THE SCIENTIFIC SPIRIT IN FRANCE. 



125 



method has been most fruitful, and, far from being ex- 

 hausted, promises undreamt of results in the future. It 

 was probably more from the desire to keep his view 

 clear and his method simple, than with any necessarily 

 sceptical tendency, that when Laplace was questioned by 

 Napoleon how it was that in the great volumes of the 

 ' Mecanique celeste ' the name of God did not appear, he 

 replied, " Sire, je n'ai pas besoin de cette hypothese." 



But French science did not leave that great field of 

 research uncultivated, which is the very playground of 

 individual life. Its cultivation was the work of that 

 other great representative of French science the con- 

 temporary of Laplace Georges Cuvier. 1 Linnaeus had 



27. 



Individu- 



a"ty the 



centre of 



Ol 



the group is set down under that 

 characteristic. This is the raw 

 material from which the statist 

 endeavours to deduce general theo- 

 rems in sociology. Other students 

 of human nature proceed on a dif- 

 ferent plan. They observe indi- 

 vidual men, ascertain their history, 

 analyse their motives, and compare 

 their expectation of what they will 

 do with their actual conduct. This 

 may be called the dynamical method 

 of study as applied to man. How- 

 ever imperfect the dynamical study 

 of man may be in practice, it evi- 

 dently is the only perfect method 

 in principle, and its shortcomings 

 arise from the limitation of our 

 powers rather than from a faulty 

 method of procedure. If we be- 

 take ourselves to the statistical 

 method, we do so confessing that 

 we are unable to follow the details 

 of each individual case, and expect- 

 ing that the effects of widespread 

 causes, though very different in each 

 individual, will produce an average 

 result on the whole nation, from a 

 atudy of which we may estimate 

 the character and propensities of 



an imaginary being called the Mean 

 Man." 



1 It is not necessary here to ex- 

 plain the reasons which have in- 

 duced me to confine myself mainly 

 to the two great names of Laplace 

 and Cuvier as the great repre- 

 sentatives of the exact scientific 

 Spirit, as it first asserted its su- 

 premacy in France, and from there 

 gradually fought its way all over 

 Europe. To me it seems that no- 

 where has this modern scientific 

 spirit been represented in greater 

 completeness and greater purity. 

 This is so much the more remark- 

 able, as other influences and tempta- 

 tions were not wanting in that age 

 and country which might have in- 

 terfered with the application of 

 the purely scientific method. The 

 scientific spirit is in danger of being 

 contaminated by two interests which 

 are essentially foreign to it : the 

 one is the practical, the other the 

 philosophical. Frequently they are 

 united ; and when united their influ- 

 ence on the progress of science has 

 frequently been disastrous. In no 

 department of knowledge has this 



