On this page

• Text (2)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • 

    448 : 7 ¦ . TflE LEADB1' tSATtrap Ay, - ...

  • 

    THE TWO SISTERS. Awake ! awake ! the roy...

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Comte's Positive I'Ll I L O S O V Iiy. B...

    oloev has been the predominating element ; m the seeond , Metaphysical .-, inlhe third , Positive conception has predominated . The germ of Positivism will be found even in the Fetichistie stage ; nor was man ever absolutely incapable of Abstraction . On the other hand , the Positive period will not entirely exclude the initial and intermediate tendencies of the human mind . It should be observed , too , that these three states are all closely connected ; for the Metaphysical is a transition state , and is partly theological and partly scientific . The chasm between Supernaturahsm and Positivism is bridged over by Metaphysics . Without it Humanity would never have arisen ; for natura non agit per saltum . The principle of gradation or continuity , the characteristic of nature , is also the characteristic of the new Philosophyand will be found to underlie all its logical and

    , scientific conceptions . As an illustration , I subjoin a passage from Sir John HerscheFs Discourse . — ' There can be little doubt that the solid , liquid , and aeriform states of bodies are merely stages in a progress of gradual transition from one extreme to the other ; and that , however strongly marked the distinctions between them may appear , they will ultimately turn out to be separated by no sudden or violent line of demarcation , but shade into each other by insensible gradations . M . " The present is a favourable occasion for bringing forward a criticism on the much-used and much-abused term , " Laws of Nature , " which for nearly

    twenty years I have employed with misgiving . The phrase has two vices : it is inaccurate , and it is misleading ; and I think that a severe critic might not unreasonably condemn its employment as peculiarly improper in Positive Philosophy . The conception implied in , or suggested by , the phrase " Laws of Nature , " is the last and most refined expression of the

    Metaphysical stage of speculation : in it Law replaces the old term Principle ; in it Law is the delicate abstract Entity super added to the phenomena . For observe : When you say that it is according to a law that bodies gravitate , that fluids ascend to their level , or that the needle points towards the north , you are superadding to the facts an abstract entity ( law ) , which you believe coerces the facts , makes them to be what they are ; you give a generalized statement of the facts , and out of that you make an entity—a something ab extra . What is this Law which produces the phenomena , but a more subtle , a more impersonal substitute for the Supernatural Power which , in the Theological epoch , was believed to superintend all things ,

    " To guide the whirlwind and direct the storm ?" If the Savage says it is a Demon who directs the storm , does not the man of science say it is a Law-which directs it ? These two conceptions , are they not identical ? I know it will be answered , that men o £ science do not so conceive Law . They do not believe that the everliving activities we in our profound ignorance christen Nature , are moved according to certain celestial Statutes , with " pains and penalties" thereunto attached . But my objection is not habituall this

    the less valid . The current language of men y expresses conception ; and although , when their attention is directed to it , when they begin rigorously to define terms , they call a Law the " expression of the relations of coexistence and succession , " yet I say their language about " breaking the laws of Nature , " acting " contrary to the laws of Nature , " indicates the misleading suggestions of the term , and much , of their reasoning is vitiated by it . Thus , to g o no farther than the Development theory , which assumes a certain fixed and definite Plan in the universe are not the Laws which work out this Plan endowed with a

    mysterious prescience of the end they are to reach ? And what are prescient laws but metaphysical entities ? Nevertheless , that the Creator has subjected matter to certain immutable laws , is a conception which most men of science loudly proclaim ; and however they may refine upon terms , and sublimate the idea of Law , its human element cannot always be eliminated . But this , I must confess , seems to me a mechanical theory of the universe , both sterile and irreligious : it makes God necessary as a postulate , and there leaves him . He having legislated for the universe once for all , the laws arc now sufficient to sustain the great life of the universe ! According to my own dynamic conceptions , which admit God only as Life , and the Universe as his Activity , such notions of Law are profoundly erroneous ; and I object therefore to the term Laws of Nature , because its direct

    meaning points to a mechanical conception of Nature , and because , however we may circumscribe its meaning , as expressive simply of the relations of coexistence and succession , the word Law does ami must bring with it its human associations , and must therein be delusive , Rather than the popular , and , as I call it , mechanical theory of the Universe , let me have the primitive spontaneous theory of the earlier stages of Humanity : 1 can accommodate myself better with the old Deities—capricious and human as they arc—than with the modern Laws ; for the Deities at least were Ivmng powers ! 'Spinoza and Goethe teach us something better than the mechanical theory , and to them I refer the reader , upon whose lips a scornful

    smile has been raised by what has just been said . Let me suppose it granted that the term Law is objectionable . What shall be the substitute ? The difficulty of finding one has been very great . The " mind in the spacious circuit of its musing" alighted on terms all oloKKed with intrusive and delusive meanings , which unfitted them for replacing the old term . The one upon which I finally settled does not altogether satisfy me , but it fulfils the main requisites , I pioposo to call the relations of coexistence and succession , usually named Laws , by the name of Methods . Etymologically , Method ( fxeOodoc ) is a path louding onwards , a way of transit . The Methods of Nature would

    therefore express the paths along which the activities of Nature travelled to results ( phenomena ) . I cannot avoid figurative language , and It is useful , because expressive ; but the conception here expressed is limited to the facts , with nothing superadded . Given the phenomena , we name the process by which they are called forth , the Way ofNature —the path Forces take to that particular result . . These paths may be intersected by the paths of other Forces . For instance , a spark will ignite dry gunpowder . Here a particular path is opened along which Forces can travel to a particular issue ( explosion ); but if we throw water on the powder , the particular path is blocked up , and another issue is reached , Fire raises

    the temperature of water . Yet if you pour water into a red-hot crucible containing liquid sulphuric acid , the temperature of the water is not raised ; nay , so far from that , it is lowered to the freezing point , and in lieu of steam you have ice ! -This is no contradiction to the Laws of Nature ; no law is broken ; the path is intersected by another path , thus : The rapid evaporation of the sulphuric acid produces cold so intense that the water which ( the acid absent ) would have hissed off in steam , now not only loses in evaporation all the heat given it by the fire , but also loses a portion of that heat which kept it liquid . And this is simply because the Method of Nature—the true path of its activity as regards sulphuric acid subjected to heat- —is what we call rapid evaporation .

    To understand this conception of Methods , let us place ourselves at the most abstract point of view : let us consider Nature as the sum of Forces , which because they are , and are Forces , must ady and must act along some pathway or other— -and let us further consider these Forces about to leap into results—we can only consider them as travelling along certain definite paths to reach Certain definite results . We thus see that the path of activity is one of the conditions of an act ; and that to the observed actions we superadd nothing not given in tlie actions themselves , by declaring such and such to be the Methods of Nature . I try various forms of expression , and various illustrations , to familiarize my meaning . Let me take one from the science of Mechanics . Matter is said to be inert : as a scientific artifice this may be useful in mechanics ,

    but out of that domain to consider matter as incapable of spontaneously modifying the action of forces applied to it , is a remnant of the old Metaphysical notion , that all states of activity and movement are produced //^ without ; a notion in , accordance with that phase of mental development when movement was explained by supernatural entities ; a notion in accordance with the mechanical theory that all matter is a " lifeless mass of clay in the potter ' s hands . " I cannot bring myself so to consider it . I desire some considerable rectification of these gross conceptions of matter , and would view it ae tho phenomena of Forces , and eay that all matter , animate and inanimate , is everywhere in a state of spontaneous activity

    of Life , in short ; a conception , I need scarcely add , to which all modern science is rapidly tending . And having once so conceived it , we should conclude that the movements of matter are not obedient to Laws , but are the spontaneous activities of the Forces ; and what we call Laws are nothing but the paths , or Methods , along which the Forces move . That there are objections incident to the use of the term Methods , I am

    aware ; is it possible to avoid objections ? Moreover , I am not Quixotic Neologist enough to expect that the old term will fall out of use , could even a new term , wholly free from objection , be suggested . But I thmk this digression will not have been superfluous , if it serve to fix the students attention on the characteristic defect of the conception of Law , and it it cause him , when he meets with the term Law , mentally to correct it into Method . Without at once altering our scientific phraseology , we may at

    once accustom our thoughts to Methods of Nature , and so familiarize ourselves with the positive spirit of regarding Nature . I know not what Comte will say to this criticism , but I have noticed the effect of the term Law as decidedly misleading ; and I think the direction in which it points—to the mechanical , theory of the universe—a direction Philosophy should energetically be warned against . To quit this discussion , and return to the Cours de Philosophic Positive , let me advise those who have some mathematical attainment , to study the chapters devoted to Mathematics in the first volume ( pp . 117-739 ) , «* despair of giving any useful account of them within the space at my disposal , even though a friend has submitted to me his analysis . Those unacquainted with M athematics will do w ell just to skim through the chapters , picking out the general principles , and then commencing the Le ctures o Astronomy—which I will open next week . *

    Comte's Positive I'Ll I L O S O V Iiy. B...

    .. t i * For tho Gomto Subscription Fund I Uavo to acknowledge 2 ? . from Ur . Wyn Harding , and 10 » . " irom u Gorman . "

    448 : 7 ¦ . Tfle Leadb1' Tsattrap Ay, - ...

    448 : 7 ¦ . TflE LEADB 1 ' tSATtrap Ay , - . — '"""" ' - - '•¦ — - ^———^—*—^^——^ mma—^ m i—^^^^ w ^——^^^ . ~ ^ ¦ ¦ .. I ¦ ¦ - ¦ ¦ _ ¦ . ' - ¦ .. ¦ .... ¦ ... . ¦ : ' . ¦ . - . " . ' ¦ '' ' ' : - " ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ : ¦ ¦ . '¦¦ ¦ . . , '^^^^^*^^ i ^»

    The Two Sisters. Awake ! Awake ! The Roy...

    THE TWO SISTERS . Awake ! awake ! the royal hills Arc diademed with rosy light , The waving forests , warbling rills , All worship God aright . Where trcea like qmerald pillars rise , A child is kneeling on the sod , Her face is looking on the skies , Her heart is gone to God . Her prayer is said , she rises now , She seeks the dear familiar bower , . _____ _

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 8, 1852, page 20, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_08051852/page/20/