24 ADAPTATION AND PROGRESS 
fundamental laws, whether statical or dynamical, which regu- 
late the harmony of the social elements, and the filiation of their 
successive variations. ‘There is no disturbing influence, exterior 
or human, which can make incompatible elements co-exist in the 
political system, nor change in any way the natural laws of the 
development of humanity. What then are the modifications of 
which the social organism and social life are susceptible, if noth- 
ing can alter the laws either of harmony or of succession? The 
answer is that modifications act upon the intensity and second- 
ary operation of phenomena, but without affecting their nature or 
their filiation. In the intellectual order of phenomena, for in- 
stance, there is no accidental influence, nor any individual 
superiority, which can transfer to one person the discoveries 
reserved for a subsequent age, in the natural course of the human 
mind; nor can there be a reverse case of postponement.” + This 
gives rise to his theory of opportuneness which, though carried too 
far, contains a truth that needs to be re-emphasized in these days 
of legislative radicalism. 
Comte’s theory of social control is tersely expressed in these 
words: “ It is the social function of mind to struggle perpetually, 
in its own way, to modify the necessary rule of material power, by 
subjecting it more and more to respect for the moral laws of 
universal harmony, from which all practical activity, public and 
private, is apt to revolt, for want of loftiness of view and gener- 
osity of sentiment. Regarded in this way, legitimate social 
supremacy belongs neither to force nor to reason, but to morality, 
governing alike the actions of the one and the counsels of the 
other. . .. This spiritual authority will be naturally kept 
within bounds by the very nature of its functions, which will be 
those of education, and the consultative influence which results 
from it in active life; and again, by the conditions imposed on 
their exercise, and the continuous resistance which must be 
encountered, — the authority itself being founded on free assent, 
within the limits necessary to guard against abuse. . . . The 
disposition to seek in political institutions the solution of all 
difficulties whatever is a disastrous tendency of our time.’? 
1 Positive Philosophy, ii, pp. 90-92. 2 Ibid., ii, p. 471. 
