OF SOCIETY. 



503 



events and facts. The esprit d'ensemble was to guide 

 the student of social life and progress in arriving at 

 a co-ordination of facts in the same way as it must 

 guide the biologist. 1 In this respect Comte took up 

 the same cue as Schelling had done before him. He 

 was equally impressed by recent researches, which had 

 raised the organic or biological sciences to such a high 

 level, but he took a different view of the principle of 

 this advance. In one respect also Comte resembled 

 Hegel : both were animated by a universalistic tendency ; 

 both attempted to grasp the whole of history, not a 

 restricted or limited development in a special period 

 or country. And so it happened to Comte as it did 

 to Hegel, that his followers benefited by the use of 

 the method he had defined, but mostly discarded the 

 first and grand application which he had made of it. 

 It took, as I stated above, a considerable time 



1 This introduced an apparent 

 dualism into Comte's system and 

 led, in the sequel, to antagon- 

 ism between two sides in the 

 positive school not unlike the split 

 which took place among Hegel's 

 followers. This is clearly brought 

 out in an important work by Dr 

 Paul Barth which bears the title 

 ' Die Philosophic der Geschichte als 

 Sociologie' (1897) : "In the sketch 

 which we owe to Comte a closer 

 scrutiny reveals a contradiction : 

 the social series is a continuation 

 of the animal but it is impossible 

 to deduce it therefrom. From the 

 properties of individuals Comte 

 frequently insists the evolution 

 of society cannot be deduced ; 

 sociology cannot be got out of 

 physiology however much biology 

 may form the foundation. The 

 latter gives only certain general 



conceptions, of development, of 

 specialisation of organs, of consensus 

 or solidarity. The positive law of 

 development is that of the three 

 states, by no means a biological but 

 a logical principle. Thus Comte is 

 by no means a in on is t, for, with 

 him, these two principles at least 

 confront each other. It is there- 

 fore quite natural that among the 

 students of sociology that follow, 

 a division should take place. As 

 the intellectual principle strongly 

 predominates with Comte, so much 

 so that it is by no means surprising 

 that it led, in his subjective period, 

 to a fantastic spiritualism, his dis- 

 ciples saw their task in an elaboration 

 of the same. On the other side the 

 natural sciences made, after Comte, 

 great progress, so that it appeared 

 enticing to cultivate the biological 

 side of the system" (vol. i. p. 58). 



