n beings for a common purpose or purposes. Few,
indeed, of the elementary laws of the human mind are peculiar to this
state, almost all being called into action in the two other states. But
those simple laws of human nature, operating in that wider field, give
rise to results of a sufficiently universal character, and even (when
compared with the still more complex phenomena of which they are the
determining causes) sufficiently simple, to admit of being called,
though in a somewhat looser sense, _laws_ of society, or laws of human
nature in the social state. These laws, or general truths, form the
subject of a branch of science which may be aptly designated from the
title of _social economy_; somewhat less happily by that of _speculative
politics_, or the _science_ of politics, as contradistinguished from the
art. This science stands in the same relation to the social, as anatomy
and physiology to the physical body. It shows by what principles of his
nature man is induced to enter into a state of society; how this feature
in his position acts upon his interests and feelings, and through them
upon his conduct; how the association tends progressively to become
closer, and the co-operation extends itself to more and more purposes;
what those purposes are, and what the varieties of means most generally
adopted for furthering them; what are the various relations which
establish themselves among human beings as the ordinary consequence of
the social union; what those which are different in different states of
society; in what historical order those states tend to succeed one
another; and what are the effects of each upon the conduct and character
of man.

This branch of science, whether we prefer to call it social economy,
speculative politics, or the natural history of society, presupposes the
whole science of the nature of the individual mind; since all the laws
of which the latter science takes cognizance are brought into play in a
state of society, and the truths of the social science are but
statements of the manner in which those simple laws take effect in
complicated circumstances. Pure mental philosophy, therefore, is an
essential part, or preliminary, of political philosophy. The science of
social economy embraces every part of man's nature, in so far as
influencing the conduct or condition of man in society; and therefore
may it be termed speculative politics, as being the scientific
foundation of practical politic