The Philosophy of Auguste Comte

by Lucien Lévy-Bruhl

[CHAPTER III]
THE IDEA OF HUMANITY

In this world there is nothing absolute, everything is relative; Comte wrote this to his friend Valat as early as 1818.[354] But as a matter of fact, there exists a supreme reality to which all others are subordinated, the idea of which is the principle of a rational conception of the world. Comte calls this reality humanity. Instead of being the ultimate end of all thought and all action “in itself,” it is the ultimate end “for us.” But this difference simply signifies that the new philosophy leaves the metaphysical for the positive point of view. With these limitations the idea of humanity “corresponds” to the old idea of the absolute. It takes its place and fulfils its religious part. It is truly, if one dares to say so, a “relative absolute.”

In Comte’s doctrine, the idea of humanity is presented under several successive aspects, or, to put it better, the development of his system has brought to light, in turns, the various attributes of this “Great Being.” In his first career, Comte prefers to consider humanity as an object of science. In his second career, it rather appears to him as an object of adoration and of love. Here we can follow the progress of the mystical and religious feeling which, especially from 1846, filled his thoughts and modified his language, his philosophical doctrine, nevertheless, remaining essentially the same.

I.

We must not, says Comte, define Humanity by man, but on the contrary man by Humanity. In general this formula is understood in a moral and social sense. It is understood as a condemnation of “individualism,” and one of the directing principles of the positivist régime. This interpretation is not a false one, and consequences of this kind can indeed be drawn from Comte’s formula. But they are only consequences. The immediate object of the formula is not to subordinate the individual to the multitude. In the first place it expresses a fact. If we consider a man by himself, positive science only allows us to define him as an animal, in whom as in all others, the end of animal life is to insure organic life. Do we wish to define him by what is essentially human in him, that is to say, by intellect and sociability? One must then pass from the consideration of the individual to that of the species. From the strictly biological point of view M. Bonald’s saying must be reversed; we must say that man is an organism served by an intellect. It is only if we leave the biological for the social point of view, if we look upon the human species as a single “immense and eternal” individual (a conception which is justified by the continued development of intelligence and sociability),[355] that we can consider the voluntary and systematic subordination of vegative to animal life as the ideal type towards which civilised humanity is tending. We can then make use of this subordination to refine it. In a word, we are really men only by our participation of humanity.

The essential attributes of this “immense and eternal social unity” are solidarity and continuity.[356] These attributes are at once social and moral and it could have no others. The attributes of the theological and metaphysical absolute had reference to the categories of substance, of cause, of time, of space, etc. It was one, simple, infinite, etc., all often incomprehensible and contradictory expressions of this idea that the supreme principle is “absolute.” On the contrary, positive philosophy admits that in the scale of beings, dependence grows with dignity. Humanity, which is the most “complex” and the “noblest” of all beings known to us, is therefore also the most dependent. Its existence will necessarily end with that of the planet which it inhabits. Its unity is one of “collection.” It is imperfect and subject to crises of all kinds. Such as it is, however, science and morality show us in it the highest term which our mind can reach, the loftiest ideal which our heart can love, and finally the object most worthy of our devotion.

Human solidarity has been studied by statical sociology. We have seen with what admiration the social consensus inspired Comte, a consensus, according to him, even closer and more intimate than the vital consensus. Positive education will develop the feeling of solidarity and make it the principle of moral instruction. Every individual in all his ways of thinking and acting, will be imbued with two convictions which imply one another. In the first place he will know that he is only really a man by his participation in humanity, since his intelligence and his morality are essentially social things. He will also know that the life of humanity is in part made up of what he brings to it, and that each of his actions, independently of his will has a social interest and a social counterpart. Once we are thoroughly persuaded that we live in humanity and by humanity, we shall also become convinced that we must live for humanity. Malebranche said that God is the locus of intellects: Comte would readily say that humanity is the locus of good wills.

As, in sociology, dynamics is more important than statics, so among the attributes of humanity, continuity is placed above solidarity. Not only are the individuals and the peoples of the same epoch bound by a common solidarity, but the successive generations co-operate in the same work. Each one has its “determined participation” in it: and their combination in time produces “a still nobler and more perfect conception of human unity.” This is the conception which Comte admired so much in Condorcet, which he borrowed from him, and which he developed in the positive idea of progress.

Humanity so understood will inspire us with the strongest feelings of gratitude. Do we not owe to her all that is good, precious and human in us? Man will see “co-operators” in the men of all time.[357] Each of us has to reflect only upon his physical, intellectual and moral being to realise what he owes to the whole of his predecessors. The man who would think himself independent of others could not even formulate this error (which in Comte’s eyes becomes blasphemy) without contradicting himself; for is not language itself a collective and social work?[358]

History will become the “sacred science” of humanity. To put it more simply, it will be the ever clearer consciousness which humanity will have of itself, through the study of its intellectual and moral activity in the past. Gradually, with the progress of the historical spirit, the idea of an evolution subject to laws, the idea of “order conceived as capable of development,” will become substituted to the prejudice which attributes to man boundless power of action upon social facts. It will become apparent that the part played by each generation in the common work of humanity is necessarily a very small one, as compared with what is transmitted to it by previous generations. To refuse this inheritance would be to refuse to be what we are: it would be an absurd and immoral pretention, and, moreover, entirely fruitless. It is impossible for man to disown humanity without ceasing to exist. He necessarily represents, while he lives, a long past of intellectual and moral efforts. And this is the most essential attribute of human life, although we meet with more or less developed solidarity also among other animal species. But continuity belongs to humanity alone. In a word, according to Comte’s fine formula: “Humanity is made up more of the dead than of the living.”