VI PREFACE. 



that reason they have been now and then betrayed into 

 speculations that would grace the most arbitrary pages 

 of Hegel's " Naturpliilosophie." 



What Hegel needed was a better appreciation of the 

 empirical aspects of inquiry. What the empirical scien- 

 tist needs is a better appreciation of the speculative 

 aspects of inquiry. And clear indications are not 

 wanting that the true relation between the empirical 

 and the speculative is coming to be better understood 

 by many in both these special schools of thought. 



If this be true, we may infer that the scientist of 

 the future will not be content, nor even feel secure, 

 without a " speculative" training; while the specialist in 

 speculative studies will not dare, even if he should 

 desire, to remain in ignorance of the special methods 

 and results of the so-called empirical sciences. 



Indeed, as was just intimated, these sciences are 

 already far from wanting in sufficiently daring specula- 

 tions. And it is to be added that the culmination of 

 these speculations, in their most elaborate and most 

 consistent presentation, we owe to Herbert Spencer. 

 It is for this reason that I have never been able to 

 separate the work of Mr. Spencer from that of Hegel, 

 widely as these two are contrasted in many respects. 

 Evolution, and fixity of order in Evolution that is the 

 key-note of both systems. The one develops this con- 

 ception in the form of the necessary process of Thought 

 itself. The other traces the evidences verifying this 

 conception throughout the realm of " Nature " consid- 



