Who knows but that the "&c." may include Hume? And in that case what is the value of M. Comte's praise of him?
[14] Now and always I quote the second edition, by Littré.
[15] "Philosophie Positive," ii. p. 440.
[16] "Le brillant mais superficiel Cuvier."—Philosophie Positive, vi. p. 383.
[17] "Philosophie Positive," iii. p. 369.
[18] Ibid. p. 387.
[19] Hear the late Dr. Whewell, who calls Comte "a shallow pretender," so far as all the modern sciences, except astronomy, are concerned; and tells us that "his pretensions to discoveries are, as Sir John Herschel has shown, absurdly fallacious."—"Comte and Positivism," Macmillan's Magazine, March 1866.
[20] "Philosophie Positive," i. pp. 8, 9.
[21] "Philosophie Positive," iii. p. 188.
[22] The word "positive" is in every way objectionable. In one sense it suggests that mental quality which was undoubtedly largely developed in M. Comte, but can best be dispensed with in a philosopher; in another, it is unfortunate in its application to a system which starts with enormous negations; in its third, and specially philosophical sense, as implying a system of thought which assumes nothing beyond the content of observed facts, it implies that which never did exist, and never will.