and
independent laws, it proceeds to those which are more complicated, which
presume the existence of other laws; in such manner that at every stage
of our scientific progress we are supporting ourselves on the knowledge
acquired in the one preceding.

"The positive philosophy," he tells us, "falls naturally into
five divisions, or five fundamental sciences, whose order of
succession is determined by the necessary or invariable
subordination (estimated according to no hypothetical opinions)
of their several phenomena; these are, astronomy, mechanics,
(_la physique_,) chemistry, physiology, and lastly, social
physics. The first regards the phenomena the most general, the
most abstract, the most remote from humanity; they influence
all others, without being influenced by them. The phenomena
considered by the last are, on the contrary, the most
complicated, the most concrete, the most directly interesting
to man; they depend more or less on all the preceding
phenomena, without exercising on them any influence. Between
these two extremes, the degrees of speciality, of complication
and personality, of phenomena, gradually increase, as well as
their successive dependence."--Vol. I. p. 96.

The principle of classification is excellent, but is there no rank dropt
out of this _hierarchy_? The metaphysicians, or psychologists, who are
wont to consider themselves as standing at the very summit--where are
they? They are dismissed from their labours--their place is occupied by
others--and what was considered as having substance and reality in their
proceedings, is transferred to the head of physiology. The phrenologist
is admitted into the hierarchy of science as an honest, though hitherto
an unpractised, and not very successful labourer; the metaphysician,
with his class of internal observations, is entirely scouted. M. Comte
considers the _mind_ as one of those abstract entities which it is the
first business of the positive philosophy to discard. He speaks of man,
of his organization, of his thought, but not, scientifically, of his
_mind_. This entity, this occult cause, belongs to the _metaphysic_
stage of theorizing. "There is no place," he cries, "for this illusory
psychology, the last transformation of theology!"--though, by the way,
so far as a belief in this abstract entity of mind is concerned, the
_metaphysic_ condition of our knowledge appe