10 



the limits of pliilosopliical inquiry wliich I, iii cOiiiiiion with many 

 other men of science, hohl to be just, the Archbishop opens his 

 address by identifying this " new philosophy^' with the positive 

 philosophy of M. Comte (of whom he speaks as its "founder;") 

 and then proceeds to attack that philosoper and his doctrines 

 vigorously. Now, so far as I am concerned, the most reverend 

 prelate might dialectically hew M. Comte in pieces, as a modern 

 ^Vgag, and I should not attempt to stay his hand. In so far as 

 my study of what specially characterizes tlie Positive Philoso2:>hy 

 has led me, I find therein little or nothing of any scientific value, 

 and a great deal which is as thoroughly antagonistic to the very 

 essence of science as anything in ultramontane Catholicism. In 

 fact, M. Comte's philosophy in practice might be compendiously 

 described as Catholicism onimis Christianity. But what has 

 Comptism to do with the " Xew Philosophy," as the Archbishop) 

 defines it in the fi3llowing passage ? 



" Let me briefly remind you of the leading principles of this 

 new philosophy. 



" All knowledge is experience of facts acquired by the senses. 

 The traditions of older philosophies have obscured our ex2:>erience 

 by mixing with it much that the senses cannot observe, and until 

 these additions are discarded our knowledge is impure. Thus, 

 metaphysics tell us that one fact which we observe is a cause, 

 and another is the efl*ect of that cause ; but upon a rigid analysis 

 we find that our senses observe nothing of cause or effect ; they 

 observe, first, that one fact succeeds another, and, after some op- 

 portunity, that tliis fact has never failed to follow — that for cause 

 and effect Ave should substitute invariable succession. An older 

 philosophy teaches us to define an object by distinguishing its 

 essential from its accidental qualities ; but experience knows 

 nothing of essential and accidental ; she sees only that certain 

 marks attach to an object, and, after many observations, that 

 some of them attach invariably, whilst others may at times be 

 absent. ***** ^\^g .j| knowledge is relative, the not '.on 

 of anythhig being necessary must be banished with other tradi- 

 tions." 



There is much here that expresses the sj^irit of the " Xcw 

 Philosophy," if by that term be meant the spirit of modern sci- 

 ence ; but I cannot but marvel that the assembled wisdom and 

 learning of Edinburgh should have uttered no sign of dissent, 

 when Comte was declared to be the founder of these doctrinesi 



