CHAPTEK VII. 



OF THE CHEMICAL, OR EXPERIMENTAL, METHOD IN 

 THE SOCIAL SCIENCE. 



1. |THE laws of the phenomena of society are, and can 

 be, nothing but the laws of the actions and passions of human 

 beings united together in the social state. Men, however, in 

 a state of society, are still men ; their actions and passions 

 are obedient to the laws of individual human nature. Men 

 are not, when brought together, converted into another kind 

 of substance, with different properties; as hydrogen and 

 oxygen are different from water, or as hydrogen, oxygen, 

 carbon, and azote, are different from nerves, muscles, and 

 tendons. Human beings in society have no properties but 

 those which are derived from, and may be resolved into, the 

 laws of the nature of individual man. In social phenomena 

 the Composition of Causes is the universal law. 



Now, the method of philosophizing which may be termed 

 chemical overlooks this fact, and proceeds as if the nature of 

 man as an individual were not concerned at all, or were con- 

 cerned in a very inferior degree, in the operations of human 

 beings in society. All reasoning in political or social affairs, 

 grounded on principles of human nature, is objected to by 

 reasoners of this sort, under such names as " abstract theory." 

 For the direction of their opinions and conduct, they profess 

 to demand, in all cases without exception, specific experience. 



This mode of thinking is not only general with practi- 

 tioners in politics, and with that very numerous class who (on 

 a subject which no one, however ignorant, thinks himself 

 incompetent to discuss) profess to guide themselves by common 

 sense rather than by science ; but is often countenanced by 

 persons with greater pretensions to instruction ; persons who, 

 having sufficient acquaintance with books and with the current 



