590 



LOGIC OF THE MORAL SCIENCES. 



of the capital, as frequently in France, 

 or of the capital only, as in Ireland." 

 But though it may often be very justly 

 objected to the existing race of politi- 

 cal economists "'that they attempt to 

 construct a permanent fabric out of 

 transitory materials ; that they take 

 for granted the immutability of ar- 

 rangements of society, many of which 

 are in their nature fluctuating or pro- 

 gressive, and enunciate, with as little 

 qualification as if they were univer- 

 sal and absolute truths, propositions 

 which are perhaps applicable to no 

 state of society except the particular 

 one in which the writer happened to 

 live ; " this does not take away the 

 value of the propositions, considered 

 with reference to the state of society 

 from which they were drawn. And 

 even as applicable to other states of 

 Bociety, " it must not be supposed that 

 the science is so incomplete and un- 

 satisfactory as this might seem to 

 prove. Though many of its conclu- 

 sions are only locally true, its method 

 of investigation is applicable univer- 

 sally ; and as whoever has solved a 

 certain number of algebraic equations 

 can without difficulty solve all others 

 of the same kind, so whoever knows 

 the political economy of England, or 

 even of Yorkshire, knows that of all 

 nations, actual or possible, provided 

 he have good sense enough not to 

 expect the same conclusion to issue 

 from varying premises." Whoever 

 has mastered with the degree of pre- 

 cision which is attainable the laws 

 which, under free competition, deter- 

 mine the rent, profits, and wages, 

 received by landlords, capitalists, and 

 labourers, in a state of society in which 

 the three classes are completely sepa- 

 rate, will have no difficulty in deter- 

 mining the very different laws which 

 regulate the distribution of the pro- 

 duce among the classes interested in 

 it in any of the states of cultivation 

 and landed property set forth in the 

 foregoing extract.* 



* The quotations in this paragraph are 

 from a paper written by the author, and 

 puljlished i» a periodipal in 1834, 



§ 4. I would not here undertake to 

 decide what other hypothetical or 

 abstract sciences similar to Political 

 Economy may admit of being carved 

 Qut of the general body of the social 

 science ; what other portions of the 

 social phenomena are in a sufficiently 

 close and complete dependence, in the 

 first resort, on a peculiar class of 

 causes, to maKC it convenient to 

 create a preliminary science of those 

 causes : postponing the consideration 

 of the causes which act through them, 

 or in concurrence with them, to a 

 later period of the inquiry. There is, 

 however, among these separate depart- 

 ments one which cannot be passed 

 over in silence, being of a more com- 

 prehensive and commanding character 

 than any of the other branches into 

 which the social science may admit 

 of being divided. Like them, it is 

 directly conversant with the causes 

 of only one class of social facts, but a 

 class which exercises, immediately or 

 remotely, a paramount influence over 

 the rest. I allude to what may be 

 termed Political Ethology, or the 

 theory of the causes which determine 

 the type of character belonging to a 

 people or to an age. Of all the sub- 

 ordinate branches of the social science, 

 this is the most completely in its in- 

 fancy. The causes of national char- 

 acter are scarcely at all understood, 

 and the effect of institutions or social 

 arrangements upon the character of 

 the people is generally that portion of 

 their effects which is least attended 

 to, and least comprehended. Nor is 

 this wonderful when we consider the 

 infant state of the Science of Ethology 

 itself, from whence the laws must be 

 drawn, of which the truths of political 

 ethology can be but results and ex- 

 emplifications. 



Yet to whoever well considers the 

 matter, it must appear that the laws 

 of national (or collective) character 

 are by far the most important class of 

 sociological laws. In the first place, 

 the character which is formed by any 

 state of social circumstances is in 

 itself the roost interesting pheno' 



