84 THE SOCIAL THEORY OF GEORG SIMMEL
The standpoint from which the individual may be understood
 may be taken either within or outside the individual.
 The totality of his life may be regarded either as the
centripetal destiny of its bearer or as the product and element
 of the social life. Therefore the fact of socialization
brings the individual into a double situation. He is included
 in it and is at the same time in antithesis to it. He
is a member of its organism and at the same time a closed
organic whole.
“Within” and “without” are not two determinations
which exist alongside of each other, but they signify the
whole unitary position of the social being. His existence
is therefore not merely in subdivision of its content partially
 social and partially individual. It stands under the
fundamental, formative, irreducible category of a unity,
which cannot be expressed otherwise than through thé synthesis
 of these two logically antithetical determinations. Society
 consists not only of individuals who are in part not
socialized, but also of individuals who are conscious of leading
 a completely social existence on the one hand and at
the same time a completely individual existence on the
other hand. The social being is the synthetic category of
the two, just as the concept of causation is an aprioristic
 unity which includes the two elements of cause and
effect.!
This analysis enables us to see the second a priori of
empirical social life. “It may be formulated as the ability
to view society as the terminus a quo and the terminus ad
quem of human beings who view themselves as a ferminus a
quo and a terminus ad quem of its qualities, developments,
and destinies.”?
The third a priori might be roughly formulated as a
1 Soz., pp. 88-41.
* Ibid, p. 41.