CH. XIX.] ILLUSTRATIONS AND CRITICISMS. 233 



ing. Considering how, throughout the latter part of his life, 

 he steadfastly refrained from the study of contemporary scien- 

 tific literature, I do not think it likely that Comte ever 

 became aware of the growing prominence of this conception 

 of genesis ; and if he had become aware of it he would 

 doubtless have scornfully repudiated it, as he repudiated 

 almost every new conception which was distinctly in advance 

 of the limited scientific knowledge of 1830. The knowledge 

 which Comte was not prepared to utilize at that date, he 

 was certainly not in a condition to utilize at any later period 

 of his life. It was in 1857, tlie year of Comte's death, that 

 Mr. Spencer, in an essay entitled " Progress : its Law and 

 Cause," first definitely extended the law of organic develop- 

 ment to historic phenomena ; although he had ever since 

 1851 been visibly working toward that result, and had in 

 1855 reached that grand generalization of the development 

 of both life and intelligence, regarded as processes of adjust- 

 ment, which underlies the law of social progress here ex- 

 pounded. It was this splendid series of researches, culmi- 

 nating in the announcement of the universal law of evolution, 

 in 1861, which supplied a new basis for all the sciences 

 wliich treat of genesis, and rendered possible the discovery of 

 the special laws of sociogeny. And finally, in 1861, the 

 fuither clue to these special laws was given by Sir Henry 

 Maine, whose immortal treatise on " Ancient Law " threw an 

 entirely new light upon the primitive structure of society, 

 and demonstrated — what before could only have been sur- 

 mised — that human society, as earliest organized, consisted 

 of a congeries of tribal communities by the integration of 

 which nave arisen the various orders of states and federations 

 known lo history. 



When, therefore, we inquire whether Comte did or did not 

 create a science of sociology, we need not be surprised if it 

 appears that he did not create such a science, For in socio- 

 logy, even more than in any other science, the prime requisite 



