For some time much has been said, in England and on the Continent,concerning "Positivism" and "the Positive Philosophy." Those phrases,which during the life of the eminent thinker who introduced them hadmade their way into no writings or discussions but those of his very fewdirect disciples, have emerged from the depths and manifested themselveson the surface of the philosophy of the age. It is not very widely knownwhat they represent, but it is understood that they represent something.They are symbols of a recognised mode of thought, and one of sufficientimportance to induce almost all who now discuss the great problems ofphilosophy, or survey from any elevated point of view the opinions ofthe age, to take what is termed the Positivist view of things intoserious consideration, and define their own position, more or lessfriendly or hostile, in regard to it. Indeed, though the mode of thoughtexpressed by the terms Positive and Positivism is widely spread, thewords themselves are, as usual, better known through the enemies of thatmode of thinking than through its friends; and more than one thinker whonever called himself or his opinions by those appellations, andcarefully guarded himself against being confounded with those who did,finds himself, sometimes to his displeasure, though generally by atolerably correct instinct, classed with Positivists, and assailed as aPositivist. This change in the bearings of philosophic opinion commencedin England earlier than in France, where a philosophy of a contrary kindhad been more widely cultivated, and had taken a firmer hold on thespeculative minds of a generation formed by Royer-Collard, Cousin,Jouffroy, and their compeers. The great treatise of M. Comte wasscarcely mentioned in French literature or criticism, when it wasalready working powerfully on the minds of many British students andthinkers. But, agreeably to the usual course of things in France, thenew tendency, when it set in, set in more strongly. Those who callthemselves Positivists are indeed not numerous; but all French writerswho adhere to the common philosophy, now feel it necessary to begin byfortifying their position against "the Positivist school." And the modeof thinking thus designated is already manifesting its importance by oneof the most unequivocal signs, the appearance of thinkers who attempt acompromise or juste milieu between it and its opposite. The acutecritic and metaphysician M. Taine, and the distinguished chemist M.Berthelot, are the authors of the two most conspicuous of theseattempts.
The time, therefore, seems to have come, when every philosophic thinkernot only ought to form, but may usefully express, a judgment respectingthis intellectual movement; endeavouring to understand what it is,whether it is essentially a wholesome movement, and if so, what is to beaccepted and what rejected of the direction given to it by its mostimportant movers. There cannot be a more appropriate mode of discussingthese points than in the form of a critical examination of thephilosophy of Auguste Comte; for which the appearance of a new editionof his fundamental treatise, with a preface by the most eminent, inevery point of view, of his professed disciples, M. Littré, affords agood opportunity. The name of M. Comte is more identified than any otherwith this mode of thought. He is the first who has attempted itscomplete systematization, and the scientific extension of it to allobjects of human knowledge. And in doing this he has displayed aquantity and quality of mental power, and achieved an amount of success,which have not only won but retained the high admiration of thinkers asradically and strenuously opp