OF SOCIETY. 495 



thinkers like Mill, G-rote, and Lewes, we must add the 

 much more important fact that Comte offered exactly 

 that which Mill was occupied with and in search of, 

 but for which Comte's own countrymen were not yet 

 prepared, a patient and scientific analysis of the methods 

 of the exact sciences and an examination as to how far 

 these could, or could not, be employed in the treatment 

 of political and social questions. 



Mill had l completed about two-thirds of his ' System 

 of Logic ' ; he had at an earlier stage already become 

 acquainted with Comte's writings when the latter was 

 still classed as a disciple of Saint-Simon. Having for a 

 time lost sight of him, he again fell in with him when the 47. 



Influence on 



first two sociological volumes of the ' Cours de Philosophic J - s- Mil1 - 

 Positive ' were published. In them he found assistance 

 in elaborating his theory of " the Inverse Deductive 

 Method as the one chiefly applicable to the complicated 

 subjects of History and Statistics." We know that Mill's 

 logical studies were originally prompted by a similar 

 desire to that of Comte viz., to make the methods 

 which had proved so fertile in natural philosophy useful 

 and applicable in dealing with political, or what we now 

 term social problems. The further development of 

 Comte's ideas on the subject of social science had 

 disappointed him, but his " enthusiasm was rekindled " 

 when in the sociological volumes Comte expounded his 

 ' Connected View of History ' which contained his cele- 

 brated ' Law of the Three States.' Mill then carried on 

 an interesting correspondence with Comte, which termin- 

 ated when, as Mill says, " I found, and he probably 



1 See 'Autobiography,' p. 209. 2 Ibid., p. 210. 



