CHAP, iv THE APPEAL TO HISTORY 37 



under Christian influences, man claims that he shall not 

 ultimately be made subject to the forces of blind and 

 unprogressive nature ; he cries out for God to rescue the 

 historical gains of human culture and human faith from 

 the destructive forces of the natural world ; he finds 

 God answering or anticipating his cry in Jesus Christ. 

 There is nothing like this in Hatch. With him history 

 scarcely differs from a new department of physical 

 science. But we observe a manifest parallel between 

 this Kitschlian position and Comte's subjective synthesis 

 or subordination of the head to the heart. At the same 

 time, there are immense differences. Justifiably or un- 

 justifiably, the Bitschl school, amid all their scorn for 

 dogmatic metaphysics, believe that they themselves, in 

 their own way, have verified faith in God. They think 

 that they have saved theology from the wreck of 

 opinions, by stating it as a view of the contents of 

 historical revelation, and as vouched for by its corre- 

 spondence with man's nature and needs. In Comtism 

 the subjective or affectional synthesis is admittedly a 

 piece of human make-believe. Objectively corresponding 

 to it, there is nothing. 



But how does Comtism itself, which has dismissed 

 all interest in theology and all belief in God, make its 

 own appeal to history for social guidance ? Or in what 

 different ways may such an appeal be made, purely in 

 the interests of society ? 



The simplest view that can be taken is that which 

 regards history as " philosophy teaching by examples." 

 This view has been eagerly pressed upon our generation 

 by one of its most brilliant teachers, Sir J. K. Seeley, 

 though with a special reference to politics in the stricter 

 sense, rather than to what we distinguish as social 

 problems. Political history, according to Seeley, gives 



