After having spoken of the aim of this book, it remains for me to justify its method. This differs considerably from what the mass of the public like far too well. But a scientific treatise must not take purely literary works for its models; and I can say to my readers, with much more reason than old Rabelais, that if they wish to taste the marrow, they must take the trouble to break the bone. My first and chief consideration is to assist in the foundation of a new science—ethnographical sociology. Elegant and vain dissertations, or vague generalities, have no place here. It is by giving way to these, and in attempting to reap the harvest before sowing the seed, that many authors have lost themselves in a pseudo-sociology, having no foundation, and consequently no value.

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