Page:History of Modern Philosophy (Falckenberg).djvu/575

 COMTE. SS3 (born at Montpellier in 1798, died at Paris in 1857), whose chief work, the Course of Positive Philosophy, 6 vols., ap- peared in 1830-42, [English version, " freely translated and condensed," by Harriet Martineau, 1853.] The positive philosophy seeks to put an end to the hoary error that anything more is open to our knowledge than given facts — phenomena and their relations. We do not know the essence of phenomena, and just as little their first causes and ultimate ends ; we know — by means of observation, experiment, and comparison — only the con- stant relations between phenomena, the relations of suc- cession and of similarity among facts, the uniformities of which we call their laws. All knowledge is, therefore, rela- tive ; there is no absolute knowledge, for the inmost es- sence of facts, and likewise their origin, the way in which they are produced, is for us impenetrable. We know only, and this by experience, that the phenomenon A is invariably connected with the phenomenon B, that the second always follows on the first, and call the constant antecedent of a phenomenon its cause. We know such causes only as are themselves phenomena. The fact that our knowledge is limited to the succession and coexistence of phenomena is not to be lamented as a defect: the only knowledge which is attainable] by us is at the same time the only useful knowledge, that which lends us practical power over phe- nomena. When we inquire into causes we desire to hasten or hinder the effect, or to change it as we wish, or at least to anticipate it in order to make our preparations accord- ingly. Such foresight and control of events can be attained only through a knowledge of their laws, their order of suc- cession, their phenomenal causes. Savoir pour pr^voir. But, although the prevision of facts is tiie only knowledge which we need, men have always sought after another, an "absolute" knowledge, or have even believed that they were in possession of it ; the forerunners of the positive philosophy themselves, Bacon and Descartes, have been Zellfrjubilaum, 1887 ; Maxim. Brlitt, Der Positivismus, Programme of the Real- gymnasium des Johanneums, Hamburg^, 1889; [also, besides Mill, p. 560. John Morley, Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. vi. pp. 229-238, and E. Caird, Tkt Social Philosophy and Religion of Comte, 1885. — Tr.].