PURPOSE OF SOCIOLOGY 453
genetics, but they failed to take account of individual telesis as modifying this process. That which has been aptly called "astronomical economics," therefore failed, and it was dis- covered by the Newton of biology that the Malthusian princi- ple was a fundamental principle of biology. 1 As soon as atten- tion began to be directed to wide classes of facts it was seen that this law required to be modified in so many respects before it could be applied to man as to amount almost to a reversal of it. a While the philosophers were ignoring one half of mind the feelings the economists were ignoring the other half the intellect and both of these great movements were limp- ing along in this fashion. It has remained for sociology, whether calling itself by that name or not, to recognize the psychologic basis of human activities and to found a science upon all the faculties of the mind.
The fact that the defective political economy described necessarily led to a gloomy view of human life, gaining for it Carlyle's name of the "dismal science," has given birth to the erroneous impression that the early writers were cold, hard- hearted men, who looked upon the laborer as simply a machine to be run until it breaks down, and who had no hope that the conditions they described could ever in the nature of things be altered or improved. The fact is that those writers were all humane and enlightened men with warm sympathies. Adam Smith is now ranked among the founders of utilitarianism, which is an essentially melioristic doctrine. It is a curious fact, rarely referred to, that the very title of the great work of Malthus which is regarded as the most pessimistic of all that class of writings, contains a clear declaration of his humanitarian pur- pose. Even in the first edition the title reads : An Essay on the Principle of Population as it affects the future Improvement of Society. The first seven words remained the same in all editions, but in the second edition the remainder reads: or a review of
1 See Darwin's Autobiography in Lift and Lttttrt, Vol. I, p. 68. See The Psychologic Basis of Social Economics, Proc. A. A. A. S. t Vol. XLI, pp. 301-32*.
