“We come at length,” says Spencer, “to the nervous system.” This is by far the most interesting item in Spencer’s catalogue, because it is here that the evolutionary philosopher and the Manchester School politician come into open contradiction. “We have now to compare the appliances by which a society as a whole, is regulated, with those by which the movements of an individual creature are regulated.” Beginning with the nervous systems of lower animals he discovers their inferiority to lie in the absence of a controlling center. The lower Annulosa is composed of a series of ring-like segments. Each ring has its own nerve ganglia linked by connecting nerves, but “very incompletely dependent on any general controlling power. Hence it results that when the body is cut in two, the hinder part continues to move forward under the propulsion of its numerous legs; and that when the chain of ganglia has been divided without severing the body, the hind limbs may be seen trying to propel the body in one direction, while the fore limbs are trying to propel it in another.” As we move up in the animal world the nervous system culminates in a centralized brain, and similarly as society becomes more complex, government appears. And now the great apostle of the non-interference of government with the life of society is driven into the glaring contradiction of contending that the highest animal organization is that in which the brain, which he compares to government in society, interferes and controls most effectively. “Strange as the assertion will be thought,” he says, “our Houses of Parliament discharge, in the social economy, functions which are in sundry respects comparable to those discharged by the cerebral masses in a vertebrate animal.” Strange indeed! Especially to Mr. Spencer’s disciples. Then Mr. Spencer discovers that the kind of brain activity displayed by the highest animals best compares with that form of government called “representative.” He says: “It is the nature of those great and latest-developed ganglia which distinguish the higher animals, to interpret and combine the multiplied and varied impressions conveyed to them from all parts of the system, and to regulate the actions in such a way as duly to regard them all; so it is in the nature of those great and latest-developed legislative bodies which distinguish the most advanced societies, to interpret and combine the wishes of all classes and localities and to make laws in harmony with the general wants.” It would seem from this that, a society whose government represents only the interests of a handful of the community while the great majority are uncared for, is suffering from social paralysis. Before we pass to the next chapter where we shall examine the position presented in “The Man Versus The State” we will observe one break in Spencer’s analogy which he fails to notice.