are, if
possible, worse. Void of enlarged views, despising all that is too large
for their comprehension, devoted exclusively each to his special
science, contemptuously indifferent to moral and political interests,
their sole aim is to acquire an easy reputation, and in France (through
paid Academies and professorships) personal lucre, by pushing their
sciences into idle and useless inquiries (speculations oiseuses), of no
value to the real interests of mankind, and tending to divert the
thoughts from them. One of the duties most incumbent on opinion and on
the Spiritual Power, is to stigmatize as immoral, and effectually
suppress, these useless employments of the speculative faculties. All
exercise of thought should be abstained from, which has not some
beneficial tendency, some actual utility to mankind. M. Comte, of
course, is not the man to say that it must be a merely material utility.
If a speculation, though it has no doctrinal, has a logical value--if it
throws any light on universal Method--it is still more deserving of
cultivation than if its usefulness was merely practical: but, either as
method or as doctrine, it must bring forth fruits to Humanity, otherwise
it is not only contemptible, but criminal.

That there is a portion of truth at the bottom of all this, we should be
the last to deny. No respect is due to any employment of the intellect
which does not tend to the good of mankind. It is precisely on a level
with any idle amusement, and should be condemned as waste of time, if
carried beyond the limit within which amusement is permissible. And
whoever devotes powers of thought which could render to Humanity
services it urgently needs, to speculations and studies which it could
dispense with, is liable to the discredit attaching to a well-grounded
suspicion of caring little for Humanity. But who can affirm positively
of any speculations, guided by right scientific methods, on subjects
really accessible to the human faculties, that they are incapable of
being of any use? Nobody knows what knowledge will prove to be of use,
and what is destined to be useless. The most that can be said is that
some kinds are of more certain, and above all, of more present utility
than others. How often the most important practical results have been
the remote consequence of studies which no one would have expected to
lead to them! Could the mathematicians, who, in the schools of
Alexandria, investigated the properties of