258 THE SOCIAL THEORY OF GEORG SIMMEL

concepts by means of which previous periods had organized
 their knowledge of society, together with the characteristic
 historical point of view of the romantic movement.
 It contained the time-worn analogy between society
and the individual, the mixture of value and existential
judgments known as the idea of progress together with the
search for the law of that mixture, the interest in the historical
 dimension, the general rationalistic prejudice, and
the interest in historical prediction. In other words, it contained
 all the basic presuppositions and fundamental categories
 that were necessary to reduce all social study inevitably
 to some form of social philosophy or philosophy
of history.
The history of social theory in the nineteenth century
is the history of a gradual methodological clarification and
of the slow liberation of the study from restricting presuppositions
 and confusing aims. Comte may have thought
of himself as the herald of the positive stage, but in reality
he left his scientific descendants an estate which was still
largely incumbered with metaphysics. However, even if
he was the father of modern sociology, he must have had a
few paternal ancestors himself, and so there are a few
others to blame for the rather doubtful heritage. But
among descendants of patriarchal Aryans it is not considered
 good form to criticize one’s paternal ancestors too
severely, so instead of merely referring to Comte’s doubtful
 methodology, let us also admit that he has been the
stimulus to a renewed study of social phenomena.
Comte has been the starting-point for a great many
different trends of social theory. With the help of a little
imagination, the most divergent types of thought could be
easily traced back to his works. They contain in embryo
so many ideas that have later been developed into distinct
theories that it is just as easy to view them as the begin-