" he declared, "of the sovereign
authority--which is, or ought to be, simply a delegation of the people
appointed to act for its good--appears to me to be not only to enforce
the renunciation of the anti-social desires, but wherever it may be
necessary to promote the satisfaction of those which are conducive to
progress."[12] There is no conception here of the principles of
organization and responsible leadership, so necessary in constituting
this "delegation."

+Herbert Spencer.+--By a great many sociologists it is denied that man
has his destiny in his own hands, or can by common effort modify the
conditions of existence so as to promote progress. The conception which
is held to justify this view is that there is an exact correspondence
between the progress of human society and the growth of an organism.
Foremost among those who take this view is Mr. Herbert Spencer. The
close analogy which the progress of the assumed social organism bears to
the growth of the physiological organism is worked out in great detail
throughout the "Synthetic Philosophy," and is taken to establish "that
Biology and Sociology will more or less interpret each other." The
practical conclusion which is drawn is that the growth of society must
not be interfered with; if the State goes beyond the duty of protection,
it becomes an aggressor. So Mr. Spencer is a most uncompromising
opponent of State action, even education and public sanitation coming in
for his condemnation. Moreover, he holds that if the social organism be
let alone it will tend to a future state of society in which social
altruism will be so developed that the individual will voluntarily
sacrifice himself in the interests of society.

In an essay on _The Social Organism_ ("Essays," Second Series), he
writes:--

Strange as the assertion will be thought, our Houses of Parliament
discharge in the social economy functions that are, in sundry
respects, comparable to those discharged by the cerebral masses in
a vertebrate animal.... We may describe the office of the brain as
that of _averaging_ the interests of life, physical, intellectual,
moral, social; and a good brain is one in which the desires
answering to their respective interests are so balanced that the
conduct they jointly dictate sacrifices none of them. Similarly we
may describe the office of Parliament as that of _averaging_ the
interests of the various classes in a co