Postscript on Mr. Buckle. 215 



tuseness to subtle distinctions, but even more con 

 spicuously in his utter failure to seize upon any 

 deeply significant but previously hidden relations 

 among facts, in the work which he put forth as 

 the &quot; Novum Organum &quot; of historical science. 



If we contrast his book with some of the really 

 great books which were contemporary with it, 

 such as Mr. Darwin s &quot; Origin of Species,&quot; Mr. 

 Spencer s &quot; Principles of Psychology,&quot; or Sir 

 Henry Maine s &quot; Ancient Law,&quot; the difference is 

 striking enough. Each of these works set forth 

 old facts in new and hitherto unsuspected connec 

 tions, and in so doing enunciated thoughts which 

 have quite changed the aspect of the questions 

 with which they deal. There is not a naturalist 

 in either continent to-day whose most specific in 

 quiries do not bear some more or less conscious 

 reference to what is known as &quot; the Darwinian 

 theory.&quot; The time-honoured contest represented 

 by Locke and Leibnitz, or by Hume and Kant, 

 is beginning to take a new point of departure, 

 owing to Mr. Spencer s suggestion of the acquire 

 ment of mental faculties through inheritance and 

 slow variation ; and Sir Henry Maine s lucid ex 

 position of early ideas regarding contract, prop 

 erty, and family relationship obliges us to look at 

 all the phenomena of society from an altered 



