth of this proposition wiU be clearly seen when we 

 bear in mind that the spiritual organisation of a society simply 

 embodies those beliefs which are the expression of the power of 

 expansion of a race, its need for expansion. On the one hand 

 in order to realise a considerable degree of expansion, in order 

 to go forth conquering and to conquer, a nation must possess 

 an adequate spiritual organisation guaranteeing its integration 

 and stability ; but, on the other hand, a nation capable of great 

 expansion is necessarily a nation of biological superiority. Thus 



