466.
The distinguishing feature of our nineteenth century is not the triumph of science, but the triumph of the scientific method over science.
467.
The history of scientific methods was regarded by Auguste Comte almost as philosophy itself.
468.
The great Methodologists: Aristotle, Bacon, Descartes, Auguste Comte.
469.
The most valuable knowledge is always discovered last: but the most valuable knowledge consists of methods.
All methods, all the hypotheses on which the science of our day depends, were treated with the profoundest contempt for centuries: on their account a man used to be banished from the society of respectable people—he was held to be an "enemy of God," a reviler of the highest ideal, a madman.