238 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
something gross and impure, and wholly unworthy of a place in any scheme of philosophy. 1
But in quite recent times, under the stimulus of modern ideas of biology, the conception of the biological origin of mind has begun to work a change in the prevailing habit of thought on the subject, and psychologists are coming to recognize the feel- ings as a department of psychology. In sociology the least reflection reveals the immense importance of this department. Indeed it is found to constitute the true foundation upon which that science must be built, so that it may be said that "the stone that the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner." The secret of all this is that it is in the affective side of mind that the forces of society are found to lie. Feeling is a force. It is the only psychic force, and is at the same time the fundamental social force.
The particular form under which feeling manifests itself as a force is desire, and the social forces consist in human desires. They are true natural forces and obey all of the Newtonian laws of motion. They are either negative desire to escape pain or positive desire to secure pleasure. In either case they impel the individual to action. A convenient and highly expressive synonym for desire in its widest sense is will, but the word must then be used in the philosophic sense of motive, and not in the popular sense of choice. Schopenhauer based his entire phi- losophy on this conception, and by projecting the will into the inanimate world he showed in the clearest manner the true nature of will as a simple mode of manifestation of the universal force. In identifying all forces with will he simply demonstrated that the human will is a force. From an economic point of view we may identify it with want, and contemplate the combined wants of mankind as constituting the social forces.
This conception is susceptible of great expansion. It really embraces the whole domain of feeling in the intensive sense, t. e., as having to do with pleasure or pain. All instincts, affections and emotions range themselves under it. All the "passions of
1 JAMES : Principles of Psychology, II, 9.
