Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 1.djvu/124

 112 of the gap between analogy and identity. Perception of the insufficiency of biological analogies does not, however, as so many critics appear to imagine, involve the consequence that resort should be had to conceptions still less adequate. It rather imposes the task of building up more highly refined concepts of societary relationships. In doing this constructive work the mind cannot do without any of the general notions derived by science from acquaintance with all the relations discovered among the inferior orders of reality.

The fundamental difference between the men who value biological conceptions as tools in sociology, and the critics who affect to consider the use of biological analogies necessarily superficial, is that the latter do not believe it worth while to examine societary phenomena as closely as the biologists examine vital phenomena. Such being the case time may be trusted to settle the question of relative superficiality.

The departments of Minor Editorials, Reviews, and Sociological Miscellanies will be represented in the next number.