MS 1343 (1902) - Of the Classification of the Sciences

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Second Paper. Of the Practical Sciences.

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science of Ornamental Gardening, which does not include Horticulture, Dendsology, etc.

B. Sciences Ministrant to Civicultural Instincts.

The Govern-Instinct is subserved by the practical sciences of Polity, and of all matters of government, including Police, Detection, Punishment, Jurisprudence, and Law. The last might be regarded as a theoretical science; but practical applications are constantly kept in view in the investigation of it, and therefore it is properly a practical science. By law is commonly meant those rules which the government provides an organization for enforcing; and that alone is the law which will be so enforced. Of the Law in this sense, of Jurisprudence or the inquiry into what such law ought to be, and of Polity or the science of government, the present author is entirely ignorant, and therefore will not attempt to produce subdivisions which, no doubt, have been elaborated by competent

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men. It is, however, needful to remark that this group includes the studies connected with other laws than three. Legal practitioners are often heard to deny that International Law is law, because it is not enforced by a sheriff's posse. But there are other modes of enforcement of rules which though less mechanically perfect, perhaps, are in some cases far more conducive to the purposes of those rules. Indeed, it is not at all a sheriff's posse or brute force that is the fundamental support of any effectual law, but the public sense of right and wrong. The brute force is nothing but an instrument, though a quite essential one. But there are other forms of brute force than a sheriff's posse. When a man detected at cheating in play is cut in the street by his acquaintances, that is brute force,—far more rigorous than telling him out and hanging him. We must therefore include among the sciences of this group, the study of the Code of Honour

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as pursued by Chateuvillard, Harlay Coëtquem, Louis XIV, Dalloz, Montesquieu, etc. Here belongs also the Science of Etiquette, which must be treated before long in a broad and scientific manner, if it has hitherto been given over to petty minds.

Perhaps no book has ever treated broadly with sincerity and good faith the question of how the Ghost instinct may best be gratified. But there have been studies innumerable of the propriety of special rites and methods of cultivating religion. These form a distinct group of sciences.

As of all the instincts no other is so energetic as the Gore-Instinct, so there is none for the satisfaction of which study has been more thoroughly scientific. No attempt will be made here to classify the military sciences, for that has no doubt been satisfactorily done in special treatises. It is a nice question whether inquiries into

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the proper conduct of games involving contest ought to be included in this group or in the group of sciences ministrant to the Gambol Instinct. In favor of putting them in this group, it may be said that the Gore instinct is none the less their leading motive that it happens in these cases to be in a facetious mood. The contest is none the less sincere that the penalty for defeat is light. If players who entered into the true spirit of the game enjoyed losing almost as much as they do winning, then, and only then, it could truly be said that the Gambol Instinct was the predominant one. But in point of fact such players would be regarded as half-hearted, unsatisfactory players. On the other hand, it may be said that, no matter how intensely the Gore Instinct may be excited in a game, the purpose of this excitation, after all, is simply to give stimulus to the exercise. The exercise of the powers,—the Gamboling,—is the only sincere motive. Let this question remain un-

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decided; though the strong affinity between games and puzzles goes to confirm the latter argument. Provisionally, the subject of Games may be introduced here. Many games are exclusively dependent upon chance, which seems, at first sight, to favor putting them here. But not to speak of the fact that those who love such games are apt to fancy that the result depends upon some gift of the player, it is to be remembered that the passion for such games is traditional (if not hereditary) from an age when mental power and the favor of higher powers (as the Muse, in the case of poets) were confounded, and when luck would be reckoned as a sort of genius. Ancient authors always reckon a general's luck as a part of his ability. Why should it not, then, be exercized like any other activity? Games not principally of chance are divisible into those in which muscular strength is a large factor, those which are chiefly intel-

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