422 ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF BOOKS. 



would prefcT this order; and it has an outward show of regular development. 

 But, when examined closely, it is seen to confuse the natural system. It is 

 empirical. It establishes a doubtful precedency for one kind of art before another. 

 It leaves several chief heads, such as law and philanthropy, to say nothing- of 

 political economy and the whole historical department, unprovided for, and is 

 therefore incomplete. 



To state the question in another way : Having considered mankind in nature, 

 shall we next consider mankind in society, and afterwards the individual person 1 

 This also, although a reasonable order, is practically too large and crude. Some- 

 thing moi'e specific and precise is needful. 



Having considered mankind as a physiological idea, correlative with but 

 generically (or ordinally) distinct from and superior to the rest, and in fact closing 

 up the statement of the whole organic world, we pass to the consideration of the 

 realizations of this highest physiological idea in time and in space, Avhich are 

 its two most abstract and universal formula). In other Avords, having described 

 the earth, and its genera and species of inhabitants, and mankind as one of 

 these, we arrive at the description of the relations which this mankind holds to 

 the world so inhabited — relations first of time and also of space. Now then 

 come u^) in proper series all those questions of the origin and the migrations of 

 human races, to settle which exist the sciences of chronology, ethnology, 

 archaeology, mythology, and general history. That these questions involve 

 discussions of intellectual and spiritual phenomena is true, but only by the way, 

 and incidentally. Their sciences are essentially humauo-terrestrial, and only 

 prepare the Avay for the nobler social and moral sciences. Chronology (5') leads 

 off, because it is the mathematics of the class, and on its deductions ethnology 

 (5^) relies. Archaeology (5^ a) follows, bringing forward with it, and retaining 

 at its side, its protege mythology (5^ b), in spite of the kindred ties between 

 the latter and religion (7^). History (5"^) sums up the whole, and invites atten- 

 tion to the next great group. 



The only serious difficulty met with in reducing these ideas to practice occurs 

 in the matter of historical documents (5* c), which form so large a collection in 

 this and other libraries. Their proper place, in the most perfect system, is not 

 exactly with general history, for they are chiefly the records of single acts and 

 individual lives, and illustrate much higher relationships than that of man with 

 earth. But, on the other hand, the distinction between history and its docu- 

 ments is obscure. Historical text-books, monographs of particular eras, reigns, 

 and individual events, graduate insensibly into pamphlet forms ; while bound 

 volumes of historical addresses, rare political squibs and speeches in Congress 

 or in Parliament, can, after all, stand nowhere in a library so usefully and 

 naturally as on the shelves of history. 



Class VI. Sociology (6^), including, of course, statistics, holds the same relation 

 to the sciences of allairs in the world of men (on which we now enter) that 

 mathematics holds to the sciences of measurement in the world of number, that 

 chemistry holds as the science of molecular arrangement in the Avorldof matter, 

 and that biology holds to the sciences of individuality in living beings. Further- 

 more, its relation to the Avorld of the present is the same as that of chronology 

 (5') to the Avorld of the past. Its questions which now meet us are those of man 

 with man. It leaves to the last-named class all those questions of preliminary 

 fact respecting man and the earth. It takes the past for granted, and proceeds 

 to determine the values of societies of men, considering their status on the 

 earth, their accumulations of industry, the wealth of nature at their command, 

 the energetic forces of invention and association, and the intelligent self-con- 

 struction and self-preservation of society. Manufactures (6"^), commerce (G'^), 

 war (G^), and law (G*'), are its four groups of phenomena, coming in their natural 

 order of advancing intelligence. The legal science is the logical consummation 

 of this class, as religion concludes the next. , 



