Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 1.djvu/503

Rh d) Social control is Utopian and cannot be exercised in a large measure or in the interest of a remote aim.

2. In reply to these objections it may be said:

a) That the preliminary task is to outline the whole field. If it prove too large for one scholar, it will quickly be subdivided. The scheme provides for such subdivision.

b) Ideals are the only spur to progress: they are universally present; they are effective in direct proportion to their harmony with the possible; it may well be a scientific aim to eliminate the speculative element from the ideals which society is constantly constructing.

c) As to the extent to which social forces can be modified there is room for wide difference of opinion, but so long as even a slight margin of possible change is admitted, the obligation to take the wisest advantage of the opportunity remains.

d) Again, it may be reiterated that the tasks are more important than the name. Let the former be clearly grasped, and nomenclature will adjust itself to the facts.

3. Conclusion.

From the relation which the tasks sustain to each other, it is clear:

a) That chief emphasis must be laid at present upon the fundamental importance of Descriptive Sociology, i. e., the general facts and laws of association as induced from the data of the special social sciences, and properly related in a synthetic view of society, and of those divisions of Statical and Dynamic Sociology which deal with the present and the past.

b) It is, however, necessary to put such knowledge as is already available, at the service of society in the most effective way. Therefore, it is important to develop a method to accomplish this result. Ideostatics and the dynamics of active progress undertake this task. With the development of the fundamental pursuits these subsequent departments will increase in efficiency.