Minds in which the conceptions of social actions are thus rudimentary, are also minds ready to harbor wild hopes of benefits to be achieved by administrative agencies. In each such mind there seems to be the unexpressed postulate that every evil in a society admits of cure; and that the cure lies within the reach of law.
[A superstitious conciousness] may even wonder how any being can reverence a thing shaped with his own hands; and yet it readily entertains subtler forms of the same feelings…. there is a tacit supposition that a government moulded by themselves has some efficiency beyond that naturally possessed by a certain group of citizens subsidized by the rest of the citizens.
…the instinct of self-preservation in each institution soon becomes dominant over every thing else; and maintains it when it performs some quite other function that that intended, or no function at all.
Spencer, Herbert. “The Study of Sociology.” Popular Science May 1872. Google Books Web. 26 Apr. 2014.
