OF THE GOOD. 



191 



It seems thus as if Comte is aimin^ at bringing about 37. 



° o o ^ „g^y social 



a generally recognised and accepted Order of things as °^^^'^- 

 the first requisite of further progress. As I stated 

 above, the existence of such an order seems to have been 

 tacitly or openly admitted by all moral philosophers 

 in this country, forming as it were the background of 

 their speculations and . the object of their reforms. 

 Comte thus aimed at providing by philosophical reason- 

 ing and instruction what in this country had uncon- 

 sciously grown up under the automatic play of historical 

 forces. 



In the later phase of his philosophical speculations, 

 which were much influenced by the peculiar conditions 

 of his private life, he seems to have devoted all his 

 powers to this scheme of social reconstruction and or- 

 ganisation, reviewing at the same time the principal 

 points of his earlier doctrine as contained in the ' Cours 

 de Philosophie Positive ' : the important change or ad- 

 dition, so far as the subject of this chapter is concerned, 

 being this, — that he saw the necessity of adding to the 

 six sciences classified in his earlier scheme, a seventh, 

 that of morals, which is to follow the science of Sociology, 



this metaphysical difference through 

 which the Oottinnvjkeit of Kiause 

 becomes meaningless for Comte, 

 being replaced by Alentichhcitinnig- 

 keit, the similarity of the ethical 

 temper and the intellectual atti- 

 tude of the two thinkers is striking. 

 Vivrc pour autrui and Vivrc au 

 f/rand jour; these are the two 

 precepts in which the founder of 

 positivism sums up his ethics. 

 'You ought to further the perfec- 

 tion of all beings witli all your 

 might : and this intercourse should 

 be such as it would be if we could 



contemplate each other directly 

 as spirits ' : this may he said to be 

 the kernel of the humane ethics of 

 Krause. And not only in the belief 

 in moral progress . . .but also in 

 many externalities can we trace 

 this analogy ; the predilection for 

 the didactic form of a catechism, 

 for the elaboration of principles in 

 the smallest detail, the repellently 

 dry terminology surcharged with 

 newlj' created technicalities. Both 

 feel themselves to be prophets in 

 this world , &c. , &c. " (' Geschichte 

 der Ethik,' vol. ii. pp. 102, 103.) 



