INTRODUCTION. 



37 



volumes, or if we recognise the fact that the more useful 

 and popular publications of our day have abandoned the 

 philosophical introductions and preliminary discourses^ 

 by which the earlier works preserved a semblance of 

 unity and method, and are contented to be merely useful 

 dictionaries of reference. The encyclopa3dic treatment of i 

 knowledge, the execution of Lord Bacon's scheme, has 

 shown that the extension and application of learning 

 leads to the disintegration, not to the unification, of i 



knowledge and thought 



A conviction of this sort is i7. 



Lectures on 



no doubt the reason why in German universities lectures "E?cycio- 



'' padie 



on " Encyclopadie " have been abandoned.^ They were 1"^^^^^^ 

 very general and popular in the earlier years of the "'"^^''^^ '^- 

 century, when, under the influence of Kant, Fichte, and 



kind useful viz., that it must be 

 finished, however imperfect it may 

 Tae, and that it must be completed 

 within a limited time, on account of 

 the revolutions and smaller changes 

 in thought and knowledge. These 

 essential conditions were alwaj's be- 

 fore the mind of Diderot. See his 

 article " Eucyclopedie," pp. 636-644. 

 ^ The object of the philosophical 

 introductions has in course of this 

 century been much more completely 

 attained by such works as Mill's 

 ' Logic ' and Jevons's ' Principles of 

 Science'; whilst the "preliminary 

 dissertations," such as were con- 

 tained in the older editions of the 

 'Encyclopedia Britaunica,' have 

 been partially superseded by works 

 like Whewell's ' History ' and his 

 'Philosophy of the Inductive Sci- 

 ences,' in which the common origin, 

 the genesis, the continuous develop- 

 ment and interdependence of the 

 different sciences, are traced. The 

 value in this respect of an under- 

 taking like that of the Royal Ba- 



varian Academy (' Geschichte der 

 Wissenschaften in Deutschland,' 

 vol. i., 1864 : it has now reached 

 22 vols., the science of War signifi- 

 cantly filling three large volumes, 

 that of Mathematics one small one) 

 is much diminished by the title 

 suggesting that science is a nation- 

 al, not a cosmopolitan or interna- 

 tional concern. Fortunately many 

 of the contributors to this impor- 

 tant and highly useful publication 

 have not limited their narratives 

 to jjurely German science, but have 

 largely taken notice of non-German 

 research. Special reports on the 

 state of any science or branch of 

 science in a nation have, of course, 

 quite a different meaning and 

 value. 



- The term is still in use for 

 courses of lectures giving a gen- 

 eral and comprehensive view of 

 special sciences : thus, " Encyclopii- 

 die des Rechts, der Medicin, der 

 Philologie, der Philosophie, der 

 Theologie." 



