POSITIVISM. 298 POSSESSION. to experiential terms, excluding supernatural and spiritual agencies, liiddeu forces and immaterial essences, and causatioij regarded as a mysterious tie binding phenomena together. Instead of causes it looked for laws, i.e. the uniformities of coexistence and sequence among phenomena. When a certain uniformity has been discovered, no reason can be assigned, it claimed, for that uniformity. The uniformity is a fact given us by our experience, and reasons for facts do not exist. Though Comte invented the term posi- tivism, lie was not the first positivist. Indeed, views more or less fundamentally like his can be discovered in Greek philosophy, especially among the sophists. In modern times Hume (q.v. ) deserves to be called a positivist by reason of his view of causation, although with Hume the reign of natural law was a subjective rather than an 9bjective fact. This subjectivism differentiates him from the prominent positiv- ists of to-day. Kant's philosophy in recent times has also given rise to a school of thinkers in Germany who are one with Comte in throwing aside all considerajions of metempirical cliar- acter and in confining all scientific knowledge to phenomena and actually oliserved relations be- tween plienomena. Prominent among these Ger- man thinkers are Laas (q.v.), Rielil (q.v.), T. Ziegler. and F. Jodl. Allied with these are such thinkers as Schuppe, Rehmke, and Averarius, all differing from each other, but insisting that the task of philosophy is to state the highest laws of experience, and all denying that there is any- thing behind experience. In England the ten- dency of positivism has lately been to appeal to the feelings by the establishment of a church with ritual, ceremonials, and the like, all in the worship of humanity. This tendency has its point of departure in Comte's religion of human- ity. The leaders of this movement have been R. Congreve and Frederic Harrison. Of the last generation Lewes (q.v.) was the English pro- tagonist of positivism, but he was interested more in its philosophical than its religious side. In France E. Littre and H. Taine have been the most noted positivists, while Renan was greatly influenced by Comte's doctrines. For bibliogra- phy, sec the article Comte, Auguste. Consult, also: Bridges, A General View of Positivism (London, 1865) : David (D. G. Croly). A Posi- tivist Primer (New York. 1871) ; Balfour. The Religion of Humanity (Edinburgh. 1888); Fouil- lee, Le mouvement positiviste et la coiieeption du monde (Paris, 1896) ; Huxley. "Scientific As- pects of Positivism." in his Lay fiermons (Lon- don, 1871); Laas, Idcalismus und Positivismus (Berlin, 1S79) ; Fiske. Outlines of Cosmic Phi- losophy (Boston, 1874) ; Gruber, Der Positivis- mus vom Todc Auguste Comtes bis auf unsere Tage (Berlin, 1891). POSO. See Chica. POSSE (pos'se) COM'ITATXIS. A legal term, meaning power of the country. As used in military law it refers to the employment of the army to aid in enforcing the laws. Such use is forbidden by statute except in cases where it is expressly authorized by the Constitution or by Congress (20 Stat. L. 1.52). The army regulations prescribe the manner in which troops shall be employed to aid the civil authorities as a posse comitatus or in execution of the laws of the United States. POSSESSION, L.w OF (Lat. possessio, from possiderc, to possess). Possession is primarily a matter of fact. It is the control by a person of a tangible thing. The degree and kind of control necessary to constitute possession vary with the nature of the thing possessed and the liabits of the community. He who controls a thing as owners of things usually control them is possessor of the thing. Possession is quite independent of any legal right to possess. A thief possesses the thing he has stolen; and the person who has surrepti- tiouslj- or by force placed himself in control of a house possesses the liouse. Adv.xt.ges of POS.SESSION. To the possessor as such, without regard to liis riglit to possess, every legal system, even in the highest stage of development, accords certain advantages. The possessor is protected against every one who has no better riglit than himself. He is protected against disturbance (trespass), and if wrongfully dispossessed he recovers possession simjily on the ground of his prior possession and the wrongfiUness of the dispossession. Even when his adversary has a superior right to possess, the possessor may be protected against forcible dis- possession. Further, possession is, as the English lawyers express it, a 'root of title.' At Roman law own- ership cannot be acquired without acquisition of possession, although when acquired it survives the loss of possession. Finally, in every system of law possession ripens by prescription (q.v.) into full property right. Leg.^l Possession. In determining to what persons, and under what circumstances, the legal advantages above indicated shall be accorded, every legal system develops a more or less arti- ficial doctrine of possession. Persons having ])liysical ])ossession without the legal advantages of possession are not legal possessors; in civil- law terminologv' they are "detentors." On the other hand, persons not having physical posses- sion, but enjoying the legal advantages accorded to possession, are termed 'possessors.' In some cases one person is treated as legal possessor as regards protection against disturbance and against dispossession, while another person is regarded as possessor for the purposes of pre- scription. The law of possession is less clearly devel- oped in the English law than in the Roman and modern civil law. This is due partly to the fact that the English law employs the same actions. A'iz. tres])ass. ejectment, and trover, for the protection of possession and for the enforce- ment of property right, while the Roman law has distinct pos.sessory remedies. In their practical op- eration, however, the two systems attain substan- tially similar results. In both systems (as indeed in every legal sys- tem ) the person who has physical control of a thing and holds it for himself — the person who, as the Roman jurists express it. has both the corpus of possession and the animus possidendi — is a legal possessor. Those who hold for others are diffeiently treated in different systems. In no legal system are they possessors as regards prescription; but as regards protection against disturbance and against dispossession distinc- tions are drawn. Servants and employees acting under the direction of a master or employer are generally regarded as mere detentors. Agents,
