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Precluded by their education from any plan of scien- tific observation of even the smallest phenomena, from any notions of normal legislation, from all perception of what demonstration is, they ought to obviously be incapable of applying a technique in which they had no exercise to the most complicated of all analyses." 396 Comte in fact would acknowledge to the research of sociology only guys who experienced successively 182 THE COUNTER-REVOLUTION 6F SCIENCE and properly mastered all the other sciences and so adequately organized on their own for the most tricky process of the examine of the most complex of all phenomena. 397 Although the additional develop- ment of the new science could not all over again present difficulties as terrific as those he had himself surmounted in initial building it, 398 only the extremely finest minds could hope successfuly to grapple with them. The exclusive problem of this job occurs from the absolute requirement of working with all elements of culture at the exact time, a requirement dic- tated by the specially near "consensus" of all social phenomena. To have sinned in opposition to this principle and to have tried to deal with financial phenomena in isolation, "apart from the evaluation of the intellectual, ethical, and political point out of culture," 399 is one of his key reproaches towards the economists. Their "pretended science" provides to "all qualified and professional judges most decidedly the character of purely metaphysical ideas." 40 "If a single considers impartially the sterile disputes which divide them regarding the most elementary concepts of price, utility, production, and so on., just one may well fancy oneself attending the strangest debates of medieval scholastics on the essential characteristics of their metaphysical entities." 401 But the major defect of political economic system is its summary, "the sterile aphorism of complete industrial liberty," 402 the belief that there is no will need of some "specific establishment instantly charged with the endeavor of regularizing the spontaneous co-ordination" which should be re- garded as basically providing the possibility for imposing authentic organi- zation. 403 And he particularly condemns the inclination of political economic system to "answer to all problems that in the extensive operate all lessons, and specifically the a single most wounded on the current occasion, will enjoy a serious and long term satisfaction a reply which will be re- garded as derisive, as very long as man's lifestyle is incapable of becoming indefi- nitely lengthened." 404 eight. It cannot be much too much emphasized in any dialogue of Comte's philosophy that he had no use for any know-how of which he did not see the practical use. 405 And "the reason of the institution of social philosophy is to re-establish buy in modern society." 406 Nothing seems to him "far more repugnant to the serious scientific spirit, not even the theological spirit," 407 than disorder of any type, and almost nothing is SOCIOLOGY: COMTE, AND HIS SUCCESSORS 183 most likely more attribute of the complete of Comte's perform than "the inordinate demand from customers for 'unity' and 'systematization' " which J. S. Mill described as the fons errorum of all Comte's later speculations. 408 But even if the "frenzy for regulation" 409 is not really as preponder- ant in the Cours as it turned in the Syst&me de philosophic optimistic, the sensible conclusions to which the Cours leads, just since they are however totally free from the great exaggeration of the afterwards function, present this aspect already in a marked degree. With the institution of the "definitive" 41 philosophy, positivism, the crucial doctrine which has characterised the previous period of changeover has done its historic mission and the accompanying dogma of the unbounded liberty of conscience will vanish. 411 To make the producing of the Cours attainable was, as it had been, the very last needed purpose of "the groundbreaking dogma of free enquiry," 412 but now that this is achieved, the dogma has shed its justification. All information staying after again unified, as it has not been due to the fact the theological stage began to decay, the up coming task is to set up a new mental govern- ment the place only the proficient experts will be authorized to decide the difficult social concerns. 413 Since their action will in all respects be determined by the dictates of science, this will not imply arbitrary government, and "true liberty," which is nothing else than "a rational submission to the preponderance of the legislation of mother nature," 414 will even be increased. The depth of the social business which beneficial science will im- pose will need not worry us in this article. So significantly as economic everyday living is concerned, it however resembles in lots of respects the earlier Saint-Simonian strategies, specially in so far as the major function of the bankers in guiding in- dustrial activity is anxious. 415 But he dissents from the later out- right socialism of the Saint-Simonians. Private residence is not to be abolished, but the wealthy become the "important depositaries of the community capitals" 418 and the possessing of property a social perform. 417 This is not the only issue in which Comte's system resembles the afterwards authoritarian socialism which we associate with Prussia relatively than socialism as we utilised to know it. In point in some passages this resemblance with Prussian socialism, even down to the extremely words and phrases employed, is actually incredible. Thus when he argues that in the long run so- ciety the "immoral" principle of specific rights will disappear and 184 THE COUNTER-REVOLUTION OF SCIENCE there will be only duties, 418 or that in the new modern society there will be no personal individuals but only point out functionaries of numerous units and grades, 419 and that in consequence the most humble profession will be ennobled by its incorporation into the formal hierarchy just as the most obscure soldier has his dignity as a end result of the solidarity of the military services organism, 420 or last but not least when, in the concluding portion of the initial sketch of the foreseeable future purchase, he discovers a "distinctive disposi- tion in direction of command in some and Hot sexy Chat in the direction of obedience in other individuals" and assures us that in our innermost heart we all know "how sweet it is to obey," 421 we may match just about every sentence with identical statements of recent German theoreticians who laid the intellectual foundations of the doctrines of the Third Reich. 422 Having been led by his philosophy to consider about from the reactionary Bonald the watch that the particular person is "a pure abstraction" 423 and society as a total a solitary collective staying, he is of necessity led to most of the char- acteristic attributes of a totalitarian check out of culture. The later growth of all this into a new Religion of Humanity with a entirely created cult is exterior our topic. Needless to say that Comte, who was so entirely a stranger to the one particular real cult of humanity, tolerance (which he would acknowledge only in indifferent and uncertain matters), 424 was not the man to make a great deal of that idea, which in by itself does not absence a specific greatness. For the rest we can- not far better summarize this final phase of Comte's assumed than by the effectively-regarded epigram of Thomas Huxley, who described it as "Ca- tholicism minus Christianity." 9. Before we solid a look on the immediate affect of Comte's major get the job done we must briefly look at certain simultaneous and in a perception parallel efforts which, from the exact same mental history, but by a distinct route, manufactured an perception which tended to reinforce the tendencies of which Comte's function is the primary repre- sentative. The Belgian astronomer and statistician Quetelet, who need to be pointed out here in the to start with position, differs from Comte not only by getting a terrific scientist in his personal subject but also by the wonderful contributions which he has designed to the methods of social research. He did this specifically by that software of arithmetic to social analyze which Comte condemned. Through his application of the "Gaussian" SOCIOLOGY: COMTE, AND HIS SUCCESSORS 185 regular curve of mistake to the assessment of statistical info he became, much more than any other single man or woman, the founder of modern stats and significantly of its application to social phenomena. The worth of this achievement is undisputed and indisputable. But in the standard ambiance in which Quetelet's function grew to become known the belief was sure to crop up that the statistical techniques, which he had so good results- fully utilized to some problems of social daily life, were being destined to become the sole technique of research. And Quetelet himself contributed not a little to develop that perception. The intellectual surroundings out of which Quetelet rose 425 is ex- actly the identical as that of Comte: it was the French mathematicians of the circle of the Ecole poly procedure earlier mentioned all Laplace and Fourier, from whom he drew the inspiration for the application of the principle of likelihood to the trouble of social studies, and in most respects he, a great deal extra than Comte, need to be regarded as the genuine continuer of their work and of that of Condorcet. His statistical get the job done right is not our issue. It was the typical influence of his dem- onstration that a little something like the techniques of the purely natural sciences could be utilized to specified mass phenomena of modern society and of his implied and even specific need that all challenges of social science really should be dealt with in a very similar manner, which operated in a course parallel to Comte's teaching. Nothing fascinated the ensuing genera- tion so much as Quetelet's "average male" and his celebrated con- clusion of his scientific studies of moral data that "we pass from a single year to another with the unhappy standpoint of observing the same crimes repro- duced in the exact same purchase and contacting down the similar punishments in the similar proportions