8 COMTE TO BENJAMIN KIDD CHAP, i 



whether each author is so much as self -consistent? 

 Thirdly, we ask, granted that we learn some fresh truth, 

 is it taught us authoritatively by science, whether by 

 the science of biology or by some other ? or has natural 

 science merely suggested parables to the moral judg- 

 ment ? These formal or logical tests pretty well clear 

 the ground. A remainder of our theories, however, is 

 overthrown (fourthly) by the final test, by the touch- 

 stone of the moral consciousness. 



Positively our argument can hardly be said to go 

 beyond this point, that if biological clues are to afford 

 guidance for human conduct, they must be supplemented 

 by clearer moral and religious light, and in philosophy 

 by some scheme of metaphysical evolutionism, marking 

 a transition perhaps from "Darwin" to "Hegel." 



