Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/55

 NUMBER AS DETERMINING FORM OF GROUP 43

thing from the beginning separated from the persons of those who carry it on, and indeed in the case of a duality of such persons this is not otherwise true than in the case of one alone or many. The reciprocal relationship of the business associates has its purpose outside of itself ; whereas in the case of mar- riage it is within itself. In the former instance the relationship is the means for the gaining of certain objective results ; in the latter everything objective appears really only as a means for the subjective relationship. It is the more observable that in mar- riage, nevertheless, the objectivity and self-reliance of the group- structure, which are otherwise more foreign to groups of two, psychologically increase in contrast with immediate subjectivity.

One constellation, however, of extreme sociological impor- / tance is wanting in every grouping of two, while it is in principle open to every group of larger numbers, namely, the shifting of duties and responsibilities upon the impersonal structure, which so often, and not to its advantage, characterizes social life. This occurs in two directions. Every totality which is more than a mere juxtaposition of given individuals has an indefiniteness of its boundaries and of its power which easily tempts us to expect from it all sorts of achievements that really belong to the sepa- rate members. We turn them over to the society, as we very often, in pursuance of the same psychological tendency, post- pone them to our own future, whose nebulous possibilities give room for everything, or will accomplish, by spontaneously grow- ing strength, everything which the present moment is not willing to take upon itself. In the precise circumstances in question, the power of the individual is transparent, but for that very reason it is also clearly limited, while in contrast with it is always the somewhat mystical power of the totality, of which we there- fore easily expect, not only what the individual cannot perform, but also what he would not care to perform, and, moreover, with the feeling of the full legitimacy of this transfer. Quite as dan- gerous, however, as on the side of omission is membership in a totality also on the side of commission. Here the point is not merely the increase of impulsiveness and the exclusion of moral restraint, as they appear in the case of the individual in a crowd,