The extent to which society may be considered as an organism is still, I understand, a matter of controversy with sociologists. But without awaiting its adjudication, we may surely make use of a simile as ancient as that of the Apostle who spoke of individual Christians as members of one body, or as that of the wise old Roman, who taught the mutinous plebs the parable of the body politic, all of whose members were nourished by the well-fed patrician belly, and consider together this evening the social function of science in the body social
