Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/455

 SOCIAL CONTROL 441

It is one thing lo recognize the manifold interactions of men in social life and to act accordingly ; it is quite another thing to believe that apart from, and prior to, the bonds of interdepend- ence, trust, or affection that grow up in the social mechanism, there is a unity of essence that calls for justice and sympathy' between men. The mere perception of likeness fosters sympa- thy, but the conviction of underlying oneness does more. It destroys the ego-centric world which each unreflecting creature builds for itself under the spur of the self-preservative instinct. It opposes to spontaneous selfishness the growing authority of reason. 1 It makes egoism appear as denial of the ideal bond, therefore itself untrue. It fosters respect for others by putting them in the eyes of reason on the same foptijig^with ourselves. 1 It lessees our willingness to use them as means to our own ends.

The growing disgust with that self-abasement and fawning servility that tickles the vanity of a savage potentate, the grow- ing levelness of speech of superior to inferior, the swelling tide of sentiment that bespatters the criminal while uplifting the slave, the serf, and the woman ; the prompt indignation on behalf of the oppressed and put-upon, the increasing sanctity of human life, the reverential treatment everywhere accorded the dead these, if traced down to their tap root will be found to spring not from belief in God or immortality, but from some- thing still deeper, viz., the conviction of our fundamental iden-* tity in nature and destiny. This is the modern counterpart of the old blood bond and may perhaps be as much to our social union as that tic was to the primitive Semites.

We have but to perceive that the real belief-basis of our characteristic forms of ethical feeling is idealistic,' but not necessarily theological, to understand the persistence of con- scious and systematic goodness, despite the wreck of dogma and

1 See HYDE, Outlines of Sofia! Theology, p. 75.

The keen vision of the anti-social Nietschc recognizes this. "The idealist, pre- cisely like the priest, 11 sees "the 'understanding/ the 'senses,' 'honors/ 'good-living/ and 'science* under him, as injurious and seductive forces, over which 'spirit' soars in pure being-by-itself." The Case against Wagner, p. 244.