PHYSICAL METHOD. 573 



within the departments in question it were unimpeded 

 by any other. In this way a nearer approximation is 

 obtained than would otherwise be practicable to the 

 real order of human affairs in those departments. 

 This approximation has then to be corrected by making 

 proper allowance for the effects of any impulses of a 

 different description, which can be shown to interfere 

 with the result in any particular case. Only in a few 

 of the most striking cases (such as the important one 

 of the principle of population) are these corrections 

 interpolated into the expositions of political economy 

 itself; the strictness of purely scientific arrangement 

 being thereby somewhat departed from, for the sake 

 of practical utility. So far as it is known, or may be 

 presumed, that the conduct of mankind in the pursuit 

 of wealth is under the collateral influence of any other 

 of the properties of our nature, than the desire of 

 obtaining the greatest quantity of wealth witli the 

 least labour and self-denial, the conclusions of poli- 

 tical economy will so far fail of being applicable to the 

 explanation or prediction of real events, until they 

 are modified by a correct allowance for the degree of 

 influence exercised by the other cause." 



When M. Comte (for of the objections raised by 

 inferior thinkers it is unnecessary here to take account) 

 pronounces the attempt to treat political economy, 

 even provisionally, as a science apart, to be a misap- 

 prehension of the scientific method proper to Sociology ; 

 I cannot but think that he has overlooked the exten- 

 sive and important practical guidance which may be 

 derived, in any given state of society, from general 

 propositions such as those above indicated; even 

 though the modifying influence of the miscellaneous 

 causes which the theory does not take into account, 

 as well as the effect of the general social changes in 



