Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/537

Rh abstract sociology appears to us as the positive philosophy of the inductions of all the social sciences.

It is these inductions, for example, and not simple biological analogies, which will lead us to recognize and to point out that the structure of all society is primarily determined by its economic organization; but in the concrete sociological synthesis this law will lose its absolute character by the very fact that every economic phenomenon is inseparable from the genetic, aesthetic, scientific, ethical, juridic, and political elements; the separation does not exist in abstract analysis. It is thus only that the fundamental character of the economic branch of the social structure is common to all civilizations; we can generalize and make an abstraction of all the local and temporary variations. In concrete reality no social phenomenon is free from mixture; the general abstract laws rise above this concrete character, but without losing sight of it. Let us here recall our definition of a law: A law is a constant and necessary relation between any phenomenon and the conditions under which this phenomenon appears. When the conditions remain the same, the phenomenon remains constant; this is the static aspect of law. When the conditions vary, the phenomenon varies; this is the dynamic aspect of law.

In last analysis, all relations can be reduced to relations of similarity or of difference, either in time or space, or else in time and space together. Laws must not be confused with causes; thus weight and gravitation are not causes. In the scientific sense, causes are the conditions which regularly accompany or precede the appearance of a phenomenon. We especially call the conditions which precede a phenomenon the causes of the same; for example, the ensemble of the conditions constituting springtime is called by us the cause of the blooming of the lilacs, Likewise, we consider low wages as a partial cause of illegitimate births; they regularly precede and accompany the latter. Therefore, the knowledge of causes—that is to say, knowledge of the conditions which precede, pave the way for, and favor the appearance of social phenomena—permits us to foresee the return of these phenomena. Hence, by modifying or