Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 10.djvu/221

 THE NATURE OF THE SOCIAL UNITY 209

take his profusion of biological illustration for a basis. Other writers of less note were more deeply influenced by the analogy. Fundamentally, the fallacy of the writers of this school, in so far as they did not escape from the form of their statement, is the same fallacy as that made by those who were influenced by the mechanical analogy. Instead of actually analyzing the social process and discovering the real unity, they merely generalized their conception of the biological unity. This was favored by two considerations. First, the recent scientific progress in biology and the practical problems connected therewith had brought it to the center of the stage. Everybody was interested in biology; its conceptions and its terminology were influencing the whole form of the world's thinking. Secondly, the biological unity bears a deeper resemblance to the social unity than does the mechanical, and thus it was more adequate as an analogy. Just as it is to be criticised on the same logical ground as the mechani- cal statement, so it has the same practical justification. Stated more generally, the fundamental fallacy of each lies in the fact that it takes a concept which is valid in a certain sphere and applies it in a sphere in which it is not valid, just because there are certain resemblances between the two spheres. The two spheres are not altogether similar. It is just because these points of difference were not analyzed and considered equally with the points of resemblance that the unity was not adequately conceived. Following the biological analogy came the psychological analogy. This can, in a general way, be accounted for in much the same manner. Psychology had made progress. Its concep- tions and terminology were exerting a greater influence upon thinking generally. In a certain respect the psychological anal- ogy was more nearly adequate as a statement of the social unity than was the biological analogy. In its extenuation much may be said similar to what has already been said in regard to the other two forms of analogy. It has helped to call attention to certain aspects of reality. It may also be granted that the psy- chological statement is felt to be, in some sense, figurative, although some of the writers of this school positively assert that they are to be taken literally and not figuratively. To be per-