Auguste Comte

Abstract

This chapter will consider five themes related to Auguste Comte’s sociology: Positivism, the Unity of the Scientific Method, Comte’s positive religion, the law of three stages, and Comte’s alleged madness. In the final section, the text will summarize the main criticisms against Comte and those in his favor.

Textbooks of sociological theory have long since expelled Comte. The text will explain which aspects of his thought are still current and why they should still be studied today.

Introduction

This chapter will consider five themes related to Auguste Comte’s sociology: Positivism, the Unity of the Scientific Method, Comte’s positive religion, the law of three stages, and Comte’s alleged madness. In the final section, the text will summarize the main criticisms against Comte and those in his favor.

Textbooks of sociological theory have long since expelled Comte. The text will explain which aspects of his thought are still current and why they should still be studied today.

The Power of Prediction

Auguste Comte (1798–1857) founded positivism, the philosophical current that dominated European culture in the second half of the nineteenth century. According to positivism, knowledge should be based on the observation of reality. The word “positive” comes from the Latin “positum,” literally “what is placed” or “rooted” in the reality of the facts. Positivism does not investigate the ultimate causes of phenomena; it limits itself to ascertaining their existence to understand the laws by which they are regulated. In his A Discourse on the Positive Spirit, Comte writes that, about social phenomena, we can know only their mutual relations without ever penetrating the mystery of their production (Comte [1844] 1903). Filled with admiration for the scientific progress from Galileo onward, Comte believes that to make political science positive, it is necessary to introduce the predominance of observation over imagination (Comte [1822] 1998, 90).

What is the main characteristic of the positive spirit? This characteristic, Comte explains, is the “rational prediction” that allows human dominion over nature, on which the progress of humanity depends. Scientific knowledge serves to predict future phenomena. Comte distinguishes erudition from science. The erudite man accumulates many facts without deducing them from each other, unlike the positivistic man, who knows that the facts, unable to produce laws, are sterile.

This first chapter will deal with the man who invented the terms “sociology” and “sociological theory.” In the judgment of many scholars, almost everything he wrote is outdated. However, in the last fifty years, a group of researchers transformed the studies on Comte, long dominated by Raymond Aron (Aron 1998), Leszek Kolakowski (Kolakowski 1972), Frank E. Manuel (Manuel 1962), Karl R. Popper (Popper 1964), Friedrich Hayek (Hayek 1952), Norbert Elias (Elias 1978), Evans-Pritchard (Evans-Pritchard 1970), Ronald Fletcher (Fletcher 1966), Donald G. Charlton (Charlton 1959), and Walter M. Simon (Simon 1963)

These worthy scholars, who have re-evaluated the importance of Comte, are Terence R. Wright (Wright 1986), Mary Pickering (Pickering 1993), David Hesse (Hesse 1996), Robert Scharff (Scharff 1995), Gillis Harp (Harp 1995), Andrew Wernick (2001), Johan Heilbron (Heilbron 1990), and Mike Gane (Gane 2016).

The First Theme: The Unity of the Scientific Method

Three main themes dominate Comte’s sociology.

The first is the unity of the scientific method.

According to Comte, all disciplines must use the method of natural sciences. Men must study social phenomena through observation, experimentation, and comparison. Comte called his new discipline “social physics,” presenting his aims in an 1825 opuscule entitled Philosophical Considerations on the Sciences and Scientists.

He clarifies that philosophers must study society as physicists study matter. Comte establishes that social physics must elaborate causal explanations of social phenomena, considered with the same spirit with which astronomical, physical, chemical, and physiological phenomena are considered, that is, as subject to invariable natural laws. Social physics should explain how the human race gradually progressed toward civilization in modern Europe through a necessary chain of transformations. A few years later, Comte would have coined the term “sociology,” which appears, for the first time, in the fourth volume of his Course of Positive Philosophy, published in 1839.

According to Comte, history is the scientific basis of sociology and the laboratory in which the sociologist verifies his hypotheses and theories. The sociologist finds facts to be observed in history, which they must order according to cause-effect relationships. Just as the sociologist cannot do without history, the historian cannot do without sociology. Without a general theory of society, the historian’s work would inevitably degenerate into a compilation of provisional materials. The sociological theory allows the historian to separate relevant facts from irrelevant ones. Bad theories lead to bad observations. The primacy of sociological theory over empirical research is a logical prescription, and the function of sociological theory is to guide observations. In this way, Comte sets a principle that Pierre Bourdieu, as we will see later, summarized as follows: “None of us live in the world without glasses to interpret it” (Bourdieu 2010, 75).

By virtue of the extreme complexity of the phenomena, good observations are difficult and rare because of the imperfection of positive theories. Any social observation must require the use of the fundamental theories destined to continuously connect the facts that happen to the facts that happened. It is from the link with previous events that one learns to understand subsequent events.

The Second Theme: The Intellectual Reform

Intellectual reform is the second central theme of Comte’s sociology, which inaugurates a sociological tradition based on social commitment on the part of the sociologist, exhorted to use their research to solve the problems of their time. Comte would like to help Europe emerge from the profound intellectual anarchy into which it has fallen. Misconceptions create disorganized societies, and social disorganization is always a source of anarchy and unhappiness. Comte’s intellectual reform consists of the spread of positivism in all spheres of life, public and private. As men have conflicting opinions on how society should be organized, it is crucial to find a source of absolute truths that can bring everyone to a consensus. Scientific laws are this source, and politics must do nothing but incorporate scientific findings to solve social and economic problems. Once everyone has embraced positivism, politics will become useless.

The intellectual crisis originates from the French Revolution, on which it is helpful to know Comte’s judgment to clarify the differences that separate Comte from revolutionary and reactionary thinkers, such as Edmund Burke (Burke 1935), Joseph de Maistre (de Maistre [1814] 1847), and Louis de Bonald (de Bonald [1800] 2020).

Comte’s judgment can be considered a synthesis of the revolutionary and counter-revolutionary positions.

Of the revolutionary culture, Comte loves the cult of progress based on the future; of the counter-revolutionary culture, he loves the cult of order based on the past. This explains the motto of Comte’s positivism: “Order and progress.”

For Comte, the crisis in Europe is not to be resolved in a revolutionary way by erasing the old world nor in a reactionary way, by rejecting the new world. The crisis in Europe must be resolved by linking progress and tradition together. Comte attributed a positive and a negative function to the French Revolution. The revolutionaries gave a salutary jolt to the intelligence of Europeans, affirming the need for a new political order. However, revolutionary criticism is purely negative, and, as such, it cannot construct anything positive. The French Revolution was a necessary and indispensable stage in humanity’s journey. Still, the metaphysical philosophy of the revolutionaries is inconclusive and aggravates the “moral disease of Europe,” as he names it. This disease is the lack of absolute truths, which only sociology can guarantee. Once men are united around the positive philosophy, society will be able to develop indefinitely, thanks to a new mindset, which will make it possible to organize society on the basis of infallible principles derived from natural laws.

The Third Theme: The Positive Religion

The third central theme of Comte’s sociology is the foundation of the positivist religion, or the religion of humanity, representing the most advanced part of his intellectual reform. Traditional religions must disappear because they have accomplished their essential historical function of leading humanity to the age of science. Despite its merits, Christianity should be replaced by positivism. Only in this way can men reconcile reason and passion. Science alone cannot defeat intellectual anarchy. Feelings are more powerful than reasoning, and Comte wants to combine them into a new religion he declared the pope. For this reason, he was isolated on charges of being mad, an accusation also shared by Norbert Elias (Elias 1978, 33). However, as we will see, the most recent research by Mary Pickering has disproved this thesis, linking Comte’s religion to the cultural project of his youth.

After introducing the three main themes dominating Comte’s sociology, we are ready to delve into his works.

Let’s proceed in order, starting with the Early Essays in Social Philosophy.

Box 2.1 The Works

Unlike Raymond Aron, who proposed dividing Comte’s philosophical evolution into three phases (Aron 1998, 81), I propose a division into two phases since I do not see substantial differences between the youthful ideas of the Early Essays in Social Philosophy published in six volumes between 1819 and 1828 and those contained in his fundamental work, the Course of Positive Philosophy published between 1830 and 1842. Three years before his death, Comte wrote that there is substantial continuity between his early writings and the Course of Positive Philosophy (Comte [1819–1828] 1969, 3).

In summary, this chapter distinguishes two periods.

The first includes the six Early Essays in Social Philosophy, plus the Course of Positive Philosophy. The second period includes the System of Positive Polity (Comte 1851–1854), published in four volumes between 1851 and 1854, plus other minor works, which I will quote in due course. The main difference between the two periods is represented by the fact that in the first, Comte limited himself to theorizing; in the second, he founded a real church, of which he proclaimed himself the “High Priest” to win men over to a religion based on the principles of positivism: The religion of humanity.

In the first period, Comte attempted to conquer minds; in the second, hearts.

Theological-Military Society and Scientific-Industrial Society

In the Early Essays in Social Philosophy, Comte sets out some fundamental ideas that will accompany him throughout his life. The omnipresent idea is that human progress is unstoppable and develops according to a natural law that pushes men through theological, metaphysical, and positive phases. In other words, the human mind progresses by employing three methods of philosophizing whose characteristics are different and opposed (Comte [1830–1842] 2000a, vol. I, 27).

Even when men establish faulty institutions, the progress of civilization toward positivism continues. Comte acknowledges that political institutions can slow down progress, but nothing and no one can stop it.

Progress is the reduction of the preponderance of emotional life over intellectual life (Comte [1830–1842] 2000b, vol. II, 100). When feelings retreat and reasoning advances, progress appears.

Two clarifications are needed.

The first is that no matter how much progress man may make, human passions will always prevail over reason. It follows that evolution consists in the reduction, never the elimination, of the weight of sentiment on reasoning. The second clarification is that to speak of progress, reason must be used to subdue nature. Comte believed that reason should perform the pragmatic function of transforming the material world since the main desire of almost all individuals is not to act on man but on nature. Men want to enjoy the advantages of civilization, but this enjoyment depends on their ability to exercise action on things. Civilizations that do not develop the ability to change nature for their benefit are essentially useless. In sum, progress is the reduction of the preponderance of emotional life over intellectual life to submit nature to man’s needs.

Another youthful idea, which we also find in maturity, is that the crisis in Europe is due to the conflict between two types of society: The theological-military one, declining, and the scientific-industrial one, ascending. The theological-military society is characterized by the predominance of theologians and warriors, slowly undermined by men of science and industry. This social category also includes bankers, entrepreneurs, and business executives. Europe is divided between two opposing ways of organizing society. Despite any apparent flaws, the scientific-industrial order is ultimately successful because the application of science in production will lead to a prosperous society and render war unnecessary. In the modern world, factories produce the resources that warriors once acquired through battles. In the future society, Comte envisions that scientists will wield spiritual power while industrialists will hold temporal power.

The problem is that the priests and the warriors don’t want to abdicate.

How to do?

One way to resolve the clash could be a new revolution, leaving only one winner alive. Comte does not approve of violence as it only worsens problems rather than solving them. He believes that the solution lies in the contribution of a superior mind, which he believes is his own. Through intellectual reform, he aims to help people understand that scientific and industrial development is both inevitable and advantageous. Scientific evolution opens up a bright future for everyone. Thanks to the alliance between science and industry, men will no longer have to fight with their fellow men to obtain resources; they will only have to fight against nature, thanks to the alliance between science and industry.

After introducing the main themes of Comte’s sociology, I am ready to approach his major work: the Course of Positive Philosophy.

Social Statics

In the Course of Positive Philosophy, Comte does not change his fundamental ideas but extends them to the world. The object of his reflection is man’s journey toward science from the beginning to today. The best way not to get lost in this mighty work is to start from the distinction between the theory of social statics and the theory of social dynamics.

Static sociology studies the spontaneous order of human societies.

In all societies, some institutions tend to form spontaneously, so it is possible to find them at any time and place. All societies, large or small, have common elements, which social statics identify through studying history. They are human nature, the family, the specialization of functions, and the government.

First: Human Nature

The first element of social statics is the instinct for sociability that men are naturally endowed with. Human beings are called to live together in a direct and immediate way, without personal calculation.

Comte denies that individual utility is the profound force that drives men to associate. The utility that men derive from being together develops after the society is established and not before. The calculation of individual utility cannot have created society; if anything, society has provided men with goods to calculate their individual utilities. Once they enter society, men discover that being together offers many goods and advantages that they previously ignored. If individual profit did not create the society, why did men decide to associate? Comte responds by thanking Franz Joseph Gall for having demonstrated, with his cerebral theory, the irresistible social tendency of human nature and disproving the theses of those who deny that man is naturally sociable. Society was born because men have an instinct for sociability.

An optimistic conception of human nature animates Comte. Men show a spontaneous tendency to associate and sympathize with the sufferings of living beings, especially those of their fellow men. Moreover, altruism often leads men to jeopardize their interests and life. Comte is horrified by those who describe the man as a being dominated only by egoism. Everyone should recognize that men often sacrifice their lives to help others. Comte recognizes that man is also made up of selfishness and personal instincts. Still, Comte’s optimism transforms egoism into a positive fact since men, without loving themselves, could not love their neighbors. Loving oneself is the precondition for fulfilling the precept of the Gospel, which requires us to love our fellow men as ourselves. In addition to the instinct for sociability, another characteristic of man is the strong preponderance of the affective faculties over the intellectual ones. Short: Feelings are more powerful than reasoning.

The theme of man’s “weak intelligence” is central to Comte and requires attention.

Due to their fragile constitution, men must progress by leveraging what they lack: The faculties of the intellect. The human mind is sluggish and easily fatigued. This datum that biology supplies to sociology explains the significant part that the sweet doing nothing occupies in all civilizations. Men are naturally inclined to manual work, and not intellectual one, and they usually activate their mental faculties to solve above all practical problems associated with organic life. In the fiftieth lesson of the Course of Positive Philosophy, Comte writes that intellectual activity, short it lasts, causes real fatigue that soon becomes unbearable in most men.

The fact that men’s mind is so weak also explains the ease with which they let themselves be dominated by passions. However, Comte does not negatively judge the preponderance of passions over the intellect; on the contrary, he is happy that this imbalance can never change for physiological reasons. Feelings perform a dual function. On the one hand, they set reason in motion, shaking it from its physiological lethargy; on the other hand, they provide individuals with the goals they strive to fulfill. If passion did not dictate the objectives, the human mind would be lost in a sea of ​​inconclusive speculations up to the limit of transcendent idiotism. And if men strengthened their intellect, would that be bad? No, Comte replies, full of optimism, it would be good. A more powerful intellect would cause a growth in men’s natural altruism, which could better discipline their most egoistic impulses.

However, Comte’s optimism did not blind him to reality. He was aware of the importance of conflict in social life. He acknowledges that striking the right balance between individual and social instincts is difficult. Even the more irenic religious communities are often tormented by profound daily discords, impossible to avoid when one wants to reconcile intimacy and the extension of human relationships.

Second: Family

The family is the second element of social statics. Even when it comprises only the two spouses, the family is the only true social unit. It acts as a link between the individual and society and is where we learn the rules for living in harmony with the surrounding world. The family helps individuals to discipline their egoism and to respect hierarchies. Man’s nature is dual as it is crossed by two opposing forces: Egoism and altruism. Domestic life makes possible a complete fusion of the two natures into one. To reconcile egoism and altruism, the family establishes common goals and instills the principle of subordination.

In fierce controversy with the advocates of social equality, Comte exalts the diversity and inequalities between genders, convinced that the family hierarchy is fundamental for the proper functioning of any society. To make themselves socially useful, men must learn to subordinate themselves to one another. Women must submit to their husbands and sons to their parents. Attacking the family means exposing the whole social organization to the risk of dissolution.

Comte acknowledges that families are affected by a crisis of legitimacy, which he wants to resolve by freeing them from the Catholic religion. Only a positive philosophy can settle the fundamental spirit of the family on truly stable natural foundations. Therefore, the family is the fundamental cell to build a new intellectual order based on the subordination of the sexes and the subordination of the ages. The first subordination establishes the family, and the second preserves it. Comte lashes out against the revolutionary declamations on the equality of the two sexes. If such equality were achieved, society would cease to function.

These statements by Comte hardly ever appear in the textbooks of sociological thought. However, it seems important to report them for three reasons. The first is that Comte’s thinking about women helps us understand the intellectual roots of one of the most current problems of our time: Discrimination against women. Secondly, it allows us to acquire a deeper awareness of Western culture, also in relation to the cultures of other civilizations, which we often judge with a severity that we do not reserve for ourselves. The third is that the last part of this book is devoted to Black feminism. By studying Comte’s prejudices toward women, we can compare the sociological conception of women in the nineteenth century and today.

Let us continue, therefore, with what Comte calls the “sociological theory of the family.” Women, he assures, cannot evolve intellectually due to physiological limits. They are not predisposed to rational reasoning, having a marked tendency to allow themselves to be dominated by emotions and moods. Comte believes that women can be happy and satisfied only in the subordinate role nature has designed for them in family life.

It is noteworthy that Comte does not link women’s character traits to societal organization or believe that women in his era have inferior cultural levels compared to men due to limited access to education. He thinks quite differently that the cause of the problem is “physiological.” History, Comte urges, has always confirmed, on equal terms and conditions, the inferiority of women compared to men in all fields. Women are unsuitable for government functions, which require the control of passions and the ability to grasp the interdependence of complex phenomena. The eternal function of women in the family and society is to use their innate sweetness to mitigate the harshness of men. Women are generally much superior to men for a greater natural impulse of sympathy and sociability, as much as they are inferior to them in terms of intelligence and reason.

I see a contradiction emerging here.

Comte argues that a fundamental tenet of his sociology is that society must explain the behavior of individuals. Comtian sociology does not consider human society as made up of individuals. However, Comte applies this principle selectively, depending on whether he studies men or women.

If the woman does not excel in politics or study, the organization of society is not contemplated. However, when, on another page of the Course of Positive Philosophy, Comte tries to explain the dissolute life of men, he identifies the cause of the problem in society and the spirit of an era characterized by intellectual anarchy, the “main disease of our century.” Here is the contradiction: Comte explains women with biology, reducing everything to the individual, and men with sociology, bringing everything back to society. In this “biological philosophy,” as he names it, the subordinate position of women has organic-individual causes, while the depravity of men has historical-social causes.

Third: Specialization and Government

The third element of static sociology is the specialization of work, which constitutes the elementary principle of society. The specialization contains a positive and a negative tendency. The positive one pushes society toward continuous progress. Through job specialization, humans have established a society that thrives on extensive and consistent cooperation. The division of labor is the elementary cause of the extension and complexity of the social organism.

The negative tendency of specialization of work leads to the disintegration of society. Men, doing different jobs, develop different interests. Specialization, without a guide, evaporates solidarity, placing individuals against each other. On the one hand, separating social functions allows for development; on the other, it makes solidarity difficult. In short, Comte warns the specialization of jobs contains a universal tendency toward dispersion. To avoid such a danger, permanent discipline is needed to reduce individual differences. The government performs this function, which is the fourth element of social statics. Specialization and government are in such a close relationship that they are in a necessary correlation. By intervening in social life, the government prevents the specialization of work from damaging social cohesion. The government’s ability to lead society must increase as evolution progresses. The more complex and developed society becomes, the more the government becomes indispensable as a regulatory body.

In summary, static sociology indicates four elements that never change because they are spontaneous. They are (1) prosocial behavior and altruistic human nature; (2) family, based on the hierarchy between the sexes; (3) specialization, which divides work among men; and (4) the government, which prevents disintegration.

The Social Dynamics

The heart of social dynamics is the law of the three stages, according to which humanity relentlessly evolves until it enters the scientific or positive state. Comte also calls the stages “mental ages.”

Before proceeding, we must ask ourselves a crucial question: What is evolution?

Digging into Comte’s work, I derived the following definition: Evolution consists of decreasing the preponderance of the affective over the intellectual life (Comte [1830–1842] 2000c, Vol. III, 13). When passion takes a step back and the intellect takes a step forward, Comte speaks about progress or evolution with a clarification that he cares a lot about. However, as much as a man may progress, passions will always prevail over reason. Evolution consists of reducing the power of emotions on the human mind, never in their elimination. The law of the three stages wants to explain the process of formation of the scientific mentality, which has developed cumulatively, millennium after millennium, thanks to the contribution of all past societies, each of which has provided a small advance in the direction of science. One of the educational implications of the law of the three stages is that men always have something for which to be grateful to previous generations, including primitive peoples, since men of all times, and those of all places, cooperate for the same intellectual or material, moral or political, evolution.

The theological state is characterized by imagination: Men try to explain the intimate nature of things and the first and final causes of all the phenomena, imagining that some supernatural agents intervene directly, constantly, and arbitrarily in the universe. In the theological state, men seek absolute knowledge.

The metaphysical state is dominated by speculation: Men explain the world no longer with supernatural agents but with a series of abstract forces or personified abstractions, which have the power to produce all phenomena. The metaphysical stage is an intermediate stage of intelligence, in which there are elements of the previous state and anticipations of the next. This transitory and hybrid condition causes the metaphysical stage to be characterized by a great confusion between imagination and reality, continually substituted for one another.

The positive stage is characterized by observation: Men give up investigating the fate and origin of the universe. Asking who created the sun and the earth is not important to a positivist. All that matters is to discover the invariable laws that govern the relationships of succession and similarity between phenomena through the use of reason and experiment. In the positive stage, general laws must explain particular phenomena, which make predictions possible and allow humans to dominate nature.

The Theological Stage and Fetishism

Comte’s pages dedicated to the first forms of religion are probably the most beautiful he has written.

Theological philosophy, he explains, played the fundamental function of placing the first men on the path of progress, shaking their minds from the “animal torpor” (Comte [1830–1842] 2000c, Vol. III, 19). If the primitives, with their small intellectual forces, had known that necessary laws dominate the world, they would have fallen into despair and apathy. Theological philosophy allowed them to hope that nature would be more benign if they knew how to curry favor with the gods. Theological philosophy also allowed the establishment of the first societies, providing individuals with a standard system of ideas and values to overcome individual egoisms that endanger cooperation. The three stages have crossed the theological state in progression: Fetishism, polytheism, and monotheism, three ways of thinking.

In fetishism, a spontaneous theology, men deify each body or phenomenon by which they are impressed or frightened, including shadows and mysterious-looking animals. This philosophy, the most ancient one, animated the whole of nature. At the dawn of humanity, the primitives animated and personified all observable bodies. In this way, they made the world recognizable and could cling to some certainty about its functioning. The fetishist mental universe makes the outside world appear in perfect harmony, which could never be found later in the same degree and which must have produced in primitive man a particular feeling of full satisfaction.

According to Comte, fetishism was a rather weak means of civilization because it did not create a sacred caste dedicated exclusively to speculative activity. More precisely, fetishism, with its particular way of conceiving divinity, has hindered the formation of priestly authority. The gods of fetishism are generally individual deities, each residing in a specific place or object. A priest does not need to evoke divinity if its abode is known and everyone comes into direct contact with it. The cult exists and is sometimes widely practiced, but it is a personality cult that does not need intermediaries.

According to Comte, the priestly caste performed two fundamental functions in the history of progress.

The first function is that priests, free from productive activities, can devote their whole lives to reflection and developing intelligence. The second function is that by rising above the masses, they created the first form of government. The progress of civilization requires men’s subjection to a higher government, of which the priestly caste is the first form. Religious beliefs need to be directed by a higher authority, which imposes on men only one way of believing in God under the lash of discipline. Without priestly authority, men indulge in the most incredible fantasies, and religion becomes a source of discord rather than harmony since everyone ends up having different ideas. In turn, religious divisions prevent the birth of a solid and cohesive political community. Fetishism, by preventing the birth of a priestly caste, has prolonged the primordial condition of the primitive organization.

By connecting a series of passages, scattered in different points of the Course of Positive Philosophy, I have brought out a causal chain, which I divide into four points, to clarify the way in which fetishism has slowed the process of civilization:

• (a) The fetishist conception of divinity prevented the birth of a priestly caste.

• (b) The lack of a priestly caste prevented the formation of a higher religious power

• (c) The lack of a higher religious power prevented primitive men from subjecting themselves to a system of shared beliefs on which to found a cohesive community

• (d) The lack of a cohesive community prevented, for a long time, the first men from marching together to conquer ambitious goals, which mark the process of civilization.

Since Comte believes that progress is cumulative and gradual, he must necessarily find an element of progress in fetishism that allows him to find an evolutionary link with polytheism. In Comte’s logic, fetishism must have necessarily left a contribution because progress passes through a long series of gradual changes in human ideas and conceptions. This contribution is astrolatry, which represents the highest refinement of the fetishist religion. The adoration of the stars was the fundamental turning point which allowed humanity to pass from fetishism to polytheism. In fact, astrolatry tends to create a full-blown priesthood.

Let’s see how.

Stars are very general fetishes. Being visible from everywhere, they can be the fetish of large populations. Humans, Comte speculates, once they understood that the stars are inaccessible, must have felt the need for a group of special intermediaries between them and those unreachable gods. According to Comte, it must have taken a considerable amount of time for wizards to gain recognition for their ability to control celestial bodies such as the moon and stars. At the dawn of humanity, the primitives attributed more importance to nearby phenomena than distant ones. Men deified the objects and animals that appeared on their way, not the distant stars of the sky. It is worth noting that this idea of Comte will be central to Durkheim’s The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, as we will see in Chap. 5.

Once it reached astrolatry, Fetishism could exert a genuinely capital political influence, taking humanity’s progress a step further. Political development would have remained impossible without an organized cult and a distinct priesthood whose formation was greatly encouraged by the cult of the stars. Greater generality and more difficult access to divinity are the two essential characteristics of astrolatry that render cult and priesthood indispensable. Comte criticizes those who condemn astrolatry as a form of human degradation without recognizing its beneficial contribution in advancing the progress of humanity. In sum, priesthood was essential to political development in the history of human progress.

Polytheism

What progress can we attribute to polytheism?

In polytheism, the deities are independent of each other, and each has unique characteristics corresponding to the infinite variety of natural phenomena. The mental structure of polytheists is far from conceiving the existence of invariable and necessary natural laws. Rather, it leads earthly events back to the arbitrary will of the divinities. Polytheism has played a crucial role in stimulating the human imagination to create imaginary beings responsible for natural occurrences. In fetishism, the power of feelings over reason is more pronounced than in polytheism. The imagination of polytheists does not erase feelings but begins to contain them for the first time in history seriously.

Comte attributes a much greater tolerance to polytheism than monotheism. Polytheistic religions have a multitude of deities, allowing for the possibility of introducing new ones as needed, providing greater flexibility and openness. Polytheistic religions have a multitude of deities, allowing for the possibility of introducing new ones as needed, providing greater flexibility and openness. For these same reasons, polytheism is little inclined to fanaticism and proselytism. It also possesses some characteristics that have favored progress toward the scientific mindset. Among these is the spirit of observation and induction. Haruspices systematically observed the flight of birds and animals’ entrails to interpret the deities’ will.

Comte writes that no stage is more critical than polytheism in human development. The scientific education of humanity began under the reign of polytheism. Yet, philosophers have almost always undervalued the significant and essential shift in human intelligence from fetishism to polytheism. As simple as this first advance may seem today, it was perhaps more fundamental than any subsequent improvement. The creation of the gods constitutes the first general attempt at the purely speculative activity of our intelligence, which, up to fetishism, had limited itself to animating all external bodies, following a spontaneous impulse and, therefore, without making the slightest intellectual effort.

Polytheism has also had important merits in the evolution of the social organization. It gave impetus to the first form of division of labor, raising a group of individuals above the crowd, the priests, who could devote all their time to cultivating the intellect. In polytheism, even if the divinities intervene directly in human affairs, they communicate with men through an elected class. Fetishism, on the other hand, did not provide for the institution of a true priesthood except in the final phase of astrolatry, which, as we have said, paved the way for polytheism.

Comte’s evaluation of polytheism must be followed carefully because it becomes more complex.

According to Comte, polytheism played a role in both creating and eliminating certain barriers on the path toward a scientific mindset.

What obstacle has polytheism posed to science?

By tracing all events to the unpredictable will of a series of undisciplined and highly fickle divinities, polytheism has distanced men from the idea, so central to science, of the existence of immutable laws. In sum, polytheism subordinated all phenomena to many extremely arbitrary wills, incompatible with any great idea of fixed rules.

What obstacles has polytheism removed on the road to the scientific mentality?

Through the concept of destiny, polytheism introduced a corrective to the whims of the gods. Destiny is a divinity to which the gods themselves must submit. Destiny is an inscrutable dark force that has already decided the course of events, just like the laws of science. Thanks to the idea of destiny or fate, polytheism has introduced a fundamental idea of the scientific mentality, according to which events are moved by objective, external, and necessary forces, unchangeable by individual will, with the difference that, in science, those forces are known and not obscure. In other words, polytheism created a particular god for immutability. This god was considered superior to all other gods, even though they were independent entities that existed alongside it. Polytheism spontaneously introduced, under the name of destiny or fatality, a general conception capable of providing primordial support to the fundamental principle of invariability of natural laws.

Monotheism

Let us now ask ourselves what progress toward scientific mentality has been offered by monotheism.

The form of monotheism that Comte deals with the most is Catholic monotheism, which advanced the scientific spirit by restricting the “right of supernatural inspiration” and subjecting it to rigorous authenticity verification (Comte [1830–1842] 2000c, Vol. III, 83).

What does it mean “to limit the right of supernatural inspiration,” and what would its positive functions be?

Restricting the right of divine inspiration means, quite simply, that Catholicism does not accept that an ordinary believer claims to have come in direct contact with God, the Madonna, or the saints. A similar prerogative belongs only to the pope and, possibly, to a few priests, who must demonstrate that they are sincere by providing proof of their visions and miracles. The Catholic Church has also introduced other prohibitions, which have proved to be very important for the progress of the scientific spirit. Catholicism has further cleared the public space of the presence of the supernatural by suppressing wizards, witches, premonitions, magic, and superstition. The Roman church’s concentration of supernatural powers in the hands of the pope, and its control over those who claim to have had contact with otherworldly forces, resulted in a reduction of the supernatural in both public and private life.

More concretely, Comte is meant to say that a society in which everyone has a daily apparition is full of bursting emotions that weaken reason. The passions had to loosen their grip on the intellect, thanks to Catholic monotheism. This is the reason why Comte believes that Protestantism represents a huge step backward in the path toward the scientific mentality. In opposition to the priestly caste of the Roman church, Protestantism gives individual believers the power to get in direct contact with God, restoring new impetus to the right of supernatural inspiration. In short, Protestantism, far from suppressing the right of divine inspiration, facilitated its extension, causing the progressive development of humanity to retreat. The protestant reform has spread to all strata of the population the idea that every man can dialogue directly with God, creating enormous intellectual and social disorientation and bewilderment.

In addition, Catholic monotheism has made a great contribution to human progress with the organization of a general education system. This immense social innovation is also found in Islamic monotheism inspired by the Catholic example.

The Metaphysical Stage

The metaphysical stage reaches its peak with the Enlightenment philosophy, of which Comte targets two fundamental aspects: individualism and subjective criticism. Comte thunders against the “superficial and immoral sects who trace their origin to Voltaire and Rousseau” (Comte [1854] 1858, 7).

Subjective criticism creates disorientation and chaos because it questions fundamental truths about human nature, spreading deadly anarchist utopias. Comte defines Rousseau as a “modern metaphysician” at the head of a pernicious anarchist school, that considers brutal social isolation as an example of the ideal society. Rousseau pushed the spirit of regression to the most extravagant delirium. His school of thought is guilty of a disastrous social influence, responsible for the most serious political aberrations that reach our days. Comte believes that theological and positive philosophy share the ability to establish a solid social order because they are both capable of providing absolute certainties. Metaphysical philosophy cannot succeed in such an essential undertaking because its fundamental nature is to be critical. The metaphysical stage resembles the theological stage without offering the advantage of its certainties.

I want to insist on the points of contact between theological and positive philosophy, recalling Comte’s attitude toward the Catholic Church.

Comte believes that Catholicism must be supplanted by positivism. However, he credits the Roman church with defending its fundamental precepts by repressing subjective criticism. Comte admires the Catholic axiom attributed to Saint Augustine: In necessariis unitas, in dubiis libertas, in omnibus charitas, a Latin phrase meaning “in necessary things unity; in uncertain things liberty; in all things charity.” The “necessary things” are the indisputable truths the Catholic church admits no doubts about.

Individualism and subjective reason, so hated by Catholicism, are not even liked by Comte because they leave the door open to endless discussions on the fundamental principles of social organization. These exhausting discussions are incompatible with the social order necessary for progress. Constantly examining, without ever deciding, would be considered madness in private life, let alone in public life, where uncertainty can create popular upheavals. Progress needs order, but the social order will always be incompatible with the permanent freedom left to everyone to question society’s very foundations.

Box 2.2 Sociocracy

Comte believed that absolute tolerance is impossible and has never truly existed. This is evident in revolutionary politics, which claim to uphold freedom of conscience but only tolerate opinions that are considered less important. Censorship can be found in all human groups. The revolutionaries, who want to overthrow the established order to build a more tolerant society, do not tolerate anyone criticizing their doctrine. A similar argument applies to Protestant sects, which, on the one hand, accuse Catholicism of being intolerant and, on the other, promote tyrannical intolerance within them.

Galileo was under trial for demonstrating the Earth’s movement. Still, it is equally true that the Roman church tolerated science as long as it avoided questioning those fundamental truths about which it admitted no doubts. Whether or not the papacy was a friend of science is of little relevance to Comte’s perspective. The evolution of science follows a spontaneous and natural course. The magicians in fetishism, the haruspices in polytheism, and the pope in monotheism unwittingly follow a higher plane, which is the law of the three stages. Like positivists, Comte is faithful to a scientific program that does not consider the social actors’ subjective motivations, purposes, and values (Jonas 1970, 286). What individuals think and want is not important in his scheme of universal evolution. External forces drive men. The interpretations of individuals and the meaning they attribute to their actions are irrelevant to the laws of science. Comte’s society is imagined as detached from the man who created it, governed by its eternal laws (Omodeo 1970, 186). Not surprisingly, Comte theorized an authoritarian society based on the power of scientists, which he called “sociocracy” (Donzelli 2003; Cassina 2014), a term he coined in the first volume of the four-volume System of Positive Polity published between 1851 and 1854 in Paris: “As then Theocracy and Theolatry depended upon Theology, so Sociology is necessary as the systematic basis of Sociocracy and Sociolatry” (Comte [1851] 1875, vol. I, 326).

One of the most current aspects of Comte’s thought concerns the relationship between science, freedom, and democracy, which scholars widely debate today (Guston 1993; MacLeod 1997; Kleinman 2000; Jasanoff 2003; Brown 2009; Barrotta 2016; Ostinelli 2020; Hartl and Tuboly 2021).

The Positive Stage

In the third stage, the positive philosophy allows to reach indisputable certainties by establishing the primacy of the whole over the parts and the synthesis over the analysis. Natural laws guide progress, and the positive stage would be established under the pressure of a necessary, continuous, inevitable, and spontaneous evolution.

The idea that progress is directed toward the last stage of humanity is also present in Marx, with a significant difference. In Marx, progress depends on the profusion of conflict; in Comte, conversely, it depends on its elimination. No society, for Comte, can run toward a grandiose goal if conflicts hold back its momentum. The conflict between workers and entrepreneurs must be eliminated by cultural reform. On the contrary, as we will see in Chap. 3, Marx proposes an intellectual reform, his theory of historical materialism, to fuel the conflict in the factories and extend it to the whole world.

Comte took it upon himself to expedite social evolution by elucidating his laws and the benefits of progress.

Comte was convinced that applying the scientific method to politics would make the conflicts between men disappear since scientific truth is unique, and men must accept it. Freedom of conscience cannot exist in the face of the results of science, which men and governments must only acknowledge. There is no freedom of conscience in astronomy, physics, chemistry, and physiology, in the sense that everyone would find it absurd not to believe with faith in the principles established in these sciences by their proponents. On the contrary, there are no stable principles in politics since the old principles have fallen, and the new ones still need to be formulated. Starting from similar premises, Comte imagines that positive philosophy may one day replace politics. In his view, politics is the government of the conflict triggered by the scarcity of resources. Once opulence is achieved, thanks to the application of science to the world of industry, conflicts will vanish, and politics will become superfluous. In a society founded on science, there will no longer be room for subjective opinions: Men will live on objective truths (Orsini 2019).

The development of the sciences also follows the development of human intelligence. With the progress of intelligence, the sciences have become more complex and, at the same time, more specific. Comte, reconstructing the historical development of the sciences, writes that the human mind first discovered the principles of the simplest objects and then those of the most complex ones. Physics, which deals with natural phenomena, living and dead, large and small, developed in the seventeenth century; chemistry, which is more complex and less general than physics—since there are many physical phenomena without chemical consequences, but there are no chemical phenomena without physical consequences—only became a positive science in the eighteenth century. Biology, whose laws are even more complex but only apply to living bodies, became a positive science in the nineteenth century; sociology would be the last to assert itself. Its laws have an unparalleled complexity, but they must account for specific phenomena. Human beings form the smallest subset of natural phenomena.

What does Comte think about European colonialism?

Comte deems Europe as the beacon of civilization, but this does not induce him to have aggressive attitudes toward other people.

Comte’s condemnation of colonialism is harsh.

Although he swears about the superiority of the white race, which he considered indisputable (Comte [1830–1842] 2000c, vol. III, 8), Comte is against ​​imposing the European social model on other societies. Each people has his/her social organization, which must be understood with reference to its context and respected. Colonial slavery of our day is “a truly social monstrosity” (Comte 2000b, vol. II, 273). Comte regards colonialism as an aberration dishonoring European civilization. In another passage, he states that today’s colonial slavery must be despised and regarded with “righteous horror” (Comte [1830–1842] 2000c, vol. III, 46). Comte calls for respect for the habits and customs of non-European countries and preaches love for all peoples. However, he believed that the past’s colonialism had influenced humanity’s progress by spreading European knowledge to other continents.

The System of Positive Polity

Comte’s invitation to universal love makes it possible to introduce the third central theme of his sociology quickly.

In the System of Positive Polity, Comte establishes a new religion, exhorting all men to celebrate the “Great Being” or the glorious deeds carried out by humanity throughout history. In short, the religion of the Great Being is the religion of humanity that celebrates itself. The institution of a new religion is announced from the long title of the work, which, quoted in full, is System of Positive Polity or Treatise on Sociology, Instituting the Religion of Humanity. Comte also creates a liturgy and a calendar with the saints, represented by the great geniuses of humanity, to which he adds the “religious formula” of Positivists: “Love is our Principle; Order is our Basis; and Progress our End.” (Comte [1851–1854] 1856, vol. I, 312).

The calendar, which inaugurates the positivist era, consists of thirteen months, each of which is named after a personality who has left an indelible mark on the history of evolution. Comte clarifies that his calendar is based on tradition and is different from the French revolutionaries, who were eager to create a break with the past. The revolutionaries do not realize that even the men most justly famous for their discoveries almost always owe most of their successes to their predecessors.

In the last phase of his life, Comte begins to build a real church, of which he proclaims himself the great priest. Man needs science and religion because they have a dual nature, another idea of Comte that will influence Durkheim greatly. Man is egoistic, but they are also altruistic because of their instinct for sociability. Men are also “dual” for neurological reasons. Their brains have two large locations: in the back, they house feelings; in the front, they house reasoning. However, it is the feelings that have the greatest power over actions. Religion, with the fundamental help of the family, solicits the instinct for sociability and restrains egoism. Religion is a sort of balance needle which shifts the cerebral balance toward the emotional dimension. Men must love the new positive order religiously.

Criticism of Comte

There is a considerable number of scholars who have expressed criticism toward Comte. Here, I will deal with the criticisms of Durkheim, John Stuart Mill, Raymond Boudon, Lewis Coser, Johan Heilbron, Raymond Aron, and Anne Pickering. Ultimately, I will include my own critique of Coser’s critique concerning Comte. I will explain why Coser’s condemnation of Comte is an exaggeration.

According to Durkheim, Comte did not rigorously respect the rules he had placed at the foundation of sociology. Instead of respecting the empirical method and describing the effective functioning of human societies, Comte developed more of a philosophy of history than scientific sociology. In Durkheim’s own words, Comte: “Hardly went beyond generalities concerning the nature of societies, the relationships between the social and biological realms, and the general march of progress” (Durkheim [1897] 2013, 18).

According to the ancient judgment of John Stuart Mill, there was a Comte to remember, that of the Course of Positive Philosophy, and a Comte to forget, that of the System of Positive Polity.

More recently, Raymond Boudon criticized Comte’s methodological collectivism. Comte maintained that, when understood as a scientific discipline, sociology does not allow human society to be considered as made up of individuals. According to Boudon, this methodological precept of Comte contains an anti-individualistic principle that limits the development of sociological knowledge because it diverts attention from the importance of individuals and their subjectivity. Boudon, as we will see in the next chapter, does not like behaviorism. Behaviorists precisely apply Comte’s idea, according to which human science must eliminate any consideration of the subjectivity of the actors. According to behaviorists, scientific psychology is a discipline that focuses on studying the relationship between two observable elements—stimuli and responses. For Boudon, this is a very poor scientific approach (Boudon 2008, 224).

Comte’s efforts to create a new religion have often been met with ridicule and contemptuous judgments to the point that, among the masters of sociological thought, he enjoys the “worst reputation” (Heilbron 1990, 153).

Lewis A. Coser was strict with Comte’s positive religion and his personal conduct in the latter stage of his life (Coser, Lewis A. [1971] 1977, 39). Comte surrounded himself with men of low intellectual level, including mechanics, carpenters, and failed poets, who prostrated themselves at his feet with the reverence that is due to an eminent religious figure. Many outside his circle considered him a “madman,” and Coser himself is inclined to believe he really was. Coser engages in a deeper analysis and tries to explain Comte’s alleged madness using the psychology of groups. Psychologically frustrated and saddened by being turned away like an outcast by thinkers of his own level, Comte surrounded himself with mediocre admirers whom he easily overlooked. Comte held mass and, during the week, received unbalanced people of various kinds, who listened to his sermons and confessed feelings of guilt and sins, even asking for absolution. Comte had proclaimed himself “pope” of the religion of humanity and acted as such, inviting his most unstable followers even to chastity. All this admiration must have been psychologically gratifying for a man who fell into disrepute with the major thinkers by whom he was once esteemed. Comte received letters of appreciation for his early writings from some of the most prestigious intellectuals of France, including the German explorer and scientist Alexander von Humboldt, who expressed his esteem and admiration for him in 1824 (Pickering 2009a, vol. II, 39). With time, Comte paid a very high price for his isolation from his peers, who stopped exercising control over his conduct. No longer having to fear the judgment of a culturally elevated group, Comte lost all restraint and fell to the bottom, becoming the “pathetic Pope of Humanity” (Coser [1971] 1977, 41). Leaving academia positively affected Comte, who was free to express all his creativity. However, this freedom cost him dearly. With no more ties to that rigid and severe academic world, Comte, taking refuge in his religious sect, derailed and became an outcast or perhaps a madman.

Although Comte is regarded today as “one of the first modern epistemologists” (Heilbron 1990, 153), Coser’s adverse verdict is still widespread. Until it remains undisputed, Comte’s intellectual figure will not be fully rehabilitated. Fortunately, there is no shortage of elements to challenge Coser’s devaluing interpretation of Comte.

First of all, through his theory of “descent to the bottom,” as I like to name it, Coser uses an interpretative category, which sociologists today call “loss of negative feedback,” a term that has been used to indicate the condition of religious fanatics, who, “encapsulated” in their sects, evade the moral condemnation of the surrounding world. Negative feedback plays an essential regulatory function in any social system, whether it comes from within the system or from outside. Negative feedback helps a social system to maintain its balance. Isolation often prevents the group from receiving sufficient feedback.

Social psychologists who refer to Kurt Lewin (Cummings et al. 2016) speak of “unfreezing” (Clark McCauley and Sophia Moskalenko 2017), which indicates the situation of those who find themselves projected into a new context, no longer linked to their previous life and, therefore, free to engage in conduct that was once censored. Unfreezing also stands for “disconnection.” Coser’s interpretation suggests Comte was out of touch with the scientific community and no longer subjected to negative feedback’s moderating power.

I must recall another concept in this examination of Comte’s deviance to update Coser’s lexicon: “Social encapsulation.” This is the term that sociologists would use today to express Coser’s idea, according to which Comte became a deviant because he locked himself up in his positivist sect.

Both sociologists of religion, Marc Galanter (Galanter 1989) and Lorne L. Dawson (Dawson 1998, 149), have clearly described the consequences of social encapsulation and the loss of negative feedback. Once the negative feedback disappears, the surrounding world can no longer influence the daily life of the members of the religious sect with its dissent toward their behaviors.

Historians have no doubts that Comte, toward the end of his life, became socially “encapsulated” and that his colleagues couldn’t let him feel their negative feedback. However, it should be noted that Comte did not increase his isolation only because of the foundation of the new religion but also because of his political positions. In 1851 he approved the coup d’état of Louis Napoleon, even losing the closeness of his faithful friend Émile Littré and other followers, who abandoned the Positivist Society, founded by Comte in 1848. In 1851, the year of the publication of the first volume of the System of Positive Polity, Comte also lost his job as a repeater at the École Polytechnique in Paris.

Through his theory of descent to the bottom, Coser also explains the degeneration of Comte’s writing, which would have tried to captivate an audience of a lower level than the one who once read the Course on Positive Philosophy. As a negative example, Coser cites the Philosophical Treatise on Popular Astronomy, better known as the Discourse on the Positive Spirit, which he used as the preface to the Treatise, published in 1844. Comte, Coser concludes, had once tried to win over the chosen minds; he now aims to conquer the feelings of the vulgar.

At this point, asking how such a vertiginous social fall could have begun is legitimate.

To answer this question, Coser goes back to the beginnings of Comte’s career, marked by his relationship with Claude Henri de Saint-Simon (1760–1825), a prominent intellectual he first loved and then hated. When the two began collaborating in 1817, Comte, much younger than Saint-Simon, became a pupil and secretary of his. In the reprint of his work, the Catechism of the Industrialists (Saint-Simon 1824), in which the term “positive” appears for the first time, Saint-Simon also included an essay by Comte, the System of Positive Polity, without mentioning the name of Comte, who turned away from his advisor, cursing him. Comte separated himself definitively from Saint-Simon between April and June 1824 (Martino 1978, 6). Saint-Simon had an enormous number of readers and visibility compared to Comte, who was greatly damaged by the breakup, including losing an audience.

Furthermore, his position at the École Polytechnique in Paris, always modest and marginal, gave him neither the academic gratifications he aspired to nor an audience adequate for the grandiose mission of regeneration of humanity, which he had attributed to himself. He did not even give him a decent fee for living, so much so that Comte lived on subsidies generously offered by friends, students, and admirers for a long time. Coser attributes Comte’s intellectual degeneration, above all, to his isolation from more cultured groups. Since Comte craved an audience, he did not have, he lowered the quality of his work to charm a larger number of readers.

Coser’s argument appears logical, but upon closer inspection, it reveals its limitations.

Critique of Coser’s Critique

Coser takes for granted that all scholars always want to have cultured and refined readers, but no empirical evidence confirms this common-sense idea. More likely, what happened to Comte usually happens to many scholars. When a scholar completes an enormous intellectual effort, such as the Course on Positive Philosophy, and feels he has given full expression to his ideas and creativity over twelve years, it is typical that he feels the need to publish a book with a more popular slant so that his theses reach a wider audience. Psychologically, philosophers’ relationship with readers is generally the same as that of capitalists with money: They always want more.

I want to develop a hypothesis opposite to that of Coser: Comte did not lower the quality of the writing because he was frustrated but satisfied. Free from academic restraints, Comte has revealed a psychological trait common to all scholars: Greed for readers. Intellectuals seek power and success like all ordinary men (Pellicani 2003). The modern intellectuals, on the one hand, despise the common people for their lack of education; on the other hand, they need their recognition and enthusiastic support. Two contradictory and equally imperious needs are urgent in the intellectual: The aristocratic isolation and the bond with the people to become their spiritual guide (Pellicani 2008, 27).

There would also be the possibility of developing an additional hypothesis based on a letter to Clotilde de Vaux dated June 6, 1845, in which Comte writes that he seeks in public life the joys that private life had denied him (Pickering 1993, vol. I, 17). This letter could allow us to affirm that Comte lowered the quality of his publications not because he was frustrated in public life but because he was frustrated in the private one, not for lack of readers, but for lack of love. However, we cannot know whether Comte wrote these words to Clotilde sincerely or because he hoped to attract her care, giving her the image of a man in need of love, unjustly struck from life. Probably, each of these interpretations captures an aspect of reality. Comte had met Clotilde de Vaux—a thirty-year-old separated from her husband—in October 1844, with whom he fell deeply in love with her. Comte declared her love for her the following year, which Clotilde rejected. On April 5, 1846, Clotilde, aware of being ill, died under the eyes of Comte, who dedicated a personal cult to her. According to some historians of sociological thought, Comte identified the cult of Clotilde with the positive religion presented in his latest work (Izzo 1994, 63).

Revaluation of Comte

Instead of condemning Comte’s religion, Raymond Aron saw profound meaning in it. Aron writes that sociology should not create religions. However, he likes Comte’s religion much more than the ones created by many of his atheist colleagues, who, Aron writes, even go so far as to wish the death of those who do not believe in the economic order to which they are devoted. Aron does not mention the Marxists but refers above all to them. Many secular intellectuals, Aron insists, mock Comte’s religion, but then they are the first to be devoted to some sacred text of philosophy. According to Aron, Comte’s religion is less absurd than is usually believed. If it is necessary to derive religion from sociology, which Aron personally would avoid doing, the only one that seems strictly conceivable to him is, after all, that of Comte (Aron 1998, 123). Today, we can be lenient toward Comte’s positivist religion. All in all, Comte’s religion has tried to contribute to the spread of scientific culture and altruism in all strata of society. In fact, the last phase of Comtian philosophy leads to a real religion of science based on the cult of humanity and progress. This phase must not be judged in an exclusively negative way since it is still part of a historical battle in favor of science and philanthropy (Abbagnano and Fornero 1992, vol. III, 302; De Boni 2003, 2005).

Let’s now turn to Mary Pickering whose conclusion is firm: Scholars who explain his religion of humanity with madness fail to grasp the coherence and continuity of his thought. After re-examining the documentation, Pickering rejected the thesis that Comte was first an arid scientific thinker and then became a mad religious reformer in his second career because of his sudden love for Clotilde de Vaux (Pickering 1993, 6; Cassina 2001). Comte’s shift toward authoritarianism must not be explained by psychology. It can be traced back to the broader historical context of nineteenth-century France, characterized by the weakness of liberalism. Many other scholars, and not just Comte, slipped toward authoritarianism because the French liberal culture, at that time, was not developed enough. Authoritarianism was not Comte’s problem; it had been the problem of many French scholars and thinkers. Anyway, when discussing Comte’s authoritarianism, I would like to remember that Comte, after having supported the coup d’état of Louis Napoleon, withdrew from it, protesting against the suppression of freedom of the press, which, among other things, hindered the dissemination of the positivist message.

Pickering’s conclusion, according to which Comte did not find his religion because he was a madman, must be considered seriously.

Prejudices are often rooted in events or episodes of the past, of which the memory has been lost. In his youth, Comte had suffered from what, at the time, was considered a “mental illness.”

When, exactly?

The young Comte, who belonged to a rigid Catholic and monarchical family, had caused a scandal by declaring himself a republican and a free thinker. In 1816, he was expelled from the École Polytechnique for insubordination. After his expulsion, he began collaborating with Saint-Simon, with whom he broke off relations in 1824, accusing him of intellectual theft. In 1826 Comte suffered a severe mental illness and was held in a psychiatric clinic for eight months (Pickering 2009b, vol. III, 2). He recovered with the help of his first wife, Caroline Massin, but struggled with bipolar disorder all his life. Over time, he became manic-depressive, obsessed with the idea of ​​having to regenerate humanity. In 1838, he fell victim to paranoia. He forbade himself to read books by contemporary authors, newspapers, or magazines, which risked damaging his originality, but also to avoid having to read negative reviews of his books. Comte’s pain was great when the people closest to him abandoned him due to his complex personality. His wife, whom he continually accused of not appreciating and betraying him, left him in 1842. In the meantime, Comte had obtained a marginal position, that of repetiteur, at the École Polytechnique, where he tried, several times, to win a professorship in mathematical analysis without success.

Comte is increasingly appreciated and re-evaluated over time. Many of his ideas are still considered relevant in sociology and allied fields.

Johan Heilbron noted that Comte’s law of three stages was already present in Turgot’s work (1750) and that Comte’s positivism is not particularly original. Comte’s intellectual legacy goes beyond his positivism and sociology and cannot be reduced to these two concepts alone. Comte was more important as a theorist of science than as a positivist or a sociologist. Comte’s contributions to the world of science are truly remarkable. While he is remembered as a positivist or a sociologist, it is his work as a theorist of science that truly sets him apart. His insights have had a profound impact on the way we understand and approach scientific inquiry today. First, Comte viewed scientific knowledge as a historical process, with changing concepts and theories. Second, he rejected the notion that scientific statements could be distinguished once and for all from non-scientific statements using universal criteria. Third, he differentiated sciences based on their object’s specific characteristics. In sum: “Auguste Comte can be described as one of the very first modern epistemologists” (Heilbron 1990, 157).

On his part, Perrin identified ten of Comte’s most enduring contributions (Perrin 1996, 130).

• Society may crumble when individuals solely determine whether their actions benefit the greater good,

• Moral consensus, and not self-interest, produces a durable social order.

• Governments become authoritarian when moral authority fails, and individuals no longer find a reference point outside themselves. The result is “administrative despotism,” i.e., the government of an oppressive and corrupt bureaucracy.

• Social change depends on opinions and not on material forces.

• Modern society depends on the division of labor, but specialization weakens the intellect and narrows mental perspectives, eventually dissolving the sense of community and the common good.

• Social progress has some limitations and evils that cannot be cured.

• Discovery is possible only thanks to theory. The world cannot be understood without a sociological theory that makes sense of social facts by linking them together. “Absolute empiricism” is impossible.

• The in-depth study of history provides a more profound knowledge of society than social statistics or the application of probability to social phenomena.

• Emotions are far more powerful than intellect, which they direct and invigorate.

• Objectivity is an ideal that cannot be achieved in sociology.

Who Liked Comte’s Positivism?

Born in France, positivism became the hegemonic philosophy in Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century. His influence in England, Germany, and Italy was notable.

The causes for the success of Comte’s positivism are numerous.

From a political point of view—except for the Crimean War of 1853–1856 and the blitzkrieg war between Prussia and France in 1870—peace prevails in Europe. Comte’s optimistic thesis on the peaceful future of the scientific-industrial society seemed to be confirmed before being denied by the outbreak of the First World War in 1914.

From an economic point of view, European capitalism leaps forward, thanks to the process of industrialization and the internationalization of trade. Again, Comte’s thesis seemed to find confirmation: science, applied to the world of industry, created an opulent society.

From a social point of view, the second half of the nineteenth century saw the development of the welfare state, especially in Bismarck’s Germany. The development of the welfare state also confirmed the optimistic thesis of the inexorable progress toward an opulent and peaceful society.

In the technical-scientific field, numerous important discoveries also favored the spread of positivism. Everything seemed to confirm Comte’s fundamental theses on the new happy era disclosed by science. If in France the three thousand highest priests in office were to fail—Claude Henri de Saint-Simon had written in 1819—the State would not suffer any damage; if, on the other hand, the three thousand most important scientists were to fail, it would be seriously affected. The bourgeoisie liked the optimism and reformism of positivism and its enmity toward revolutionary violence.

The more dynamic elements of the bourgeoisie liked Comte’s philosophy.

In the next chapter, I will deal with Spencer, who had a remarkable influence on sociology and was considered one of the greatest philosophers of his time. In life, his fame equaled that of Darwin.

Conclusion

In this chapter, we have explored Comte’s law of three stages. One of the most original aspects of Comte’s reflection is his idea that the Catholic Church worked in favor of the development of the scientific mentality. By eliminating the right of individuals to claim to be possessed by a divine spirit, the Catholic Church has reduced the power of emotions and irrationality in society. Robert G. Perrin listed ten aspects of Comte’s sociology that are still relevant today. To these, we can add Comte’s idea that the goal of sociology is generalization. As we will see in the chapter on symbolic interactionism, ethnographers also use their information to develop some generalizations. According to Comte, the goal of science is prediction, but prediction is impossible without generalization.

The text also showed that his major interpreters, such as Pickering, no longer share the thesis of Comte’s madness. Thanks to the development of social psychology, the behaviors of the last phase of Comte’s life, once considered the result of madness, are today considered the typical behaviors of certain social groups, such as religious sects characterized by closure toward the outside world and the loss of “negative feedback.” Heilbron and Perrin reassessed Comte. Heilbron considers Comte a pioneering modern epistemologist, while Perrin identified ten reasons why Comte remains relevant.

Self-test Path

• (1) Describe the unity of the scientific method in Comte.

• (2) What is the characteristic trait of the positive spirit?

• (3) Could you provide some information about Comte’s intellectual reform?

• (4) What are the immutable elements of society?

• (5) Explain Comte’s law of three stages.

• (6) What has been the importance of astrolatry in human progress?

• (7) Why is polytheism so important to Comte?

• (8) In what respect was Catholicism important for developing the scientific spirit?

• (9) What are the most severe criticisms of Comte’s positivist religion?

• (10) What did Mary Pickering write about Comte’s alleged madness?