ANTHROPOMORPHISM AND COSMISM 



or the Newton of modern philosophy, it is not 

 at all unlikely that he will be pronounced its 

 Copernicus. Though he was wrong in assert- 

 ing that in the course of speculative evolution 

 there are three radically distinct stages, and 

 wrong also in assuming that the consciousness 

 of Absolute Existence can ever be abolished ; 

 he was right in asserting that there has been a 

 definite course of speculative evolution, of which 

 deanthropomorphization is an essential feature, 

 and which must end in the complete rejection 

 of ontology. And this — though Professor 

 Huxley has not remarked it — was the part of 

 his statement which called attention to the fact 

 that a new era in speculation was commencing. 

 I cannot, therefore, unreservedly endorse Mr. 

 Spencer's assertion ^ that Comte, while accepting 

 the doctrine of the relativity of knowledge and 

 kindred doctrines of modern scientific philoso- 

 phy, nevertheless did nothing toward placing 

 these doctrines upon a firmer ground than they 

 had hitherto occupied. Comte indeed contrib- 

 uted nothing whatever to the psychological jus- 

 tification or elucidation of these doctrines ; yet 

 with his keen historic sense, he did much to- 

 ward justifying them historically. To Hume's 



^ [See Spencer : ** Reasons for Dissenting from the Philo- 

 sophy of M. Comte,'* Essays, vol. ii. p. 123 (Library Edi- 

 tion, New York, 1891).] 



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