384 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



beginning with astronomy, through the biological to the 

 sociological sciences. Significantly he leaves out psy- 

 chology and metaphysics. Through omitting the former 

 he stands in opposition to the then ruling school of 

 philosophy in France, headed by Eoyer Collard and 

 Victor Cousin ; through omitting the latter he stands 

 in opposition to the ruling philosophical systems in 

 Germany. Though we read a great deal in Comte's 

 philosophy of the three stages of knowledge, the theo- 

 logical, the metaphysical, and the positive, and though 

 he emphasises the fact that positive knowledge is not 

 limited to that of facts, but looks for the connection 

 of things or the laws of nature, Comte does not contri- 

 bute anything material to the theory of knowledge. 

 The exposition of the methods of exact research was 

 not followed as it was in England by a psychological 

 analysis of these methods. This was effected later ^ by 



^ Though English and, later on, 

 German thinkers have gained a 

 general reputation as having mainly 

 dealt with the logic and methods of 

 scientific thought, it is well to note 

 that France all through the nine- 

 teenth century possessed an ex- 

 tensive literature on the subject 

 which, on the whole, has attracted 

 little attention in other countries, 

 and has, even in France itself, been 

 very insufficiently appreciated. 

 There are notably four representa- 

 tives of the mathematical, physical, 

 and natural sciences who occupied 

 themselves with the principles and 

 the philosophy of the sciences in 

 which they themselves had, through 

 their original researches, gained 

 great distinction. Foremost among 

 these stands Andre-Marie Ampere 

 (1775-1826). He was professor at 

 the Ecole Polytechnique as well as 



at the College de France, and one 

 of the greatest physicists of the 

 century, having earned through his 

 memoirs on electro-dynamics the 

 title of the " Father " of that 

 science. Of his philosophical writ- 

 ings his classification of the sciences, 

 differing from that of Bacon, became 

 known in England through Whewell 

 in his ' Philosophy of the Inductive 

 Sciences. ' Sonaewhat later another 

 teacher at the Ecole Polytechnique, 

 J. Duhamel (1797-1872), a contem- 

 porary of Comte, through his text- 

 books on the Calculus and on 

 ' Analytical Dynamics,' exercised 

 for some time an important in- 

 fluence upon the teaching of higher 

 mathematics in France and Ger- 

 many. He published in 1866- 

 1872 a large work in five vol- 

 umes, ' Des Methodes dans les 

 Sciences de llaisonnement,' in 



