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CLASSICAL ESSAY |
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by Auguste Comte
In order to explain properly the true nature and peculiar character of the Positive Philosophy, it is indispensable that we should first take a brief survey of the progressive growth of the human mind, viewed as a whole; for no idea can be properly understood apart from its history. In thus studying the total development of human intelligence in its different spheres of activity, from its first and simplest beginning up to our own time, I believe that I have discovered a great fundamental Law, to which the mind is subjected by an invariable necessity. The truth of this Law can, I think, be demonstrated both by reasoned proofs furnished by a knowledge of our mental organization, and by historical verification due to an attentive study of the past. This Law consists in the fact that each of our principal conceptions, each branch of our knowledge, passes in succession through three different theoretical states: the Theological or fictitious state, the Metaphysical or abstract state, and the Scientific or positive state. In other words, the human mind -- by its very nature -- makes use successively in each of its researches of three methods of philosophising, whose characters are essentially different, and even radically opposed to each other. We have first the Theological method, then the Metaphysical method, and finally the Positive method. Hence there are three kinds of philosophy or general systems of conceptions on the aggregate of phenomena, which are mutually exclusive of each other. The first is the necessary starting-point of human intelligence: the third represents its fixed and definite state: the second is only destined to serve as a transitional method. In the Theological state, the human mind directs its researches mainly towards the inner nature of beings, and towards the first and final causes of all the phenomena which it observes -- in a word, towards Absolute knowledge. It therefore represents these phenomena as being produced by the direct and continuous action of more or less numerous supernatural agents, whose arbitrary intervention explains all the apparent anomalies of the universe. In the Metaphysical state, which is in reality only a simple general modification of the first state, the supernatural agents are replaced by abstract forces, real entities or personified abstractions, inherent in the different beings of the world. These entities are looked upon as capable of giving rise by themselves to all the phenomena observed, each phenomenon being explained by assigning it to its corresponding entity. Finally, in the Positive state, the human mind, recognizing the impossibility of obtaining absolute truth, gives up the search after the origin and destination of the universe and a knowledge of the final causes of phenomena. It only endeavors now to discover, by a well-combined use of reasoning and observation, the actual laws of phenomena -- that is to say, their invariable relations of succession and likeness. The explanation of facts, thus reduced to its real terms, consists henceforth only in the connection established between different particular phenomena and some general facts, the number of which the progress of science tends more and more to diminish. The Theological system arrived at its highest form of perfection, when it substituted the providential action of a single being, for the varied play of the numerous independent gods which had been imagined by the primitive mind. In the same way, the last stage of the Metaphysical system consisted in replacing the different special entities by the idea of a single great general entity -- Nature -- looked upon as the sole source of all phenomena. Similarly, the ideal of the Positive system, towards which it constantly tends, although in all probability it will never attain such a stage, would be reached if we could look upon all the different phenomena observable as so many particular cases of a single general fact, such as that of Gravitation, for example. This is not the place to give a special demonstration of this fundamental Law of Mental Development, and to deduce from it its most important consequences. We shall make a direct study of it, with all the necessary details, in the part of this work relating to social phenomena. I am only considering it now in order to determine precisely the true character of the Positive Philosophy, as opposed to the two other philosophies which have successively dominated our whole intellectual system up to these latter centuries. For the present, to avoid leaving entirely undemonstrated so important a law, the applications of which will frequently occur throughout this work, I must confine myself to a rapid enumeration of the most evident general reasons which prove its exactitude. In the first place, it is, I think, sufficient merely to enumerate such a law for its accuracy to be immediately verified, by all those who are fairly well acquainted with the general history of the sciences. For there is not a single science which has to-day reached the Positive stage, which was not in the past -- as each can easily see for himself -- composed mainly of metaphysical abstractions, and, going back further still, it was altogether under the sway of theological conceptions. Unfortunately, we shall have to recognize on more than one occasion in the different parts of this course, that even the most perfect sciences still retain to-day some very evident traces of these two primitive states. This general revolution of the human mind can, moreover, be easily verified to-day, in a very obvious, although indirect, manner, if we consider the development of the individual intelligence. The starting-point being necessarily the same in the education of the individual as in that of the race, the various principal phases of the former must reproduce the fundamental epochs of the latter. Now, does not each of us in contemplating his own history recollect that he has been successively -- as regards the most important ideas -- a theologian in childhood, a metaphysician in youth, and a natural philosopher in manhood? This verification of the law can easily be made by all who are on a level with their age. But, in addition to the proofs of the truth of this law furnished by direct observation of the race or the individual, I must, above all, mention in this brief summary the theoretical considerations which show its necessity. The most important of these considerations arises from the very nature of the subject itself. It consists in the need at every epoch of having some theory to connect the facts, while, on the other hand, it was clearly impossible for the primitive human mind to form theories based on observation. All competent thinkers agree with Bacon that there can be no real knowledge except that which rests upon observed facts. This fundamental maxim is evidently indisputable if it is applied, as it ought to be, to the mature state of our intelligence. But, if we consider the origin of our knowledge, it is no less certain that the primitive human mind could not, and indeed ought not to, have thought in that way. For if, on the one hand, every Positive theory must necessarily be founded upon observations, it is, on the other hand, no less true that, in order to observe, our mind has need of some theory or other. If in contemplating phenomena we did not immediately connect them with some principles, not only would it be impossible for us to combine these isolated observations, and therefore to derive any profit from them, but we should even be entirely incapable of remembering the facts, which would for the most part remain unnoted by us. Thus there were two difficulties to be overcome: the human mind had to observe in order to form real theories, and yet had to form theories of some sort before it could apply itself to a connected series of observations. The primitive human mind, therefore, found itself involved in a vicious circle, from which it would never have had any means of escaping, if a natural way out of the difficulty had not fortunately been found by the spontaneous development of Theological conceptions. These presented a rallying-point for the efforts of the mind, and furnished materials for its activity. This is the fundamental motive which demonstrated the logical necessity for the purely Theological character of Primitive Philosophy, apart from those important social considerations relating to the matter which I cannot even indicate now. This necessity becomes still more evident, when we have regard to the perfect congruity of Theological Philosophy, with the peculiar nature of the researches on which the human mind, in its infancy, concentrated to so high a degree all its powers. It is, indeed, very noticeable how the most insoluble questions -- such as the inner nature of objects, or the origin and purpose of all phenomena -- are precisely those which the human mind proposes to itself, in preference to all others, in its primitive state; all really soluble problems being looked upon as hardly worthy of serious thought. The reason for this is very obvious, since it is experience alone which has enabled us to estimate our abilities rightly, and if man had not commenced by overestimating his forces, these would never have been able to acquire all the development of which they are capable. This fact is a necessity of our organization. But, be that as it may, let us picture to ourselves as far as we can this early mental disposition, so universal and so prominent, and let us ask ourselves what kind of reception would have been accorded at such an epoch to the Positive Philosophy, supposing it to have been then formed. The highest ambition of this Philosophy is to discover the laws of phenomena, and its main characteristic is precisely that of regarding as necessarily interdicted to the human reason, all those sublime mysteries which Theological Philosophy, on the contrary, explains with such admirable facility, even to the smallest detail. Under such circumstances, it is easy to see what the choice of primitive man would be. The same thing is true, when we consider from a practical standpoint the nature of the pursuits which the human mind first occupies itself with. Under that aspect, they offer to man the strong attraction of an unlimited control over the exterior world, which is regarded as being entirely destined for our use, while all its phenomena seem to have close and continuous relations with our existence. These chimerical hopes, these exaggerated ideas of man's importance in the universe, to which the Theological Philosophy gives rise, are destroyed irrevocably by the first-fruits of the Positive Philosophy. But, at the commencement, they afforded an indispensable stimulus without the aid of which we cannot, indeed, conceive how the primitive human mind would have been induced to undertake any arduous labors. We are at the present time so far removed from that early state of mind -- at least as regards the majority of phenomena -- that it is difficult for us to appreciate properly the force and necessity of such considerations. Human reason is now so mature that we are able to undertake laborious scientific researches, without having in view any extraneous goal capable of strongly exciting the imagination, such as that which the astrologers or alchemists proposed to themselves. Our intellectual activity is sufficiently excited by the mere hope of discovering the laws of phenomena, by the simple desire of verifying or disproving a theory. This, however, could not be the case in the infancy of the human mind. Without the attractive chimeras of Astrology, or the example, where should we have found the perseverance and ardor necessary for collecting the long series of observations and experiments which, later on, served as a basis for the first Positive theories of these two classes of phenomena? The need of such stimulus to our intellectual development was keenly felt long ago by Kepler in the case of astronomy, and has been justly appreciated in our own time by Berthollet in chemistry. The above considerations show us that, although the Positive Philosophy represents the true final state of human intelligence -- that to which it has always tended more and more -- it was none the less necessary to employ the Theological Philosophy at first and during many centuries, both as a method and as furnishing provisional doctrines. Since the Theological Philosophy is spontaneous in its character, it is, for that reason, the only one possible in the beginning; it is also the only one which can offer a sufficient interest to our budding intelligence. It is now very easy to see that, in order to pass from this provisional form of philosophy to the final stage, the human mind was naturally obliged to adopt Metaphysical methods and doctrines as a transitional form of philosophy. This last consideration is indispensable, in order to complete the general sketch of the great law which I have pointed out. It is easily seen that our understanding, which was compelled to progress by almost insensible steps, could not pass suddenly, and without any intermediate stages, from Theological to Positive philosophy. Theology and Physics are so profoundly incompatible, their conceptions are so radically opposed in character, that, before giving up the one in order to employ the other exclusively, the human intelligence had to make use of intermediate conceptions, which, being of a hybrid character, were eminently fitted to bring about a gradual transition. That is the part played by Metaphysical conceptions, and they have no other real use. By substituting, in the study of phenomena, a corresponding inseparable entity for a direct supernatural agency -- although, at first, the former was only held to be an offshoot of the latter -- Man gradually accustomed himself to consider only the facts themselves. In that way, the ideas of these metaphysical agents gradually became so dim that all right-minded persons only considered them to be the abstract names of the phenomena in question. It is impossible to imagine by what other method our understanding could have passed from frankly supernatural to purely natural considerations, or, in other words, from the Theological to the Positive régime.
Excerpted from Cours de Philosophie Positive, by Auguste Comte |
Positive
Philosophy of Auguste Comte Vol. 1
(1855), Introduction
to Positive
Philosophy,
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