Morning journal and courier., 1884-08-23
COmtess Passion for Regulating Pos
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 Herbert Spencer in Nineteenth Century.l Surprise has been the feeling habitually produced in me on observing the incongruity between the astounding claims made by the propounder of this new creed and the great intelligence of disciples whose faith appears proof against the shock which these astound- ing claims produce on ordinary minds. Those who, from broad view of human pro- gress, have gained the general impression that ''the individual withers, and the world is more and more," must be disincined to believe that in the future any one individual will impose on the world government like that sought to be imposed by M. Comte, who, unable to influence any considerable number of men while he lived, consoled himself with the thought of absolutely ruling all men after his death Met, as he complained, by "a conspiracy of silence" he was nevertheless confident that, very shortly becoming con verts, mankind at large would hereafter live and move and have their being within his elaborated formulas. Papal assumption is modest compared with the assumption of ''the founder of the religion of humanity" A pope may canonize saint or two; but M Comte undertook the canonization of all those men recorded in history whom he thought specially worthy of worship. And such a 
 membrance with honor of mythical person ages like Hercules and Orpheus, and writers such as Terence and Juvenal; other days on which honors, like in degree, ere given to Kant and to Robertson, to Bernard de Palis- sy and to Schiller, to Capernicus and to Dol lond to O5way and to Racine, to Locke and to Freret to Froissart and to Dalton, to Cyrus and to Penn-such canonization! in which these selected men, who are the Posi- twist saints for Sundays; with the result that Socrates and Godfrey are thus placed on par: that while day is dedicated to Kepler, a week is dedicated to Gall; Tasso has week assigned to him, and Goethe day; Mozart presides over week, and day is presided over by Beethoven; a week is made sacred to Louis the Eleventh, and day to Washing ton-such canonization! under which the greatest men, giving their names to months, are so selected that Frederick the Second and St. Paul alike bear this distinction; Gutten- burg and Shakspere head adj djacent months; and while Bichat gives his name to a month, Newton gives his name to a week. This, which recalls the saints calendar of the Baby lonians, among whom, as Professor Sayce shows, leach day of the year has been as- signed to it's particular deity or patron saint" exemplifes in but one way M Comte's con stunning passion for regulating posterity, and the colossal vanity which led him to believe that mankind would hereafter perform their daily actions as he dictated. He not only settles the hierarchy of saints who are above others to be worshipped, but he prescribes the forms of worship in minute detail. Nine sacraments are specified; prayer is to be made thrice a day; for the ''daily expression of their emotions both in public and private" it is predicted that future men will use Italian; and it; is a recommended ''rule of worship" of the person you adore that Ca precise idea of the place, next of the seat or the attitude, and lastly of the dress, appro- priate to each particular case," should be summoned before the mind.