[84] See the chapter on “Ethical Development Extending Through Life” in The World Crisis.
[85] Vide Appendix II, on Force and Freedom.
[86] I use the word Organize in its spiritual sense. The empirical, animal organism is commonly taken as the type upon which the notion of organism is modeled. The animal organism, however, fails to express the implicit idea, for the following reasons: The number of members is limited; the combination of organs is, so far as we can know, accidental, and the relation is hierarchical,—there are inferior and superior organs. The spiritual conception differs in each of these points. The number of members is infinite; the relation is necessary; and they are equal, that is, of equal worth. To distinguish the spiritual pattern from the animal type the term metorganic may be used for the former, in analogy to such terms as metempirical, metaphysical, etc., and the system of ethics expounded in this volume may be called the metorganic system of ethics.
[87] Representation by geographical districts is the logical outcome of the individualistic conception of democracy. Where this prevails, the state is supposed to take account only of the common interests, those in respect to which all individuals are alike, such as security of life and property, those interests being ignored in respect to which the groups that constitute society, the farmers, the merchants, the industrial laborers, etc., differ. Hence any convenient number of citizens, pursuing their life purposes side by side within a certain geographical area, may serve as a constituency. The absence of regard for the real diversity, and often the clash of interests, between persons belonging to such constituencies, is due to the atomistic, individualistic notion of democracy just mentioned. But sheer individualism is everywhere on the wane, and is bound to become less and less dominant in the degree that the industrial evolution of society proceeds, and the various groups stand out distinctly as different against one another in their functions and in the conditions subservient to those functions. Society is in fact not an aggregate of human atoms. It is already an imperfect organism, destined to become more and more adequately organized. And the system of representation has got to be remodeled and adjusted to this fact and this ideal.
[88] By “interests” I understand fulfilment of the social function with which the group is charged.
[89] And, as a matter of fact, because this is so, there is no state, no democracy, in which public opinion or public sentiment actually does rule, save by fits and starts. Government is usually in the hands of more or less selfish coteries, who operate behind the scenes, who do know what they want and who, like the Piper of Hamelin, are past masters of the art of leading the political children whither they will.
[90] I am not of course discussing the merits or demerits of the protective tariff as such, but am using it as illustration. As such it will serve the purpose.
The practice of “log-rolling” may at first sight seem to resemble the proposed plan. But, in reality, the two are diametrical opposites. By “log-rolling” is meant the kind of concessions made by the shipping interests to the manufacturers by the manufacturers to the farmers, or to the workingmen when the latter happen to be strong enough to enforce their demands. Each group persists in pursuing its selfish aims; only, in order to achieve them it makes concessions to the selfishness of the others. Each follows the path into the Hades of egotism, and throws the necessary sops to Cerberus on the way. The plan outlined in the text, on the other hand, has for its object the interlocking of the various social interests, the fitting them reciprocally into one another; or better, the object is to cure each group as far as possible of its selfishness by so modifying its claims, that the granting of them shall become beneficial to the rest.
[91] See Fouillée’s Esquisse psychologique des Peuples européens, also the Chapter on German, English and American Ideals in The World Crisis.
[92] Each term in the series of social institutions is ethically defined by referring to the succeeding terms. The family prepares for the vocation, the vocation for the state or nation, the nation for the international society, and all the successive terms receive their ultimate definition from the infinite spiritual universe which includes them, and broods over them and dwells in each, so that the expanding ethical experience gained at the successive stations is spiritually the ratio cognoscendi, not the ratio essendi.