192 COSMIC PHILOSOPHY. [PT. n. 



use of elimination as it is employed in the simpler sciences. 

 &quot; If without any previous investigation of the properties of 

 terrestrial matter, Newton had proceeded at once to study the 

 dynamics of the universe, and after years spent with the 

 telescope in ascertaining the distances, sizes, times of revolu 

 tion, inclinations of axes, forms of orbits, perturbations, etc., 

 of the celestial bodies, had set himself to tabulate this 

 accumulated mass of observations, and to educe from them 

 the fundamental laws of planetary and stellar equilibrium, 

 he might have cogitated to all eternity without arriving at a 

 result.&quot; This lucid illustration, which I have cited from the 

 introduction to Mr. Spencer s &quot; Social Statics,&quot; suggests the 

 proper method of approaching the investigation of complex 

 phenomena. Minor perturbing elements must for a time be 

 left out of consideration, just as the inequalities of motion 

 resulting from the mutual attractions of the planets were at 

 first passed over in the search for the general formula of 

 gravitation. The discussion of endless minute historical 

 details must be reserved until the law of social changes has 

 been deduced from the more constant phenomena, and is 

 ready for inductive verification. A law wide enough to form 

 a basis for sociology must needs be eminently abstract, and 

 can be found only by contemplating the most general and 

 prominent characteristics of social changes. The prime 

 requisite of the formula of which we are in quest is that it 

 should accurately designate such changes under their leading 

 aspect. 



Now by far the most obvious and constant characteristic 

 common to a vast number of social changes is that they are 

 changes from a worse to a better state of things, that they 

 constitute phases of Progress. It is not asserted that human 

 history has in all times and places been the history of 

 progress ; it is not denied that at various times and in many 

 places it has been the history of retrogression ; but attention 

 is called to the fact made trite by long familiarity, yet none 



