reason of man in the
aggregate. Such are morals, hygiene, social economy, and (in countries
where men belong to themselves) political economy. Of these sciences
Bentham might above all have said: "It is better to circulate, than to
advance them." What does it profit us that a great man, even a God,
should promulgate moral laws, if the minds of men, steeped in error,
will constantly mistake vice for virtue, and virtue for vice? What does
it benefit us that Smith, Say, and, according to Mr. de St. Chamans,
political economists of _every school_, should have proclaimed the
superiority in all commercial transactions, of _liberty_ above
_restraint_, if those who make laws, and for whom laws are made, are
convinced of the contrary?

These sciences, which have very properly been named _social_, are again
peculiar in this, that they, being of common application, no one will
confess himself ignorant of them. If the object be to determine a
question in chemistry or geometry, nobody pretends to have an innate
knowledge of the science, or is ashamed to consult Mr. Thenard, or to
seek information from the pages of Legendre or Bezout. But in the social
sciences authorities are rarely acknowledged. As each individual daily
acts upon his own notions whether right or wrong, of morals, hygiene,
and economy; of politics, whether reasonable or absurd, each one thinks
he has a right to prose, comment, decide, and dictate in these matters.
Are you sick? There is not a good old woman in the country who is not
ready to tell you the cause and the remedy of your sufferings. "It is
from humors in the blood," says she, "you must be purged." But what are
these humors, or are there any humors at all? On this subject she
troubles herself but little. This good old woman comes into my mind,
whenever I hear an attempt made to account for all the maladies of the
social body, by some trivial form of words. It is superabundance of
produce, tyranny of capital, industrial plethora, or other such
nonsense, of which, it would be fortunate if we could say: _Verba et
voces praetereaque nihil_, for these are errors from which fatal
consequences follow.

From what precedes, the two following results may be deduced: 1st. That
the social sciences, more than others, necessarily abound in _Sophisms_,
because in their application, each individual consults only his own
judgment and his own instincts. 2d. That in these sciences _Sophisms_
are especially injurious, beca