not extend.
Such then is the historical origin of the State. But it is of
capital importance to understand that, in Aristotle’s opin-
ion, this question of historical origin has nothing on earth
to do with the far more important question what the State
essentially is. It is no mere mechanical aggregate of families
and village communities, {322} Thenatureof the State is
not explained in this way. For though the family is prior to
the State in order of time, the State is prior to the family
and to the individual in order of thought, and in reality.
For the State is the end, and the end is always prior to
that of which it is the end. The state as form is prior to
the family as matter, and in the same way the family is
prior to the individual. And as the explanation of things is
only possible by teleology, it is the end which explains the
beginning, it is the State which explains the family, and
not vice versa.
The true nature of the State, therefore, is not that it is
a mechanical sum of individuals, as a heap of sand is the
sum of its grains. The State is a real organism, and the
connexion of part to part is not mechanical, but organic.
The State has a life of its own. And its members also have
their own lives, which are included in the higher life of the
State. All the parts of an organism are themselves organ-
isms. And as the distinction between organic and inorganic
is that the former has its end in itself, while the latter has
its end external to it, this means that the State is an end
in itself, that the individual is an end in himself, and that
the former end includes the latter. Or we may express the
same thought otherwise by saying that, in the State, both
the whole and the parts are to be regarded as real, both
having their own lives and, in their character as ends, their
own rights. Consequently, there are two kinds of views of
the nature of the State, which are, according to Aristo-
tle, fundamentally erroneous. The first is the kind of view
which depends upon asserting the reality of the parts, but
denying the reality of the whole, or, what is the same {323}
thing, allowing that the individual is an end in himself, but
denying that the State as a whole is such an end or has a
separate life of its own. The second kind of false view is of
the opposite kind, and consists in allowing reality only to
the whole State, and denying the reality of its parts, the
individuals. The opinions that the State is merely a me-
chanical aggregate of individuals, that it is formed by the
combination of individuals or families for the sake of mu-
tual protection and benefit, and that it exists only for these
purposes, are examples of the first kind. Such views subor-
dinate the State to the individual. The State is treated as
an external contrivance for securing the life, the property,
or the convenience of the individual. The State exists solely
for the sake of the individual, and is not in itself an end.
The individual alone is real, the State unreal, because it
is only a collection of individuals. These views forget that
the State is an organism, and they forget all that this im-
plies. Aristotle would have condemned, on these grounds,
the social contract theory so popular in the eighteenth cen-
tury, and likewise the view of modern individualism that
the State exists solely to ensure that the liberty of the in-
dividual is curtailed only by the right of other individuals
to the same liberty. The opposite kind of false view is il-
lustrated by the ideal State of Plato. As the views we have