Since science first seriously directed her attention to the study of social phenomena, the interest of workers has been arrested by the striking resemblances between the life of society and that of organic growths in general. We have, accordingly, had many elaborate parallels drawn by various scientific writers between the two, and “the social organism” has become a familiar expression in a certain class of literature. It must be confessed, however, that these comparisons have been, so far, neither as fruitful nor as suggestive as might naturally have been expected. The generalisations and abstractions to which they have led, even in the hands of so original a thinker as Mr. Herbert Spencer, are often, it must be acknowledged, forced and unsatisfactory; and it may be fairly said that a field of inquiry which looked at the outset in the highest degree promising has, on the whole, proved disappointing.

Yet that there is some analogy between the social life and organic life in general, history and experience most undoubtedly suggest. The pages of the historian seem to be filled with pictures of organic life, over the moving details of which the biologist instinctively lingers. We see social systems born in silence and obscurity. They develop beneath our eyes. They make progress until they exhibit a certain maximum vitality. They gradually decline, and finally disappear, having presented in the various stages certain well-marked phases which invariably accompany the development and dissolution of organic life wheresoever encountered. It may be observed too that this idea of the life, growth, and decline of peoples is deeply rooted. It is always present in the mind of the historian.