Science and Tradition 



misery and hunger. The influence of writers such as Voltaire and 

 Rousseau, that is, the influence of their social writings, has been exag- 

 gerated, while the influence of science has been underestimated. The 

 Old Regime could function only in the darkness; as soon as light was 

 being poured into the dark corners, the defects and diseases became 

 visible and obnoxious, and the thought of correcting them almost un- 

 avoidable. During the eighteenth century science, pure science, grew 

 steadily, slowly at first, then faster and faster. The new intellectual tem- 

 per which has been referred to above, was shaping itself. The Old 

 Regime was established on superstitions, such as the divine right of 

 kings, the excessive privileges of the aristocracy and of the high clergy, 

 the identity of state and crown. Men of science did countenance such 

 superstitions, just as long as they themselves were inhibited by them, 

 but not much longer. Their own ideas, scientific ideas, did not have 

 much currency to begin with and their field of activity was at first very 

 restricted, but in that field, which was steadily growing, their power was 

 irresistible. Moreover, these ideas were gradually vulgarized, not only 

 by the Encyclopedistes and by Voltaire, but by such inoffensive people 

 as BuFFON and the abbe Pluche. 



Diseases, whether of the human body or of the body politic, can exist 

 and flourish indefinitely as long as they are hidden, but throw the light 

 of knowledge upon them and the situation begins to change; aye, it may 

 change so fast that a revolution occurs. The diseases are recognized 

 and their danger acknowledged; they are described with increasing pre- 

 cision, remedies are contemplated and tried, the experiments are pub- 

 lished, the victims are counted and the damages evaluated, the deter- 

 mination of fighting the evil and overcoming it is strengthened. The 

 struggle becomes more intense and sooner or later the diseases are 

 cured if they be curable, or they are abated if they are not. 



Before the Revolution a few personal diseases could be alleviated but 

 social diseases were practically incurable, because it was impossible to 

 investigate them and to know them sufficiently. In the second half of 

 the nineteenth century the conditions of research and healing were de- 

 cidedly better. Among the benefactors to whom we owe that improve- 

 ment I would like to commemorate one, the Belgian Adolphe Quetelet 

 ( 1796-1874). Quetelet did not declaim against social evils but he un- 

 dertook to make a scientific investigation of them and he was one of the 

 first to realize strongly that when the elements to be considered are far 

 too numerous to be studied individually, the only method of approach 

 is the statistical method. He had been trained to appreciate the value 

 and limitations, the difficulties and pitfalls of that method by his studies 

 of meteorology and phenology. He discovered that the average num- 

 ber of robberies, murders, suicides, births out of wedlock, etc., is con- 

 stant in a given community (under normal conditions) and drew the 

 conclusion that these crimes and delinquencies must needs divulge reali- 

 ties comparable to physical realities, and that the most secret behavior 

 of men is submitted to social laws of the same kind as the laws of physics. 

 It follows that those crimes and delinquencies are caused partly by the 



