Feb., 1890. 
THE PKINCIPLES OF SOCIOLOGY. 
29 
that the public distrust is justifiable. The science has indeed 
advanced beyond the stage of mere theoretical possibility ; it 
does exist, but only in the embryonic condition, with all its 
details and even its general outlines as yet indistinct. There 
is a preliminary difficulty in the selection of its data, which 
of course renders its inferences questionable in geometrical 
ratio with the doubtfulness of their foundation. All this is 
fully admitted by Mr. Spencer in his chapter entitled 
“ Primitive Ideas.”* 
“What ideas are primitive ? ” we ask—and the answer is, 
“ We do not know.” It must be remembered that our savage 
contemporaries are, in one sense, no more primitive than we 
are. They have an equally long ancestry, and there is no 
reason for assuming that the lowest of them have neither 
advanced nor retrograded since the dawn of humanity. 
“ Probably,” says Mr. Spencer, “ most of them had ancestors 
in higher states ; and among their beliefs remain some which 
were evolved during those higher states.It is 
possible, and I believe probable, that retrogression has been 
as frequent as progression.” What is said of ideas may, of 
course, be said of customs, manners, and laws ; so that our 
study of the evolution of mankind from primitive conditions 
is hindered by the difficulty—nay the impossibility—of 
determining by direct evidence what those primitive condi¬ 
tions were. 
Another and less obvious hindrance comes from our in¬ 
complete knowledge of our own times. What are we our¬ 
selves, viewed as social units ? Whither are we moving, and 
what is the curve of our line of progress ? What is the goal 
towards which we are really working ?—for it may be, and 
probably is, far other than that which we set before our 
imagination. Not possessing the solution of these enigmas, 
we cannot know the full sociological significance of our own 
day or of any previous day, since part of that significance 
lies in the unseen future. That future is without doubt as 
rigorously predetermined by past and present as the nature 
of the harvest is predetermined by the nature of the seed 
that is sown. If we really knew the crop, we could both 
predict the harvest and could trace its past history from the 
formation of the ovule to the liberation of the seed when 
mature. No child of the century can truly understand him¬ 
self or his age, or can solve the problems in which he him¬ 
self is a factor. If he could, he would be a child not of this 
century, but of all centuries. As our knowledge advances, 
and as our apprehension of principles becomes more definite 
‘Principles of Sociology, Vol. I., p. 93. 
