l entities--and with this further
disadvantage, as compared with the mathematician, that the blunders of
the latter are of no practical consequence, while the errors of
systematic materialism may paralyse the energies and destroy the beauty
of a life.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] The substance of this paper was contained in a discourse which was
delivered in Edinburgh on the evening of Sunday, the 8th of November,
1868--being the first of a series of Sunday evening addresses upon
non-theological topics, instituted by the Rev. J. Cranbrook. Some
phrases, which could possess only a transitory and local interest, have
been omitted; instead of the newspaper report of the Archbishop of
York's address, his Grace's subsequently-published pamphlet "On the
Limits of Philosophical Inquiry" is quoted; and I have, here and there,
endeavoured to express my meaning more fully and clearly than I seem to
have done in speaking--if I may judge by sundry criticisms upon what I
am supposed to have said, which have appeared. But in substance, and, so
far as my recollection serves, in form, what is here written corresponds
with what was there said.

[11] "The Limits of Philosophical Inquiry," pp. 4 and 5.

[12] Hume's Essay "Of the Academical or Sceptical Philosophy," in the
"Inquiry concerning the Human Understanding."

VIII.

THE SCIENTIFIC ASPECTS OF POSITIVISM.

It is now some sixteen or seventeen years since I became acquainted with
the "Philosophic Positive," the "Discours sur l'Ensemble du
Positivisme," and the "Politique Positive" of Auguste Comte. I was led
to study these works partly by the allusions to them in Mr. Mill's
"Logic," partly by the recommendation of a distinguished theologian, and
partly by the urgency of a valued friend, the late Professor Henfrey,
who looked upon M. Comte's bulky volumes as a mine of wisdom, and lent
them to me that I might dig and be rich. After due perusal, I found
myself in a position to echo my friend's words, though I may have laid
more stress on the "mine" than on the "wisdom." For I found the veins of
ore few and far between, and the rock so apt to run to mud, that one
incurred the risk of being intellectually smothered in the working.
Still, as I was glad to acknowledge, I did come to a nugget here and
there; though not, so far as my experience went, in the discussions on
the philosophy of the physical sciences, but in the chapters on
speculative and practical sociology. In these there