CHAP, ii COMTE S LIFE AND TEACHING 23 



field of scientific achievement by detecting new uni- 

 formities. Before Comte, it is urged, there was no 

 science of society. Comte learned from biology to 

 regard society as an organism, profoundly related to) 

 its environment. But that did not establish a science! 'ix 

 of sociology. Two luminous generalisations did so 

 the Law of the Three Stages, and the Hierarchy of the i 

 Sciences. This illustrates to us the intricate arrange- 

 ment of material characteristic of Comte's redundant 

 method. The Hierarchy of the Sciences includes 

 sociology ; but again, the hierarchy is revealed to 

 mankind by sociology ; and, once more, the hierarchy 

 constitutes one half the title-deeds of sociology, justify- 

 ing its claim to be ranked with the sciences. 



It is a somewhat remarkable development of pheno- 

 menalism, this arrangement of sciences, not merely in 

 sequence, but in a rising scale. It recalls to mind the 

 great Idealist systems of Germany, so like, and so j/ 

 unlike, Comte's philosophy. One is not surprised to * 

 find Spencer protesting against the ladder of knowledge, 

 protesting that the relation between different sciences 

 is not one of superiority and subordination, but one of 

 equal reciprocity, each borrowing from each, each lend- 

 ing to the other. Still, if only because, as Carlyle 

 said, "speech is linear though character is solid," still, 

 it is necessary to take sciences one at a time, first one, 

 then another ; the synthetic philosophy itself has a be- 

 ginning, a middle, and an end. And probably Comte's 

 view has better justification than Spencer's, though 

 there is a measure of truth in each. It is true that 

 borrowing and lending go on between different sciences, 

 backwards and forwards, up and down ; but it is also 

 true and the truth is of greater importance that 

 high branches of science are dependent on the results 



