THE PROGRESS OF SOCIAL SCIENCE 9 



meaning in the universe, but to the personal interest Book i 

 which we each of us take in our own welfare such, 

 for instance, as a general redistribution of wealth, 

 the abolition or complete reorganisation of private 

 property, the emancipation of labour, and the 

 realisation of social equality. 



Thisdistinction between the speculative and practi- Men have thus 



. , . i adouble reason 



cal aspects of social science has a special importance, for being inter- 

 which will be explained and insisted on presently. But science! 



it is here mentioned only to show the reader how strong 

 a combination of motives is impelling the present far studying it; 

 generation the conservative classes and the revolu- 

 tionary classes equally to transfer to social science 

 the interest once felt in physical ; and how strong is the 

 stimulus thus applied to sociologists to emulate the 

 diligence and success of the physicists and biologists, 

 their predecessors. Nor have diligence, enthusiasm, 

 or scientific genius been wanting to them. As has 

 already been observed, they have transformed social 

 science altogether by applying to it the doctrines of and it has 

 evolution which physical science taught them, and number of men 

 have thus organically affiliated the former study to hav^appiied 

 the latter. This is in itself a triumph worthy of the ^eSiIxfs 

 enterprise that has achieved it. But they have done lea ed in the 



school of phy- 



far more than borrow from physics this mere general sicai science. 

 theory. They have established between physical 

 phenomena and social an enormous number of 

 analogies, so close that the one set assists in the 

 interpretation of the other. They have borrowed 

 from the physicists a number of their subsidiary 

 theories, their methods of grouping facts, and, above 



