Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/36

 24 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

not scattered through a homogeneous circle, but they signify a definite and firm articulation of the circle^ through which six per- sons from its number are made eminent, and then they grow together to a guiding unity. The characterless impersonality of the naming by means of the number is just here highly charac- teristic ; for it denotes more decisively than any less formal idea could that herewith no individuals, as persons, are meant, but that it is a purely social structure ; the structure of the circle demands a definite quota of its units as a guiding body. In the purely numerical concept resides the pure objectivity of the for- mation, which is indifferent to everything personal in the sepa- rate memberj and only demands that he shall be merely one of The Six. There is, perhaps, no more effective expression with which to emphasize, along with the social eminence of individu- als, at the same time the complete irrelevance of everything which they stand for as persons outside of this function.

The unity of grouping which reveals itself in the composing of elements into a higher number is brought to light with spe- cial clearness by means of an apparent instance to the contrary. That senate of Barcelona which was called the One Hundred had at last in reality more, up to the number of two hundred, without on that account changing its name. The same phe- nomenon appears when the number operates, not as a distinguish- ing, but as a dividing, principle. Where the division of the population according to hundreds occurred, which we shall discuss later, there was never exact preservation of this precise number of members in the subdivision. This is expressly stated of the old German Hundreds. The number is in this case, therefore, immediately the synonym of the social member, which at first included, or was supposed to have included, precisely such a circle of individuals. This apparently insignificant fact shows the immense significance of numerical definiteness for the struc- ture of the group. The number becomes indeed independent of its arithmetical content ; it shows that the relation of the mem- bers to the whole is a numerical one ; or, the number having become stable, represents this relation. There remains at the same time the idea of the subdivision, to consist of one hundred