NATURE AND LIMITS OF SCIENCE OF POLITICS. 729 



experience that is, on science but the mere fact that statesmen are 

 constantly impelled to act at once in directions which very imperfectly 

 correspond to their own conceptions of what is really best throws a 

 shadow of doubt and uncertainty over the scientific character of the 

 studies concerned. It is felt, not unreasonably, that if those who are 

 most concerned to be acquainted with the best methods of political 

 research forbear to turn these methods to account at the moment of 

 the utmost need, this is at least as likely to result from the inherently 

 imperfect and illogical nature of the branch of knowledge in question 

 as from any other cause. To this comprehensive skepticism some of 

 the classes of facts above adverted to may be held to supply an an- 

 swer. The unscientific character of a policy adopted at any crisis has 

 often been an exact measure of the amount of external pressure ap- 

 plied through the competition of factions, or through the impetuosity 

 of a populace only jaded into an unwonted attention to political affairs 

 by exceptional events. Where this pressure is not at hand, rulers still 

 may, indeed, through unworthy influences and motives, prefer the 

 worse to the better way ; but enough instances of the persistent 

 maintenance of a deliberately adopted policy in the face of the most 

 seductive allurements to fluctuation have been exhibited to show that 

 it can not be fairly alleged that Politics must necessarily be unscien- 

 tific because few in the real business of life have time, or liberty, or 

 tenacity of purpose, sufficient to withstand the impetuous torrent of 

 popular zeal generated by sudden crises or catastrophes. 



Probably the most real and enduring objection to the claims of 

 Politics to assume the rank of a true science is the confessedly imma- 

 ture and imperfectly developed character of the component or pre- 

 paratory studies, apart from which, in their combination with each 

 other, the study of Politics can not be pursued. It has already been 

 noticed that the complex and composite nature of political studies is 

 of itself a presumption against the facility, if not against the possibility, 

 of ever imparting to those studies the rigorous certainty essential to 

 Science. But this presumption is greatly increased by the fact that in 

 such broad but indispensable preparatory studies confessedly of a 

 scientific aspect as Ethics, Economics, and Jurisprudence, there are 

 to be found only the very smallest' number of uncontroverted propo- 

 sitions. And, even as to the logical methods applicable in each branch 

 of knowledge, no generally assented-to decisions have yet been ac- 

 cepted. 



There is thus afforded to the skeptically-minded a wide opening 

 for treating as unscientific a study which, like that of Politics, must 

 be built up on conclusions yet to be established in those other regions 

 of knowledge, but none of which are as yet established with a certainty 

 which is beyond debate. Nevertheless, if it be admitted that those 

 component studies are capable of being placed on a strictly scientific 

 foundation, and only wait for longer time and attention to assume 



