Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/417

 not the case conflicts of authority will incessantly arise, and the consequence will be not strengthening but weakening of the relationship. Especially in the event that one who is generally subordinate by some peculiar turn of affairs reaches a superiority which remains within the province of his previous inferiority, it follows that partly through the character of rebellion which the condition will then usually bear, partly through the inadequate qualification of the always subordinate for superiority in the same sphere, the stability of the group will suffer. Accordingly at the time of the supremacy of Spain, the Spanish army, for example in the Netherlands, broke out in periodical rebellions. Although it was held together in the beginning by terrific discipline, yet every now and then an irrepressible democratic energy manifested itself. At certain almost calculable intervals the soldiers rose against the officers, removed them, put them under strict control, and chose other officers of their own, who, however, were subject to the supervision of the soldiers, and were allowed to do nothing which was not approved by all their subordinates. The harmfulness of such intermixture of superiority and inferiority in one and the same sphere needs no discussion.

A case of quite similar sociological form, with entirely different content, was presented by the serious embarrassments which arose at the beginning of this century in the American Episcopal Church. The ecclesiastical bodies were often seized with a feverish passion for exercising control over the clergy, while the latter were installed for the very purpose of exerting moral and ecclesiastical control over the membership. Substantially the same thing occurs in hierarchies of civil officials, where the one in authority is dependent in technicalities upon his subordinates. The superior official often lacks knowledge of the technical details or of the actual condition of affairs. The subordinate official passes his life as a rule within the same round of duties, and thereby acquires a detailed knowledge of his limited sphere which escapes him who rises rapidly through the different grades, while the decisions of the latter cannot be carried into