Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/266

 252 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

acquire ingenuity and inventiveness in dealing with the hetero- geneous mass of human beings out of which it is constituted, all of whom, however, are actuated in every movement by fixed laws that it must first discover. This social intellect must imi- tate in all respects the individual intellect. It must even be egoistic, since its own interests are also those of its individual components, and therefore there is no possibility of injury except through failure to secure those interests.

Rut these propositions are too general. Let us descend to something more specific. The general result of a careful study of the alleged "social organism" results in the conclusion that the only true basis of comparison between society and an animal organism is psychical. In this comparison it is admitted even by Spencer that the true social homologue of the animal brain is to be found in human government. The social intellect, if there is to be one, must be located in the governing body of society. That such a thing is possible is obvious to any one who is capable of divesting himself of popular prejudices.

Of course, as already remarked, this is largely theoretical in the present state of society, but nothing is clearer than that the legislative body of any given state may exercise intelligence. It is supposed to do this now, and only misarchists will deny that it generally does so, albeit an intelligence of a rather low order, as ought to be expected from a body that does not pre- tend to do more than represent the intelligence of its constitu- ents, including the lowest as well as the highest, i. e., a body representing approximately the average social intelligence. In a more highly developed community the degree of intelligence applied to legislation will necessarily be correspondingly greater, and, in theory at least, it may ultimately reach the level attained in the present state of society by those individuals most highly developed intellectually. As soon as the social brain shall have attained this stage of development it will begin to employ the indirect method so characteristic of the individual. It will not only display shrewdness and diplomacy, but it will also display ingenuity. A science of government will be established, based