60 PREFACE. 



says, with a candour equally rare and admirable, that 

 he has vainly searched M. Comte s works and his 

 own mind for an answer. Nevertheless, he adds s 

 &quot;j ai reussi, je crois, a ecarter 1 attaque de M. Her 

 bert Spencer, et a sauver le fond par des sacrifices 

 indispensables mais accessoires.&quot; The sacrifices are 

 these. He abandons M. Comte s division of In 

 organic Science into Celestial Physics and Ter 

 restrial Physics a division which, in M. Comte s 

 scheme, takes precedence of all the rest ; and he 

 admits that neither logically nor historically docs 

 Astronomy come before Physics, as M. Comte alleges. 

 After making these sacrifices, which most will think 

 too lightly described as &quot; sacrifices indispensables 

 mais accessoires,&quot; M. Littre proceeds to rehabilitate 

 the Comtean classification in a way which he con 

 siders satisfactory, but which I do not understand. 

 In short, the proof of these incongruities affects his 

 faith in the Positivist theory of the sciences, no 

 more than the faith of a Christian is affected by 

 proof that the Gospels contradict one another. 



Here in England I have seen no attempt to meet 

 the criticisms with which M. Littre thus deals. 

 There has been no reply to the allegation, based on 

 examples, that the several sciences do not develop 

 in the order of their decreasing generality ; nor to 

 the allegation, based on M. Comte s own admissions, 

 that within each science the progress is not, as ho 

 says it is, from the general to the special ; nor to 



