nd placed on a
more solid and enduring basis. But they prove nothing more than this:
they do _not_ prove that these sciences must ultimately supersede
Theology, or that they have a necessary tendency towards Atheism. On the
contrary, we hold that they afford a valid presumption from analogy on
the other side. For suppose, even, that Religion, following the same law
of development which determines the progress of every other branch of
human knowledge, had become incorporated, in its earlier stages, with
many fond and foolish superstitions, the analogy of the other sciences
would lead us to conclude that, just as the reveries of Astrology had
passed away and given place to a solid system of Astronomy,--and as the
vain speculations of Alchemy had been superseded by the useful
discoveries of Chemistry,--and as the arts of Augury and Divination had
finally issued in the inductive science of true Natural History,--so
Theology might also purge itself from the fond conceits which had been
for a time incorporated with it, and still survive, after all
superstition had passed away, as a sound and fruitful branch of the tree
of knowledge.

This is not the precise light, however, in which M. Comte regards
Theology, He does not speak of it as _a distinct and independent
science_, but rather as _a method of Philosophy_, which has been applied
to the explanation of _all_ the departments of Nature; and, viewed in
this light, he objects to it on the ground that Positive Science
peremptorily demands the elimination of all causes, efficient and final,
and, consequently, the exclusion of all reference to God, or to any
supernatural power, in connection with the laws either of the material
or moral world. This is the fundamental basis of his theory. It is
assumed that the recognition of natural laws is incompatible with the
belief in supernatural powers, and that these laws must be invariable
and independent of any superior will. Hence the supposed antagonism
between Theology and Physical Science, which is strongly affirmed by M.
Comte[77]; as if the laws of Nature could not exist unless they were
independent of the Divine will, or as if the arts of industry could not
be pursued, on the supposition of a Providence, without sacrilegious
presumption. The laws for which he contends must have had no author to
establish, and can have no superior will to control them; they had no
beginning, and can have no end; they cannot be reversed, suspended,