Homo, according to Bacon, natures minister et interpres, tantum facit et inteltigit quantum de
natures ordine re vet monte observaverit; nee amplius seit, aut potest. A finite Being, oiroum-
scribed within the intellectual horizon of the mundane age in which each individual lives
man can reason merely upon phenomena. Quicquid enim, wrote the immortal Newton ex
phenomenis non deditcitur hypothesis vocanda est; et hypotheses vel metaphysical, vel physicce vel
qualitaium occultarum seu mechanises, in philosophic, locum non habent.
What is Philosophyg; Etymologically, the “ love of wisdom,” and paraphrastically, the
“ love of knowledge multiform are the significations through which this sublime Greek
word has travelled. From the ablest English historian (3) of its phases, we extract such
paragraphs as will convey to the reader our individual perceptions of its import at this
day.
“ We shall find some obscurities cleared up, if we can master an accurate and-compre-
hensive definition of Philosophy. The definition I have finally settled upon is this:_
“ Philosophy is the explanation of the Phenomena of the Universe. By the term explanation
the subject is restricted to the domain of the intellect, and is thereby demarcated from
religion, though not from theology.
“ Philosophy is inherent in man’s nature. It is not a caprice, it is not a plaything it is
a necessity; for our life is a mystery, surrounded by mysteries: we are encompassed by
wonder. The myriad aspects of Nature without, the strange fluctuations of feeling within
all demand from us an explanation. Standing upon this ball of earth, so infinite to m
so trivial in the infinitude of the universe, we' look forth into nature with reverent awe'
with irrepressible curiosity. We must have explanations. And thus it is that Philosophy
in some rude shape, is a visible effort in every condition of man—in the rudest phase of
half-developed capacity, as in the highest conditions of culture: it is found among the
sugar-canes of the West Indies, and in the tangled pathless forest of America. Take man
where'you will—hunting the buffalo on the prairies, or immovable in meditation on the hot
banks of the Ganges, priest or peasant, soldier or student, man never escapes from the
pressure of the burden of that mystery which forces him to seek, and readily to accept,
some explanation of it. The savage, startled by the muttering of distant thunder, asks|
* What is that ?’ and is restless till he knows, or fancies he knows. If told it is the voice
of a restless demon, that is enough; the explanation is given. If he then be told that, to
propitiate the demon, the sacrifice of some human being is necessary, his slave, his enemy,
his friend, perhaps even his child, falls a victim to the credulous terror. The ’childhood of
man enables us to retrace [archaeologically] the infancy of nations. No one can live with
children without being struck by their restless questioning, and unquenchable desire to
have everything explained; no less than by the facility with which every authoritative
assertion is accepted as an explanation. The History of Philosophy is the study of man’s
successive attempts to explain the phenomena around and within him.
“ The first explanations were naturally enough drawn from analogies, afforded by consciousness.
Men saw around them activity, change, force; they felt within them a mysterious
power, which made them active, changing, potent:| they explained what they saw, by
what they felt. Hence the fetichism of barbarians, the mythologies of more advanced
races. _ Oreads and nymphs, demons and beneficent powers, moved among the ceaseless
activities of Nature. Man knows that in his anger he storms, shouts, destroys. What,
then, is thunder but the anger of some invisible being ? Moreover; man knows that a
present will assuage his anger against an enemy, and it is but natural that he should
believe the offended thunderer will also be appeased by some offering. As soon as another
conception of the nature of thunder has been elaborated by observation and the study of
its phenomena, the supposed Deity vanishes, and, with it, all the false conceptions it originated,
till, at last, Science takes a rod, and draws the terrible lightning from the heavens,
rendering it so harmless that it will not tear away a spider’s web!
“ But long centuries of patient observation and impatient guessing, controlled by logic,
were necessary, before such changes could take place. The development of Philosophy,
like the development of organic life, has been through the slow additions of thousands upon
thousands of years ; for humanity is a growth, as our globe is, and the laws of its growth
are still to be discovered. . . . One of the great fundamental laws has been discovered by
Auguste Comte — viz : the law of mental Evolution . . . which he has not only discovered,
. GO G. II- L ew e s : Biographical History of Philosophy ; London, 1846. The substance of OUT remarks m ay hs
found in vol. iv . pp . 2 1 6 -2 6 2 , under thé heading of A u g u s t e Comte, “ the B a cp n of the nineteenth century,” and
author of Cours de Philosophie Positive. The original source of tliia a b s t r a c t may be found in Comte, vol. i.
edit. Paris, 1 83 0 , “ Exposition,” pp. 3 - 5 , 63, 4 c . ; but we take Mr. L ew e s ’s later definitions from The Leader;
London, 1 8 5 2 ; April 1 7 , 21, and May 1. A profound thinker has recently done full honor to Mr. Lewes’s
work. (Tide McCuli.oh : Credibility o f the Scriptures; Baltimore, 1852, vol. ii. pp. 4 5 1 -4 5 8 .)
but applied historically. . . . This law may he thus stated: “ Every branch of knowledge
passes successively through three stages : 1st, the supernatural, or fictitious; 2d, the metaphysical,
or abstract; 3d, the positive, or scientific. The first is the necessary^point of departure
taken by human intelligence; the second is merely a stage of transition from the
supernatural to the positive; and the third is the fixed and definite condition in which
knowledge is alone capable of progressive development.
“ In the attempt made by man to explain the varied phenomena of the universe, history
reveals to us,” therefore, “ three distinct and characteristic stages, the theological, the metaphysical,
and the positive. In the first, man explains phenomena by some fanciful conception
suggested in the analogies of his own consciousness; in the second, he explains
phenomena by some d priori• conception of inherent or superadded entities, suggested in
the constancy observable in phenomena, which constancy leads him to suspect that thev
are not produced by any intervention on the part of an external being, hat are owing to the
nature of the things themselves ; in the third, he explains phenomena by adhering solely
to these constancies of succession and co-existence ascertained inductively, and recognized
as the laws of Nature. . . „ -
Consequently, “ in the theological stage, Nature is regarded as the theatre whereon the
arbitrary wills and momentary caprices of Superior Powers play their varying and variable
parts. . . . In the metaphysical stage the notion of capricious divinities‘is replaced by that
of abstract entities, whose modes of action are, however, invariable. . . . In the positive stage
the invariableness of phenomena under similar conditions is recognized as the sum total of
human investigation; and,, beyond the laws which regulate phenomena, it is considered idle
to penetrate.” _ ■ .
“ Although every branch of knowledge must pass through these three stages, in obedience
to the law of evolution, nevertheless the process is not > strictly chronological
Some sciences are more rapid in their evolutions than others; some individuals pass
through these evolutions more quickly than others; so also of nations. The present intellectual
anarchy results from that difference; some sciences being in the positive, some in
the supernatural [or theological], some in the metaphysical stage: and this is further to he
subdivided into individual differences; for in a science which, on the whole, may he fairly
admitted as.bemg positive,^ there will be found some cultivators still in the metaphysical
stage. Astronomy is now in so positiye a condition, that we need nothing but the laws of
dynamics and gravitation to explain all celestial phenomena; and this explanation we know
to be correct, as far as anything can he known, because we can predict the return of a
comet with the nicest accuracy, or can enable the mariner to discover his latitude, and find
his way amidst the < waste of waters.’ This is a positive science. But so far is meteorology
irom such a condition, that prayers for dry or rainy weather are still offered un in
churches; whereas if once the laws of these phenomena were traced, there would he no
more prayers for ram than for the sun to rise at midnight.”
We have only to reverse the order, and apply its triple classification to individuals, and'
m the natural arrangement of the strata, tracing backwards from the positive to the ’metaphysical,
from the latter down to the supernatural, we shall perceive that this last, at
onee the oldest stage and unhappily the most common, represents the least mature," the
least educated, the most antiquated, state of human intelligence. In consequence," the
mere supernatnrali&t believes anything and everything, however impossible.
he ^ P f yM d a n believes he can penetrate into the causes and essences of the phenu-
^Im ’ M i l # Posltmist> recognizing his own ineompetency, limits his efforts
to the ascertainment of those laws which regulate the succession of these phenomena.”
In the quintuple classification of those sciences into-which Positive Philosophy has hitherto
been successfully introduced, M. Comte (1832-40) admits only Astronomy, Physiis, Chemistry,
Physiology, and Sociology. It strikes us that, at the present day, this division is
more.exclusive than the progression of knowledge any longer warrants. Archaeology, for
mstanoe, we claim to have arrived at its positive grade; and although its laws are by no
means popularly appreciated, to have become as certain in its results as any other human
science. A brief exposition of its attributes may prepare the reader for a just recognition
oi its utility.
S f e S “ ancient>” and Avyos, a “ discourse,” are Hellenic words—meaning, when
, in general acceptation, “ discourse or treatise on the opinions, customs, and man-
s o t e ancients., This is the definition of Archceology proposed by the sage Millin, (4),
(4) introduction à Vétude de VArchéologie; Paris, 1796; pp. 2, 20, 22.