Machinery, positing itself in political economy in opposition to
the division of labor, represents synthesis opposing itself in
the human mind to analysis; and just as in the division of labor
and in machinery, as we shall soon see, political economy
entire is contained, so with analysis and synthesis goes the
possession of logic entire, of philosophy. The man who labors
proceeds necessarily and by turns by division and the aid of
tools; likewise, he who reasons performs necessarily and by turns
the operations of synthesis and analysis, nothing more,
absolutely nothing. And labor and reason will never get beyond
this: Prometheus, like Neptune, attains in three strides the
confines of the world.
From these principles, as simple and as luminous as axioms,
immense consequences follow.
As in the operation of the mind analysis and synthesis are
essentially inseparable, and as, looking at the matter from
another point, theory becomes legitimate only on condition of
following experience foot by foot, it follows that labor, uniting
analysis and synthesis, theory and experience, in a continuous
action,--labor, the external form of logic and consequently a
summary of reality and idea,--appears again as a universal method
of instruction.
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