Prof. F. H. Giddings of Columbia University is the sponsor of the last sociological principle which will be mentioned in this connection. His principle is known as the "Consciousness of Kind." According to Prof. Giddings: "Consciousness of Kind is that pleasurable state of mind which includes organic sympathy, the perception of resemblance conscious or reflective sympathy, affection and the desire for recognition."[11] "This consciousness is a social and socializing force, sometimes exceedingly delicate and subtle in its action, sometimes turbulent and all powerful. Assuming endlessly varied modes of prejudice and of prepossession, of liking and of disliking, of love and of hate, it tends always to reconstruct and to dominate every mode of association and every social grouping."[12]
By means of this very comprehensive principle many otherwise merely stray and isolated items of information that have come down to use regarding early Christianity can be given a place and a meaning in the graduated series of phenomena which mark the transition from the eschatological to the socialized movement. Such, for instance, are the exhibitions of consciousness of kind according to differences and similarities of sex, age, kinship, language, political beliefs, occupations, rank, locality, wealth, and the like. The very number of ways in which consciousness of kind exerts influence makes this principle of very great use when the task is that of forming a general conclusion from the investigation of sources which are incomplete, inconclusive and sometimes contradictory.
The different sociological principles mentioned above are intended as specimens only. The list is not in any sense complete. No attention is paid to other principles held as coordinates or as correlates of those referred to. Whole classes of principles, the anthropological and geographic, for instance, are consciously omitted. The list is in the highest degree a hit-and-miss selection and the more casual it is, the better for the purpose in hand. This purpose is to show that any given series of principles elucidated by students of our contemporary modern civilization, will be found to have been operating in discernable fashion in the case of an obscure form of theological speculation in the first centuries of the Christian era. That Chiliasm was the natural result of the heredity and environment of the early Christians, or perhaps better, the natural result of the reaction of inherited elements in vital contact with the contemporary world, will probably be admitted readily enough by anyone who has followed the discussion thus far. But the aim of this thesis, particularly of this last chapter, is something more than that. Its aim is to uphold the contention that the forces now operating in society to shape and reshape beliefs and opinions are the very same in kind as operated in the society of the Roman Empire. In short, any explanation of early Christian Chiliasm which seeks to bring in the operation of any social principles which cannot be shown to be objectively operative in contemporary society is to be viewed with a certain measure of doubt, if not of suspicion.
It may be taken as a safe assumption that all attempts to obtain a complete explanation of any historical event in terms of one principle of one science are foredoomed to failure. The same is true, in less degree, even if we take all the so far discovered principles of any one science. In order to give anything like a really comprehensive explanation of the historical process which forms the subject of this thesis there would be required the contributions of the principles of economics, political science, psychology, and the other social sciences. Such a synthesis of principles is beyond the ability of any one individual. The application of them all to our subject would be a task requiring the cooperation of many specialists in many lines for some not inconsiderable period of time. The writer's task will not perhaps have been utterly in vain, if he has, even in the slightest measure, helped to bring home to a single reader, this important fact.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] L. M. Bristol, Social Adaptation, Harvard Economic Studies, Vol. XIV. Cambridge 1915.
[2] Communist Manifesto. Authorized English Translation, Chicago, 1898.
[3] W. J. Ghent, Mass and Class, Chap. 1. New York, 1905.
[4] Grundriss der Sociologie; Moore's Translation, p. 85. Annals Am. Acad. Pol. Sci. Phil. 1899.
[5] G. Tarde, Social Laws, p. 41. New York, 1899. The Laws of Imitation, p. 22. New York, 1903.