Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 15.djvu/724

 7IO THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

Notes sur Auguste Comte par un de ses disciples. By Deroisin. Paris: Georges Cres et Cie, 1909. Crown 8vo, pp. iii+186. This is a book of memories of a master by a faithful disciple. But despite the strong devotion of the writer, apparent on almost every page, the point of view is almost unimpeachably frank and impartial. His literary analysis reminds one of the traditional cool- ness of the surgeon. For he by no means finds all in Auguste Comte good. The book is filled with details and first hand im- pressions of the great Postivist which are of great value to the historian of philosophy and of sociology. However, little has been added to previous expositions beyond the more definite massing of facts and details. As to the character of Comte himself, he has not given us a more favorable impression. One cannot read the book without getting a pretty definite conviction that Comte was mildly insane practically during the whole of his life. His domes- tic and personal relations were certainly not those of a man we would have style himself the priest of humanity. Perhaps no- where else in the western world than in France could a man be taken seriously in such a profession after having married a licensed prostitute (pp. 22, 180) with whom he had been on inti- mate terms (p. 181), and after having later cast her off with an open avowal of attachment to another woman. In his personal relations he is shown to have been petty and vain and unscrupulous to an extreme degree. Yet the loyalty of his disciples was re- markable. Even his wife seems to have been more sinned against than blamable in her relations with him. She did much to keep him balanced and within bounds. The Notes bring out pretty clearly that he wished to become moral and intellectual dictator of France and worked to this end the latter half of his life. Comte was a defective, but possessed of great mental vigor. He suffered from extreme myopia and from tics, with perhaps chronic melancholia. It would seem that the chief value of the book for the sociologist as well as for the general reader is to be found in a possible lesson in avoiding hero-worship, especially in connection with thinkers on social questions. For it is not true that we can or do consider a man's work apart from the man.

L. L. Bernard The University of Chicago