Mar., 1891. 
THE SCOPE OF SOCIOLOGY. 
61 
which he was fitted. But we see that the check was only 
temporary. Arrest of progress may come to a nation, but 
humanity is ever moving onward. Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, 
Greece, and Borne, pass away, as did the less civilised nations 
who preceded them ; but all that they achieved is part of the 
lasting progress of the world, and that, from the dim past, in 
which our “ social ” foundations were laid, has been—slow 
and gradual, but unceasing—a growth towards a perfection 
whose beginning we do not know and whose end we cannot 
guess. 
Biology has taught us that Evolution has already done 
much in working out the beast in man’s lower physical 
nature; Sociology tells us that the same Evolution is still 
actively energetic in working out his higher perfection too, and 
in bringing about that perfect social state for which only a 
perfect human being is fitted A comparison of results 
suggests the belief that man is even yet only at the dawn of 
his full day ; and fills us with the faith that, as Tennyson 
puts it:— 
“ This fine old world of ours is but 
A child yet in the go-cart.” 
Having given us the data and the scope of Sociology. 
Spencer finishes the introduction to his work by what is really 
a note of warning against the danger of isolating any one 
set of phenomena, by reminding us that “the highest 
achievement in Sociology is so to grasp the vast hetero¬ 
geneous aggregate, as to see how the character of each 
group at each stage is determined, partly by its own ante¬ 
cedents, and partly by the past and present actions of the 
rest upon it.’' 
The motto of old science was: “Isolate the phenomena 
to be studied ; ” the motto of modern science mav well be 
the direct opposite of this. In proportion as everything is 
known, any one thing is known better ; all knowledge is 
relative, and only omniscience could rightly and completely 
know anything. Until we have taken in all the relations, 
immediate and remote, into which a thing, actually or 
potentially, enters, we do not know all about the thing—but 
for such an exhaustive acquaintance, an acquaintance with 
every other thing, actual and potential, near and remote, is 
needed. In the true spirit of our evolutionary science, 
Tennyson sings :— 
“ Flower in the crannied wall, 
I pluck you out of the crannies ; 
I hold you here, root and all, in my hand, 
Little flower—hut if I could understand 
What you are, root and all, and all in all, 
I should know what God and man is.” 
