[Footnote 3120: Franklin defined man as a maker of tools.]
[Footnote 3121: Condorcet, "Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès de l'esprit humain."]
[Footnote 3122: Montesquieu: "Esprit des Lois," preface. "I, at first, examined men, thinking that, in this infinite diversity of laws and customs, they were not wholly governed by their fancies. I brought principles to bear and I found special cases yielding to them as if naturally, the histories of all nations being simply the result of these, each special law being connected with another law or depending on some general law."]
[Footnote 3123: Pinel, (1791), Esquirol (1838), on mental diseases.--Prochaska, Legallois (1812) and then Flourens for vivisection.--Hartley and James Mill at the end of the eighteenth century follow Condillac on the same psychological road; all contemporary psychologists have entered upon it. (Wundt, Helmholz, Fechner, in Germany, Bain, Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer and Carpenter, in England).]
[Footnote 3124: Condillac, passim, and especially in his last two works the "Logique," and the "Langue des Calculs."]
CHAPTER II. THE CLASSIC SPIRIT, THE SECOND ELEMENT.
This grand and magnificent system of new truths resembles a tower of which the first story, quickly finished, at once becomes accessible to the public. The public ascends the structure and is requested by its constructors to look about, not at the sky and at surrounding space, but right before it, towards the ground, so that it may at last become familiar with the country in which it lives. Certainly, the point of view is good, and the advice is well thought-out. The conclusion that the public will have an accurate view is not warranted, for the state of its eyes must be examined, to ascertain whether it is near or far-sighted, or if the retina naturally, or through habit, is sensitive to certain colors. In the same way the French of the eighteenth century must be considered, the structure of their inward vision, that is to say, the fixed form of their intelligence which they are bringing with them, unknowingly and unwillingly, up upon their new tower.
Its signs, duration and power.--Its origin and public supporters.--Its vocabulary, grammar and style.--Its method, merits and defects.