270 THE SOCIAL THEORY OF GEORG SIMMEL 
time series was far from scientific. As each change was 
regarded primarily in the light of a later change, the series 
of changes came to be regarded as one unitary immanent 
process of change. The series of changes in the institution 
came to be viewed as its evolution, as the mystical un- 
foldment of its immanent form. The result was that the 
actual primary processes of change, the effective factors 
and forces, were neglected. Not only did this type of in- 
vestigation in the social fields not contribute to general 
scientific knowledge, but it was not even satisfactory from 
the point of view of history. The historical development 
can be understood only on the basis of a knowledge of the 
timeless laws, but the investigation required to find those 
timeless laws was omitted. 
The knowledge that the organic form, man, devel- 
oped from the organic form, amoeba, and the economic 
form, capitalism, from the economic form, tribal commu- 
nism, through different intermediary stations is not of im- 
mediate practical value. Not the fact that capitalism de- 
veloped out of tribal communism and the monogamic mar- 
riage out of general promiscuity is of importance, but the 
causes of change at each point of change. The social sci- 
ences draw their material, of course, from historical data. 
But they should use these data for the purpose of a general 
induction which will lead to a timeless law. They should 
use these data as Simmel uses them, without any considera- 
tion for their specific place in the time series. Historical 
data can also be used for an inquiry into the so-called his- 
torical law, but that is the function of history, not of sci- 
ence. Science can fulfil its function only if it turns once 
and for all, not only from all philosophic and historical 
speculation, but also from all such concepts as evolution 
and historical law. 
The fact that the historical dimension as an end in it- 
self has entirely disappeared out of Simmel’s method, and