NUMERICAL RELATIONS OF SOCIAL FORMS 137
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the reciprocal activities and relationships of its elements
can crystallize. Out of that necessity are born objective
structures and norms, official and representative bodies as
means to preserve the social unity, which small circles can
dispense with. The formation and function of these special
structures will be dealt with in the chapter on social preservation.
They are referred to here because their formation
is immediately related to the size of the group, and
hecause they are, as such, characteristic of large groups.
The formal difference between large and small groups
is also manifest in the type of norm by means of which the
group secures its self-preservation. This is most evident
in the distinction between mores and law. In small groups
the relationships between individuals are regulated by the
mores; the large group needs, in addition to these, the law.
The life of primitive peoples living in small communities
was entirely regulated by the mores. The mores set the
norms for the whole of the religious, political, and economic
life, and covered the entire domain of what appear at present
as the spheres of morality, convention, and law. With
the formation of larger social circles and the combination
of these small groups in single units, there occurred a differentiation
in fields of different social content and a differentiation
in different kinds of norms. The result had both
a social and a sociological aspect. Out of the mores differentiated
on the one hand individual morality. on the other
hand law. In modern society all three forms of norms
serve to secure an individual behavior in accordance with
social requirements.
Society has an interest in the moral perfection of the
individual only in so far as that moral perfection guarantees
an adequate social behavior. that is. only in so far as
it regulates social relationships. But in so far as it serves
that function, it is a highly efficient instrument. It has a
