historical works (_Kritische Geschichte der Allgemeinen Principien der Mechanik_[61]; _Kritische Geschichte der Philosophie_[62]; _Kritische Geschichte der Nationalökonomie und des Socialismus_[63]) than in his systematic treatises. [61] _Critical History of the General Principles of Mechanics._ [62] _Critical History of Philosophy._ [63] _Critical History of Political Economy and Socialism._ Nevertheless, Dühring can at the farthest be regarded only as one of the forerunners of that Messiah that is destined for German philosophy and German intellectual culture perhaps in the coming century; of that man who shall be able to cast up the accounts of the work of the present period, with its infinite analyses, its historical comparative character, and its pyramidal yield of material, and to condense that which now everywhere surges about us like a spiritual ether, but nowhere palpable or tangible, into the unity of a system that shall point out the paths to be followed and shall dominate all minds. * * * * * There are many,—and among them eminent investigators and estimable scholars,—who smile at this prophecy as an Utopian dream; nay, almost stand in dread of such hopes, as perilous to science. The day of systems, say they, is past. Philosophy, too,—perhaps it were more proper to say "mental science,"—is breaking up into a number of special sciences, over which it is sought to place a general science of knowledge or theory of science, as the last representative of that which was once called philosophy and was recognised as the queen of the sciences.