A curious case under the first head is a monograph of 80 pages published in 1903 as a part of the Twentieth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology. When the monograph was written its author, J. W. Powell, was director of the bureau. The title reads: or The Science of Institu tions.' Major Powell says (p. lx) : "I classify the sciences of sociology as statistics, eco nomics, civics, histories and ethics, . .. my purpose being classification only, . . . pleas ure, welfare, justice, expression and opinion are concomitant; one cannot exist without the other, hence there can be no sociology without esthetology, technology, philology and so Under the second head, the schemes of Spencer and Selig& were essentially similar. They were structures purporting to comprehend all societary relationships as analogues of the structure and functions of physical organisms. On the whale, all of the men who approached the problem in the same way (Lilienfeld, Fouil lee, Isolet, Worms, etc.) merely proposed shad ings of detail in the conception. Although American sociologists as a rule have regarded the conception as more useful pedagogically than scientifically, and although use of bio logical analogies in either sense has rapidly lost favor, progress of sociology toward aca demic recognition, both in Europe and the United States, has been seriously embarrassed by the widely prevalent impression, among other misconceptions, that sociology is merely a name for amateurish dallying with remote and imperfect likenesses between physiological and social relations. While the sociological division in the drive toward objectivity in social science was in danger of exhausting itself in attempts to resolve human experience into symbolic or literal biology, a powerful corrective was in troduced into American thinking by the publica tion of Lester F. Ward's (Dynamic Sociology' (1883; 2d ed., 1897, identical with the first, except that a new introduction reviews the progress of sociology to date. Ward's "mental autobiography," 'Glimpses of the Cosmos,' Vol. III, pp. 146 sq., contains an illuminating account of the incubation of the book, from 1869, especially of its relations to Comte and Spencer). For nearly a decade the work seemed to have been still-born. Then scattered signs began to appear that it was making its way. Ward was by profession a botanist. He was an unhesitating evolutionist. Combined with the novelty of much in the book, these two facts gave it significance. Herbert Spencer's rendering of evolution, especially as he was understood to carry it out in his sys tem of sociology and in his hussez faire dogmas in politics and economics, went far toward es tablishing the belief that evolutionism and me chanical fatalism are identical. Ward was the first physical scientist to get a hearing for the contradictory doctrine that evolution ascended one step in the scale with the differentiation of mind: and that it foreshadows the ultimate control of physical forces by psychic forces. Although the further significance of the book was not recognized at once, it virtually called for the transformation of sociology into social psychology. While Ward's psychological method was impossible, he heartened Ameri can sociologists to assume at once an affirmative answer to the question which has not ceased to embarrass British sociology, as to whether evolution would permit any reckoning upon mental influences at all. In fact, with all their differences of detail, from the time that a few Americans began to call themselves sociologists they were practically of one accord in the belief that the distinctive and decisive trait in human society is that it is somehow or other a play of mental factors. At the same time Ward was a conspicuous illustration of a crudity, not vet entirely outgrown by sociologists, which was common to all the earlier social scientists of the generalizing types. Each of them more or less consciously cherished an ideal of a com plete system of social science, in most cases to be called by the name of the respective dreamer's division of social science. This version projected a structure of knowledge in which there would be a place for everything of importance in human affairs, and in which every thing of importance would have been fitted into its place; a scheme of mental architecture which should faithfully reflect the totality of human experience. Each of the philosophies of his tory, Comte's "positive philosophy," Spencer's "synthetic philosophy," and John Fiske's ((cos mic philosophy" illustrates the general pro clivity. Ward's system was primarily a cosmic philosophy, and his sociology was a more par ticular account of mundane processes within this entire planetary order. The best con spectus available of American, and to a certain extent of European sociological opinion while this type of thinking had not yet surrendered to influences which were already potent within it, is afforded by a series of papers read at the Saint Louis Congress of Arts and Sciences in 1904. Consult Proceedings, Vol. V, pp. 787 888; Giddings, 'Concepts and Methods of So ciology' ; Vincent, 'The Development of Soci ology' ; Ratzenhofer, 'The Problems of Sociol ogy' ; Tonnies, 'The Present Problems of Social Structure' ; Ward, 'Evolution of Social Structure' ; Thomas, 'The Province of Social Psychology' ; Ross, 'The Present Problems of Social Psychology.' Practical aspects of so cial theory at the same period are set forth in Vol. VII of the Proceedings.
We have implied that the Saint Louis Con gress marked a stage in the development of sociology. The chief variant which rapidly gained influence in sociological ways of think ing after that point, may he characterized in general as a tendency to diminish attention to structural aspects of social relations and to increase attention to functional phenomena. The
predominance of statical views in sociology had always retarded development of dynamic conceptions which were implicit in the more obvious interpretation. In the nature of things this shifting of emphasis was inevitable from the moment that mental factors in social func tioning began to receive attention. A social psychology was in process of differentiation long before it was recognized as a distinct di vision of labor. The men whose present treat ment of social psychology bears least resem blance to Ward's will scarcely fail to recognize him as the first important American adventurer into this type of inquiry. The first American book which bore upon its title page the phrase asocial psychology* was written by a psychol ogist (J. Mark Baldwin, 'Social and Ethical Interpretations,' 1897). Not a few books which at the time of publication were appraised, both by author and public, chiefly with refer ence to some other element in their contents, now appear to have done their best service in stimulating consciousness that there can be no solution of social problems without resolving the mysteries of transmission of mental influ ence. When Simon N. Patten published his 'Theory of Social Forces' in 1896, he classed himself as an economist. He was in fact dis covering himself and disclosing himself as a daring pioneer in social psychology. Giddings' 'Principles of Sociology' (1896) was accepted chiefly as a proposal in social architecture. The extraordinary attention which it has received all over the world is due fundamentally to the fact that it presented psychological aspects of the problem of society with unusually challeng ing force. (For digest of Giddings' doctrines, and references to his other works, consult Northcott, Sociological Theories of Franklin H. Giddings,' American Journal of Sociology, Vol. X XIV, p. 1, 1918). Thomas' brief monograph, 'The Scope and Method of Folk Psychology' (American Journal of Soci ology, Vol. 1, p. 434, 1896), may be regarded as a prospectus of a division of labor, previ ously organized in Europe, which has had a large share in reshaping the primal conceptions and the methods of sociology. Notable in this connection are Sumner, 'Folkways' (1907) ; Thomas, 'Race Psychology: Standpoint and Questionnaire, with Peculiar Reference to the Immigrant and the Negro) (American Journal of • Sociology, Vol. XVII, p. 725, 1912) ; and Thomas, 'Source Book for Social Origins' (1909).
Meanwhile a tool had been tacitly adopted into our sociological technique which more than any single instrument has tended to stabilize our procedure. It was the use of the concept denoted by the term °interest," or some equiva lent, as the leading clue to the activities of socii composing groups, or of groups con sidered as correlations of socii. The term "valuation" has certain advantages over the term "interest" as an expression of the idea. The essential thing is that the motivation of activities in human groups is traced to prefer ences in the minds of people, and that qualita tive and quantitative analysis of these "inter ests," °valuations," "preferences," with de termination of their proportions in the partic ular combination in question, has become the crucial operation in social interpretation. This method has been implicit at least as a partial re course in all attempts to explain human nature. It had become more or less systematic in the program of many sociologists before it was published in the form of an elaborated method. The author who most appropriately marks this stage in the development of sociology is Gus tav Ratzenhofer, at the time of the completion of his work an officer on the retired list of the Austrian army, with the rank of Feld-Marschall Lieutenant. Ratzenhofer's life from early years was that of a soldier. As he rose in rank his outlook became more and more politi cal. He was obliged to study the conditions, first and foremost within the empire, then in countries in political relations with the empire, which served as reasons for the existence of Austrian armies. As this experience matured, it crystallized into an ethic, a sociology, and a political philosophy with a strong set toward science. Ratzenhofer's chief contribu tion to sociology is to be found not in his later books, in which he formulated his more general theory of ethics and sociology, but in the work which is most nearly related to political science, 'Wiesen und Zweck der Politik. Als Theil der Sociologie und Grundlage der Staatswissen schaften,> (3 vols., 1893). The author's most important additions to the method exemplified in this work were in the single volume entitled, 'Die Sociologische Erkenntnis. Positive Philos ophie des socialen Lebens) (1898). Ratzen hofer's method, so far as contained in these two works, may be described as a psychological sur vey chiefly generalized from, or illustrated by groups visible in and around the Austrian Em pire. The outstanding peculiarity of the two works, considered as a single essay in sociolog ical methodology, is the relatively, large propor tion of concrete material cited in support of the more generalized conclusions. That Rat zenhofer has had so little influence on the Con tinent can be explained only by the traditional attitude of European scholars toward men not of their gild. The most complete account of his method available in English is a digest, with annotations, in Small, 'General Sociology,' pp. 183-396. The tables, "Typical Interests Within States," on page 252, and "Contempo rary Conflicting Interests in Austria," page 393, present at a glance the scheme of the inquiry.