This may perhaps be the work of centuries. We are only witnessing its early beginnings. We still have only a vague idea of a polity founded upon science; and we do not yet know what individual and social psychology will yield as a positive science. Comte anticipated results which could not be immediate. This is yet another feature which he has in common with Descartes, to whom we have so often had occasion to compare him. Having conceived a certain mathematical ideal of physical science, Descartes pictured the problems of nature, and especially of living nature, as being infinitely less complex than they are. Our scientific men to-day no longer venture to put to themselves the biological questions whose solution appeared to Descartes to be comparatively easy. In the same way, Auguste Comte, having recognised that moral and social phenomena should be objects of science, just as those of inorganic and living nature, believed this new science to be far more advanced by his own labours than it was in reality. It is easy to understand his mistake. He was anxious to proceed to the “social reorganisation,” in view of which he was constructing his philosophy. Then, given the conception he had formed of social science, he was bound to think that the discovery of the great dynamic law of the three States was sufficient to finally constitute it. In his eyes “the hardest part of the work was done.” Sociologists at present believe that almost everything remains to be done. But, here again, we may renew the comparison between Descartes and Comte. In the work of both, without much difficulty, we can distinguish what is done by the scientific man properly so-called and what is done by the philosopher. It is the same with Comte the sociologist as with Descartes the physicist. Their hypotheses have met with the fate common to scientific labours, of which Comte himself has so well set forth the necessary transitoriness. The other portion of their work, more general in character, is possessed of more enduring qualities. In this sense, and setting aside his political and religious views, which belong to another order, the speculative philosophy of Comte is living still, and pursues its evolution even within the minds of those who are engaged in opposing it. THE END. _W. Jolly & Sons, Printers, Albany Press, Aberdeen._ FOOTNOTES: [370] Cours, IV, 237. * * * * * Transcriber's Notes Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations in hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all other spelling and punctuation, in particular the inconsistent punctuation of the footnotes, remains unchanged. Opening or closing quotation marks are frequently omitted. Where these are obvious they have been inserted, otherwise they have been left unchanged.