(1) Comte, A., Cours de Philosophie Positive, Tome IV: La partie dogmatique de la philosophie sociale, (1830) (Paris, 1908) 132 p.Google Scholar

(2) For example Bogardus, A., A History of Social Thought (Los Angeles, 1929)Google Scholar; Fletcher, Ronald, Auguste Comte and the Making of Sociology (London, 1926)Google Scholar; Marvin, F.S., Comte: The Founder of Sociology (London, 1937)Google Scholar; Therborn, Göran, On the Formation of Sociology and Historical Materialism (Göteborg, 1974)Google Scholar; Thompson, Kenneth, Auguste Comte. The Foundation of Sociology (London, 1976).Google Scholar

(3) See for example Madge, John, The Origins of Scientific Sociology (New York, 1962).Google Scholar

(4) As for example the topic of inquiry in Barnes, H. and Becker, H., Social Thought from Lore to Science, (1938) (New York, 1961).Google Scholar

(5) The point concerning scientific discipline here is very superficial. The basic foundation of scientific discipline is a set of internal and external expectations, routines and norms, concerned with the production of knowledge without any practical or external justification. When materialized into actual organization these expectations etc. will serve as the basis for scientific reproduction. This will be discussed in a forthcoming book with the preliminary title Disciplinary processes of science.

(6) See Edward A. Tiriyakian, Ein Problem für die Wissenssoziologie: Die gegenseitige Nichtbeachtung von Emile Durkheim und Max Weber, in Wolf Lepenies (ed.) Geschichte der Soziologie. Studien zur kognitiven, sozialen und historischen Identität einer Disziplin, Bd 4, pp. 17–28.

(7) Comte, Auguste, Cours de philosophie positive (1830). Tome IV La Partie dogmatique de la philosophie sociale. Tome V, La partie historique de la philosophie sociale en tout ce qui concerne l'état théologique et l'état métaphysique. Tome VI, Le complément de la partie historique de la philosophie sociale et les conclusions générales (Paris, 1908).Google Scholar

(8) The discussion of the Scottish Historical School is respectably large but not as large as it deserves, in my opinion. The first person to draw attention to its importance to the emergence of sociology was Sombart, Werner in a short essay, »Die Anfänge der Soziologie«, Erinnerungsgabe für Max Weber I (Hrgs), Melchior Palyi (München und Leipzig, 1923) pp. 5–19Google Scholar. Other discussants are Bryson, Gladys, Man and Society. The Scottish Enquiry of the 18th Century (Princeton, 1945)Google Scholar; Camic, Charles, Experience and Enlightenment. Socialization for Cultural Change in Eighteenth-Century Scotland (Edinburgh, 1983)Google Scholar; Jogland, Helena, Ursprünge und Grundlagen der Soziologie bei Adam Ferguson, Beiträge zur Geschichte det Sozialwissenschaften, Heft 1 (Berlin, 1959)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lehmann, William, Adam Ferguson and the Beginning of Modern Sociology (New York, 1930)Google Scholar; ibid.John Millar of Glasgow 1735–1801. His Life and Thought and his Contribution to Sociological Analysis (Cambridge, 1960); Meek, Ronald, ‘The Scottish Contribution to Marxist Sociology’ in Saville, John (ed.) Democracy and the Labour Movement. Essays in Honour of Dona Tour (London, 1954) pp. 84–102Google Scholar; ibid.Social Science and the Ignoble Savage (Cambridge, 1976); Skinner, A.S., ‘Economics and History: the Scottish Enlightenment’, Scottish Journal of Political Economy, XII 1965, pp. 1–22CrossRefGoogle Scholar; ibid. ‘Natural History in the Age of Adam Smith’, Political Ideas, 15, 1967, pp. 32–48; Swingewood, Alan, ‘Origins of Sociology’ British Journal of Sociology, vol XXI: 2 1970, pp. 164–179CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and my own Samhällsvetenskapens ursprung. En tolkning ur den sociologiska traditionens perspektiv (Uppsala, 1988).Google Scholar

(9) The term rupture épistémologique belongs to the philosophy of science of Gaston Bachelard. It can be found in most of his books, for example in La formation de l'esprit scientifique. Contribution à une psychanalyse de la connaissance objective (Paris, 1947).Google Scholar

(10) This relation is somewhat discussed in my essay ‘Small events-Big events. A note on the abstraction of causality’, Archives Européennes de sociologie, XXXI, n^o 2, 1990, pp. 205–237.Google Scholar

(11) Examples are Bossuet's, Jacques BénignePolitique tirée de l'Écriture Sainte, (ed.) Bossuet, J. B. (Nephew B.E.) (Bruxelles, 1710)Google Scholar; Filmer, Robert, Patriarcka or the Natural Power of Kings (London, 1680)Google Scholar. See also Hill, Christopher, The World turned upside down: radical Ideas during the English Revolution (Harmondsworth, 1984).Google Scholar

(12) Simmel, Georg, ‘How is society possible ?’ trans. Small, Albion W., American Journal of Sociology, XVI, 1910, 3, pp. 372–391.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

(13) See William Robertson, Historical Works III p. 249; Dunbar, James, Essay on the History of Mankind in Rude and Cultivated Ages (London, 1780) p. 24Google Scholar; or Hume, David, A Treatise of Human Nature (1739) (Oxford, 1973), p. 486.Google Scholar

(14) Hobbes, Thomas, Leviathan, (1651) (ed.) Plamenatz, John (London, 1972), p. 143.Google Scholar

(15) David Hume, Treatise, p. 486.

(16) ‘… everything, which contributes to the happiness of society, recommends itself directly to our approbation and good-will. Here is a principle, which accounts, in great part, for the origin of morality: and what need we seek for abstruse and remote systems, when there occurs one so obvious and natural?’ Hume, David, Enquiries concerning the Human Understanding and concerning the Principles of Morals, (1777) (Oxford, 1972), p. 219Google Scholar. The most important theoretical discussion on society from the first half of the century, preceding the sociological breakthrough, is in my opinion Hume's essay Of the Original Contract, where these two solutions are confronted.

(17) Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, p. 141.

(18) David Hume, Enquiries, p. 294.

(19) It is at the same time obvious that Hume, to a certain extent, was on his way to qualifying the utilitarian or utilistic position. The interesting point of view here is his insistence on ‘custom’ as the crucial factor behind human behaviour.

(20) I have used the following editions: Ferguson, Adam, Essay on the History of civil Society (1767) (Edinburgh, 1966)Google Scholar; Millar, John, The Origin of the Distinction of Ranks, 3°, (1779)Google Scholar is included in Lehmann, William, John Millar of Glasgow 1735–1801. His Life and Thought and his Contribution to Sociological Analysis, (Cambridge, 1960) pp. 165–322Google Scholar; same An Historical View of the English Government (London, 1803)Google Scholar; Smith, Adam, The Theory of Moral Sentiment (1759)Google Scholar, The Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Glasgow, 1976)Google Scholar; same Lectures on Jurisprudence ibid. (Oxford, 1978); same An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, (1776) ibid. (Oxford, 1976).

(21) Other works are James Dunbar Essay; Kames, Lord, Historical Law Tracts (Edinburgh, 1758)Google Scholar; Robertson, William, History of America (1777) Historical Works III–IV (Edinburgh, 1813)Google Scholar and History of the Reign of Charles V, with a View of the Progress of Society from the Subversion of the Roman Empire to the Commencement of the Sixteenth century, (1769) Historical Works V–VI (Edinburgh, 1813)Google Scholar; Stuart, Gilbert, A View of Society in Europe in its Progress from Rudeness to Refinement (London, 1783).Google Scholar

(22) See for example Scott, W.R., Adam Smith as Student and Professor (Glasgow, 1937).Google Scholar

(23) Turgot's solution to the multiformity problem can be found in his « Plan d'un ouvrage sur la géographie politique » in Turgot, Œuvres de Turgot et documents le concernant (Paris, 1913), I: 255–274Google Scholar, and in « Plan de deux discours sur l'histoire universelle » Œuvres I: 275–324. See Meek, Ronald, Smith, Turgot and the Four Stages Theory, History of Political Economy, vol. 3 1971, pp. 9–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

(24) This concerns his intellectual interests at least up to 1753–54 when he took over the courses in moral philosophy and started the discussion that was to end in Theory of Moral Sentiment published in 1759.

(25) That this recommended way is not the factual way of science has been made overwhelmingly clear in the last decades in the works of Bruno Latour, Steven Woolgar and Karen Knorr-Cetina.

(26) Merton, Robert K., Social Theory and Social Structure, 1957, p. 5.Google Scholar

(27) Smith, Adam, The History of Astronomy, Essays on Philosophical Subjects (ed.) Black, Joseph and Hutton, James (Edinburgh, 1795) pp. 3–124.Google Scholar

(28) See note 37.

(29) Gay, Peter, The Enlightenment. An Interpretation. Volume II The Science of Freedom (New York, 1969) p. 174.Google Scholar

(30) ‘These are therefore the principles of union or cohesion among our simple ideas… Here is a kind of attraction which in the mental world will be found to have as extraordinary effects as in the natural, and to shew itself in as many and as various forms’. David Hume, Treatise of Human Nature pp. 12–13.

(31) For a secondary presentation see Peter Gay, The Enlightenment… p. 181.

(32) Adam Smith, ‘History of Astronomy’, pp. 20–21.

(33) Ibid. 58, my emphasis.

(34) For a discussion of the 18th century view of Newton see Peter Gay, The Enlightenment… pp. 128–140.

(35) Adam Smith, ‘History of Astronomy’ pp. 122–123, my emphasis.

(36) ibid, 73, my emphasis.

(37) In a short discussion in his book A History and Philosophy of the Social Sciences (Oxford, 1987) pp. 20–23Google Scholar, Peter Manicas seems to maintain the thesis that Smith's view of science was commonsensual, on the basis of his misapprehension of what Newton said concerning gravitation. For my part I will contend that irrespective of his views on gravitation, the quotation cited is proof enough that Smith had an anti-commonsensual view of science. I do not find it contradictory to preserve some common sense elements in your conception of gravitation and still maintain an anti-common sense program of science.

(38) Dugald Stewart, ‘Account of the Life and Writings of Dr Smith’. Preface to A. Smith, Essays on Philosophical Subjects.

(39) Ibid. XI, my emphasis.

(40) A. Ferguson differed from this vocabulary by using instead the chain of ‘the barbarous stage’, ‘the savage stage’ and ‘the stage of civil society’.

(41) Locke, J., Two Treatises on Government, (ed.) Laslett, Peter (New York, 1965), p. 343Google Scholar. It should thus be observed that the seminal thought that all societies have started from the same point of departure does not originate from the Scottish school, but was much older. For a discussion of this see Meek, Ronald, Social Science and the Ignoble Savage (Cambridge, 1976) 37 p.Google Scholar

(42) A. Smith,‘History of Astronomy’, p. 15.

(43) When describing surprise, Smith really lets himself go: ‘when surprised the passion is then poured in all at once upon the heart, which is thrown, if it is a strong passion, into the most violent and convulsive emotions, such as sometimes cause immediate death; sometimes, by the suddenness of the ecstacy, so entirely disjoint the whole frame of the imagination, that it never after returns to its former tone and composure, but falls either into a frenzy or habitual lunacy’ Ibid, 6.

(44) Ibid., my emphasis.

(45) A. Ferguson, Essay on the History of Civil Society, p. 122, my emphasis.

(46) A. Smith, Lectures of Jurisprudence, p. 207, my emphasis.

(47) A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, p. 215, my emphasis.

(48) J. Millar, Historical View I: 376, my emphasis.

(49) A. Smith, Lectures of Jurisprudence pp. 347–348; see also Wealth of Nations, pp. 25–27.

(50) Concerning surplus and property, see A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, p. 709; W. Robertson, Historical Works III, p. 292; A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 82; J. Millar, Ranks, p. 183. Concerning ‘distinction of ranks’, see J. Millar, Ranks p. 183; A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 83; W. Robertson, Historical works III, p. 293; A. Smith, Lectures, p. 216; A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, p. 712.

(51) A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 98, 100, A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, p. 715, J. Millar, Ranks, p. 204.

(52) J. Millar, Ranks. p. 245, J. Millar, Historical View I, pp. 45–46, 55, W. Robertson, Historical Works III, p. 357, A. Smith, Lectures, p. 348.

(53) For a discussion of this see B. Eriksson, Samhällsvetenskapens uppkomst, pp. 225–230. These discussions can be found in A. Ferguson, Essay‥, pp. 96–7 and J. Millar, Ranks…, p. 252.

(54) A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 98.

(55) A. Smith, Wealth of Nations. p. 47.

(56) All authors were eloquent in this discussion and treated it in a way that anticipated Marx's discussion of alienation. See for example Millar, J., Historical View IV, p. 144Google Scholar, A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 182, and A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, p. 781–2.

(57) J. Millar, Ranks, p. 245.

(58) A. Ferguson, Essay‥, p. 218.

(59) A. Smith's principal methodological discussion is the ‘History of astronomy’, but both Ferguson and Millar contributed with methodological points of view. A. Ferguson's contributions is scattered in the text of Essay‥ while J. Millar's is contained in his very substantial ‘Introduction’ to the later editions of the Ranks.

(60) ‘‥general principles relating to/the character of man/ … are useful only so far as they are founded on just observation and lead to important consequences‥’ A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 3 (my emphasis).

(61) A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 2.

(62) Rousseau, J.J., ‘Discourse on the Origin of Inequality’, The Social Contract and Discourses, (ed.) Cole, G.D.H., 1973, p. 39.Google Scholar

(63) B. Eriksson, Samhällsvetenskapens uppkomst, p. 285.

(64) A. Ferguson, Essay‥, p. 3.

(65) Account of a Savage Girl found in the Woods of Champagne (Edinburgh, 1762).Google Scholar

(66) A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 4.

(67) ‘The step betwixt these two/the hunter and the shepherd society/is of all others the greatest in the progression of society, for by it the notion of property is extended beyond possession, to which it is in the former state confined’, A. Smith, Lectures, p. 107.

(68) Ferguson, A., Institutes of Moral Philosophy, (1769) 2^e (Basil 1800) p. 69.Google Scholar

(69) Ibid., p. 24, see also the quotation from Millar in note 48 above.

(70) A. Smith, Wealth of Nations, p. 456, my emphasis.

(71) The argument launched against sociology is the reverse then: sociology is too abstruse, too vacillating, and most often too ideological to be consistent and taken seriously.

(72) A. Ferguson, Essay, p. 17.

(73) Ibid., pp. 18–19.

(74) An extensive and systematic discussion of the different analyses of the Scottish Enlightenment can be found in Charles Camic, Experience and Enlightenment‥ Chapt. 3.

(75) The Dictionary, historical and critical of Peter Bayle, (1697) vol 1–5 (London, 1734–1738).Google Scholar

(76) de Montesquieu, C., Considérations sur les causes de grandeur des Romains et de leur décadence, (1734) (Paris, 1932).Google Scholar

(77) Voltaire, , Le siècle de Louis XIV (1751) (Paris, 1929)Google Scholar, Essai sur l'histoire et sur les mœurs et l'esprit des nations depuis Charlemagne jusqu'à nos jours (Amsterdam et La Haye, 1757).Google Scholar

(78) Bossuet, J.B., Discours sur l'histoire naturelle universelle, (1681) (Rouen, 1788).Google Scholar

(79) Turgot's contributions were not published until the beginning of the 19th century, but were circulated among his closest contemporaries. Today we can find them in Œuvres de Turgot et documents le concernant. Avec biographies et notes de Gustave Schelle, 1.5 (Paris, 1913).Google Scholar

(80) The person really acquainted with this was Adam Ferguson who in the first place was born and raised in the Highlands and in the second place worked as a chaplain at the Black Watch, a highland regiment, in the war in Flanders.

(81) Eriksson, B., Small events—Big events…, Archives Européennes de Sociologie; XXXI n^o 2 (1990) pp. 205–237.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

(82) Marshall, Gordon, Presbyteries and Profits. Calvinism and the Development of Capitalism in Scotland 1560–1707 (Edinburgh, 1980).Google Scholar

(83) Chitnis, Anand, The Scottish Enlightenment. A social History (London, 1976), p. 43.Google Scholar

(84) The most renowned example is of course the non-admittance of Hume into the university by the Town Council of Edinburgh.

(85) Chitnis refers to a satirical pamphlet where a fictitious evangelical states the ‘Thirteen maxims of Moderate man’: ‘that all clergymen suspected of heresy were to be esteemed men of high genius and to be given all support; that in preaching a Moderate minister must confine himself to social duties and to base his views on heathen authorities; that a Moderate minister must be very unacceptable to the common people; that he should regard the unbeliever more than those professing religion’ etc. A. Chitnis, The Scottish Enlightenment‥ p. 53.

(86) Smout, , A History of the Scottish People 1560–1830 (1972), p. 349.Google Scholar

(87) Chitnis mentions that between 1707 and 1751, 96% of the entrants to the faculty of Advocates came from landed families or families with close landed connections. The Scottish Enlightenment‥, p. 75.

(88) The titles of some of Kames' work can give an overview of his interests: Essays upon several Subjects of British Antiquities (Edinburgh, 1747)Google Scholar; Historical Law Tracts (Edinburgh, 1758)Google Scholar; Elements of Criticism (Edinburgh, 1761)Google Scholar; The Gentleman Farmer; being an attempt to Improve Agriculture by Subjecting it to the Test of Rational Principles (Edinburgh, 1776).Google Scholar

(89) See Stone, Lawrence (ed.), The University in Society II. Scotland and the United States from the 16th to the 20th Centuries (Princeton, 1974).Google Scholar

(90) A. Chitnis, The Scottish Enlightenment…, p. 134.

(91) Ibid. pp. 195–210.

(92) In fact, the most ‘unindividual’ of the more prominent persons is Adam Smith who is mostly vaguely eulogized.