308 



SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT. 



not as clear as it has become since, and the work hu 

 also been superseded by more detailed labours, espe 

 cially of German historians.^ The ' Philosophy of the Ie 

 ductive Sciences,' by the same author, was written wit 

 the object of doing something towards determining th 

 nature and conditions of human knowledge, and ha 

 thus a philosophical rather than a historical object i 

 view. The same can be said of Mill's ' Logic,' of Comte 

 ' Philosophic positive,' and of more recent works sue 

 as Jevons's ' Principles of Science.' They form an in 

 portant section of the philosophical literature of on 

 century, and on future occasions I shall frequently hav 

 to refer to their teaching. At present I am not aboi 

 to investigate the eternal principles of correct reasoi 

 ing, and the particular methods adopted, consciously c 

 unconsciously, by scientific writers of all times. Whs 

 1 desire to do is, to enumerate and analyse brietiy tli 

 changing ideas, the general views, under the guidanc 

 of which scientific work has progressed in the cours 

 of this century. No doubt the same object was befoi 



^ Besides the works on the his- 

 tory of tlie special sciences con- 

 tained in the Munich Collection, 

 ' Geschichte der Wissenschaf ten in 

 Deutschland,' which in many in- 

 stances is not limited to German 

 science and learning, there is the 

 unique ' Geschichte der Chemie,' 

 by Hermann Kopp (Braunschweig, 

 4 vols., 1843-47), the 'Geschichte 

 der Physik,' by Rosenberger (Braun- 

 schweig, 3 vols., 188-2-90), and 

 Hiiser's ' Geschichte der Medicin ' 

 (Wien, 1875-82, 3rd ed.) In addi- 

 tion to the numerous works of Ger- 

 man specialists, I must mention as of 

 the first importance and value the 

 histories by the late Isaac Todhunter 



of the ' Theory of Attraction an 

 Figure of the Earth' (2 vols 

 1873), the ' Calculus of Variations 

 (1861), the ' Theory of Probability 

 (1865), and the 'Theory of Elasti. 

 ity ' (continued by K. Pearson, 

 vols, in 3 parts, 1886-93). The 

 supply the want of a good histor 

 of modern mathematics, which dot 

 not exist. Lastly, the " Deut.scli 

 Mathematiker- Vereinigung " hav 

 published in their Jahrbuch vali 

 able histories of special branches c 

 mathematics notably the ' Theor 

 of Invariants ' by Franz Ma^-er, an 

 the ' Modern Theory of Functions 

 by Brill and Noether. , 



