A General View of Positivism by Auguste Comte (learn to read books TXT) 📕

is not the way to find it. But again, freedom of teaching is a step towards the normal state; it amounts to an admission that the problem of education is one which temporal authorities are incompetent to solve. Positivists would be the last to deny that education ought to be regularly organized. Only they assert, first, that as long as the spiritual interregnum lasts, no organization is possible; and secondly, that whenever the acceptance of a new synthesis makes it possible, it will be effected by the spiritual power to which that synthesis gives rise. In the meantime no general system of State education should be attempted. It will be well, however, to continue State assistance to those branches of instruction which are the most liable to be neglected by private enterprise, especially reading and writing. Moreover, there are certain institutions either established or revived by the Convention for higher training in special subjects; these ought to be carefully preserved, and brought up to the present state of our knowledge, for they contain the germs of principles which will be most valuable when the problem of reorganizing general education comes before us. But all the institutions abolished by the Convention ought now to be finally suppressed. Even the Academies should form no exception to this rule, for the harm which they have done, both intellectually and morally, since their reinstalment, has fully justified the wisdom of the men who decided on their abolition. Government should no doubt exercise constant vigilance over all private educational institutions; but this should have nothing to do with their doctrines, but with their morality, a point scandalously neglected in the present state of the law. These should be the limits of state interference in education. With these exceptions it should be left to the unrestricted efforts of private associations, so as to give every opportunity for a definitive educational system to establish itself. For to pretend that any satisfactory system exists at present would only be a hypocritical subterfuge on the part of the authorities. The most important step towards freedom of education would be the suppression of all grants to theological or metaphysical societies, leaving each man free to support the religion and the system of instruction which he prefers. This, however, should be carried out in a just and liberal spirit worthy of the cause, and without the least taint of personal dislike or party feeling. Full indemnity should be given to members of Churches or Universities, upon whom these changes would come unexpectedly. By acting in this spirit it will be far less difficult to carry out measures which are obviously indicated by the position in which we stand. As there is now no doctrine which commands general assent, it would be an act of retrogression to give legal sanction to any of the old creeds, whatever their former claim to spiritual ascendancy. It is quite in accordance with the republican spirit to refuse such sanction, notwithstanding the tendency that there is to allow ideologists to succeed to the Academic offices held under the constitutional system by psychologists.

But Positivism will have as beneficial an influence on Public Order as on Liberty. It holds, in exact opposition to revolutionary prejudices, that the central power should preponderate over the local. The constitutionalist principle of separating the legislative from the executive is only an empirical imitation of the larger principle of separating temporal and spiritual power, which was adopted in the Middle Ages. There will always be a contest for political supremacy between the central and local authorities; and it is an error into which, from various causes, we have fallen recently, to attempt to balance them against each other. The whole tendency of French history has been to let the central power preponderate, until it degenerated and became retrograde towards the end of the seventeenth century. Our present preference for the local power is therefore an historical anomaly, which is sure to cease as soon as the fear of reaction has passed away. And as Republicanism secures us against any dangers of this kind, our political sympathies will soon resume their old course. The advantages of the central power are, first, that it is more directly responsible than the other; and, secondly, that it is more practical and less likely to set up any claims to spiritual influence. This last feature is of the highest importance, and is likely to become every day more marked. Whereas the local or legislative power, not having its functions clearly defined, is very apt to interfere in theoretical questions without being in any sense qualified for doing so. Its preponderance would, then, in most cases be injurious to intellectual freedom, which, as it feels instinctively, will ultimately result in the rise of a spiritual authority destined to supersede its own. On the strength of these tendencies, which have never before been explained, Positivists have little hesitation in siding in almost all cases with the central as against the local power. Philosophers, whom no one can accuse of reactionist or servile views, who have given up all political prospects, and who are devoting themselves wholly to the work of spiritual reorganization, need not be afraid to take this course; and they ought to exert themselves vigorously in making the central power preponderant, limiting the functions of the local power to what is strictly indispensable. And, notwithstanding all appearances to the contrary, republicanism will help to modify the revolutionary feeling on this point. It removes the distrust of authority caused naturally by the retrograde spirit of the old monarchy; and it makes it easier to repress any further tendencies of the same kind, without necessitating an entire change in the character of our policy for the sake of providing against a contingency, of which there is now so little fear. As soon as the central power has given sufficient proof of its progressive intentions, there will be no unwillingness on the part of the French public to restrict the powers