The  secret  society  completely  lacks  organic  growth,
instinctive  expansions,  and,  on  the  part  of  its  mem-
bers, all  naive,  matter-of-fact  feeling  of  belonging
together  and  forming  a  unit.  However  irrational,
mystical,  or  emotional  its  contents  may  be,  the  way
in  which  it  is  formed  is  thoroughly  conscious  and  in-
tentional. In  its  consciousness  of  being  a  society —
a  consciousness  which  is  constantly  emphasized
during  its  formative  period  and  throughout  its  life-
time— it  is  the  opposite  of  all  spontaneous  groups,
in  which  the  joining  is  only  the  expression,  more  or
less,  of  elements  which  have  grown  together  like
roots.  Its  social-psychological  form  clearly  is  that
of  the  interest  group  [Zweckverband].  This  constel-
lation makes  it  understandable  why  the  formal  char-
acteristics of  group  formation  in  general  are  specifi-
cally pointed  up  in  the  secret  society,  and  why
some  of  its  essential  sociological  traits  develop  as
mere  quantitative  intensifications  of  very  general
types  of  relationship.
