Even one well-made observation will be enough in many cases, just as one well-constructed experiment often suffices for the establishment of a law. Emile Durkheim More Quotes by Emile Durkheim More Quotes From Emile Durkheim Man is a moral being, only because he lives in society. Let all social life disappear and morality will disappear with it. Emile Durkheim moralitysocialmen Society is not a mere sum of individuals. Rather, the system formed by their association represents a specific reality which has its own characteristics... The group thinks, feels, and acts quite differently from the way in which its members would were they isolated. If, then, we begin with the individual, we shall be able to understand nothing of what takes place in the group. Emile Durkheim groupsrealitythinking We do not condemn it because it is a crime, but it is a crime because we condemn it. Emile Durkheim crime Each new generation is reared by its predecessor; the latter must therefore improve in order to improve its successor. The movement is circular. Emile Durkheim generationsmovementorder A mind that questions everything, unless strong enough to bear the weight of its ignorance, risks questioning itself and being engulfed in doubt. Emile Durkheim riskstrongignorance When mores are sufficient, laws are unnecessary. When mores are insufficient, laws are unenforceable. Emile Durkheim unnecessarysufficientlaw Our whole social environment seems to us to be filled with forces which really exist only in our own minds. Emile Durkheim environmentsocialmind When man discovered the mirror, he began to lose his soul. Emile Durkheim mirrorssoulmen There is no society known where a more or less developed criminality is not found under different forms. No people exists whose morality is not daily infringed upon. We must therefore call crime necessary and declare that it cannot be non-existent, that the fundamental conditions of social organization, as they are understood, logically imply it. Emile Durkheim differentorganizationpeople When morals are sufficient, law is unnecessary; when morals are insufficient, law is unenforceable. Emile Durkheim unnecessarymorallaw What history teaches us is that man does not change arbitrarily; he does not transform himself at will on hearing the voices of inspired prophets. The reason is that all change, in colliding with the inherited institutions of the past, is inevitably hard and laborious; consequently it only takes place in response to the demands of necessity. For change to be brought about it is not enough that it should be seen as desirable; it must be the product of changes within the whole network of diverse casual relationships which then determine the situation of man. Emile Durkheim voicemenpast A religion is a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is to say, things set apart and forbidden-beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who adhere to them. Emile Durkheim communitypracticereligion If religion has given birth to all that is essential in society, it is because the idea of society is the soul of religion. Emile Durkheim essentialssoulideas Sociological method as we practice it rests wholly on the basic principle that social facts must be studied as things, that is, as realities external to the individual. There is no principle for which we have received more criticism; but none is more fundamental. Indubitably for sociology to be possible, it must above all have an object all its own. It must take cognizance of a reality which is not in the domain of other sciences... there can be no sociology unless societies exist, and that societies cannot exist if there are only individuals. Emile Durkheim criticismpracticereality Man is only a moral being because he lives in society, since morality consists in solidarity with the group, and varies according to that solidarity. Cause all social life to vanish, and moral life would vanish at the same time, having no object to cling to. Emile Durkheim groupscausesmen This solidarity can grow only in inverse ratio to personality... Solidarity which comes from likenesses is at its maximum when the collective conscience completely envelops our whole conscience and coincides in all points with it... when this solidarity exercises its force, our personality vanishes, as our definition permits us to say, for we are no longer ourselves, but the collective life. Emile Durkheim definitionspersonalityexercise Each victim of suicide gives his act a personal stamp which expresses his temperament, the special conditions in which he is involved, and which, consequently, cannot be explained by the social and general causes of the phenomenon. Emile Durkheim suicidalsuicidegiving The totality of beliefs and sentiments common to the average members of a society forms a determinate system with a life of its own. It can be termed the collective or creative consciousness. Emile Durkheim creativebeliefaverage Reality seems valueless by comparison with the dreams of fevered imaginations; reality is therefore abandoned. Emile Durkheim imaginationdreamreality To pursue a goal which is by definition unattainable is to condemn oneself to a state of perpetual unhappiness. Emile Durkheim unattainabledefinitionsgoal
