Hence it became necessary to fix the Scientific character of all these branches of intelligence, in order to create a Scientific basis for his Sociology. It was, however, impossible for him to claim that a Demonstrable or Infallible method of Proof was applicable to Chemistry and Biology; while, on the other hand, to exhibit such a method as introducing a certainty into Mathematics, Astronomy, and Physics which did not appertain to the other so-called Positive Sciences, would have indicated too plainly the unspanned gulf which yawned between the indubitable Demonstrations of the Exact Sciences and the merely probable Generalizations of the others, and have exposed the fallible character of his Sociological theories.
A Classification was rendered indispensable, therefore, which should display uniformity in its character, and a sufficiently rigorous mode of Scientific proof. To fulfil this end, the Inexact Sciences were accorded a position of certainty in reference to their Principles which does not in reality belong to them; while the Exact or Infallible Sciences were degraded from their peculiarly high state, and brought to the new level of the former on the middle ground of the Positive Philosophy. A quasi-Scientific basis was thus erected for the Sociological movements of the French Reformer.
Had he been as Metaphysically analytical, profound, and discriminating in his intellectual development, as he was vigorous, expansive, and broadly generalising, he would have discerned the insufficiency of the bases of the structure which he was building. Had he understood the Scientific problem of the age, he would have known that until the task which he believed too great for accomplishment was adequately performed, until all the phenomena of the respective Sciences were brought within the scope of a larger Science and included under a Universal Law, there could be no 'clearness, precision, and consistency' throughout all our domains of Thought, and hence no true Sociology. Had he rightly apprehended the nature of 'The Grand Man,' as he aptly denominates Humanity, he would not have failed to perceive that the attempt to measure the capacities and requirements of Society by the capacities and requirements of any individual or individuals, how catholic soever they may be, is but the repetition of the Procrustean principle on a broader basis, and that a reconstructive movement established on such a foundation could not meet the wants of this individualized epoch. That he should not have perceived that the capital and necessary precursor of any true Science of Society must be a Universal Science, a Science of Universal Laws underlying and unifying Physics and Metaphysics, is not strange, when we consider his peculiar mental characteristics. That he should ever have anticipated any permanent acceptance of his Sociological Theories, or regarded his Social Institutions as anything more than transitional forms, could only have been due to a lack of the highest Scientific powers, and to an earnest impatience at beholding Humanity crawling along the path of Progress by the aid of obsolete instrumentalities.
The work which Auguste Comte accomplished was immense. Its value can hardly be overestimated. Every modern Scientist and Thinker is largely indebted to him for that which is indispensable to high intellectual development and progress in thought. For the immense steps in Scientific advancement which he took; for his love of his Race; for his really religious spirit, exhibited in his utter devotion to that which he deemed the highest right; the love and sympathy of every student of Science and every devotee of truth is, and will be, forever his. That he failed in achieving a permanent Scientific basis of a sufficiently universal and unquestionable character—a real Universology, which should exhibit the essential verity of the religious intuitions of the past, and should establish their inherent and harmonious connection with the unfolding intellectual discoveries of the present—is true. But it should not be forgotten that every attempt, made in the right direction, which comes short of the final result, is but a stepping stone for the next effort, and, viewed as a single round in the great ladder of human ascension, a success—an element without which the final achievement would have been impossible. Without Comte there would have been no Buckle, whose work furnishes another of these steps. Every page of the 'History of Civilization' exhibits the indebtedness of the English Historian to the French Encyclopædist of the Sciences; while the 'Intellectual Development of Europe' bears evidence of a 'Positivist' inspiration to which Professor Draper might have more completely yielded with decided benefit. For the lift which the author of the Positive Philosophy and the founder of the Positive Religion has given the world, let us be deeply grateful; although we must reject, as a finality, a System of Science which cannot Demonstrate the correctness of its Principles and Phenomena, or a System of Religion which emasculates mankind of its diviner and more spiritual aspirations, and dwarfs him to the dimensions of a refined Materialism.
In classifying our existing Knowledge, then, on our present basis of Scientific acquisition, we must draw a distinct line between Mathematics, Astronomy, and Physics, on the one side, and all remaining departments of Thought, on the other, and set these three Sciences apart as the Exact or Infallible ones, occupying a rank superior to the others, by virtue of the Certainty and Exactitude with which we are able, through the operation of the true Deductive Method, to ascertain their Principles and Phenomena. We shall then be enabled—by the aid of Comte's principle that the domains of investigation take rank in proportion to the complexity of their Phenomena—to ascertain, after a very brief examination, the place which History holds in the Scale, and how much claim it can lay to a Scientific character.
Comte closes the Hierarchy of the Positive Sciences by adding to the three which we have denominated Exact Sciences, Chemistry, Biology, Sociology, and La Morale, in the order in which they are named, as indicated by the nature of the Phenomena with which they are concerned. If we adopt this arrangement, and annex to each of these general Sciences, as they are called in the language of Positivism, its derived or dependent branches, we shall have the following order: Chemistry; Geology; Biology, including Botany, Human and Comparative Anatomy, and Physiology; Zoology; Sociology; and La Morale. Although this enlarged scale is defective, many important departments, such as Ethnology, Philology, etc., being left out, it is sufficiently correct to show the complex nature of the Phenomena with which History must concern itself.
History—in its largest aspect, that in which we are now considering it—is the record of the progress of the Race in all its various modes of development. In it is therefore involved the examination and consideration of all the agencies, Material or Spiritual, which have operated on Mankind through past ages. Mathematical questions concerning Number, Form, and Force; Astronomical problems on the relation of our Earth to other Celestial bodies, and the effect thereof on Climate, Soil, and Modes of Life; Physical inquiries into the influence of Heat, Electricity, etc., on individuals and nations; Chemical investigations into the nature of different kinds of Food, and their relations to the animal economy, and hence to the career of Peoples; Geological researches to discover the origin of the human Race, and its position in the Animal Kingdom; questions of Physiology, of Social Life, of Ethnology, of Metaphysics, of Religion; every problem, in fine, which the world has been called to consider, forms a part of the record of its progress and comes within the scope of History. As the Descriptology, or verbal daguerreotyping of the Continuity of Society, and hence of the Dynamical aspect of Concrete Sociology, History stands, then, in a sense, at the head of the scale, omitting Theology, the true apex of the pyramid of Sciences, which pyramid Comte has decapitated of this very apex.
The problems which History is called to solve are therefore exceedingly intricate and perplexing. The Generalizations of Chemistry, conducted, as they must be, on our present basis of Knowledge, by the Inductive Method, are involved in a degree of uncertainty, not only on account of the complexity of their Phenomena, but also by reason of the absence of any method of ascertaining when all the elements of a right Generalization are obtained. In Geology, including Mineralogy, the complexity increases, and the possibility of precision and certainty decreases in the same ratio. This augmentation of complexity in the Phenomena and proportionate diminution of exactitude and certainty in respect to the Generalizations derived from them, continues at every successive degree of the scale; so that when we arrive at History, all hope of even proximate precision, and all expectation of anything like positive Knowledge, except in the broadest outline and generalization, by any application of the Inductive Method, has completely vanished.
The hopelessness of a Science of History prior to the discovery of a Unitary Law and the introduction of the Deductive Method into all domains of investigation, now becomes plainly apparent. Until the occurrence of that event we shall look in vain for a true Science of History. With the advent of such a discovery, it will be possible to carry the precision and infallibility of Mathematical Demonstration into all departments of Thought, and to subject the Phenomena of History to well-defined and indubitable Laws.
We must guard, however, against entertaining the supposition that a Unitary Science will bring all the Phenomena of the universe within the compass of Demonstrable apprehension. The province of Science is not infinite, but circumscribed. We are limited in the application of Mathematical Laws, even within the sphere of Pure Mathematics; general equations of the fifth degree having until recently resisted all attempts to solve them; and fields yet remain into which we cannot advance. The power of the human mind to analyze Phenomena ceases at some point, and there our ability to apply Scientific Principles, however indubitable in themselves, ends. It is the office of Exact Science to furnish us with a knowledge of the inherent Laws which everywhere pervade the Universe and govern continuously and unalterably its activities. To the extent to which it is possible to trace the constituent elements of Thought or Things we can have the guidance of these Laws or Principles. But when we reach that point in any department of investigation where the complexity of the Phenomena renders it impossible for the human intellect to successfully analyze it and discover its separate parts, the sphere of accurate Scientific Knowledge is transcended. The Intuition—the faculty which apprehends what we may call the spirit of Concrete things, which goes to conclusions by a rapid process that overleaps intermediate steps, which is our guide in the numerous decisions that we are called to make in our every-day life, and which perceives, in a somewhat vague and indefinite manner—becomes our only guide in this Realm of the Inexact.