48 ON TEE EDUCATIONAL VALUE n 



But, in an educational point of view, it is most 

 important to distinguish between the essence of a 

 science and the accidents which surround it; and 

 essentially, the methods and results of Phj'siology 

 are as exact as those of Physics or Mathematics. 



It is said that the Physiological method is es- 

 pecially comparative * ; and this dictum also finds 

 favour in the eyes of many. I should be sorry to 

 suggest that the speculators on scientific classifica- 

 tion have been misled by the accident of the name 

 of one leading branch of Biology — Comparative 

 Anatomy; but I would ask whether comparison, 

 and that classification which is the result of com- 

 parison, are not the essence of every science 

 •whatsoever? How is it possible to discover a re- 

 lation of cause and effect of any kind without com- 

 paring a series of cases together in which the sup- 

 posed cause and effect occur singly, or combined? 



* " In the third place, we have to review the method of 

 Comparison, which is so specially adapted to the study of 

 living bodies, and by which, above all others, that study 

 must be advanced. In Astronomy, this method is neces- 

 sarily inapplicable ; and it is not till we arrive at Chemistry 

 that this third moans of investipition can be used; and 

 then only in subordination to the two others. It is in the 

 study, both statical and dynamical, of living bodies that it 

 first acquires its full development ; and its use elsewhere 

 can be only through its apjjjication here." — Comtk's Posi- 

 tive Philosopfiy, translated by Miss Martineau. Vol. i. j). 

 372. 



By what method does M. Comte suppose that the equal- 

 ity or inequality of forces and quantities and the dissimi- 

 larity or similarity of forms — i)oints of some slight impor- 

 tance not only in Astronomy and Physics, but even in 

 Mathematics — are ascertained, if not by Comparison f 



