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THE PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SCIENCES.

23

Abstract

science.

Concrete

science.

prescription of our limits,-the ascertainment of our field
of inquiry. We must distinguish between the two classes
of Natural science;-the abstract or general,
which have for their object the discovery of
the laws which regulate phenomena in all
conceivable cases: and the concrete, particu-
lar, or descriptive, which are sometimes called
Natural sciences in a restricted sense, whose function it is
to apply these laws to the actual history of existing beings.
The first are fundamental; and our business is with them
alone, as the second are derived, and however important,
not rising into the rank of our subjects of contemplation.
We shall treat of physiology, but not of botany and
zoology, which are derived from it. We shall treat of
chemistry, but not of mineralogy, which is secondary to it.
We may say of Concrete Physics, as these secondary
sciences are called, the same thing that we said of theories
of the arts, that they require a preliminary knowledge of
several sciences, and an advance of those sciences not yet
achieved; so that, if there were no other reason, we must
leave these secondary classes alone. At a future time
Concrete Physics will have made progress, according to
the development of Abstract Physics, and will afford a
mass of less incoherent materials than those which it now
presents. At present, too few of the students of these
secondary sciences appear to be even aware that a due
acquaintance with the primary sciences is requisite to all
successful prosecution of their own.

We have now considered,

First, that science being composed of speculative knowledge and of practical knowledge, we have to deal only with the first; and

Second, that theoretical knowledge, or science properly so called, being divided into general and particular, or abstract and concrete science, we have again to deal only with the first. Being thus in possession of our proper subject, duly prescribed, we may proceed to the ascertainment of the true order of the fundamental sciences.

The classification of the sciences is not so easy a matter as it may appear. However natural it may be, it will always involve

Difficulty of
classification.

something, if not arbitrary, at least artificial; and in so far, it will always involve imperfection. It is impossible to fulfil, quite rigorously, the object of presenting the sciences in their natural connection, and according to their mutual dependence, so as to avoid the smallest danger of being involved in a vicious circle. It is easy to show why, Historical and Every science may be exhibited under two dogmatic methods or procedures, the Historical and methods. the Dogmatic. These are wholly distinct from each other, and any other method can be nothing but some combination of these two. By the first method knowledge is presented in the same order in which it was actually obtained by the human mind, together with the way in which it was obtained. By the second, the system of ideas is presented as it might be conceived of at this day, by a mind which, duly prepared and placed at the right point of view, should begin to reconstitute the science as a whole. A new science must be pursued historically, the only thing to be done being to study in chronological order the different works which have contributed to the progress of the science. But when such materials have become recast to form a general system, to meet the demand for a more natural logical order, it is because the science is too far advanced for the historical order to be practicable or suitable. The more discoveries are made, the greater becomes the labour of the historical method of study, and the more effectual the dogmatic, because the new conceptions: bring forward the earlier ones in a fresh light. Thus, the education of an ancient geometer consisted simply in the study, in their due order, of the very small number of original treatises then existing on the different parts of geometry. The writings of Archimedes and Apollonius were, in fact, about all. On the contrary, a modern geometer commonly finishes his education without having read a single original work dating further back than the most recent discoveries, which cannot be known by any other means. Thus the Dogmatic Method is for ever superseding the Historical, as we advance to a higher position in science. If every mind had to pass through all the stages that every predecessor in the study had gone through, it is clear that, however easy it is to learn rather than invent, it would be impossible

HISTORICAL AND DOGMATIC METHODS OF STUDY. 25

to effect the purpose of education,-to place the student on the vantage-ground gained by the labours of all the men who have gone before. By the dogmatic method this is done, even though the living student may have only an ordinary intellect, and the dead may have been men of lofty genius. By the dogmatic method, therefore, must every advanced science be attained, with so much of the historical combined with it as is rendered necessary by discoveries too recent to be studied elsewhere than in their own records. The only objection to the preference of the Dogmatic method is that it does not show how the science was attained; but a moment's reflection will show that this is the case also with the Historical method. To pursue a science historically is quite a different thing from learning the history of its progress. This last pertains to the study of human history, as we shall see when we reach the final division of this work. It is true that a science cannot be completely understood without a knowledge of how it arose; and again, a dogmatic knowledge of any science is necessary to an understanding of its history; and therefore we shall notice, in treating of the fundamental sciences, the incidents of their origin, when distinct and illustrative; and we shall use their history, in a scientific sense, in our treatment of Social Physics; but the historical study, important, even essential, as it is, remains entirely distinct from the proper dogmatic study of science. These considerations, in this place, tend to define more precisely the spirit of our course of inquiry, while they more exactly determine the conditions under which we may hope to succeed in the construction of a true scale of the aggregate fundamental sciences. Great con

fusion would arise from any attempt to adhere strictly to historical order in our exposition of the sciences, for they have not all advanced at the same rate; and we must be for ever borrowing from each some fact to illustrate another, without regard to priority of origin. Thus, it is clear that, in the system of the sciences, astronomy must come before physics, properly so called: and yet, several branches of physics, above all, optics, are indispensable to the complete exposition of astronomy. Minor defects, if inevitable, cannot invalidate a classification which, on the whole, fulfils the principal conditions of the case. They belong to what

is essentially artificial in our division of intellectual labour. In the main, however, our classification agrees with the history of science; the more general and simple sciences actually occurrring first and advancing best in human history, and being followed by the more complex and restricted, though all were, since the earliest times, enlarging simultaneously.

A simple mathematical illustration will precisely represent the difficulty of the question we have to resolve, while it will sum up the preliminary considerations we have just concluded.

We propose to classify the fundamental sciences. They are six, as we shall soon see. We cannot make them less; and most scientific men would reckon them as more. Six objects admit of 720 different dispositions, or, in popular language, changes. Thus we have to choose the one right order (and there can be but one right) out of 720 possible ones. Very few of these have ever been proposed; yet we might venture to say that there is probably not one in favour of which some plausible reason might not be assigned; for we see the wildest divergences among the schemes which have been proposed, the sciences which are placed by some at the head of the scale being sent by others to the further extremity. Our problem is, then, to find the one rational order, among a host of possible systems.

tion.

True principle Now we must remember that we have to of classifica- look for the principle of classification in the comparison of the different orders of phenomena, through which science discovers the laws which are her object. What we have to determine is the real dependence of scientific studies. Now, this dependence can result only from that of the corresponding phenomena. All observable phenomena may be included within a very few natural categories, so arranged as that the study of each category may be grounded on the principal laws of the preceding, and serve as the basis of the next ensuing. This order is determined by the degree of simplicity, Generality. or, what comes to the same thing, of generality of their phenomena. Hence results their successive dependence, and the greater

Dependence.

or lesser facility for being studied.

FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION.

27

It is clear, à priori, that the most simple phenomena must be the most general; for whatever is observed in the greatest number of cases is of course the most disengaged from the incidents of particular cases. We must begin then with the study of the most general or simple pheno-✓ mena, going on successively to the more particular or complex. This must be the most methodical way, for this order of generality or simplicity fixes the degree of facility in the study of phenomena, while it determines the necessary connection of the sciences by the successive dependence of their phenomena. It is worthy of remark in this place that the most general and simple phenomena are the furthest removed from Man's ordinary sphere, and must thereby be studied in a calmer and more rational frame of mind than those in which he is more nearly implicated; and this constitutes a new ground for the corresponding sciences being developed more rapidly.

We have now obtained our rule. Next we proceed to our classification.

Inorganic and
Organic phe-

nomena.

We are first struck by the clear division of all natural phenomena into two classes of inorganic and of organic bodies. The organized are evidently, in fact, more complex and less general than the inorganic, and depend upon them, instead of being depended on by them. Therefore it is that physiological study should begin with inorganic phenomena; since the organic include all the qualities belonging to them, with a special order added, viz. the vital phenomena, which belong to organization. We have not to investigate the nature of either; for the positive philosophy does not inquire into natures. Whether their nature be supposed different or the same, it is evidently necessary to separate the two studies of inorganic matter and of living bodies. Our classification will stand through any future decision as to the way in which living bodies are to be regarded; for, on any supposition, the general laws of inorganic physics must be established before we can proceed with success to the examination of a dependent class of phenomena.

Each of these great halves of natural I. INORGANIC. philosophy has subdivisions. Inorganic phy

sics must, in accordance with our rule of generality and the

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