SPENCER AND EVOLUTION. 29 



view in a different sphere, the essay on the " Genesis of Science " 

 being contributed to the British Quarterly Review in July, 1854. 

 This was primarily called forth by Miss Martineau's " Abridgment of 

 Comte," then just issued, and was in part devoted to the refutation of 

 the French philosopher's views respecting the classification of the 

 sciences. But it became the occasion for a further development of the 

 doctrine of Evolution in its relation to intellectual progress. The 

 whole genesis of science is there traced out historically under the as- 

 pect of a body of truths, which, while they became differentiated into 

 different sciences, became at the same time more and more integrated, 

 or mutually dependent, so as eventually to form " an organism of the 

 sciences." There is, besides, a recognition of the gradual increase in 

 definiteness that accompanies this increase in heterogeneity and in co- 

 herence. 



It was at this time that Mr. Spencer's views on psychology began 

 to assume the character of a system the conception of intellectual 

 progress now reached being combined with the ideas of life previously 

 arrived at, in the development of a psychological theory. The essay 

 on the " Art of Education," ' published in the North British Review 

 (May, 1854), assisted in the further development of these ideas. In 

 that essay the conception of the progress of the mind during educa- 

 tion is treated in harmony with the conception of mental Evolution 

 at large. Methods are considered in relation to the law of develop- 

 ment of the faculties, as it takes place naturally. Education is re- 

 garded as rightly carried on only when it aids the process of self-de- 

 velopment ; and it is urged that the course in all cases followed should 

 be from the simple to the complex, from the indefinite to the definite, 

 from the concrete to the abstract, and from the empirical to the ra- 

 tional. 



Having reached this stage in the unfolding of his ideas, Mr. Spencer 

 began the writing of the " Principles of Psychology " in August, 

 1854. This is a work of great originality, and is important as mark- 

 ing the advance of Mr. Spencer's philosophical views at the time of its 

 preparation. The whole subject of mind is dealt with from the Evo- 

 lution point of view. The idea which runs through " Social Statics," 

 that there is ever going on an adaptation between living beings and 

 their circumstances, now took on a profounder significance. The rela- 

 tion between the organism and its environing conditions was found to 

 be involved in the very nature of life ; and the idea of adaptation 

 was developed into the conception that life itself " is the definite com- 

 bination of heterogeneous changes, both simultaneous and successive 

 in correspondence with external coexistences and sequences." It is 

 argued that the degree of life varies with the degree of correspond- 

 ence, and that all mental phenomena ought to be interpreted in terms 



1 Republished in his little work on "Education," under the title of " Intellectual Edu- 

 cation." 



