8 HABIT AND INTELLIGENCE. 



men learn from tlieir contemporaries — but lie would 

 How the attempt more : lie would not be satisfied with describing 

 feet Voul'd ^^^^ visible effects which constitute the events of history : 

 be at- he would endeavour to ascend from effects to causes, and 

 now\ '^ to ascertain what the causes were which produced the 

 decline and fall of the Eoman Empire.^ This method of 

 regarding history, not as a mere succession of events, but 

 in the light of cause and effect, is essentially the scientific 

 method : by it history has become scientific. It is not 

 easy, nor is it very important, to determine how this modern 

 and more profound conception of the problems of history 

 grew up in men's minds. I do not think it was in .any 

 direct way due to conceptions derived from the study of 

 physical science. 

 History Thus history has become scientific, and, at the same 



'^le^^tifi™^ time, science has become historical. Many scientific sub- 

 andseience jects admit of, and demand, an historical mode of treatment. 

 lis oiica . rpj^.g ^g especially true of geology, which, more than any 

 other science, captivated the imaginations of the last gene- 

 ration, at least in this country. Every geological problem 

 is an historical one ; its general formula may be stated 

 thus : From an actual state of things, to ascertain the 

 causes which have produced it. Astronomy, also, has 

 become in some degree an historical science. I refer, of 

 The nehu- course, to the Nebular theory, which aims, and, as I think, 

 with a great degree of success, at giving a physical expla- 

 nation of the origin of the solar system by the gradual 

 condensation of a rotating nebula. I only mention this 

 here as an instance, and a very remarkable one, of the 

 tendency of science, at the present time, to occupy itself 

 with historical questions, or questions of origin. I shall 

 have more to say about it in the chapter on " the Motive 

 Powers of the Universe." 



The same tendency may to a great extent be asserted of 

 the science of life, which, more than any other science, is 

 captivating the imaginations of the present generation. 



^ This attempt has been made, I believe, with a great degree of success 

 by Giiizot, and by Mr, Finlay, the author of " The History of the Byzantine 

 Empire," 



