6 INTRODUCTION 



that our philosophy will be pessimistic, but even so it will enter 

 the lists to contend with those of different cast, and the attain- 

 ment of truth, if this is a rational universe, must be the ultimate 

 outcome, and with truth, increased well-being. A second justi- 

 fication for such an investigation is thus to provide a critique of 

 current social theories and of schemes for social regeneration. 



Social philosophy has a third function. Advance in science is 

 dependent very largely on the possession of a scientific imagina- 

 tion, — the power to jump at conclusions which become working 

 hypotheses to be verified, repudiated or corrected in the light of 

 inductive study. The western world is interested today as never 

 before in the increase of human well-being. But social ameliora- 

 tion is as truly a science as physics or geology though infinitely 

 more complex. Sane advance in this science must be guided by 

 sane philosophy. The latter will furnish the background for the 

 formulation of laws and methods of social advance and these 

 should prove far more workable than unsophisticated guesses. 



Spencer in his Study of Sociology says that if you give a man 

 who does not understand metal work a sheet of metal with a dint 

 in it and ask him to flatten it out, he will take a hammer and 

 knock the dint flat only to find that it has appeared elsewhere. 

 He tries to flatten these other dints but with like result.^ Thus it 

 is with much social legislation not based on the laws of social 

 change. 



A final Justification is analogous to Comte's praise of the crude 

 behefs of primitive times. As those common behefs in spirits 

 that animated and controlled the phenomena of nature provided 

 a unity of thought as the necessary background for unity of 

 action, so a generally accepted theory of social progress would 

 provide an educational aim that could be put into practice; a 

 common principle of legislation that would make enforcement 

 easy; a common goal of endeavor which might make possible a 

 social reconstruction in the interest both of the group as a whole 

 and of the constituent members. 



Comte claimed this virtue for his system but the vagaries of 

 his Polity did much to retard the spread of his theory. Since 



* Quoted by Hobhouse, Social Evolution and Political Theory, p. 5. 



