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    when I come to treat of Beligion . The definition not only seems to me a plain expression of the actual nature of Philosophy , but thereby serves to rid us of the perplexities arising from the opposition between Metaphysics and Science , which are thus shown to be nothing more than different methods of reaching the same end . To wrest its secret from the Universe , and to understand our relations to external Nature and to Man , is equally the object of Metaphysical as of - Positive inquiry ; but / the Metaphysician believes he can penetrate into the causes and essences of the phenomena around him , while the Poaitivist , recognising his incompetency , limits his efforts to the ascertainment of the laws which regulate the succession of these phenomena .

    Philosophy is inherent in man ' s nature . It is not a caprice , it is not a plaything , it is a necessity ; for our life is a mystery , surrounded with mysteries : we are encompassed by wonder . The myriad aspects of Nature without , the strange fluctuations of feeling within , all demand from us an explanation . Standing upon this ball of earth , so infinite to us , so tr ivial in the infinitude of the Universe , we look forth into nature with reverent awe , with irrepressible curiosity . We must have explanations . And thus it is that philosophy , in some rude shape , is a visible effort in every condition of the history of man , —in the rudest phase of half-developed capacity , as in the highest conditions of culture : it is found among the sugar-canes

    of the West Indies , and in the tangled pathless forests of America . Take man where you will—hunting the buffalo on the prairies , or immovable in meditation on the hot banks of the Ganges , pr iest or peasant , soldier or student , ma n never escapes from the pressure of the burden of that mystery which f orces him to seek , and readily to accept , some explanation of it . The savage , startled by the muttering of distant thunder , asks , "What is thai ? " and is restless till he knows , or fancies he knows . If told it is the voice of a wrathful demon , that is enough : the explanation is given . If he then be told that to propitiate the demon the sacrifice of some human being is necessary , his slave , his enemy , his friend , perhaps , even , his child , falls a victim to the credulous terror . The childhood of man enables us to

    retrace * the infancy of nations . No one can live with children without being struck by their restless questioning , and unquenchable desire to have everything explained , no less than by the facility with which every authoritative assertion is accepted as an explanation . The History of Philosophy is the story of man ' s successive attempts to explain the phenomena around and within him . The first explanations were naturally enough drawn from analogies , afforded by consciousness . Men saw around them activity , change , force ; they felt within them a mysterious power , which made them active , changing , potent : they explained what they saw , by what they felt . Hence the fetichism of barbarians , the mythologies of more advanced races . Oreads

    and Nymphs , Demons and Beneficent Powers , moved among the ceaseless activities of Nature . Man knows that in his anger he storms , shouts , destroys : what , then , is thunder but the anger of some mighty invisible being ? Moreover , man knows that a present will assuage his anger against an enemy , and it is but natural lie should believe the offended thunderer will also be appeased by some offering . As soon as another conception of the nature of thunder has been elaborated by observation and study of its phenomena , the supposed deity vanishes , and , with it , all the false conceptions it originated , till , at last , Science takes a rod , and draws the terrible lightning from the heavens , render ing it so harmless that it will * not tear away a spider ' s web !

    But long centuries of patient observation and impatient guessing , controlled by logic , were necessary , before such changes could take place . The development of Philosophy , like the development of organic life , has been through the slow additions of thousands upon thousands of years ; for Humanity is a growth , as our globe is , and the laws of its growth are still to be discovered . One of the great fundamental laws has been discovered by Auguste Comte . Before proceeding to expound it , however , it may not be out of place to inquire whether any law of intellectual evolu tion can be regarded as a fitting exponent of the evolution of Humanity , — in other words , whether the various conditions of social existence are dependent on , and

    correspond with , conditions of scientific development ? This has been so luminously stated by John Stuart Mill , in the sixth book of his Logic , that I shall borrow the whole passage . " In order to obtain bettor empirical laws , we must not rest satisfied with noting the progressive changes which manifest themselves in the separate elements of society , and in which nothing is indicated but the relation of the fragments of the effect to corresponding fragments of tho causo . It is necessary to combine the statical view of social phenomena with the dynam ical , considering not only the progressive changes of tho different elements , but tho contemporaneous condition of euoh ; and thus obtain empirically the law of correspondence not only between tho simultaneous states , but between the simultaneous changes , of thosq elements . This law of correspondence it is , which , after being duly verified a priori , will becomo the real scientific derivative tow of tho dovplopment of humanity and human

    affairs . ,.,., . j " In tho difficult process of observation and comparison which is hero required , it would evidently be a very great assistance if it should happen to he the fact , that some one element in tho complex existence of social man is pre-eminent over nil others as tho prime agent of tho social movement . For wo could then take tho progress of that ono element as the central chain , to each successive link of which , tho corresponding links of all tho other progressions being appended , the succession of tho fiwts would by this alone be prowntod in a kind of epoataneoua

    order , fkr more nearly approaching to the real order of their filiation than could be obtained by tiny other merely empirical progress ; "Now , the evidence of history and the evidence of human nature combine , by a most striking instance of consilience , to show that there really is one social element which is thus predominant , and almost paramount , among the agents of tie social progression . This is , the state of the speculative faculties of mankind | including the nature of the speculative beliefs which by any means they have arrived at , concerningthemselves and the world by which they are surrounded . tf

    It would be a great error , and one very little likely to be committed , to assert that speculation , intellectual activity , the pursuit of truth , is among the more powerful propensities of human nature , or fills a large place in the lives of any , save decidedly exceptional individuals . But notwithstanding the relative weakness of this principle among other sociological agents , its influence is the mam deteimnmng cause of the social progress ; all the other dispositions of our nature which contribute to that progress , being dependent upon it for the means of accomplishing their share of the work . Thus ( to take the most obvious case first , ) the impelling force to most of the improvements effected in the arts of life , is the desire of increased material comfort ; but as we can only act uponexternal objects in proportion to our knowledge of them , the state of knowledge at any time is the impassable limit of the industrial improvements possible at that time ; and the progress of industry must follow , and depend upon , the progress of knowledge . The same thing tday be

    shown to be truth , though it is not quite so obvious , of the progress of the fine arts . Further , as the strongest propensities of human nature ( being the purely selfish ones , and those of a sympathetic character which partake most of the nature of selfishness ) evidently tend in themselves to disunite mankind , not to unite them ; -jto make them rivals , not confederatesj social existence is only possible by a disciplining of those more powerful propensities , which consists in subordinating them to a common system of opinions . The degree of this subordination is the measure of the completeness of thesocial union , and the nature of the common opinions determines its kind . But in order that mankind . should conform their actions to any set of opinions , these opinions must exist , must be believed by them . And thus , the state of the speculative faculties , the character of the propositions assented to by the intellect , essentially determines the moral and political state of the community , as we have already seen that itdetermines the physical ;

    " These conclusions , deduced from the laws of human nature , are in entire accordance with the general facts of history . Everyconsiderable change histori cally known to us in the condition of any portion of mankind , has been preceded by a change , of proportional extent ,- in the state of their knowledge , or in their prevalent beliefs . As between any given state of speculation , and the correlative state of everything else , it was almost always the former which first showed itself though the effects , no doubt , reacted potently upon the cause . Every considerable advance in material civilization has been preceded by an advance in knowledge ;

    and when any great social change has come to pass , a great change in the opinions and modes of thinking of society had taken place shortly before . Polytheism , Judaism , Christianity , Protestanism , the negative philosophy -of modern Europe , and its positive science—each of these has been a primary agent in making society what it was at eacli successive period , while society was but secondarily instrumental in making them , each of them ( so far as causes can be assigned fox its existence ) being mainly an emanation not from the practical life of the period , but from the state of belief and thought during some time previous . The weakness of the speculative propensity has not , therefore , prevented the progress of speculation from governing that of society at large j it lias only , and too of ten , prevented progress altogether , where the intellectual progression has come to an early stand for want of sufficiently favourable circumstances . " From this accumulated evidence , we are justified in concluding , that the order of human ession in all respects will be a corollary deducible from the order

    progr of progression in the intellectual convictions of mankind , that is , from the law ot the successive transformations of religion and science . " Assuming it proved , as history will warrant , that the evolutions of Humanity correspond with the evolutions of Thought—that Science is the torch whereby we see our way—the importance of the fundamental law discovered by Comte cannot easily be exaggerated . It is to Social Science what Newton ' s great discovery was to Physics . To" make the reader fairly master its significance I will , in my next paper , illustrate the law by familiar examples ; but as more space would be needed than can here be afforded , I will close this article with a digression on the subject of atheism , which a writer in the Times this week , following many others , attrib utes to

    Comte . It is a mistake . Comte certainly , by more than one passage , leads an incautious reader , dipping here and there , to suppose him an atheist j but I cannot believe any truthful-minded man could read Comtei s works with that attention all serious works demand , and not be strongly impressed by the forcible and scornful rejection of atheism so often there recurring . He regards atheism as the dregs of the metaphysical period , and his scorn for metaphysics is incessant . I will , however , translate a passage from his Discourse on the Ensemble qf Positivism , which , to all who know his unequivocal outspeaking , will be sufficient : — - " Although I have long formally rejected all solidarity—dogmatic no less than historic—between positivism and what is called atheism , I wji here indicate a few summary points of view . Even considered under the

    purely intellectual aspect , atheism only constitutes a very imperfect e J " " " cipation , since it tends to prolong indefinitely the metaphysical stage by » ceaseless , pursuit of new solutions of theological problems , instead o ^ pushing aside all such problems as essentially inaccessible * Tho tru ^ positive spirit consists in always substituting the study of laws to tUa causes—the how to the why . It is , therefore , incompatible with the ambitious dreams of a misty atheism relative to the formation of the waivers , the origin of animals , &c . Positivism , in its appreciation of pur mver stages of speculation , docs not hesitate to declare these doctoral chune very inferior—even in rationality—to tho spontaneous beliefs of man For the principle of all theology consisting in explaining p henom «» a J the intervention of a will , it can only be « et aside by the recognition oi truth that muses are inaccessible , and by the study of the laws . *><> « " *

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    S 76 ; ^ H [ SA ^ tr ^

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), April 17, 1852, page 376, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1931/page/20/