Religious Representations Are Collective Representations

When Mores Are Sufficient, Laws Are Unnecessary. When Mores Are Insufficient, Laws Are Unenforceable.

A Social Fact Is Every Way Of Acting, Fixed Or Not, Capable Of Exercising On The Individual An External Constraint; Or Again, Every Way Of Acting Which Is General Throughout A Given Society, While At The Same Time Existing In Its Own Right Independent Of Its Individual Manifestations.

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.

Man's Characteristic Privilege Is That The Bond He Accepts Is Not Physical But Moral; That Is, Social. He Is Governed Not By A Material Environment Brutally Imposed On Him, But By A Conscience Superior To His Own, The Superiority Of Which He Feels. Because The Greater, Better Part Of His Existence Transcends The Body, He Escapes The Body's Yoke, But Is Subject To That Of Society.

There Is No Sociology Worthy Of The Name Which Does Not Possess A Historical Character.