44 FROM COMTE TO BENJAMIN KIDD PARTI 



If we are to learn from the past it must be mainly in 

 some other way. 



Shall we say then that we are to ascertain from 

 historical study which causes are gaming and which 

 declining ? And thereafter are we to shout with the 

 biggest crowd ? Is the teaching of history to be a 

 grandiose contribution to our study of the question 

 which way the cat jumps ? Comte's Law of the 

 Three Stages an alleged continuous evolution in 

 the history of the past may be so interpreted ; it 

 may be taken as a warning not to commit ourselves 

 to modes of belief which are plainly growing obso- 

 lete. And it may be urged that, under due restric- 

 tions, there is high wisdom, not ignoble policy, in 

 bowing to the declared and inevitable forces of his- 

 tory. Burke has given classical utterance to this 

 position in well-known words. " If a great change 

 is to be made in human affairs, the minds of men 

 will be fitted to it ; the general opinions and feelings 

 will draw that way. Every fear, every hope will 

 forward it, and then they who persist in opposing 

 this mighty current in human affairs will appear 

 rather to resist the decrees of Providence itself than 

 the mere designs of men." It is this master current 

 of tendency which we are to think of as the Zeitgeist. 

 The name is not to be profaned, as one may say, by 

 applying it to every little ripple upon the surface of 

 events. Mr. Disraeli, presenting himself before the 

 students of Glasgow University as a wise and good 

 old man, felt all his wonted dramatic relish of the 

 game of life in his new part of Lord Rector, when 

 he told his young hearers that they must clearly un- 

 derstand the spirit of their age ; perhaps they would 



