THE ATTITUDE OF PHILOSOPHY 



most. And when we cannot have genius, by all 

 means let us have vision, so far as science can 

 impart it to us. Daily we grow indignant over 

 the hand to mouth policy of our legislators, 

 which inflicts so much needless suffering, and 

 makes it so much harder for all of us to earn 

 our bread. But we must remember that such a 

 policy is the natural outcome of a foolish neg- 

 lect of the lessons which history has to teach, 

 and which may be read by any one who holds 

 the scientific clew to them. 



Such is our practical object, and our sole prac- 

 tical object, in studying sociology as a science. 

 To attempt to construct an ideal polity, by 

 adopting which society is to remodel itself, is to 

 show that we have studied that science to little 

 purpose. For if history can teach us anything, 

 it can teach us that civilization is a slow growth, 

 of which no one can foresee, save in its most 

 general features, the final result ; far less force 

 that result prematurely merely by appeals to 

 men's judgment. 



How utterly Comte ignored all this — the 

 plain teaching both of historic induction, and 

 of deduction from the laws of organic life — can 

 be appreciated only when we read the insane 

 pages in which he attempts to predict the im- 

 mediate future. He by no means intended that 

 society should wait till a remote era for the en- 

 tire realization of his project. In seven years 



349 



