264 COSMIC nilLOSOniY. [pt. i. 



festations of the Absolute Power. And manifestly these 

 differences between the two systems of philosophy constitute 

 an antagonism which is fundamental and irreconcilable. If 

 the Positivist conception of philosophy be true, then the 

 work which I am now writing is founded upon a baseless 

 metaphysical fallacy; and conversely it is impossible to 

 accept the doctrine expounded in this work, without ipso 

 facto declaring the main position of Positivism to be un- 

 tenable. 



I shall hereafter have occasion to examine the views con- 

 cerning Psychology, Sociology, Religion, and Practice, which 

 are characteristic of the Positive Philosophy; and, as here- 

 tofore, while dissenting from those views in every instance, I 

 shall have no hesitation in acknowledging their merits or in 

 assigning a full meed of homage to the great thinker by 

 whom they were propounded. But while my dissent upon 

 all these points will serve to emphasize and illustrate the 

 fundamental dissent declared in these Prolegomena, it will not 

 be needful again to demonstrate in detail that we are not 

 adherents of the Positive Philosophy. With thrice-reite- 

 rated argument, and at the risk of wearying the reader, 

 it has now been made sufficiently evident that Cosmism and 

 Positivism, far from being identical or identifiable with each 

 other, are in a certain sense the two opposite poles of 

 scientific philosophizing. And in virtue of this demon- 

 strated antagonism, the divergences hereafter to be signalized 

 will appear not merely as easily intelligible but even as 

 a priori inevitable. 



