COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



is insisted, with entire justice, that every hy- 

 pothesis which does not admit of verification 

 should be remorselessly discarded from philo- 

 sophy ; and that even a veritable hypothesis 

 should never be incorporated as a part of phi- 

 losophy or science until it has been actually 

 verified. Far different is the attitude taken 

 by Comte in his later works, when he is at- 

 tempting to reconstruct society. In the " Poli- 

 tique Positive " he begins by endeavouring to 

 reinstate the subjective method ; deluding him- 

 self, by a play upon words, into the beHef that 

 that method can be so reformed as to become 

 available in the search for positive truths. " The 

 subjective method," he tells us, " possesses 

 striking advantages which can alone compensate 

 for the inconveniences of the objective method." 

 This unhappy sentence is of itself enough to 

 show how far the waiter had strayed from posi- 

 tive grounds. Here we see the necessity for 

 constant verification characterized as an " in- 

 convenience," and the liberty to string together 

 premises and conclusions without ever stopping 

 to test their conformity to facts is called a 

 " striking advantage." Nothing could be more 

 thoroughly metaphysical in temper. The " in- 

 convenience " of the objective method is the in- 

 convenience of being often obliged to stop and 

 confess our ignorance of many things we should 

 like to know, our lack of many data we should 

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