the organic conception be true and of scientific importance, it fails to get to the bottom of things. It assumes that, even if society is an organism, there is necessarily some interaction of individual with individual, or some form of activity common to all individuals that serves to bind them together in helpful and pleasurable relations, and that this activity, instead of being merely physical, like the cohesion of material cells, is a mental phenomenon. It assumes that all social bonds may be resolved into some common activity or some interactivity of individual minds. It is, in short, a view of society as a mode of mental activity.

This is the psychological conception in general terms. It takes, however, four specific forms in attempting to answer the question: What definite mode of mental action is the most elementary form of the social relation?

According to the most pretentious of these answers, one that dates back to Epicurus, and lies at the basis of all the covenant or social-contract theories of political philosophy, the psychological origin of society is found in a perception of the utility of association. It assumes that men consciously and purposely create social relations to escape the ills of a state of nature' and to reap the rewards of co-operation. This rationalistic theory offers a true explanation of highly artificial forms of social organization in a civil, especially an industrial, state, but it throws no light upon the nature of elemental, spontaneous co-operation. For this we must turn to the other three conceptions-all of them, I venture to think, modernized forms of certain very ancient notions.

According to one of these, the most elementary social fact is seen in the constraining power, the impression, the contagious influence that an aggregation, a mass, of living beings exerts upon each individual mind. Society is thus viewed as a phenomenon closely allied to suggestion and hypnosis. This view of society is most fully set forth in the writings of Durkheim and Le Bon.

A third conception, identified with the life-work of our lamented colleague, Gabriel Tarde, assumes that impression,

contagion, influence, as forms of the interaction of mind with mind, may themselves be accounted for. It explains them as modes of example and imitation. All society is thus resolved

into products of imitation.

In strict psychological analysis these "impression" and "imitation" theories must be classed, I think, as scientifically developed forms of the "sympathy" theories of society, that may be traced back through the literature of political philosophy to very early days. They offer proximate explanations of the great social facts of resemblance, of mutuality, of solidarity; but do they, beyond a doubt, trace concerted activity back to its absolute origin? Above all, do they account not only for similarity, but also for variation, for the differentiation of communities into leaders and followers, for competition as well as for combination, for liberty as well as for solidarity?

The fourth conception, put forth some years ago by the present writer, should be classed as a developed form of the instinct theory, dating back to Aristotle's aphorism that man is a political animal. It assumes that the most elementary form of social relationship is discovered in the very beginning of mental phenomena. In its simplest form mental activity is a response of sensitive matter to a stimulus. Any given stimulus may happen to be felt by more than one organism, at the same or at different times. Two or more organisms may respond to the same given stimulus simultaneously or at different times. They may respond to the same given stimulus in like or in unlike ways; in the same or in different degrees; with like or with unlike promptitude; with equal or with unequal persistence. I have attempted to show that in like response to the same given stimulus we have the beginning, the absolute origin, of all concerted activity the inception of every conceivable form of co-operation; while in unlike response, and in unequal response, we have the beginning of all those processes of individuation, of differentiation, of competition, which, in their endlessly varied relations to combination, to co-operation, bring about the infinite complexity of organized social life.

It is unnecessary to argue that this conception of society not

only takes account of individuality as well as of mutuality, but that also it carries our interpretation of solidarity farther back than the theories of impression and of imitation, since both impression and imitation must be accounted for-in ultimate psychological analysis — as phenomena of reciprocal, or interstimulation and response. Indeed, the very language that Tarde uses throughout his exposition tacitly assumes as much. Example is stimulus, the imitative act is response to stimulus. The impression that the crowd makes upon an individual is stimulus, and the submission, obedience, or conformity of the individual is response to stimulus. Moreover, the formation of the crowd itself has to be accounted for, and it will be found that, in many cases, the formation of a crowd is nothing more nor less than the simultaneous like-response of many individuals to some inciting event, circumstance, or suggestion. In short, impression, imitation, and conformity are specific modes, but not by any means the primary or simplest modes, of stimulation and response; and some of the most important phenomena of concerted action can be explained only as springing directly from primary like-responses, before either imitation or impression has entered into the process.

This conception meets one further scientific test. It offers a simple and consistent view of the relation between social life and the material universe. It assumes that the original causes of society lie in the material environment, which may be regarded as an infinitely differentiated group of stimuli of like-response, and therefore of collective action; while the products of past social life, constituting the historical tradition, become in their turn secondary stimuli, or secondary causes, in the social process.

A mere momentary like-response by any number of individuals is the beginning of social phenomena, but it does not constitute a society. Before society can exist there must be continuous exposure to like influences, and repeated reaction upon them. When this happens, the individuals thus persistently acting in like ways become themselves mentally and practically alike. But likeness is not identity. The degrees of resemblance or of difference in the manner of response to common stimuli manifest

themselves as distinguishable types of mind and of character in the aggregate of individuals; while the differing degrees of promptitude and persistency in response have as their consequence a differentiation of the aggregate into leaders and followers, those that assume initiative and responsibility, and those that habitually look for guidance. These differences and resemblances have subjective consequences. Differing individuals become aware of their differences, resembling individuals become aware of their resemblances, and the consciousness of kind so engendered becomes thenceforth a potent factor in further social evolution.

Summarizing our analysis to this point, we may say that we conceive of society as any plural number of sentient creatures more or less continuously subjected to common stimuli, to differing stimuli, and to inter-stimulation, and responding thereto in like behavior, concerted activity, or co-operation, as well as in unlike, or competitive, activity; and becoming therefore, with developing intelligence, coherent through a dominating consciousness of kind, while always sufficiently conscious of difference to insure a measure of individual liberty.

Which of these various conceptions of the ultimate nature of the social relation shall in the long run prevail must depend upon a certain fitness to account for all the phenomena of social life in the simplest terms. That fitness can be determined only through the further evolution of social theory.

But whatever the finally accepted view may be, there are certain classifications of social facts that may be accepted as among the elementary notions of any sociological system.

And first there are types or kinds of societies. The broadest groupings correspond to the familiar demarkations made by Natural History. There are animal societies and human societies; and the human societies are further divided into the ethnic-or communities of kindred, and the civil-or communities composed of individuals that dwell and work together without regard to their blood-relationships.

More significant for the sociologist, however, is a classification

based on psychological characteristics. The fundamental division now is into instinctive and rational societies. The bands, swarms, flocks, and herds in which animals live and co-operate, are held together by instinct and not by rational comprehension of the utility of association. Their like-response to stimulus, their imitative acts, the frequent appearance among them of impression and submission, are all purely instinctive phenomena. Not so are the social relations of human beings. There is no human community in which instinctive like-response to stimulation is not complicated by some degree of rational comprehension of the utility of association.

The combinations, however, of instinct and reason are of many gradations; and the particular combination found in any given community determines its modes of like-response to stimulus and its consciousness of kind--establishes for it a dominant mode of the relation of mind to mind, or, as Tarde would have phrased it, of inter-mental activity. This dominant mode of inter-mental activity-inclusive of like-response and the consciousness of kind-is the chief social bond of the given community, and it affords the best distinguishing mark for a classification of any society on psychological grounds. So discriminated, the kinds of rational or human societies are eight, as follows:

1. There is a homogeneous community of blood-relatives, composed of individuals that from infancy have been exposed to a common environment and to like circumstances, and who, therefore, by heredity and experience are alike. Always conscious of themselves as kindred, their chief social bond is sympathy. The kind or type of society, therefore, that is represented by a group of kindred may be called the Sympathetic.

2. There is a community made up of like spirits, gathered perhaps from widely distant points, and perhaps originally strangers, but drawn together by their common response to a belief or dogma, or to an opportunity for pleasure or improveSuch is the religious colony, like the "Mayflower" band, or the Latter-Day Saints; such is the partisan political colony, like the Missouri and the New England settlements in Kansas;

ment.