Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 9.djvu/293

 NOTES AND ABSTRACTS 279

the liberties of the individual, freedom of thought, right of private property, security of person, rights as citizen. Not only in their internal affairs, but also in their foreign relations, were these nations quite advanced.

In modern times as in all times the position of a strong and able-bodied man is determined by his labor. But to the aged, the women, and the children, those not able to work, the state should guarantee a living. It should also protect those who do labor by a minimum wage and maximum hours. But do we find in any religion a feeling of this responsibility except perhaps in the form of alms-giving ? Further, the state should take the lead in publishing statistics of public value, on questions of public health, on the housing of the working people, etc., etc. The state, too, should give to its youth the best opportunities of education an education by frank, rational, and sincere methods, without fraudulent reticence or attenuated deceptions. But what does this religion say on this point ? It makes but a sorry attempt in doubtful for- mulas and categorial declarations. It does not provide even for the health of the mind, so essential to the health of the body.

If we go back to the accepted records of Judaism, the essence of the prevailing Christianity, and ask what part it has had in the evolution of society, under such headings as: the rights of the individual; public freedom, or liberty of the state ; the condition of man, of woman, and of minors; public health, public instruction, progress of the arts and sciences ; the reform of justice, and the abolition of war, we shall find that Judaism has been found wanting.

The littte kingdom of Judah, situated between the great powers of Africa and of Asia, and furnished with few warriors, could not reasonably hope for political inde- pendence. To ally themselves with the peoples of Asia or with those of Egypt would mean to give up their God, Jehovah. But in spite of this reasonable and inevitable political dependence, we find Jeremiah and all the other prophets declaring, in sub- stance, that for such a political alliance Jehovah will be avenged upon them, and, moreover, declaring that all the misfortunes of Israel had been visited upon her because she had forsaken Jehovah. The religion was not only not a good thing for the political welfare of the Jews, but was a weakening and terrifying element. The religion of the Jews as set forth in the Bible was such as to render good internal affairs and foreign relations impossible. The role of Judaism has been, on the whole, more hurtful than helpful in the social development of the countries in which it has been perpetuated in Christianity. MAURICE VERNES, "Les religions et leur role sociale," in L'kumaniti nouvelle, July, 1903.

T. J. R.

Sociology and the Social Sciences. Sociology is said to be the science of social facts, but these facts are already the subject-matter of a multitude of special sciences such as history, law, statistics, economics, etc. If sociology has the same object as the special sciences, then it is confounded with them, and is only a term to designate them collectively. If sociology is a separate science, it must have an object peculiar to it and different from that of the other sciences.

In fact, neither of these suppositions is tenable. Sociology is only the system, the corpus, of the social sciences, and it necessitates a radical change in the method and organization of them.

To define sociology as only the system of the social sciences would seem at first to put it in opposition to its founders. However, it is certain that Comte recognized sociology only as an integral speculation, closely attached to general philosophy ; not a special science, but a universal science. Positive philosophy is itself sociology. The special sciences form one homogeneous system. The unity of the positive method does not prevent their specialization. Comte considered political economy outside of the positive philosophy simply because of its false method, its sterile discussions of elementary notions of value, utility, production, which recalled the debates of the scholastics of the Middle Ages upon the fundamental attributes of pure metaphysical entities.

In the last twenty years there has been a veritable efflorescence of sociological literature and many new systems. In nearly every case the effort is made to reduce the science to a single problem. For one writer it is the law of imitation, for another the law of adaptation, or the struggle for existence, especially among races,