0

LOGIC

BY

ALEXANDER BAIN, LL. D. ,

PROFESSOR OF LOGIC IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN.

PART SECOND.

INDUCTION .

CALONDON :
LONGMANS, GREEN, READER, & DYER.

1870.
Phil5041.3

15
‫عر‬
‫بی‬

18719 July1.

Ward Fund.

BOUNEL MAN 20 911

ABERDEEN :
PRINTED BY ARTHUR KING AND COMPANY,
CLARK'S COURT, TOP OF BROAD STREET.
 TABLE OF CONTENTS.

BOOK III.

INDUCTION .

CHAPTER I.

NIE BIOPT OF INDUCTION.

PAGE
by means
Aut 20 pr is inations
in various as th
2. The sole evidence Inductive m
ment, 7

CHAPTER II.

THE GROUND OF INDUCTION-UNIFORMITY OF

NATURE-LAWS OF NATURE.

1. Induction proceeds from the known to the unknown, and

supposes the Uniformity of Nature, • 8
2. The course of the world is not a Uniformity, but Uniformi-
ties. Laws of Nature, ib.
3. Laws of Nature ' are sometimes limited to the highest
generalities, 9
4. Uniformity of Nature viewed under CO-EXISTENCE, CAUSA-
TION, and EQUALITY, ib.
iv CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III.

INDUCTION OF CO- EXISTENCE .

1. Of Uniformities of Co-existence, many are the result of
Causation,
2. Natural Kinds seem to furnish uniformities of Co-existence,
3. A Law of Co-existence supposes two independent properties
everywhere conjoined,
4. Leading example of Co- existence- Inertia and Gravity,
5. The proof of Co -existence is uncontradicted Agreement
through all nature,
6. The special coincidences of Kinds must be verified by Agree-
ment, •

CHAPTER IV.
LAW OF CAUSATION.
1. The Uniformities of Succession are subject to one uniformity,
named Causation, .
2. In Causation, the same effect is not always due to the same
cause, •
3. The Plurality of Causes is subject to uniformity,
4. Causation under three different aspects,
5. Cause, practically viewed, is some one circumstance specially
important to attend to. Aristotle's enumeration of Causes, A
6. In scientific investigations, the Cause is the assemblage of
conditions required for the effect,
7. The suppressing of essential conditions is a common fallacy,
8. The most advanced view of Causation is in connexion with
the Conservation of Force,
9. Statement of the Law of Conservation,
10. Forces distinguished as MOLAR and MOLECULAR. The Molar
are the Mechanical Forces,
11. The Molecular Forces : -Heat, Chemical Force, Electricity,
Nerve Force, Light,
12. Causation, as Conservation, is the transferring of a definite
amount of Force,
13. Conservation must be coupled with COLLOCATIONS,
14. Collocation may be given elliptically as the Cause,
15. Collocation expresses the modes of Potential Energy,
16. Effect may mean a new arrangement or Collocation of
materials, •
17. The evidence for Causation and for Conservation is the same,
18. The Cause of an Effect is to be sought among the antecedent
circumstances , ·
19. An invariable antecedent is not necessarily the cause,
20. Composition of Causes. When several forces are conjoined,
the composite effect is the sum of the separate effects,
21. Chemical Composition of Causes,
 CONTENTS.

CHAPTER V.
ELIMINATION OF CAUSE AND EFFECT.-
OBSERVATION AND EXPERIMENT.
PAGE
1. Causes are usually mixed up with agents unconcerned in the
effects, 41
2. Preparatory to the disentangling process, there is made an
analysis of the situation, 42
3. Varying the circumstances. Observation and Experiment, 43
4. Review of the ordinary entanglements demanding the pro-
cess of Elimination, 44
5. The weapons of Elimination are found in the Law of Causa-
tion itself, 46
6. The three aspects of the Law convertible into canons of
Elimination, 47

CHAPTER VI.
THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.
1. The three chief Methods are Agreement, Difference, and
Concomitant Variations, • 49
90
80
2. Method of Agreement. Canon of the Method. Examples, ib.
3. Method of Difference. Canon and Examples, 57
4. Joint Method : -Agreement in Absence coupled with Agree-
ment, 61
5. Concomitant Variations, 62
6. Supplementary Method by Residues. Partly Deductive.
An instrument of Discovery, 65

CHAPTER VII.
28293

EXAMPLES OF THE METHODS.

Mode of action in the Sense of Smell, 67
Investigation of the cause of Dew, 68
Brown-Séquard on Cadaveric Rigidity, 72

CHAPTER VIII.
FRUSTRATION OF THE METHODS .
1. Conditions assumed for the successful working of the Ex-
1156

perimental Methods, 76
2. The same effect may have a PLURALITY OF CAUSES, 77
vi CONTENTS.

PAGE
3. The effect of plurality is to frustrate the Method of Agree-
ment, • 78
4. The remedies are (1 ) multiplication of instances, and (2) the
Joint Method , 79
5. There occur cases of the INTERMIXTURE of EFFECTS, 80
6. Intermixture is a bar to the Experimental Methods. Re-
course must be had to Deduction, 82

CHAPTER IX.

CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

1. A means of Elimination is obtained through the calculation

of Chance, 84
2. A Chance coincidence is one that would occur without causal

88888
connexion, . 85
3. Causation is shewn by the coincidences being more frequent
than chance would account for, 86
4. When Chance is combined with Law, the Law is obtained
by eliminating Chance, 89
5. Elimination of Causes indiscernible from their comparative
smallness, ib.
PRINCIPLES OF CHANCE OR PROBABILITY.
6. Probability expresses a state of the mind, and a situation
among facts, 90
7. Meaning of the Probability of the occurrence of an event, 91
8. Mode of estimating Probability, ib.
9. The probability of the occurrence of two independent events
is the product of the separate probabilities, 92
10. Occurrence of one or other of two events that cannot concur,
the sum of the separate probabilities, 93
11. Rule for the cumulation of independent Testimonies, ib.
12. Rule for the deterioration of Testimony, ib.
13. Laplace's Theorem applicable to the inductive determination
of Causes, 94

CHAPTER X.

INDUCTION AIDED BY DEDUCTION.

1. It is desirable at all times to carry out Inductive laws De-

35

ductively, 95
2. The full scope of the DEDUCTIVE METHOD comprises, I. Pre-
established Inductions. Rules for the Discovery of In-
ductions, ib.
 CONTENTS. vii

PAGE
3. II. Deduction may consist (1) of simple extension of an in-
ductive law ; and (2) of the combination of several laws,
involving Calculation, 97
4. III. The Deductive process is completed by Verification, 100

CHAPTER XI.

SECONDARY LAWS-EMPIRICAL AND DERIVATIVE.

1. Secondary laws are valuable as being closely adapted to

concrete realities, . 102
2. An EMPIRICAL LAW is one supposed to be secondary, but not
yet resolved, 103
3. A secondary law once resolved is called a DERIVATIVE LAW, 104
4. Empirical Laws are, I. combinations of higher laws under
definite collocations, ib.
5. II. They may take the form of laws of succession between
remote causes, ib.
6. III. Laws of Co-existence or of Succession between effects of
the same cause, 105
7. The aggregation of properties in a Natural Kind resembles
Empirical Laws, ib.
8. The first criterion of an Empirical Law is to rest on Agree-
ment solely, · ib.
9. Other criteria, 106
LIMITED APPLICATION OF DERIVATIVE AND EMPIRICAL LAWS.
10. Derivative, and still more Empirical, Laws are to be confined
within limits of Time, Place, and Circumstances. Illus-
trated with reference to the combination of laws under
collocations, ib.
11. Case of laws of remote connexion of Cause and Effect, 111
12. Uniformities supposed to be effects of a common cause. 112
EVIDENCE OF THE LAW OF CAUSATION.
13. The Law of Causation proved solely by Agreement through
all nature, 113
14. As Persistence of Force, the law has been subjected to experi-
mental tests. The Law compared with Empirical Laws, ib.

CHAPTER XII.

EXPLANATION OF NATURE.
1. The laws obtained through Induction and Deduction are the
proper EXPLANATION of Nature, • 116
2. The basis of all scientific explanation is to assimilate facts, in
other words, to generalize, ib.
viii CONTENTS.

PAGE
3. Mill's three forms of Explanation : —I. Ajoint effect explained
by the laws of its causes, 117
4. II. The discovering of an intermediate link, or links, 118
5. III. The subsumption of inferior laws in higher laws, 119
LIMITS OF EXPLANATION,
6. The limits of Explanation are the limits of Induction, 121
7. The limits to inductive generalization are the limits to the
community of facts. Examples :-Gravity ; the Correlated
Forces, ib.
8. The ultimate laws of nature cannot be less numerous than
the ultimate feelings of the mind,. 123
FALLACIOUS AND ILLUSORY EXPLANATIONS.
9. Repeating the same fact in different language, 124
10. Regarding phenomena as simple because they are familiar, 125
11. Supposing that we can pass beyond the generalized conjunc-
tions or sequences of phenomena :-Gravity, Free-will,
union of Mind and Body, Things in themselves, . 126

CHAPTER XIII.

HYPOTHESES.
1. A Hypothesis may mean a suggestion as to some matter
unknown, leading to proof or disproof, 128
2. The more special meaning is an assumption not resting on
sufficient evidence of its own, and proved by tallying
with the facts, 129
3. The agents assumed should be known to exist. The hypo-
thesis regards their presence and amount, ib.
4. It may be allowed to assume new agents ; but the conditions
of proof are more stringent. Undulatory Hypothesis of
Light, 131
5. Certain Hypotheses are of the nature of Representative Fic-
tions :-The minute structure and movements of matter,. 132
6. The reasonings of Geometry said to rest on hypotheses. The
word is here improperly applied, . 134
7. Bacon's experimentum crucis is a fact that decides between two
rival hypotheses, · 135

CHAPTER XIV.

APPROXIMATE GENERALIZATIONS AND PROBABLE

EVIDENCE.

1. Probable inference is inference from a proposition approxi-

mately true, ib.
 CONTENTS. ix

PAGE
2. The proportion of cases gives the numerical probability of
the inference, · 137
3. Endeavour should be made to increase the approximation of
a rule. Modes of effecting this, 138
4. Approximate Generalizations give an opening to bias and
to sophistry, 139

CHAPTER XV.

ANALOGY.

1. The foundation of reasoning is Similarity, which may be of

various degrees, 140
2. Difference in the subjects compared may not prevent a strict
Inductive inference, 141
3. Analogy, in the peculiar sense, defined , 143
4. An argument from Analogy is only Probable. Examples, . ib.

CHAPTER XVI.

CREDIBILITY AND INCREDIBILITY.

1. Propositions supported by evidence may yet be disbelieved ;

being called INCREDIBLE, 148
2. Incredibility is owing to inconsistency with established in-
ductions, • 149
3. Assertions that contradict Gravity or Causation are incred-
ible, ib.
4. When one probability is opposed to another, the credibility
rests with the stronger, 151
5. Allegations as to new species of plants or of animals, ib.
6. Assertions regarding facts beyond the reach of verification
are to be held as untrue, • 152

BOOK IV.

DEFINITION .
Processes referring to the Class, Notion, or Concept, 153
Fundamental principle :-Things to be grouped in such classes
as shall contain the greatest amount of agreement or
community, ib.
X CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

CANONS OF DEFINITION.
PAGE.
1. Definition is fixing by language the signification of General
Names, 154
2. Definition must adapt itself to the two fundamental charac-
ters of knowledge -Agreement and Difference, 155
Positive Method.
3. Canon.-' Assemble for comparison the Particulars coming
under the Notion to be defined. ' Examples. Some of
the recognized particulars may have to be rejected and
others included , in order to secure the maximum of agree-
ment. There may be a margin of transition ; how dealt
with, • · • 156
Negative Method.
4. Canon.-'Assemble for comparison the Particulars of the
Opposed or contrasting Notion.' Cases peculiarly
suited to this method, 162 ,
Deductive Definitions.
5. Complex Notions may be defined by stating their composi-
tion, • 165
The Language of Definition.
6. Defining by Language consists in assigning the constituents
of a Complex Notion. The dictionary definitions by
synonyms are not proper definitions, ib.
7. The scholastic mode of defining-per genus et differentiam-
belongs to the expression, and not to the discovery, of a
meaning, • 166
Ultimate Notions.
8. For Ultimate Notions, generalization still holds, but langu-
age fails. Enumeration of Ultimate experiences. Nominal
and Real Definitions, 168

CHAPTER II.

GENERAL NAMES.
སྦུབ

1. Names, how far indispensable for General Reasoning, 171

2. First Requisite of Language :-Every name should have a
meaning well defined, · 172
3. The extension of Names to new meanings a cause of vague-
ness. Modes of extension, ib.
4. Transitive applications of words, 173
5. Extension of words by Generalization, and by Specialization, 175
6. Precautions to be observed in re-adjusting the signification
of words, ib.
 CONTENTS. xi

PAGE
7. The Second Requisite of Language is that there should be a
word for every important meaning. This involves (I) a
Descriptive Terminology, 177
8. II. There is wanted a name for every distinct product of
Generalization, • 179
9. The names of generalities should be short, 180
10. Derivation of names from foreign languages. Advantages
and Disadvantages, ib.
11. The improvements of classification may require new terms, 181
12. The adaptation of existing names is possible with precautions, ib.
13. III. There are names specially appropriated to Classification, 184

CHAPTER III.

CLASSIFICATION.

1. Methods of Classification, I. The sequence of the Descriptive

characters should follow the order of their exposition, ib.
2. II. In placing things in Classes, regard should be had to
the maximum of resemblance, 185
3. There may be alliances of nearly equal value, 186
4. In Zoology, the most natural classification nearly corresponds
with a serial order. Other instances, 187
5. III. To save repetition, classification may take place by suc-
cessive grades, 188
6. The arrangement by grades is calculated to suggest Laws of
Concomitance, 189
7. The grades terminate in the SPECIES, or Lowest Kind, 190
9. It is sometimes desirable to give entire, without reference to
grades, the descriptive characters of a species. Human
Anatomy, 192
10. IV. The statement of characters is by well-marked Agreements
and Differences, ib.
11. V. Index Classifications, 194
LOGICAL DIVISION.
12. The rules of Logical Division are rules of Classification.
Fallacies of Cross-classification, 195
13. Logical Division fails in things formed by Growth or Rami-
fication, • 198
 BOOK V.

LOGIC OF THE SCIENCES .

CHAPTER I.

LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.
PAGE
1. Mathematics is the best example of a Formal Deductive
Science, 199
2. Mathematic treats of QUANTITY in the abstract, so far as
definitely expressible, ib
Notions of Mathematics.
3. Enumeration of the principal Notions, with a view to the
propositions, 200
Propositions of Mathematics.
4. Logically viewed these are of the nature of propria ; the pre-
dicate is deducible from the subject, 202
Definition in Mathematics.
5. Certain of the Notions are Ultimate ; the rest are definable
by derivation. Ultimate notions of Arithmetic ; of
Geometry, 203
Axioms ofMathematics.
6. These should be (1 ) Real Propositions ; (2) underived within
the science,
Euclid's axioms tested. Postulates, 207
Divisions ofMathematics :-Arithmetic.
7. Groundwork and Propositions of Arithmetic, 212
Algebra.
8. Extension of Arithmetic by using symbols of numbers and
signs ofoperation, 213
10. Algebra shows the equivalence of different operations, and
renders them mutually resolvible, 214
11. The signs and rules of operation have to be adjusted by being
verified, ib.
12. The highest form of the Algebraical problem is the RESOLU
TION OF EQUATIONS, 215
Geometry.
13. Order of topics. Euclid's proving the fourth proposition is
a mistake ; it should have been assumed on the basis of
induction, · 216
14. Ends served, in elementary Geometry, by the reference to
Diagrams, • 217
 CONTENTS. xiii

Algebraic Geometry.
PAGE
15. Algebraic expression enlarges the scope of Geometrical infer-
ence, • 218
16. The special point in Algebraic Geometry is to provide rules
for the embodiment and the interpretation offormulæ, ib.
The Higher Calculus.
17. The difficulty caused by incommensurables, • 219
18. The solution of Incommensurables can only be approximate, ib.

CHAPTER II.

LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

1. Physics divided into Molar and Molecular, • 221

MOLAR PHYSICS.
2. Divisions of Molar Physics, 222
3. Notions of Molar Physics, · ib.
4. Propositions of Molar Physics. These are (1) PrimaryInduc-
tions of Force and Motion ; (2) Deductive Propria ; (3)
Empirical generalizations, • 224
5. Definitions of Molar Physics. Motion, Force, Matter, --are
ultimate notions. The derived notions are Mass, Density,
Momentum, Impact, Attraction , Repulsion, &c. , • 225
6. Axioms of Molar Physics. The Laws of Motion, as given by
Newton, confound verbal and real propositions. Virtual
Velocities, 228
7. Induction of the Law of Gravity, 231
8. Concatenation and Method of Molar Physics. The Abstract
departments are deductive ; the Concrete unite deduction
with experiment, · 232
MOLECULAR PHYSICS.
9. Definition and Divisions, 233
Notions of Molecular Physics.
Molecule, Atom, 234
MOLECULAR ATTRACTIONS - PROPERTIES OF MATTER. Solid,
Liquid, Gas ; Crystal ; Hard, Elastic, Tenacious, Ductile,
Malleable ; Viscosity ; Cohesion ; Adhesion ; Diffusion ;
Osmose ; Crystalloid, Colloid, Dialysis ; Effusion, Diffu-
sion, Transpiration, ib.
HEAT. The notion two-sided - subjective and objective.
Various phenomena of Heat - Conduction, Convection,
Radiation, &c. , • 237
LIGHT. Position of the subject dubious. Notion of Light
itself. The subsidiary notions, forming the topics of the
science, 238
ELECTRICITY, ib.
xiv CONTENTS.

Propositions of Molecular Physics.

PAGE.
Axiom of Conservation of Force. Other propositions, in the
various departments , 239
Predominant Methods of Physics.
10. Physics combines Induction and Deduction. Its Hypotheses 224

CHAPTER III.

LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY.
1. Relationship of Chemistry to Molecular Physics, ib.
2. Chemical Attraction the characteristic of the Science. Its
definition, 243
3. The Propositions of Chemistry relate (1) to the circumstances
of chemical change, (2) to the substances that undergo the
change, ib.
4. Chemistry divided into Inorganic and Organic, 244
Classification of the Simple Bodies or Elements.
5. Division into Non-metals and Metals. Transition bodies, ib.
6. Both Metals and Non-Metals are subdivisible into smaller
classes. Order of the Elements in exposition, • 245
Descriptive Characters of Chemical Substances.
7. The description of bodies should coincide with the exposi-
tory order of the properties. Examples of Description :-
Oxygen, Nitrogen, Carbon, 248
8. The descriptive characters should be kept separate from
explanations and theories, 253
9. Closely allied bodies should be pointedly contrasted, ib.
10. The generalities of Chemistry are Empirical Laws, · 254
11. The ultimate generalizations characterized, · ib.
12. The Hypotheses of Chemistry are mainly of the class-
Representative Fictions, • · 265
Nomenclature and Classification of Chemistry.
13. The symbolical notation of Chemistry, 256
14. A desideratum in the Nomenclature is the statement of the
structural Heat, • 257

CHAPTER IV.

LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.
1. Biology the Science of Living Bodies, 257
Definition of Life.
2. Mr. Herbert Spencer's definition, ib.
3. Definition by (I.) Constituent Elements , (II.) Structure, and
(III.) Functions, 259
 CONTENTS. XV

PAGE
4. The Divisions of Biology conform to the definition. Other
Notions of Biology :-Plant, Animal ; Tissue, Organ,
Vessel-their various forms ; Processes of Plant Life ;
Parts and Processes of Animal Life, 262
5. Analysis ofthe Living Organism-Plant or Animal, 266
Propositions of Biology.
6. Propositions relative to STRUCTURE, ib.
7. Propositions of FUNCTION, or Physiology, 267
8. Law of Conservation of Force, and other laws of Physics
and of Chemistry, carried up into Biology, 268
9. In the department of Function necessarily occur many
Empirical Inductions, ib.
Logical Methods of Biology.
10. Application of Experiment, with certain limitations, 270
11. Elimination by Agreement and by Concomitant Variations, ib.
12. Cases for the Elimination of Chance, 271
13. Inductions approximately true, and yielding only Probable
Evidence, ib.
14. Many propositions in Biology are wanting in numerical
precision, ib.
15. Hypotheses of Biology. Development Hypothesis- its evi-
dence. Spencer's and Darwin's Hypotheses of Reproduc-
tion, 272

CHAPTER V.

LOGIC OF PSYCHOLOGY.
1. Psychology comprises Mind proper and its alliance with
the Body, • 275
2. Definition of Mind. Ultimate antithesis of all knowledge-
Object and Subject, · • ib.
3. Mind has three attributes-Feeling, Volition, and Intellect, ib.
4. Concomitance of Mind and Body, ib.
5. The union of Mind and Body holds throughout, 276
6. In consequence, every fact of mind has two sides. Other
notions of Psychology :-Conciousness, Sensation, Emo-
tion, Volition, Intellectual states, ib.
Propositions of Mind.
7. The complexity of the notions of mind occasions Essential
Predications, 279
8. The conjunction of Mind and Body the chief basis of Real
Predication, ib.
9. The functions of Intellect Discrimination, Agreement,
Retentiveness -are unfolded in predications, 280
10. There may be propositions as to the rise, continuance, and
subsidence of Feelings, · 281
Logical Methods of Psychology.
11. Ultimate Analysis of the phenomena, ib.
xvi CONTENTS .

PAGE
12. Proof of an Analysis (1 ) individual self- consciousness, 282
13. (2) Identity of the consequences and collaterals— the Objec-
tive proof, · ib.
14. Difficulty in establishing the adequacy of an Analysis, ib.
15. The Inductions of Mind give room for the Experimental
Methods, ib.
16. Application of the Deductive Method, 283
17. The union of Mind and Body is the severest test of logical
Explanation, 284
18. Empirical and Derivative Laws in Mind, ib.
19. Hypotheses in Mind : -The problems of analysis—Innate
Ideas, External Perception, and the Will, 285
20. Chance and Probability in Mind, • 286
LOGIC OF CHARACTER.
21. Character involves the proportion of the sensibilities and the
powers in different individuals. Phrenology, ib.
22. In describing characters, there is wanted a scale of degree, 287
23. The Native elements of character fall under Activity, Feel-
ing, and Intellect, 288
24. The Law of Conservation comes up under the form ofLimi-
tation of the Powers, ib.
25. Operation of Circumstances in the Formation of Character.
Enumeration of influences, 289
26. Classification of Characters, • 290
27. The details of Character, 291

CHAPTER VI.

SCIENCES OF CLASSIFICATION.

MINERALOGY.
1. Definition of Mineralogy and Mineral, 292
2. I. Arrangement of Mineral Characters, 293
3. Il. The Maximum of Affinity of Minerals, as guiding their
Classification. Arrangement in the British Museum, 294
4. Species marked off according to Chemical Composition and
Crystalline Form, 297
5. III. Classification by Grades, 298
6. IV. Marking of Agreement and Difference, ? 299
7. V. Index Classification of Minerals, 300
BOTANY .
8. I. Arrangement of the characters of Plants, according to
the order of their exposition, 301
9. II. Maximum of Affinity in the Classification, · 302
10. III. Botany the best example of Classification by Grades, 304
11. IV. Marking of Agreement and Difference, 305
12. Modes of exhibiting Differences, 306
 CONTENTS. xvii

PAGE
13. V. Index Classifications of Plants. The Linnæan System.
Modified scheme, · • 308
ZOOLOGY.
14. Multitude and Complications of the Animal Kingdom ib.
15. I. Characters of Animals. Division of the animal system
into Constituent Organs, ib.
16. Search for Laws of Concomitance between the different organs, 309
17. II. The Choice of classes follows the maximum of agree-
ments of the organs, • 310
18. III. The number of Grades regulated by the agreements, · 312
19. IV. Marking of Agreement and Difference, . • 313
20. V. Index Classification, · · 314

CHAPTER VII.

LOGIC OF PRACTICE.
1. Practical Sciences are defined by their ENDS, 315
2. Crowning end of practice, Happiness or Well - being, ib.
3. The final end cannot be proved ; it must be assumed, ib.
4. Virtue as a final end. Objections to this view, ib.

CHAPTER VIII.

LOGIC OF POLITICS.
1. Politics refers to the action of human beings in Society, 318
2. Divided into Theoretical and Practical, ib.
3. Political Science has given off the departments-Jurispru-
dence, International Law, Political Economy, and Statistics, 319
4. The remainder includes (1) Form of Government and (2)
Legislation on all subjects not otherwise embraced, ib.
5. Curtailment of Individual Liberty a leading/ topic, 320
The Structure of Political Society.
6. View of Political Relationships and Institutions, ib.
7. Primary notions of Political Society :-Government, Law,
Punishment, Inferiors, Obedience, Obligation, the Social
state, 321
8. The Legislative, Executive and Judicial Functions. Notions
relative to each, 322
9. Form of Government, 323
10. Business of Government, ib.
11. Local and Central Government, 324
12. Province of Government. Line between Public and Private
management, ib.
13. Private Institutions to be taken account of, 325
14. Good and Bad Government, ./ ib.
xviii CONTENTS.

PAGE
THEORETICAL POLITICS.
15. Theoretical Politics consists of the Principles of Political
Society, and the Methods of Investigation, 326
16. The Propositions of Society may affirm Co-existence or
Succession ; in both cases involving Causation, ib.
Human Character as a Political Element.
17. The characteristics of human beings-a primary element, · ib.
18. Political Ethology is the science of character as adapted to
Politics, 327
Propositions of Theoretical Politics.
19. Laws of Cause and Effect in the working of the several in-
stitutions, 328
20. Two classes of Propositions :-those affirming general ten-
dency, and those adapted to limited cases, 229
Methods of Theoretical Politics.
21. Observation of Political Facts, 331
22. The Facts of Politics are the matter of authentic History or
Narrative, ib.
23. Facts brought under the form called Statistics, 332
24. Causes of erroneous observation in Politics partly general
and partly special, ib.
25. Experiment enters into Politics, 333
26. Causation in Politics appears chiefly as Collocation ; some-
times as Conservation, 334
27. Necessary to take into account the entire aggregate of con-
ditions, ib.
28. The Method of Agreement enters into Politics, with certain
shortcomings, 335
29. The Method of Difference, 336
30. Agreement in Absence, ib.
31. Concomitant Variations, 337
32. The Deductive Method, or Induction and Deduction combined,
is the mainstay of political investigation, • ib.
33. Hypotheses in Politics, 339
34. Simplification of the Political Problem, 340
35. Fallacious Methods in Politics, 342
PRACTICAL POLITICS.
36. The Political End . Two different views,
37. The End being settled, the Principles of Theoretical Politics 343
become maxims of Practice, 344

CHAPTER IX.

LOGIC OF MEDICINE .
1. Definition of the correlative couple-Health and Disease, 345
2. Sciences preparatory to Medicine, • 347
3. Pathological, based on Physiological, Analysis, ib.
 CONTENTS. xix

PAGE
4. The analysis of Physiological Functions is also an analysis
of diseased actions, 348
5. Account of morbid Products, 349
Enumeration of Diseased Processes -General Pathology.
6. Diseases are the repetition of a small number of diseased
processes, ib.
7. The process called ' Fever ' is a General Disease, ib.
8. General Therapeutics, or the generalizing of Remedial
agencies, 350
9. Notions of Disease ( 1) diseased processes, (2) diseases.
Definition of Fever ; Inflammation. Definition of special
Diseases-Gout, Small- Pox, Influenza, Scurvy, • 351
Propositions of Medicine.
10. Real Propositions, as opposed to Essential or Defining Pro-
positions, • 358
11. Inferences or Propria from Essential Characters, ib.
12. Predications of the Causes of Disease, 359
13. Predications of the Effects of Disease, 360
14. Predications of Remedies, ib.
The Experimental Methods in Medicine.
15. All the Experimental Methods are applicable, with precau-
tions, ib.
16. The Elimination of Chance. Medical Statistics, 362
17. The Deductive Method,
18. Hypotheses in Medicine :-Contagion. Functional weakness or
Degeneration, 363
Classification of Diseases.
19. Principles of Classification as applicable to Medicine, 365
20. Desideratum of an Index Classification, 367

BOOK VI.

FALLACIES .

CHAPTER I.

MILL'S CLASSIFICATION OF FALLACIES.

Division into five classes, • 369
I. Fallacies of Simple Inspection, or a priori Fallacies, ib.
II. Fallacies of Observation, • 370
III. Fallacies of Generalization, 371
IV. Fallacies of Ratiocination , ib.
V. Fallacies of Confusion, 372
XX CONTENTS .

CHAPTER II.
THE POSITION OF FALLACIES .
PAGE
Inconsistency of separating Fallacies from the rules they violate, 373
Narrowness of the old Logic an excuse for a separate chapter on
Fallacies, ib.
The Inductive Logic enables many to be absorbed ; not all, 374
No proper place in the logical scheme for either Fallacious
tendencies of the Mind, or Fallacies of Confusion, ib.

CHAPTER III.
FALLACIOUS TENDENCIES OF THE MIND .
Sources of Belief, 376
I. The Inherent Activity of the System a source of Fallacy.
Over-generalization, 377
II. Influence of the Feelings :-Self-Interest ; Sympathy ; the
Special Emotions, 379
III. Influence of Intellectual Associations, 385

CHAPTER IV.
FALLACIES OF CONFUSION.
Ambiguous and ill-defined terms :-Nature, Moral, Utility, Self,
Identity, Probability, 386
Separate meanings assigned to separate words :-Identical Pro-
positions ; Realism, 388
Unsuitable phraseology and unreal questions :-Motion ; Local-
ity applied to Mind ; Free-will , 390
Fallacies of the Suppressed Relative :-Innate Ideas ; Autonomy
ofthe Will ; Virtue supposing Obligation ; the Absolute, &c., 391
Petitio Principii, 393
Ignoratio Elenchi, ib.
False Analogies, · 394

CHAPTER V.

LOGICAL FALLACIES.
Fallacies of Equivalence, or Immediate Inference, 335
Deductive Fallacies, ib.
Inductive Fallacies, ib.
Fallacies of Definition, 396
 APPENDIX.
F.-ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS .
PAGE
General idea of Analysis, 397
Chemical Analysis and Synthesis, ib.
Logical Analysis substantially the same as Generalization,
Corresponding Synthesis, . 398
Analysis as signifying Induction ; Synthesis as Deduction, 399
Special case of Mathematical Analysis and Synthesis, · 401
G.- GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.
BACON. His Tables of Arrangement of Facts. Process of Ex-
clusion. Prerogative Instances, 403
NEWTON. Rules of Philosophizing, 408
HERSCHEL. Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy, 409
WHEWELL. Explication of Conceptions, and Colligation of
Facts. Methods in the formation of Science, 411
H.- ART OF DISCOVERY.
Distinction between Proof and Discovery, 413
Arts of Observing, · 414
Psychological aids to Discovery, 415
Generality to be kept in view as the great fact of science, 416
Value of order, method and explicitness, . 417
The Inductive scheme as an aid to Discovery, 418
The Deductive operation, in its material aspect, is a generalizing
process, • 419
The Processes coming under DEFINITION minister directly to Dis-
covery, ib.
Discoveries of concomitance through Tabulation, 420
Example from Darwin. The suggestion of the doctrine of Deve-
lopment, ib.
Analytic separation generally, 421
Invention in the Arts. Parallel case of Geometrical constructions, ib.
I.-HISTORICAL EVIDENCE.
Requisites to the proof of a historical fact, 423
Supreme canon-All testimony must be contemporary, 424
Application to Roman history, ib.
Transmission of Evidence. First, by writing . Safe-keeping
and authentication of documents. The controversy as to
the Platonic Dialogues, 425
Security against spurious additions or omissions, 427
Intentional perversion or suppression, 428
Mythical History, 429
Transmission by Oral Tradition. Its weakness and its confirma-
tions, 430
K.- EXPLANATION OF SOME LOGICAL TERMS.
Argument, Categorematic , Dictum, Enthymeme, Ignava Ratio,
Intuitive-Symbolical, Modals, Porphyry's Tree, Simple
Apprehension , Sufficient Reason, Sophisma Polyzeteseos,
and Sophisma Heterozeteseos. 431
 BOOK III.

INDUCTION.

CHAPTER I.

MEANING AND SCOPE OF INDUCTION.

1. Induction is the arriving at General Propositions, by

means of Observation or Fact.
In an Induction, there are three essentials :-( 1 ) the result
must be a proposition- an affirmation of concurrence or non-
concurrence as opposed to a Notion : (2 ) the Proposition
must be general, or applicable to all cases of a given kind : (3)
the method must be an appeal to observation or Fact.
(1) By Induction, we arrive at Propositions, -Affirmations
of coincidence or non-coincidence of distinct properties ; we
have to do, not with verbal, but with Real Predication . That
'The boiling temperature destroys animal life, ' is an induction
so far as being a proposition, affirmation, or real predication ;
there are two distinct facts-boiling heat, and destruction of
animal life—and these two facts are coupled in an affirmation
of coincidence.
To this essential of Induction, are opposed the cases where
what we arrive at is a Notion or Definition. Sometimes we
are liable to confound the two. This happens when we are
attending too exclusively to the second characteristic of Induc-
tion- generality. In the process of defining, we generalize a
number of individuals, so as to obtain and express their point
or points of community, which expressed community is a De-
finition or Notion ; as Heat, Knowledge, Justice. If such
definitions, or expressed general notions, are absolutely limited
to one indivisible fact or attribute, they are by that circum-
stance decisively contrasted with inductions, which always join
4 1
2 MEANING AND SCOPE OF INDUCTION.

at least two facts or attributes. Thus, the generalized notions

of length, resistance, whiteness , heat, could not be confounded
with inductions ; there is clearly absent from these the con-
joining or coupling of distinct properties. But we have seen
many instances where a definition expresses a plurality of
attributes concurring in the same subject, as in all the natural
kinds-minerals, plants, animals-and in various other things.
There is no small delicacy in placing the boundary between
those generalities ending in plural notions, or definitions, and
proper inductive generalizations. We have to ask whether or
not the stress is laid on the circumstance of conjunction,
whether it is made a question-are the properties conjoined
or not. In definition, the conjunction is tacitly assumed ; in
induction, it is laid open to question ; it has to be proved or
disproved. (See p. 62).
(2) The Propositions established by Induction are general.
A single individual concurrence , as ' the wind is shaking the
tree, ' is in its statement a proposition, but not an induction.
On such individual statements, we base inductions, but one is
not enough. If the coincidence recurs, we mark the recur-
rence ; we are affected by the shock or flash of identity, a very
important step in our knowledge. If, pursuing the sugges-
tion, we remark that as often as the wind is high, the trees
are shaken ; that the two things have concurred within the
whole course of our observation ; that the same concurrence
has been uniform in the observation of all other persons
whose experience we have been informed of, -we are then
entitled to take a still wider sweep, and to say, ' every time
that a high wind has been observed, a waving of the trees has
also been observed.'
Still, with all this multitude and uniformity of observations,
there is no proper Induction. What then remains ? The
answer is, the extension of the concurrence from the observed
to the unobserved cases-to the future which has not yet
come within observation, to the past before observation began,
to the remote where there has been no access to observe . This
is the leap, the hazard of Induction, which is necessary to
complete the process . Without this leap, our facts are
barren ; they teach us what has been, after the event ; whereas,
we want knowledge that shall instruct us before the event,
that shall impart what we have no means of observing. A
complete induction, then, is a generalization that shall express
what is conjoined everywhere, and at all times, superseding
for ever the labour of fresh observation.
 IMPROPER INDUCTIONS. 3

We thus contrast Induction with that species of ' Induc-

tions improperly so called,' where a general statement merely
sums up the observed particulars.
If, after observing that each one of the planets shines by the
sun's light, we affirm that all the planets shine by the sun's
light, ' we make a general proposition to appearance, but it
falls short of an induction in the full sense of the term. The
general statement is merely another way of expressing the par-
ticulars ; it does not advance beyond them. But without such
an advance there is no real inference, no march of information,
no addition to our knowledge . Induction is the instrument of
multiplying and extending knowledge ; it teaches us how,
from a few facts observed, to affirm a great many that have
not been observed . If, from the observation of the planets
now discovered, we make an assertion respecting all that have
yet to be discovered , we make the leap implied in real or
inductive inference. If the assertion had been made when
only six planets were known, actual observation would have
been the guarantee for those six, induction for the remaining
hundred or upwards .
So the proposition ' all animals have a nervous system ' is
an induction only when affirmed on the observation of a part
of the animal species. If the representatives of every species
had been examined before the statement was made, the pro-
position would be proved by observation, and not by induction ;
the generality would be merely a literal repetition or summary
of the particulars .
This kind of improper induction is assumed in the attempt, made
first by Aristotle and repeated by others, to bring Induction under
the syllogism. Induction ' is defined by Aristotle, " proving the
major term of the middle by means of the minor ;" in which
definition, the expressions major, middle, and minor, are used
relatively to their extension, to designate respectively the attribute
proved, the constituted species of which it is proved, and the
aggregate of individuals by which the species is constituted.'
(Mansel's Aldrich, Note G. ). Thus-
X, Y, Z, (minor) are B (major),
X, Y, Z, are all A (middle),
All A is B.
This has the appearance, but only the appearance of a syllogism
in the Third Figure. It is liable to the criticism already made
upon syllogisms with two singular premises. It is not a syllogism
at all, in any correct sense, but a mere process of equivalence. The
two premises can be summed in one, by verbal or grammatical
condensation ; and when that has been done, the conclusion is a
mere repetition of part of the meaning of the combined statement.
4 MEANING AND SCOPE OF INDUCTION.

A more ambitious form of the Inductive Syllogism is given by

Aldrich and Whately, which trenches on Induction proper.
The magnets that I have observed, together with those that I
have not observed, attract iron.
These magnets are all magnets.
All magnets attract iron.
The major here obviously assumes the very point to be estab-
lished, and makes the inductive leap. No formal logician is entitled
to lay down a premise of this nature. The process altogether
transcends syllogism or formal logic.
In no sense is the Inductive Syllogism an admissible logical
form .
A truly inductive Proposition may be but a narrow genera-
lity. That the breeze always spreads the royal flag hoisted
at Windsor Castle ' is a proper induction ; it covers the unseen
and the future as well as the seen. The still wider induction,
' the breeze spreads all the flags of all nations, ' is not more
essentially inductive, although of more value as knowledge.
(3) An Inductive Proposition is based on the observation
of facts. Many true propositions, instead of being based on
a direct appeal to observation, are derived from other propo-
sitions ; such are, with a few exceptions, the propositions of
Mathematics, and many truths in all the other sciences. In
this view, Induction is contrasted with Deduction. Induction
is necessarily the prior source of truths ; the Deductive pro-
positions are obtained from Inductions. We must commence
with observation of fact, and thence rise to Inductive gene-
ralities, before we can proceed downwards in the way of
deduction.
By the use of our observing faculties for the object world,
and of self- consciousness for the mind, we not merely obtain
our notions of things-stars, mountains, trees, men, pleasures
-but also discern the conjunctions or connexions of things.
A single conjunction excites little notice, but an iterated con-
junction awakens our feeling of identity ; we attend to the
circumstance, and watch for the recurrence. If, in the midst of
fluctuation, some one couple of things is found always associ-
ated, we state the fact to ourselves as a natural conjunction, a
law of nature ; and the statement is an inductive proposition.
A meteor flashing along the sky is an isolated circumstance ;
we term it casual or accidental. The recurrence of a stream
of meteors year after year, in the same month, is a coincidence,
which we elevate into an induction, affirming it for the future
as well as for the past.
The semblance of Induction is put on by certain operations
 INDUCTION AND DEDUCTION CONFOUNDED. 5

purely Deductive. Of these Inductions improperly so called,

two forms may be mentioned.
First. There is a certain likeness to Induction in the demon-
strations of Euclid ; which are each made upon an exemplary
diagram, and thence extended to all similar instances, by what
is termed parity of reasoning.
When Euclid proves that the angles at the base of an isos-
celes triangle are equal, he proves it upon a single diagram,
and rests the general proposition upon the circumstance that
the same result would be arrived at in every other case of the
same sort. The resemblance to Induction lies in extending
what is found in one instance to all other instances . Yet the
resemblance fails on vital points .
In reality, such truths are not established by measuring the
particular diagram, and recording that measure as an observed
fact, to be taken with other facts similarly observed, in mak-
ing up a general rule ; as if we were, by means of an induction
from the pyramids, to lay down a general law of pyramidical
structure. The only use made of the figure is to provide a
concrete reference in applying the general language of the
demonstration. One triangle is as good as another for the
purpose . We expressly omit from the reasoning all reference
to the size of the triangle, to its material, to the size of the
angle included by the two equal sides ; consequently, our
proof is independent of any one of these elements, and holds
under all variations of each. The demonstration is to the
effect that, quoad isosceles triangle, the affirmation is true ; it
is a perfectly general truth. The expression, ' the same might
be proved of any other isosceles triangle,' would be idle and
superfluous; the fact is already proved of every such triangle.
Secondly. The term Induction has been improperly applied
to discoveries of identification to establish a minor- a purely
deductive operation .
When Kepler, after comparing a great many positions of
Mars, came to the conclusion that all these places lay in an
ellipse of certain dimensions, he made an advance from the
known to the unknown, which is one criterion of induction .
Without any farther observations, it was possible to assign
the place of the planet at any moment of time throughout
the entire circuit. Yet, notwithstanding this remarkable
peculiarity, the case is not an induction. It is, in fact, a
deduction. We might term it a discovery of identification to
establish a minor.
Supposing that, in the time of Kepler, the geometrical pro-
6 MEANING AND SCOPE OF INDUCTION.

positions of the ellipse had been still undiscovered, he could

not have established his law, nor applied it to fill in the inter-
mediate places of the planet. What he really discovered was
an identity between the series of observed positions of Mars
was
and the path of an ellipse with the sun in the focus. It
by the help of the known properties of the ellipse that he made
this identity. The identity once established, any or all of the
propositions of the ellipse could be applied to the orbit of
Mars, and by these the orbit could be as it were drawn, so as
to show the successive positions of Mars as he described his
circuit. There could have been no inference from places
observed, to places unobserved, except through the application
of those laws respecting the ellipse, which had been dis-
covered by the Greek geometers. The propositions of the
ellipse supplied the major premise of the reasoning. Kepler's
observations supplied the minor premise ; they showed that
the places of Mars coincided with the places in an ellipse ;
whereupon whatever was true of the ellipse was true of the
orbit of Mars.
Similar instances of discoveries of Deduction could be cited.
When after the inductive establishment of the laws of
magnetism upon Iron, other substances were discovered to
be magnetic as Nickel, Cobalt, Manganese, Chromium, & c.,
the magnetic laws were forthwith transferred deductively to
these bodies. Franklin's great discovery of the identity of
lightning and electricity, enabled all the previously ascertained
facts regarding electricity to be applied to the atmospheric
charge.
In contrast to the law of the elliptic orbits, we may quote
Kepler's third law-the relation of the periodic times to the
mean distances, an induction in the proper sense of the word.
There is still a mathematical element present, but that element
is not the major proposition, to which Kepler supplied a minor.
The numerical ratio merely expresses the point of concurrence
of the particulars observed, it being the nature of that con-
currence to be numerical. The basis of the induction was the
agreement of the six planets in the numerical ratio ; and the
induction was brought out in its real character when new
planets were discovered and the law applied to them at once,
and before there was time to observe the fact in each indivi-
dual case .
Of a similar nature to Kepler's third law is the law of the
refraction of light, a proper induction set in mathematical lan-
guage. From a number of positions of the incident and re-
 FUNDAMENTAL INDUCTIVE METHOD. 7

fracted rays of light in various substances, Snell found that

the relation of the two could be expressed by a definite
numerical proportion of the sines of the angles, the proportion
being constant for the same transparent medium. He had
observed the relation in a number of cases, and he inductively
affirmed it in all.
In like manner the establishment of the law of gravitation
was an induction numerically expressed.
2. The sole method of attaining Inductive truths being
the observation and the comparison of particulars, the sole
evidence for such truths is Universal Agreement.
A permanent or uniform concurrence can be established, in
the last resort, only by the observation of its uniformity. That
unsupported bodies fall to the ground, is a conjunction sug-
gested by the observation of mankind, and proved by the
unanimity of all observers in all times and places. What is
found true, wherever we have been able to carry our observa-
tions, is to be accepted as universally true, until exceptions are
discovered. This is to apply the Universal Postulate, the
primary assumption at the root of all knowledge beyond the
present that what has never been contradicted (after sufficient
search) is to be received as true.
Through this method alone-of Universal Agreement in de-
tail-can our most general and fundamental truths be dis-
covered and proved. It is the only proper Inductive Method.
By it are established the Axioms of Mathematics, the Axioms
of the Syllogism, the Law of Gravity, the Law of Causation or
of Conservation. Likewise on it we depend for the proof of
all uniformities that, although not ultimate, are for the time
unresolved into higher uniformities ; or what are termed Empi-
rical Laws.
 CHAPTER II.

THE GROUND OF INDUCTION-UNIFORMITY OF

NATURE -LAWS OF NATURE.

1. As Induction proper infers from the known to the

unknown ; it assumes that, under certain circumstances
(to be specified), what has been will be. The same thing
is otherwise expressed by affirming that Nature is Uni-
form ; that there are Laws of Nature.
This great foundation of all possible inference is stated in
many forms of language. ' Nature repeats itself,' ' the future
will resemble the past,' the absent is like the present,' ' the
Universe is governed by Laws.' In one great department, it
is named Causation, or the Law of Cause and Effect.
The principle is put in another light by the remark of Mr.
Mill that the Uniformity of Nature is the ultimate majorpremise
of every inductive inference. To prove that the present
generation of men will die, we may construct a syllogism
thus -major- what has been in the past will continue
(under given circumstances) ; minor- men have died in the
past ; conclusion- men will continue to die.
Nature is not uniform in all things. One day agrees with
another in part, and differs in part. Human beings are
born with a certain amount of uniformity, and also with
a certain amount of difference. The law of uniformity, there-
fore, needs to be limited and qualified.
2. The course of the world is not a Uniformity, but
Uniformities. There are departments of uniformity, which
are radically distinct.
The most pointed illustration of this statement is the
Classification of the Sciences. Although, in early ages, men's
minds were strongly prepossessed with a supposed Unity of
Nature, we now recognize a plurality of distinct kinds of
phenomena, each kind having its own separate principles or
laws. Thus, the facts and principles of Number are studied
apart from the facts and principles of Life.
 LAWS OF NATURE. 9

The phrase ' Laws of Nature ' may be understood to imply

(1 ) that Nature is uniform, and (2) that this uniformity is a
plurality and not a unity. There are separate departments,
each with its own uniformities or laws. That unsupported
bodies fall to the ground, that fire is quenched by water, that
men pursue pleasure- are said to be laws of nature ; they are,
however, generically different laws, and are distributed under
distinct branches or departments of Science or Knowledge.
The word ' Law ' is a metaphor taken from human society,
where it supposes the relationship named authority and obedi-
ence. Seeing that in all well- constituted societies, the decrees
emanating from the sovereign authority are alike binding upon
all citizens, in all times and places, they have the characteristic
of uniformity ; and it is on this characteristic alone, that ' law '
can be employed to signify the order of the natural world.
The full definition of a law is inapplicable to physical sequences.
The likeness fails in the essential point. In human authority,
a certain beneficial result is aimed at by rules of conduct on
the part of the subjects of the state ; which conduct is enforced
by a penalty or punishment ; and the penalty is directed with
precision upon the wrong doer. In the order of the world,
on the contrary, a man conforming to the physical sequences
is safe, whatever be the extent of his violations of moral law.
Night exposure may be more injurious to the policeman than
to the thief ; immunity is purchased not by virtuous conduct
as regards others, but by prudential care as regards self.
3. The term ' Law of Nature ' is sometimes used in a
more restricted sense, to express the highest generalities ,
or ultimate uniformities of nature.
There being a constant wish to discover, not merely laws
that shall be true, but laws of the highest and most command-
ing generality, such laws are more emphatically termed
' The Laws of Nature ' -the most centralized and all- compre-
hending expressions of the order of nature. This more
imposing character appears to belong to the law of Gravity,
and to the principle named ' The Conservation of Force.'
4. As regards Logical Method, the general Uniformity
of nature may be distributed under three branches, already
expressed in the ultimate classification of Propositions--
CO-EXISTENCE (as Co-inherence of Attributes), CAUSATION,
and EQUALITY.
The three great relationships found capable of embracing
10 THE GROUND OF INDUCTION.

all propositions were stated to be (1 ) Co-existence, (2)

Sequence, (3 ) Equality and Inequality (Number and Quan-
tity). Under Co-existence was included Order in Place, and
CO-INHERING ATTRIBUTES ; the first- Order in Place, being
resolvable into laws of Quantity. Under Sequence or Succes-
sion was included Order in Time and CAUSATION; the first-named
being also a purely numerical relationship. The third rela-
tionship, Equality and Inequality, is the basis of Mathematics,
the science of QUANTITY and Number.
Thus the three distinct heads of scientific investigation,
comprising all the uniformities or laws of nature, are Unifor-
mities of Co-existence, Uniformities of Succession (Causation),
Uniformities of Equality and Inequality. These are the three
cases that Induction has to deal with.
In the actual working of Induction, we find it to be almost
entirely absorbed with the second head- CAUSATION.
Besides that there are very few general laws of pure Co-
existence, Causation is singular in providing a comprehensive
Uniformity, which may be appealed to deductively, for all
cases. The uniformities of Co-existence (independent of
Causation) can be proved only piece-meal ; each stands on its
own evidence of observation in the detail ; no one assists us
to prove another. There is thus a blankness of resources
in regard to the proper laws of Co-existence ; their Logic is
speedily exhausted .
The same defect, strange as it may sound, attaches to the
uniformities of Quantity- based on the relations of Equality
and Inequality. The certainty of the mathematical axioms is
a certainty due to their easy and thorough verification one by
one ; not to their falling under any uniformity more compre-
hensive than themselves. It is by " Agreement through all
Nature ' that we prove that ' Things equal to the same thing
are equal ; ' having found this fact always true, never false,
we extend it, by the Inductive hazard, to all cases whatsoever.
We repeat the operation upon the other great axiom-" The
sums of equals are equal. We must proceed, in the same
method of detail, to all other axioms-as the dictum of the
syllogism, the axiom a fortiori, &c.
The extended machinery of Inductive research, constituting
the Logic or Method of Induction, is thus nearly confined to
Causation. The greatest resources for eliminating accidental
accompaniments and for seizing the real concomitances of
facts the so-called ' Experimental Methods '-have their full
application only to Cause and Effect.
 CHAPTER III.

INDUCTION OF CO-EXISTENCE.

1. Of Uniformities of Co-existence, a very large num-

ber may be traced to Causation. It remains to be seen
whether there be any not so traceable.
The numerous Co-existences of Order in Place, or the dis-
tribution and arrangements of material objects throughout the
Universe, are all the results of causation, starting from some
prior arrangements. The distribution of sea and land, the
stratification of the earth's crust, the existence of an atmos-
phere, the distribution of the materials of the globe generally,
are the result of natural agencies or forces, operating upon
prior arrangements. Salt is found in the ocean, because the
water has dissolved all accessible portions of it. The heavy
metals are found in deep rocks in consequence of their weight ;
the corrosible and combining metals occur in combination ;
and those that are reluctant to combine, occur nearly pure, as
Platinum and Gold.
There are thus no independent laws of co-existence to be
found among uniformities of Order in Place. We must seek
for them, if there be any such, among Co-INHEREING ATTRIBUTES .
It is possible that attributes or properties not connected as cause
and effect, may yet be conjoined uniformly through all nature.
If so, they are likely to be found among the natural kinds—
Minerals, Plants, Animals. The conjunction of body and
mind in man, and in the animals, is to all appearance such a
case as we are quest of.
2. It is the special peculiarity of the Natural Kinds to
combine many attributes in unity of subject. In them we
have the chief exemplification of co-inhering attributes ;
and they seem to furnish uniformities of co-existence.
Thus Gold unites a certain specific gravity (19.3) , crystal-
lization (cubical), tenacity, fusibility (melting point, 1200° C),
colour and lustre (yellow), electrical conduction, atomic weight
(196), combining properties (acted on by aqua regia) . These
are eight leading attributes that concur in every piece of gold ;
12 INDUCTION OF CO-EXISTENCE.

and unless we see our way to deriving some of them from

others, we must pronounce them essentiæ, essential or defining
attributes of gold. There is a co - existence, or co- inherence of
these eight facts, with others, in the object named gold.
To appearance there is here a uniformity of co- existence.
No specimen of gold is devoid of any one of the eight proper-
ties. Properly speaking, however, this is merely affirming an
identical proposition. Should there occur a specimen wanting
in one, two, or three of the eight, we should say not that a law
of co-existence was infringed , but that a different substance
was produced. If these be the essential attributes of gold-the
meaning or connotation of the name, then, on the failure of any
one or more, the name would cease to be applied, the substance
would not be ranked as gold , it would be classed as a new and
distinct substance. Gold with the specific gravity of 9, or
with a silvery colour, or with a liability to corrode, would not
be gold, it would be treated as a different material, a distinct
grouping or aggregate of powers and properties. If there be
any one of the now enumerated properties of gold that we
could see changed and yet keep up the designation gold, that
property is declared not to be the essence, but a concomitant
of gold. A proper inductive enquiry would hold in such a case,
3. For a Law or Uniformity of Co-existence, properly
so called, we must refer to examples, if such there be,
where two or more independent properties are conjoined
through all nature, or in all substances where one of them
occurs.
We must search among the properties of kinds- mineral,
vegetable, and animal, for some that are coupled throughout
every species, and under every variety of aggregation. For
example, could we find a certain crystalline form regularly
conjoined with certain chemical characters, not in one sub-
stance only, but in all substances possessing that crystal-
lization, this would be a proper law or uniformity of co-exist-
ence. There would still remain a question, often difficult to
settle- whether, on the one hand, the two are mutually im-
plicated properties, or, on the other hand, whether they are
connected by cause and effect.
To detect such uniformities of general co-existence, among
the essential properties of mineral bodies, whether simple or
compound, is a proper object of scientific enquiry. Nor has
it been neglected by physical enquirers. The following are
the leading examples obtained up to the present time.
 LAWS OF CO-EXISTENCE. 13

(1 ) A law has been discovered connecting Atomic Weight

and Specific Heat by an inverse proportion. For equal
weights of the simple bodies, the atomic weight, multiplied by
a number expressing the specific heat, gives a nearly uniform
product. Thus, for sulphur, the atomic weight ( 32), multi-
plied by the specific heat (0.1776) , gives 5.68 ; the atomic
weight of platinum (197), multiplied by its specific heat,
(0.0324), gives 6,38. The products for all the elements are
near the constant number 6.
(2) A law obtains between the Specific Gravity of substances
in the gaseous state and the Atomic Weights. Thus, the specific
gravity of oxygen is 16, its atomic weight 16 ; hydrogen,
specific gravity 1, atomic weight 1 ; phosphorus, specific
gravity 62, atomic weight 31 (the relation here is 2 to 1) ;
steam, specific gravity 9, atomic weight 18 (relation of 1 to 2) .
The relationship of the two numbers is thus, in some instances,
equality ; in other instances, the one is a multiple of the
other. The law is one of importance in ascertaining atomic
weights.
With an exception to be noticed presently, these are perhaps
the two most widely-operating laws, as yet discovered , whereby
two distinct properties are conjoined throughout substances
generally. There are various laws of narrower range, as, for
example, Andrews's laws of the heat of combination of the
metals.
4. A peculiar importance belongs to the law of universal
―-
co -existence uniting the two properties Inertia and
Gravity. These properties are co- existent through all
matter and proportionate in their amount.
Inertia, the defining attribute of matter, means both resist-
ance to movement, and force when moved . It is totally dis-
tinct from gravity. A body rolled on a level surface shows its
inertia ; so also do two weights equipoised, as in the beautiful
experiments of Atwood. Now, all inert matter gravitates ;
and the force of gravitation is proportional to the inertia.
Equal weights, (which are the estimate of gravity) , are equally
resisting to a horizontal impulse (the measure of inertia) or to
a vertical impulse in the balanced condition.
It cannot be maintained that these properties are mutually
implicated. We can easily suppose matter (considered as
inert) without the property of distant mutual attraction , or
gravitation ; this last property may be fairly viewed as added
to, or superinduced upon mere inertia. Nor can we call the
14 INDUCTION OF CO-EXISTENCE.

two either cause and effect, or effects of a common cause ; our

knowledge does not entitle us to make either supposition. We
can prove cause and effect only by exhibiting first a cause,
and then an effect flowing from it. Here the two facts or
properties are inseparable.
There is no other equally unambiguous instance of a law of
universal co- existence. The examples above quoted with
reference to three properties-specific gravity in the gaseous
state, atomic weight, and specific heat- may, for anything we
know, be mutually implicated, or related as cause and effect.
If we understood more thoroughly the ultimate arrangement
of the atoms of bodies, and their intestine motions, we might
not improbably find that some one fundamental property was
at the foundation of all the three ; -a real essence, of which
these are but propria. As regards many of the minor laws,
the existence of either implication or causation is more than a
mere surmise.
Under such circumstances we are entitled to conclude that
uniformities of general co-existence are very rare. The pre-
sumption or probability (although not the certainty) in every
new case of uniformity is that it is a case of causation and not
of co -existence. Thus, the conjunction of Mind and Body may
be a co-existence independent of causation, like inertia and
gravity ; but it may also follow the more prevailing type, and
be a case of cause and effect. Which is cause and which
effect, or whether they are effects of a common cause, may be
open to dispute.
5. The only proof of Uniformities of Co -existence not
known to depend on causation, is uncontradicted Agree-
ment through all nature.
This is the proof of the Law of Causation itself. Now any
uniformity not coming under causation must stand on its
own independent evidence ; and this evidence is uniform
agreement throughout the whole compass of observation .
We must find it true in all times, all places, and all circum-
stances ; and provided our search has been so extensive, that if
there were any exceptions we should light upon them , and no
exceptions have been found , we are entitled to declare it a law
of all nature.
The coincidence of gravity with inertia has been proved over
the entire globe ; it applies undoubtedly to the solar system ;
and by very strong analogy to the distant stars. This, there-
fore, may be held to be an established uniformity of co- existence.
 CONCOMITANT PROPERTIES OF KINDS. 15

The alliance of mind with a bodily mechanism extends

throughout the whole of animal life, past and present.
The co-existences above mentioned regarding the properties
of gaseous specific gravity, atomic weight, and specific heat,
have to be verified by the method of Agreement throughout all
bodies . We cannot, as in cause and effect, presume from a
certain number to all the rest.

6. The special coincidences making up the Natural

Kinds must also be verified by Agreement over the whole
field of instances.

We have already remarked that an exception to a kind,

arising from the failure of an essential property, would not be
the infringement of a uniformity, but the setting up of a new
kind. The only case for proving a co-existence would be the
case of concomitant properties, or those not adopted into the
essence or connotation of the kind. Of such a character is the
blackness of the crow, the whiteness of the swan, and varia-
tions of colour generally ; a point seldom treated as essential,
whether in minerals, plants, or animals. Now the sole proof
that ' every crow is black,' is observation through all Nature ;
so long as no other colour is seen, we affirm the general pro-
position ; the occurrence of various albinos has disproved the
generality, and reduced it to an approximate generalization, of
a very high order of probability.

CHAPTER IV.

LAW OF CAUSATION.

1. The Uniformities of Succession presented in nature

are subject to one great uniformity-the law of Causation.
The law may be expressed thus :-In every change, there
is a uniformity of connexion between the antecedents and the
consequents.
No single expression sums up all that is implied in Cause
and Effect. When it is said, ' Every effect has a cause, and
every cause an effect, and that the sequence is regular, the
same causes being always followed by the same effects,' the
16 LAW OF CAUSATION.

proposition is an identical statement; the word ' Cause ' means

what brings about an effect ; and the word ' Effect, ' what
follows from a cause. To avoid this objection, we may state
the law as follows :-' Every event that happens is definitely
and uniformly connected with some prior event, or events,
which happening, it happens ; and which failing, it fails.'
The kindling of a fire follows regularly on the prior events of
making a heap of combustibles and applying a light.
A law is more sharply stated by help of its denials. Causa-
tion denies two things. First, it denies pure spontaneity of
commencement. If the law is true, no change arises out of
vacuity or stillness ; there must be some prior event, change,
or movement, as a sine quâ non of the occurrence of any new
event. A fire never bursts out without some commencing
circumstance, in the shape of movement, change, or activity.
Secondly. The law denies that events follow one another
irregularly, indiscriminately, or capriciously. The same cir-
cumstances that make a fire burst out to-day, will, if repeated,
make it burst out to-morrow, or at any future time. The
same pain, in the same circumstances, does not at one time
repel, and at another, attract and allure us. In short, the
law is the statement of uniformity in the Succession of events.
2. In Causation, the same cause always produces the
same effect ; but the converse does not hold ; the same
effect is not always produced by the same cause. There
may be Plurality of Causes.
A severe blow on a man's head will always cause death :
but death is not always caused by a blow on the head. There
are many causes of motion ; and the presence of any one in
the proper circumstances, will always be followed by motion.
This is an important limitation of the law, and has to be
kept in view in the investigation of causes. If a change has
occurred, there must have been a previous change, or ante-
cedent fact, but not necessarily one particular antecedent.
3. The Plurality of Causes is subject to uniformity in
two respects : (1) the number of causes is fixed ; (2 ) the
character of each is as definite as if it were the sole cause.
The causes of death may be numerous, but they are all
fixed and knowable ; and, when known, may be counted on
with certainty and precision. The fact of plurality renders
the causation of an event ambiguous ; there may be several
alternative antecedents. Yet, these antecedents being, once
 PRACTICAL ASPECT OF CAUSATION. 17

for all, exhaustively known, we are sure that one of them is

the operative circumstance in the case before us .
It will be pointed out afterwards that plurality of causes is
more an incident of our imperfect knowledge than a fact in
the nature of things . As knowledge extends, we find less of
plurality. The numerous apparent causes of motion are differ-
ent only in superficial appearance ; they are all one at bottom .

4. Causation may be viewed under three different aspects .

(1 ) The first may be called the practical and popular aspect
-a partial view suited to the ordinary emergencies of life.
Under this aspect, the cause is some one circumstance or
condition demanding our solicitude, as being precarious.
Thus, when the soldier, on the eve of an engagement, is urged
to keep his powder dry, this is not the whole cause of his
hitting the enemy ; it is the circumstance that happens to be
in peril at the time.
(2) The second aspect is the Scientific or complete view of
Causation. Under this view, all the conditions or antecedent
circumstances are fully enumerated .
(3) A third aspect is Causation viewed as embracing the
modern generalization , entitled the Conservation or Correlation
of Force.
CAUSATION PRACTICALLY VIEWED.

5. In common language, the Cause of an event is some

one circumstance selected from the assemblage of condi-
tions, as being practically the turning point at the moment.
A man slips his foot on a ladder, falls, and is killed . The
cause of the fatality is said to be the slipping ; for if this one
circumstance had been prevented , the effect would not have
happened . Yet, in order to the result, many other conditions
were necessary :-the weight of the body (gravity) , the height
of the position (a certain collocation), the fragility of the human
frame. Yet, for practical purposes, we leave out of sight at
the moment all the elements that are independent of us and
secure, taking notice only of what is in our power and needs our
attention . By a common ellipsis, all arrangements that are
fixed and settled , are passed over in silence. We presume
on the forces of heat and gravity, and devote our care to the
choice and shaping of the materials whereby these forces may
be made to work out our ends.
When we speak of food as the cause of animal strength, we
2
18 LAW OF CAUSATION.

suppose a healthy constitution, able to digest and assimi-

late it. But, in this particular case, mankind long erred in
ignorantly suppressing a condition no less essential than
food, namely, the oxygen of the atmosphere the aerial
element of our food.*
Language is adapted principally to this mode of viewing
causation. In the distinction of agent and thing acted on,
which pervades the whole of grammar, and gives the character
to the active verb, there is an arbitrary selection of one circum-
stance as cause, other equally indispensable circumstances being
overlooked. A prize ox is reared in a breed of cattle ; the
breeder is by courtesy styled the cause or agent ; but his activity
is only a single, although indispensable circumstance. A teacher
instructs a pupil, and is credited as the cause or author of the
pupil's knowledge. A still more glaring ellipsis is practised
in attributing the issue of a war to the commander-in-chief ;
as when we speak of the conquests of Alexander or Cæsar.
6 The monk that shook the world ' is rhetoric for the agency of
Luther.
The first attempt at a precise analysis of Causation was made by
Aristotle. He enumerates four kinds of Causes , —the material, the
formal, the efficient, and the final. The material cause is literally
the matter used in any construction ; marble or bronze is the
material of a statue. The formal cause is the form , type, or
pattern in the mind of the workman ; as, the idea or design con-
ceived by the statuary. The formal cause of a building is the
architect's plan. The efficient cause is the power acting to produce
the work, the manual energy and skill of the workman, or the
mechanical prime mover, whether human power, wind, water, or
steam. The final cause is the end, or motive on whose account the
work is produced - the subsistence, profit, or pleasure of the
artificer.
Aristotle gives the instance of a physician curing himself, as
combining all the four causes in one subject.
* Whenever the existence or safety of anything depends upon a sum or
system of contrivances adapted to a common end-which, together, are
conditions necessary for its preservation -then the destruction, disturbance,
or removal of one of these contrivances-the failure of any part of this
composite system of safeguards- is considered as the cause of the ruin of
the whole. For example, if the action of any one of the functions or organs
necessary to human life is stopped, life is extinguished, and the circum-
stances producing that effect is said to be the cause of death. So, if a ship
springs a leak and sinks, or if an army is surprised through the absence of
a sentinel from his post-the springing of the leak, and the absence of the
sentinel, is said to be the cause of the loss of the ship and the surprise of
the army. The language by which such an effect is commonly ascribed to
a merely negative cause is elliptical. (G. C. LEWIS).
 SCIENTIFIC CAUSATION. 19

This analysis is obviously taken from human industry, which

contains the several circumstances mentioned. It throws no light
upon causation in the order of nature ; while the attempts to
express natural phenomena according to such a scheme, have led
to distortions and unmeaning conceptions,
The first and second causes give the celebrated distinction of
Matter and Form, which pervades the whole of Aristotle's philo-
sophy. The third, the Efficient, has continued in the language of
science ; a better designation for the meaning is Prime Mover, or
Moving Power. The fourth, the Final cause, is more perspicu-
ously expressed by Motive, End, Intention, Purpose, Object or
Design ; it applies to nature only as personified, or as the work of
a personality.
SCIENTIFIC CAUSATION.

6. In scientific investigations, the Cause must be regarded

as the entire aggregate of conditions or circumstances re-
quisite to the effect.
All the conditions suppressed by the practical man are
brought back by the scientific man in a full statement of the
cause . If any are omitted, it is because they are so obvious
that no person could overlook them. There is a legitimate
ellipsis of expression, even in the scientific enumeration of con-
ditions.
The cause of the inundations of the Nile would be described
´as ( 1 ) the fall of moisture as snow on the lofty mountains of
Africa where the Nile has its source ; (2) the melting of this
snow by the summer heat. Gravity, the laws of heat, the con-
stitution of water, are all a part of the cause, and if not men-
tioned, are supposed to be fully present to the mind of the
hearer.
The growth of plants is a complicated causation. There
must concur, the properties of the germ, the contact with the
soil, air, water, saline bodies in the soil, heat, light, &c .
The agriculturist thinks only of a select number of these- the
seed, the quality of the soil, moisture, and heat ; the vegetable
physiologist brings into view the physical, chemical, and vital
agencies, which are the causes of the phenomenon in the final
analysis.
The cause of vision is summarily given as light entering the
lenses of the eye. The full enumeration of the circumstances
would include the optical action of the lenses, the physiology
of the coats of the eye, and of the nerves and brain ; and
finally, the link associating a certain activity of the brain with
a feeling in the mind .
20 LAW OF CAUSATION.

The cause of the Reformation was Luther's preaching against

the sale of indulgences, concurring with the administration of
the church, and the state of men's minds at the time.
In speaking of antecedents of the French Revolution, it is
customary to use the plural -Causes ; signifying that a union
of many circumstances or conditions was involved. In the
enumeration of Alison , no less than sixteen causes are given.
Gibbon attributes the rapid growth of Christianity to one
primary cause, namely, the convincing evidence of the doctrine,
and of the ruling providence of its author ; and to five aiding
secondary causes, which assisted in producing the effect, viz.:
1 , the inflexible zeal of the early Christians ; 2 , the doctrine
of a future life, as held by the Christian Church ; 3, the mira-
culous powers ascribed to the primitive church ; 4, the pure
and austere morals of the Christians ; 5 , the union and
discipline of the Christian republic .'
The conditions of phenomena include negative as well as
positive circumstances ; the absence of hindrances to the
operation of the agents concerned. The sun is the cause of
vision, provided he is not screened , provided the subject is not
asleep or blind. It is usual to suppress the mention of all
such hindrances, if they are really absent.
7. The suppressing of essential conditions is a common
fallacy of Causation.
When, in the statement of a cause, there is not merely an
ellipsis of understood circumstances, but an omission of some
essential fact, the consequence is positive error.
When the healthy effects of residence at a medicinal spa is
attributed exclusively to the operation of the waters, there is
a fallacy of causation ; the whole circumstances and situation
being the cause.
This is a common form of Inductive fallacy, and prevails in
all the complicated sciences, as Politics and Medicine.
CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

8. A great advance, in the mode of viewing Causation ,

is made by the modern discovery of the law named ' Con-
servation of Force.'

The great generalization ofrecent times, variously designated

the Conservation, Persistence, Correlation, Convertibility,
Equivalence, Indestructibility of Force, is the highest expres-
sion of Cause and Effect. In every instance of causation, there
 LAW OF CONSERVATION. 21

is a putting forth of force in given circumstances, and the law

in question states with exactness what becomes of the force,
and is often the sufficing explanation of the special phenomena ,
as well as the embodiment of nature's uniformity in succes-
sions.
In the number and complicacy of causal conditions, we feel
the want of some principle of analysis or distribution under
heads. Such analysis is provided in the Law of Conservation ;
according to it, we view every cause under two aspects, ( 1 )
an embodiment of moving power in given amount, and (2) a
collocation, or arrangement of circumstances, for the power to
operate in. These two being given, the law declares the result.
In the simpler modes of the operation of force, as in
Mechanics, the moving power is the predominating fact ; the
collocation being simple and easily allowed for. In the com-
plicated phenomena of chemical and vital actions, the colloca-
tion attains an over-ruling importance, and often baffles the
attempt to predict the consequences of a given amount of
power.
Statement ofthe Law of Conservation.
9. Force, Moving Power, Matter in motion, or Momen-
tum, is embodied in various forms, all mutually convertible
at a given rate ; and no force is ever lost.
(1) Inert matter in motion is Force under every manifesta-
tion ; but themodes ofmotion may be very various. We are most
familiar with the fact in the case of mechanical momentum , as
in a flying ball, a water stream, or the wind. There is, how-
ever, reason to believe that the force named Heat consists in
the movements of material particles.
(2) The different kinds of force may, under certain arrange-
ments, be transmuted one into the other ; mechanical force may
pass into heat, and heat into mechanical force. There is a
fixed scale or rate of conversion, to be afterwards given.
(3) In the transfer of force, nothing is lost. The mechani-
cal momentum transmuted into heat is fully accounted for in
the heat produced ; by proper arrangements, it could all be
gained back.
Of these three circumstances, the first- matter in motion, is
the definition or generalization of force ; the second- transmu-
tation of one mode of motion into another, and the third-
conservation of the amount under all changes, are the pro-
perties or predicates, constituting the Law of Correlation or
Conservation of Force.
22 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

10. In explaining the principle of Conservation as

applied to the different forces, we may rank them in two
divisions, MOLAR and MOLECULAR,-motion in mass and
motion in molecule.
The Molar Forces are the same as those termed
Mechanical.
The molar or mechanical forces are the motions of sensible
masses, as a hammer, a waterfall, a locomotive, a planet. The
science of Mechanics, or Molar Physics, is occupied with the
computation of these forces, in their transfer and re-distribu-
tion under all varieties of circumstances.
The Persistence or Conservation of Force was first distinctly
conceived with reference to these palpable motions. Newton's
First Law of Motion expresses the fact that a mass once in
motion will, if unobstructed , always continue in motion at the
same rate ; which is the same as saying that force never
decays . In free space, beyond the reach of molestation from
without, a moving body would preserve its motion for ever.
This is the simplest aspect of Conservation.
A moving body encountering a second body, whether at rest
or already in motion, is said to strike or impel that other
body ; which means imparting its own motion, in whole or in
part, to the body struck. This is a new situation . There is
a loss of power on one side, and a gain on the other ; a
redistribution of the movements of the two masses. Now, in
this state of things, the Law of Conservation declares that in
the interchange nothing is wasted ; whatever the striking
body loses, tne struck body gains. If a bullet of ten pounds,
moving at a thousand feet a second, were to strike an equal
bullet at rest, the two would proceed together at five hundred
feet a second. The momentum, before and after impact,
Iwould be constant. This new situation was expressed in
Newton's Second and Third Laws. All the calculations
respecting the collision of bodies, the communication of force
by stroke or impact, are grounded on the conservation of the
totality of force.
If a contemporary of Newton had been asked what becomes
of the force of cannon shot arrested by a dead wall, he would
probably have answered that an infinitesimally small move-
ment was imparted to the mass of rock and its contiguous
material. This would have been regarded as a consistent
following out of the theory of conservation in communicated
momentum. The lost momentum of the quick-moving ball
 CONSERVATION OF MECHANICAL FORCE. 23

would exist as momentum in a huge mass very slowly mov-

ing.
Had the farther question been asked, -what becomes of the
force of two opposing movements destroying one another, —the
above answer would not have served the purpose. No mo-
mentum is created in any form ; there is nothing to appearance
but sheer waste on both sides
The new difficulty would in all likelihood have been met by
a very plausible assumption. It might have been said that
the conservation of force was to be interpreted as force operat-
ing in the same direction ; all forces in the opposite direction
being held as negative quantities, like debt to credit. It would
be a sufficient account of any force that it had neutralized an
equal and opposing momentum ; as when a payment of a hun-
dred pounds to any one's credit extinguishes a hundred pounds
of debt.
Very probably this explanation was actually entertained by
many, and held to be irresistible and axiomatic, nay, even in-
tuitive and necessary ; its opposite being inconceivable. Yet
it is fallacious as a principle, and in opposition to the facts of
the case . Two movements in opposing directions are not to
be compared to positive and negative ; each has a positive
value, for any purpose whatsoever. Two streams running in
opposite directions, are as good for mill-power as two streams
moving in the same direction. Easy mechanical contrivances
can, without loss, divert a moving power into any direction .
The two opposing forces that by collision extinguish one
another, could by a suitable arrangement, unite their power in
the same course. The destruction , therefore, that ensues in a
hostile collision, is (on the present assumption) pure destruc- .
tion, unredeemed waste, annihilation . It is at variance with
the Law of Conservation, which would have to be restricted
and qualified to moving bodies always following the same
course.
The principle of Conservation has been rescued from this
perplexity by the discoveries of recent times. When two
moving bodies encounter and arrest one another's movements,
the mechanical or molar energy is indeed sunk ; but re-appears
in an equivalent energy or momentum imparted to the mole-
cules, and manifested as Heat. The rise of temperature in the
encountering masses is exactly proportioned to the visible
momentum destroyed . This is an entirely new view of Force ;
and saves the principle of Conservation, by giving it an
enlarged scope. It teaches us to take account of all the
24 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE ..

protean transformations of energy, and prevents us from

rashly declaring that force is destroyed when it has ceased to
appear in the original shape. Mechanical force in some cir-
cumstances, well understood , yields mechanical force ; in other
circumstances, for example, hostile collision, it yields a mole-
cular force, namely, Heat.
Going back upon the first query propounded to a contem-
porary of Newton, the account to be given of a ball's
momentum on a dead rock,—we should now answer the ques-
tion not by mechanical transference-a slow motion imparted
to the rock- but by molecular transformation. The ball and
the place where it struck would both be found to rise in tem-
perature, and the more as the momentum of the ball was
greater. All the energy would be accounted for in this way.
In every case of collision, and even of impact without opposi-
tion, something is lost by conversion into heat. The loss of
power by friction is a generation of heat.
11. The MOLECULAR Forces may be provisionally enu-
merated as follows :-(1) Heat, (2) Chemical Force, (3)
Electricity, (4) Nerve Force, (5) Light.
This enumeration is to be held as provisional ; it may not
include all the species ; and it may represent, as distinct kinds,
what are only slight modifications of one kind.
(1 ) Heat.-Probably the best example for showing the mole-
cular forces, in their contrast to the molar, or mechanical , is
Heat. Our experience of this influence is abundant and
various. Yet, only of late years have we been led to call it a
form of moving matter, a species of molecular momentum,
which bursts forth on the shock that extinguishes a mechanical
impetus.
Such shocks of mechanical collision are the usual mode of
transmuting mechanical momentum into heat. Friction is
only a more gradual and protracted collision . A familiar
illustration is seen in hammering a piece of cold iron till it
becomes red hot. The high temperature of the sun is hypo-
thetically accounted for by collisions of enormous swift-moving
masses, brought together by gravity.
Such is the situation for converting mechanical motion
into Heat. The transmutation of heat into Mechanical
force, is effected through the expansion of bulk caused by
raising the temperature of bodies. In solids, and in liquids,
this expansion is small in range, but great in force ; and is
adapted only to special cases, as the splitting of rocks, where
 MOLECULAR FORCES. 25

there is need for a great power moving only a very little way .
Through the medium of gases, the expansion can be converted
into mechanical momentum, in any form we please, as in the
diversified performances of steam power.
In generating mechanical power by heat, as in the steam
engine, the source of heat must be of a higher temperature
than the medium ; the fire must be hotter than the water and
the steam. The power is given forth by the descent of the
heating body to a lower temperature. Between bodies equally
hot, there is no development of mechanical power, no forcible
expansion of any one body.
There is a peculiar incontinence attaching to the Heat
force. We usually find that some body possesses it in such
superior degree as leads to radiation upon other bodies, with
loss to the radiating body. This is the moment for obtaining
a mechanical or other equivalent. It is also the moment of
dissipation of energy without equivalent, if the opportunity is
not turned to account. The solar heat falling on the planets
gives an equivalent in raising their temperature, and in pro-
ducing other forces ; what is not intercepted is at once dissi-
pated into empty space, without farther result than to elevate
by a slight addition the general temperature of space ; a real
but unprofitable equivalent of the heat lost to the sun.
It is as regards Heat that the rate of exchange with mechan-
ical force has been settled with the highest numerical precision.
The assumed unit of mechanical momentum is the foot- pound
of England (and the metre-kilogramme of the Continent),
meaning the force expended in raising one pound weight one
foot, which is the same as a momentum of one pound moving
at eight feet per second. The unit of heat is one pound of
water raised in temperature one degree of the thermometer.
The rate of exchange or equivalence is 772 foot-pounds to one
pound of water raised 1º of Fahrenheit ; or 1390 foot- pounds
to 1° Centigrade. In the Continental scale of weights and
measures, the expression is 425 metre-kilogrammes to one
kilogramme of water raised 1° Centigrade. By a perfect
machinery of conversion of heat into mechanical power, the
heat requisite to boil a gallon (ten pounds ) of freezing water
would lift 1389600 pounds one foot, or impart to that mass a
velocity of 8 feet per second.
(2) Chemical Force. -The power requisite to separate chemi-
cal compounds, and given forth when bodies combine chemi-
cally, is chemical force. When water is decomposed into its
elements-oxygen and hydrogen-a certain amount of force is
 26 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

absorbed or used up in order to bring about the decomposition ;

and the same force is liberated when the elements are
re-combined .
This chemical force is a very slight modification of Heat.
In the case of combination, the force evolved appears as heat
in its common form. Indeed, our artificial heat of combus-
tion, is the chemical force liberated in the chemical combina-
tion of oxygen and carbon (supposing coal or charcoal to be
the fuel). By peculiar arrangements, this force of combination
may be prevented from appearing as sensible heat, and may
take other forms ; it may decompose other compounds (as in
the double decomposition of salts) ; or it may pass into elec-
tricity or into magnetism.
Again, Heat may operate as a decomposing agent . Many
compounds are decomposed at once by the application of
heat, as the oxides of the noble metals. A familiar example is
the decomposition of chalk or carbonate of lime, in a lime
kiln ; the heat drives off the carbonic acid, and what remains
is burnt lime. Other compounds are decomposed by heat,
when there is an arrangement for combining one of the de-
composed elements with a third substance ; as when water is
decomposed in a red-hot iron tube, the oxygen combining with
the iron.
That heat, the result of combination, should be the means
of decomposition, is the proper, the natural consequence of
the Law of Conservation. Whatever is given out when ele-
ments combine, must be restored when they separate again.
This is the exact relationship of heat to chemical action, which
is disguised and apparently reversed by the familiar employ-
ment of heat to make bodies combine, as in lighting a
fire. The application of heat in such a case, however, is a
mere incident ; it seems to operate by disturbing the quies-
cence of the elements . It no more renders heat a combining
power, than the pailful of water thrown into a pump before
pumping is the cause of the subsequent flow.
The rate of commutation of Heat and Chemical Force, has
to be given in the detail, inasmuch as different compounds
give forth different quantities. I quote as examples a few
oxygen compounds. One pound of hydrogen burnt (that is,
combined with oxygen) would elevate, by 1° C. , about thirty-
four thousand pounds of water. This is the most heating of
all oxygen combinations ; we have long been familiar with the
intense heat of the oxy-hydrogen blow-pipe. Of simple
bodies burnt, or combined with oxygen, the next in rank, is
 HEAT.- ELECTRICITY. 27

carbon, the chief ingredient of ordinary combustion, and also

of animal combustion. The figure for carbon is less than one
fourth the figure for hydrogen ; a pound of carbon burnt
elevates, by 1° C. , about eight thousand pounds of water .
Phosphorus ranks next among the simple bodies examined
(5747 pounds ) ; then sulphur (2307) ; the metals, zinc, iron,
and tin, are nearly equal ( zinc, 1301 , iron, 1576, tin, 1233) .
(3) Electricity. This variety of molecular force is distin-
guished by two main peculiarities. The first is polarity, or the
development of opposite forces at opposite points ; the magnet
is the most familiar example of the power, operating in masses
of matter. The second is named conduction, and means the
rapid transmission of the force from one part of a body to
another, along a wire, for example ; a process of conveyance
quite different from any of the modes of the transmission of
heat. An electrical charge passes almost instantaneously, and
with little diminution of force, through miles of copper wire .
The name Electricity ' now includes various phenomena
marked by characters widely different. Three types or species
may be indicated- Magnetism, Friction or Franklinic Electri-
city, and Voltaic Electricity : the first and second have a molar
or mechanical side ; the last is purely molecular and in close
relation to chemical force. Magnetism, as a member of the
group of Correlated Forces, under the Law of Conservation,
is best studied in the form called Electro-magnetism, or mag-
netism generated from electricity ; for, while the magnetism ,
which is a mechanical attraction, can be estimated by its
mechanical effects, the electricity can be estimated chemically
by the amount of acid and zinc combined in the cells of the
battery. Friction Electricity, in the common electrical machine,
is generated by mechanical force (sometimes by heat, as in
steam) ; its discharge, being marked by vehemence, concentra-
tion, or intensity, is not measurable with accuracy ; the effects
are seen in the rupture of atomic cohesions, in strong outbursts
of heat and light, and other indications of concentrated force.
Voltaic Electricity is the species most closely allied with
Chemical Force ; which force is its source, its measure, and
one of its results. Through chemical force, as measured by
the amount of material chemically combined in the voltaic
cells, we can state the rate of exchange or commutation of
Voltaic Electricity with Mechanical force, and with Heat.

These three modes of Force - Heat, Chemical force, Elec-

tricity-are the well-defined species of molecular activity ;
28 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

they can all be measured and put into strict equivalence with
Mechanical momentum. There still remain, however, Light,
and any modes of activity in living bodies, distinct from, and
superadded to the forces of the inorganic world ; the Nerve
Force is one well-marked example. From the close analogies
between this last-named forcé and Electricity, we may take it
next in order.
(4) Nerve Force.-The Nerve Force is the special activity of
the nerves and brain . Like Electricity, it is a current force. It
differs from Electricity in moving at a comparatively slow rate ;
and also in depending for its maintenance upon chemical com-
binations in the material of the nerves ; hence, while electricity
decreases as it goes, the nerve force increases. Although this
force cannot be subjected to accurate measurement, we con-
clude from analogy that there is an exact equivalence between
it and the chemical transformations that are its source ; part
of the food of the body is expended in supplying it. It con-
tributes to muscular power, in which case it has a mechanical
equivalent; and to molecular changes, chemical or other, also
on a definite rate. As the physical concomitant of mental
states, we must still regard it as definitely related in quantity
to these ; a double amount of feeling, other things being the
same, involves a double amount of nervous transformation .
(5 ) Light. The divorcing of Light from Heat, in the enu-
meration of the molecular forces , needs to be explicitly justified .
The divorce is at best provisional and temporary ; the reasons
are such as the following. Although Light is a distinct product
of the other forces, more especially Heat, and is instrumental
in causing at least one of them, chemical force, yet hitherto
nothing has been done towards establishing the rate of com-
mutation or exchange between it and the others. When a
body is heated till it becomes luminous, there ought to be a
definite loss of heat, equivalent, on a certain scale, to the
light produced ; at present, however, we have made no ap-
proach to such an estimate. Moreover, although light is
the instigator of chemical change, we cannot say that it oper-
ates by supplying chemical power, as heat or as electricity
does ; the effect may be similar to the action of heat in lighting
a fire, a mere disturbance sufficing to begin the chemical
union of elements ready to combine. Chlorine and hydrogen,
mixed together, will not combine chemically in the dark ; the
combination begins under the light. It is to be remarked,
however, that decomposition is the direct test of chemical force.
Now, light will not cause decomposition unless in the presence
 POTENTIAL ENERGY. 29

of a body, like hydrogen or chlorine, having a powerful

tendency to combine ; or, when, as in vegetation, light is
accompanied by heat. We are, therefore, led to regard light
chiefly as the prompter to a change otherwise maintained . And
in this view there is a numerical proportion between the amount
of light and the extent of the chemical action ; as shown in
the researches of Bunsen and Roscoe (Phil . Trans., 1857) .

When mechanical force operates against gravity, as when

a projectile is thrown upwards, the force is at last spent ; the
equivalent gained is a position of advantage, with respect to
gravity ; for, by the continued operation of the gravitating
energy, the whole of the impetus lost will be restored in the
downward direction ( the resistance of the air being left out
of the account) . We are familiar with this employment of
gravity in clocks propelled by weights regularly wound up to
a height. To this peculiar situation , Sir W. Thomson has
applied the name ' potential energy,' to distinguish it from
the energy of a mass in actual motion. The placing asunder
of the celestial bodies, all which gravitate towards each other,
was the primeval situation of advantage, whence may have
arisen (by collisions ) the heat of our suns and planets, and by
consequence all the other modes of force- mechanical, chemi-
cal, and electrical.
It is by this operation that the force of gravity is introduced
into the circle of forces, and is counted as a cause or productive
agent. Viewed in itself, it creates no force ; what is gained
in power is lost in position ; to restore the position would
require the power to be given back. It can, however, divert
power ; it can also store up and re-distribute it, as a banker
does money.
A similar position of advantage may be found in the mole-
cular forces. Thus, the existence of two elementary bodies,
able to combine, is a potential chemical energy, which, on the
occurrence of the opportunity and the stimulus, is converted
into actual molecular energy. Such is the potential force of
our coal, and of all the uncombined and combinable elements
of the globe, as native sulphur, the native metals, and the
lower compounds susceptible of entering into higher com-
pounds.
The molecular attractions of bodies (as cohesion) may oper-
ate exactly in the manner of gravity. A spring is an obvious
example. The electricity of compressed air may be turned to
the same account.
30 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

12. Causation, viewed as Conservation, is thus the trans-

ferring or re-embodying of a definite amount of Force.
When a ship is propelled by wind or by steam, the motion
is said to be caused by those agents ; which expend themselves
in producing the effect. The expansiveness of steam is due to
heat operating through the medium of water. The heat arises
from the combustion or chemical union of coal and oxygen.
The coal was the carbon of plants of former ages, whose
growth demanded an expenditure of solar heat.
So, again, in the human body, mechanical force is obtained
by mucsular exertion ; that exertion is owing to the oxidation
of the materials found in the blood ; these materials are either
vegetable products, or the bodies of other animals fed on
vegetables ; and, thus we come round again to the agency of
the solar ray in vegetation.
Transferred energy is thus the final and sufficing explanation
of all change, and the only explanation in the highest sense of
the word. Any fact of causation not carried up into this
supreme law, may be correctly stated, but it is not accounted.
for.
Whatever appearances militate against the principle of Con-
servation are to be held as fallacious. The ' perpetual motion '
has long been rejected as incompatible with the mere mechani-
cal phase of the principle. There still remain to be dissipated
various errors against the more comprehensive view. For
example, the incautious remark is frequently made that Light
is the operative cause of vegetative growth, meaning light
alone ; but the large amount of chemical power required to
decompose water into its elements (the bodies of all others
most costly in their demands) could be furnished only by the
heating rays of the sun ; however much light may co-operate
in giving stimulus or direction.
13. The Law of Conservation exhausts Causation, viewed
as the transfer of Force or Moving Power, but leaves many
complicated, and, as yet, unsolved questions of COLLOCA-
TION.
If we view causation as the transfer or re- distribution of a
certain definite amount of moving power, nothing can be
simpler than the statement of the principle ; and, in many
instances, we find it easy to make the exact calculation . But
the circumstances attending the transfer, the situation or
collocation of the materials engaged, may have all degrees of
complexity.
 COLLOCATIONS. 31

The simplest situation is the transfer of mechanical power

by impact, as when a golf ball is impelled by the momentum of
the club. At least, we usually suppose this to be a simple
case ; we take no account of the internal agitations of the
particles of the body struck, being content to assume that the
momentum is transferred with inconsiderable loss. Here,
then, the collocation is the easiest possible ; it is the sensible
contact of one moving body with another, either at rest or
already in motion. Even when one moving body strikes
another moving in a different direction, the difficulty of the
collocation is not much increased ; the mechanical theorems of
oblique forces will predict the new distribution, and assign the
directions after the impact.
When we pass from the interchange of mechanical forces , to
the mutual interchange of mechanical and molecular, we en-
counter situations or collocations of various degrees of com-
plexity. Least difficult is the relation of mechanical momentum
with heat. When a moving body encounters a dead resistance,
the whole of the energy is resolved into increase of tempera-
ture of the encountering masses ; if the body struck gives way
in part, and takes on motion, the momentum generated is so
much deducted from the energy transformed into heat.
The transfer of heat into mechanical force, as in the steam
engine, is accomplished by the expansiveness of the heated.
matter. Starting from the fact of forcible expansion, the con-
version is merely an instance of mechanical impact. The
difficulties are postponed to the next stage.
The interchange of Heat and Chemical Force, the production
of each from the other, at will, is effected by an arrangement
that can be expressed with considerable definiteness in the
gross, although leaving the ultimate links of transition in deep
obscurity. The active combination of two combinable bodies,
as carbon and oxygen, evolves heat ; but the minute circum-
stances of the evolution can be only hypothetically surmised .
The intestine heat motions of carbon and of oxygen, in their
separation, when transferred to the joint carbonic acid mole-
cules, are in excess, and the surplus gives elevation of tem-
perature, or sensible heat, to the mass.
The re-conversion of Heat into Chemical Force (potential) ,
as in chemical decompositions, is somewhat more complicated ,
but an account can be given of the situation in gross. In the
cases where decomposition is effected by heat alone, we have
the simple restoring of the surplus heat of the combination .
In the other cases, where a new combination must be formed,
32 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

we have an additional circumstance, still perfectly definable,

and, in a rough manner, hypothetically conceivable.
The difficulties of Collocation grow thick upon us when we
grapple with the Electrical group of forces. The polarized
state of matter, whether in mass, as the magnet and the
Leyden jar, or in molecule, as in the decomposing cells of the
voltaic battery, is a new and unique phenomenon ; and its
generation by mechanical force or by heat may be stated in
the extreme terms, but without intermediate explanation,
even by a plausible hypothesis. After many laborious tenta-
tives, Faraday discovered the arrangement for directly convert-
ing mechanical power into voltaic electricity (commonly called
the magneto-electric machine) , but the links of the transition
or intermediate melecular changes are as yet unassignable .
Yet worse perplexities surround the collocations for trans-
ferring force in Living Bodies. Even the simplest case-the
production of Animal Heat from chemical combination or
combustion-is anomalous when compared with the same
phenomenon out of the body. The general fact is oxidation,
but the circumstances and arrangements are peculiar and
unknown. Again, the production of Muscular Force from the
process of oxidation is in accordance with the Law of Conserva-
tion, while the transition links are hitherto inscrutable. Like-
wise, the Nerve Force has the same common origin in chemical
transformations (or closely allied molecular transformations)
as the other forces, and follows a regular rule of exchange,
while the mode of derivation is involved in obscurity.
14. Seeing that, in Causation, there must be provided ,
not merely a sufficient force, energy, or moving power, but
also the suitable arrangement for making the transfer as
required ; this completing arrangement, or collocation, is a
part of the Cause, and (by ellipsis) is frequently spoken of
and investigated as the Cause.
A running stream is the proper source of the energy that
turns a mill. In order to the effect, however, the due colloca-
tion or connexion must be made for bringing the water to
bear upon the machinery.. Hence, the stream being taken for
granted, the cause of the grinding of the corn is the providing
of machinery, and the regulation of the sluices ; which circum-
stances are of the character, not of force, but of collocation .
So, in a Voltaic Battery, intended to decompose water, or
to charge an electro-magnet, the prime mover is chemical
force arising in the cells of the battery ; the completing
 UNKNOWN COLLOCATIONS. 33

arrangements include the whole apparatus of the battery, and

the final act of closing the circuit.
The combination of the food materials with the oxygen of
the air, may be reckoned the source of all animal power ;
but so numerous are the conditions to be secured in the
way of arrangement or due collocation, that we have often
to think far more of these than of the propelling agency de-
rived from the primal source of all moving power. We not
unfrequently assign as the cause of a man's bodily strength, a
good digestion, healthy lungs, or a good constitution generally,
and say nothing of the real derivation of the strength ; the
reason being that, without the complex group ofarrangements
implied in these facts, the power would not be transferred from
the common fund and embodied in the man's muscular and
nervous energies.
When a man properly supplied with food, goes through a
day's work, we recognize a transfer of moving power, under
the Law of Conservation. When any one prostrate with
weakness is restored to strength by a few drops of laudanum,
there is no proportion between the cause and the effect, con-
sidered as moving power giving birth to equal, although
different moving power. The salutary interference must be
regarded, not as a communication of moving energy corres-
ponding to the access of energy that follows, but as the restor-
ing of some arrangement or collocation, necessary to the
conversion of the body's nourishment into the various forces
of animal life.
As our knowledge of the Law of Conservation is such as to
account for the remote source of all power whatsoever, the
enquiry usually presented for scientific investigation is by
what arrangements a given effect has been secured, or through
what media the bank of Nature's Force has been drawn upon
in the particular instance. Not many years ago the pheno-
menon of volcanoes was regarded as wholly mysterious ; since
the establishment of the Law of Conservation, all that part of
the mystery connected with the source of the upheaving power
has been removed . It is the internal heat of the earth con-
verted at certain points into mechanical energy. What re-
mains for scientificinvestigation is a pure question of collocation;
we are still ignorant of the arrangements for effecting the
transference of power in that particular manner.
In the same way, all the great cosmical changes, marking
the evolution of the solar system, and the geological history of
the earth, are referable to the primal sources of energy ; the
3
34 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

moving power at work is no longer a secret. Yet the circum-

stances, arrangements, or collocations, whereby the power
operated to produce our existing mountain chains, the rise and
fall of continents, the fluctuations of climate, and all the other
phenomena revealed by a geological examination of the earth,
are as yet in uncertainty.
15. The importance of Collocation appears in another
aspect, as representing the modes of Potential Energy.
Potential Energy is energy of situation, arrangement, or
collocation. The Potential Energy, stored up when moving
bodies work against gravity, till their force is exhausted, is
described as a position of advantage, a collocation of power,
with reference to a gravitating mass. Here we have the re-
markable case of force embodied in absolute stillness or quies-
cence. A mountain taru is absolutely quiescent while its
enclosure is perfect ; the immense impetus to be displayed in
its descent to the plains is not represented even by a present
molecular momentum.
A similar energy of collocation is created when bodies are
distended in opposition to their cohesive attractions, as in
springs.
Lastly, there is the energy of separation of Chemical ele-
ments, as in coal, sulphur, metals, and other combinable sub-
stances, simple or compound. Gunpowder is a concentration
of potential chemical energies, or of combinable elements in a
situation of readiness to combine.
It is in the case of these potential energies that we seem to
create momentum, to bring forth force, without a prior equiva-
lent force, to make small causes yield great effects. The
cause, or antecedent circumstance, of a great outburst of
moving power, is something altogether trivial, as if force were
evoked and absolutely created. Cause and Effect cannot, in
such instances, be stated as one moving power transmuted into
an equal moving power, molar or molecular. A child's touch
might be made to discharge a man-of-war's broadside, or
inundate a village. One word of a general, the signature of
a sovereign, may destroy an empire.
Cause, in all these instances, has a peculiar and important
signification . It is not a moving momentum equal to the
momentum of the effect, it is the exertion, however easy, that
changes a situation of potential energy to a situation of actual
energy ; the cutting of the string that suspends a weight, the
drawing of a sluice, the setting a light to a combustible , the
supplying of a motive to human volition.
 ENQUIRY INTO COLLOCATIONS. 35

The course of experimental investigation must adapt itself to

this position of our knowledge as regards Causation. We
know the ultimate, and, in most instances, the proximate
sources of moving power or energy ; we know a certain
number, more or less, of the conditions or collocations of the
transfer ; what we still desiderate is the thorough and fully
generalized knowledge of the remaining collocations.
In the subtle actions of Light, we are at this moment in
doubts whether the luminous ray operates as a dynamical
and force-giving agent, like Heat and Electric Force, or only
as a collocating agent, either to complete the medium for
transmitting a true force, or to convert a potential into an
actual force. As causing chemical combinations, we can
ascribe to it nothing more than the liberation of the potential
chemical energy . So, in acting on the eye to rouse our
optical sensibility, it may be no more than a disturber of
latent forces.
The settling of this preliminary point is necessary to our
progress in the investigations of luminous agency. In merely
completing, or else disarranging collocations, Light must
exert a dynamical force, but it may be of the very slightest
amount, and out of all proportion to the results that ensue.
There is no proof that, in any situation, the energies aroused
by light are maintained at the cost of the light.
The character of a disturbing agent must attach to many, if
not most, of our sensations. The tickling of the nose by the
proboscis of a fly cannot be the source of the muscular move-
ments that arise from the feeling. The irritation of a musical
discord, the revulsion at an odour, the energetic discharge of
a bitter morsel from the mouth-are efficacious as disturbing
some collocation, and bringing potential force into actuality.
In the complicated animal framework, there may be violent
displays of energy consequent on the withholding of the
regular supplies of energy. Extreme hunger may lead to
nausea and retching. In the delirium of fever, when no
nourishment can be received, there is great muscular exertion .
We are at no loss, on the foregoing principles, to solve the
apparent contradiction .
16. As Cause may not always mean the Moving Power
transferred, according to the Law of Conservation, so, the
Effect may not always mean Momentum gained, but a new
arrangement or Collocation of materials.
Moving Power is often expended, not with a view to repro-
36 CAUSATION AS CONSERVATION OF FORCE.

ducing some equivalent power, but merely to re- distribute

materials, as in transporting stones from a quarry to erect a
building. There is a definite expenditure of power, corres-
ponding to the collective amount of the stones, the distance,
and the friction of the roads ; but the whole effect consists in
a change of position of the materials, without even potential
energy.
Such is the nature of many Geological changes. When the
forces of the earth and the sun raise mountains, they impart a
position of advantage, or of potential energy ; whereas the
transport of erratic boulders, the deposition of strata at a dis-
tance from the source of the material, are effects of change
without any embodiment of moving power.
17. The evidence for Causation and for Conservation is
the same.
This follows from the identity of the principles . Now, as
previous to the announcement of the principle of Conserva-
tion, a great body of evidence had been accumulated in favour
of Causation in the old form, all the experimental proofs in
favour of Conservation are a pure addition to the evidence of
Causation. In point of fact, however, these experimental
proofs are themselves considered adequate to establish the
principle of Conservation.
Those speculators that rely on an intuitive basis of proof
for this grand generalization treat the two forms as identical.
Thus, Sir W. Hamilton is singular among metaphysicians, in
giving to the Law of Causation a form almost exactly co-inci-
dent with the principle of Conservation, which he may be said
to have anticipated .
Mr. Herbert Spencer holds that ' the total quantity of matter
in the Universe, cannot really be conceived as diminished, any
more than it can be conceived as increased. Our inability to
conceive Matter becoming non-existent, is immediately con-
sequent on the very nature of thought. Thought consists in
the establishment of relations. There can be no relation estab-
lished, and therefore no thought framed, when one of the
related terms is absent from consciousness . The annihilation
of Matter is unthinkable for the same reason that the creation
of matter is unthinkable ; and its indestructibility thus be-
comes an a priori cognition of the highest order-not one that
results from a long continued registry of experience gradually
organized into an irreversible mode of thought : but one that
is given in the form of all experiences whatever ' ( FIRST PRIN-
 EVIDENCE FOR CAUSATION. 37

CIPLES, 2nd edit. p. 175) . So much as regards Matter. Now

as Matter is known to us merely as exerting force, the reason-
ing really applies to Force as the underlying experience, the
real signification of Matter. Hence, by the indestructibility
of matter, we really mean the indestructibility of the force
with which Matter affects us.'
Without re-entering into the controversy as to the test of
truth furnished by the inconceivability of the opposite, we
may remark that in the absence of experimental confirmations
and interpretations, such an a priori conception would be very
hazardous to rely on. It would not tell us, for example, that
all the force of nature seems tending to a mode of dissipation
which is, to all intents and purposes, annihilation , namely, the
radiation of heat into space. Moreover, the case has already
been adduced of two opposing forces meeting to neutralize one
another ; a fact formerly accepted as in full consistency with
the indestructibility of mechanical force ; the universal belief
of scientific men, as well as of others, was that nothing survived
such a collision. Such a priori renderings are of the nature of
prophecies made after the event.
When the Inductive Methods have been fully explained , the
proof of the Law of Causation will be reverted to with a view
of indicating its logical character. We here assume it as
sufficiently established, and we shall have to proceed upon it
deductively in several of the methods of Inductive Proof and
Elimination . Without it , there could be no short cut to the
establishment of a law of nature ; every separate induction
would have to be proved by a detailed examination of instances
through all nature. The most potent ofthe Inductive Methods ,
the Method of Difference, is a deductive carrying out of the
law of Causation or of Conservation.

18. The Cause, or aggregate conditions, of an Effect

must be sought among the antecedent circumstances con-
joined with it.
To appearance, Cause and Effect are a sequence or succes-
sion ; the cause being first, or the antecedent ; the effect,
second, or the consequent. It is, therefore, among the circum-
stances preceding the effect, and in sufficient connexion of
time and place, that we look out for the cause.
The main difficulty of the determination is due to the fact
that, in most cases, circumstances not entering into the cause
are also found among the antecedents, in as close connexion of
time and place as the causal conditions. It is to extricate the
38 THE COMPOSITION OF CAUSES .

real conditions that we must enter on a course of observation,

experiment, and comparison of instances.
19. An invariable antecedent is not necessarily the cause
or any part of the cause of an effect.

The familiar example is the sequence of day and night ;

which, although invariable, is not a sequence of cause and
effect. So in the evolution of a living being, there are numer-
ous links of invariable succession ; and yet we are not entitled,
on that circumstance alone, to pronounce the earlier the cause
of the later.
The case of day and night, being an understood phenomenon,
illustrates the difference between causation, and mere invaria-
bility of order. We know that the cause of day, is the light of
the sun falling upon the earth ; that the cause of night is the
absence of the sun. We farther know that the earth's rotation
is the circumstance occasioning the periodical absence of the
light. The cause of this entire phenomenon is made up of-the
luminosity of the sun, our being placed within reach of that
luminosity, and the earth's rotation about its axis. The
alternation of light and dark is itself but a consequence-a co-
effect of the assemblage of facts constituting the phenomenon.
Some of the invariabilities of vegetable and animal growth
may be proved, and others presumed, to be only common effects
of the real cause.
Such invariabilities are part of the difficulty of causal
elimination.
The cause must be an invariable antecedent, but it must
farther be what Mr. Mill expresses as the ' unconditional in-
variable antecedent, ' the sole sufficing circumstance whose
presence makes the effect, and whose absence arrests it. Day-
light is preceded by darkness ; but a state of darkness is not
everywhere followed, after a certain duration, with day-light.
We cannot, in the case of day and night, separate darkness from
its order of alternation with light ; but, in referring to other
cases, and other situations, we do not find that a present dark-
ness always alternates with illumination.

THE COMPOSITION OF CAUSES.

20. When several motive powers are conjoined, the com-
posite effect is the sum or difference of the separate effects,
according as they conspire with, or are opposed to each
other.
 COMPUTATION OF COMBINED CAUSES. 39

Causes, understood as prime movers, may be combined, and

the result computed by a numerical operation. Two men pul-
ling at the same rope, two locomotives, two weights, when
acting in the same direction, have a total effect equal to the
sum of the separate effects. When they thwart one another,
the result is the difference. For oblique action, the computa-
tion is made by the parallelogram of forces.
In the molecular agencies the same rule applies. Two equal
fires give twice the heat of one ; two bushels of coals make
twice the combustion of one, that is, twice the heat ; in the
steam engine, to double the fuel is to double the motive power.
Three identical wax candles produce a triple illumination.
Two equal magnets put together will sustain a double weight.
If one cell of a voltaic battery decompose a pound of water
in a given time, six equally energetic cells will decompose six
pounds in the same time.
The same principle extends to the Physiological or vital
forces. Increase of heat, light, and assimilating material
makes a corresponding increase of vegetable growth. Food
and oxygen actively combined, give forth a proportionate
amount of animal force.
Even in Mind, the ratio holds, although interfered with by
new forces arising out of the complication. The pleasures
and pains are in accordance with the amount of their several
agents. A man's enjoyments increase with his gains and
diminish with his losses, other things being the same.
The Social forces in like manner combine, and may be com-
puted by adding the sum of the effects . The addition of new
causes of discontent in a people already dissatisfied, makes a
corresponding advance towards anarchy and revolution. On
the other hand, some agreeable or soothing agency may neu-
tralize an ill feeling already at work.
In all these instances, Cause is to be interpreted as meaning
Motive Power, or Force ; in no other sense does the rule of
arithmetical sum and difference apply. Causes that merely make
good the collocation for bringing a prime mover into action,
or that release a potential force, do not follow any such rule.
One man may direct a gun upon a fort as well as three ; two
sparks are not more effectual than one in exploding a barrel
of gunpowder. In medicine, there is a certain dose that
answers the end ; and adding to it does no more good.

21. Composition of Causes is sometimes applied to

Chemical actions, so as to mean not a union of forces, but
40 THE COMPOSITION OF CAUSES .

the union of substances or materials. In this way, oxygen

and hydrogen combine to form water.
This part of the chemical process comes under collocation,
and not under force . The mixing of materials, and the union
of forces, are not the same fact.
In chemical action, thus understood, we cannot fully predict
the characters of the compound from the characters of the
elements. It is the speciality of chemical combination to
merge nearly all the physical properties of the substances com-
bined, and to yield a new product, where the combining ele-
ments are not recognizable. Sulphur combines with copper
to form a black flaky substance, the sulphuret of copper.
There are still wanting general laws that would serve us to
compute the resultant of a chemical combination ; we know
only that weight is not lost, and that the law of definite pro-
perties holds.
The analogy of Chemical Combination has been applied to
mental and social combinations. Thus, the complex emotions
of the mind are often so far different from their constituents,
as scarcely to suggest these to the mental analyst. The moral
sense, for example, is declared by many to be a simple faculty,
on the ground of its having no resemblance to any other simple
elements of the mind.
Again, in the study of national characters, we may know
that certain influences concurred in the process of formation,
and yet find a difficulty in tracing them .
These, however, are mere analogies. Chemical combination
is an illustrative metaphor and little besides. The analogy
fails in one essential circumstance , definite combinations. The
disguise of the elements or components is the only point of
similarity and that would probably be better referred to the
analogy of growth, where the constituents entering at one stage
form a product, still farther combined in succesive operations,
which cannot all preserve a record of themselves.
 CHAPTER V.

ELIMINATION OF CAUSE AND EFFECT. - OBSERVA-

TION AND EXPERIMENT.

1. The enquiry into causation is usually presented in

nature as a complication of influences and arrangements,
some concerned and some not concerned in the cause or
the effect sought.

For instance, a man in good health goes to a new place and

a new occupation . His health gradually fails . There must
be a cause for the failure ; assuming that he could have
retained his health in his original abode and occupation, the
cause must lie in the new circumstances that he is placed in.
These new circumstances are perhaps numerous ; the climate
may be hotter or moister, not to mention many other variations ;
the man's new pursuits and recreations may be widely different
from his old . Now, while some of these differences must have
some share in the effect, others probably have no share ; and the
problem lies in disentangling the one class from the other ; in
separating the operative from the inoperative surroundings.
The case now supposed represents the inductive search in
its extreme speciality, and as it appears in the commoner
practical questions. A more general enquiry is exemplified
in determining the effects of given agents, as heat, moisture,
electricity, ozone, light, foods or medicines, on the human
constitution. Every one of those agents has a variety of pro-
perties, or modes of action ; in the case supposed, some are
operative and some not ; and we must discriminate the one
class from the other.
Again, we may propose a still more general enquiry- What
is the common antecedent to the effect denominated Heat, or
the peculiar fact or situation always recurring when there is an
increase in the temperature of material bodies ? In looking
at the incidents attending the development of heat in any in-
stance, we find them to be numerous and various ; and we have
to find some mode of separating the inefficient from the efficient
elements of the situation.
We know from the law of Causation, even in the less ex-
plicit form (Conservation being left out of view) , that in the
42 ELIMINATION OF CAUSE AND EFFECT.

changes going on in the world, the present situation is the re-

sult of the previous situation ; and if that previous situation
were reproduced so would the present. But this is not all ;
for we may be able to show that if a certain part of the previ-
ous situation were reproduced, the present would follow ; we
can put aside all otiose or inert accompaniments and reduce
the antecedent circumstances to those really operative. This
is the process of INDUCTIVE ELIMINATION, required alike in
special and in general enquiries as to cause and effect.
Yet farther, we may find the sequence of a past and a pre-
sent situation to consist in a plurality of distinguishable
sequences, which we may analyze and isolate by the methods
to be pointed out. Political causation is almost always a
complication of many distinguishable threads.

2. Preparatory to the disentangling or eliminating pro-

cess, we make, in our own mind, an analysis of the situation.
As the final end is to discriminate the necessary from the
unnecessary elements of the situation, we begin by a separate
enumeration of all the circumstances, taking care to reduce
each to its simplest components. If a man has lost his health,
in a certain locality, we first suppose to ourselves what may be
the distinct agents concerned ; we analyze the climate into all
its constituent circumstances-temperature, moisture, fluctua-
tions, purity of air, and so on ; we analyze the peculiarities of
his mode of nourishment, occupation, habits, state of mind ;
and the more thorough-going the analysis, the better are we
prepared for the operation that is to follow. Indeed, an in-
sufficient analysis will of itself defeat the best laid schemes of
elimination. Newton's investigation of the planetary motions
owed its success to his analyzing the course of each planet
into a central tendency towards the sun, and a tangential
tendency. This separation was the first clue to the mystery.
In any enquiry into the cause of some effect due to the sun,
as for example, sun-stroke, the different known constituents of
the solar beam- heating, lighting, and chemical rays—should
be separately viewed as the possible cause.
The ability to perform these mental analyses is partly depen-
dent on the state of knowledge at the time. Thus, we now
know, what was not known in the beginning of the last cen-
tury, the constituents of the atmosphere; we are therefore pre-
pared for an enquiry, according to the methods of elimination ,
into the precise cause of any atmospheric effect. If it is pro-
posed for enquiry, why does meat putrefy in the air, we keep
 VARYING THE CIRCUMSTANCES. 43

in view the distinct constituents - nitrogen, oxygen, water,

carbonic acid, dust, living germs ; as among these, or among
some concurrent action of these the cause must be found. So ,
it is only of late, that the analysis of the solar ray has indi-
cated the so-called chemical rays in addition to the luminous
and the heat-giving rays.
It may be farther remarked, that this analytic ability is a
special mental aptitude personal to the enquirer, and indicat-
ing the scientific faculty.
3. In separating the essential from the non-essential
accompaniments in cause and effect, the course is to vary
the circumstances, for which end we must resort to Observa-
tion and Experiment.
The different antecedents and consequents being separated
in thought, we have to ascertain which antecedent is connected
with a given consequent. Having usually a plurality of ante-
cedents, or a plurality of consequents, or both, we need to
single out the connected couples of antecedent and consequent .
This requires us to look for other instances where the group-
ings are different, and to note what happens when particular
antecedents or consequents are wanting : an operation described
by Bacon as ' varying the circumstances .'
The varied circumstances, or groupings, are so many new
facts attainable only by Observation, to which we may add
Experiment. The distinction between these two processes is
not fundamental, and is seldom important. Observation is
finding a fact, Experiment is making one. The worth of the
fact depends on what it is in itself, and not on the manner of
obtaining it. Both methods are used as far as possible.
The advantages of Experiment are not confined to the
obvious circumstance of multiplying the facts, important as it
must often be to multiply them. A second consideration is
the power that we may have of suiting the facts to the case in
hand-of producing the sort of variation that we need . Thus,
in order to ascertain which of the gases of the atmosphere
supports combustion, or animal life, and what are the elements
that bring about putrescence and decay, we must, by means of
experiments, separate artificially one or another of the gases
from the rest ; such separation not being provided for us in
nature.
Dr. Balfour Stewart remarks, with reference to an investiga-
tion by Dulong and Petit as to the cooling of a body surrounded
by a gas, that the research was a very troublesome one, from
44 ELIMINATION OF CAUSE AND EFFECT.

the variations that had to be made in the temperature of the

body, and in the density, temperature, and chemical nature of
the gas .
A third superiority of Experiment over Observation lies in
the power of producing a phenomenon under known circum-
stances and surroundings, so as to take account of all extraneous
influences. Thus, instead of observing electricity in thunder
discharges, we evolve it in a room where we know all the
modifying influences. For the examination of magnetism, a
house is constructed wholly of wood, so that the local disturb-
ance of pieces of iron may be prevented. Likewise, the best
opportunity for the study of disease is in hospitals, where the
sick are wholly under the control of the physician.
Experiment finds its greatest scope in Physics and in Chemis-
try. It is admissible in Physiology, in the Human Mind, and in
Human Society, with limitations easily divinable by any
reflecting student.
In the situation of enquiring into the Cause of a given
Effect, Experiment is for a moment unavailing. We can try
the effect of a given cause, but we cannot try the cause of a
given effect. Assuming heat as an agent, we can make experi-
ments on its various powers or capabilities ; but given the heat
of a fermenting mass, as an effect, we cannot, by experiment,
get out the cause. We must first conjecture a cause ; experi-
ments may then be instituted to find out the effects of that
supposed cause ; if these tally with the effect in question ,
we have made out our point.
The problem of Causation may thus be presented in both
aspects-given a cause to find the effect, given an effect to
find the cause—-but the experimental solution is one ; namely,
to watch the effect of an assumed cause. The course of the
phenomenon flows in one way ; cause first, effect second.
When we seem to be working backward, we are in reality
working forward.
REVIEW OF THE COMPLICATIONS OF CAUSE AND EFFECT,
4. The Inductive Elimination of Causes and Effects may
be illustrated by a review of the various complications
actually met with.
We have already adduced examples of the complications
that have to be unravelled, in order to assign the neat effects
of a cause, or the causes of an effect. We are able to present
a more comprehensive view of the actually occurring entangle-
ments.
 COMPLICATIONS OF CAUSE AND EFFECT. 45

Those natural aggregates, termed Kinds by pre- eminence,

are marked by the concurrence, in a single object, of many
different properties. Oxygen, carbon, phosphorus, iron, mer-
cury, platinum- have each a great number of distinct powers
or activities ; hence, when the introduction of any one of them
is followed by some change in the things they are brought into
contact with, we are at first uncertain which of all the many
properties of the substance is the operative circumstance.
Carbon, for example, is found to absorb gases in large amount ;
which suggests the enquiry, which of the properties of carbon
is this owing to :-its specific gravity, porosity, blackness,
amorphous structure, or any other ? Again, mercury has
certain medicinal effects ; and we desire to know which of its
many properties is the causative circumstance. Platinum, in
a finely divided or spongy state, brought into contact with a
stream of hydrogen, makes it ignite. What does this depend
upon ?
So then, in the elementary bodies of Chemistry, the simplest
substances known to us, there is a great concourse of anteced-
ents present whenever any one is brought into play. But, in
nature, these are usually found mixed together ( I am not
alluding to Chemical combination, which yields new substances )
in great varieties of compounds. Thus, the Atmosphere is a
mixture of two simple bodies- nitrogen and oxygen ; various
known chemical compounds- water, carbonic acid, and am-
monia ; and a great many other gaseous effluvia, together
with solid particles, partly dust and partly ova of plants and
animals. Moreover, it possesses at each moment a certain
temperature, a certain electrical condition, and perhaps
other peculiarities. Thus, when the atmospheric air is pre-
sented to us as a cause or agency, the possible variety of
antecedents is very great. Many researches have been occu-
pied in eliminating the causal conditions in combustion, in
vegetable and in animal life, in putrefaction, in spontaneous
generation ( so-called) , &c .
Again, the sea is not pure water, but a solution of numerous
saline bodies.
Most minerals are mixed substances . A geological stratum
is highly compound ; and when certain vegetables are found
to grow in a particular soil, elimination must be applied to
ascertain which are the needful constituents.
In Vegetable, and in Animal Kinds, the complication is
still greater. The chemical constituents of plants and of ani-
mals have very complex atoms, whose disintegration may yield
46 WEAPONS OF ELIMINATION.

a variety of different products. Hence, vegetable and animal

substances used as food, as medicines, as dyes, &c., have many
possible modes of operating. We must, however, when living
bodies are agents, farther take into account the organic or living
structure ; the poison of a living plant or animal has powers
of derangement quite different from the chemical action of its
chemical constituents.
The complication in the world of Mind is very great. A
human being is by nature many-sided, and by education still
more so. Hence, when one person exercises an influence upon
another, it is far from obvious, at first sight, by what peculiari-
ties the effect arises. So again, in the explanation of motives,
a historian is often baffled to select the one that actually
swayed a given effect.
The operations of Government are ramified in their conse-
quences. A single enactment-the imposition of a tax on
windows or its removal, free-trade, or its opposite- operates
variously according to circumstances.

WEAPONS OF ELIMINATION.

5. It is in the comprehensive Law of Causation itself,

once established by Induction, that we have the instru-
ments for eliminating causes and effects in the detail.
As already said, there is but one proper Inductive Method
-Universal Agreement ; there is, in the first instance, no
shorter cut to an Inductive Generalization. We must go
through the labour of a full examination of instances, until we
feel assured that our search is complete, that if contrary cases
existed, they must have been met with.
By such thorough-going examination, various inductive laws
have been established, including that momentous truth called
the Law of Causation. Now, in whichever of its two properly
scientific aspects, we view this law-whether in the less sug-
gestive but perfectly accurate form of Uniformity of Sequence,
or in the new and better form of Conservation accompanied
with Collocation, we find in it a means of shortening the labour
of ascertaining specific causes and effects. By applying the
general law, in either form, there is often a possibility of prov-
ing causation by a single instance.
Thus, to take the first form of Causation- Every event is
uniformly followed by some other event ; and every event is
uniformly preceded by one or other of a definite number of
events ' :-given an antecedent, one consequent succeeds ; given
 CAUSATION THE BASIS OF ELIMINATION. 47

a consequent, some one of a few definite antecedents has pre-

ceded. Now from this it follows, that whenever an agent is
introduced into a quiescent state of things, and when certain
changes follow at once on that fact, the sequence happening
once will happen always. Nothing springs out of nothing.
Nature in the matter of sequences is uniform ; and a single
case, cleared of ambiguities, establishes a law. By the stroke
of an axe, a block is cleft ; the same effect will always follow
the cause. Hence, a single experiment in the laboratory may
establish for ever a causal property.
On the second or more precise form of Causation , there is
a definite transfer of motive power under some given arrange-
ment of things. We know, by this law, without any new
observation, that a blow with a hammer will realize its
equivalent, either in mechanical momentum, or in some form
of molecular force. If in a certain situation, it splinters a
stone, it will always do the same thing, in the same situation.
In a different arrangement, it raises the temperature of a
surface ; and what it does once, it does always. All that we
have to settle empirically in this form of the law, is the
transfer attending each collocation, and the collocation attend-
ing each transfer. By induction proper (universal agree-
ment) we have already ascertained this to be uniform , and
accordingly pronounce upon a single clear instance.
There is thus only one Inductive Method at the foundation
(Agreement), but there are several Deductive Methods, or
methods depending upon the grand generalization of Cause.
For instance, the method known as the ' Method of Differ-
ence,' is not an inductive but a deductive method ; for, with-
out the law of Causation , the method would be incompetent.
Even the ' Method of Agreement ' as employed for the pur-
pose of elimination, supposes the Law of Causation, and is to
that extent a deductive method.
6. The Law of Causation involves the three following
affirmations , each of which is the groundwork of a process
of Elimination.
(1) Whatever antecedent can be left out, without preju-
dice to the effect, can be no part of the cause.
A cause is what produces an effect. As the presence of
the cause is the presence of the effect, so the absence of the
cause is the absence of the effect. The absence of the cause,
with the presence of the effect, would be a contradiction of
the law. We are sure, therefore, that whatever can be omitted
48 WEAPONS OF ELIMINATION.

or withdrawn without making any difference to the effect in

question, is not the cause, or any part of the cause. If we
cut a string that we suppose to be the support of a weight,
and the weight continues to be supported, the string is not
the support.
Upon the Law of Causation, viewed on this side, reposes
Mr. Mill's Method of elimination by Agreement. A certain
effect remains after the successive withdrawal of all the ante-
cedents except one ; which leaves that one in sole and undis-
puted possession, and therefore the cause.
(2) When an antecedent cannot be left out without the
consequent disappearing, such antecedent must be the
cause or a part of the cause.
This affirmation, likewise, is implied in the law. It presents
the other side of the same linking of cause and effect ; absence
of the cause is absence of the effect. Whatever, by disappear-
ing, makes the effect to disappear, is by that very fact an
essential or causal condition. If the cutting of a string is the
falling of a weight ; the string is the support of the weight.
This aspect of cause gives the decisive Method of Difference ;
the method whereby a single instance may be incontrovertible
proof of a cause.
(3) An antecedent and a consequent rising and falling
together in numerical concomitance are to be held as Cause
and Effect.
This is Causation in the more special aspect of Conserva-
tion, and is directly implicated in that principle. In the
transfer of moving power, the quantity gained is the quantity
lost ; and the tracing of quantitative concomitance is our very
best clue to the force operative in a given effect. As the com-
bustion of a locomotive is increased, so is the steam power.
In those agencies that merely bring about a collocation,
there is no numerical ratio between the agent and the result.
A slight touch is enough to complete the electric circuit, and
a double vehemence adds nothing to the energy of the circnit.
The process now described is the Method of Concomitant
Variations.
These are the three chief methods of Eliminating the un-
concerned circumstances present in cause and effect. After
considerable progress has been made in the discovery of
causes, recourse may be had to a farther proceeding, namely,
to allow for the influence of all known causes, and to attribute
 ELIMINATION FOUNDED ON CAUSATION. 49

what remains of the effect to what remains of the cause. This

also is a proper inference from the Law of Causation. It is
termed the Method of Residues.
The Method of Agreement may be employed negatively ;
that is, cases may be found where cause and effect are uni-
formly absent together. We may call it Agreement in Absence.
When this circumstance can be conjoined with the positive
method-Agreement in presence, an approach is made to the
decisive cogency of the Method of Difference. Mr. Mill has
given to this conjoint mode the designation-Joint- Method.
The following chapter will exemplify the employment of
these Five Methods of Inductive (or Deductive) Elimination
in investigating Cause and Effect.
It is not possible to separate from the thorough working of
these instruments of Elimination the process of generalizing,
or attaining to Inductive generalities. In carrying out the
Method of Agreement, for example, the collation of a large
number of instances where a cause or an effect is present,
cannot fail to suggest laws of causation of a higher generality
than the enquirer sets out with. Nevertheless, it will not be
expedient to dwell upon this generalizing operation while we
are bent upon the eliminating process. Generalization belongs
to Discovery ; Elimination is Proof; and Proof, more than
Discovery, is the end of Logic. Still, we shall have to make
room for a consideration of the best modes of arriving at the
higher generalities.

CHAPTER VI.

THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

1. There are three chief methods of eliminating the

cause of a phenomenon from the neutral or indifferent
accompaniments -Agreement, Difference, and Concomitant
Variations.

METHOD OF AGREEMENT.
2. The Method of Agreement is expressed thus :-If
two or more instances of a phenomenon under investiga-
4
50 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

tion have only one circumstance in common, that circum-

stance is the cause (or effect) of the phenomenon.
The instances are studiously varied so as to leave out in
turn all the circumstances attending the phenomenon. What-
ever is left out, in any one instance, without detriment to the
effect, cannot be the cause ; the possibilities are gradually
reduced in number ; and , if the means of elimination are com-
plete, the enquiry terminates in assigning one circumstance
that has never been wanting where the phenomenon appears.
The method is illustrated symbolically thus :-Let A repre-
sent a cause and a an effect. In nature we seldom have A
followed by a alone ; were such isolation the rule, the Experi-
mental Methods would be unnecessary. What we find is A in
combination with other things as A B C, and a also in com-
bination, as in a b c. But, now, if these conjunctions were
rigid and invariable, we should have no opening for the
methods. The real fact is, however, that though a cause may
be always in combination with other agents, it is not always
in the same combination ; at one time the union is A B C, at
another time A B D, and again A CE ; there being corres-
ponding conjunctions in the effects—a b c, a b d, a ce.
If we suppose, then, the instances—
A B C giving a bc,
A B D giving a b d,
ACE giving a ce,
we reason thus. So far as the first instance is concerned—
A B C giving a b c, the effect a may be produced by A, or
by B, or by C. In the second instance-A B D giving a b d,
the cause C is absent , the effect a still remaining ; hence C is
not a cause of a. In the third instance -A C E giving a c e,
-B is absent, a remaining ; hence B is not a cause of a. The
only antecedent persisting through all the instances is A ;
when a is present as a consequent, A is always present as an
antecedent. If, then, we are sure that every other antecedent
circumstance has been removed in turn, the consequent a still
surviving, we have conclusive evidence that A is a cause,
condition, or invariable accompaniment of a.
It matters not which is the form of the enquiry,—given an
effect to find a cause, or given a cause to find an effect. The
first is supposed to be the more frequent occurrence. Science,
from of old, was
rerum cognoscere causas.
If the problem be given in the first form, the proof is always
given in the second ; we try a cause to see what effect
 METHOD OF AGREEMENT. 51

will follow, which proves at once that the consequent is the

effect of the antecedent, and that the antecedent is the cause
of the consequent ; the two affirmations being identical.
Although our professed object now is to unfold the Induc-
tive elimination of Cause and Effect, having already disposed
of the case of Co-existence as Co-inhering Attributes, yet, in
expounding the Methods, we must receive instances indis-
criminately, as we do not at first know how they will turn out.
There are many connexions of Cause and Effect that appear
as Co-existences, and there are instances that we must leave
undecided, being unable to assign the ultimate nature of the
union. The more obvious tests of Causation are these :-
(1) sequence in time, as when innoculation is followed by the
small-pox pustule ; ( 2) expenditure of energy, as when a
cannon ball shatters a fort. Where these tests are wanting, as
in co-inhering powers of the same substance-for example,
gravity and inertia- we are left to presume co-existence,
there being, as alternative possibilities, mutual implication, and
the co-existing effects of a common cause.
This explanation is more especially called for in commenc-
ing the Method of Agreement-the universal or fundamental
mode of proof for all connexions whatever. Under this
method in particular, we must be ready to admit all kinds of
conjunctions ; reducing them under Causation, when we are
able, and indicating pure Co-existence when the presumption
inclines to that mode.
As a simple example, we may take the case of the conver-
sion of solid bodies into liquids, and the farther conversion of
liquids into gases. The bodies so converted are of every
possible variety of properties ; the one circumstance common
to all the instances of such conversion is the application of
heat. The elimination is complete as regards this antecedent,
which is therefore correctly assigned as the essential condition
or cause. We may apply in this example, the most decided
test of Causation, the expenditure of energy or force ; we should
never regard the fact as a mere Co-existence.
The next example is of a different character.
The peculiar phenomenon called the polarization of light,—
consisting in the exhibition of bands of alternating or 'periodi-
cal ' colours, when a beam of light prepared in a particular
manner is thrown upon certain transparent substances, -may
be propounded for investigation. We may ask- is there any
other property or phenomenon always present in the bodies
that show this peculiar effect ? Now, the bodies must, as a
52 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS .

matter of course, be transparent ; but all transparent bodies

do not exhibit the polarized bands ; hence, transparency is
eliminated. By farther comparison of instances, we find that
there is no constant mode of colour, of weight, of hardness,
of form ( crystalline), of composition (physical or chemical) ;
so that no one of all these properties is concerned in the
phenomenon. There is, however, one circumstance that has
never failed to be present in polarizing substances ; they are
all doubly refracting substances, that is, present two images of
things seen through them obliquely. By Agreement through
all known substances, there is proof of the concurrence of
these two properties.
It is not ascertained , however, and cannot be ascertained by
Agreement alone, whether the two facts are cause and effect,
or whether they are a case of co -existence without causation.
Agreement is the method of proof for all conjunctions what-
soever- whether Causation or Co-existence. The enquiry
belongs to a particular class- the conjoined Properties of
Kinds, where there may be laws of co-existence without cau-
sation. The decisive criteria of causation are wanting in the
case.
To take a third example. In flowers, there is a remark-
able concurrence between the scarlet colour and the absence
of fragrance. The following quotation gives a selection of
instances.
' Among all the colours that blooms assume, none are less
associated with fragrance than scarlet. We cannot at present
recollect a bright scarlet blossom that is sweet- scented—yet
no other colour among flowers is more admired and sought
after. Scarlet prevails among Balsamina, Euphorbia, Pelar-
gonium, Poppy, Salvia, Bouvardia, and Verbena, yet none of
the scarlets are of sweet perfumes. Some of the light- coloured
Balsams and Verbenas are sweet-scented , but none of the
scarlets are. The common Sage, with blue blooms, is odorifer-
ous both in flower and foliage ; but the scarlet Salvias are
devoid of smell. None of the sweet-scented-leaved Pelar-
goniums have scarlet blooms , and none of the scarlet bloomers
have sweet scent of leaves nor of blooms. Some of the white-
margined Poppies have pleasant odours ; but the British
scarlets are not sweet-scented. The British white-blooming
Hawthorn is of the most delightful fragrance ; the scarlet-
flowering has no smell. Some of the Honeysuckles are
sweetly perfumed , but the Scarlet Trumpet is scentless ' (ELDER,
American Gardener's Monthly) .
 EXAMPLES OF AGREEMENT. 53

Fourth Example. The North- East wind is known to be

specially injurious to a great many persons. Let the enquiry
be-what circumstance or quality is this owing to ? By a
mental analysis, we can distinguish various qualities in winds ;
-the degree of violence, the temperature, the humidity or
dryness, the electricity, and the ozone. We then refer to
the actual instances to see if some one mode of any of these
qualities uniformly accompanies this particular wind. Now
we find, that as regards violence, easterly winds are generally
feeble and steady, but on particular occasions, they are stormy ;
hence, we cannot attribute their noxiousness to the intensity
of the current. Again, while often cold, they are sometimes
comparatively warm ; and although they are more disagree-
able when cold, yet they do not lose their character by being
raised in temperature ; so that the bad feature is not coldness.
Neither is there one uniform degree of moisture; they are some-
times wet and sometimes dry. Again, as to electricity, there
is no constant electric charge connected with them, either
positive or negative, feeble or intense ; the electric tension of
the atmosphere generally rises as the temperature falls.
Farther, as respects ozone, they have undoubtedly less of this
element than the South-West winds ; yet an easterly wind at
the sea shore has more ozone than a westerly wind in the heart
of a town. It would thus appear that the depressing effect
cannot be assigned to any one of these five circumstances.
When, however, we investigate closely the conditions of the
north easterly current, we find that it blows from the pole
towards the equator, and is for several thousand miles close
upon the surface of the ground ; whereas the south-west wind
coming from the equator descends upon us from a height.
Now, in the course of this long contact with the ground, a
great number of impure elements-gaseous effluvia, fine dust,
microscopic germs-may be caught up and may remain sus-
pended in the lower stratum breathed by us. On this point
alone, so far as we can at present discover, the agreement is
constant and uniform .
What is the conclusion ? As Agreement by itself does not
decide that conjoined circumstances are cause and effect, we
must find some mode of excluding Co-existence, and rendering
the case one of succession. When the two circumstances are
plainly in succession, as when a fracture follows a blow, uni-
form agreement (with elimination ) proves causation ; when
they are not demonstrably successive, the agreement fails in
this respect .
54 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

Now, there is a general belief that the two events supposed

-the east wind and the uncomfortable sensations- are not
contemporaneous, but in succession ; the wind first, the feel-
ings afterwards. This belief is supported by the circumstance
that a change of feelings, must have, according to the law of
causation, an antecedent condition ; and if all antecedents,
besides the one above named, are eliminated, that one is the
cause, or an essential part of the cause.
The phenomenon to be explained is not a permanent fact
or potentiality, like polarization or double refraction, it is a
temporary manifestation, and requires some causal circum-
stance to bring it forth. In this respect, it resembles the
actual display of one of these optical properties ; it cannot
happen without a suitable agent and collocation, which is pro-
perly a cause of the appearance.
If then, the elimination be supposed complete, there is a
proof by Agreement that the deleterious influence of the east
wind is due to the circumstance named ; and the case exempli-
fies the eliminating efficacy of the method.
In the foregoing example, we cannot withhold from our
mind a certain presumption in favour of the result, grounded
on our knowledge of the deleterious tendency of atmosphere
impurities caught up from the surface of the ground . This
is a circumstance not properly belonging to the proof by
Agreement ; it is a confirmation from deductive sources . The
addition of such a presumption always operates strongly on
our belief ; the total absence of it leaves a considerable shade
of uncertainty in all the methods, but most of all in Agree-
ment. The third example shows this deficiency ; we are not
at present aware of any connexion of a causal kind between
the scarlet colour of flowers and the absence of fragrant
odour ; the proof of the law rests upon the Agreement alone.
That method ofproof is final, only when the elimination has been
exhausted, by variation of circumstances, and when the coin-
cidence has been shown through all nature, so as to establish
a law of Universal Co-existence .
Fifth Example. Let the phenomenon given be Crystallization,
and let the thing sought be the antecedent circumstances,
positive and negative, of the formation of crystals . This is a
case of succession, and therefore of Causation.
We must begin by collecting instances of the effect. In the
following series, the circumstances are purposely varied with
a view to elimination :-
1. Freezing of water.
 EXAMPLES OF AGREEMENT. 55

2. Cooling and solidifying of molten metals and minerals.

3. Deposition of salts from solutions.
4. Volatilizing of solutions.
5. Deposition of solids from the gaseous state, as iodine.
6. Pressure.
7. Slow internal change, as in rocks.
8. The transformation of metals from the tough to the
brittle condition, by hammering, vibration, and re-
peated heatings and coolings.
Looking at the first and second instances - ice, and the
solidifying of molten metal— we discover two antecedent cir-
cumstances, namely, lowering of temperature, aud change
from the liquid to the solid state.
The third instance-deposition of salts from solution-
agrees in the same two circumstances, there is a lowering of
temperature, and also a change from liquid to solid .
The fourth instance the volatilizing of solutions, as in
boiling down sea-water-appears to fail in the matter of cool-
ing, but still contains the circumstance of prior liquidity ; the
prominent fact is that the solvent is driven off, and the dis-
solved substance thereby compelled to resume the solid state.
The fifth instance the deposition of solids at once from
the gaseous state, as in the case of iodine- seems to eliminate
prior liquidity. We must then shift the ground, and, for
liquidity, substitute one of" the two higher states of matter.
The sixth instance is heavy and long continued pressure
upon an amorphous substance ; principally shown in geology.
This would eliminate the prior liquid or gaseous condition, and
bring to view the forced approximation of the constituent
particles of bodies. But the same circumstance accompanies
all the previous cases, being merely a different expression of
what is common to them. We know heat as forcibly enlarg-
ing the bulk of bodies- making their particles mutually re-
pellent ; the withdrawal of this force leaves the attractions of
the particles free to operate.
The seventh instance-slow geological transformation-
unless viewed by the light of the circumstance just named, is
difficult to interpret. It is not, however, incompatible with
the predominance of the molecular attractive forces by the
abatement of the repellent forces.
The eighth instance- change of metals from the tough to
the brittle state -is a true case of crystallization ; brittle-
ness is accompanied with an imperfect crystalline arrangement.
The effect is produced by cooling after hammering ; by re-
56 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

peated heating and cooling ; by long-continued vibration or

concussion :-all which influences tend to expel the structural
heat of the substance ; the consequence being that the mole-
cular attraction is more preponderant .
We have thus eliminated Cooling, Deposition from Solution,
and Prior Liquidity ; and have found but one uniform antece-
dent-the increased scope and operation of the molecular or
solid-forming cohesion ; to which point, however, these other
circumstances really tend ; they are all of them remoter ante-
cedents of the one constant antecedent. The examination of
the instances has enabled us to generalize the phenomenon, as
well as to establish the generality upon evidence, namely, the
evidence of Agreement.
As we have stated this enquiry, it is a clear case of Cause
and Effect. We have sought the antecedent circumstances
whereby a body in an amorphous or uncrystallized state be-
comes crystallized ; and we find that there is an expenditure
and re-distribution of power or energy. The result of the ex-
penditure is not an active manifestation, as when we produced
mechanical force, or heat ; it is an arrangement, or structural
collocation ; a case already contemplated (p. 35) among the
results of expended force.
Sixth Example. Let us next apply the method to eliminate
the cause, or the antecedent conditions essential to the pro-
duction and maintenance, of Light.
Now, the most constant circumstance is a high temperature ;
solid bodies become luminous at a temperature of from 980°
to 1000° Fahrenheit. So far, there is a remarkable unanimity.
It is found, however, that gases do not always become lumin-
ous at this temperature, nor at a much higher ; a current of
gas may be raised to upwards of 2000° F. without being
luminous ; whence we conclude that the state of the body is
also a condition . Again, the electric spark is a luminous
effect, which would give the disturbance of the electric
discharge as an antecedent. Asthere is a possibility, however,
that the great violence of the discharge may be accompanied
with sudden rise of temperature, this may be merely another
form of heat. We should need to show, by varying the
instances, that high temperature is not essential to the spark.
In the next place, certain substances give light at common
temperatures, to which fact has been given the name phosphor-
escence. Some minerals, gently heated, emit a feeble light,
which soon ceases, and cannot be renewed until the body has
been exposed to the sun or the electric spark. This is still a
 COGENCY OF AGREEMENT. 57

form of heat, but not of the intense degree of ordinary light.

More peculiar still is animal phosphorescence, as the glow-
worm, fire-fly, and certain sea animalcules . Here the accom-
paniment is a special mode of vitality hitherto uneliminated,
and excluding the circumstance of high temperature ( Mr.
Herbert Spencer suggests that it is an incident attending
oxidation). Once more, a faint flash of light occurs with
certain substances in the act of crystallizing.
We may thus collect from Agreement, that ignited solids at
the temperature of 1000° are luminous, and that an electric
discharge is luminous ; but we cannot at present lay down
any wider generalization . Excepting the very general fact of
molecular disturbance of some kind or other, which we are
unable to qualify in the precise mode concerned in the effect,
our comparison of instances does not point to a constant
circumstance. For the present, we regard Light as having
a plurality of causes.
As farther instances of Agreement, we may quote the proof
of the coincidence of Sleep with low nervous action, which
means a feeble cerebral circulation ; also, the connexion of
Memory with the intensity of Present Consciousness. The
uniformity of these conjunctions under all varieties of other
conditions is the evidence afforded by Agreement. The Rela-
tivity of Knowledge is established partly by Agreement, partly
by the method of Concomitant Variations, as will be shown.
The cogency of Agreement is manifestly in proportion to
the thoroughness of the elimination . Whatever circumstance
has never been eliminated is a possible cause. There are not
a few instances, as in the action of drugs , where nature does
not provide the variety requisite for a thorough elimination .
The complicacy of the Natural Kinds passes our means of
extrication by Agreement alone.
METHOD OF DIFFERENCE.
3. Elimination by Difference is expressed in the follow-
ing canon - If an instance where a phenomenon occurs,
and an instance where it does not occur, have every cir-
cumstance in common except one, that one occurring only
in the first ; the circumstance present in the first and
absent in the second, is the cause, or a part of the cause,
of the given phenomenon .
We are supposed to have two instances and only two. Each
is a complex sequence, a group of antecedents followed by a
 ¹2
< 58 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

group of consequents. The two complex sequences differ by

only a single sequence, present in the one, and absent in the
other. Thus the sequence A B C D gives a b c d, and B C D
gives b cd: the only difference being the presence of A in the
antecedent, and of a in the consequent, of one sequence, and
the absence of these in the other sequence. Supposing A B C D
changed into B C D, by the loss of A ; while at the mom-
ent a b c d is changed into b c d by the loss of a ; we have
a proof of the connexion of A with a. Indeed, the assertions
are identical ; to say that the disappearance of one thing is
followed by the disappearance of another thing, there being no
other change, is merely a way of expressing causal connexion.
Difference plays a great part in our everyday inferences.
The usual form is the sudden introduction of some limited and
definite agency or change, followed by an equally definite con-
sequence. When the drinking of water is followed at once by
the cessation of thirst, we do not hesitate to pronounce the one
fact the cause of the other. The human system is a great
complication, but the only difference made upon it in two
successive minutes is the sequence of drinking and the satisfy-
ing of thirst ; there has been, we presume, no time for any
other change to manifest itself. So when we waken a sleeper
by a noise, or strike a light by the friction of a match, we
infer causation ; the new agency being instantaneously fol-
lowed by the new effect.
The first example given, under Agreement, is also proved by
Difference. That Heat is the cause of the melting of ice, of
wax, or of lead, is proved by making, upon these substances,
the one change of raising the temperature. Being quite sure
that in the conversion of ice into water, no change has been
made except this, we have a conclusive experiment of Differ-
ence to show that heat is the cause.
The same substance in two states, as solid and liquid, or as
amorphous and crystallized , enables us to ascertain what effects
are due to change of state. Thus charcoal, uncrystallized, is
black, opaque, and a conductor of electricity ; as crystallized,
in the Diamond, it is transparent and a non- conductor.
A large part of our knowledge of nature and of living beings
is gained by making experimental changes and watching the
consequences. Our proof is the immediate result. An im-
mediate response is satisfactory evidence in almost any de-
partment. Thus, in medicine, there is little doubt as to the
operative force of purgatives, emetics, sudorifics, diuretics ,
narcotics, stimulants, irritants ; the uncertainty attaches to
 METHOD OF DIFFERENCE. 59

alteratives, tonics, and the protracted treatment of chronic

cases. The effect of quinine, in ague, is established beyond
dispute.
Whether it be to add, or to withdraw, a definite agent, a
change instantly following is proved to be an effect. Even in
politics, we may have a proof from difference ; as in the
accession or resignation of a minister, like Chatham . No
other circumstances arising in the ordinary course of a year
would make that total change in the course of politics that
followed on Chatham's becoming minister. It could not be
denied that he was the cause (in the practical sense of cause)
of our successes in America, and on the continent of Europe.
The consequences of his retirement were equally decided as
proving, on the method of Difference, the vast superiority of
his powers as an administrator.
Wherever Difference can be resorted to, the knowledge of
causes is gained at once. In ordinary cases, the method is so
obvious in its application, so satisfactory and conclusive, as
scarcely to need a master to explain or enforce it. The special
discipline of Logic, so far as this method is concerned, lies in
showing the precautions requisite in the more complicated
cases.
In Physiology, the functions of the nerves were ascertained
by the experiment of dividing each in turn, and watching the
effect. Whatever function is immediately arrested on the
division of a nerve, is shown to be due to that nerve, or to
require that nerve in order to its performance. Such experi-
ments, however, do not exhibit the entire circle of conditions
involved in the function in question. We know that the
integrity of the spinal cord is necessary to sensation and to
movement in the trunk and in the extremities of the body ;
we do not exhaustively know what else is necessary. For this
more extensive knowledge we should have to multiply experi-
ments all through the brain. If the destruction of any part
interferes with these functions, that part enters into the
causal conditions ; if otherwise, it does not enter into those
conditions.
The extension of this class of experiments to the brain
exemplifies one situation where the method of Difference may
be indecisive. Deep incisions in the brain, intended to affect
one single organ, as the cerebellum, may injure adjoining
organs ; and may therefore be inconclusive as to the functions
of the special organ in view. It is on this ground that
Brown- Séquard objects to the views of Flourens regarding the
60 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

function of the cerebellum. The one certain inference in such

cases is, that whatever function survives, in its integrity, the
destruction of an organ, cannot be exclusively due to that
organ. The obverse inference is certain only on the supposi-
tion that the injury has been confined to the part affected.
With reference to the connexion of scarlet bloom with
absence of odour, we have a seeming case of Difference in
comparing such varieties as the white-flowering and the red-
flowering hawthorn : the one fragrant, the other not. In the
complicacy of Kinds, we can seldom be sure that a variation
is rigidly confined to the circumstances that are apparent.
Moreover, where there is not a clear case of Causation, Differ-
ence is insufficient to prove a coincidence.
Sir G. C. Lewis lays it down as essential to the validity of
a proof by Difference, that we should know, by a previous
induction, the general adequacy of the assigned cause to the
production of the effect. When we infer that a man, shot
through the heart, drops down dead, we need to know, he
thinks, that, as a general rule, a gunshot wound in the heart,
is a cause of death. To this remark the reply is, that practi-
cally we do make use of such previous knowledge, but it is
not essential to the method of Difference. Provided we are
quite sure that the new agent is the only change that has
preceded the effect, the instance is conclusive, on the Law of
Causation solely. The use of a more specific induction is to
supply the defect of certainty in the instance itself. There
may be other unseen agencies at work, as well as the one
supposed, and this is the only ground either for invoking a
general presumption, or for multiplying instances of the
phenomenon. In practice, we seek both for presumptions
(from prior inductions) and for repetition of instances ; but
an ideally perfect instance of Difference, in a case of Causation,
is conclusive in itself.

Agreement and Difference can be easily compared as to their

respective advantages and disadvantages. Agreement needs
a large number of instances, but their character is not re-
stricted. Any instance that omits a single antecedent contri-
butes to the result ; the repetition of the same instance is of use
only as giving means of selection. Difference requires only
one instance ; but that one is peculiar, and rarely to be found.

A great extension is given to the power of Agreement, by

extending it to agreement in absence. When such cases are
 JOINT METHOD. 61

conjoined with those where the agreement is in presence, there

is an approach to the conclusiveness of the method of Differ-
ence. This double employment of the method of Agreement
is brought forward by Mr. Mill under the designations-the
' Joint Method of Agreement and Difference,' and the ' Indirect
Method of Difference.' It might also be called the ' Method
of Double Agreement.'
JOINT METHOD.
4. The canon of this Method is :-If two or more in-
stances where the phenomenon occurs have only one cir-
cumstance in common, while two or more instances where
it does not occur have nothing in common save the absence
of that one circumstance ; the circumstance wherein alone
the two sets of instances differ, is the effect, or the cause,
or a necessary part of the cause of the phenomenon.
If we require to ascertain, under this method, that A is
the cause of a, or a the effect of A, we add, to the instances of
uniform presence of A and a, other instances of uniform
absence, as B F G followed by bf g, C H I followed by c h i,
and so on. If we have never discovered A wanting as an
antecedent without having a absent as a consequent, there is
a strong additional presumption that A and a are united as
cause and effect a presumption that may approach to the
certainty of the method of Difference.
It is a confirmation of the cause, suggested by Agreement,
of the noxiousness of the North-East wind, that the South-
West wind, the genial and wholesome current, is wanting in
the circumstance assigned. It descends upon us from the
eleyated regions of the atmosphere, where impurities are
highly diluted by dissemination.
Again, to revert to the example of Crystallization. Let us
review the non-crystallized solids, and note the mode of
their formation. The amorphous stones and rocks, as sand-
stone, chalk, &c., are known to be sedimentary deposits from
water. Before being solidified , they existed as solid particles ;
they were not dissolved in water, neither did they exist in a
molten condition. This Agreement in absence would confirm
the inference from Agreement in presence-that (so far as
certain instances went) crystals existed in a previous higher
condition. But the general inference, from the full compari-
son of examples, was the superior play given to the molecular
attraction by counterworking the molecular repulsion. Now,
62 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

this general fact is absent from all mere sedimentary deposits ;

these bodies have no aid , in the shape of loss of heat or other
cause, to their molecular attractions.
The comparison of the amorphous rocks yields another
circumstance, namely, the irregular mixture of different sub-
stances. For, although in a mud sediment silica or alumina
may prevail, neither is ever pure ; and the mixture of different
elements is a bar to crystallization, unless they are of the
kind called isomeric (from erystallizing alike). There is more
to be got over in crystallizing compounds of unlike elements,
and the crystals must be deficient in regularity.
Another uncrystallized class comprizes the vegetable and
animal tissues . In their case, however, the antecedent circum-
stances are too complicated and obscure to furnish insight ;
they rather stand in want of illustration by the parallel lights
of more obvious cases. Besides, there is in them a method
and order of aggregation more analogous to the crystallized,
than to the amorphous solids.
A third class includes the Colloids, or glue- bodies, of
Graham (represented by gum, starch, gelatin, albumin, tannin,
caramel ). They are not confined to the viscid form of glue,
but include compact solids, as flint. The points of contrast
between these and crystallized bodies are numerous and
important. Their mode of formation is various ; many of
them are the products of living bodies, and therefore share in
the complication of living growth. Flint is an aggregate of
particles of silica, which particles were originally the shells of
animals, and therefore also organic in their formation. In
this case, the molecular attraction of silica, in its progress
towards crystallization, is thwarted by the pre- existing forms
of the silicious particles.
It would require too long a discussion to show the bearing
of the colloid peculiarities on the question as to the antece-
dents of the crystalline formation, Enough has been given to
show the working of the method of Obverse Agreement.
METHOD OF CONCOMITANT VARIATIONS.
5. Canon of the Method : - Whatever phenomenon
varies in any manner whenever another phenomenon
varies in some particular manner, is either a cause or an
effect of that phenomenon, or is connected with it through
some bond of concomitance.
The effects of Heat are known only through proportionate
 CONCOMITANT VARIATIONS. 63

variation. We cannot deprive a body of all its heat ; the

nature of the agency forbids us. But, by making changes in
the amount, we ascertain concomitant changes in the accom-
panying circumstances, and so can establish cause and effect.
It is thus that we arrive at the law of the expansion of bodies
by heat. In the same way, we prove the equivalence of Heat
and Mechanical Force as a branch of the great law of Con-
servation or Persistence of Force.
The proof of the First Law of Motion, as given by Newton,
assumed the form of Concomitant Variations. On the earth,
there is no instance of motion persisting indefinitely. In
proportion, however, as the known obstructions to motion-
friction and resistance of the air-are abated, the motion of a
body is prolonged. A wheel spinning in an exhausted receiver
upon a smooth axle runs a very long time. In Borda's experi-
ment with the pendulum, the swing was prolonged to more
than thirty hours, by diminishing friction and exhausting the
air. Now, comparing the whole series of cases, from speedy
exhaustion of movement to prolonged continuance, we find
that there is a strict concomitance between the degree of
obstruction and the arrest ; we hence infer that if obstruction
were entirely absent, motion would be perpetual.
The celebrated experiment of carrying the barometer to the
top of Puy de Dôme was a proof by variation of the connexion
between the pressure of the air and the rise of the mercury.
By Concomitant Variations, we derive one of the proofs of
the connexion between the brain and the mind. In the same
manner, we learn to associate health with the healthy agencies,
and diseases with noxious agencies.
The doctrine that change of impression is an essential con-
dition of consciousness, from which proceeds the theory of
Relativity as applied to feeling and to knowledge, is most
strikingly attested by Concomitant Variations. The intensity
ofa mental impression notably varies according to the greatness
of the transition from one state to another : witness the in-
fluence of novelty, of all great changes of circumstances, of
suddenness and surprise.
The Statistics of Crime, reveal causes by the method of
Variations. When we find crimes diminishing according as
labour is abundant, according as habits of sobriety have in-
creased, according to the multiplication of the means of
detection, or according to the system of punishments, we may
presume a causal connexion, in circumstances not admitting
of the method of Difference.
64 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

The Concomitance may be inverse. Thus we find that the

tendency to chemical action between two substances increases
as their cohesion is diminished , being much greater between
liquids than between solids. So, the greater the elevation of
the land, the less the temperature, and the more scanty the
vegetation.
Parallel Variation is sometimes interrupted by critical
points, as in the expansion of bodies by heat, which suffers a
reverse near the point of freezing. Again, the energy of a solu-
tion does not always follow the strength ; very dilute solutions
occasionally exercise a specific power, not possessed in any
degree by stronger. So, in the animal body, food and stimu-
lants operate proportionally up to a certain point, at which
their farther operation is checked by the peculiarities in the
structure of the living organs.
The properties of highly rarefied gases do not exhibit an
exact continuity of the phenomena that vary with density. In
a perfect vacuum, there is no electrical discharge ; but the
variations of the discharge, in highly rarefied air, do not pro-
ceed in exact accordance with the degree of rarefaction.
We cannot always reason from a few steps in a series to the
whole series, partly because of the occurrence of critical points,
and partly from the development at the extremes of new and
unsuspected powers. Sir John Herschel remarks, that until
6
very recently the formulæ empirically deduced for the elas-
ticity of steam, those for the resistance of fluids, and on other
similar subjects, have almost invariably failed to support the
theoretical structures that have been erected upon them.'
The method of Concomitant Variations is powerful in
suggesting, as well as efficacious in proving, causal connexions.
The mind is apt to be aroused to the bond between two
circumstances by encountering several conjunctions of the
two in unequal degrees. Very often, we are not alive to a
connexion of cause and effect till an unusual manifestation of
the one is accompanied with an unusual manifestation of the
other. We may be using some hurtful article of food for a
length of time unknowingly ; the discovery is made by an
accidental increase of quantity occurring with an aggravation
of some painful sensation. This is one form of the efficacy of
an Extreme Case ; an efficacy felt both in science and in
rhetoric .
A remarkable case of Concomitant Variations is furnished by
the discovery of a connexion between the solar spots and the
positions of the planets. Thus, as regards Venus, ' spots are
 CONTINUOUS COMPARISON. 65

nearest to the solar equator when the heliographical latitude

of Venus is 0°,' and obversely .
An important device for discovering, and also for proving,
laws of causation, consists in arranging things possessing a
common property in a serial order, according to the degree of
the property. Thus, we may arrange bodies according to
their Transparency or Opacity, according to Specific Gravity,
to Conduction of Heat and Electricity, and so on. We are
then in a position to detect any corresponding increase in
some accompanying property, and thereby to establish a law of
concomitance or causation. This method is designated, by
Mr. Mill, Classification by Series, and by Sir G. C. Lewis,
the Method of Continuous Comparison . The progress of Life
in the animal scale ; the progress of mental development in
human beings ; the progress of civilized institutions, as
Government, Judicature, the Representative System, -may be
expressed in a series, so as to trace concomitant variations.
It is greatly to be desired that, in Physical Science, all the
substances in Nature should be set forth in distinct tabula-
tions, according to the degree of every important property.
It was when transparent bodies were arranged in the order of
their refracting power, that the connexion was discovered
between high refracting power and combustibility.
METHOD OF RESIDUES.
6. The canon of Residues is :---- Subduct from any
phenomenon such part as previous induction has shown.
to be the effect of certain antecedents, and the residue of
the phenomenon is the effect of the remaining antecedents.
After a certain progress is made in the inductive determina-
tion of Causes, new problems are greatly simplified by sub-
ducting from a complex sequence, the influence of known
causes. Sometimes this of itself may amount to a complete
elimination Such procedure is styled the Method of Residues.
It is an instrument of Discovery as well as of Proof.
The method is symbolically illustrated thus :-Suppose the
antecedents A B C followed by the consequents a bc ; and
that by previous inductions, we have ascertained that B gives
b, and C gives c. Then by subtraction, we find A to be the
cause of a. The operation is substantially the method of Dif-
ference, and has all the decisiveness belonging to that method.
Sir John Herschel was the first to show the importance of
studying residual phenomena. His examples are very strik-
5
66 THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

ing (Introduction to Natural Philosophy, p. 156 ) . Thus,

the retardation of the comet of Encke has been the means of
suggesting, and may ultimately suffice to prove, the existence
of a resisting medium diffused throughout space. Again , the
observation of Arago—that a magnetic needle, set a vibrating,
is sooner brought to rest when suspended over a plate of copper
-was the first clue to the discovery of Magneto- Electricity.
The anomalies in the motion of Uranus led Adams and Le
Verrier to the discovery of Neptune.
The study of the electrical odour was the first step to the
discovery of the remarkable substance- Ozone.
6
Sir G. C. Lewis remarks that the unforeseen effects of
changes in legislation, or of improvements in the useful arts,
may often be discerned by the Method of Residues. In
comparing statistical accounts, for example, or other registers
of facts, for a series of years, we perceive at a certain period
an altered state of circumstances, which is unexplained by the
ordinary course of events, but which must have some cause.
For this residuary phenomenon, we seek an explanation until it
is furnished by the incidental operation of some collateral
cause. For example, on comparing the accounts of live cattle
and sheep annually sold in Smithfield market for some years
past, it appears that there is a large increase in cattle, while
the sheep are nearly stationary. The consumption of meat in
London may be presumed to have increased, at least in pro-
portion to the increase of its population ; and there is no
reason for supposing that the consumption of beef has increased
faster than that of mutton. There is, therefore, a residuary
phenomenon, viz., the stationary numbers of the sheep sold
in Smithfield-for which we have to find a cause. This cause
is the increased transport of dead meat to the metropolis,
owing to steam navigation and railways, and the greater
convenience of sending mutton than beef in a slaughtered
state.'
The question as to the existence ofa special force of Vitality—
the vital force, or the vital principle-takes the form of an
enquiry into a residuum. We have first to make allowance
for the operation of all the known forces of inorganic matter ;
and when these have been exhaustively computed, the re-
mainder may be set down to a special influence, or vital
principle. For anything we know at present, the inoryanic
forces, operating in the special collocations of organized bodies,
may be competent to produce all the observed effects.
The only proof of an exhaustive Analysis, whether in
 PROOF OF AN ANALYSIS BY RESIDUES. 67

material actions or in mental processes, is there being nothing

left. Thus, in the Human Mind, it is disputed whether there
be a separate and unique faculty, called the Moral Faculty, or
the Moral Sense. Now, there can be no doubt as to the
presence of common elements of Feeling, Will, and Thought, in
our moral judgments and actions ; as, in the case of the vital
principle, the question is, what remains, when these are all
allowed for. The same application of the Method of Residues
occurs in the controversy as to Instincts, and Innate Ideas ;
does Experience, concurring with the usually admitted Intel-
lectual Powers, account for the whole of the facts ?

CHAPTER VII.

EXAMPLES OF THE METHODS .

The Experimental Methods have been regarded mainly as

instruments of Elimination and Proof, or of separating irrele-
vant accompaniments from causal accompaniments. In their
working, however, they unavoidably lead to inductive generali-
zations, in which aspect they are methods of Discovery. The
same search for instances, the same comparison of them when
found, both conduct us to new principles or laws, and prove
them when once attained. Still, it was not desirable to keep
up the double illustration throughout. In the miscellaneous
examples that are to follow, occasional allusion will be made
to the procedure suited for the discovery of generalities.

The proofs adduced to show that the mode of action, in

Smelling, is Oxidation, may be quoted in illustration of the
Methods. The phenomenon is one of great interest, and of
some perplexity. The following important facts were indicated
by Graham.
The sweet odours are due to hydro- carbons, as the ethers,
alcohol, and the aromatic perfumes. Now, all these substances
are highly oxidizable at common temperatures, being speedily
decomposed in the air. Again, sulphuretted hydrogen, the
most familiar of malodorous substances, is readily oxidized,
and is destroyed in that manner. These are instances of
Agreement (in presence).
68 EXAMPLES OF THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

A farther instance of Agreement is shown in the decomposi-

tion of hydrogen compounds, in the act of causing smell.
When a small quantity of seleniuretted hydrogen is inhaled
by the nose, the metallic selenium is found reduced upon the
lining membrane of the cavities . The sensation is an intensely
bad smell.
A remarkable case of Agreement in Absence is furnished by
the marsh gas- carburetted hydrogen. This gas has no smell.
As the proof of the concurring absence of its oxidation at com-
mon temperatures, Graham obtained it from the deep mines
where it existed, for geological ages, in contact with oxygen.
smell ; and
Again, hydrogen itself, if obtained in purity, has no
it does not combine with oxygen at the usual temperature of
the air.
An instance approaching to Difference is the following. If
oxygen is excluded from the cavities of the nose, there is no
smell. Also, a current of carbonic acid arrests the odour ; an
influence which may ( although not with absolute certainty)
be supposed hostile to oxidation.
To make the evidence complete , it is requisite that all the
instances of the effect should be of the same unvarying tenor, or
that there should be no exceptions. Until every apparent dis-
crepancy is reconciled, the facts are inconclusive. A seeming
exception is the pungency of ozone, which is looked upon as a
more active form of oxygen. Now we can hardly suppose that
ozone combines with oxygen ; a more likely supposition is
that, by its superior activity, it combines with the nasal mucus .

The research into the cause of Dew has been used by Sir
John Herschel, and again by Mr. Mill, as a happy example of
experimental elimination involving nearly the whole of the
methods. All the stages of this inductive determination are
highly instructive .
The first point is to settle precisely the phenomenon to be
explained . This is an exercise of Definition, and can never be
too rigidly attended to . There is some danger, in the present
case, of confounding the effect with certain other effects ; and
hence the expediency of defining by an exhaustive contrast.
Well, Dew is moisture ; but that moisture is not rain, and not
fog or mist ; it is moisture spontaneously appearing on the
surface of bodies when there is no visible wetness in the air.
In a perfectly clear and cloudless night, there may be a copious
moisture on the surface of the ground, and this moisture is the
thing to be accounted for.
 RESEARCH ON DEW. 69

Now, the problem being given as an effect, with the cause

unknown, we cannot make experiments, until a cause is sug-
gested. This is a pure effort of Discovery, preparatory to the
application of the methods of inductive proof. On the various
occasions when dew appears, we must look out for the atten-
dant circumstances, with a view to their successive elimination.
We know, for example, that dew appears chiefly at night,
which would suggest some of the circumstances connected
with night-fall, as darkness, cold , and any of the concomitants
of these. That darkness is not the cause could be shown if
either dew appears before sunset, or if it ever fails to appear
at night. As the last alternative is very frequent, we must,
so far as the Experimental Methods are concerned, pronounce
against darkness . There would then remain the agency of
Cold.
Farther, in this preliminary stage of looking out for a pos-
sible cause, we need not confine ourselves to the actual pheno-
menon. In the conduct of the research, as recorded, much
stress was laid upon the reference to analogous effects, or to
other cases where moisture spontaneously appears on surfaces,
in the absence of visible wet. All such analogies are valuable
for suggestion or discovery, in the first instance, and for proof
afterwards. They are these :-(1 ) the moisture that gathers
on cold stone or metal when breathed upon ; (2) the moisture
on the outside of a tumbler of spring water fresh from the
well in hot weather ; (3) the moisture that often appears on
glasses when brought in to a hot room full of people ; ( 4)
what appears on the inside of windows when a room is
crowded, and during changes in the outside temperature ; (5 )
what runs down our walls, especially outer passages , when a
warm moist thaw succeeds to frost. All these cases correspond
to the definition ; and their comparison is likely to indicate
some circumstance to be subjected to experimental elimination .
To take the first instance—the breath upon a cold metallic sur-
face ; the warmth of the air and the coldness of the surface
are obvious accompaniments. Some of the others would sug-
gest the same conjunction, while all are compatible with it.
Now, this is the situation already suggested by the original
phenomenon, the dew at night-fall. Consequently, we are in
a position to proceed experimentally ; we can try the cooling
down of surfaces under variation of circumstances.
An easy experiment will tell us whether the cooling of the
surface be a uniform fact, in the production of dew. Lay a
thermometer on the dewed grass, hanging another in the air ;
70 EXAMPLES OF THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS .

and repeat this on many successive nights. The actual result

is that whenever a surface is dewed, it is colder than the air
around it. This is a proof from Agreement ; but proofs from
Agreement, unless they can be multiplied through all nature,
in all climes, seasons, and situations, will not of themselves
decide either causation , or universal coincidence .
By varying the circumstances, we can bring to bear the
other methods. We may, for example, try Agreement in
Absence ; that is, make the same appeal to experiment in
nights where there is no dew anywhere. The phenomenon,
however, would be found to evade this test ; there would be
cases of actual cooling of surfaces below the temperature of
the air, and yet without dew. Hence the necessity of a dif-
ferent course of proceeding .
Observation reveals to us the fact that on the same night,
and in the same spot, some surfaces are dewed, and others
not. This holds out the prospect of an appeal to the Method
of Difference . On the surface of a plate of glass, there may be
dew, while on a polished metallic surface, there is none. Unfor-
tunately, however, such a couple is not suited to the canon of
Difference. The points of diversity between glass and metal
are too numerous to comply with the stringent requisite of that
canon. We must, therefore, shift our ground once more.
It being apparent that the nature of the material enters
into the effect, let us expose a great variety of different
materials-metals, glass, stone, wood, cloth, & c. We now
find that there is a scale of degree ; between the extremes of
no dew and copious dew, there is a gradation of amount. The
enquiry then arises, is there any other property of these
different materials varying in concomitance with their being
dewed ? Does their temperature (which is the clue that we
are going upon) change in exact accordance with the amount
of dew ? There was here scope for a direct appeal to the
thermometer. We have not, however, to record the issue of
such an appeal ; the history of the research pursues another
and more circuitous route for arriving at the conclusion. It
so happened, that the experiments, begun by Sir John Leslie,
upon the conduction and the radiation of heat, came in to the
aid of the present enquiry ; and the use made of these is
sufficiently illustrative of the canons of Elimination. It
appeared, on the comparison of the various materials, that the
rate of becoming dewed varies inversely with the conducting
power of the substance ; the good conductors— the metals-
are not dewed, the bad conductors are dewed according to
 RESEARCH ON DEW. 71

their badness as conductors. This is the method of Concomi-

tant Variations ; what it points to will be seen presently.
It is next desired to ascertain how far difference of surface
operates, material being the same. The comparison shows
that rough surfaces are more dewed than smooth, and black
more than white. Instead of the direct test of the thermo-
meter, the appeal here also is to Leslie's experiments on the
radiation of heat from surfaces ; those surfaces that are most
dewed- rough and black -are the best radiators of heat. The
interpretation of this will be taken with the foregoing.
In the meantime, make another variation, namely, for texture;
comparethe compact textures of metal, stone, wood, velvet , eider-
down, cotton, &c.; the compact bodies are little dewed , in the
comparison, the loose bodies, much. Now, as regards heat, the
loose bodies are very bad conductors ; they resist the passage
of heat through them, and are therefore chosen as clothing.
Let us now seek the interpretation of these three last re-
sults of Concomitant Variations. The first and third relate to
bad conduction of heat as a concomitant, the second to good
surface- radiation. Now, both circumstances point to one re-
sult, that is, surface cooling, in a cold atmosphere. A surface
is cooled down by a cool contact, but if heat is rapidly sup-
plied from within (which is good conduction) the lost heat is
made good, and the fall of temperature is delayed , until the
interior has cooled also. In bad conductors, the loss is not
made good in the same way, and the surface temperature falls.
Thus, bad conductors sooner become superficially cold, in a
cold atmosphere. Next as to Radiation. The explanation
here is still more easy. Good radiation is, by implication, sur-
face cooling ; bad radiation, as from a polished metal surface,
is retention of surface heat. We thus come round to the con-
clusion, which a series of trials by the thermometer would
have given at once, namely, that surfaces become dewed exactly
as they fall in temperature. To all appearance, therefore, we
have established a link of connexion between cooling and dew.
The appearance is not the reality. There is still outstand-
ing the fact that the same fall of surface temperature will not
always bring out dew. Neither the same absolute surface
temperature, nor the same difference between the surface
temperature and the air temperature, is constantly followed
by a deposit of moisture. We have here obviously a residual
circumstance, whose investigation should next follow. The
instances where the same thermometric difference is unattended
with dew need to be studied by exactly the same routine as
72 EXAMPLES OF THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS .

has now been followed. We must look out for the suggestion
of a possible agency ; and next subject that to experimental
trial, with a view to proof or disproof. This residuum would
have given rise to a very arduous research if it had been left to
experimental determination . The difficulty was conquered in
another way. Already ( 1799) had Dalton published his theory
of Aqueous Vapour, or the Atmosphere of Steam, which was the
missing link in the explanation of Dew. His positions were-
that the aqueous vapour contained in the atmosphere is vari-
able in amount, according to circumstances, and that the
amount is limited by temperature. To each degree of temper-
ature corresponds a certain amount, which is the saturation of
the air at that temperature. An amount equal to one inch of
mercury is sustained at 80°, half an inch, at 59°. Supposing
the air saturated at any one moment, a fall of temperature
will lead to precipitation as visible moisture ; but as the air is
not always saturated, a fall of temperature will not bring
dew or mist, unless the fall extends below the degree corres-
ponding to saturation, called the temperature of the Dew-
point. This is the residual circumstance, the thing wanted to
complete the proof of the connexion of dew with surface cold-
ness.
The present instance is a case of Cause and Effect ; as may
be shown in various ways. In the way that the case has been
stated, there is not apparent any transfer of energy, which is
the best criterion of causation ; but underneath the appearance,
we find there is such a transfer. Heat is necessary to convert
water and steam, and this conversion is an instance of the
transmutation ofpower according to a definite rate of exchange.
The withdrawal of the heat is followed by the re- collapse of
the invisible vapour into water or visible moisture. So that
the production of dew is clearly a sequence under the great
law of transferred energy. Other proofs of causation are dis-
pensed with by this decisive consideration. Mr. Mill, however,
remarks, as a distinct criterion of cause and effect, as well as a
means of settling which is cause, and which is effect, that cool-
ing is a consequence of known and independent antecedents,
and therefore cannot be set down as consequent on the occur-
rence of dew.

The next example is of value as showing the Experimental

Methods in their purity, or in the absence of all deductive
applications of laws, such as completed the enquiry into the
cause of Dew.
 MUSCULAR IRRITABILITY AND PUTREFACTION. 73

On the 16th of May, 1861 , Dr. Brown-Séquard delivered the

Croonian Lecture before the Royal Society, and took for his
subject the Relations between Muscular Irritability, Cada-
veric Rigidity, and Putrefaction.' In this he adduced facts
to maintain the following position :—
'The greater the degree of muscular irritability at the time of
death, the later the cadaveric rigidity sets in and the longer it
lasts, and the later also putrefaction appears and the slower it
progresses.'
By muscular irritability is meant muscular power or apti-
tude for contracting . A man fresh in the morning for his
day's work would be said to have a good store of muscular
irritability at the end of the day's work, the stock is com-
paratively exhausted . It would of course be still more ex-
hausted after protracted fatigues continued through many
days.
The cadaveric rigidity is a stiffening of the muscles that
occurs in all animals some time after death. The time when
the stiffening begins, and the duration of it, are variable, and
Dr. Brown Séquard tries to establish the law or cause or con-
dition of this variation. This he does by a series of observa-
tions, whose force will be appreciated by noting how far they
comply with the exigencies of the experimental methods.
First set of Experiments. - Paralyzed muscles. Here he has
two connexions to establish, in order to the end in view.
He first shows that the paralysis of a muscle leaves it for a
time with more irritability than the unparalyzed or exerted
muscles. He paralyzed the muscles of one leg in a dog, by
section of the nerve. Five hours afterwards the dog is
killed (by asphyxia) . In the paralyzed muscles the irritability
lasted ten hours ; that is, it was possible to induce contrac-
tions in them (by stimulants) up to that time. In the healthy
leg, the irritability lasted only four hours ; in other words
was very much less. Now compare the results as regards
Rigidity and the delay of Putrefaction—
Duration of irrit. Duration of rigidity. Putrefaction
commenced.
Paralyzed M. 10 hours 13 days 17th day.
Healthy "" 4 "" 5 "" 7th 99
Here then is an experiment clearly of the nature of Differ-
ence ; for two legs of the same animal were compared, and
the only difference was the paralysis of one of them. It is
true, as in all cases of vivisection, that an experiment of Dif-
ference must always be received with caution , seeing that
74 EXAMPLES OF THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

other changes may be made by the means taken to produce

the difference. Yet, at all events, here is a strong presumption.
The doctrine is confirmed farther by another aspect of the
paralysis. If an animal is allowed to live a month after
paralysis of a member, the paralyzed muscles are then inferior
in irritability, and when compared under those circumstances,
they become rigid and putrefy sooner.
Second set of Experiments. -Effects of diminution of tem-
perature upon muscles. - Dr. Brown- Séquard had determined,
by previous experiments, that cold increases the vital proper-
ties of the nerves and muscles—a fact on which the stimulating
power of cold upon the animal system depends. He now
applies this fact to the enquiry in hand.
Two kittens of the same litter were placed in different tem-
peratures. After death, the following differences were discern-
ible. The one, kept at a temperature of 98°.6, assumed the
rigidity in 3 hours ; this lasted three days, putrefaction
commencing in the fourth. In the other, which had been kept
so cool, that a thermometer inserted in the rectum stood at
77°, the rigidity was delayed till the 10th hour, and lasted
nine days, putrefaction commencing on the tenth. This experi-
ment was repeated with many animals, and is also an experi-
ment according to the Method of Difference . This is the
general principle of the fact known in hot climates, that the
dead putrefy almost immediately after death, and must be
interred without a moment's delay. The relaxation of the
vital powers in hot climates is only a part of the same fact.
The full explanation of this point, or the resolution of the law
into still higher laws is not yet fully made out.
Influence of death by lightning and galvanism. It was
thought by John Hunter that animals killed by lightning did
not stiffen. This has been found not the case. Still there are
instances where the rigidity has either not set in, or been of
so short duration, that its existence has not been traced .
Lightning may kill in various ways :-1st, By fright ; 2nd, By
hæmorrhage ; 3rd, By concussion of the brain. In all these
three modes, there ought to be a manifestation of the rigidity.
But there is a fourth mode, which is to convulse all the
muscles so violently as utterly to exhaust their irratibility ; in
which case the rigidity may fail to be noticed . This is the
way that galvinism acts upon animals.
Experiments were accordingly tried by galvanizing the
limbs of Rabbits ; comparing the galvanized with the un-
galvanized limbs, with respect to the time of rigidity.
 MUSCULAR IRRITABILITY AND PUTREFACTION. 75

Galvanized Limb. Not Galvanized.

Duration of Irritability, 7 to 20 minutes. 120 to 400 min.
"" of Rigidity, 2 to 8 hours. 1 to 8 days.
Putrefaction advanced, within a day. After several days.
The experiments were repeated on dogs with the very same
results.
Also, guinea-pigs were subjected wholly to galvanism, but
in different degrees. In those powerfully galvanized , the
irritability lasted a short time, and the rigidity was correspond-
ing rapid and brief. With a less degree of galvanism, the time of
both phenomena was protracted . We have, therefore, an
additional corroboration of the law, still by the powerful
Method of Difference.
Influence of prolonged muscular exercise. This, of course,
is a cause of diminished irritability. Now, there are well-
ascertained facts that connect prolonged exertion with rapid
putrefaction. Over-driven cattle and animals hunted to death
putrify speedily. So in cocks killed after a fight. Soldiers
killed in a very prolonged fight show the same phenomenon.
The rigidity is quickly over, and the putrefaction rapid.
These are instances of the Method of Agreement.
Influence of nutrition on muscles. - Dr. Brown- Séquard
here collects confirming instances, from the comparison of
cases where death happens in a well nourished condition of the
muscles, with cases where death had been preceded by inanition.
Thus, when men strong and fresh have been killed suddenly,
the rigidity and putrefaction have appeared very late. A case
is recorded of muscular irritability continuing twenty-six hours
in a decapitated man. Here is Agreement in presence.
Compare those instances with others of persons dying of slow
exhaustion, and the appearance is reversed. A man dying of
prolonged typhoid fever, for example, was found to show no
trace of rigidity, and putrefaction commenced in less than an
hour. This is Agreement in Absence.
Influence of Convulsions on rigidity and putrefaction.- It
appears that muscles much attacked with cramps before death
speedily give way to putrefaction.
Certain poisons (as strychnine) sometimes produce con-
vulsions before death, and in those cases the rigidity and
putrefaction progress rapidly.
Such is an ample body of evidence from observation and
experiment to establish the position laid down. The Methods
ofAgreement, of Difference, the Joint Method, and the Method
of Variations, have been all brought into play. And if there
76 FRUSTRATION OF THE EXPRIMENTAL METHODS .

are any doubts about the decisiveness of the experiments on

the Method of Difference, from the possibility of making other
changes besides the one intended, these doubts are dispelled
by the coincidence of results from so many distinct experi-
ments. The research is purely Inductive. No consideration
of a Deductive kind has been introduced ; although there
are general considerations that give great probability to the
conclusion. Muscular irritability is the living condition
of the muscle - its vitality-which may be greater or less ;
and the greater it is, the longer the muscle will retain its
living characters, or the longer it will be in passing to the
characters of death, which are rigidity and putrefaction.
These, therefore, are delayed by fulness of vitality ; while loss
of vitality hands the system over all the sooner to the
destroyer.

When we form conclusions, on an insufficient employment

of the methods of elimination, we commit Fallacies of Induc-
tion. Of these, numerous examples might be given, and the
proper place for them is in the course of the exposition of the
Methods themselves. As it is still the custom, however, to
retain, in works of Logic, a separate chapter or book on
Fallacies, we shall reserve for that part of the subject, the
instances of Inductive fallacy.

CHAPTER VIII.

FRUSTRATION OF THE METHODS .

1. In the Inductive Methods as hitherto contemplated,

two conditions have been supposed ; first, that an effect
has only one cause, or set of antecedents ; secondly, that
different effects are kept apart and distinguishable. Both
conditions may be wanting.
In the method of Agreement, for example, it is assumed, that
the effect a has only the cause A ; should A and C both be
causes, the method would be defeated. The absence of A
would not prove that it is not a cause ; for the effect might
still be due to C. The special difficulties attending this case
must now be considered.
 PLURALITY OF CAUSES NOT FINAL. 77

Again, the effects a b c are supposed to stand out distin-

guishable. They may, however, be fused or united in one
simple effect 2 a c, or 3 a. This is the Intermixture of Effects ;
and is still more baffling to the inductive methods, as hitherto
given.
PLURALITY OF CAUSES.
2. In many instances, the same effect is produced by a
PLURALITY OF CAUSES : as Motion, Heat, Pleasure, Death.
Bodies are put in motion by all the different agencies termed
Prime Movers -animal strength, wind, water, steam, combus-
tion (as in gunpowder), &c. Finding a body in motion,
therefore, we cannot ascribe it to any special agent, merely
from the fact that it is in motion : we see a wheel turning and
doing work, but we may not be able to attribute its motion to
one agent rather than another. In like manner, there are
various sources of Heat ; the solar ray and combustion are
the most familiar ; but friction and electricity are also sources.
Hence the fact of the evolution of heat does not point out the
cause ; as an example, uncertainty still attaches to the immedi-
ate antecedent of animal heat.
There are numerous causes of pleasure and of pain : nume-
rous modes of stimulating the nervous system ; numerous
agencies of good health and of bad health ; numerous ways of
getting a livelihood ; numerous causes of death.
It is to be noted, however, that the plurality in some of
these instances is on the surface only. As regards Motion, the
law of the Persistence of Force assigns a common origin to all
the so-called prime movers ; these, therefore, are proximate, and
not the ultimate sources. The same law covers the produc-
tion of Heat, however various the apparent antecedents. The
causes of Pleasure can be generalized into a small number of
agencies, if not into one. Possibly all stimulants may, in the
last analysis, be found to have a common effect on the sub-
stance of the nerves. The ways to Wealth may be apparently
many, but we can cover them all by one general expression, -
earning and saving. In Health and Sickness, there might
possibly be generalized expressions of the many proximate
causes. So with Death .
Nevertheless, for practical purposes, we have to ascertain
not simply the primal cause, but the special embodiment of
that cause, on a certain occasion. It is not enough, when a
man is found dead, to assign the stoppage of the heart, or of
78 FRUSTRATION OF THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

the lungs, or the extinction of the vital forces ; we desire to

know in what form and circumstances these generalized causes
were specialized ; whether by cold, by inanition, by poison, by
mechanical violence, or otherwise.
3. The chief consequence of Plurality of Causes is to
frustrate the Method of Agreement.
The Method of Difference remains intact. Whatever be the
plurality of causes of motion, if we observe the introduction of
some one agent followed by the effect, we know the cause in
that instance. There may be many ways of keeping up the
animal heat, but the transition from the temperature of 60° to
30°, by causing an immediate sense of chilliness shows that the
external temperature is essential to comfortable warmth on
that particular occasion.
The operation of Plurality is to give uncertainty to the
Method of Agreement. For example, we observe numerous
cases of unhealthy human beings whose parents were un-
healthy ; this would be to a certain extent a proof from
Agreement. On the other hand, many unhealthy persons are
the children of perfectly healthy parents ; whence, concluding
by the strict rule of Agreement, we should affirm that
unhealthiness in the parents is in no case a cause of unhealthi-
ness in the children ; that the two facts are not in any way
connected as cause and effect. The conclusion is obviously
wrong ; it would be correct were there only one cause of ill
health ; it is illegitimate if there be many causes.
Plurality is illustrated by our English spelling. The
method of Agreement is nullified in this instance . In certain
words, the letters ough agree with a peculiar sound, as in
' rough.' The same word occurs with other letters, as in ' ruff,'
and the same letters occur with a different sound, as in ' bough.'
Whence, by the Method of Agreement, we should infer that
there was never any connexion between either sound and
6
ough. ' A similar illustration is afforded by ambiguous
words. The word ' air ' is spoken in company with a musical
melody ; at other times it is spoken where there is no music ;
any one unprepared for plurality, and following out Agreement,
would conclude that the connexion with music was purely
casual ; that there was no fixed bond of union between the
two. We acquire the meanings of the vocables ofour language
chiefly by the method of Agreement. We gradually eliminate
all accompaniments that may be absent consistently with the
employment of each word. We find, after a number of
 FAILURE OF THE METHOD OF AGREEMENT 79

repetitions of the word ' fire ' in various connexions, that the
one fact common to all is blazing combustion with heat. We
learn in course of time to extend the word to metaphorical
significations. These being conjunctions of pure co-existence,
without causation, they cannot be dealt with by any other
method, while the occurrence of plurality, even when under-
stood and allowed for, is a serious and painful distraction to
the inductive process.
Again, pressure on the brain is a cause of insensibility ;
yet, as we find insensibility where there has been no pressure,
we should say, according to Agreement, that pressure is not
a cause. In the same way, every one of the causes might be
proved not to be a cause -deficiency of blood , excess of dark
unhealthy blood, rupture of the nervous continuity, &c.
Extraordinary facts have come to light showing the possi-
bility of exerting the mental powers, under disease of very
large portions of the brain. These facts would seem to
prove that such parts have no share in the mental functions.
The safer inference is that there is a plurality of nervous seats
or tracks for the same functions. It has long been supposed
that the two hemispheres have common functions.
The discussion of the problem of Beauty is often rendered
fruitless by the neglect of Plurality. The attempt is made to
assign some one circumstance present in all beautiful things-
as Colour, Harmony, Fitness, Unity, Suggestion of Mental
qualities. Now, by the unqualified method of Agreement,
every assignable circumstance could be disproved ; with refer-
ence to each one in turn, would it be possible to find objects
of unquestioned beauty where that one is not present. Jeffrey
thinks it a sufficient refutation of the theories he opposes,
to produce beautiful objects where the alleged source of beauty
is absent.
4. The counteractives to the failure of Agreement, in
the case of Plurality, are (1) great multiplication of in-
stances, and (2) Agreement in absence, that is, the Joint
Method.
(1) One remedy for the failure of the Method of Agreement,
under Plurality, is multiplication of instances. This will
operate in various ways. It will tend to bring out all the
causes ; which is one desirable issue of Plurality. An ex-
tended statistics of Crime or Pauperism will show us the pos-
sible agencies, by giving a wide scope for elimination. The
long experience of medical practitioners has taught them
80 FRUSTRATION OF EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

nearly all the possible causes of the greater number of

diseases . At this stage of exhausted plurality, the only point
for enquiry, in the special instance, is-Which of the causes
are present, and are these free to operate ? Knowing, all the
contributing causes of Pauperism , we ask which of these occur
in England, in Ireland, or in Scotland, and are they free or
uncounteracted ? Being aware of the various antecedents of
dyspepsia-bad food, too much food , too little food , hard labour,
want of exercise, intemperance, mental wear and tear, bad air,
a hot climate, &c. — we can judge what brought on the disease
in a given instance.
If we do not know which causes are present on a given
occasion, and whether those actually present are counteracted,
mere Agreement is wholly fallacious . The fallacy named post
hoc, ergo propter hoc, is an abuse of Agreement, where elimina-
tion is vitiated by Plurality, as in a great number of political
inferences. It is remarked that Protestantism is accompanied
with superior industry ; the instances attainable are insuffi-
cient in number, to eliminate other causes.
(2) The other remedy is the Joint Method . We should seek
out cases of Agreement in absence, which are of a very decisive
nature. If in all cases where a particular effect fails, one par-
ticular cause is absent, there is, in spite of possible plurality,
a strong presumption that these two circumstances are cause
and effect in those instances. The reason grows out of that
close approach to the Method of Difference furnished by
Agreement in absence. Although there are various causes of
light, yet the union of agreement in presence with agreement
in absence is sufficiently decisive of the connexion of light
with a high temperature. The special connexions of light
with low temperature are not denied ; they are admitted as
exceptions to agreement in absence, as a residuum to be ac-
counted for. We know one cause thoroughly ; we find there
are other causes, as yet imperfectly known , which have this
uncertainty, namely, that a body at the common temperature
of the air may possibly be luminous.
THE INTERMIXTURE OF EFFECTS .
5. The Methods of Elimination suppose different effects
to remain separate and distinguishable ; whereas cases
arise where the effects of different causes unite in a homo-
geneous total.
When, in an aggregate phenomenon, distinguishable ante-
 INTERMIXTURE OF EFFECTS. 81

cedents produce distinguishable consequents-A B C giving

α b C, and A D E giving a de, the experimental methods
operate to advantage. The combination of wind, rain, and
increased temperature, produces a combination of distinguish-
able effects- waves on the surface of water, flooding of streams,
the sensation of warmth.
In other cases, and these very numerous, the effect of the
several causes is homogeneous, and is merely increased in
amount by the concurrence . The sea is fed by innumerable
rivulets. The wind often concurs with tidal agency, so as
to produce a higher tide. A body propelled by several prime
movers , as when a train is urged by three locomotive engines,
shows only one effect, velocity of movement. The moon's
path is a resultant of the attractive forces of the sun and
moon combined with its own projectile movement. The path
of a comet is the resultant of many influences ; it does not
bear on the face of it the story of them all. An invalid repairs
to some salubrious spot, and plies all the means of restoration
to health ; many influences combine to the result, but the
effect is one and indivisible.
A still more perplexing situation is the conflict of opposing
agencies. In an equal balance nothing is seen, and yet great
powers have been at work. In unequal contests there is an
effect ; but that effect does not suggest the fact of conflict. A
trader has a net profit at the end of the year ; the statement
of that profit, however, gives no information of his expenditure
and receipts . The patient may be under various healthy
stimulants, each working its proper effect ; but some one
noxious agency may counteract the whole.
Natural agencies can never be suspended ; they may be
counteracted by opposite agents. The force of gravity is not
interfered with when a balloon rises, it is merely opposed by a
greater force ; it still operates but in a different form. Instead
of causing the usual appearance, namely, the descent of bodies
to the ground, it operates to diminish the effect of an upward
force, the buoyancy of the air (itself an indirect consequence
of gravity) .
A counteracted force is technically said to exist in tendency.
There is a tendency in all bodies to descend to the ground ; in
water to find its level ; in the moon to move towards the earth,
and towards the sun. There is a tendency in human beings to
seek their own interest ; in despotic sovereigns to abuse their
power. The tendencies are not annihilated when they fail to be
realized ; theyare only counteractedbysome opposingtendencies.
6
82 FRUSTRATION OF THE EXPERIMENTAL METHODS.

A farther circumstance working to invalidate the operation

of the methods is the mutuality of cause and effect. In political
causation, this is illustrated by Sir G. C. Lewis as follows :- :-
' It happens sometimes that when a relation of causation is
established between two facts, it is hard to decide which, in
the given case, is the cause and which the effect, because they
act and re-act upon each other, each phenomenon being in
turn cause and effect. Thus, habits of industry may produce
wealth ; while the acquisition of wealth may promote industry :
again, habits of study may sharpen the understanding, and
the increased acuteness of the understanding may afterwards
increase the appetite for study. So an excess of population
may, by impoverishing the labouring classes, be the cause of
their living in bad dwellings ; and, again, bad dwellings, by
deteriorating the moral habits of the poor, may stimulate
population. The general intelligence and good sense of a
people may promote its good government, and the goodness of
the government may, in its turn, increase the intelligence of
the people, and contribute to the formation of sound opinions
among them. Drunkenness is in general the consequence of
a low degree of intelligence, as may be observed both among
savages and in civilized countries. But, in return, a habit of
drunkenness prevents the cultivation of the intellect, and
strengthens the cause out of which it grows. As Plato
remarks, education improves nature, and nature facilitates
education . National character, again, is both effect and
cause ; it re-acts on the circumstances from which it arises.
The national peculiarities of a people, its race, physical struc-
ture, climate, territory, &c., form originally a certain character,
which tends to create certain institutions, political and domes-
tic, in harmony with that character. These institutions
strengthen, perpetuate, and reproduce the character out of
which they grew, aud so on in succession, each new effect
becoming, in its turn, a new cause. Thus, a brave, energetic,
restless nation, exposed to attack from neighbours, organizes
military institutions ; these institutions promote and maintain
a warlike spirit ; this warlike spirit, again, assists the develop-
ment of the military organization, and it is further promoted
by territorial conquests and success in war, which may be its
result-each successive effect thus adding to the cause out of
which it sprung. ' (Methods of Politics, I. p. 375).

6. The Intermixture of Effects is a bar to the Experi-

mental Methods.
 INTERMIXTURE OF EFFECTS. 83

If A B C D conspire to yield, not a b c d, but a ; and if

A B C F yield still a, nothing is eliminated, there is no pro-
gress. If a were precisely measurable, and if its variations
corresponded definitely to the removal of particular agents,
the Method of Difference would cope with the case : the
omission of A followed by the reduction of a toa, would be
a proof that A produced a. But the Method of Agreement,
in its proper character of varying the circumstance by ex-
cluding some agents and including others, could not furnish
a decisive proof, so long as a represented the sum of several
effects.
Now, as in many departments, effects are thus inextricably
blended, we should be at a stand-still, were we not in posses-
sion of some method more searching than Agreement. Even
in the Inorganic Sciences, as Mechanics and Chemistry, we
have this complication ; in Biology, Mind, and Society, we
have it still more. A good crop is a single effect ; the agency
may be multifarious. A voluntary action may be the result-
ant of several motives. The rise and fall of prices, the general
prosperity of a country, the increase of population, seldom
depend on one cause exclusively ; yet the effect in each case
is, to our eyes, homogeneous.
Concomitant Variations is the only one of the Methods that
can operate to advantage in such cases. If a cause happens
to vary alone, the effect will also vary alone, and cause and
effect may be thus singled out under the greatest complica-
tions. Thus, when the appetite for food increases with the
cold, we have a strong evidence of connexion between those
two facts, although other circumstances may operate in the
same direction .
The assigning of the respective parts of the sun and moon,
in the action of the Tides, may be effected, to a certain degree
of exactness, by the variation of the amount according to the
positions of the two attracting bodies.
By aseries ofexperiments of Concomitant Variations, directed
to ascertain the elimination of nitrogen in the human body
under varieties of muscular exercise, Dr. Parkes obtained the
remarkable conclusion, that a muscle grows during exercise,
and loses bulk during the subsequent rest ..

For the first of the difficulties now illustrated- Plurality,

with the aggravation of counteracting influences an import-
ant instrument remains, an additional Method of Elimination,
termed Elimination by the Computation of Chance.' For
84 CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION .

dealing with the same uncertainty, and for the still greater
(and often accompanying) uncertainty of Intermixture of
Effects, the chief resort is to DEDUCTION. The two next chap-
ters will be occupied with those two subjects .

CHAPTER IX.

CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

1. An important resource in eliminating the irrelevant

antecedents or accompaniments of an effect is obtained
through the calculation of Chance or Probability.
This is to approach the problem of Induction from a novel
aspect. Instead of varying the circumstances so as to procure
the absence of the several antecedents A B C in turn, we
consider whether these agents might not be present of them-
selves without any regard to the effect in question. Thus, a
person dies at midnight, when the sun is below the horizon
and due north. Now, seeing that this event happens every
twenty-four hours, as a consequence of cosmical operations, it
must come round and must coincide with a great many
things that happen on the earth. The fact of such coincidence
is not of itself held as proving causation or regular concomi-
Before we
tance with everything that happens at that time.
presume a concurrence of causation between two coinciding
things, we enquire whether the two things are not equally
liable to concur, whether connected or unconnected.
The night that Oliver Cromwell died, a great storm devas-
tated London . The coincidence might affect the minds of the
superstitious, but there was no proof of causal connexion.
Each event grew out of its own independent series of causes
and conditions ; the one was a consequence of the bodily con-
stitution and manner of life of Cromwell ; the other was a
consequence of the laws of the atmosphere. They concurred
in time, and that is all that should be said regarding them.
Every event of every man's life must concur with some one
position of the planets, on the supposition of their being no
connexion whatever. Hence, such concurrences prove nothing
at all ; they are left out of account without even the trouble of
elimination .
 MEANING OF A CHANCE COINCIDENCE. 85

There are certain cases, where a cause fails to produce its

effect, being connteracted by some other cause. ABC is
followed by bc d, from which the inference, by Agreement
would be, that A is not the cause of a. Bark is administered
to a patent in ague, but the symptoms are not alleviated. The
strict application of the Method of Agreement would lead to
the inference that bark does not cure ague. Yet we do not,
in practice, lose faith in medicines from individual failures.
We are prepared to encounter exceptions to cases of compli-
cated causation. The question then comes, how far is this to
go ? How are we to be sure of causes at all, if they fail to
work their effects ? What difference can we draw between
such instances and mere accidental concurrences ?
The theory of Chances, or Probabilities, applies to both the
situations now illustrated ; -the dropping without the trouble
of elimination what would be present whether another thing
were present or not ; and the proving of a causal agent,
although not uniform in producing the proper effect .
2. A chance coincidence is one where there is no implied
connexion of cause and effect, or one that would be the
same in the absence of any such connexion.
Instances have been already given, and could be multiplied
at pleasure. A person walking on the sea shore at a certain
hour every day, will, on a given day, walk at low water ; but
the concurrence is said to be a chance concurrence, as the
person's walking is not in any way regulated by the state of
the tide. On the other hand, the concurrence with the time
of day is not chance. There is a concurrence in both cases ;
the one without cause, or a matter of chance, the other with
a cause, and not a matter of chance.
If it is proposed to enquire what coincidences are due to
chance and what not, the method is dictated by the so-called
rules of Chance.
Common sense suggests the principle of the solution . We
know that low tide coincides with a certain hour of the day
twice a month. If, on a long average, the coincidences of low
tide and the person's walking on the shore happened exactly
twice a month, we should say the relationship is casual,
accidental, or without any link of causation ; for on the supposi-
tion of there being no connexion, this number of coincidences
might occur through the laws of tides. If, on the other hand,
the two facts coincided daily, we should presume a coincidence.
Moreover, even if it did not occur daily, but once or twice a
86 CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

week, this would be more than chance would account for, and
there would be a presumption of a causal connexion, which,
however, is liable to be defeated or counteracted.
So with the connexion between the walking and the hour
of the day. Suppose the person might walk at any time dur-
ing fifteen hours of the day, he would, by mere chance, walk
during any particular hour, once every fifteen days on a long
average. If in fact, some one hour coincided with the walking
only once in sixty days, there would be proof of an influence
hostile to going out at that hour ; if at some other hour, the
walking occurred six days in seven, there would be proof of
positive connexion with the said hour.
These obvious considerations are reduced to principles and
rules in the logico - mathematical science called the ' Doctrine
of Chances or Probabilities.'

3. The principle is as follows :-Consider the positive

frequency of the phenomena themselves, and how great
frequency of coincidence must follow from that, supposing
there is neither connexion nor repugnance. If there be a
greater frequency, there is connexion ; if a less, repugnance.
This may be called the general case, as distinguished from
certain modified cases to be stated afterwards.
If we find from observation (sufficiently extended to genera-
lize the facts ) that A exists in one instance out of every two,
and that B exists in one instance out of every three ; then, if
A and B are wholly indifferent to each other- neither con-
nected nor repugnant- the instances of A and B happening
together will be (in the Arithmetic of Chances ) one out of
every six, on a sufficient average . If, in fact, the two co-exist
oftener, there is connexion ; if seldomer, repugnance.
By this method singly, could we determine a connexion of
cause and effect in the instance of rain occurring with a par-
ticular wind, say the South-West. The experimental methods
fail in such an instance. It 6 is well remarked by Mr. Venn
(Logic of Chance, p. 127) that in Probability we distinctly
take notice of, and regard as evidence, reasons so faint that
they would scarcely be called by any other name than mere
hypothesis elsewhere. '
In the Chinese astronomical observations , frequent entry
was made ofnew stars ; and by far the larger number of these
appeared in the milky way. The coincidences implied some
law of connexion, but no such law was suspected by the
 PROOF OF LAWS NOT UNIFORM. 87

Chinese astronomers. We now know that the milky way

contains the great mass of the stars of our galaxy ; conse-
quently all changes connected with the stars will be most
numerous there. The circumstance has been adverted to as
an important confirmation of the accuracy of the Chinese
astronomical records.
In the generalizations of co-inhering attributes, in Physics
and in Chemistry, there is often a want of perfect agreement
in the details : yet the agreement is too extensive to be the
product of chance, and hence we must admit the existence of
a law, which, in the complications of the phenomena, is occa-
sionally crossed and counteracted. It is a law that the alka-
line bases are oxides of the metals ; a remarkable exception
occurs in ammonia. The law does not become waste paper
because of this exception . The coincidence is one that mere
chance cannot account for ; and some way has to be sought
out to reconcile the discrepancy. Perhaps an expression will
be found that will apply alike to ammonia and to the other
alkalies. The discovery of a metal in ammonia has been
looked to as a solution of the difficulty.
Many genera of plants are centralized in definite geogra-
phical areas, Erica for example ; the species being collected
within a certain tract, at some one point of which there is
found the maximum number of species. As chance cannot
account for such localizations, the endeavour is made to trace
out laws of connection (cause and effect) between the plants
and the locality.
In the controversies raised on the subject of Phrenology,
the opponents of the system have considered that they dis-
proved it by instancing decided exceptions to the phrenological
allocation of faculties-cases of mathematicians with a small
organ of number, or musicians with a small organ of tune.
The facts supposed , however, are not conclusive against the
system. For, in the first place, the disproof of the coincidences
alleged, in respect of one or two faculties, or any number,
would not disprove all the rest, But, in the second place, a
few exceptions would not thoroughly disprove the alleged
connexion ; they would only disprove its unfailing uniformity.
The phrenologist could still retreat upon the principle we
are now discussing ; for, if the coincidences of a certain
distinguished mental aptitude, -as number, music, colour-
with the unusual size of a certain region of the head, were
more frequent than it would be on mere chance, or in the
absence of all connexion, he would be entitled to infer a
88 CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

relationship between the two. No doubt, the practical value

of the facts would be very much lowered by the supposed
relationship being frequently defeated ; still, the bond must be
considered as established . In this view, an extensive series of
observations on the size and form of the human head, and on
the accompanying mental qualities, if reduced to a statistics
of comparative frequency, could yield indications of the loca-
lizing of mental functions, if such be the actual case.
The homoeopathic maxim ' similia similibus curantur,' may
be subjected to the same criticism. Exceptions do not nullify
the principle, although they reduce its value as a guide. Both
this and the opposite maxim ( ' contraria contrariis curantur ' )
may hold in nature. The coincidences in both cases may be
greater than chance would account for.
The prevalence of the different forms of Christianity after
the Reformation shows a coincidence with Race that chance
would not account for. The Greek church was propagated
principally in the Slavonic race ; the Roman Catholic church
coincides largely with the Celtic race ; and the Protestant
church has found very little footing out of the Teutonic races.
From this coincidence must be presumed a positive affinity
between the several forms and the mental peculiarities of the
races :—which , as an empirical law, may be applied to cases
immediately adjacent, and as a derivative law (so it may be
considered) may be applied still wider. We may fairly con-
clude, that any speedy conversion of one church to another is
very unlikely. But the law being at best a derivative law,
involving a plurality of simpler uniformities under collocations
or co-efficients, may be subverted by circumstances arising in
the lapse of time. It might also happen that change of place
and of circumstances might defeat the law ; such as emigra-
tion to other countries, or great political revolutions.
We may apply the principle to the problem of the Spread of
Language. The articulate modes of the human voice being
nearly the same in all races, there would be a great many
common words struck out, without any communication be-
tween the races. Then it might happen too that some of
these common words might be applied to the same objects,
because some name or other must be applied. Of course, the
probability of the same sound as the radical ma, being ap-
plied to the maternal parent, by different races independently
is a very small probability ; and the probability of any great
number of such coincidences is still smaller. Therefore, if we
find in the languages of India, and of Great Britain, a very
 COMBINATION OF CHANCE AND LAW. 89

considerable number of names almost the very same, applied

to the same things, we must conclude that the coincidence is
not the work of chance, and is the result of some cause.
4. A special case of the elimination of chance is pre-
sented by the combination of Chance with Law, or of
casual and causal links. In a sufficiently prolonged ex-
perience, chance may be eliminated.
Thus, so far as the mere decay of the human system is con-
cerned, deaths would be equally frequent at all periods of the
year, and at all hours of the day. In the statistics of Mortality,
however, we find that some months are marked by an exces-
sive number of deaths ; as December, January, and February.
This points to a law of connexion between winter severity and
mortality. In the same way, if we had the statistics of the
deaths occurring at different hours of the day. we might find
a greater number occurring in the depressing hours of the
night, namely, between midnight and dawn. There is an
element of chance, and an element of law ; the chance can be
eliminated by statistics, and the law ascertained and estimated .
The combination of chance and law is seen in the progress of
the seasons . The Chance element is the fluctuation from day
to day, due to meteorological changes, which, in our ignorance,
we view as fortuitous. The Law is the progress of the sun,
which if undisturbed would be shown in the steady increase of
temperature from January to July, and reversely. The influ-
ence of the winds interferes with this regular course ; but by
averages taken for many years, we could ascertain for any one
place the temperature proper to each day of the year, through
the solar influence alone.
The skill of a player at cards is shown by his winnings at a
year's end. So, the keeper of a gaming table, in spite of daily
fluctuations, has a sure profit in the long run ; the table being
constructed with a definite percentage in his favour.
In taking observations, it is usual to multiply instances, and
to strike an average. This eliminates mistakes of the senses,
accidents, and all errors that do not grow out of some perma-
nent bias.
5. A third form of the elimination of chance is the
discovery of causes so small in amount as to be submerged
by the casual accompaniments.
Loaded dice are detected after a long series of throws.
Actual trials have shown that, in the course of 1200 throws,
90% CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

there would be very nearly 200 turns-up of each side. Any

great deviation from equality would be a proof of loading.
It was by the average of many daily observations of the
barometer that the diurnal variations were discovered. Those
periodical variations were too small to be noticed in the midst
of the fluctuations from day to day ; but the elimination
ofthese last by a long course of observations brought the other
to light, and gave their amount.
A small bias in an instrument might be detected by great
multiplication of instances. All the chance errors would be
eliminated, and would show a residuum, to be accounted for
only by some permanent bias.
PRINCIPLES OF CHANCE OR PROBABILITY.
6. Probability expresses a state of the mind, and also a
situation among objective facts.
As a state of the mind, it is a grade or variety of Belief.
The highest degree of belief is called Certainty ; the inferior
degrees are degrees of Probability. The psychological criterion
of strength of belief is readiness to act.
As a situation of objective facts, it points to our experience
of the recurrence of events with more or less uniformity.
What happens always, under certain circumstances,- -as the
rise of the sun , the termination of human life -is called cer-
tain ; our assurance in such instances is at the highest . What
happens, not always, but sometimes , -as that the sun rises in
a cloudless sky , that men live seventy years - is not certain .
Neither the fact, nor the failure of the fact, is certain . To
this middle situation , is applied the term Probability.
At a first glance, we might be disposed to say that such
events are positively uncertain ; that any judgment as to their
happening is incompetent ; that we are in as great ignorance
as to whether the sun will ever rise clear, or whether any man
will live to seventy, as if we had never known the sun to rise
or any man to die. In this emergency, however, we derive
an aid from extended observation . If, in the same locality,
we observe the rise of the sun for a great many days, we find
that the rise in a clear sky happens in a certain fixed propor-
tion, which is more and more steady as observation is pro-
longed. So, if we keep a record of the duration of men's
lives, for a considerable period of time, we find the seventy
years ' lives to recur in a fixed proportion, the more steady the
longer the records are extended. Hence, if it is of any value
 PRINCIPLES OF CHANCE. 91

to us to know how many days in the year the sun rises cloud-
less in a given climate, or how many men live to seventy, we
can obtain the information with absolute certainty.
Now, there are many occasions when this knowledge of
proportionate recurrences of events, or of what is called
averages, is of the highest practical moment. It is needless
to cite, among other examples, the system of Insurance, which
is wholly built upon it.
7. When a sufficiently extended series of observations
shows a fixed proportion in the relative occurrence of
events, this proportion is called the Probability of the
occurrence of any single event ; which, however, is a fiction,
meaning only the certainty of the proportion, or average,
on the whole.
If, in the run of many years, it appears that there have been,
in some one place four dry days for three wet, then it is a
matter of inductive certainty , that in the future that propor-
tion will hold. We may stake any practical interest upon the
recurrence of that proportion . But we are unable to say, be-
fore hand, of any one day whether it will be wet or dry. Still,
a convenient fiction is used applicable to a single day. We
see that the chances or probabilities are that some given day
will be dry. A numerical expression is used for the degree of
the probability ; it is said to be four to three in favour of dry-
ness, or against rain. This does not mean that we gain any-
thing in a single case ; a case taken apart must be held as
absolutely uncertain . Unless we act upon the gross or total,
we gain nothing by taking into account the numerical pro-
babilities with a view to a single instance .
But although we are no wiser as to the individual day that
we desire to be dry or wet, yet, as there are a great many
similar emergencies in life, where we have to apply averages
to single cases,-by following the measure of probability on all
such occasions, and on all subjects, we shall be oftener right
on the whole, than if we were to neglect this probability.
This is the justification of our presuming that a given day will
be dry and not wet, under the probability assigned.
8. It is found that the experienced recurrence of events
coincides with an estimate formed thus :-Suppose that we
know of several events that some one will certainly happen,
and that nothing in the constitution of things determines
one rather than another ; in that case each will recur, in
92 CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

the long run, with a frequency in the proportion of one to

the whole.

Thus, in the familiar case of tossing a penny, there is sup-

posed to be nothing in the form of the coin, or in the impulse
given to it, to determine one side rather than another. In
this case, every second throw will, in the long run, be heads.
So, in throwing dice, if they are fair, every sixth throw, on
a long series of trials, will give ace.
An a priori necessity has been assumed for this proportionate
recurrence of events . Such a necessity appears to be justified
in the tossing of a penny ; we seem to be in a state of equipoise
between the two possibilities of head and tail, and feel that
any inequality in the result would be without reason or cause.
Accordingly, we are apt to assume, as a necessity of the case,
that the turning up of head and of tail should be equally
balanced at the end of a long trial. The fact is, however, that,
in this and like cases, we are exceptionally circumstanced in
point of knowledge ; we know what are the causes at work,
and that there is nothing to give a bias in the long run to
either side of the penny.
In the more complicated cases, as human life, shipwrecks,
fires, &c., we should not be disposed to predict anything before
hand from such considerations as the above. We should not
consider all years, from one to ninety, as equally open for men
to die in, or that the year of age is quite indifferent. We soon
come to know better ; and, refraining from a priori supposi-
positions we trust solely to induction from a sufficiently
prolonged basis of actual observation.

9. The important theorems growing out of the general

principles and applied to problems in Logic, are these.
I. The probability of the concurrence of two indepen-
dent events is the product of the separate probabilities.

If A occur once in six times, its probability is , or one for

and five against ; if B occur once in ten times, its probability
iso, or one for, and nine against ; the probability, or relative
frequency in the long run, of the concurrence of the two is
do -one for and fifty- nine against.
This rule is an arithmetical consequence of the general for-
mula, and does not need a separate appeal to observation and
induction. Suppose two days in three are dry, and one in
three has a westerly wind, then (if the two phenomena were
 COMBINATION OF PROBABILITIES. 93

independent), the chance is X

× or ; that is two for and
seven against.
10. II . The probability of the occurrence of one or other
of two events that cannot concur is the sum of the separate
probabilities.
'If one man in ten is over six feet, and one in twelve under
five ; then in a large number, say 120,000, there will be about
12,000 over-six-feet men, and about 10,000 under-five-feet
men ; the sum of the two 22,000, will represent the number of
such as are one kind or the other.'

11. III. The rule for the cumulation of independent

Testimonies in favour of a fact, is to multiply the numbers
expressing the proportionate value of each Testimony.
If a witness is correct six times out of seven, or speaks six
truths for one error, his relative testimony is six for and one
against, or . Two witnesses of this character concurring
would give a probability of 6 to 1 multiplied by 6 to 1 , or
36 to 1 , and so on.

12. IV. The rule for the deterioration of testimony in

passing from one person to another, that is, for the weaken-
ing of traditional evidence through lapse of time, is to
multiply the fractions expressing the separate probabilities .
If one witness speaks truth five times in six, the fraction is
§; if another witness speaks truth nine times in ten, the value
is . Ifthe one repeats what he has heard from the other,
the testimony is weakened by the transmission to <
ਧੰਨ := 45, or 3. Of facts attested by the second witness, de-
riving from the first, three will be true and one false. A few
such transitions bring the evidence below probability, and
render it worthless . Four successive witnesses each valued
2, would give , which would be a probability against their
testimony. Now, there are many cases where a testimony is not
put too low by the above fraction ; if a want of perfect veracity
is joined with inadequate comprehension of the statement,
weak memory, or other infirmity, a witness would not be correct
three times in four.

The application of the Theory of Probabilities to the induc-

tive determination of Causes is given in the following theorem
taken by Mill from Laplace.
94 CHANCE, AND ITS ELIMINATION.

13. ' Given an effect to be accounted for, and there being

several causes that might have produced it, but of whose
presence in the particular case nothing is known ; the
probability that the effect was produced by any of these
causes is as the antecedent probability of the cause, multiplied
by the probability that the cause, if it existed, would have pro-
duced the given effect.
Let M be the effect, and A, B, two causes, by either of
which the effect might have been produced. To find the pro-
bability that it was produced by the one and not by the other,
ascertain which of the two is most likely to have existed, and
which of them, if it did exist, was most likely to produce the
effect M ; the probability sought is a compound of these two
probabilities.
' Case I. Let the causes A and B be both alike in the second
respect either A or B, when existing, being supposed equally
likely (or equally certain) to produce M ; but let A be itself
twice as likely as B to exist, that is twice as frequent a pheno-
menon. Then it is twice as likely to have existed in this case,
and to have been the producing cause of M.
Case II, Reversing the last supposition, let us suppose that
the causes are equally frequent, equally likely to have existed,
but not equally likely, if they did exist, to produce M ; that in
three times. that A occurs, it produces that effect twice, while
B, in every three times produces it but once. Since the two
causes are equally frequent in their occurrence, in every six
times that either exists, A is three times and B three times.
But A in three occurrences produces M in two ; while B in
three occurrences produces M in one. Thus, in the whole six
times, M is produced thrice, but twice by A and once by B.
So that the probability is in favour of A in the proportion of
two to one.
' Case III. Let there be an inequality in both respects. Let
A be twice as frequent as B ; and let A produce the effect
twice in four times ; B thrice in four times. Then the
antecedent probability of A to B is 2 to 1 : the probability
of their producing M is as 2 to 3 ; the product is 4 to 3.
In other words the probabilities in favour of A being the
cause are as 4 to 3. And so on with any other combination.'
The principle may be applied to distinguish casual coin-
cidences from those that result from law. The given fact
may have originated either in a casual conjunction of causes,
or in a law of nature. The probabilities, therefore, that the
 CHANCE APPLIED TO CAUSATION. 95

fact originated in these two modes, are as their antecedent

probability, multiplied by the probabilities that if they existed
they would produce the effect. But the peculiar combination
of chances, if it occurred, or the law of nature if real, would
certainly produce the series of coincidences . The probabilities,
therefore, are as the antecedent probabilities of the causes.
One of these the antecedent probability of the combination of
mere chances that would produce the given result is an
appreciable quantity, on the principles already laid down.
The antecedent probability of the other may be estimated more
or less exactly, according to the nature of the case.'

CHAPTER X.

INDUCTION AIDED BY DEDUCTION.

1. It is desirable at every stage to carry out Inductive

laws into their Deductive applications . Now, Deductions
cannot be made or verified without Observation of facts .
Deduction or Ratiocination, in its purely formal aspect, is
given in the Syllogism. In its material side, it involves the
comparison of facts, and is akin to Induction . We have yet
to view it as it plays a part in the Inductive Sciences .
2. The full scope of the Deductive Method comprises
three operations.
I. There must be certain pre-established INDUCTIONS .
We must somehow arrive at Inductive Generalizations, and
next prove them when arrived at. The Experimental Methods
have in view these two ends, and especially the last, namely,
Proof. Incidentally, the methods indicate the mode of Dis-
covery, but they have not been expressly aimed with that view.
It has been apparent, however, that the collection and study of
instances, under the Method of Agreement, must suggest the
points of Agreement, when we are ignorant of them, which is
to suggest a general law. Our examination of the problem of
Crystallization, and the enquiry into the cause of Dew, led
first to the discovery, and next to the proof, of generalized
coincidences. Still, it was not advisable to carry on a double
96 INDUCTION AIDED BY DEDUCTION.

illustration, by means of the Experimental Methods, to eluci-

date at once Discovery and Proof ; of the two ends, the
logician has most to do with the second ; Proof is his main
object, for which he can lay down definite laws ; Discovery is
a valuable end, likewise, but it is not equally amenable to
prescribed rules.
In the management of particular instances, with a view to
the Discovery of generalities, assistance may be obtained in the
three following ways :-
(1) The number of instances should be as extensive as pos-
sible. In the comparison of a large number the mind will be
struck with points of community, from the very fact of the
recurrence ; as in the examples collected in the research on
Dew. Moreover, there will start forth some one that contains
the circumstance sought, in startling prominence ; these are
the glaring or suggestive instances . Such, in the case of
Dew, was the example of the warm breath upon a cold iron
surface, as a knife blade.
(2) When out of mere number and variety of instances, the
identity does not flash upon the mind, the next thing is to
select a few for careful scrutiny. Each instance should be
studied in isolation, should be gone over in every minute point,
and examined from every side ; the features being exhaustively
set down in writing. After a few separate instances have been
considered in this thorough way, the resemblances (unless at
the time inscrutable for want of other lights ) will become
apparent to the view. Newton's study of the phenomenon of
the coloured rings of the soap-bubble, was an exercise of the
severe mental concentration now described.
(3) The general laws of phenomena must be sought in the
cases where they are least complicated or combined with other
laws. This is an obvious precaution conducing to Discovery.
The laws of motion are studied in simple cases, such as straight-
lined movements, or wheel-movements, under a single impulse.
Gravity is best studied in bodies falling perpendicularly, where
there is no other force operating. Neither the first law of motion,
nor the law of gravity, could have been advantageously genera-
lized, in the flow of rivers, or in the motions of the planets.
These complications are not suited for inductive discovery, but
for deductive application, as at present contemplated . The
first principles of Optics are sought, not in the workings of the
eye, nor in complicated lenses, but in the simple mirror for
reflexion, and in the plane transparent surface for refraction.
So the more transcendental powers of light, in causing mole-
 SIMPLE DEDUCTION. 97

cular change, are not studied on the retina of the eye, but in
the easier (although still obscure) cases- chemical action and
photography. The osmotic action of cells is illustrated by
Graham's experiments on the passage of liquids through por-
celain partitions. The capillary circulation of the blood is
compared to the flow of liquids in capillary tubes . Salivation
and digestion are examined by withdrawing saliva and gas-
tric juice from the animal body, and subjecting different
materials to their action apart. The laws of Mind , which are
to be carried out deductively in resolving the complicated
situations of human beings, as in Society, are to be generalized
from observations of the individual man in favourable situa-
tions. For the laws of mental growth, we have to begin at
infancy ; for the germs of moral sentiment, we refer to the
uncivilized races.*

3. II. DEDUCTION proper involves two stages of com-

plexity ; ( 1 ) The simple extension of an inductive law to
a new case , and (2) the combination of several laws in a
conjoint result, involving processes of Computation.

(1) Simple Deduction is the extending of an inductive

generalization to new cases. As in all enlargements of know-‹
ledge, so in this, there is both discovery and proof. The cases
have first to be suggested to the mind, and next to be rigor-
ously verified by the procedure suited to the case.
Without dwelling upon the means of suggesting new
applications of laws, let us consider the mode of proving such
applications . This resolves itself into a question of identity.
Supposing that the inductive proposition ' all matter gravi-
tates ' has been formed upon solids and liquids, shall we apply
it to gases ? This depends upon whether gases are matter-
whether any property of gases is identical with the defining
property of matter. Now, the defining property of matter is
inertia, and gases are proved to possess this property ; whence,
the proposition ' matter gravitates ' is extended to them.
Again, Does Ether (the supposed medium of Light and Heat)
also gravitate ? As before, we must test its identity with the
characteristic property of matter. Now, if, as seems to be
implied in the retardation of Encke's comet, the ether is
a resisting substance, then it is matter, and accordingly
gravitates.
* The Arts of Discovery, brought out by scattered allusions throughout
the work, will be systematically given in APPENDIX H.
7
98 INDUCTION AIDED BY DEDUCTION .

Questions of identity to establish a minor are necessarily

part and parcel of inductive research ; but they must not be
confounded, as they sometimes are, with the process of induc-
tive generalization to establish a major or a general law.
Thus, it is a moot point, whether any, and what alloys are
chemical compounds ; which must be settled by examining
the characteristics of alloys, and comparing them with the
essentials or characteristics of chemical combination.
We may instance important researches that have for their
end the proof of an identity. Thus, Dr. Andrews insti-
tuted a series of experiments to identify Ozone (formed by
Electricity) with the atmospheric constituent that decomposes
Iodide of Potassium . He selected three peculiarities of
ozone ;-( 1 ) the power of oxidizing mercury, ( 2 ) the destruc-
tion of ozone reactions by dry peroxide of manganese, ( 3) the
destruction of its reactions at a high rate of temperature
(237° C) ; and tried the element found in the atmosphere by
these tests. It answered to them all. The first, however,
(the oxidizing of mercury) is not conclusive, as other bodies,
besides ozone, tarnish mercury. The last of the three tests
(high temperature) , answers to no known substance, except
ozone. The three tests conjoined furnish superabundant
evidence of the identity of the so-called ozone of the air, with
ozone as obtained by electrolysis, and by the electrical machine.
Another remarkable discovery of Identity is seen in Graham's
experiments on the relations of Hydrogen to Palladium.
There have always been chemical reasons for believing that
hydrogen gas is the vapour of a highly volatile metal.
Graham has contributed new evidence in favour of the
identity. The metal palladium is capable of absorbing eight
or nine hundred times its volume of hydrogen gas ; and ,
when so charged, is found to undergo changes in Density,
Tenacity, Electrical Conductivity, Magnetism, relations to Heat,
and Chemical properties . On investigating these changes,
Graham shows that they correspond to the alterations made
on one metal when united in an alloy with another metal ; so
that, as far as metallic properties can be shown in such a union,
hydrogen is metallic. The metal hydrogenium ' has a white
aspect, is of sp. gr. 2, has a certain amount of tenacity, and is
magnetic. The cumulation of proof is all but equivalent to
the separate production of the solid metal.
Sir G. C. Lewis confounds the establishment of a minor, as
a part of Deduction, with the establishment of an Inductive
major by the method of Difference. He considers that the
 COMBINATION OF DEDUCTIONS. 99

proof of a burglary in a Court of Law, or the proof that Sir

Philip Francis wrote Junius, is an employment of the Experi-
mental or Inductive method of Difference as one of the
Inductive methods. In reality, all such cases are the making
good of an identity to prove a minor. The kind of Difference
employed consists in bringing out successive details or cir-
cumstantials, to exclude by degrees every person but one ;
and thereby to complete the identity of that one person with
the actor in the given case.
(2) The more difficult employment of Deduction is in the
concurrence of different agents to a combined result ; as
when we deduce the path of a projectile from gravity, the
force of projection, and the resistance of the air ; or the tides
from the united action of the sun and the moon. This is the
form of the Deductive Method, whereby we cope with the
otherwise intractable situation called Intermixture of Effects.
Physical Astronomy will ever remain the grand exemplar
of Deductive Investigation, as the computation of joint causes
producing an effect. The causes can be estimated with numeri-
cal precision, and their combined operation can be calculated
by the higher Mathematics. In other parts of Physics, there
are instances of the Deductive Method . The calculations
respecting Machinery, Fluid Pressures, Motions of Fluids,
Gaseous Pressure and Movements , Sound, Light, Heat, Elec-
tricity, proceed upon inductive laws, often united in their
operation, and requiring to be computed in their joint effect .
It has been seen, in the research on Dew, that Dalton's
generalization of the laws and constitution of the atmosphere
of vapour, deductively applied, made up the wanting link in .
the experimental investigation.
Equally telling examples of the Deductive Method may be
culled from the recent applications of Chemistry to Animal
Physiology. The laws of chemical combination enable us to
trace the metamorphosis of tissue, by means of the products
of waste. The single fact of oxidation is all-pervading in the
animal system, and the deductions from it clear up at once
many obscurities beyond the reach of experimental elimina-
tion . The difficult question of Animal Heat is to a great
extent solved already by this deductive application, and its
complete solution will probably depend on the same method.
We may quote farther the special applications of Chemistry,
under the great law of Persistence, to the phenomenon of
muscular power, of which no adequate account could be given
by mere observation or experiment. We now know that
100 INDUCTION AIDED BY DEDUCTION.

muscular expenditure represents a definite combustion of the

material of the food, although we do not know the precise
links of the transmutation.
When purely Inductive or Experimental proofs are sup-
ported by reasons, or by a consideration of the nature of the
case, the meaning is that Deduction is brought to the aid of
Induction. The conclusion respecting the N. E. wind was
confirmed by the general operation of atmospheric impurities.
The result gained from the comparison of instances of Crystal-
lization, is in accordance with the theoretical views of the
two opposing molecular forces attraction and repulsion .
The experimental facts as to the exhaustion of the mind along
with the body, are supported by what we know of the brain
as the organ of the mind. Our inductions respecting despotic
governments are aided by deductions from the laws of human
nature.
The applications to the Human Mind, to Character, and to
Society, will be more fully exemplified afterwards, in the
special chapters on the Methods of these Sciences.
4, III. The Deductive process is completed by VERIFI-
CATION.
This applies more particularly to the Computation of
combined causes.
The way to verify the deductive extension of a single law to
a new case, is actual observation of that case. We apply
deductively the law of gravity to air, and verify the deduction
by observing whether the air has weight. As, however, we
may dispense with deduction when we have actual observation,
such an instance does not show the power of the Deductive
Method. The thing meant is, that after verifying a deduction
by one or more instances , we shall be able to apply it to other
instances without farther verification ; these last instances
depending for their proof solely on the deductive process.
When an effect is the result of several conspiring causes, we
may deduce it from a computation of the causes ; as, for
example, the lunar and planetary perturbations . To show
that we have taken account of all the causes, that we have
obtained a proper estimate of each, and that we have correctly
computed their conjoined action, we must compare the deduced
effects with the observed effects in a variety of instances. If
the two precisely tally, the deductive machinery is verified ;
if not, not. A want of accordance points to a defect in one or
other of the circumstances quoted :-the causes or agents are
 VERIFICATION OF DEDUCTIONS. 101

not fully taken account of ; their exact amount is not precisely

obtained ; or the calculation of their united action is not
perfect. Sometimes, the first point is defective, there being a
residual agent. In other cases, we know the cause but not its
exact numerical amount ; thus, in Astronomy, we need to
know the relative masses of the sun, moon, and planets,
together with their mutual distances. Finally, it may happen
that the calculations are impracticable.
In Astronomy, where Deduction has gained its greatest
triumphs, verification has also been most thoroughly worked.
Upwards of fifty Observatories are incessantly engaged in
watching celestial phenomena ; the observations have been
the means of perfecting the deductive operation, and making
good all its shortcomings.
The deductive theory of projectiles combined gravity, pro-
jectile force, and the air's resistance ; the experiments on
gunnery are the verification.
The laws of the strength of materials are deduced from
geometrical and mechanical laws, involving the size, shape,
and position of beams, &c.; and however certain the principles
may appear, they cannot dispense with actual trials.
We have supposed the verifying tests to consist of detached
observations ; they may be furnished by groups of observa-
tions, summed up into what are termed Empirical Laws.
Such was the verification of Newton's planetary theory
(founded on gravity) by Kepler's Laws. So, any theory or
generalization of the operation of refracting surfaces on light,
must be in consistency with Snell's law of the proportion of
the sines of incidence and refraction.
The formulæ of fluid motions are of themselves insufficient
to predict the facts ; experiments on the flow of rivers must
be conjoined in a matter of so great complicacy.
Newton calculated deductively the velocity of sound, and, on
comparing it with the observed velocity, found a difference of
nearly twenty per cent. It is only of late years, that the dis-
crepancy has been got over, by a more complete view of the
forces developed in the act of propagation. În such a delicate
question, one verifying instance is too little. Newton himself
squared the results by arbitrary assumptions (as the thickness
of the air particles) , which would have required for their con-
firmation an independent class of facts.
Very confident predictions have been made to the intent
that the Sun is cooling down in consequence of his enormous
radiation ; and that the earth's rotation must ultimately decay,
102 INDUCTION AIDED BY DEDUCTION.

through the friction of the Tides. The data and the calcula-
tions seem very secure in both instances ; yet, in order that
the deductions may be fully established, we need evidence of
an actual change, in past time, as regards both these moment-
ous facts .
Combined Induction and Deduction expresses the full force
of scientific method for resolving the greatest complications.
Induction alone, and Deduction alone, are equally incompetent
to the great problems even of the Inorganic world ; still more
so with Life, Mind, and Society. Induction , exclusively relied
6
on, is called empiricism ; ' Deduction, without an adequate
basis and an adequate check in the Inductive Methods, ex-
presses the bad sense of 6 theoretical,'
The two following chapters will continue the exemplification
of the Deductive Method, of which they merely vary the
aspect.

CHAPTER XI.

SECONDARY LAWS- EMPIRICAL AND DERIVATIVE.

1. The importance of Secondary (as opposed to Ulti-

mate) Laws, grows out of their close adaptation to concrete
realities.
Speculation delights to attain ultimate generalities, which
give the key to a vast department of nature ; as Gravity,
Conservation, and Relativity. These are highly satisfactory
to the mind in its craving after unity, simplicity, ' the one in
the many.' A far more important use of these supreme
generalities is to perfect the statement of the Secondary Laws,
which are the more immediate guides of conduct, and the
expression of the phenomena in their actual or concrete
enibodiment. The generalization of gravity did not supersede
Kepler's Laws of the Planetary Motions. So long as the
concrete fact of planetary motion has an interest for us, so
long are we concerned with the secondary laws representing
that fact. The use of the higher laws of Newton is to render
these indispensable secondary laws more precise.
The secondary laws are the ' media axiomata ' of Bacon.
They were viewed by him (too exclusively) as the steps for
ascending to the supreme laws. Equally essential is the
 IMPORTANCE OF SECONDARY LAWS. 103

descending movement from the higher to the middle generali-

ties. No branch of knowledge is complete until it has
assembled all the secondary laws that express the more usual
configurations of actual phenomena, and until these secondary
laws have attained all the precision that induction and deduc-
tion can give them.

We formerly had occasion to remark (p. 79) , with reference

to Propositions, that, like the notion, they vary in regard to
the reciprocal properties- Extension and Comprehension . As
we increase the extension, we lose comprehension, and con-
versely. Now, of the two attributes, the one most important
for us practically is Comprehension. We have to deal with
small classes, and with individuals, and our interest lies in
knowing the whole of the specialities attaching to these. An
English statesman needs to know the peculiarities of English-
men. A physician has to deal with the diseases special to
humanity, and still more those special to his own sphere ;
while even this degree of generality, is but to prepare him for
mastering individual cases.
Hence, the narrowing of a proposition, which may seem a
defect to the theorizing or speculative intellect, is the highest
merit in applications to practice : provided always that the
limitation of extent is accompanied with a corresponding in-
crease in amount of predication , that is, in meaning , connota-
tion, or intent. The full enumeration of the properties special
to iron, as it is found in a certain district, is essential to the
working of that particular ore ; the account of the properties
common to all metals would be valuable merely as contributing
a quota to the highly specialized and exhaustive knowledge
relative to the particular substance.
It was a frequent remark of Aristotle that the finishing
stroke of knowledge is the tact that modifies all general pro-
positions according to the individual case. This of course is
in the more purely practical point of view.

The secondary laws are either EMPIRICAL or DERIVATIVE.

2. An EMPIRICAL LAW is a uniformity supposed to be
secondary, that is, resolvable into some more general uni-
formities, but not yet resolved.
That quinine cures a fit of ague is an Empirical Law. It
is a uniformity established by experience ; it is, however, a
secondary uniformity ; we have reason to believe that it is
104 SECONDARY LAWS.

capable of being resolved into higher uniformities. The pre-

sent inability to resolve it is a disadvantage, not merely in a
theoretical or speculative point of view, but as regards the
application of the law in practice.

3. When what was an Empirical Law has been resolved

into more general uniformities, or into highest laws, it is
termed a DERIVATIVE LAW.

The occurrence of snow on high mountains was at one time

an empirical uniformity. It was established as an induction
from experience, but was not susceptible of being referred to
any higher generalizations . We can now resolve it into the
laws connected with radiant heat passing through the atmos-
phere. These may not themselves be the highest attainable
generalities ; still they are much more general than the induc-
tion connecting snow with height.
The converting of an Empirical Law into a Derivative
Law is a step gained both in scientific explanation, and in
practical facilities . The defects inherent in an Empirical Law
do not inhere to the same degree in a Derivative Law.
4. Empirical Laws are of various kinds. Their charac-
ters are judged from their appearance after being resolved,
that is, made derivative.
I. Many are obviously made up of the combination of
higher uniformities under definite arrangements or collo-
cations.
We see this class largely exemplified in the explained or
derived laws. The law of a projectile, Kepler's laws, the tides,
the laws of wind and rain , the laws of geological action (igne-
ous and sedimentary) , combustion, the nourishment of living
bodies-being formerly empirical laws, and now derived- we
can, from them, presume the character of those that are still
empirical.
These combinations have been already discussed under the
Deductive Method. They suppose certain ultimate laws, con-
curring in their operation, and also a certain definite arrange-
ment and amount of the concrete agencies or forces that the
laws refer to.

5. II. Some secondary laws take the form of laws of

succession between effects and remote causes ; they still,
however, possess the character last named,
 VARIOUS KINDS OF SECONDARY LAWS. 105

When a sudden shower disperses a crowd, the shower is a

very remote cause of the effect ; a number of intermediate
links of causation are assignable. The taking of food is re-
moved by a good many stages from the renewal of the muscu-
lar strength. The sowing of a seed is followed at a long
interval with the maturing of an oak.
This is merely a superficial variety of the first case- com-
bination of agents, in definite collocation. Each one of the
links is a distinct law of causation or coincidence, requiring to
be embodied in a definite collocation ; and the combination of
the whole, in a suitable arrangement, is necessary to the
result.
6. III. Some are laws of Co-existence or of Succession
between effects of the same cause.

Such are the phases of the Tides, the flow of the Seasons,
Day and Night. Here also there is the same constant circum-
stance-a conjunction of agents and collocations. In every
case of a secondary law, there is, from the nature of the case,
more than one power at work. Only ultimate laws express
agents in isolation, purity, or abstractness.
In any complicated structure, a new agent produces a
variety of changes. The taking of food leads to concurring
alterations in almost every organ in the body. Every disease
has concurring symptoms. A country engaging in war has
its economy simultaneously disturbed in many different ways ;
hence there are numerous empirical statements applicable to
the condition of war, which are co- effects of the one general
situation.

7. The aggregation of properties in a natural kind—a

mineral, plant, or animal- has something in common with
Empirical Laws.
As there may be uniformities of co -existence, not resolvable
into cause and effect, such uniformities stand solely on their
own inductive evidence, like empirical laws. They are proved
by the method of Agreement alone, and the proof extends no
farther than the cases observed.

8. The criteria of an Empirical Law are principally

these :-
If a uniformity is established only by Agreement, it is
not shewn to be a law of causation ; and (if not an ulti-
mate law of co-existence) it is an empirical law.
106 SECONDARY LAWS.

Agreement does not single out a cause when there is plurality.

It is at fault, besides, in discriminating cause and effect from
effects of the same cause. Moreover, unless the variation of
the circumstances has been thorough and complete, there is
an uncertainty even in cases where there is but a single cause,
and where the antecedents contain that cause.
The Method of Difference does not at once lead to ultimate
laws. The swallowing of alcohol is followed by a certain
sensation ; this is proved by the Method of Difference to be
cause and effect, yet it is not an ultimate sequence ; it is an
empirical uniformity.
9. The other criteria arise out of the characters already
mentioned.
Thus, when phenomena are obviously complicated, and
when there are intermediate links of operation, the laws of
such phenomena are not ultimate but secondary ; they are
empirical, or, if resolved, derivative.
The law that connects the fall of the barometer with wind
or rain is plainly empirical. We can see that many different
agencies enter into the sequence ; and, also, that there are
many intermediate steps between the antecedent and the
consequent.
We presume the action of a drug to be an empirical law,
because we know, from the complication of the human body
and the plurality of attributes of natural kinds, that there
must be many concurring processes, each one governed by its
own law or laws of causation.

LIMITED APPLICATION OF DERIVATIVE AND EMPIRICAL LAWS.

10. A Derivative Law, and still more an Empirical Law,
must not be extended beyond narrow limits of Time, Place,
and Circumstance.
It being supposed that such laws are established by all the
evidence that the case admits of, still they are applicable only
a certain way beyond the narrow sphere where they have been
observed to operate.
The reasons are those already stated under the Deductive
Method. A uniformity depending on several higher uniformi-
ties, and on a definite collocation of agents, that is, on certain
special co-efficients, must fail, first, if any of the concurring
uniformities be counteracted, and secondly, if the proper ad-
justment of the agencies is departed from. The elliptic
 APPLICATION TO ADJACENT CASES. 107

motion of the planets would be defeated, if some great dis-

turbing body were sufficiently near to counteract solar
attraction, or if the tangential force were made different from
what it is. Hence we cannot extend the law of the ellipse to
every body that may now or at any future time revolve about
the sun.
This limit to the extension of secondary laws- whether
Empirical or Derivative- is the all-important fact respecting
them, in the logical point of view. A large number of pre-
vailing errors might be described as the undue extension of
Empirical Laws. We shall present a few examples of secondary
laws, calling attention to the difference of our position in
regard to them, according as they are Empirical or Derivative.
The rise of water in pumps was an empirical law, previous
to the discovery of the pressure of the atmosphere. The
application of the Method of Agreement in different countries,
and with pumps of different bore, proved that no pumps could
draw water beyond about 33 feet. The law could be relied on
within the wide limits of place and circumstance where it had
been tried. It could not have been extended to other planets ;
but it might be extended, with apparent safety to any part of
the earth.
Since the law became derivative, the limits of its operation
are precisely defined ; we can tell exactly where it would have
failed. We know that on the tops of high mountains the
maximum height would have been much below 33 feet ; that
the exact height would not be the same at all times ; that
other liquids, as alcohol, sulphuric acid, solutions of salts,
mercury, vary in the height attained . Now, probably none
of all these limitations had been actually discovered in the
empirical stage ; they might have been obtained by sufficiently
wide and careful experiments ; the derivation superseded the
laborious task, which was probably beyond the competence of
an unscientific age.
It is an empirical law that the temperature of the earth
increases, as we descend, at a nearly uniform rate of 1° of
Fahrenheit to 50 feet of descent. This law has been verified
by observations down to almost a mile. We might extend the
law inferentially to the adjacent depths, as far perhaps as
several miles ; but we are not at liberty to extend it to the
centre of the globe. We do not know that the requisite col-
locations extend so far.
Yet this law is not wholly empirical. It is a derivative
uniformity. It is connected with the known facts-that the
108 SECONDARY LAWS.

earth has a high temperature in the interior, and is cooled at

the surface by radiation in space. Knowing these, we are yet
unable to deduce the law of decrease from the higher laws
concerned, because we are ignorant of the degree of central
heat, and imperfectly acquainted with the laws of its conduc-
tion through the unknown materials of the globe. We under-
stand the general situation, but do not possess the numerical
and other data requisite for computing the effects.
That air-breathing animals are hot- blooded, is a law formerly
empirical, now derivative. It comes under the general law of
the dependence of temperature on the oxygenation of the blood,
and may be extended widely on the faith of that great
generality.
The Law of Continuity- Natura non agit per saltum '-is
an Empirical Law. In the continuity of Vegetable and Animal
Life, there would be, under the Doctrine of Development, a
reason for the fact, and it would be in that case Derivative .
Also, in the transition from one state of matter to another,—as
in melting, boiling, and their opposites- there must be a
certain amount of continuity owing to the greatness of the
transition. But except where there is some presumption of
this nature, the extension of the law is wholly unsafe ; we are
not to expect, for example, that the simple bodies of nature
should be arranged in series with continuous or shading pro-
perties. We find the greatest gaps in almost all the properties
of the elementary bodies.
In medical science, there is hardly such a thing as a single
effect produced by a simple cause. What is worse, there are
scarcely any great inductive generalities relating to the cure of
disease, except through hygienic or constitutional treatment.
Thus the use of drugs is almost exclusively empirical.
The limitation in this case operates variously. It forbids
our inferring that two medicines of close kindred will have
the same effect ; thus bark and quinine are not interchange-
able, although the one is the crude form and the other the
essential extract. It also forbids our extending a mode of
treatment to a closely allied ailment, as in reasoning from
one species of fever to another. Lastly, it forbids the applica-
tion of the same treatment to the same disease, in different
persons.
Hence, medicine is of all sciences the one most completely
tentative. Experience gives a probability to begin with ; but
until the effect is tried in the new case, we cannot, as a
general rule, rely on it.
 EMPIRICAL LAWS IN MEDICINE. 109

Until the day arrives when the operation of medicines is

made derivative, the only progress possible is to obtain through
multiplied experience, a more exact statement of the conditions
attending on the successful application of certain modes of
treatment ; as for example, the constitutional or other circum-
stances in the patient favourable or unfavourable to special
drugs.
The treatment of tape worm by male fern is of old date in
medicine. In the early period, the failures were frequent ;
at present, the oil of the fern is extracted and given instead ofthe
root, with an almost uniform success. This empirical unifor-
mity is to a certain extent derived or explained ; the substance
is a poison to the parasite. After such an explanation, there
is afforded a clue to other remedies for the disease ; previous
to the explanation, the uniformity was confined to the one
remedy.
As an empirical law in Medicine, we may instance Bright's
discovery of the connexion between albuminous urine, and
degeneration of the kidney. The law is as yet unresolved
into any higher law of structure and function ; the kidney
degeneration is not associated with degeneration in any other
tissues of the body ; and no account is given of the temporary
production of albumen without the permanent disease.
It is an empirical law that about 250 persons in a year
commit suicide in London. This law may be extended a little
way into the future, but it may not be extended into a remote
time, when moral habits may be different, nor to other cities
and populations.
The Statistics of Mortality show a remarkable coincidence
between the rate of mortality and the density of the popula-
tion. A high degree of longevity is found in thinly peopled
districts, notwithstanding even the poverty that sometimes
occurs in sterile tracts ; and mortality reaches its maximum
in the most crowded parts of cities. If we knew nothing of
the causes of this uniformity, if it were as empirical as the
medicinal action of mercury on the system, we could not
extend the law into other countries and other circumstances of
the population. But it is a derivative law, and knowing what
agents the effect depends on, and what circumstances would
defeat their operation, we apply it without scruple to every
portion of the human race. We should, however, refrain from
applying it to animals very differently constituted from man
as to the necessities of breathing pure air. All animals require
oxygen, but some need it in smaller quantity, and are indif-
110 SECONDARY LAWS.

ferent to impure gases ; while warmth and the opportunities of

better food might more than compensate for the close atmos-
phere of a confined habitation.
In regard to the Human Mind and character, we have
uniformities that cannot be extended to the race generally.
Thus, the universality of sympathy or fellow-feeling is liable to
exceptions. Mr. Samuel Bailey, after quoting, from a travel-
ler in Burmah, the incident of a drowning man being beheld
by a crowd as an amusing spectacle, and being allowed to
sink without an attempt at succour, makes the following
remarks :-
' Incidents of this kind (and the example might be easily
parallelled from other nations) serve to show that when we
ascribe certain sentiments to human nature or to men univers-
ally on given occasions, because they exist amongst ourselves
on those occasions, it is by no means a safe inference ; we
cannot safely ascribe them except to men under analogous
circumstances of knowledge and civilization.
' We may attribute with confidence to most men and to most
races of men, the rudimentary feelings which I have shown to
originate and to constitute moral sentiment ; and some of them
with equal confidence to all men : namely, sensibility to cor-
poreal pleasure and pain ; liking the causes of one and dis-
liking the causes of the other ; the propensity to reciprocate
both good and evil ; the expectation of the same reciprocation ;
and more or less sympathy with other sensitive beings ; but
the direction and intensity of these emotions respectively it is
often difficult and even impossible to assign : there are so
many causes at work to counteract, or modify, or suppress
such of these common susceptibilities as can be counteracted,
or modified, or suppressed-to call them forth or to keep
them in, that, unfurnished with precise knowledge of national
and social circumstances, we cannot predict with confidence
how they will manifest themselves on particular occasions.
Without specific information of this kind we cannot safely
pronounce that the people of rude or distant and imperfectly
explored countries would, under given circumstances , share in
those affections and moral sentiments which it seems contrary
to our own very nature, under such circumstances, not to have.'
That ' the mind of man is by nature conciliated and adapted
to his condition ' was formerly an empirical law. We may
now consider it as a deduction or derivation from the law of
Universal Relativity. The principle has been greatly abused.
It has been loosely extended far beyond the limits where it is
 POLITICAL RULES. 111

observed to hold true ; indeed those limits were never correctly

marked in its empirical state. As a derivative uniformity, we
may assign its limits with tolerable precision .
The laws of Political Society are all secondary laws, either
empirical or derivative. Hence the necessity for limiting their
application. The politician is, like the ancient sailors, obliged
to sail close by the shore, rarely venturing out of sight of land .
We are not at liberty to transfer to our own time the maxims
suitable to the ancient world, supposing even that the ancients
really attained any political rules highly salutary in their own
case.
เ
The distinction between ancient and modern history,' says
Mommsen, is no mere chronological convenience. Modern
History is the entry on a new cycle of culture, connected
at several epochs of its development with the perishing or
perished civilization of the Mediterranean States, but destined
to traverse an orbit of its own. ' It would be a vicious extension
of secondary laws, to predict the extinction of modern nations ,
because the great ancient empires are perished.
We cannot transfer at once the practice of one nation to
another nation. Hardly any political device has been so much
copied as the British constitution . Yet, its advantages being
not purely empirical, but to a certain extent derivative, it may
be extended to adjacent cases with some confidence.
It is suitable to the complicacy of the political structure to
make changes in the direction of existing institutions, and to
confide in them only when introducing a state ofthings nearly
adjacent to the present. After seeing the working of a ten-
pound franchise in this country, the inference was fair that
the lowering to eight, seven, or six pounds could not depart
very far from actual experience.
The use of precedents in Law and in Politics exemplifies the
rule of limitation . Bacon, remarking on legal precedents , lays
it down that the more recent are the safer, although, on the
other hand, they have a less weight of authority. A prece-
А
dent is at its maximum of proving force when it is sufficiently
near our own time to ensure similarity of circumstances, and
sufficiently distant to ensure the consolidation of practice, and
the experimental exhibition of the practical result. ' (G. C.
Lewis).

11. The rule may be farther illustrated under the second

form of the Secondary Laws-Uniformities of remote
connexion between cause and effect.
112 SECONDARY LAWS.

Of these, the most prominent examples are the results of

slow processes in the arts, protracted treatment in disease, the
growth of plants, the development of animals, the formation of
the human character. That all empiricisms of this class must
be precarious and liable to frequent defeat is apparent. Even
when derivative to the full extent, they are rendered uncertain
by the number and complication of the agencies.
12. Lastly, with reference to Uniformities suspected or
known to be effects of a common cause.
The principle of limitation is still the same.
As an example, the case is put- what reliance are we to
place on the sun's rising to-morrow ?
Suppose, in the first place, that this were an empirical
generality, we being ignorant of its derivation. Suppose,
also, that we have authentic evidence that the sun has risen
daily for the last five thousand years. How far into the future
are we at liberty to extend the law ; to what limits of time
should we confine it ? The answer is, we may count the con-
tinuance in the future, on the same scale as the continuance
in the past ; we may fairly assume a period counted by
thousands of years ; we may be tolerably certain for one
thousand years, and have a considerable probability, for three,
four, or five thousand ; but we should not be safe in extending
the scale to tens of thousands, still less to hundreds of
thousands. For anything we should know, a catastrophe may
be preparing that will speedily interfere with the regularity of
day and night ; still, long continuance in the past reduces,
without annihilating the chances.
Let us next look at the case as a derivative uniformity. We
know that the phenomenon will continue so long as these
circumstances are conjoined, namely, ( 1 ) the luminosity of
the sun, (2) the earth's being within a proper distance of the
sun, (3) the earth's rotation, and (4) the negative condition of
the absence of any intervening opaque body to act as screen.
Now, we know from past experience that all these conditions
are likely to be perpetuated for a period of time, to be estimated
by not less than hundreds of thousands of years. The sun
may be cooling, but the rate, judging from the past, is
extremely slow ; the earth's rotation is believed to be subject
to decay, but the rate of decay is infinititesmally little ; the
removal of the earth out of the solar influence is in opposition
to our very best guarantees ; and the permanent intervention of
an eclipsing body is the most unlikely incident of all. Thus,
 INDUCTION OF CAUSE. 113

then, while, as an empirical law, we cannot well extend the

rising of sun (or day and night as we now have it) beyond
thousands of years at most, we may extend it, as a derivative
law, to hundreds of thousands, if not to millions.

EVIDENCE OF THE LAW OF CAUSATION.

13. It may be shown that the Law of Causation, the indi-

spensable ground work of all Induction, itself reposes on
the highest evidence suitable to the case- uncontradicted
Agreement through all nature.
We have hitherto taken for granted that sufficient evidence,
of the only kind suited to the case, has been obtained in favour
of the law of Universal Causation, on which law have been
grounded all the processes of experimental elimination. A
summary of this evidence will farther illustrate the logical
processes detailed in the foregoing chapters.
The uniformity of successions was first observed in easy
instances, such as the more obvious mechanical effects. A
body at rest was observed never to move from its place without
the application of some force to move it ; a body in motion
was observed not to stop abruptly without interference and
obstruction. The fact of the descent of unsupported bodies
is invariable. So light and heat display obvious regularities
that could be counted on. Even in the instability of the winds
there would be discovered circumstances of constancy. The
most complicated of all things, living bodies, were seen to
have numerous points of striking uniformity.
That change of every kind whatsoever follows on a definite
prior change, could not be affirmed in early times, except by
the mere instinct of generalization, which is no proof. Hence
in ancient philosophy, there were alternative suppositions .
Aristotle allowed an element of Chance, along with the reign
of Law.
Modern science has extended the search into natural se-
quences, collecting new examples of uniformity, and removing
exceptions and apparent contradictions. Investigations have
been pushed into every department of nature ; and had there
been any decisive instances where change grew out of nothing,
or where the same agent, in the same circumstances, was not
followed by the same effect, such instances must have been
brought to light.
14. In the form of Persistence of Force, under definite
8
114 EVIDENCE OF THE LAW OF CAUSATION.

laws of Collocation, the Law of Cause and Effect has been

subjected to the most delicate experimental tests.
By irrefragable observations it was shown that Matter is
indestructible, which is one element of nature's constancy.
Farther observations have proved the numerical Persistence
of Force throughout all its transformations, and also the unifor-
mity of the collocations or arrangements for transferring it.
The first contribution to this result was the proof of the
Laws of Motion, as respects both the continuance of motion
once begun, and the conservation of the total momentum in
case of transfer by impact. These mechanical verities make
up one department of uniform cause and effect. Next came
the proof of the equivalence of mechanical force and heat-
the constancy of the amount of one produced from a definite
amount of the other. Joule's mechanical equivalent of Heat
testifies to nature's constancy in a very wide department.
Following on this is the mumerical estimate of the heat of
Chemical combinations, also admitting of numerical statement,
from which there is no deviation ; a third great department
of constancy is thereby established.
If numerical equivalence has not been arrived at in Nerve
Force, and in Light, the subtleties of the phenomena are
sufficient to account for the deficiency. We have reasonable
ground to presume that, according as these phenomena are
fully understood, they will show the same constancy as all the
rest ; the burden of proof lies upon any one maintaining the
contrary.
The only exception usually claimed to the Law of Causation
is the alleged Freedom of the Will. But whatever be the
mode of dealing with this long-standing enigma, there is a
statistical testimony in favour of the constancy of human
motives. The actions of men have a degree of regularity
compatible only with uniform causation.
Mr. Mansel has characterised as a ' paralogism ' the doc-
"
trine that the ground of all Induction is itself an Induction.'
He might have called it a paradox or an epigram, an apparent
contradiction needing to be resolved : it is not a paralogism
unless it can be made out a self-contradiction .
If the account given above of the methods of Proof and
Elimination is sufficiently intelligible and conclusive, nothing
farther is necessary to resolve the paradox. There is one fun-
damental mode of Proof-Agreement through all nature-by
which all ultimate laws are established, including Causation.
 CAUSATION RESTS ON AGREEMENT ALONE. 115

There are several derivative, deductive, or dependent methods

of Proof, the special Methods of Elimination- Agreement
(according to Mill's Canon) , Difference, and Variations ; these
are called by courtesy Inductive Methods ; they are more
properly Deductive Methods, available in Inductive investiga-
tions. The special form of Agreement described in the canon
is not quite the same as the fundamental method of Agree-
ment, on which alone repose all the ultimate generalizations .
That canon, as supposing Causation, would be inapplicable to
the proof of Causation . The method of Agreement that proves
Causation is not a method of elimination. It does not proceed
by varying the circumstances, and disproving successive
antecedents ; it can only find A followed by a, wherever the
two occur. Until the law is first proved, we cannot establish
A as the cause of a, by omitting successively B, C, D, and all
other accompanying circumstances, leaving nothing constantly
joined save A and a ; even if this were done, there must still be
a search through all nature for A followed by a, when the ques-
tion of causation itself is at issue. Hence Agreement for estab-
lishing an ultimate law is not the same as the Method of
Agreement, in Mill's canon, for establishing cases of causation,
after the general law is sufficiently guaranteed.

There is a certain propriety in comparing the establishment

of the Law of Causation (or any other ultimate law) , with the
proof of an Empirical Uniformity, which has nothing but de-
tailed Agreement to found upon. True, an Empirical Uni-
formity is to be applied only a little way beyond the limits of
time, place, and circumstances. But, now, as Mr. Mill
remarks, if we suppose the subject matter of any generaliza-
tion to be so widely diffused, that there is no time, no place,
and no combination of circumstances, but must afford an
example either of its truth or its falsity, and if it be never
found otherwise than true, its truth cannot depend on any
collocations unless such as exist at all times and places ; nor
can it be frustrated by any counteracting agencies, unless by
such as never actually occur. It is, therefore, an empirical
law, co-extensive with all human experience ; at which point
the distinction between empirical laws and laws of nature
vanishes, and the proposition takes its place among the most
firmly established, as well as largest truths accessible to
science.'
 CHAPTER XII.

EXPLANATION OF NATURE.

1. The laws arrived at by Induction and Deduction are

the proper EXPLANATION of natural phenomena.
Explanation has various meanings. These all agree in
affording us a certain satisfaction or relief when oppressed
with the difficulty, obscurity, perplexity, contradiction , mys-
tery, of natural facts. But the human mind has at different
times been satisfied in different ways ; and individuals still
vary as to what satisfies them in the way of explanation.
When all Nature was peopled with deities, and the various
phenomena partitioned among them, a sufficient explanation
of anything was that a certain god or goddess willed it. The
intervention of Neptune was a satisfying account of why a
storm arose. The wrath of Apollo was the explanation of the
plague that broke out among the Greeks at the siege of Troy. *
There is a special and every-day form of explanation that
consists in assigning the agency in a particular occurrence ;
as when we ask-what stops the way ? who wrote Junius ?
who discovered gunpowder ? These questions belong to our
practical wants and urgencies, but the answer does not involve
the process of scientific explanation. If, however, we proceed
from the who ' or ' what ' to the ' why :' -why does A's
carriage stop the way ? why did the author of Junius write
so bitterly ?-there is an opening for the higher scientific
process .
2. The basis of all scientific explanation consists in
assimilating a fact to some other fact or facts. It is
identical with the generalizing process, that is, with In-
duction and Deduction.
Our only progress from the obscure to the plain, from the
mysterious to the intelligible, is to find out resemblances among
facts, to make different phenomena, as it were, fraternize.
We cannot pass out of the phenomena themselves . We can
explain a motion by comparing it with some other motion, a
* See GROTE'S Plato (Phædon) for the views of the ancient philosophers
with regard to Explanation, or the Idea of Cause.
 EXPLANATION IS GENERALIZATION. 117

pleasure by reference to some other pleasure. We do not

change the groundwork of our conception of things, we
merely assimilate, classify, generalize, concentrate, or reduce
to unity, a variety of seemingly different things.
The phenomenon of combustion was considered to have
been explained when Priestley showed it to be the combina-
tion of oxygen with carbon or other substance ; in short, he
assimilated the fact to cases of oxidation, as the formation of
the red precipitate of mercury, the rusting of iron, &c.
Lightning was explained by Franklin's assimilating it with
electricity. The polarity of the needle was explained by
assimilating the entire globe to a magnet or loadstone.
Explanation thus steadily proceeds side by side with
assimilation, generalization. Combustion was explained by
oxidation ; oxidation is explained by the higher generality-
chemical combination ; chemical combination is swallowed up
in the Conservation of Force.

3. Mr. Mill distinguishes three forms of the explanation

of facts and laws.
I. Explaining a joint effect, by assigning the laws of
the separate causes, as in the ordinary Deductive operation.
The Deduction of a complex effect, by computing the sum
of the separate elements, is also the explanation of that effect.
By combining gravity with projectile impulse, we explain
the motions of the planets. This deduction once verified, is
offered as the explanation of the planetary motions . In other
words, the showing that these motions are made up of the
two causes -gravity and tangential force-is the explaining
of their motions.
In such cases, the explanation points out the simple causes
concurring, in the shape of forces or agencies, and also indi-
cates their amount and their due concurrence. Jupiter's
orbit depends on the mass of the sun, on the tangential force
of the planet, and on its mean distance from the sun . These
are, in the language of Astronomy, the coefficients, which must
be given in order to our assigning the result of the operation
of the laws. A mere law, such as the law of gravity, is not
an explanation until it is clothed in the concrete statement of
two or more gravitating masses, with a given amount and a
given distance from each other. These numerical statements,
the coefficients of Astronomy, are also said to determine the
collocations of the agents concerned.
118 EXPLANATION OF NATURE.

To explain the rise of a balloon, is to give the laws of

gravity, of buoyancy, and of gaseous elasticity, and to state
the exact weight and elasticity of our atmosphere, and the
specific gravity of the mass of the balloon .
To explain genius is to refer it to general laws of the mind,
or to certain elementary powers -intellectual and emotional-
whose higher or lower degrees and modes of combination
produce the kind of intellectual superiority so named.
To explain the rise of free governments is to state the
general principles of human action, and the definite collocation
of circumstances calculated to produce the effect.
The separate laws are obviously more general than the laws
of the conjoint effect. Gravity has a much wider sweep than
planetary motions ; the law of the perseverance of moving
bodies in a straight line is far more comprehensive than
tangential impulse.

4. II. Explanation may assume the form of discovering

an intermediate link, or links, between an antecedent and
a consequent.
What seems at first sight the direct or immediate cause of a
phenomenon may, by the progress of assimilation, turn out
the remote antecedent. The drawing the trigger of a musket
is followed by the propulsion of a ball. The why of this
phenomenon is given by disclosing a series of intermediate
sequences, each of which is assimilated with some known
sequence. The trigger by concussion evolves heat ; the heat
ignites the gunpowder ; the gunpowder is a mass adapted for
very rapid combustion ; the combustion evolve gases which,
being confined in a small space, have a very high expansive
force ; the expansive force propels the ball.
Again, the contact of sugar with the tongue is the precursor
of a feeling of the mind, the sensation called sweetness. The
explanation, so far as hitherto attained, supplies the following
series of closer links. The sugar is absorbed by the mucus
membrane of the tongue, and comes in contact with the fila-
ments of the gustatory nerve ; there ensues a chemical or
some other molecular action on the nerve. This action is
of a kind that can be propagated along the course of the nerve
to the nerve centres, or the brain ; whence are diffused a multi-
tude of nervous currents ending in muscular movements. To
the cerebral agitation attaches the mental state called the sensa-
tion of sweetness.
MA
INTERMEDIATE LINKS. 119

The unexplained phenomena connected with the Law of

Conservation refer to the intermediate links, or transitions, in
the interchange of the mechanical and the molecular forces,
and of one molecular force with another. The molecular pro-
cesses in the conversion of mechanical momentum into heat,
heat into electricity, chemical force into muscular power and
nervous power, - —are not accounted for : and we see only a
beginning and an end where we have reason to believe that
there must be various intermediate stages, each susceptible of
being assigned and brought under some general law of causa-
tion.
The intermediate links, or sequences, are each one more general
than the combined sequence. Take the case of a sweet taste.
The absorptive power of the animal membranes for various
substances (the crystalloids of Graham) is a general law, of
which the action in tasting is merely one example or applica-
tion. The molecular disturbance from the contact of nerve
and sugar is but a case of chemical or molecular affinity.
The current action of the nerve force is a limited instance of
current actions ; the electrical forces exhibit other cases,
the whole being comprehensible under some higher law.
Finally, the link that relates the physical actions of the brain
with the mental effect belongs to some wider statement that
relates mental states generally to their physical concomitants.
As observed, in the previous chapter, it is incident to such
many-linked sequences, to be more frequently frustrated than
the simpler sequences that make them. A circumstance
counteracting any one of the closer links counteracts the
whole phenomenon. If the lock of the musket makes an in-
sufficient concussion of the explosive substance ; if the gun-
powder is rendered incombustible by damp ; if the expanding
gases burst the piece :-in any one of these contingencies, the
ball is not propelled .
5. III. The third mode of Explanation is termed the
Subsumption of one law into another ; or the gathering up
of several laws in one more general and all-comprehending
law.
This represents the upward march of generalization, pure
and simple. We have attained a certain number of inferior
generalities, by assimilating individual cases in ordinary in-
duction. We have assimilated the kindling of fires for heat
and for light and for the disintegration of compounds, under
one head, called combustion ; we have assimilated the tarnish-
120 EXPLANATION OF NATURE.

ing and corrosion of metallic surfaces under another head ;

we subsume both under the higher law of oxidation, which
both exemplify. We have also assimilated the action of acids
upon alkalies under a general head : we find that this case
can fraternize with the foregoing and with many other
phenomena, under a still higher, or more general aspect,
signified by chemical combination.
So, again, terrestrial gravity and celestial attraction, each
the result of separate assimilations, being found to agree, are
subsumed into the illustrious unity of Universal Gravitation.
Magnetism, Common Electricity, Voltaic Electricity,
Electro-Magnetism, &c., are all strung upon the common
thread of Electrical Polarity.
Capillary attraction , solution, alloys (not chemical), cements,
&c., are subsumed under the general law of molecular attrac-
tion (not chemical ) between different substances, named
heterogeneous or alien attraction.
Numerous laws of smaller compass are subsumed under
Relativity. The pleasures of variety and novelty, the neces-
sity of contrast in works of art, antithesis in rhetoric, the
statement ofthe obverse or counter proposition in science,-are
minor laws generalized, but not superseded, bythe higher
law.
When minor laws are thus merged in a greater law, the
mind feels a peculiar and genuine satisfaction- the satisfaction
of having burst a boundary to expatiate over a wider field.
We rise from a statement bearing upon a small group of facts
to a statement comprehending a much larger group ; from a
ten-fold condensation, we reach a thousand-fold condensation.
The intellect, oppressed with the variety and multiplicity of
facts, is joyfully relieved by the simplification and the unity of
a great principle .
The charm of resolving many facts into one fact was acutely
felt by the speculative minds of antiquity. It took a power-
ful hold of the earliest Greek philosophers ; and made them
almost unanimous in imagining that all phenomena whatso-
ever are at bottom one, or are susceptible of being represented
in some single expression, being merely the many- sidedness of
some single central power, substance, agent, or cause. Such
unity was, according to Thales, Water ; according to Anaxi-
mander, an Indeterminate Substance ; according to Anaxi-
menes, Air ; according to Pythagoras, Number.
 ULIMATE PHENOMENA. 121

LIMITS OF EXPLANATION.
6. Scientific explanation and inductive generalization
being the same thing, the limits of Explanation are the
limits of Induction.
Wherever Induction (extended by Deduction) can go, there
legitimate scientific Explanation can go, they being the same
process differently named.
7. The limits to inductive generalization are the limits
to the agreement or community of facts .
Induction supposes similarity among phenomena, and when
such similarity is discovered, it reduces the phenomena under
a common statement. The similarity of terrestrial gravity
to celestial attraction enables the two to be expressed as one
phenomenon. The similarity between capillary attraction,
solution, the operation of cements, &c., leads to their being
regarded not as a plurality, but as a unity, a single causative
link, the operation of a single agency.
So remarkable have been the achievements of modern times,
in the direction of lofty generalities, that some countenance
seems to be lent to the ancient dream of attaining an ultimate
centralized unity in the midst of the seeming boundless
diversity of nature.
It depends purely on actual investigation, how far all
phenomena are resolvable into one or into several ultimate
laws ; whether inductive finality leaves us with one principle,
with two, or with twenty principles.
Thus, if it be asked whether we can merge gravity itself
in some still higher law, the answer must depend upon the facts.
Are there any other forces, at present held distinct from
gravity, that we may hope to make fraternize with it, so as to
join in constituting a higher unity ? Gravity is an attractive
force ; and another great attractive force is cohesion, or the
force that binds together the atoms of solid matter. Might
we then join these two in a still higher unity, expressed under
a more comprehensive law ? Certainly we might, but not
to any advantage. The two kinds of force agree in the one
point-attraction, but they agree in no other ; indeed, in the
manner of the attraction they differ widely ; so widely that
we should have to state totally distinct laws for each. Gravity
is common to all matter, and equal in amount in equal masses
of matter whatever be the kind ; it follows the law of the
122 EXPLANATION OF NATURE.

diffusion of space from a point (the inverse square of the

distance) ; it extends to distances unlimited ; it is indestruc-
tible and invariable. Cohesion is special for each separate
substance ; it decreases according to distance much more
rapidly than the inverse square, vanishing entirely at very
small distances. Two such forces have not sufficient kindred
to be generalized into one force ; the generalization is only
illusory ; the statement of the difference would still make two
forces ; while the consideration of one would not in any way
simplify the phenomena of the other, as happened in the
generalization of gravity itself.
Again, gravity, considered as a power to put masses in
motion, to generate momentum or moving force, may be
compared, by way of an attempt at assimilation, with the
equally familiar mode of begetting motion by impact, or the
stroke of a mass already in motion ; as in propelling a ball by
a mallet. Here too, however, we have, with similarity of
result, a total contrast in the mode. Gravity draws bodies
together from a distance ; impact must be supposed to urge
them through their atomic repulsions. When the expanding
gases of kindled gunpowder blow a bullet through the air,
there is no actual contact of the parts ; there is merely the
operation of powerful forces of mutual repulsion, acting,
however, at very short distances, like the cohesion of solidity.
Now, there appears to be nothing in common to gravity and
these atomic repulsions, except the result. We have, there-
fore, no basis for assimilation or inductive generalization in
such a comparison . The two modes of action must be
allowed to lie apart in physical science ; they must be em-
bodied in different statements or laws, with no hope of being
ever brought together.
It is because gravity does not assimilate with the propulsion
of impact from a blow or a stroke that people have accounted
it mysterious. In point of fact, there is no more mystery in
the one than in the other. Attraction, from great distances,
is one form of the production of force ; Repulsion, at near
distances, is another form. The last of the two is, on the
whole, most familiar to us ; it is the genus that our own
physical force belongs to ; and we, by a mere whim, suppose
it a simpler and more intelligible mode of exerting power ;
the truth being that, in all that regards simplicity and intel-
legibility, gravity has the advantage. It is only by confining
ourselves to the superficial glance of bodies coming into close
contact, thence giving and receiving momentum, that we
 ULTIMATE FEELINGS OF THE MIND. 123

suppose this mode of exerting force a simple one ; the inter-

polated links of molecular repulsion are much more compli-
cated than gravity.
A similar line of remarks would apply to any endeavour to
assimilate gravity with the Correlated Forces generally. These
forces by their nature counteract gravity. The various move-
ments in nature are explicable by the conflict and mutual
action of two great Powers ; Gravity, on the one hand,
and the sum total of the Correlated Forces, molar and mole-
cular on the other . The Correlated Forces mostly appear
under the guise of repulsions, as, for example, heat ; so much
so that this must be considered their typical manifestation ;
the electrical and magnetic attractions are exceptional, and
are probably mere superficial aspects of the deeper fact of
repulsive separation.
Three departments of Force thus stand out so distinct as to
be incapable of assimilation :-Gravity, the Correlated Forces,
and Molecular Adhesion. This last appears under two
forms ; the attraction between particles of the same sub .
stance-iron for iron, water for water ; and the attraction
between two substances— as iron for lead, water for alcohol or
for common salt. There may be a possibility of generalizing
these two, or stating them as a common force. Some approach
has been made to this in the fact that the second kind of
attraction holds between bodies nearly allied—as metals with
metals, earths with earths.
8. The ultimate laws of Nature cannot be less numerous
than the ultimate feelings of the human mind.
This, as Mr. Mill pointed out, is the insurmountable barrier
to generalization, and consequently to explanation. Whatever
number of distinct states of consciousness, not mutually re-
solvable, can be traced in the mind, there must be that number
of ultimate facts or elements of knowledge, and of ultimate
laws connecting those states with their causes or concomitants.
If the sensation of colour be radically distinct from the feelings
of resistance, of movement, of form, there must be a separate
law with reference to colour. The phenomenon called white-
ness cannot be resolved into the phenomenon of form, or of
motion.
Even if we found that the fact of whiteness is conditioned
by a certain molecular structure, and certain molecular move-
ments, we should not thereby resolve whiteness into movement ;
the facts would be distinct facts, although joined in nature.
124 EXPLANATION OF NATURE.

So, we are aware that the sensation of sound is conditioned by

a vibratory movement of the particles of a sounding body ;
but the vibration is not the sound ; all we can say is that a
law of causation relates the vibration to the sound. Now
there must always remain one law connecting the molecular
movements of bodies with the sensation of whiteness, and
another law connecting molecular movements with the sensa-
tion of sound.
In so far as all sensations are generalized into a common
fact of sensation, having similarity with diversity, so far may
we generalize the laws that connect sensation with corporeal
activities. This is a real and important step of generalization.
Yet it does not supersede the necessity of other laws for con-
necting special and irresolvable modes of sensation with their
special seats of corporeal activity. We may have a law of
pleasure and pain generally ; yet we need laws for the distinct
modes of pleasure and pain-the pleasures of light, of sound,
&c.-inasmuch as these cannot be resolved into each other.
The great generalities relating to Force all refer to one
sensibility of our nature-the muscular, or the active side ;
owing to which fact, they may admit of unity of law, or a
common statement. Likewise, there may be unity of law as
regards Light and Colour, provided all the modes and varie-
ties are resolvable into the variation in degree of some funda-
mental mode of consciousness. Ifthere be several fundamental
modes, there must be a law for each ; thus there may be
wanted one law for white light, with its degrees, and one for
each of the primary colours-four laws for the sense of sight.
We may be able to discover how Heat causes Light to the
extent of generalizing the molecular condition of luminosity,
and connecting this with the molecular condition of high
temperature ; but that such molecular condition and its ac-
companiments-radiation, refraction, &c. - - should yield the
sensation of light, must always be expressed in a distinct law,
a law uniting an objective with a subjective experience. Such
is the proper goal or end of our knowledge in regard to the
phenomenon.
FALLACIOUS AND ILLUSORY EXPLANATIONS.
9. One form of illusory explanation is to repeat the fact
in different language, assigning no other distinct yet
parallel fact.
This is ridiculed in Moliere's physician, who gives as the
reason why opium causes sleep, that it has a soporific virtue.
 ILLUSION OF FAMILIARITY. 125

Not much is done to explain the greenness of the leaf of

plants by saying that it is due to a substance named ' chloro-
phyll.' The only step gained is the fact (if it be a fact) that
greenness in all plants is due to the same substance.
A simile is sometimes offered for an explanation. Black's
Latent Heat was merely a re-statement of the fact : he might
have gone on to call it secret, concealed , embodied, shut-up
Heat ; all which expressions would merely iterate the circum-
stance that a certain amount of heat no longer appeared as
heat to the sense, or to the thermometer.
It is with the great ultimate generalizations, such as the
Uniformity of Nature, and the Axioms of Mathematics, that
we are most prone to give as a reason, or " proof, a mere
various wording of the principle itself. Why must the
future resemble the past ? ' Because Nature is Uniform.'
The phenomenon, sleep, was referred by Whewell to a
law of periodicity in the animal system. This, however, does
nothing but repeat the fact to be explained ; there is no
assimilation with another fact, so as to yield a higher gene-
rality, which would be inductive explanation, and no reference
to a higher generality already formed, which would be deduc-
tive explanation. A step towards real explanation is made by
comparing it with the repose or quiescence of the organs
after any activity whatsoever. This is to assimilate the
phenomenon with another distinct phenomenon ; the two taken
together form a higher generality, which, so far as it goes, is
an explanation.

10. Another illusion consists in regarding phenomena

as simple because they are familiar.

Very familiar facts seem to stand in no need of explanation

themselves, and to be the means of explaining whatever can
be assimilated to them.
Thus, the boiling and evaporation of a liquid is supposed to
be a very simple phenomenon requiring no explanation, and
a satisfactory medium of the explanation of rarer phenomena.
That water should dry up is, to the uninstructed mind, a thing
wholly intelligible ; whereas, to the man acquainted with
Physical science, the liquid state is anomalous and inexplicable.
The lighting of a fire, by contact with a flame, is a great
scientific difficulty ; yet few people think it so. A soap
bubble is a conflux of unexplained phenomena. Voluntary
action, from familiarity, has long been reckoned so simple in
126 EXPLANATION OF NATURE.

itself as to have provided a satisfactory explanation of all

other modes of generating mechanical force.
11. The greatest fallacy of all is the supposition that
something is to be desired beyond the most generalized
conjunctions or sequences of phenomena.
It is supposed by many that the possession of a supreme
generality on any subject is insufficient ; the mind, it is said,
craves for something deeper, and this craving (which can
never be satisfied ) is considered to be proper and legitimate.
The generalization of Gravity leaves behind it a sense of
mystery unsolved, as if there were something farther that we
might arrive at if obstacles did not intervene.
Newton seemed unable to acquiesce in gravity as an ulti-
mate fact. It was inconceivable to him that matter should
act upon other matter at a distance, and he therefore desired
a medium of operation, whereby gravity might be assimilated
to Impact. But this assimilation has hitherto been impracti-
cable ; if so, gravity is an ultimate fact, and its own sufficing
and final explanation.
The acceptance of the law of universal gravitation as a full
and final solution of the problem of falling bodies, without
hankering or reservation, is the proper scientific attitude of
mind. There seems no hope at present of making it fraternize
with any other force, and there is no other legitimate outgoing.
of enquiry with reference to it.
In the same way the mysteriousness often attributed to
Heat, is partly resolved by the Theory of Correlated Forces,
under which heat is assimilated to movement. The subjec-
tive fact of heat—the sensation of the mind so described, is a
fact coming under the general relationship of body and mind.
Light is still a mystery in the legitimate sense ; it has been
but imperfectly generalized as regards its physical workings.
Every isolated phenomenon is, in the proper acceptation, a
mystery.
Apparent contradiction is something that demands to be
explained ; investigation should never stop short of the attain-
ment of consistency. Thus, the glacial period of the earth's
history, is at variance with the only hypothesis yet framed as
to the solar agency- the slow but gradual cooling in the course
of ages.
The molecular aspect of the Correlated Forces is repulsion
(as in Heat) , yet in Magnetism and in Friction Electricity, it
appears as attraction.
 MYSTERY OF BODY AND MIND. 127

Free-will is often stated as a hopeless and insoluble contra-

diction . To leave any problem in such a condition is un-
scientific.
The union of Body and Mind has long been considered the
mystery by pre- eminence. The prevailing opinion has been
that this connexion would for ever resist and paralyze explana-
tion. Yet, the scientific mode of dealing with the case is
clear. The material properties and the mental properties are
each to be conceived according to their own nature- the one
by the senses, the other by self-consciousness. We then en-
deavour to assimilate and generalize to the utmost each class
of properties ; we generalize material properties into inertia,
gravity, molecular forces, &c.; we generalize mental proper-
ties into pleasures, pains, volitions , and modes of intelligence.
We next endeavour to rise to the most general laws of the
union of the two classes of properties in the human and animal
organization. When we succeed in carrying this generalizing
operation to the utmost length that the case appears to admit
of, we shall give a scientific explanation of the relationship of
body and mind . Any farther explanation is as incompetent,
as it is unnecessary and unmeaning.
Such language as the following is unscientific :- Conscious
sensation is a fact, in the constitution of our corporeal and
and mental nature, which is absolutely incapable of explana-
tion.' The only meaning attachable to this is, that bodily facts
and mental facts are fundamentally distinct, yet in close
alliance. So 'To this day, we are utterly ignorant how
matter and mind operate upon each other .' Properly speak-
ing there is nothing to be known but the fact, generalized to
the utmost.
' Is there ' says Hume any principle in all nature more
mysterious than the union of soul and body ; by which a
supposed spiritual substance acquires such influence over a
material one, that the most refined thought is able to actuate
the grossest matter ? '
Again, we know nothing of the objects themselves which
compose the universe ; our observation of external nature is
limited to the mutual action of material objects on one another.'
What is the good of talking of a supposable, and yet impos-
sible, knowledge ? *
* See FERRIER'S Remains (vol. II. p. 436), for some pertinent remarks
on the nature of Explanation.
 CHAPTER XII1.

HYPOTHESES.

1. Various meanings belong to the word Hypothesis.

I. It means the suppositions, suggestions, or guesses, as
to any matter unknown, leading to experimental or other
operations, for proof or disproof.
In the course of a research, many suppositions are made,
and rejected or admitted according to the evidence. Kepler
made an incredible number of guesses as to the planetary
relations before he discovered the actual laws. Davy sup-
posed the alkalies to be compounds before he established the
fact by decomposing them .
In the Inductive operation of arriving at general laws, the
supposition made is some law that appears likely to explain
the fact, as Kepler's Third Law (of periodic times and mean dis-
tances). Such suggested laws have to be duly verified
according to the Experimental Methods.
In the properly Deductive operation of carrying out a law
by bringing cases under it, the supposition is an identity, as in
the examples already giver under the Deductive Method.
The hypothesis of a man's being guilty of a certain crime is of
this nature ; the proof consists in the tallying or fitting of the
circumstances of the accused with the circumstances of the
crime (commonly called ' circumstantial evidence ' ) . Of the
same nature is ' the hypothesis of Wolfe with respect to the
origin of the Homeric poems ; the hypothesis of Niebuhr,
with respect to the derivation of portions of the early Roman
history from ballads or epic poems ; the hypotheses of Eich-
horn, Marsh, and others, with respect to the origin of the text
of the four gospels ; the hypothesis of Horace Walpole, with
respect to the character of Richard the Third, and various
hypotheses with respect to the Man in the Iron Mask. So
there are hypotheses, in literary history, as to the authorship
of certain works, as the Aristotelian Economics, the treatise
De Imitatione Christi, the Letters of Junius. In each of these
cases a supposition is made, the truth of which is tried by
combining it with all the circumstances of the case.'
 A HYPOTHESIS DEFINED. 129

These cases contain no matters for logical discussion. They

do not raise the questions that attach to the Undulatory Hypo-
thesis of Light, the Development Hypothesis, the Atomic
Theory, and other celebrated hypotheses.
2. The definition of a Hypothesis (according to Mill) is
a supposition made (without evidence, or with insufficient
evidence of its own) in order to deduce conclusions in
agreement with real facts ; the agreement being the proof
of the hypothesis.
Hypothesis, in this sense, is a defective kind of proof ; there
is some missing link ; and the question is raised, how shall
this be made good in other ways.
For example, in the geological investigation concerning the
transport of erratic boulders, there are various possible suppo-
sitions-icebergs, glaciers, water currents. Now, we may be
unable to get what we should desire, in accordance with the
strict course of experimental elimination, namely, proof of the
actual presence and operation of one or other ofthese agents.
The only resource then, is to compare the appearances
with what would result from the several modes of action.
If these appearances are consistent with one mode only, there
is a certain strong presumption in favour of that one. The pre-
sumption would obviously amount to certainty, if we have
had before us (what we cannot always be sure of having) all
the possible or admissible agents.
In the absence of proof as to a man's real motives, on a
given occasion, we often decide in favour of some one, because
the man's conduct is exactly what that motive would dictate.
The soundness of the criterion depends upon there being no
other motive or combination of motives that would have the
same effects.

3. It is manifestly desirable, in assumptions relating to

natural agencies, that these should be known to exist. The
Hypothesis is then limited to such points as-their pre-
sence, their amount, and the law of their operation.
Such are the hypotheses as to the erratic boulders. So, we
may ascribe an epidemic to excessive heat, to moisture, to
electricity, to magnetism, to animalcules, to bad drainage, to
crowded dwellings, or to some combination of these. The
agencies are real ; every one of them is what Newton termed
a vera causa . What is hypothetical is the actual presence of
9
130 HYPOTHESES .

one or other, the mode of operation, and the sufficiency to

produce the effect. If all these could be established in favour
of one, the point would be proved . If the presence cannot be
proved (the difficulty in past effects) , there must be shown an
exclusive fitness in some one to account for the appearance.
The illustrious example of Gravity may be quoted in its
bearing on Hypotheses. Newton's suggestion was, that celes-
tial attraction is the same force as terrestrial gravity. He
thus proceeded upon a real or known cause ; the hypothetical
element was the extension of gravity to the sun and planets.
The preliminary difficulty to be got over was the rate of
decrease of the force according to distance. From Kepler's
laws, it was proved that celestial attraction diminishes as the
square of the distance increases. Was this true of the earth's
gravity ? The fall of the moon was the criterion, and exactly
coincided with that supposition. Thus, then, the law of the
sun's attraction and the law of the earth's attraction are the
same. The earth's attraction extends to the moon ; may it
not extend to the sun, and may not the sun reciprocate the
very same attraction ?
The wonderful amount of tallying or coincidence in this
case was sufficient in the minds of all men to justify the
assumption that the two attractions are the same. The
hypothesis was proved by its consequences. And, as no rival
supposition has ever stood the same tests, the Newtonian
theory is considered as beyond the reach of challenge.
The rival hypothesis to gravity, in the explanation of the
celestial motions, was the Cartesian vortices, or whirlpools of
ether, which floated the planets round, as a chip revolves in
an eddy of a stream.
The identity here assumed is between the circular motion
of the planets, in what is commonly supposed to be empty
space, and the circular motion of a whirlpool of water or of
air.
The first obvious disparity respects the fluid medium. In
the whirlpool of water we have a liquid mass with density
sufficient to buoy up wood, and mechanical momentum suffi-
cient to propel it in the direction of the stream . No such
fluid mass is known to be present in the celestial spaces ; the
very supposition is hostile to all familiar appearances. A
fluid sufficient to move the planets at the rate they move in
would have numerous other consequences that could not
escape detection. It would mix with our atmosphere as an
active element and produce disturbances on the earth's surface.
 ASSUMPTION OF A NEW AGENT. 131

In this vital circumstance, therefore, the comparison fails ; the

assimilation is incompetent.
A second disparity was brought to light in Newton's criti-
cism of the scheme. The laws of a whirlpool are not the laws
of the planetary orbits ; a whirlpool is incompatible with the
laws of Kepler. Now, we cannot assimilate two mechanical
phenomena, two attractions, for example, unless they follow
the same law of force. This is a vital point in a mechanical
comparison. The following of the same dynamical law was
the crowning circumstance of the likeness between gravity and
solar force.
It would be said, therefore, that the Cartesian scheme did
not assign a vera causa. It assigned, no doubt, a mode of
action quite familiar to us ; whirlpools are a real fact. But
it assumed a material substance unlike anything hitherto dis-
covered ; water we know, and air we know, but the entity
demanded for the vortices is entirely foreign to all our experi-
ence of material things.
4. As it would seem irrational to affirm that we already
know all existing causes, permission must be given to
assume, if need be, an entirely new agent. The conditions
of proof are, in this case, more stringent.
The chief example of this kind of Hypothesis is the
Undulatory Theory of Light.
The supposition of an etherial substance pervading all space,
and by its undulations propagating Light and Heat, as the air
propagates sound, is in accordance with many of the facts of
Light, more especially what is called the Interference of Light,
a generalization of many distinct appearances. The hypothesis
also served to discover new facts of luminous agency.
Assuming what is not strictly accurate as yet, that the
undulatory hypothesis accounts for all the facts, we are called
on to decide whether the existence of an undulating ether is
thereby proved.
We cannot positively affirm that no other supposition will
explain the facts ; what we can say is, that of all the hypotheses
hitherto suggested, this approaches the nearest to an exact
explanation. Newton's corpuscular hypothesis is admitted to
have broken down on Interference ; and there is at the present
day, no rival .
Still, it is extremely desirable in all such hypotheses, to find
some collateral confirmation, some evidence aliunde, of the
supposed ether. This is supplied in part by the observations
 T

132 HYPOTHESES.

on the comet of Encke. If the retardation of that comet, and

other observations of a like nature, establish the fact of a
resisting or inert medium, there will remain, as hypothetical,
the properties of that medium, namely, the peculiar mode of
electricity fitted for transmitting luminous and other emana-
tions.
There is farther to be urged, in support of the hypothesis,
its consistency with the other hypothesis that regards Heat
and Light as molecular movements in the hot and luminous
bodies. The transmission of these influences through space,
by the communication of molecular impulse, is in harmony
with their character as motions in the molecules of the masses
of ordinary matter .
An additional confirmation is supplied in the remarkable
fact that bodies, when cold, absorb the same rays (of the solar
spectrum) that they give out when hot. This is precisely
analogous to the law of musical strings, namely, that, of the
notes sounded by another instrument in their neighbourhood,
they assume each its own note.
5. Some Hypotheses consist of assumptions as to the
minute structure and operations of bodies. From the
nature of the case, these assumptions can never be proved
by direct means. Their only merit is their suitability to
express the phenomena. They are Representative Fictions.
All assertions as to the ultimate structure of the particles of
matter are, and ever must be, hypothetical . Yet we must not
discard them because they cannot be proved ; the proper cri-
terion for judging of their value is their aptness to represent
the phenomena. That Heat consists of motions of the atoms
can never be directly shown ; but if the supposition is in con-
sistency with all the appearances, and if it helps us to connect
the appearances together in a general statement, it serves
an important intellectual function.
The phenomena of the solid, liquid, and gaseous state of
matter can be represented by the opposing play of two sets of
forces the attraction of cohesion inherent in the atoms of
each substance, and the repulsive energy generated by the
heat motions. In crystals, the heat motions are at a minimum,
and in that case, the cohesion assumes a polar character, or is
concentrated at particular points, whose difference of relative
situation makes difference of crystalline form.
The Undulatory hypothesis of Light, even although it may
never be fully established as fact, will have a permanent value
 REPRESENTATIVE FICTIONS. 133

as a Representative summary of the facts of Light ; and may

be gradually carried to perfection in this character.
In a paper by Graham, on the ' Molecular Mobility of Gases,'
published in the Transactions of the Royal Society, 1863,
there is put forward a hypothesis of the Constitution of
Matter. The assumptions are these :- :-
(1) The various kinds of matter may consist of one species
of Atom or molecule, having a different kind of movement in
each substance. This is in harmony with the equal action of
gravity upon all bodies.
(2) The greater the energy or swing of the primordial and
inalienable movements of the ultimate atoms, the lighter the
mass. The leading fact named Density or specific gravity is
represented by this assumption.
(3) These ultimate molecules, whose primitive movement
gives specific gravity, are supposed to be made up in groups,
each group having a farther movement, vibratory or other ;
which second superinduced movement represents the gaseous
molecule affected by Heat, and leading to gaseous expansion.
This Graham also calls the diffusive molecule.
(4) Equal volumes of two forms of gaseous matter, irre-
spective of weight, have a facility of combining ; this is
Chemical Combination . It is a hypothetical expression of the
law connecting Atomic Weight with Gaseous Volume. The
gaseous state is expressed by Graham as the typical state of
matter ; ' the gas exhibits only a few grand and simple fea-
tures .'
The special point of the hypothesis consists in assuming
motions within motions, like primary and secondary planets.
There is no limit to the successive groupings and their charac-
teristic movements . For still more complex properties, new
groupings may be assumed.
A somewhat different hypothesis of Molecular Motions has
been given by Mr. Clark Maxwell ( Phil. Trans . 1866 ) . It
might be superadded to Graham's.
Under the methods of CHEMISTRY, we shall advert to the
hypothesis named The Atomic Theory ; and under the methods
of BIOLOGY, there will occur other examples of celebrated
hypotheses. Also, in the Logic of MEDICINE, the representa-
tive conceptions are brought under review.

The political fiction as to a Social Contract, determining

the rights of sovereignty, is not entitled to the dignity of a
Hypothesis. It is a pure fabrication to serve a political, or
 134 HYPOTHESES.

even a party purpose ; and ranks with the legends in the

ancient Grecian states, relied on as giving validity to the
title of a tribe to its territory, or of a family to the sovereign
power.
6. It has been said (by Dugald Stewart and others)
that the reasonings of Geometry are built upon hypotheses.
The meaning is, that the figures assumed are abstractions,
or ideals, and do not correspond to any real things.
The word ' hypothesis,' is here employed in a somewhat
peculiar sense. It is identical in meaning with ' Abstract,' as
opposed to actual or ' Concrete ' objects. The important
truth intended to be conveyed would probably be given much
better by avoiding the use of ' hypothesis .'
In Geometry, as in all Abstract Reasoning, the essence of
the operation is to view the things in one exclusive aspect, or
with reference to one single property, although, in point of
fact, no object exists possessing that property in pure isola-
tion. The geometrical Point is a mark of position ; we reason
upon it solely as marking position. Every real point, and
even the point that we conceive in the mind, possesses at the
same time a certain magnitude, a certain colour, and certain
material substance. We, however, make abstraction of all
these features ; we do not assume them in any degree ; we
drop them entirely out of view ; we consider ' position, ' in
so far as ' position, ' and make affirmations on that special
assumption. When we come to deal practically with an
actual point, we must re-admit all these properties belonging
to it in its concreteness ; we must allow for the fact that no
actual point can determine an abstract position ; it covers an
area, and therefore does not fix position except by an approxi-
mation.
In Mechanics, there are convenient fictions that subserve
the abstract reasonings of the sciences ; as, for example, the
supposition that the whole mass of an irregular body is con-
densed into its Centre of Gravity-an operation impossible in
fact, but having a practical convenience in mechanical demon-
strations. It is desirable, for certain purposes, that we should
make abstraction of the form and size of a mass, and view
only its weight and its relative position to some other mass ;
and one way of compassing the end is to imagine the form and
the size non- existent, or that the mass exists in a mathe-
matical point. We say there is a certain definite position in
the interior of the earth, wherein, if the whole mass were
 EXPERIMENTUM CRUCIS. 135

concentrated, the earth's attraction for the sun and the moon
would be the same as it actually is. This is merely a verbal
aid to the process of reasoning in the Abstract. The remark
is applicable to all the other abstract centres - oscillation,
suspension, gyration, &c.
7. A fact that decides between two opposing Hypotheses
was called by Bacon an experimentum crucis.
The 'Instantia Crucis ' of Bacon does not properly belong
to the Experimental Methods of Induction. It is the decisive
instance between two contending hypotheses. Thus, when
the Copernican system was brought forward in opposition to
the Ptolemaic, not only was there a necessity for showing that
the new system corresponded with all the facts ; there was
farther required the production of some facts that it alone
could conciliate. The first fact of this decisive character was
the Aberration of Light, a fact incompatible with the earth's
being at rest. Another fact, equally decisive, is furnished by
the recent pendulum experiments of Foucault with regard to
the motion of the earth . Bacon himself, who never fully
accepted the Copernican system, desiderated an ' experimen-
tum crucis ' of this nature, namely, a fact to show that the
velocities of bodies appearing to move round the earth are
in proportion to their distance ; which, he says, would be a
proof that the earth stands still, and that the apparent daily
motion of the stars is real.
The entire absence of mechanical momentum in the rays of
light is regarded as decisive against Newton's Emission
Hypothesis. The most delicate experiments fail to show any
moving energy in the concentrated rays of the sun ; which
failure is inconsistent with a stream of particles of inert matter .

CHAPTER XIV.

APPROXIMATE GENERALIZATIONS AND PROBABLE

EVIDENCE.

1. Probable Inference is inference from a proposition

only approximately true.
Every certain inference supposes that the major 6 is a pro-
position universally true, as all men are mortal,' all matter
136 APPROXIMATE GENERALIZATIONS.

gravitates .' When a minor is supplied to such propositions,

the conclusion is certainly true.
From a proposition true only in the majority of instances,
the inference drawn is not certain, but only probable. ' Most
(not all) phenogamous plants have green leaves ;' hence it is
probable that any given class of these plants has green leaves.
The word for such generalities is ' most ; ' the synonyms are
6 6 6
' many,• usually,' commonly,' generally, ' ' for the most
part,' in the majority of instances."

2. If we know the exact proportion of cases in an ap-

proximate generalization, we can state numerically the
degree of probability of an inference drawn from it.

It being known that a certain thing happens in nine in-

stances out of ten, the probability, in a particular case, is nine
to one, or nine-tenths . All the metals, except copper and
gold, are devoid of colour, (being either white or some shade
of grey). The probability that a new metal is white or grey
is as fifty-two to two.
On the supposition that the majority of drunkards are never
reformed, the probability is against the reform of any indivi-
dual drunkard . The strength of the probability depends upon
our estimate of the comparative numbers. If this estimate is
vague and uncertain,-if we cannot say whether the reformed
drunkards number one fiftieth, one twentieth, or one-fourth of
the whole,—our estimate of the probability in the given in-
stance is correspondingly vague.
What Hobbes says of Charles II—
Nam tunc adolescens
Credidit ille, quibus credidit ante Pater-
is true of the vast majority of men even in the most enlightened
countries . Hence a strong probability that any given indi-
vidual has never exercised any independent judgment in
politics or in religion . A hundred to one is a safe estimate of
such a probability.
It is an approximate generalization that both intelligence
and independent thought are most frequent in the middle.
ranks of society. The generalization has in its favour deduc-
tive as well as inductive evidence. We know the circum-
stances adverse to those qualities in the highest, and also in
the lowest, ranks. Still, it is but approximate, and yields
only probability in every given application . Like all proba-
bilities, however, if applied to masses, it gives certainty. The
 PROBABLE INFERENCES. 137

collective action of a middle class body would be more intelli-

gent and independent than the action of the other classes.
The proposition is approximately true that the wealthy are
more virtuous than the indigent. There are numerous excep-
tions, but the evidence is sufficient to prove the rule as an
approximate generalization. The only dispute is as to the
extent of it. Direct statistics on the great scale are wanting ;
and the deductive argument consists in comparing the tend-
encies for and against virtue in the wealthy, as compared
with the poorer class—a comparison where, from the vague
nature of all estimates of human conduct, a certain latitude of
expression must be allowed.
The characters of men are described by such general terms
as energetic, timid, tender-hearted, irascible, truthful, intel-
lectual, and so on. Even when most carefully generalized,
these characters are only approximate ; they represent prevail-
ing tendencies, liable to be defeated in the complicacy of
human motives So with classes, professions, and nations.
All the current generalities respecting the characteristics of
sex and of age are mere approximations. Literary and Art
criticism, as expressing the style and manner of authors or
artists, is of a like nature.
The operation of laws and institutions is at best but
approximate. We cannot affirm that the general good con-
sequences follow in every instance. The tendency of severe
punishments is to deter from crime ; they may do so in nine
cases out of ten, or ninety-nine out of a hundred. It is the
duty of the state to seek out the mode that approximates
most to the desired end . In such a case, statistics give a kind
of numerical precision to the general tendency, and a corres-
ponding exactness to the inference of probability.
The very best institutions have to be defended on the
ground of superior good, not of absolute or unexceptional
good . This is all that can be said for liberty as against re-
straints, for responsible government as against despotism.
Proverbial sayings are for the most part but rude approxi-
mations to truth. Many of them can hardly be said to have
a preponderance of cases on their side. ' The more haste, the
less speed ' is not true in the majority of instances ; its merit
is chiefly as an epigrammatic denial of the universality of the
rule that activity succeeds in its object. We often take delight
in parading the exceptions to approximate generalities ; and
not a few of our proverbs are occupied with the representation
of minorities. Tallyrand's ' No zeal ' is incorrect as a rule ;
138 APPROXIMATE GENERALIZATIONS .

the rule that it crosses, however, is but approximate, and has

exceptions ; the point of the saying lies in suggesting these.
3. It is a legitimate effort to endeavour to make the
approximation of a rule as close as possible, before apply-
ing it to cases . This can be done in various ways.
(1 ) An approximate generalization is rendered absolutely
certain in its scope, when all the exceptions can be enumer-
ated ; as in grammar rules, and in Acts of Parliament contain-
ing schedules of exceptions.
(2) A very near approximation can be made if we know the
exact occasions and circumstances where the rule holds. Thus
that ' Honesty is the best policy ' is in the abstract only a
rough generalization ; it is far from the exact truth. But we
are able to assign the specific circumstances where it holds
good more nearly. The honesty ' should exactly correspond
to the standard of the time, not rising above, and not falling
below the established code. It should be apparent and not
concealed from view. It should contribute something to the
advantage of persons of weight and influence. Thus limited
and qualified, the approximation is very near the truth ; yet
not altogether true. The dishonest successful men are still
sufficiently numerous to constitute a standing exception to the
maxim.
The Proposition Knowledge is virtue ' was maintained in
the Socratic school. It is an appproximate generalization,
giving a certain small probability in its applications. That it
has the truth on its side is proved by the statistics of crime ;
the majority of criminals coming from the least instructed
part of the population . Still, the exceptions are numerous.
We know from deductive considerations that virtue does not
spring directly from the knowing faculties ; the filiation is in-
direct or circuitous . The best application of so slight a pro-
bability is to take it with concurring probabilities. The
conditions of a virtuous character can be stated with consider-
able precision, while intellectual culture also is an element
whose value can be assigned . Hence, in applying the rule to
a known case, we can infer with a far higher probability, than
could be given by any one approximate generality, as to the
virtuous tendencies of knowledge, of parentage, of occupation,
and other circumstances. We can unite all the presumptions
into one still stronger.
It is a usual defect of empirical generalities that the sub-
ject of them is badly defined, or that the circumstances where
 INCREASED APPROXIMATIONS. 139

the predicate holds cannot be exactly specified . This is a

common defect in the practice of medicine. A drug has a
certain efficacy in the majority of instances, and is therefore
only probable in its consequences. A higher knowledge
would give the exact conditions wherein it succeeds, which
would be to convert the approximation into certainty.
So in Politics. Certain institutions, as for example Free
Government, are good for nations generally. In some cases,
they fail. It is for political science to specify accurately the
circumstances where they are suitable, and those where they
are unsuitable ; by which means we may attain to rules of a
certain, or nearly certain character.
It is commonly said that being educated at a public school
developes particular manly virtues, as self-reliance, courage,
&c. This is but an approximate generalization . If we had
the comparative numbers of the successes and the failures, we
could assign the probability in a given instance. Still better,
however, would be the enquiry, what are the circumstances
wherein the effect would arise ; what kind of youths would be
operated on in the salutary way ?
It is an approximate generalization that absolute sovereigns
abuse their power ; it is true, in a large majority of instances,
but not in all instances. It can be converted into a still closer
approximation, if we can assign the particular situation of an
individual sovereign-the motives operating upon him person-
ally, either as encouraging or as checking the despotic vices.
Hence, by a series of provisos (as Mr. Mill remarks) we may
render an approximate rule, an almost certain rule : —An
absolute monarch will abuse his power, unless his position
makes him dependent on the good opinion of his subjects, or
unless he is a person of unusual rectitude and resolution, or
unless he throws himself into the hands of a minister posses-
sing these qualities.'
4. Approximate generalizations give an opening to the
bias of the feelings, and to the arts of a sophistical reasoner.
It is impossible to deal fairly with an approximate genera-
lization, except by forming some estimate, the best that can
be had, of the instances on one side and on the other. This
is often difficult even to the most candid and painstaking
truth-seeker. Nothing then is easier than to turn away the
mind from a part of the instances, and to decide upon the
remainder. Any strong feeling has this blinding efficacy.
For example, our Patent Law has raised a certain number of
140 ANALOGY.

persons to wealth ; it has stimulated a certain number to

inventions, whether profitable or not to the inventors ; it has
induced a certain number to waste their lives in unproductive
and hopeless enterprises : it has obstructed , in certain instances,
the introduction of improvements . Whether the law has
been good or evil on the whole, depends upon the relative
number of these various instances. Now, it would be most
difficult to attain an exact comparative estimate in such a ques-
tion. How easy then for any one to incline to the instances
favouring a preconceived theory, and to pay no heed to the rest ?
The arts of the pleader suit themselves to this situation.
By dwelling upon and magnifying the instances in one side,
by ignoring and explaining away those in the other, a skilled
advocate reverses the state of the numbers in the approximate
generalization, making the minority seem the majority. The
reply needs to be conducted so as to redress the distorted
estimate. (For the practical applications of Probability to
Testimony and other Evidence, see APPENDIX I.).

CHAPTER XV.

ANALOGY.

1. The foundation and justification of all inference is

Similarity. The similarity may exist in various forms
and degrees, and the validity of the inferences will be.
modified accordingly.
When two situations are exactly the same, the uniformity
of nature leads to the same consequences. Place equal weights
in a balance so as to make an exact equipoise. Shift the
point of suspension to one end, and that end will rise and the
other fall, every time that the change is made. A great deal
of variety may be introduced into the experiment, with the
same result. The rod may vary in length, and in material,
and the weights may be small or great : so that we may have
sameness in the result without sameness of the antecedents.
Again, having seen a great many animals die, we infer that
other animals living and to be born will die ; the resemblance,
together with nature's uniformity, being the justification.
But there are often wide disparities between the instances
observed and the instances inferred.
 INDUCTION IN DIFFERENCE OF, SUBJECT. 141

It was, however, the object of the experimental methods to

eliminate the essential parts of a causal situation from the
non-essential parts. In the midst of all the various forms of
the experiment with the balance, we find, by the use of the
methods, that the one circumstance that disturbs the equipoise
is to remove the point of suspension from its central position
in the beam ; that the size and material of the beam, the size
and material of the weights, are unessential circumstances. So
with animal life ; the fact called organized life is the fact ac-
companied with mortality ; the forms and sizes of animals,
their being vertebrate or invertebrate, are inductively elimin-
ated as unessential.
An inductive inference is thus an inference from sameness in
certain particulars, shown by induction to be the particulars
always present when some consequence or collateral is pre-
sent. This is an inference by identity, a perfect induction.
2. There may be a radical difference in the subjects of
two compared phenomena without preventing a strict In-
ductive inference. The sole condition is that the same-
ness apply to the attribute found by induction to bear the
consequence assigned.
To say ' there is a tide in the affairs of men ' is to use a
mere metaphor, the subjects compared being totally distinct.
Now, to reason from one subject to another of a different kind,
might be called reasoning by Analogy ; yet, the inference
might be such as to deserve the name of induction. Great
as is the difference between the march of human history, and
the flow of the tides, still, if the two phenomena exactly re-
sembled in the single feature of ebbing and flowing, and if no
inference were drawn , except what this feature involved , the
argument would be a sound and strict induction. If human
affairs in any way are truly describable as ebbing and flowing ,
we are entitled from one movement to predict the following.
If periods of great public excitement in special topics as
Liberty, Religion , aggressive War, are followed by periods of
apathy, there is a species of tidal movement, and the laws of
the tides may so far be applied to the case, by a legitimate
induction, or else by a deduction founded on an induction.
The Chinese profess to found their government on the
paternal principle, and to justify their peculiar form of despot-
ism on the similarity of the state to a family. The argument
is not inductive ; there is a failure in essential points. It is a
crude metaphor. There is a certain important similarity,
 142 ANALOGY.

namely, the fact of government, involving authority, superior-

ity, and punishment ; and any inferences drawn upon this
single circumstance would be valid. Certain of the merits
and of the demerits of government are identical in both
instances ; the graduation of punishment to offence, consist-
ency and fairness on the part of the ruler to the ruled, are
equally required in the family and in the state. But it is not
an inductive inference to say that because the parent is
despotical, so should the state. The two cases do not agree
in the point whence the despotical relation flows ; in the
family, the subjects of government are children ; in the state,
the subjects are grown men, on a level with the rulers. The
inference would require the case of a very ignorant and
degraded community ruled by a wise and high-minded caste.
To whatever degree a nation approximates to this state of
things, there is an identity between it and the family relation-
ship.
Plato's comparison of the state to an individual man is not
an analogy in the proper sense of the term. It is one of those
figurative resemblances where the points of agreement and of
disagreement are perfectly ascertainable, and where there is
no element unknown. Any one can tell whether the inferences
drawn from the comparison follow from the points of agree-
ment. That there should be a three-fold classification of
citizens in the state, cannot be inferred or confirmed by an
analysis of the mind into three leading functions. The con-
stitution of a state has nothing in common with the divisions
of the mental powers of an individual man.
The same remark is applicable to another favourite com-
parison of Plato's-virtue to health. The resemblance is
exceedingly slight ; yet, if nothing were inferred but what
grew out of that resemblance, we could not object to the use
of the comparison. But Plato's theory of punishment derived
from it supposes a likeness that does not hold ; and the theory
is refuted by exposing the dissimilarity.
The Ancient Philosophy was full of these misapplied com-
parisons, improperly termed analogies .
Speaking with reference to the early growth of Law, Mr.
6 Analogy,
Mayne observes : · the most valuable of instru-
ments in the maturity of jurisprudence, is the most dangerous
of snares in its infancy. Prohibitions and ordinances, ori-
ginally confined, for good reasons, to a single description of
acts, are made to apply to all acts of the same class, because
a man menaced with the anger of the gods for doing one
 PROPER MEANING OF ANALOGY. 143

thing, feels a natural terror in doing any other thing remotely

connected with it. After one kind of food has been interdicted
for sanitary reasons, the prohibition is extended to all food
resembling it, though the resemblance occasionally depends on
analogies the most fanciful. So, again, a wise provision for
insuring general cleanliness dictates in time long routines of
ceremonial ablution ; and that division into classes which at a
particular crisis of social history is necessary for the main-
tenance of national existence degenerates into the most disas-
trous and blighting of all human institutions- Caste.'
Analogy has been often defined ' resemblance in relations : '
as when a wave of water is said to be analogous to an undu-
lation of air, or of ether ; or a magnet is compared to a
charged Leyden jar because of the common polar condition.
This definition is objectionable chiefly on the ground of
vagueness. The word ' relation ' is too general for a precise
statement of the case. What truth or fitness there is in the
expression can be given in other ways.
3 Analogy, as different from Induction, and as a dis-
tinct form of inference, supposes that two things from
resembling in a number of points, may resemble in some
other point, which other point is not known to be con-
nected with the agreeing points by a law of causation or
of co-existence.
If two substances agree in seven leading properties, and
differ in three, the probability of their agreeing in some
eleventh property (not known to be connected with any of the
ten) is, with reference to the known properties, seven to three.
But this rule would be modified by the consideration of the
number of properties still remaining to be discovered, a cir-
cumstance necessarily indefinite. If we had reason to suppose
that a large number of properties still remained undiscovered ,
the probability could not be stated with the same fixity or
confidence.
4. An argument from Analogy is only Probable. The
probability is measured by comparing the number (and
importance) of the points of agreement with the number
and importance of the points of difference ; having respect
also to the extent of the unknown properties as compared
with the known.
No Analogy can amount to full proof ; very few give even
a high probability. It may afford,' says Reid, a greater or
 144 ANALOGY.

less degree of probability according as the things compared

are more or less similar in their nature ; but it can afford
only probable evidence at the best.'
The natural Kinds afford the best examples of the typical
case of Analogy. They have numerous properties, known
and unknown ; extensive agreements prevail among groups
of them, together with differences more or less numerous.
Thus, sodium and potassium have numerous points of agree-
ment, and a few points of difference. There would, therefore,
be a certain amount of probability that any effect due to
sodium, or a given compound of sodium, might arise from
potassium, or the same compound of potassium.
The celebrated guess of Newton, as to the Diamond, which
was afterwards verified by experiment, was not an analogical
inference in the strict sense. Had the inference been from a
single body, as an oil, to the diamond (the point of agreement
between them being unusual refracting power) , the resem-
blance would have been too limited even for a guess. The
application to the Diamond was the carrying out of an
Empirical Law, partially, if not wholly proved . The circum-
stance that arrested Newton's attention was that the refracting
power of bodies is very nearly as their densities excepting that
unctuous and sulphureous bodies refract more than others of the
same density. Having obtained measures of the refractive
powers of the densities of twenty-two substances, varying in
density between air and diamond, he found that they fell into
two classes. In one class, were topaz, selenite, rock- crystal,
Iceland-s-spar, common glass, glass of antimony, common air : in
all which, the refracting powers are almost exactly as the
densities, excepting that the refraction of Iceland- spar is a
little more than the proportion. In the second class were
camphor,
" olive oil, linseed oil, spirit of turpentine, amber, which
are, he 6 said,' ' fat, sulphureous, unctuous bodies, ' and diamond
which probably is an unctuous substance coagulated ; ' all
these, compared together, have their refractive powers almost
exactly proportioned to their densities. But now, when the
two classes are compared, the refractive powers of the second
class (the unctuous substances) are twice or thrice as great,
in proportion to their densities, as the refractive powers of the
first class. Water has a middle position between the two
classes ; salts of vitriol may stand between the earthy sub-
stances and water ; and spirit of wine between water and the
oils. The suggestion as to the diamond thus arose from its
position among a number of highly refracting bodies that
 EXAMPLES OF ANALOGY. 145

agreed in being of an inflammable or combustible nature.

The concurrence of high refracting power with inflammability
was an empirical law ; and Newton perceiving the law,
extended it to the adjacent case of the diamond. The remark
is made by Brewster that had Newton known the refractive
powers of the minerals greenockite and octohedrite, he would
have extended the inference to them, and would have been
mistaken.
As an example of Analogy proper let us suppose the Balsam
of Peru to possess certain properties, medicinal or other.
Suppose next, that the balsam of Tolu agrees in a great number
of these, but differs in one or two important or unimportant
properties. On this proposition, we should ground a very
considerable presumption, that the one might replace the other
in new and untried applications in Pharmacy.
The illustration might be extended to Vegetable and to
Animal species . A quadruped resembles a human being in
very many points of structure and function, but also differs
in a considerable number ; while there may be undiscovered
properties in both. This reduces to a weak probability
all inferences from one to the other as to the suitable kinds of
food, liability to disease, or medical treatment. Experiments
on animals may cast light on the human subject, provided we
know that the particular organs are constructed nearly alike
in both, as in the connexions of the nerves, the breathing, the
digestion, &c. The function of the saliva and of the gastric
juice has been studied by experiments on dogs and on horses .
In a recent set of experiments on the action of mercury, dogs
were operated on ; care having been first taken to ascertain
that they agree with human beings in the mercurial symptom
of salivation.
It is interesting to determine whether our inference from
man to the lower animals as to the possession of conscious-
ness, is an induction or only an analogy. We believe that, in
human beings, consciousness is always associated with certain
external manifestations, called the signs of feeling, and with
an internal structure of brain, senses, and muscular organs.
This we hold to be an inductive uniformity completely estab-
lished as regards human beings. The induction extends to
differences of degree ; with fewer and feebler manifestations ,
and a smaller brain than usual, we couple a feebler degree of
the mental functions. Now, the physical part is found in the
brutes ; some approximating more, and some less, closely to
the human type. It would seem, therefore, that by induction,
10
146 ANALOGY.

and not by analogy, we are to infer the existence of conscious-

ness in the animals, with modifications of degree only.
Mind and Body are of opposite nature ; they are the greatest
of all contrasts. Yet there are points of analogy that have
been made use of to furnish language and illustration from
the one to the other. As in material phenomena, we may
have a plurality of forces conspiring or opposing each other,
the resultant being arithmetically computable, so in mind we
have motives uniting or opposing their strength, the effect
being computable (although not with numerical exactness) by
adding together those on each side, and noting which is the
larger amount. Reid has objected to this comparison, re-
marking that ' the analogy between a balance and a man
deliberating, though one of the strongest that can be found
between matter and mind, is too weak to support any argu-
ment.' Yet, if the analogy is trusted only to the extent of the
similarity, there is no good objection to making an inference
from it. Now, the similarity is complete as far as regards the
cumulative effect of concurring motives, and the neutralizing
or frustrating effect of opposing motives. Whatever power a
given motive adds to a man's volition when it concurs, it
must subtract or withdraw when it opposes.
The intrusion, by Aristotle and by Kant, of phraseology
derived from the intellect, into the domain of the feelings and
the will, may be pronounced an improper identification, or an
abuse of analogy. Aristotle's syllogism of the Will, and
Kant's categorical Imperative, point to no real resemblance ;
a syllogism expresses an argument conducted by the reason-
ing faculty ; it has no relevance or suitability to express the
decisions of the will.
Reflex Actions may be profitably compared with Voluntary
Actions, if we confine ourselves to the points of similarity.
The Reflex is the voluntary with consciousness suppressed or
made unessential ; on the corporeal side, there is a consider-
able amount of resemblance, or still better, a gradation or
continuity.
Until recently, the sun was considered to be only analogi-
cally compared to terrestrial fires. The points of agreement,
in giving forth radiant heat with light, are ofthe most essential
kind ; but there was supposed to be a disparity also vital. It
was conceived that the sun gave forth its vast flood of
radiance, with no diminution of intensity. Now, every hot
body on the earth cools by radiation. Until this serious dis-
parity was got over, scientific men felt that all inferences from
 ANALOGICAL HYPOTHESES. 147

terrestrial bodies to the composition of the sun were rash and

unauthorized.
Much speculation has been expended on the question- Are
the planets inhabited ? The argument is at best analogical ;
and there is not even the force of analogy except with refer-
ence to a small number. Bodies, like the moon, possessing no
water and no atmosphere, must be dismissed at once . The
planets generally appear to possess atmospheres.
We seem justified, however, in making a summary exclusion
of the near and theremote planets, on the ground of temperature.
All organized life known to us, is possible only within narrow
limits of temperature ; no animal or plant can exist either in
freezing water or in boiling water. Now, the temperature of
Mercury must in all likelihood be above the boiling point,
even at the poles, and the temperature of Uranus, and of
Saturn, below freezing at the equator. The constituent ele-
ments being now shown to be the same throughout the solar
system- Carbon, Oxygen, Hydrogen, &c., we are not to pre-
sume any such departure from our own type oforganized life as
would be implied by animals and plants subsisting in these
extremes of temperature. On the supposition that the sun's
temperature has steadily decreased, and is still decreasing, by
radiation, the day of living beings is past for Uranus and
Saturn, and perhaps for Jupiter ; it is not begun for Mercury.
Confining ourselves, therefore, to the neighbouring planets,
and referring to the others only for the periods, past or future,
when the capital circumstance of temperature is suitable, we
have an analogical argument as follows. Venus and Mars are
gravitating masses like the earth, containing, we may now say
with certainty, the same materials as this globe-solid, liquid,
and gaseous. But we cannot tell the precise arrangement of
the constituent substances ; and, seeing that with ourselves so
much depends upon the mere collocation and amount of such
elements as oxygen and carbon, we may consider that the un-
known properties of the supposed planets are considerable in
number, and serious in character. The probability arising out
ofthe points of agreement, ifnot greatly affected by known dif-
ferences, is reduced by this large element of the unknown.
Many Hypotheses are of the nature of analogies or compari-
sons, the degree and value of the resemblance being more or
less uncertain. Thus, to refer to the undulatory hypothesis
of Light. When Newton explained the waves of water, and the
vibrations of the air in sound, by the oscillations of a pendu-
lum, he was assimilating phenomena of the same mechanical
148 CREDIBILITY AND INCREDIBILITY.

character, and reasoning only from the points of similarity .

But when we reason from the sonorous vibrations of the air
to the vibrations of an ether assumed as occupying space, and
conveying light and heat, we work by analogy. It would,
therefore, not be irrelevant to apply the rule of analogy, and
estimate the points of agreement, as compared with the points
of disagreement, and conclude accordingly. On this view,
the hypothesis would have but a small intrinsic probability ;
it would be left in a great measure dependent on the kind of
evidence already quoted in its favour, the tallying with the
special facts of the operation of light.
The first attempt to penetrate the mystery of nervous action
was Hartley's hypothesis of vibratory propagation, based on
the analogy of sound. The comparison was crude and un-
satisfactory ; but there was a certain amount of likeness, and
the inferences founded on that were admissible . It realized
the fact of influence conveyed inwards from the nerves to the
brain, and outwards from the brain to the muscles, thus
suggesting a circle of action, which circumstance alone is
pregnant with valuable conclusions, as appeared after the
discovery of Bell gave new vigour to the conception . The
vibratory mode of communication had no relevance, and any
conclusions drawn from it were unsound. Next came the
analogy to the electric current, which was much closer to the
facts, more fertile in suggestions, and less charged with mis-
leading circumstances. By taking liberties with current
action, something like the liberties taken with the ether in
adapting it for light, we are able to shape a view of nerve
force that fits the actual phenomena with remarkable close-
ness. A third mode of representing the action has been
advanced by Mr. Herbert Spencer, which departs from electri-
cal and chemical action and reposes upon the physical property
called allotropism .

CHAPTER XVI.

CREDIBILITY AND INCREDIBILITY.

1. There are propositions supported by a certain amount

of evidence, that are nevertheless disbelieved. From some
 CONSISTENCY WITH ESTABLISHED INDUCTIONS. 149

circumstance connected with them, they are pronounced

INCREDIBLE.

Irrespective of the evidence specifically adduced in favour

of a certain fact, we often pronounce it credible or incredible ;
in the one case we believe, and in the other disbelieve, under
the same amount of positive testimony. We believe, on a
slight report, that a fishing boat foundered in a heavy gale ;
we do not believe, without much stronger testimony, that a
fully equipped man-of-war was wrecked. It was lately
rumoured that the Eddystone lighthouse was blown down ;
every one felt that the rumour required confirmation.
2. The circumstance that renders a fact Credible or
Incredible is its being consistent or inconsistent with
well-established inductions.
In simple cases, this is apparent. That a child initiated in
crime by its parents should become a criminal, is credible, be-
cause it is highly probable, being the result of a well-grounded
induction of the human mind. That such a child should turn
out a paragon of virtue, as is sometimes described in romance,
we pronounce improbable and therefore incredible. In the
one case we are satisfied with a small amount of testimony,
in the other case, we demand very strong evidence.
We are thus often led to reject evidence at once on the
score of antecedent improbability. We may be in the posi-
tion of refusing a large amount of positive evidence ; as when
a number of respectable witnesses testify that a man after
being immersed in the water for an hour has been resuscitated .
It is to be remarked, however, that in all such cases the evi-
dence tendered is only probable ; it may have a very high
degree of probability, it may be 500 to 1, yet it does not
amount to certainty. It fails once in five hundred and one
times, and is therefore, in certain circumstances, not safe from
rejection.
3. Such well-established scientific inductions, as the
Law of Gravity and the Law of Causation, render wholly in-
credible any assertion that contradicts them.
That Mahomet's coffin hung suspended in middle air, that
a table of its own accord mounted to the ceiling of a room,
are facts to be wholly disbelieved.
All the alleged discoveries of a perpetual motion, or the
rise of force out of nothing, are incredible ; they are opposed
150 CREDIBILITY AND INCREDIBILITY.

to Causation as expressed under the Correlation or Persistence

of Force. All supposed modes of deriving motive power,
otherwise than from solar heat past or present, are incredible.
That any medium of force more economical than the combus-
tion of coal remains to be discovered is all but incredible.
If any one affirms that some change has happened without
a cause, we refuse to listen to it. An exception to this rule is
sometimes claimed in the case of the human will ; but that
exception has never yet been established upon evidence suffi-
cient to cope with the evidence in favour of the law of causa-
tion.
The principle laid down by Hume, that nothing is credible
that contradicts experience, or is at variance with the laws of
nature, is strictly applicable to these completely proved induc-
tions. We cannot receive any counter evidence in their case,
unless of a kind so strong as to reverse our former judgment
and make them out to be mistakes. No mere probability is
equal to this task in regard to the axioms of mathematics, the
law of causation, the law of gravity, and many others.
That every living thing proceeds from a previous living
thing, or as expressed by Harvey-omne vivum ex ovo, is an
induction verified by simple agreement, through a very wide
experience ; rendering spontaneous generation, for the present,
incredible. It is an empirical law, true within all the limits
of human observation hitherto, although we may not be able
to extend it over an indefinite period of time.
Among facts antecedently incredible, we must rank the
spontaneous combustion of a human being, which is totally
inconsistent with the constitution of the animal body.
It has been alleged by witnesses that the mummy corn of
the Egyptian pyramids has been sown and been productive.
To a botanist, the assertion is wholly incredible. Seeds two
centuries old are so completely changed as to lose their
fertility.
There appears to be unexceptionable testimony to the prac-
tice of the Indian Fakeers, in allowing themselves to be buried
for a number of days, after which they are dug out alive.
This would be wholly incredible, but for the knowledge that
we have of such states as trance, or lowered animation, which
dispense with food altogether for a time, and require only the
minimum of oxygen.
It is alleged by travellers that certain tribes subsist upon
earth as food. This is admissible, only on the supposition
that the earth contains a quantity of organic products, such
 COMPARISON OF PROBABILITIES. 151

as starch, sugar, albumen, or their equivalents. That any

human being or animal could live upon the purely inorganic
matters of the soil is to be wholly disbelieved.
The phenomena of clairvoyance are all in the position of
antecedent incredibility. That any one should see with the
eyes bandaged is at variance with the conditions of vision as
established by all the authentic experience of the human race.
Yet this has been affirmed by multitudes of witnesses . The
testimony of witnesses, however, in such a matter cannot be
received. The sole condition of admitting such a fact would
be (what has never yet been attempted ) a rigorous verifica-
tion according to the methods of experimental science. So
with the other facts of the same class- prophetic dreams,
visions or intimations of events at a distance. These are all
opposed to well-established inductions.
4. When a fact with a certain amount of evidence in
its favour, is opposed, not to an established induction, but
to an approximate generalization or probability, the case
is one of computation of probabilities.
What is only probable, or approximately true, has excep-
tions ; an opposite assertion, therefore, may be credited, if
supported by a still higher probability, or by a generalization
approximating still more to certainty. A fact true ninety-
nine times in a hundred is not to be set aside by an opposing
testimony correct only nine times in ten.
In an age when physical laws were imperfectly understood,
when the law of causation itself was not fully verified, the
phenomenon of witchcraft stood between opposing probabili-
ties . There was no inductive certainty on the one hand, to
controvert the mere probabilities of human testimony on the
other. The physical knowledge even of Bacon was not
enough to render the testimonies in support of witchcraft
wholly incredible, although it might have stamped these with
inferior weight and cogency.

5. The allegations of travellers as to new species of

plants, or of animals, are credible or incredible accord-
ing as they affirm what contradicts, or what does not con-
tradict, laws of causation or of co - existence.
There are certain peculiarities of structure that are involved
as cause and effect in the animal system . An animal species
must have an organ for receiving and digesting food, a respira-
152 CREDIBILITY AND INCREDIBILITY .

tory organ, a means of reproduction . Any contradiction to

these must be absolutely rejected.
Next in point of evidentiary force are the typical peculiarities
of the order, as the four limbs in the higher vertebrata. An
animal of the higher tribes, with both wings and arms, would
present an incredible combination ; there might not be absolute
incompatibility, but there would be such a departure from the
type as experienced, that it could not be received on less
authority than ocular inspection fortified against every possi-
bility of delusion.
New combinations of compatible organs are improbable
only in proportion as they have been hitherto undiscovered.
Flying fish were improbable, but not to the degree of incredi-
bility. The extension of our knowledge of kinds, by showing
new variations, reduces the improbability in favour of other
kinds, within the limits of compatibility. That a ruminant
animal may be found without cloven hoofs is incredible, if
these are cause and effect, or effects of a common cause , it is
only improbable if they are co-existences without causation.
Such a co-existence has been widely verified, but not as yet
exhaustively.
A late distinguished historian for a long time doubted the
fact of persons having lived more than a hundred years. He
did not regard the fact itself as absolutely incredible ; but in
the absence of authentic registrations, and the uncertainty of
memory and tradition extending to events a century old, he
considered that the improbability of so great an age had not
been overcome by sufficient counter probabilities. At length
he obtained what he deemed adequate evidence in favour of
centenarians.
6. The assertion of a fact wholly beyond the reach of
evidence, for or against, is to be held as untrue.
We are not entitled to put the smallest stress upon a fact
without evidence in its favour, because, from its being inacces-
sible to observation, no evidence can be produced against it.
To affirm that the centre of the earth is occupied by gold , is
for all purposes, the same as a falsehood .
On the Great Postulate of Experience, we are to believe
that what has uniformly happened in the past will continue to
happen in the future ; we accept uncontradicted experience as
true. But where there has been no experience, we can
believe nothing. We are not obliged to show that a thing is
not ; the burden lies upon whoever maintains that the thing is.
 BOOK IV .

DEFINITION .

The processes having reference to the class, notion, or

concept, have been already enumerated. The chief are,
Classification, Abstraction, Naming (with a view to gener-
ality), Definition.
The class, notion, or concept as already explained, is a
product of generalization . It may be constituted by one
common property, as resisting, moving, white, bitter ; or by
more than one, as house, mind, man.
CLASSIFICATION, in its simplest form, follows the identifica-
tion of like things ; that is, a class is made up of things brought
together by likeness . When the mind attends more particu-
larly to the points of community, it is said to put forth the
power of ABSTRACTION. A name applied to the class in virtue
of the class likeness, is a GENERAL NAME. The precise delinea-
tion of the likeness by a verbal statement is DEFINITION.
The three processes- Classification, General Naming, and
Definition are what we are now to consider. The first-
named process, Classification, has a larger meaning than the
mere assemblage of things upon one or more points of likeness ;
it includes the arts for systematically arranging vast multi-
tudes of related objects, under higher and lower genera, as in
what are called the three Kingdoms of Nature. With a view
to this greater complication, we shall view the whole subject
of Classification last of the three.
As regards the generalization of the Class, or Notion,
in all its aspects, the fundamental principle is stated as
follows :-
Of the various groupings of resembling things, prefer-
ence is given to such as have in common the most numer-
ous and the most important attributes.
This is the basis of natural or philosophical classifications,
154 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

in contrast to insignificant and unsuggestive classifications ;

as in the distinction between the Natural and the Linnæan
systems of Botany. It may be termed the golden rule of
classifying.
We are often disposed to prefer classes on account of their
extent, although the common attributes-the comprehension
or connotation, may have dwindled down to a limited and
unimportant resemblance. Thus, the class ' land animals ' is
very extensive, with little comprehension ; and more insight
is imparted by breaking it up into groups, as mammalia and
birds, each having numerous and important points of com-
munity. The class adherents to a religious creed ' is so
wide as to impart very little information respecting the indi-
viduals ; the sub-classes Buddhists, Mahometans, Jews, Roman
Catholics, Calvinists, each connote a large circle of peculiari-
ties.

CHAPTER I.

CANONS OF DEFINITION.

1. Definition consists in fixing by language the precise

signification-the Connotation- of General Names.
Defining does not apply to the unmeaning name. An arbi-
"
trary name used for a particular object as Sirius ' for a star,
' Snowdon ' for a mountain, ' Samson ' for a locomotive, is ex-
plained only by showing or indicating the thing.*
Nevertheless, from the important consideration already
stated (Introduction, p. 6 ), that even a singular is conceived
by the mind as a conflux of generals, Definition becomes
eventually applicable to individual things. A particular star,
a mountain, a locomotive engine, may be represented and
marked off from all other things by a series of descriptive
names of general signification . For such an operation, how-
ever, the name Description is more appropriate.
It has been already explained ( Part I., p. 71 ) that a perfect
Definition is the whole connotation of the name. Some notions
have one point of community ; some two, three, or four ; some
a great many, as the often-mentioned Kinds ; the proper and
Hence the maxim of the old logicians, ' Omnis intuitiva notitia est
definitio'-' a view of the thing itself is its best definition.'
 FUNDAMENTALS OF DEFINITION. 155

complete Definition must give an account of them all. The

singling out of one or two properties, for the mere purpose of
discrimination, is not a proper or perfect definition.
2. From the very nature of human knowledge, Defini-
tion appeals to the two fundamental principles- Agreement
and Difference, or Generality and Contrast.
I. Every generality must relate to particulars.
II To every real notion, as well as to every particular
experience, there corresponds some opposite, also real.
This is simply the Law of Relativity or Contrast.
As the statement of what is common to a number of parti-
cular things, Definition is essentially a process of generaliza-
tion ; while neither particular things, nor their agreements,
have any distinct meaning, unless there be assignable a dis-
tinct opposite. The act of Defining, therefore, consists of a
generalizing operation, rendered precise at every step by
explicit or implicit opposition, negation, or contrast. If.
throughout the process of generalization, we avail ourselves
of explicit contrast, to render precise both the particulars and
the generalities, that one operation would be enough ; defining
would be generalizing pure and simple, and nothing besides.
But there is often a great advantage gained by viewing, in a
separate and distinct operation, the opposite or contrast of the
thing defined ; and hence we may lay down two canons, or
two stages of the process- the first the canon of Generalization,
the second, the canon of Contrast or Relativity ; or, as Gene-
ralization must enter into both, we may call them the Positive
and Negative Methods. Taken together they show that
Defining is rendered thorough-going, first, by generalizing the
Particulars of the Notion propounded, and secondly, by
generalizing the Particulars of its Negative.

The method of Defining given in the ordinary works on

Syllogistic Logic contains no reference to a generalizing opera-
tion. The scholastic definition directs us to assign (1 ) à
higher genus of the thing defined, and (2 ) the specific differ-
ence, or the distinction between the thing and the other
species of the same genus ( per genus et differentiam) . No
mention is made of the way of obtaining either the characters
of the genus, or the differential characters of the species.
Suppose we were to define Chemistry in this way ; (genus) a
Science, (differentia) having reference to a peculiar kind of
Combination of Bodies, called chemical ;-it is obvious that
156 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

to give such a definition we must scan the subjects ordinarily

included in Chemistry, and, by generalizing them, find an
expression suitable to them all, and to none besides. Hence,
the direction to assign the genus and the difference, merely
relates to the form of expressing the result of a generalizing
operation.
Allusion is made, by Mr. Mill, to a mode of defining by
Analysis,' or by resolving a complex notion into its con-
stituent elementary notions ; as when we define Eloquence-
' the power of influencing men's conduct by means of speech.'
Here, Eloquence is a complex property, resolved into the two
simpler properties, ' exerting influence over men's conduct,'
and speech.' If, however, the enquiry was made, how do
we arrive at this definition, the only answer would be, by
generalizing from the particular examples of eloquent address ;
so that, in point of fact, this method, if it be a method, does
not supersede the processes of generalization.
The analytic statement could, if we please, be thrown into
the scholastic form ; we have merely to adopt one of the com-
ponent notions as a ' genus,' and call the others ' differentia ;'
influencing of men's conduct (genus) , use of speech (differen-
tia). We might even reverse the notions ; ' speech ' (genus),
' for influencing human conduct ' (differentia).
Thus, neither of these two modes of defining can come into
competition with the main circumstance insisted on, namely,
that to define is to generalize. On what occasions, the
generalizing process may be dispensed with, will be a matter
of future consideration.

Positive Method.

3. Canon. Assemble for comparison the Particulars

coming under the Notion to be defined.

By the Particulars are meant, not every individual instance,

but representative instances sufficient to embrace the extreme
varieties.
To define a species of Plants, the botanist collects recognized
examples of the species, including the widest extremes admitted
into it. He compares the several specimens, noting their
agreements, until he finds what characters pervade the whole ;
these he expresses in suitable language, which language is
henceforth the definition of the species. So, in dealing with
the higher groupings- genera, orders, and classes - he follows
 GENERALIZATION OF POSITIVE PARTICULARS. 157

the same obvious plan. Likewise, the zoologist and mineralo-

gist have, in the last resort, no other method.
Further to elucidate defining by the generalization of
the positive particulars, we will select examples such as to
bring out the difficult situations, and will indicate, in the form
ofsubordinate canons, the modes of overcoming the difficulties.
Suppose we have to define a Monarchy. We must begin
by assembling instances of every institution that has ever
been called by the name : the kings of the heroic age in
Greece ; the Spartan kings ; the Roman kings ; the Persian,
Macedonian, Syrian, and Egyptian kings ; the Teutonic
king ; the kings of modern European nations ; the kings of
the negro tribes ; the emperors ; the reigning dukes, mar-
graves, counts, bishops, &c. To these we should have to add
the king-archon at Athens, and the king of the sacrifices at
Rome-mere relics of the ancient kingly government (Sir
G. C. Lewis, Methods of Politics, I. 86). Now, if we confined
ourselves to a certain number of these, we should find the
common fact of absolute or despotic government ; this, how-
ever, fails to apply to other instances, as our modern constitu-
tional monarchies ; and, if these are to be included , the
common features are greatly reduced in significance, being, in
fact, little more than ( 1 ) the highest dignity in the state, and
(2) a participation, greater or less, in the sovereign authority.
But again, if we look to the two last instances -the king-
archon at Athens, and the king of the sacrifices at Rome-we
shall not be able to apply to them even the attenuated com-
munity just given ; there would be required a still farther
attenuation, reducing the points of agreement to utter insigni-
cance.
Now this is one of the most usual situations arising in
the attempt to generalize a notion with a view to definition.
We must be led in the first instance, by the popular denota-
tion of the name ; yet, if we abide by that, we fail to obtain
any important community of meaning. It is in such a per-
plexity, that the golden rule must be called to our aid ; we
must take some means to form a class upon a deep and wide
agreement. If need be, we must depart from the received deno-
tation ; leaving out some instances, and taking in others, until
we form a class really possessing important class attributes.
Thus, in the case of the monarch, we should cut off at once
the mere relics of old kingly power. As regards the rest, we
should divide the instances between the absolute and the
limited monarchies ; there is a large and important community
160 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

word is extended to denote things that have few or no im-

portant points of community. The next example will bring to
view a perplexity of another kind.
Suppose we seek to define a Solid. Summoning to view, if
not all the solids in nature, sufficient representatives of all the
varieties compatible with the name-metals, rocks, woods,
bones, and all the products of vegetable and animal life
denominated solid-we set to work to compare them, and
note their agreement . There is little apparent difficulty in
this instance. We see that, however various these bodies
may be, they agree in resisting force applied to change their
form ; so readily does this strike us at first sight, that the case
seems scarcely worth producing to exemplify a logical formula.
Let us, however, apply the Socratic test -exposing the defini-
tion to the cavil of every objector,-and we shall probably
soon be told of a grave difficulty. The quality, so very
decided in the great mass of instances, is found to have
degrees, to shade insensibly into the state called ' liquid,'
where solidity terminates. Now, at what point does solidity
end, and the opposite state begin ? Is a paste, a glue, a jelly,
"
solid or not ? Is , Hamlet right in talking of this too, too
solid flesh ?'
We have here not a mere cavil, but a frequent and serious per-
plexity. Many couples of qualities, unmistakeably contrasted in
the greater number of instances of them, pass into one another
by insensible gradations, rendering impossible the drawing of
a hard and fast line. Who shall say at what moment day ends
and night begins ? So, there has always been a doubt as to
the exact individual that ends the animal series, and is neigh-
bour to the beginning of the plant series. Sleeping and
waking may have an intermediate state, with difficulty as-
signed to either. The great chemical sub-division into metals
and non-metals has an ambiguous border in the substances
arsenic and tellurium. In the animal system, the voluntary
shades insensibly into the involuntary.
The Greek philosophers displayed to the utmost the in-
genuity that lights upon difficulties ; and this example did not
escape them. They grounded upon it a puzzle named the
Sorites, or heap. A certain heap was presented , which was
fairly designated small ; it was then increased by very gradual
additions ; and the spectator was challenged to declare at
what point it ceased to be small, and deserved to be accounted
large.
There is but one solution of the riddle. A certain margin
 MARGIN OF TRANSITION. 161

must be allowed as indetermined, and as open to difference of

opinion ; and such a margin of ambiguity is not to be held as
invalidating the radical contrast of qualities on either side.
No one would enter into a dispute as to the moment when
day passed into night ; nor would the uncertainty as to this
moment be admitted as a reason for confounding day and
night. We must agree to differ upon the instants of transi-
tion in all such cases. While the great body of the non-metals
can be distinctly marked off from the metals, we refrain from
positively maintaining arsenic and tellurium to be of either
class ; they are transition individuals, the ' frontier ' instances
of Bacon ; in that position we leave them.
There is a margin of transition in the ethical distinction of
Reward and Punishment. In the great part of their extent,
these two motives are amply contrasted ; to bestow a reward
for performance, is a different thing from inflicting punish-
ment for non-performance ; and the withholding of a reward
is not confounded with punishment Yet circumstances arise
when the one merges into the other. A kind parent with-
holds from a child some indulgence originally meant as a
reward , if the indulgence has been so frequent as to become
a kind of use and wont, the privation is hardly distinguishable
from punishment.
When it is said, no man is to be punished for his opinions,
we are not to infer that each person is bound to associate
alike with all persons of all opinions, because to give a prefer-
ence is to stigmatize some at the expense of others. Our not
choosing any one as a companion and friend is not to be held
as inflicting a penalty, or as manifesting disapprobation.
We may farther exemplify the method upon Matter. As-
sembling the various things recognized as material, say solid
and liquid bodies, and comparing them among themselves, we
find a unanimity in these points, namely, resistance to motion
or force applied to them, and exercising power or force when
in motion. All solids and all liquids agree in these features.
They farther agree in being visible and tangible. We must
next bring into comparison the gaseous bodies. Do these
possess the same quality as to resistance and moving power ?
The identity is not at first sight apparent, but becomes so on
a closer inspection ; airs resist motion, and constitute moving
power, although in a comparatively less degree than solids
and liquids. They are not, however, as a class, visible and
tangible ; consequently, either these qualities must be dropt,
or gaseous bodies must be excluded ; we must make our
11
162 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

choice. The decision is not difficult. So exceedingly import-

ant is the material property of Resistance and Momentum
(given in one word- Inertia), that we are justified in making
it the foundation of a class, even although we associate
together things visible and tangible, and things invisible and
intangible .
The next enquiry relates to the Ether, or etherial medium,
occupying all space. Shall this be included in the class
'Matter ? ' If the property of Inertness can be proved to
belong to the supposed Ether, we must include it. On the
contrary supposition, we are in the alternative position already
exemplified ; we must either exclude the instance or attenuate
the defining properties. Now, the only community that
could exist between an unresisting Ether and Matter would
be this very general circumstance, namely, being an extended
medium for the operation of forces. The supposed ether con-
veys light and heat, and is therefore a transitory embodiment
of molecular force, as solids, liquids, and gases, are of force,
both molar and molecular. Better, however, on this extreme
supposition, not to class the Ether with Matter, but to leave,
as the defining property of Matter, the all-important fact des-
cribed by Inertia.

The foregoing instances under the Positive Canon are

enough to show Definition in its primary character as a general-
izing operation, and also to bring out the leading difficulties of
the process -the adjustment of the particulars to comply with
the golden precept, and the allowance ofa doubtful margin in
cases where opposites pass insensibly into each other.

Negative Method.

4. Canon.-Assemble for comparison the particulars of

the Opposed, or contrasting Notion .
This amounts to saying that, with the given Notion, we
shall also define, by the same generalizing method, the oppos-
ing Notion. As it is impossible for anything to be precisely
defined , unless its opposite is known, and defined with equal
precision, we must in substance perform the two- fold opera-
tion, whether or not we formally separate the opposing aspects.
The cases where the formal separation is expedient will be
made manifest by a few examples.
It is impossible to place the human mind in a more favour-
able position for comprehending a generality, than by laying
 CONTRAST. 163

out to the view two arrays of particulars-the one represent-

ing the given notion, the other its negative. The notion of
Straightness, for example, is thoroughly set forth by placing
a series of straight objects (of all varieties in other properties)
side by side with a series of bent, curved, or crooked objects.
Supposing the representation of both sides to be complete, the
very utmost has been done to put the learner in possession of
the notion, idea, or concept, called ' straight.'
Let us apply the method to the definition of a Solid. The
positive generalization leads to the expression of the common
attribute thus :-' Solids resist force applied to change their
form .' Try next the negative plan, by generalizing liquids
(and gases). On an adequate comparison of these non- solids,
we are able to say, ' liquids and gases yield to the slightest
pressure, and have no fixed form, except as given by solid
enclosures ; ' which is the exact obverse, and, therefore, the
confirmation of the prior statement with reference to solids.
Reverting now to the definition of Matter, already worked
out on the positive side, let us seek for a negative generaliza-
tion. But what is the negative of Matter ? Most persons
would answer ' Mind ; ' which is true, but not the whole truth.
Matter is indeed opposed to Mind ; but it is also opposed to
Space unoccupied (except by the supposed Ether). The com-
plete opposition to Mind is Extension, whether as resisting
Matter or unresisting Space. We have therefore to oppose
Matter to Space, and ask the definition of Space. Now, on
comparing all our experiences of what we term empty or un-
occupied space, we find this common fact, freedom to move, or
scope for movement ; a definition the exact obverse of the
definition of matter, or of the fact called Resistance or Inert-
ness.
Matter is sometimes opposed to Force. An argument for
the immateriality of mind is founded on this opposition.
Thus Hartley says, matter which is inert, cannot be the sub-
stance of mind, which is active, or a source of power. This
is a pure mistake and confusion of ideas. It takes up one
aspect of Matter - resistance, and drops the other aspect-
momentum. The two aspects are inseparable ; force is mov-
ing matter ; without matter there is no force.
The method of Opposites will be seen to advantage in de-
fining Chemical Combination, the subject matter of the science
of Chemistry. By the positive canon, we have to assemble
numerous instances of the so-called Chemical unions - the
union of oxygen and hydrogen to form water, oxygen and
 164 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

carbon in carbonic acid, &c. The operation would turn out a

very laborious one, from the great multitude of the particulars
to be examined even for adequacy of representation. We
shall, however, suppose that there has been obtained a general
statement of the points of community ; namely, change of
properties, definite proportions, and heat.
We next ask what is Chemical Combination opposed to ?
Of the genus- Combination, what are the species not chemical ?
The answer is Mechanical mixture and Solution (in its broad
phase of molecular adhesion) . We should then have to gene-
ralize these two, and confront the points of agreement with
those above given. Now, we may dispense with drawing a
formal contrast between Chemical union and Mechanical
mixture ; for this reason, that the two are so prominently
distinct as not to be in danger of being confounded. The
profitable contrast is with Solution. Generalizing the instances
of solvent attraction—in common solutions, in alloys, &c., —
we see that although the solidity of a body may be broken
up, or its state changed, it retains the greater number of its
characteristic properties ; salt and sugar, when dissolved, are
the same for most purposes ; the change is comparatively
insignificant. Again, solution may be in all degrees up to
saturation. Finally, solution is usually a cooling operation.
These are the precise opposites of Chemical union. We may
draw up a pointedly contrasting definition in this form :-
COMBINATION SOLUTION
Characters of the Compounds
Merged Retained
Proportion of Combining
Definite Indefinite
Resulting change of Temperature
Heat Cold.
In the above instance, the Negative generalization is the
easier of the two ; the field of instances being sooner over-
taken. The same advantage belongs to the defining of Mind
by the opposite. The particulars constituting Mind are
numerous, various, and complicated ; the particulars consti-
. tuting Extension, the property opposed to mind, are much
sooner gathered up into a general notion, and that notion is
much more distinct and familiar than the properties of mind :
moreover, the community of Extension is single ; of mind,
plural.
Opposing notions, having between them a border of ambigu-
ous instances, are best cleared up by the method of Negation,
 COMPLEX NOTIONS. 165

with pointed contrast. We formerly had to notice the subtlety

of the line that, on some occasions, divides the Notion from
the Proposition ; the definition of a complex notion being
often very difficult to distinguish from a Proposition .
Appetite is not sufficiently defined unless pointedly opposed
to the notion most nearly allied with it- Desire.
The principle of Utility, as the moral standard, is opposed by
Bentham, to the two principles -Asceticism, and Sympathy
or Antipathy ( Sentiment) .
The Plant or Vegetable is defined by a parallel array of
contrasts with the Animal ; and conversely.
Deductive Definitions.
5. When Complex Notions are formed by compound-
ing simpler notions, as in the Deductive Sciences , they
may be defined by stating their composition .
In the Deductive Sciences, as Mathematics, notions as well
as propositions are formed by artificial composition or deduc-
tion. Given the notion triangle,' and the various notions
' right angle,' ' equality,' &c., we can construct the complex
notions right-angled triangle,' equilateral triangle, ' isosceles
triangle.' No reference to particulars is needed for defining
such notions ; we merely recite the elements used in com-
pounding them ; ' a right-angled triangle is a triangle with
one right angle.'
Having the notion ' attractive force, ' and the various numeri-
cal notions, squares, cubes, &c., we constitute the artificial
C
compounds, force as the square of the distance, the cube of
the distance,' and so on.
This is the one grand exception to the principle of defining
by the generalization of Particulars. From the magnitude of
our Deductive Sciences, there is a very large number of such
notions ; and they have been the means of withdrawing atten-
tion from the fundamental process of Defining through the
comparison of instances in the concrete.
We make artificial compounds, not merely for scientific
ends, as in the Deductive Sciences, but also in the exercise of
Imagination, as when we feign gods, demi-gods, demons , dra-
gons, and ideal personages and scenes in poetry. The defini-
tion of these notions also is the statement of their composition.
The Language of Definition.
6. The Language of Definition consists in assigning the
constituents of a Complex Notion.
166 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

The dictionary definitions by synonyms have an inci-

dental value, but are not proper definitions.
The generalizing operation terminates in the seizing of com-
mon features, which have to be embodied in language. Now,
the language used must express some more elementary notions ,
whose combination gives the required notion. ' A solid resists
force applied to change its form -is an expression substitu-
ting for the word ' solid ' a coalition of more elementary and
general names -' resistance,' ' force, ' change,' ' form.' The
definition of Property is- the right of each person to dispose
of whatever things of value they have either acquired by their
own labour, or obtained by free gift or by fair agreement from
those that have so acquired it. ' Here the constituent notions
are ' right, ' ' disposal, ' ' value,' ' acquisition,' ' labour,' ' gift,'
' agreement.'
Liberty is definable as the power of using one's faculties at
will, subject (if Civil Liberty be meant) to not interfering
with the like use in others ; implicating power,' ' faculties,'
' will.'
Thus the so-called method of ' Analysis ' is the method of
expressing every proper Definition . Whether the source of
the definition be the generalization of particulars, or whether
it be deductive as just explained, the wording of it is analytic.
The use of synonyms in defining depends upon the circum-
stance that almost every notion or thing has a plurality of
names, and may be better known by some of these than by
others. There are many names for the fact called ' pleasure :'
joy, enjoyment, delight, happiness, felicity, delectation, rapture,
ecstacy. The less familiar of these names are explained by
the help of the more familiar ; but this is not scientific defining.
7. The scholastic formula of defining-per genus et
differentiam-like Analysis, belongs to the expression,
rather than to the discovery of the meaning of a notion.
Each of the constituent notions expressing a complex notion
is necessarily more general than the compound. ' Three,'
' side,' and ' figure ' are each more general than the notion
' triangle,' which they express by their combination. We
may, therefore, take any one of these and call it generic or the
genus-say ' figure : '' triangle ' is then a species of figure ; and
its differentia or specific marks discriminating it6 from other
figures are given in the remaining characters three ' and
' side,' combined into ' three-sided .' So, if eloquence be
 GENUS AND DIFFERENCE. 167

defined, analytically, as the influencing of men's feelings and

conduct by means of speech,' we might call influencing
men's conduct,' the genus, and the employment of speech,'
the specific difference. We might, also, invert the terms
and make speech ' the genus, and ' influencing men ' the
difference.
This latitude, however, is usually restrained by the circum-
stance that one of the constituent properties is the basis of a
recognized class, already existing. Thus, in defining a circle,
' line ' is the recognized genus, and ' equal distance from a
point, ' the specifying attribute. A great number of classes
and class notions fall under some superior class, or notion, on
some one or more of their attributes. Not to mention the
systematic classifications of Natural History, we may point to
such cases as Painting ( genus Fine Art) , Mathematics (genus
Science) , Prudence (genus Virtue) , Planet (genus Heavenly
Body), Gold (genus Metal) , Whiteness (genus Colour),
Cathedral (genus Building).
Instead of presenting an exhaustive analysis of a notion, or
class connotation, this method supposes that generic properties
are already known, that people are, as it were, educated up
to the point of comprehending the genus, and need only to
have the genus mentioned, and the specific differences stated.
Thus Mathematics is the Science (genus) of quantity (differ-
ence) . Ethics is the Science (genus ) of men's duties (differ-
ence). Painting is the Fine Art (genus) that works by colour
(difference). Poetry is a Fine Art employing the instrument
of language. Prudence is a Virtue (genus) having reference
to the welfare of the individual agent (difference ) . Justice is
a Virtue, involving an equal and impartial distribution of ad-
vantages, according to a received scale or standard . Polite-
ness is Benevolence in trifles. Religion is Government
(genus) by a Supernatural power (difference).
6 Wonder, Fear,
Love, Anger, are of the genus Emotion,6 ' each having a
specific difference.
" Sight is of the genus Sensation ; ' dif-
ference, by the Eye.'
Locke's remarks on the scholastic type are very much in point.
They are in substance these :-When, in defining, we make use of
the genus, or next general word, it is not out of necessity, but
only to save the labour of enumerating the several simple ideas
that such general word already expresses, (or perhaps the shame
of not being able to give the full enumeration). Definition being
nothing but making any one understand by words what idea the
given word stands for, it is best made by giving all the simple
ideas combined in the signification of the term ; and if people
168 CANONS OF DEFINITION,

have been accustomed, instead of the full enumeration, to use the

next general term , it is neither from necessity nor for greater clear-
ness, but for quickness and despatch. (Essay. Book III. Chap. II.)
Ultimate Notions.
8. For simple or Ultimate Notions, the generalization
from Particulars still holds, but verbal expression neces-
sarily fails.
For attaining the notion ' whiteness ' we gather particular
examples of white colour, and of colours not-white. The
conjunct impression of the positive and the negative particu-
lars does everything that can be done to master or to convey
the notion ; we may then attach a name to enable it to be
spoken upon, but we cannot give a verbal definition of it ;
there are no notions, more elementary, whose combination
would give the notion ' white.' So we cannot by any form of
words convey the idea of ' resisting ; ' as an ultimate fact it
can be known only in the actual experience of a comparison
of resisting things.
We may define Equality by Coincidence, but we can give
no definition of Coincidence, we must show it. Any attempt
at verbal expression, by such synomyms as ' agreeing in size,'
6
exactly fitting,' would be illusory.
Succession and Co-existence are an ultimate contrasted
couple, definable only by reference to examples.
Unity and its opposite, Plurality, are indefinable. We
must produce an array of objects with the common attribute,
singleness, and another array of groups, and the comparison
of the two arrays by the observer is the only possible mode of
attaining the conception.
A Mathematical point is indefinable. The definition given.
in books in geometry, ' position without magnitude ' is not
more elementary but more complex, than the thing defined .
The correct mode of defining a point for geometrical purposes
seems to be to indicate to the eye positions or landmarks
where we begin or end a measurement, or make a division .
The knowledge of a point or a position is obtained in the same
concrete examination that gives length and space dimensions.
A line is not definable ; as just noticed, it is an abstraction
derived from comparing extended bodies.
An angle is not definable ; ' inclination ' is merely another
name for the entire notion, it is not a simpler or more elemen-
tary conception. Actual examples must be shown. There is
a mutual implication of a circle with an angle, so that if we
 INDEFINABLE NOTIONS. 169

were made to master a circle in the first instance, we might

then learn an angle by definition ; but in the process of know-
ing the circle we conld not avoid knowing an angle. *
6
Complex ideas,' says Hume, ' may, perhaps be well known by
definition, which is nothing but an enumeration of those parts or
* Our sensibilities in general give us the experiences of Difference and
Agreement ; Quantity, amount or degree , Number, or discrete quantity ;
and Time (Succession is not fully given until we have the special experi-
ence of the simultaneous, an acquired and complex notion).
The Muscular sensibilities, in particular, give Resistance and Motion ;
which, by the farther help of sense experiences, are unfolded into Space
and Co-existence:
Every one of the Senses contains one or more ultimate experiences ; no
one sense can enable us to conceive what belongs to another. What
number of independent or underivable sensations should be attributed to
each sense, we cannot easily say ; whiteness, and the simple colours must
be conceived as ultimate ; while even the compounds and shades of
colour are probably for the most part beyond our power to conceive by
any mere coustructive effort, or apart from actual experience , a circum-
stance that would make the ultimate notions of sight very numerous.
Similar remarks may be extended to Sounds, Touches, Smells, and
Tastes ; under every one of these classes of sensations, there must be a
considerable number that cannot be referred by derivation to others, and
must be separately experienced . Our Organic Sensibilities, in like man-
ner, contain numerous characteristic and independent modes ; hunger,
thirst, repletion, suffocation, headache, rheumatism, &c., are all indefin-
able by analysis, because they are ultimate modes of sensibility. Even
although many of them have a common character, pain, they have a
speciality which can be understood only by being felt.
In the higher Emotions, as Wonder, Fear, Love, Anger, Pride,
Curiosity, we have many compound states. The aesthetic pleasures are a
combination of simpler modes. Still, a certain number of emotions are
to appearance ultimate, as Wonder, Fear, Tenderness, Power ; while
there is an absolute certainty that they could not be conceived without
being actually felt. Moreover, many emotions that the Psychologist is
able to analyze could yet be constructed only with very great difficulty by
the help of the elements alone. A person that never experienced the
sentiment of veneration could scarcely arrive at it by merely being told
what are its constituents.
The elementary experiences of the mind are, therefore, very numerous,
and so, therefore, are the indefinable notions. The varied situations
of human life give birth to notions practically indefinable ; the idea
of a Political Society could not be communicated to any one that had
never been a member of some actual society. Hence, in our attempts to
define Government, Law, Authority, we must make an appeal to the con-
crete experiences of the listener.
When all such cases are taken into account, the notions that are of an
indefinable and ultimate nature must be reckoned by hundreds. Diction-
ary makers have hitherto overlooked this circumstance ; and hence their
pretended definitions revolve in a circle of words, where there should be
a reference to actual things. How vain is a verbal definition of such
words as light, heat, motion, large, up, fragrance, pain, wonder !
* 170 CANONS OF DEFINITION.

simple ideas, that compose them. But when we have pushed up

definitions to the most simple ideas, and find still some ambiguity
and obscurity ; what resource are we then possessed of ? By what
invention can we throw light upon these ideas, and render them
altogether precise and determinate to our intellectual view ? Pro-
duce the impressions or original sentiments, from which the ideas
are copied . '
Locke considers himselfto have been the first to remark that Simple
Ideas are indefinable. By Reid and by Stewart, the merit of first
stating the fact is ascribed to Descartes. Hamilton would trace
it back to Aristotle (Reid's Works, p. 220) : but Mr. Mansel
questions the interpretation put by Hamilton upon the passage
apparently relied on (Aldrich, Appendix, Definition), and quotes a
remarkable passage from Occam, approaching closely to Locke's
position concerning Simple Ideas. Aristotle, says Mansel, may be
cited as an authority for limiting the indefinable to Summa Genera
and to Individuals.
Aristotle's general theory of Definition is much perplexed by
being treated as an investigation of Cause, and by keeping up the
distinction of Substance and Attribute. But, in regard to ' hunt-
ing for,' as he expressed the search after, a definition, he allows
the method of generalization from particulars, as well as the deduc-
tive method, by working down from a higher genus. He also
gives an intelligible distinction between Nominal and Real Defin-
་
ing. The Nominal definition applies where there is no evidence
of the existence of the objects, ' as when we define a purely ima-
ginary being, such as a centaur. This of course could only be a
deductive definition . Real definition applies to things known to
exist and would be most completely exemplified in defining by a
generalization of particulars.
Mr. Mill draws the line between Nominal and Real Definitions
-Definitions of Names and Definitions of Things-by remarking
that the last-named kind, along with the meaning of a term,
covertly asserts a matter of fact. (Book I., Chap. VIII.). The
Real Definition postulates the real existence of the thing defined.
In another place, however (Book III., Chap. V.), while discussing
the hypothetical character of the Definitions of Geometry, Mr.
Mill remarks truly that in order to reason out facts we must shape
our hypotheses to facts ; imaginary assumptions could bear
imaginary consequences, but we need real assumptions in order to
give real consequences .
 CHAPTER II.

GENERAL NAMES.

1. General Names may not be absolutely indispensable

to general notions, but, besides being necessary to com-
munication, they aid the memory in remembering genera-
lities, while without them, we could not combine a number
of distinct notions into propositions and reasonings.
We might discover similarities in nature, and might remem-
ber and act upon such discoveries, without the use of language.
•
We could not, however, impart such discoveries to others.
We might, indeed, in some instances, put the resembling
things side by side, which would make the identifying opera-
tion somewhat easier to those that came after us. By a
similar device, we might indicate a natural conjunction, in
certain very limited circumstances. The powers of fire might
be expressed by putting on one side of a fire, a pile of wood , and
on the other a heap of ashes ; even this would not be intelligible
without pantomime. But beyond the simplest cases, the
attempt at expressing general laws would utterly break down.
Our own recollection of discoveries of identity is vastly
lightened by the use of names. The employment of the same
name to the resembling things, both expresses the things as
individuals and declares their community or likeness ; this
mode of signifying likeness being of all others the least bur-
densome to the memory. The complex and many- sided like-
ness in difference, characteristic of natural objects - the
possibility of including the same object, an orange for exam-
ple, in a great number of classes-renders this easy mode of
keeping the various communities before the mind, of inesti-
mable value. By the use of a few terms- round, yellow, soft,
sweet, we can compendiously grasp all the relationships of the
orange, and make them enter into our reasonings with com-
parative ease. No discovery of identity among objects is
secured against neglect, until joined to a common name, it
can be borne in men's minds by means of this gentle and
constant insinuation.

2. The conditions of general Naming fall under two

heads.
172 GENERAL NAMES.

First. Every name should have a meaning well defined .

The necessity of this is too obvious to need enforcement.
Every science should have all its terms defined . The end of
the Logic of Definition is to fix the meanings of general names.
We find in point of fact that words often possess numerous,
distracting, and incompatible meanings . Take the familiar
term ' stone.' It is applied to mineral and rocky materials,
to the kernels of fruit, to the accumulations in the gall bladder,
and in the kidney ; while it is refused to polished minerals
(called gems) , to rocks that have the cleavage suited for roof-
ing (slates), and to baked clay (bricks) . It occurs in the de-
signation of the magnetic oxide of iron (loadstone) , and not
in speaking of other metallic ores . Such a term is wholly
unfit for accurate reasoning, unless hedged round on every
occasion by other phrases ; as building stone, precious stone,
gall stone, &c. Moreover, the methods of definition are
baffled for want of sufficient community to ground upon.
There is no quality uniformly present in the cases where it
is applied, and uniformly absent where it is not applied ;
hence, the definer would have to employ largely the licence
of striking off existing applications and taking in new ones.
3. The demand for new names is a cause of the loose
extension of words already in use. The processes of ex-
tension are Similarity, Composition, and Contiguity.

( 1 ) The operation by Similarity is described by the name.

A new object is brought into comparison with some one
already known, and the name transferred accordingly. Thus,
on the discovery ofan additional coal-field, all the designations
previously in use in connexion with coal are legitimately ex-
tended to the new formation. More precarious extensions by
similarity are often made . It is enough to mention the whole
class of metaphors, wherein, by virtue of similarity, accom-
panied by serious diversities, old words are employed in new
meaningslight ' Cto signify knowledge, ' fire ' to denote
zeal and irascibility, birth ' and ' death ' to mean many things
differing widely from the beginning and the ending of life in
an organized being.
(2) The process of Composition is shown in framing new
words, by the union of existing words ; as log-book, mince-
meat, hail-stones, far- sighted, and by the systematic employ-
ment of prefixes and suffixes, prejudge, undo, withhold,
boundless, wisdom, bearer, unnecessary .
 TRANSITIVE MEANINGS OF NAMES. 173

The same process is seen in using a plurality of words to

convey a single meaning : as in the systematic designation by
genus and species, white man, moss rose ; and in numerous
many-worded combinations and circumlocutions - ' the last
surviving descendant of an ancient family,' ' the father of
History.'
(3) The process of Contiguity is exemplified in the figure
called Metonymy-as in using the ' crown ' for royalty, the
turf' for horse-racing. So long as the figurative character
of this operation is kept in view, there is no harm done. A
more dangerous employment of contiguity is exemplified in
what is termed the Transitive application of words.' This
operation demands special notice.
4. A word originally applied to a thing, by virtue of one
quality, may contract the additional meaning of some
associated quality, and thence be extended to things pos-
sessing the second quality singly.
This tendency was brought into prominence by Dugald
Stewart, who gives the following symbolical elucidation of it.
·
Suppose that the letters A, B, C, D, E, denote a series of
objects ; that A possesses some one quality in common with
B ; B a quality in common with C ; C a quality in common
with D ; D a quality in common with E ; while at the same
time, no quality can be found which belongs in common to
any three objects in the series. Is it not conceivable, that the
affinity between A and B may produce a transference of the
name of the first to the second ; and that, in consequence of
the other affinities which connect the remaining objects to-
gether, the same name may pass in succession from B to C ;
from C to D ; and from D to E ? '.
The word ' damp ' primarily signified moist, husnid, wet.
But the property is often accompanied with the feeling
of cold or chilness, and hence the idea of cold is strongly
suggested by the word. This is not all. Proceeding upon
the superadded meaning, we speak of damping a man's
ardour, a metaphor where the cooling is the only circumstance
concerned ; we go on still farther to designate the iron slide
that shuts off the draft of a stove, ' the damper,' the primary
meaning being now entirely dropt. ' Dry ' in like manner,
through signifying the absence of moisture, water, or
liquidity is applied to sulphuric acid containing no water,
although not thereby ceasing to be a moist, wet, or liquid
substance.
174 GENERAL NAMES.

The word ' letter ' has undergone a series of transitions.

Originally applied to the alphabetic characters, it passed to
epistolary correspondence, to literature ( letters ) ; but in our
post-office system it has strayed sill wider ; it has come to
mean parcels made up of jewellery, soft goods, and miscel-
laneous wares, provided they are carried by post.
6
Gas ' is the popular name for any effluvia, anything in the
air. Cloud and smoke would be called gaseous emanations,
although neither are properly aerial bodies.
A'back door ' originally the door at the back of the house,
for servants, is applied to the door for the same purpose when
in front of the house.
' Street,' originally a paved way, with or without houses,
has been extended to roads lined with houses, whether paved
or unpaved.
' Impertinent ' signified at first irrelevant, alien to the pur-
pose in hand ; through which it has come to mean, meddling,
intrusive, unmannerly, insolent. So wide is the difference
between the first and last senses, that, in spite of the apparent
ease of the transitions, Mr. Baily suspects the influence of the
similarity in sound with the epithet ' pert ' (Discourses, p.
101) .
Taste ' is transferred by similarity, or metaphor, from the
feelings of the sense of Taste, to the feelings of Fine Art pro-
ductions. There is also, in all probability, a transition in the
double meaning of the word in both employments, namely, to
signify the pleasure imparted, and also the discrimination of
bodies by taste, and of good and bad in Fine Art productions.
Examples may be quoted from the highest questions of
philosophy. Thus, the epithet ' beautiful, properly circum-
scribed by Fine Art, is often loosely applied to pleasures not
artistic.
This misleading tendency was never adverted to by either
Plato or Aristotle, who, in their enquries, counted on finding
under such words as Beauty, Cause, Justice, some unity of
signification. The same mistake pervades Bacon's inductive
enquiries.
The word ' gentleman ' is an example of transitions growing
out of historical and political circumstances. Meaning origin-
ally a man born in a certain rank, it came by degrees to
connote all such qualities or adventitious circumstances as
were usually found to belong to persons of that rank. This
consideration explains why in one of its vnlgar acceptations it
means any one who lived without labour, in another without
 TRANSITIONS BY SIMILARITY. 175

manual labour, and in its more elevated signification it has in

every age signified the conduct, character, habits and outward
appearance, in whomsoever found, which, according to the
ideas of that age, belonged or were expected to belong to
persons born and educated in a high social position.'
Similar changes are traceable in the words ' loyalty,' ' vil-
lain,' ' pagan.'
A ' convict ' properly means one convicted or found guilty ;
but the signification most prominent is the transition to the
state of hard labour entering into the punishment of convicted
felons .
5. The derivations of terms frequently exhibit, in con-
junction with contiguous transitions, an element of simi-
larity.
In an interesting chapter devoted by Mr. Mill to the
Natural History of the Variation of the meaning of terms,' he
notes two different tendencies to change both grounded in
similarity-the one a movement of Generalization, the other a
movement of Specialization.
As to the first, the rendering of specific terms general, we
have such examples as ' salt ' extended from sea salt, to the
"
class of saline bodies ; oil ' from olive oils to oils generally ;
' squire ' from the owner of a landed estate to other classes
supposed to be entitled to a similar position ; ' parson ' from
the incumbent of a parish to clergymen at large.
The Specialization of terms is apt to arise when people
have occasion to think and speak oftener of one member of
the genus than of the others . Thus ' Magazine,' a store or
receptacle, has been narrowed to a periodical publication.
'Cake ' is specialized to pastry. A ' story ' is used to desig
nate a lie-a curious illustration of the frequent inaccuracy of
current narratives . ' Pleasure ' has oftener the signification
of a very narrow class of enjoyments ; to which corresponds a
special meaning of ' virtue' and virtuous. "Wit' formerly
meant intellectual power of any kind ; Bacon, Milton, and
Newton were great wits. The modern tendency is to restrict
it to the production of ludicrous effects, and even still farther
to the ingenious play upon words.
6. The precautions to be observed in re-adjusting the
signification of terms, are these : -First, important mean-
ings in current use, or meanings at the base of important
predications, should not be disturbed ; secondly, the as-
sociations of powerful sentiment should not be reversed.
176 GENERAL NAMES.

In restricting the word ' beauty ' to the refined pleasures

of Art, and of the artistic element of Nature, we do not inter-
fere with any received propositions, nor with the approving
sentiment, connected with the term. The word ' wit,' in its
modern restriction, has undergone a much greater revolution,
and certainly does not support the same propositions, nor the
same associations of dignity as in Queen Anne's time. ' Jus-
tice ' cannot be accurately defined without a reterence, in the
last resort, to law, authority, or command ; or at least to
men's opinions as to what should be authoritatively enjoined
or commanded ; a mode of defining that has always been un-
palatable, as making the illustrious quality of Justice , the
creature of law and opinion.
' Civilization ' should, if possible, be so defined that the
European nations should be included, and the American
Indians, Bosjesmans, and aboriginal Australians excluded ;
while no unfavourable sentiment should be introduced, by
giving preponderance (as Rousseau did) to the supposed evils,
or disadvantages, attending on the arts and discoveries of
civilized nations.
The difficulties attending the re-definition of a word are
illustrated by the repugnance felt by many to Mr. Grote's
view of the sophists ; a view that conflicted both with prevail-
ing propositions and with feelings of dislike. A regard to
truth or to justice may necessitate our violently interfering
with a received usage .
From the strong tendency to associate the word ' pleasure '
with the gratifications that border on vice, ethical theorists
are hampered in using it to express the natural and legitimate
end of human pursuit. They have to substitute for it, happi-
ness, well-being, or other words of more feeble import as
regards the zest and enjoyment of life.
Mr. Mill adverts to cases where he thinks it might be a
great misfortune to banish entirely the former meanings of
words ; inasmuch as the operation may involve the unfair
predominance of a one-sided theory on some important ques-
tions. He supposes the temporary prevalence of a selfish
theory of virtue, the consequence of which might be that the
word ' virtue ' would cease to connote disinterested conduct,
and the very idea of such being dropt, the practice might
degenerate accordingly. The remark, however, has no appli-
cation to the words of obsolete physical theories, as ' epicycle,'
' phlogiston,' ' vis viva, ' or to names that distort and confuse the
phenomena expressed by them, as free-will and necessity, or
 DESCRIPTIVE TERMINOLOGY. 177

to the names of infelicitous classifications, superseded by

better. And in those changes of meaning adapted to the pro-
gress of science, as with the words salt, acid, it is expedient
to drop entirely the earlier significations.
7. The second Requisite of language is, that there should
be no important meaning without its word.
This involves (I. ) a Descriptive Terminology.
It is essential that we should be able to describe with accur-
acy all individual facts and observations ; consequently names
must be devised for all the known qualities of things whether
physical or mental, and also modes of signifying differences of
degree whenever degree is taken into account. To describe
the diamond, we need such names as crystal, refracting power,
specific gravity, hardness ; and a numerical scale for stating
the amount or degree of each property. Separate names are
required for all our ultimate feelings and sensations.
As regards the Object World, the fundamental experiences
are the muscular states called Resistance and Motion, and the
Sensations which, in the order of their objectivity, are Sight,
Touch, Hearing, Taste, Smell, Organic Sensations.
The property called Resistance has other names ; as Force,
Inertia, Momentum. Gravity is a mode of the same property.
The only farther requisite is a scale of Degree, which, in this
instance, is given by the one perfect method - Arithmetical
numbers.
On the experience of movement, aided by sense, is grounded
the object property called Motion, in all its varieties ; also
Space, Extension or Magnitude, and Form. The varieties of
motion are quick and slow, regular and irregular, of this or that
form, and so on. Names are given to all the modes, and for
most, there are numerical estimates of degree. The same re-
marks apply to Space or Magnitude, which is pre-eminently
open to arithmetical statement.
Form is a property subject to great variations, and names
have to be found accordingly. The simple forms of Geometry
-as line, straight, angular, curved , circle, triangle, sphere,
cone, &c., are one department. The objects of nature and art
have many others besides - heart-shaped, egg-shaped, pear-
shaped.
The language of Botany is most exigent of designations of
form .
Colour has been expressed by assuming a certain number
of primary colours, and treating the rest as shades of these.
12
178 GENERAL NAMES,

Thus, we have many different greens, blues, reds, yellows,

greys ; often characterized in the manner above described by
quoting objects that exemplify them, sky blue, ultra- marine
blue, apple green, blood red, French-grey. These names,
however, do not define the colours ; they do not from two
simple ideas enable us to conceive a compound without refer-
ence to the actual thing, they merely mark a species as distinct
from other species .
To make colour as far as possible a precise character in
Mineralogy, there is a classified list, introduced by Werner,
giving a name to every important variety of mineral colour.
Eight colours are chosen as fundamental, white, grey, black,
blue, green, yellow, red, and brown, and under each of these
is arrayed a list of shades. Thus, under ' blue ' are enumer-
ated, -blackish-blue, azure-blue, violet-blue, lavender- blue,
plum-blue, berlin -blue, malt-blue, duck-blue, indigo-blue,
sky-blue ; ten varieties. Similarly for the others ; the number
of shades being in some cases greater, in others less .
For the scientific description of the outer or object world,
the most essential properties are Magnitude, Form, Move-
ment, Resistance (including all the modes of Force), and
Colour. Next to these in importance are Sounds, which also
posess a terminology. The musical notes can be given
numerically and symbolically ; all other varieties of sounds
must be designated by distinct names, as melodious, har-
monious, silvery, sweet, soft, harsh, grating, voluminous,
silvery, wooden- names requisite alike in practical life, in
science and in poetry. In the diagnosis of the chest, there
are characteristic sounds, which receive appropriate names.
Touch proper is cognizant of roughness and smoothness ;
in combination with muscular feeling, it gives hardness, soft-
ness, and elasticity (within limits) . The hardness of minerals
transcends touch ; the harder body scratches the softer ; and
a scale of hardness is formed upon this test. The pulse is
estimated by touch proper, and besides the number of beats,
names are applied to signify its tactile modes -as feeble, firm,
wiry, steady.
Tastes and Odours are provided with names, After indicat-
ing the more general modes- sweet, bitter, pungent, we
descend to the marked individualities, which are named chiefly
(according to the most usual device for supplying terminology)
--
from the substances where they are most marked — acid,
alkaline, sooty, game, spirituous, oily tastes, garlic, spice,
earthy.
 CLASS NAMES. 179

The Organic Sensations - Acute pains, Respiratory feelings,

Heat and Cold, Digestive feelings, &c., have a nomenclature,
partly useful in every day life, and still more extensively in-
volved in the medical art.
Although the Sensations have all an object reference, they
yet each contain subjective elements, becoming more and more
prominent as we recede from sight aud touch ; and being
almost the whole in the organic sensibilities. Hence their
designations are part of the subjective vocabulary, or the
vocabulary of Mind proper. This is completed by a series of
designations for the Special Emotions ; for the Will in its
various aspects -including desires, appetites, deliberation,
resolution, belief; and for the Intellectual processes- idea,
memory, reason, imagination, association, agreement.
8. II. There is demanded next a name for every general
notion, or distinct product of generalization.
The previous demand is limited to the means of describing
every fact belonging to either the object or the subject world.
The present relates more particularly to general notions or
generalities. But though the two ends are different, the
means are in great part the same. All the names of the
Terminology are general names ; they mean qualities in
general, although by their combination they can specify and
individualize. Resistance, Form , Colour, Sound, Taste,
are general ; and their more specific modes heavy, round, blue,
melodious, sweet, are also general. So that the Terminology
already contains a provision for expressing numerous results
of the generalizing operation.
Still, the aim now propounded is so far distinct from the
other, and may require to be separately considered and pro-
vided . The results of generalization are of two kinds - classes
in the concrete, the subject-matter of the concrete sciences , and
qualities in the abstract, which are the characteristic subject-
matter of the fundamental sciences -Mathematics, Physics, &c.
The names for the first department are not provided for under
Terminology ; thus, quartz, gold, oak, rose, fish, mammal, are
radically distinct from hard, yellow, fragrant, warm- the one
group comprises class names, the other the qualifying and
descriptive adjectives.
The Terminology coincides much more nearly with the
names used in the general sciences ; the notions of Mathema-
tics, and of Chemistry (apart from the names of the concrete
substances, gold, &c. ), are all more or less a part of the
descriptive vocabulary.
180 GENERAL NAMES.

9. It is important that the names of generalities should

be short.
The discovery of the relations of general reasoning is facili-
tated by the brevity of the designations. If we had to employ
a long periphrasis for distance, square, gravity, body, it would
be impossible to shape an intelligible notion of the law of
gravitation, still less to combine it with equally lumbering
expressions for tangential force, and for the resistance of the
air, in considering projectiles. The advantages of methods of
abbreviation are illustrated by the mathematical device of
temporarily substituting, for a long formula that has to be
treated as a whole, a single letter, a ; which relieves the mind
of what would be a cumbrous impediment.
De Morgan, with reference to the Differential Calculus, to avoid
the tedious repetition of a quantity which diminishes without
limit when a diminishes without limit,' coined the word com-
minuent.
An important enquiry is started by Mr. Mill ( Book IV. ,
Chap. VI. ) ., namely, on what occasions we may safely use
language as mere symbols, like the symbols of Algebra.
Now, the answer to this question is obtained from the nature
of such symbols ; they are signs of operation, adjusted by
careful verification, so that no error can creep in if the rules
are adhered to ; while the operations are all the more easily
and rapidly performed that the things themselves are entirely
kept out of view. On the other hand, in dealing with general
names, class names, and terminology, we have to keep up a
constant reference to the concrete things, as the only way of
preventing us from incorrect assertions. After a proposition
has once been carefully verified, as ' Knowledge is founded on
Agreement and Difference,' we seem to be under no farther
necessity of referring to the concrete particulars ; which is
true only until we begin to apply it. The Formal Logic
shows us exactly how far, in matters of general reasoning, we
may use language as mere symbols ; being to a certain extent
analogous to Mathematics, although arriving far short of that
science in the possibility of working aloof from all concrete
meanings (See Appendix B. )
10. In devising new general names, recourse may be
had either to our language, or to foreign languages . Each
alternative has its advantages and disadvantages .
The advantage of deriving from our own language is being
easily understood ; the disadvantage is the presence of mis-
 NEW TERMS. 181

leading associations. ' Damp ' would not be a good word to

apply to the gaseous form of water ; ' vapour ' is preferable as
being devoid of inappropriate connexions. When Reichen-
bach conceived that he had discovered an entirely new force
in nature, he coined a word not belonging to any language
odyl. ' The generalization of Graham, comprehending sub-
stances of a gluey, or viscid nature, with flint, and minerals
of the glassy type (showing the conchoidel fracture) is ex-
pressed by the term ' colloid ' (koλy glue) ; the English term
being too exclusively confined to the viscid character.
' Inertia ' is a useful word, although it demands to be guarded
against the too exclusive suggestion of passive resistance.
11. The mere improvements of classification may re-
quire new terms.
This is the case with Graham's Colloids and Crystalloids,
which arranged previously known substances into a new
dichotomy, or contrast, founded on an extensive and important
community of attributes. The improved classifications of
minerals, plants, and animals, required new terms, monocotyle-
don perianth, infloresence, mammalia, infusoria , &c. Owing
to the imperfection of the contrast mind and matter,'
psychologists have introduced the terms ' subject ' and ' object'
as exhibiting the antithesis in greater purity.
12. By adapting old names, we may be often saved from
a new coinage.
The creation of new terms is sometimes wanton and need-
less. When there is no new meaning, no fresh product of
generalization, the adding of new terms is not justified upon
slight pretexts. Apart from increasing the already large
burden of language, there is the more serious evil of leading
people to suppose that there is a new meaning. Some of
Kant's innovations in language are obnoxious to this criticism.
His ' analytic ' and ' synthetic ' judgments ' a priori ' and ' a
posteriori ' have some advantages as synonyms, but the mean-
ings had been already expressed.
A little management may often get over the insufficiency of
the existing names. The evil to be complained of is , that a
popular name does not exactly square with a scientific mean-
ing ; thus the words, force, resistance, motion, affinity, associ-
ation, are adopted into science ; while the popular significations,
so far from suggesting, are at various points in conflict with
the scientific meanings . Even in such circumstances, the
1.82 GENERAL NAMES.

adherence to the popular words may be a less evil than new

coinages. The precautions accompanying the use of old
names are these :-
(1 ) The words may, at the outset, be defined according to
their sense in the particular science. Thus, the mathematician
defines a point, a line, a square, a cone, a spiral ; the physicist
defines inertia, force, velocity, attraction, liquid, lever, air,
heat, &c.
The chemist defines element, compound, affinity, solution,
decomposition. The botanist gives the name ' fruit ' to all
seed-vessels. The biologist defines life, respiration, digestion.
The psychologist defines sensation, idea, memory, association,
reason, emotion, sentiment, passion, conscience ; all which
terms are liable to the loose and uncertain meanings of com-
mon speech. The political philosopher defines government,
nation, law, order, progress. These various terms being
consistently used, in accordance with the several definitions,
they are known to possess the significations indicated, and no
others, within the sphere of their respective sciences.
This plan was followed in framing the language of Geometry.
Names were usurped from common speech, and used in
peculiar senses defined at the beginning of Geometrical trea-
tises. Thus a 6 sphere (opuîpa), was originally a playing
"
ball, a trapezium ' (Tparétov), a table ; but, the scientific
sense being defined at the outset, and rigidly adhered to
throughout the demonstrations, there was no danger of con-
fusion between the popular meaning of the words and the
mathematical.
(2) We may employ, in science, the precaution required in
composition, with reference to names having plural meanings,
which are abundant in all languages ; namely, so to place and
fence each word as to keep back all the meanings not in-
tended . The word ' moral' has various distinct significations ;
yet the use of it in any one place may be such as to admit
only one. When we speak of moral suasion, ' we exclude the
meaning of right and wrong, and indicate only ' mental ' as
opposed to physical . The morality of the act was question-
able, ' shows that moral rightness is intended.
(3) The device of stating the contrary of a term has been
seen to be highly effectual in saving ambiguity. ' Reason and
not passion prevailed ' indicates that ' reason is intended in
the peculiar sense of ' motives resulting from rational calcula-
tion of the future.'
13. III. In addition to a Terminology, and names for
 NOMENCLATURE. 183

all important Generalities, there are names adapted for the

purposes of Classification.

This is Mr. Mill's third class under the Second Requisite of

a Philosophical Language. It refers more especially to the
device of double naming (the invention of Linnæus) employed
with the lowest kinds, or Species in Botany and in Zoology-
' Ranunculus arvensis,' ' Hirudo medicinalis. ' In all the higher
grades the Classes, Orders, and Genera- single names are
used ; but since the number of the objects increases as we
descend, while in Botany and in Zoology, the lowest kinds or
species amount to many thousands, an abbreviating device is
employed, namely, to retain the name of the genus, and desig
nate the species by a qualifying adjective- ' Orchis maculata.'
The saving of language is not the only advantage of the
double-name ; there is the additional effect of imparting the
knowledge of the genus that the species belongs to, and also
the mark or character dividing it from the other species of
the same genus. Thus, a name so made up gives the place of
the species in the classification , so far as effected by stating
the genus . The operation could have been carried farther, so
Order ; thus the com-
as to include the Family 6 or the Natural
mon daisy would be Compositæ bellis perennis . ' But this
would be held too burdensome.
Under the same head is included the double naming in
Chemistry-sulphate of potash, or potassic sulphate. These
designations, however, although serving to impart information
respecting the substances named, are formed upon a principle
quite different from that above explained with reference to the
Natural History sciences. They belong to the special peculi-
arity of the science of Chemistry-the distinction of substances
into Simple and Compound, and of Compounds into different
modes and degrees of union ; and in the case of compounds,
they indicate the supposed elements and manner of composi-
tion ; ' protoxide of iron, ' states that the substance named is
compounded of oxygen (in a certain measure) and iron. There
is scarcely more than an analogy between this class of highly
significant names and the double names of Botanical species.
Double naming has not been admitted into Mineralogy.
Professor Nicol remarks that the science is not yet ripe for
the change. In point of fact, however, Mineralogy is in its
nature more nearly allied to Chemistry than to Botany or
Zoology ; and the double naming if used would not be for
species, but for varieties ; thus magnetic iron ' would not be
184 GENERAL NAMES.

a proper specific designation ; the substance named has a

chemical expression, which will always be preferred .
Expressive names may be employed, apart from any system
or rule, in all subjects. Thus, in the Natural Orders of
Botany, we have such names as ' Composite, ' ' Umbelliferæ,'
which incidentally inform us of some of the characters of the
families named . So, the names of the orders of Birds are all
expressive of some leading feature.
Whewell proposed to reserve the title ' Nomenclature ' for
the designations that we have now been considering. Linear,
lanceolate, oval, or oblong, serrated, dentate, or crenate leaves,
are expressions forming part of the terminology of botany,
while the names ' viola odorata,' and ' ulex Europeus ' belong
to its nomenclature.

CHAPTER III.

CLASSIFICATION.

1. The Methods of Classification grow out of its ends.

I. The sequence of the Descriptive characters should
follow the order of the properties as expounded in the
department.
Considering that a natural kind or species-mineral, plant,
or animal-may have ten, twenty, or fifty characters, great im-
portance attaches to the method of stating them. When we
seek for a principle to govern this arrangement, we find it in
the order of the properties in the general exposition of the
science or sciences where they are discussed . Mathematical
properties would naturally precede physical, physical would
precede chemical, and so on. In an organized being, the
tissues precede the organs ; and some organs precede others
upon the reasons assigned as governing the scientific arrange-
ment or classification of knowledge.
Every classifying science has two divisions- one General ,
the other Special. The first or General division explains the
characters to be used in describing the species, and expounds
them more or less minutely. The second or Special division
comprises the detail of the objects , and assigns to each its
 SEQUENCE OF CHARACTERS. 185

share or participation in these characters ; that is, describes

the objects .
Thus, in a work on Mineralogy, the General Division com-
prises Crystallography, or the Forms of Minerals ; the Physical
Properties, as Cleavage, Fracture, Hardness, Tenacity, Specific
Gravity, Optical Properties, Heat, Electricity, Magnetism ;
Chemical Properties, as Chemical composition and re-actions.
This division is an abstract of Molecular Physics and Chemis-
try. The Special Division, named Description of Species, is
the detailed account of all known minerals, according to these
properties. For example, Quartz is described as possessing a
certain Crystalline form, a peculiar Cleavage, Fracture, &c.
So in Botany. The First Division comprises Structural
and Morphological Botany, or the parts of the plant generally
-Tissues and Organs- stated on the methodical plan of pro-
ceeding from the general to the special, the less dependent to
the more dependent. The Nutritive Organs have precedence
of the Reproductive ; their sub-divisions are taken in the order
-Root, Stem, Leaves . The Division is completed by the
functions or Physiology of the different tissues and organs.
The Second Division is the Classification and Description of
Plants. The complete account of each species then properly
accords with the order of the exposition of the constituent
tissues, organs, and functions, in the First Division .
In Zoology, the method is still the same, although not so
thoroughly carried out as in Botany, on account of the greater
complications.
Care should be taken to distinguish ultimate from derivative
characters. The Description is fully exhausted by a complete
enumeration of what are supposed to be ultimate characters.
The derivations or deductions from these, if given, should be
given as such. A character is to be provisionally received as
ultimate, if it cannot be reduced under any more general
character.
For example, the support of combustion is a derivative
character of oxygen, and does not rank with the properties at
present held to be ultimate, namely, the specific gravity,
the specific heat, electro-negative position, the combining
power generally.
2. II. Observing the golden rule, we must place to-
gether, in classes, the things that possess in common the
greatest number of important attributes .
At the outset of the present department of Logic- DEFINI-
186 CLASSIFICATION.

TION, it was necessary to state with regard to the formation of

classes of things, that preference is to be given to such groups
as contain in common the greatest number of important attri-
butes. This applies to all the modes of dealing with the Con-
cept or Notion. The mind sees objects to most advantage
when it views together those that have the greatest number of
affinities.
It is on this principle that the vertebrate animals have been
classed according to the leading points of their Anatomy and
Physiology, such as the manner of bringing forth their young,
rather than according to the element that they live in ( earth,
water, air). The bat flies in the air, but has more real affinities
with quadrupeds than with birds ; the whale, seal, and por-
poise, have warm blood and suckle their young like land
quadrupeds, although living in the sea as fishes.
The importance of the attributes is to a certain extent
governed by the end in view. For practical purposes, whales
are classed with fishes (as in speaking of the whale fishery),
because their living in the sea determines the manner of their
being caught. So, food plants, esculent roots, fruit trees, are
groups practically important, but do not coincide with the
classifications of botany.
With a view to theoretical science, whose purpose is to
assemble in the smallest bulk, and in the most intelligible and
suggestive arrangement, the greatest amount of knowledge,
the golden rule must be strictly carried out. Even for practi-
cal ends taken collectively, this is the most useful plan, from
the very reason that it does not defer to any one end in parti-
cular. The classifications for practice do not supersede the
classifications for knowledge, but are additions to these ; they
occur in the practical or applied departments of information,
as Medicine, Commerce, Law, &c.
Not only in forming groups, but in their juxtaposition in the
consecutive arrangement, regard is paid to the amount of affinity.
The Natural Orders of Plants and of Animals are so placed ,
that any two lying side by side are more nearly allied than
any other two that could be fixed upon ; and alterations are
constantly suggested to give proximity to the closest alliances.
Thus, Mr. Huxley argues in favour of an arrangement uniting
the Proboscidia with the Rodentia, rather than with the Artio-
dactyla and Perissodactyla ; the singular ties that ally the
Elephants with the Rodents having been a matter of common
remark since the days of Cuvier.
3. In aiming at a Natural Classification, that is, one
 MAXIMUM OF AFFINITY. 187

based on the maximum of important agreements, we may

meet with alliances on different sides, of nearly equal
value .

Different groups may touch each other at different points,

and may have equally strong alliances . Thus, in Botany, the
natural order Solanaceae, if viewed with reference to the pistils,
(the female side) , allies itself with Scrophulariaceae ; if viewed
with reference to the stamens and corolla (the male side), it
allies directly with Orobanchaceœ.
Various considerations may be brought forward to deter-
mine the choice under such circumstances. One mode is to
cast groups into a circular classification, wherein the succes-
sion may return to itself. Another mode is an arrangement
in two directions, as in a square ; an idea carried still farther,
although in practice scarcely workable, by a cubical arrange-
ment.
It may, moreover, be considered which method would bring
about the maximum of alliance on the whole, or with refer-
ence to the entire classification from first to last. In the
search after this maximum, we may have to be content with
occasional juxta-positions of inferior degrees of resemblance.
Yet farther, we may make provision for double placings of
the same group, with a view to comparing it on all sides with
its congeners .
4. In Zoology, the most natural classification, on the
whole, corresponds very nearly with a serial order accord-
ing to the degree of development of Animal Life, and thus
facilitates the discovery of laws by the Method of Con-
comitant Variations.
The great divisions of Invertebrate and Vertebrate, and the
sub-divisions of each, represent a gradual rise in the scale of
being. The Radiata, as a whole, are lower than the Articu-
lata ; the Fishes are the lowest, and the Mammalia the highest
class of the vertebrate type. There are deviations from this
gradual rise in organization. The fish named amphioxus
lanceolatus is surpassed in complexity of structure by many
insects and molluscs.
For plants, the method is much more qualified . There is a
wide interval between the lowest Fungi or Sea-weeds, and the
Dicotyledonous Natural Orders, but there is no line of steady
progression. The Monocotyledons are not throughout of an
inferior grade to the Dicotyledons, nor is there a gradation
188 CLASSIFICATION.

among the Natural Orders of either division. The application

of the method of concomitant variations is still possible, al-
though greatly limited. It can be seen that the absence of
the inflorescence in the inferior plants is conjoined with the
cellular structure, which is the lowest organization of the
tissue of the plant.
The serial order would apply to all kinds of objects where
there is a progress or development, and where the property
developed has a commanding importance. Thus, Social in-
stitutions, as Governments, may be classed according as they
approach to the most perfect type.
The Races of Men, viewed with reference to mental endow-
ment, lie in an ascending scale, with such occasional exceptions
as the possessing of some one faculty in a higher grade by a
race inferior on the whole. We can thus study the concomi-
tant circumstances of superiority and inferiority in mental
development.
Civilization in its larger leaps is linear, but in the minuter
differences, not so. Communities advance in special direc-
tions, the progress in one line being often accompanied by
backwardness in others, from the limitation of the human
energies as a whole. It is true of modern as of ancient civi-
lized peoples, that each has its own peculiar excellencies and
defects.
Excudent alii spirantia mollius æra
Credo equidem, vivos ducent de marmore vultus ;
Orabunt causas melius, coelique meatus
Describent radio, et surgentia sidera dicent :
Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento ;
Hae tibi erunt artes ; pacisque imponere morem,
Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.
5. III. It is an end of classification to save repetition
in the description of objects ; for which end the generaliza-
tion is made by successive steps, halting-places, or grades.
Instead of describing the species elephant ' by all its
characters, beginning with extension and materiality, the
naturalist mentions as specific marks only a small number, and
refers to the rest by a series of names expressing what is com-
mon to it with other groups.
Whenever two or more individuals agree, the agreement
may be stated once for all, and only the difference given under
each. In characterizing the races of men, we state first what
is common to the whole, and next what is special to each
 GRADES. 189

taken apart. We might apply the method to any two classes

that contain agreements peculiar to themselves . There is no
natural limit to the process but the existence of agreements.
The number of grades may be carried to any length, so long
as there is a basis of community. The more complicated the
objects, that is, the more extensive the compass of their attri-
butes, the farther may the gradation be carried. The insigni-
ficance of the points in common might be a reason for not
treating them as resting-points of the gradation.
In Botany there are four principal stages, marking Classes,
Families, or Natural Orders, Genera, and Species. These are
maintained throughout ; while, as occasion arises, intermediate
grades are constituted. ( See Part First, p . 65).
In Zoology there is first the grand division of INVERTEBRATA
and VERTEBRATA. The Invertebrata were divided by Cuvier into
Radiata, Articulata, Mollusca, whose farther subdivisions are
termed Classes (Infusoria, &c). The Classes contain Families
or Natural Orders, under which are Genera, and under these
Species. There are thus six regular halting places between
the individuals and the summum genus-Animal. The verte-
brate Animals descend at one leap to Classes ( Fishes, Reptiles,
Birds, Mammalia). The class Fishes undergoes a division
into Cartilaginous and Osseous ; under which are the Natural
Orders. The Reptiles, Birds, and Mammalia are occasionally
broken up at once into Natural Orders.
The carrying out of the classificatory arrangement demands
that by the methods of Definition, the agreements at each
stage should be thoroughly ascertained, and fully and precisely
stated. The classification by grades is a useless formality if
the corresponding characters are not given. The chemical
division of simple bodies into Metals and Non-metals is ( or
should be) accompanied with the characteristic marks or
common properties of each class. The farther sub-division of
the metals into Noble Metals, &c. , is seldom followed up by a
rigorous enumeration of all the points of community ; and the
only advantage gained is the mere proximity of the resembling
bodies. The same incomplete adoption of the formality of
grades is found in the classification of Diseases ; epilepsy,
-
chorea, tremor, hysteria are classed together, but without
the enumeration of common characters.

6. The statement, by successive gradiations, of the points

of community is suited to the discovery of Laws of Con-
comitance.
190 CLASSIFICATION.

In ascertaining whether a property a is uniformly conjoined

with a property f, there is an advantage in being able to
separate the cases where a is absent from those where it is pre-
sent. This is done in the system of grades. Thus, by isolating
the order Ruminantia, we readily discover the concurrence
of rumination with cloven hoofs.
If there were any laws of concomitance among the proper-
ties of the metallic or the non-metallic bodies of Chemistry,
they would best appear in the study of the groups formed upon
special properties. Thus, when the metallic substances are
viewed together, they readily disclose any conjunctions with
metallic peculiarities. So in the non-metallic division, the
halogens-Chlorine, Iodine, Bromine, Fluorine, present a nar-
rowed field of conjoined properties.

7. The classifications of Natural objects are understood

to terminate with the SPECIES , or lowest Kind ; and thus a
high importance attaches to the defining marks and
boundaries of Species.

In Botany and in Zoology, the view had long prevailed that

a species was marked off by community of descent, while any
differences that might arise between the descendants of a
common ancestor were regarded as varieties and not as specific
differences.
The doctrine of the absolute fixity of species is now called
in question, and proofs are offered to show that, in the course
of descent, differences called specific may arise among the
descendants of a common stock. This leads to a modified
statement of the doctrine of species. The fact still remains
that some characters have a high degree of constancy or per-
sistence through successive generations ; while others are
liable to change .
Wherever a line can be drawn between highly persistent
and highly fluctuating characters, we may call the first specific
characters and the others mere varieties. Thus, in numerous
species, both of plants and animals, colour is liable to consider-
able variation within limits. So the absolute size of living
objects may alter greatly. Also the degree of any quality or
endowment, as the strength, or sagacity of an animal, may
change. But the tissues, organs, and structural arrangements
persist through many successive generations.
Importance may, nevertheless, be still attached to the fact
of the fertility or infertility of the unions of individuals. The
 SPECIES .. 191

horse and the ass are fertile for one generation, but the progeny
is incapable of farther procreation.
In Minerals, the boundaries of species are fixed so far as
regards crystallization and chemical composition, and all the
consequences of these properties. As regards compounds, not
chemical, which may take place in all proportions, there can
be no fixed lines, although a few grades may be assigned with
doubtful margins.
In Diseases, the presence of certain fixed characters, such as
the leading symptoms of Inflammation , of Small-pox, of Gout,
offers distinctions that may be called specific.
8. In fixing the boundaries of Species, respect may be
had to the number as well as to the persistence of the
characters.
The Infima Species or lowest kind, in any of the Natural
Kingdoms, is in certain instances divided from all other species
by a large number of properties,, known and unknown. The
characters of the species ' horse are very numerous ; of man
still more so. There cannot be the same extent of specific
distinctions in the inferior animals ; nor in more than a small
number of plants. Still, the existence of as many as three,
four, or six distinguishing marks, all of some importance and
constancy, would suffice for making a species : while the
limitation to one or two might leave a doubtful choice between
Species and Variety.
Mr. Mill puts the question, are all the classes, in a Natural
Classification, Kinds ? He answers, certainly not. " Very few of
the genera of plants, or even of the families, can be pronounced
with certainty to be Kinds.' In point of fact, the difficulty would
be to fix on any class of the higher grades , whose properties are so
numerous as to rank them with differences of Kind (understood in
Mr. Mill's perhaps over-strained language respecting the Infima
Species).
Another question raised by Mr, Mill is the propriety of Whewell's
allegation that ' Natural groups are given by Type, and not by
Definition.' By a Type, Whewell meant a well- selected average
member of a class, removed alike from all extremes ; a concrete
embodiment of the class, to be used for purposes of identification,
in preference to any verbal definition. The motive was the exist-
ence of anomalous members of many groups in Natural History,
which neither conform to the verbal definition nor yet differ suffi-
ciently from the other members to be excluded from the group.
We may imagine a group formed upon ten characters, but con-
sisting of individuals that vacillate, some upon one character and
some upon another, while yet agreeing in by far the greater number.
192 CLASSIFICATION.

We may even make the extreme supposition that the vacillation is

such that no single character of the ten persists in every indi-
vidual ; hence, in strictness, there would be no common feature,
and yet there would be a very large amount of resemblance.
In commenting on Whewell's mode of getting over the difficulty,
Mr. Mill re-iterates his view of distinctions of Kind, which, when
fully complied with, can leave no such uncertainty as is supposed.
Moreover, he remarks that a class must possess characters, that
these characters cannot be arbitrary, and must admit of being
stated, which is tantamount to Definition.
Probably Whewell's difficulty might be met by the allowance of
a doubtful margin, which has been seen to be essential in cases of
continnity far less complicated than the demarcations of groups in
Natural History. "
9. The arrangement of descriptive characters by grades
gives the greatest amount of knowledge in the least com-
pass. Yet, for practical objects, it may be desirable to
bring together, in consecutive detail, all the characters of
a given species.
The genus and species, ' Man ' in the class mammalia, is
described by the Zoologist, like all the other animals, by giving
a certain number of characters at each stage-those common
to Vertebrate Animals, to Mammalia, to Bimana (of which
man is the sole representative ) , and finally the marks peculiar
to the species. But the human anatomist treats Man in the
pure isolation, disregarding, except incidentally, his place in
the animated series. So, from the importance of the species
'Horse,' there is afforded a similar exhaustive Anatomy.
Complete Monographs of important species are not only
useful for practical ends ; they are also the constituent
materials of Zoology.

10. IV. The statement of characters proceeds, in the

last resort, upon a close comparison of Agreements and
Differences.
From the nature of knowledge , the highest degree of intelligi-
bility depends upon the most complete exhibition of agreement
and of difference.
The classification by grades provides for stating Agreement.
A grade, whether Class, Order, or Genus, is defined by the
points of agreement discovered among its members . The
Botanical class ' Dicotyledon ,' has a certain structure of Stem
and of Seeds. The Animal genus ' Ovis,' has, as common
characters , Horns of a peculiar kind ; Hoofs compressed ;
 STATEMENT OF CHARACTERS. 193

Mammæ two ; Chin beardless ; region between the eyes and

nostrils convex.
When characters are stated shortly, as by a mere word
or phrase, the tabular method is the most effective ; as in
minerals. In larger descriptions, the headings at least should
stand out distinct. Thus, the genus ' Poppy ' is discriminated
(from the other genera of the Poppy Family) on two points ;
one referring to the capsule, the other to the flowers. The
generic agreements may be presented to the eye thus :-
' Capsule, Globular, ovoid or slightly oblong, crowned by a
circular disk, &c .'
' Flowers. In Size, rather large ; in Colour, red, white, (in
the British species) purplish, or (in some exotic ones ) pale
yellow.'*
The greatest difficulty and nicety belongs to the statement
of Differences. Only in dichotomies can this be accomplished
to perfection. When a genus has two species, we can put
them against each other, according to the plan observed in
defining by antithesis or contrast (see p. 164). Thus, in the
genusCorydalis ' (of the Fumitory Family) , there are two
species (Yellow and Climbing) . Their differences admit of
pointed contrast as follows ::--
YELLOW CLIMBING.
Stem .
Short, erect, branched Long, climbing, slender.
Flowers.
Yellow Whitish.
If on any one part, there are plural contrasts, the presenta-
tion might be varied thus :-
Short, erect, branched - Yellow
Stem
Long, climbing, slender - Climbing.
When there are several species, the presentation cannot
always be effectively given in this manner ; some may contain
agreements among themselves, as well as differences, which
would perplex the contrast. We may, however, occasionally
-
mark off any one from all the rest, thus :-
* Modified from the following description in BENTHAM'S British
Flora :-
'Capsule globular, ovoid or slightly oblong, crowned by a circular disk,
upon which the stigmas radiate from the centre, internally divided nearly
to the centre, into as many incomplete cells as there are stigmas, and open-
ing in as many pores, immediately under the disk. Flowers rather large,
red, white, " or purplish in the British species, or pale yellow in some
exotic ones.'
13
194 CLASSIFICATION.

OPIUM POPPY. OTHER SPECIES.

Plant.
Glabrous Stiff hairs
Colour.
Glaucous Green
Leaves.
Toothed or slightly lobed Once or twice
pinnately divided.
We may always select for pointed contrast the two classes
that are most like, and therefore most liable to be confounded .
This is done incidentally (although not with systematic thorough-
ness) in all the classificatory subjects Minerals, Plants,
Animals, Diseases. Thus the Silk-cotton order of Plants
(Sterculiacea ) resemble Malvaceae in their general characters,
particularly their columnar stamens, but differ in their two-
celled extrorse anthers . In their properties, Capparids
resemble Crucifers ' (difference not stated) . The genus
Ranuncul us is disti nguis hed from Anem one by the want of the
involucre. In the Field Poppy, capsule globular ; in the Long-
headed Poppy, capsule oblong .
11. V. It being requisite to a Natural Classification that
bodies be arranged under deep and inaccessible affinities,
a separate scheme, of an artificial nature, must be provided
as an Index.
A classification may accord with the primary rule, and may
be defective in the means of discovering the place of a given
object. The determination of a plant is puzzling to the beginner
in Botany. Now, it was a merit of the Linnæan system
to make this comparatively easy ; and the advantage was
sacrificed in the adoption of a Natural system.
The ideally best classification is one where the properties
common to the members of the several groups are both im-
portant and obvious. Such a combination is at best but
partially realized . Thus, in animals, the important affinities
are so far internal, being disclosed only on dissection, as those
referring to the minute points of the skeleton, the nervous
system, the structure of the viscera, &c.; and so far external,
as the form, the external divisions, the integument, and
(partly) the reproductive organs. It is fortunate for Zoology
that these external peculiarities either constitute of themselves,
or are marks of, the important affinities. Still, they are not
the whole, and even if they were, a scheme must be formed to
guide the student in following them out to the determination
 INDEX CLASSIFICATIONS. 195

of the name and place of the individual. Such aid has not
yet been afforded in Zoology. Yet, without it the most con-
summate natural arrangement must be a sealed book to all
but proficients in the detailed knowledge of animal species.
Chemistry (with Mineralogy) is in a still worse case. The
governing principle in arranging chemical compounds being
their chemical composition, which is indiscoverable by the
naked eye, the determination of a specimen is impracticable
without an artificial Index. Owing to the great importance
of discriminating substances chemically, in the arts, a method
is provided, known as Chemical Testing or analysis, whereby
the student, with a limited knowledge of the entire field of
Chemistry, can yet determine a large number of bodies.
In Botany, the Index Scheme, or Analytic Key, is highly
elaborated. It consists of tables based upon a succession of
properties, there being under each a bracket containing two
(rarely three or more) alternatives. (See Book V. , BOTANY).
In a case of equal importance to Chemistry, the Diagnosis
of Disease, an Index classification is still a desideratum. The
medical student has no aids to the discrimination of disease
short of an aquaintance with diseases generally, after a full
study of Pathology. The mode of preparing an Index scheme
could be readily gathered from the plans pursued in Botany
and in Chemistry.
LOGICAL DIVISION.
12. The rules laid down for DIVISION, as a Logical Pro-
cess, are rules of Classification, of which Division, in the
Logical sense, is merely one aspect.
There are many ways of dividing a whole or aggregate into
component parts. A concrete or individual object, as York
Minster, may be divided into choir, nave, and transepts ; into
main building and spire ; into walls and roof; into the part
for public worship and the private apartments. This is con-
crete partition, or dismemberment. In much the same way,
an ox is divided for consumption . Again, a concrete object
is mentally divided, or analyzed, into its abstract elements ; we
may separately attend to the form, the size, the brilliancy, the
weight, of the diamond. This is Abstraction . When a plurality
of forces concur to a certain result, they often require to be
studied in separation ; thus, in mechanics, we have to compute
moving power and friction apart ; in astronomy, the disturb-
ing forces are computed separately, and then compounded.
196 CLASSIFICATION.

This is Analysis and also Deduction, or Deductive Combination

(See INDUCTION, Deductive Method), and is one of the most
familiar of scientific operations.
Logical Division is different from any of these modes of
separating wholes or combinations into parts. The received
rules enable us to judge of its precise meaning and compass.
They are the following :-
(1) Each of the parts must contain less than the thing
divided.'
6
(2) All the parts together must be exactly equal to the
thing divided .'
(3) 'The parts must be opposed,' that is, ' mutually exclusive.'
C
Hamilton adds (4) The principle of Division should be an
actual and essential character of the divided notion ; and the
division, therefore, neither complex nor without purpose. '
These rules point to an actual, exhaustive, single-pur-
posed, and important division. The first rule points to an
actual division, for unless the parts be less than the whole,
the whole is not divided . The second rule supposes that the
parts are to be exhausted, so that we may declare everything
contained in the whole to be found in one or more of the
parts. There may be divisions where this is not insisted on.
The third rule requires that the division shall be upon one
purpose or plan, so that the parts may be mutually exclusive :
we divide an army into infantry, cavalry, and artillery ; or
into officers, non-commissioned officers, and rank and file ;
but not into infantry and co:nmissioned officers. The fourth
rule indicates that divisions should not be on trivial or insig-
nificant characters, as if we were to divide an army or a popu-
lation into persons with names of one syllable, and persons
with names of more than one syllable.
The real importance of these rules is with reference to
Classification ; for other purposes they are idle, and even
erroneous. When a comprehensive class, as Vertebrata, has
to be sub- classed, we must comply with the conditions of
classification generally, or such as we observe in the march
upward, from the lower to the higher grades. The Vertebrata
are divided or sub-classed into Fishes, Reptiles , Birds, and
Mammals ; it being obvious that each sub- class is less than
the whole, that all the four sub-classes amount to the whole ;
and that each sub-class excludes all the rest. If there were a
failure on any of these points, the classification would be bad ;
the field of the sub-divisions is supposed to be exactly the
field of the entire group ; nothing is to be left out, and nothing
 LOGICAL DIVISION . 197

counted twice. So in every case of genus and species. If

we mean to give all the species, we should give them all .
Moreover, a division into species, where the same individvals
appeared in two species, would confound the very idea of
specific distinctions. If the bat were placed among birds, and
also among mammals, there would be two conflicting principles
of classification.
Division, in the logical sense, is thus merely a way of look-
ing at classification by grades. Hamilton's additional rule-
that the principle of Division should be essential and important
-is the golden rule alike of defining and of classifying.
A division, or sub-classification, is complete when we may
disjunctively affirm a member of the class as in one or other of
the parts . ' Actions are either good , bad, or indifferent, ' sup-
poses that Actions may be exhaustively and correctly divided
or sub-classed into good , bad, and indifferent ; it being under-
stood farther that the same action is not both good and bad,
good and indifferent, or bad and indifferent.
A classification may be conveniently tested by the rules of
division, especially the third, the violation of which makes the
Fallacy of Cross-division. Thus, the old classification or
division of the Virtues, called the Cardinal Virtues - Justice,
Prudence, Courage, Temperance- is vicious ; and the vicious-
ness may be expressed as either a bad classification or as an
illogical division ; for Prudence includes the whole of Temper-
ance, as well as all that part of Courage that conduces to
self-interest.
The Analysis of a Compound is necessarily exhaustive ;
it is the purpose of analysis to ascertain everything that
enters into the given combination . A chemist examines a
meteoric stone, with a view to determine all the chemical
elements present. The physiological chemist desires to find
out all the constituents of blood , of bile, of gastric juice, of
flesh, and so on.. To such cases, the rules of Division might
apply, if anything ever turned upon them.
The ultimate analysis of the Mind, whether in whole or in
part, might be tested by logical division. Thus, Mind as a
whole is divided into Feeling, Volition, and Intellect ; and to
this division the logical tests should apply. The three depart-
ments should exhaust the mind without going beyond it ; and
they should be mutually exclusive. So in the Intellect, the
analysis into Discrimination or Difference, Agreement or Simi-
larity, and Retentiveness, professes to be an ultimate analysis ;
the three functions ought to contain all that is intellectual and
198 CLASSIFICATION.

nothing more ; while each should contain nothing in common

with the other two. The old enumeration of the Intellectual
powers - Memory, Conception, Abstraction, Reason, Judgment,
Imagination is not a logical division ; it could not be shown
to be intellect, all intellect, and nothing but intellect ; while
the members are not mutually exclusive ; memory has some-
thing in common with all the rest.
13. Logical Division fails in classifications with undefined
boundaries.
The rules of Logical Division are inapplicable to classifica-
tions growing out of combination, growth, or development.
Such are the compounds of chemistry, the offspring of living
bodies, the developments of human knowledge, the associative
growths of the mind, All these products are naturally un-
limited and inexhaustible. Oxides, carbonates, silicates,
alkalies, ethers, are interminable ; their particulars cannot be
enumerated ; no enumeration necessarily takes in the whole.
In the Human Mind, the Senses, or primary elements of
sensibility, comply with the rules of Division. The Emotions,
most of which are growths or developments, do not comply
with it. If any of the emotional states were strictly ultimate,
they would be mutually exclusive ; but there are very few
such ; Wonder, Fear, and Love, are nearly ultimate, but may
not be wholly so. The great bulk of the Emotions being
growths out of common elements, they cannot have a strict
mutual exclusion ; yet they may have distinctive characters,
and may be properly viewed as emotional species . Love, Self,
Power, Irascibility, Pleasures of Knowledge, Beauty, Moral
Feeling are all well-marked groups of emotions, but they are
formed out of common elements, which are perceptible to our
self- consciousness. As products of growth or association, they
have no fixed number ; new occasions would give rise to new
varieties or species ; and there cannot be a mutual exclusion.
They are subject to the golden rule of classification, but they
do not present a case for logical division.
There is a similar inapplicability to the classification of the
Sciences ; these also succeed one another by growth or develop-
ment. Chemistry involves Physics, and Biology, Chemistry.
The Natural History sciences- Mineralogy, Botany, Zoology,
Geology- are full of unavoidable cross-divisions and double
entries. In such a science as Materia Medica, there are many
double entries ; the same substance is at once stimulant and
narcotic. The Social Sciences -Politics, Political Economy,
Jurisprudence- cannot be made mutually exclusive.
 BOOK V.

LOGIC OF THE SCIENCES .

To exhibit the principles and rules of Logic in a new

aspect ; to indicate the fields where these are most needed,
and where examples are provided with inexhaustible ful-
ness , we shall review in order the Theoretical Sciences,
and some of the leading Practical Sciences.

CHAPTER I.

LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

1. In Mathematics, logically viewed, there is afforded

the most consummate exemplification of a Formal Deduc-
tive Science .
The processes of Deduction are seen to advantage in Mathe-
matics. The Definitions, Axioms, Demonstrations, Symbolical
language, and various devices for multiplying the relations of
quantity, the subject-matter of the science, exhibit all the
machinery for performing Deductive operations of a Formal
nature.
2. Mathematics treats of QUANTITY in the Abstract, so
far as susceptible of definite expression.
The first, the deepest, the most fundamental experience of
the human mind is Relation, or Relativity ; this is implicated
in the very nature of consciousness. The doubleness, the
essential two-sidedness of every conscious experience is a fact
that has no forerunner. Of the differences, contrasts, or cor-
relative couples, starting immediately from this primary
condition, the first is difference in Quantity or Degree-the
distinction of more and less.
200 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

Quantity adheres both to subject and to object, but it is not

always definite ; and none but definite expressions enter into
Mathematics. The most definite form of quantity is NUMBER,
or discrete quantity-one, two, three, &c . Continuous or
unbroken quantity is made definite chiefly by its being broken
artificially and made numerical. In a few instances, as in the
geometry of Incommensurables , definite relations can be ex-
pressed by lines in figures ; such is the relation of the side to
the diagonal of a square. A difficulty of a metaphysical nature
has long attended the mathematical expression of continuous
quantity in these incommensurable relations.

Notions of Mathematics.
3. An enumeration of the principal Notions occurring
in Mathematics, prepares us for ascertaining the character
of the propositions.
The chief notion is Equality, with its opposite Inequality.
This is the prevailing predicate in Mathematics. Likeness
(implicating unlikeness) applied to amount or degree gives
Equality. There may be likeness in other properties, as sound,
colour, pleasure ; but, except in quantity, there cannot be
Equality. We can both discriminate and classify, apart from
Mathematics , but when we declare things equal or unequal,
we are announcing propositions purely mathematical.
In detecting equality, the final appeal is to sense or con-
sciousness. For Number, we identify a succession of beats,
or remitted impressions, as two, or three ; this is the surest
judgment that the human mind can form. For Continuous
Quantity, we discriminate grades of continuance by the sense
proper to the peculiar effect - the eye, the ear, the touch, &c. :
the most delicate discrimination, and the one that, if possible,
all others are reduced to, is visible extension ; next in rank
is the continuance of sound. Euclid's definition of Equality is
the visible coincidence of extended magnitudes.
Number is thus seen to be a fundamental notion of Mathe-
matics, as the science of Quantity. Interrupted sensations,
or transitions, of consciousness, are vividly discriminated ; and
by memory we can easily retain a small succession of these,
and identify it with another small succession. Thus, three
coins seen by the eye, are identified to a certainty, with the
three fingers, in respect of the number of interruptions or
transitions ; they are felt to be different from two or from four
visible transitions. This is numerical equality or inequality.
 NOTIONS OF MATHEMATICS. 201

For the higher numbers, artificial aids are requisite to ensure

certainty of comparison ; but with such aids (namely, orderly
groupings) we can compare numbers of any amount ; we
can identify one hundred in two different aggregates of that
number, and discriminate one hundred from ninety-nine.
Names are given to the successive numbers, one, two, three,
four, five, &c.; at the number ten, a group is formed, and we
start afresh. This is our decimal system, to which correspond
the designations units, tens, hundreds, &c.
Addition is the next fundamental notion ; also obtained,
in the last resort, from the senses. When we bring two
detached groups or successions from different places to the
same place, or into one continuous group or succession, we
are said to add ; the implicated contrary is to Subtract. The
names whole and part refer to the same operation, and are ex-
plained by the same experience. Multiplication is merely a
continued addition, and its obverse is Division. These notions
are the names of the four cardinal processes of the manipula-
tion of numbers . Related to them are the meanings of sum,
difference, remainder, factor, product, dividend, divisor, quo-
tient, prime number.
Fraction (versus Integer) grows out of division ; also the
designations numerator and denominator, common measure.
To fractions are applied the cardinal operations - addition, &c.
Decimal is a fractional mode, related to our decimal enu-
meration.
Square, cube, square root, cube root, &c., are special growths
or extensions of multiplication and division respectively.
Ratio is the statement or implication of how many times one
number is contained in another ; the ratio of three to twelve
is four, or one to four. We do not always reduce the ratio to
the lowest terms ; we may speak of the ratio of three to six,
but the comparison of the numbers is by multiplication or divi-
sion . The expression of ratios takes the form offractions.
Proportion is equality of ratios ; three is to eight in the pro-
portion of nine to twenty-four.
Ratio, Proportion, and Fraction, conduct us to the idea of
Incommensurable.
Progression, or series, is a succession of numbers according
to a fixed law ; the Arithmetical progression being governed
by addition, the Geometrical, by multiplication. A progression
contains Extremes and Means.
Permutations and Combinations are modes of operating upon
numbers that need not here be explained.
202 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

Logarithm signifies a still more advanced notion ; being the

name for an entirely novel mode of expressing the relations of
numbers, which, when unfolded in tables, greatly reduces
the labour of the higher operations, namely, multiplication,
division, raising to powers and extraction of roots.
The foregoing comprise the leading notions of mathematics
for the initial branch, called pure ARITHMETIC. For Concrete
or commercial Arithmetic, there are involved farther the money
standards, the weights and measures, together with the adapta-
tion of the cardinal processes of proportion and of fractions, to
compute these several varieties of concrete quantity.
ALGEBRA carries forward all the arithmetical notions to a
new order of expressions of quantity. The detaching of the
operations from the actual numbers, by the use of symbols,
gives new designations, Negative Quantity, Index, Exponent,
Surd, Impossible Quantities. The general theorem for expand-
ing by powers or roots is the Binomial Theorem. Then follows
the Equation- Simple, Quadratic, &c.
The Notions of GEOMETRY are comprised in the Definitions
of Euclid :-Point, line, straight line, curve line, angle, paral-
lels, surface, solid , triangle, quadrangle, polygon, circle, cube,
sphere, cylinder, cone, problem, theorem, corollary, &c.
In TRIGONOMETRY there are new designations- sine, co-sine,
tangent, secant.
In CONIC SECTIONS are comprised the figures so named with
the further designations- eccentricity, focus, directrix, latus
rectum, parameter, abscissa, normal, asymptote.
ANALYTICAL GEOMETRY involves co-ordinates and loci ; and de-
signates a number of curves reserved for analytical handling—
cissoid, conchoid, witch, lemniscata, catenary, cycloid, invo-
lutes, spirals, &c.
The higher CALCULUS introduces us to the notions- Infinite-
simal, Differential, Integral, Limit, Dependent and Independent,
Variable.

Propositions of Mathematics.
4. In the logical aspect, these propositions are leading
examples of the predicable, called proprium. The predi-
cate is deducible and demonstrable from the subject.
The Axioms are inductions of concomitant properties. In
all other propositions (excepting those that are in reality defini
tions), the predicate is deducible from the subject through the
axioms. Thus, in the simple Arithmetical proposition, six
 DEFINITIONS OF ARITHMETIC. 203

times four is twenty four, the predicate (24) follows from the
subject (6 times 4) by the medium of the two great axioms of
equality. The predicates are not contained in the subjects by
necessary or immediate implication ; they are mediate infer-
ences drawn by the help of the highest generalities ; exempli-
fying the true nature of the proprium.

Definition in Mathematics.
5. Certain of the Notions of Mathematics are funda-
mental and indefinable ; the rest are defined by derivation
or Analysis.
It will be sufficient to advert to the specialities connected
with (1 ) Arithmetic, and (2) Geometry.
Definitions of Arithmetic. -We have seen that Number or
discrete quantity, is a series of intermitted impressions on the
mind-patches of colour, sounds, &c. This is an ultimate fact ;
language can give no account of it in any other way than by
calling each one's attention to their own experience. As
regards the numbers themselves, experience must give us a
few to begin with ; the rest may be derived and defined from
these. Unity is an ultimate reference, the abstraction from
numerous concrete objects, that is, from many single impres-
sions ; it is contrasted with two, and with the higher succes-
sions. We learn one, two, three, four, five, &c., by repeated
experiences of the successions so named ; the hand is a
familiar example of five. We might go a good way in dis-
tinguishing the successive numbers ; but, in point of fact,
when a dozen or thereby is reached, we resort to modes of
comparison that imply grouped arrangements.
So much for our actual experience of numbers, which is
presupposed in the attempt to define them. For the actual
purposes of a strict definition, we must assume one as indefin-
able, that is, as already known. Even this supposes that we
know two at least, for, without a contrast with plurality, we
cannot possess the meaning of unity.
Before going farther, it is necessary to suppose that we
understand addition. This is an abstract notion gained from
many concrete experiences of accumulating objects in mass.
We cannot define it ; we must point to the operation : an
operation, as already remarked, that makes known subtraction
likewise ; and also whole and part. To attempt to define any
of these notions is to encroach upon the ultimate experiences
of the mind ; and the futility is shown by the words employed,
204 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

' aggregation,' &c., which are not more elementary, or more

simple, than the notions that they are used to define.
With a knowledge of one, and of addition, we may begin to
define. The lowest definable number is then two ; we may
define it by the addition of one and one. The rest follow :
three is two added to one ; four is three and one ; five is four
and one, and so on. Each number is definable as one added
to the previous number. Arriving at ten, we bring into play
the decimal notation, or the grouping by tens, which gives us
double expressions : eleven is ten and one ; twelve is eleven
and one, and also ten and two ; fifteen is fourteen and one, and
also ten and five. We may be supposed at this stage to make
use chiefly of the second form, although always aware of its
equivalence to the first ; sixteen is ten and six ; twenty-seven
is twenty (two tens) and seven.
All the other notions of Arithmetic are susceptible of defini-
tion properly so called ; they may be derived from the notions
now given. In logical strictness, there is no need for a farther
appeal to experience ; although the actual understanding of
the processes is aided by using concrete examples of numbers
and their formations.
Definitions of Geometry.- The difficulties here are far more
serious ; yet the proceeding is the same. We must recognize
a certain basis of the indefinable, a resort to experience for
what can be given only by experience.
By experience, we become familiar with all the modes of
extension, and learn the names for them. We know solid
bulk, surface or area, length, angle, direction, straight, bent,
curved, parallel, and so on. We also know what a Point is,
in the peculiar acceptation of a landmark, or a place to measure
from, to begin, to terminate, or to divide a length . While
Solid Bulk is the one concrete fact, all the rest are abstractions,
and we learn to understand them in that character. We can
consider a line, or length, without affirming anything of the
breadth of the thing discussed ; we can restrict our affirma-
tions to what would be true under any width, as when we
say a piece of string and a plank are of equal lengths . By a
large concrete experience of this nature, we are prepared for
the more rigorous methods of arranging and stating these
notions in Geometry.
To advert more particularly to our experience of Lines or
lengths, abstraction being made of the accompanying breadth
and thickness. In this one experience is wrapt up inextricably
a whole group of the notions given by the geometer in separa-
 DEFINITIONS OF GEOMETRY. 205

tion. In working with rods, with strings, with wires, and

other things, we learn, not only length (as greater or less ), but
also the difference between straight and bent, crooked or
curved ; together with direction, angles, and parallelism.
Straightness, direction, angle, convergence, divergence, and
parallelism, however separated in Geometry, are all inter-
mingled in our primitive concrete experience ; and, indeed,
any one would be incompletely understood if it did not involve
all the rest. We cannot understand the full force of ' straight-
ness ' without understanding what is meant by direction :
'direction ' would be very incomplete without involving the
meaning of an angle ; and the concrete experience of an angle
gives all that is meant by convergence and divergence, and
also by the opposite of these-parallelism .
All these notions, therefore, have to be assumed as being
perfectly intelligible and as wholly indefinable. We can
assign nothing more simple or more elementary to define
them by. The attempt to define an ' angle ' only returns
upon itself; thus, an angle is said to be the inclination of two
lines, but ' inclination ' is merely another name for angle ; as
well say, ' an angle is an angle,'*
Geometry, as well as Arithmetic, is a Deductive Science.
Now it is the idea of a deductive science to assume the fewest
notions possible, and to begin to define, or derive, as soon as
there has been laid an adequate foundation in the indefinable.
To make the application to the case in hand . The fewest
elementary notions that we can proceed with may be differ-
ently stated by different persons ; but one cannot be far wrong
in the following :-point or landmark, line or length, straight,
as contrasted with bent, angle, surface, solid . The three-
line, straightness, angle-are really phases of one experience ;
and, by a great stretch of ingenuity, we might find it possible
to condense the three expressions into two, or even into one ;
for undoubtedly the line (as carrying with it length) implicates
* Geometrical definitions are of three kinds : (1) Those which express
our primary ideas of space, such as the definitions of a straight line, an
angle, a plane, &c. (2) Those which by means of the first class define
certain simple forms, the triangle, the square, and the circle, from the
properties of which all calculation of relative positions and superficial
magnitudes is derived . (3) Definitions of other forms, as the rhombus,
trapezium, hexagon, ellipse, &c., the properties of which are found by the
application of theorems obtained from the definitions of the simple forms.'
(CHALLIS ON CALCULATION, p. 61).
The last named class exemplify what are called Deductive Definitions
(p. 165).
206 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

' straightness,' which itself involves its opposite ' bending,'

and also ' direction ;' and from direction we cannot separate
change or variety of direction, as exhibited in an ' angle.' Not-
withstanding this inevitable mutual implication, we may
retain the above enumeration of primary or indefinable notions
-point, line or length, straight (with bent) , angle, surface, solid
(it would be a vain refinement to treat surface ' and ' solid '
as derived from length, or vice versa) . From these we are
able, by proper analytic definition, to give an account of all
the other geometrical notions. It is requisite, however, to
unfold the immediate implications of each, and to state which
phase, aspect, or property shall be put forward, in the subse-
quent demonstrations, as the testing property.
Point.-As stated, this is the same meaning as landmark ;
for geometric purposes, we hold it as the beginning, division,
or end, of length or a line ; all which must be understood by
actual experience.
Line or length. It is impossible to give a definite meaning
to ' line ' without at once distinguishing the straight from the
bent line ; it is only the straight line that is synonymous with
' length.' The mutually implicated notions- length and
straightness-are absolutely incommunicable by any device of
language ; they cannot even be made clearer by discussion.
We e may, however, select one feature or aspect as the test to be
referred to in the course of the demonstrations, namely, that
' two straight lines, if made to coincide in two points, will
coincide wholly,' will have no interval ; all which ideas the
learner has to bring with him from his own independent
experience. Another aspect 6 of the straight line, sometimes
given as its definition, is the shortest distance between two
points ;' this, however, may be proved by proper demonstra-
tion ; being a corollary to the proposition that two sides of a
triangle are greater than the third. At the same time, it is
sufficiently implicated with our experience of lines to be
received without proof.
-
Angle. This also must be known from experience. We
must see with our eyes two straight objects meeting with a
greater or less opening. That experience supplements our
education in direction, ' and gives us what is meant by
' divergence ' and ' convergence, ' greater or less. There is a
farther implication of two lines running side by side, and
neither diverging nor converging ; to this fact we give the
6
designations sameness of direction and parallelism ; ' all
incommunicable notions.
 FUNDAMENTAL NOTIONS OF GEOMETRY. 207

It may then be formally proper to describe an angle as two

straight lines meeting in a point, with greater or less diver-
gence. This is merely one way of referring us to our experi-
ence of the fact ; and it is thought the best workable test of
an angle in the subsequent references.
With the angle, we can conveniently connect the notion of
' Direction.' Inasmuch as all direction is relative, there must
be two lines given, and the angle they enclose gives the com-
parison of the two directions. Direction being understood,
we can define a curve line, as a perpetually changing direc-
tion ; which is an obverse equivalent of Euclid's phrase ' a line
of which no part is straight ; ' both expressions being proper
to be retained.
-
Parallels. These are inevitably understood along with the
notions already given. As to their formal, or test definition ,
Euclid's original expression, ' two lines in the same plane, pro-
duced ever so far both ways, and yet not meeting,' is properly
a negation of both convergence and divergence, and is suffi-
ciently workable, which is all that need be said for any defi-
nition.
Plane Surface. This is clearly an incommunicable notion.
It would be superfluous to construct it by the help of lines, for,
while we are learning lines, we are also learning surfaces.
All that is needed is a convenient testing peculiarity, such as
that given by Euclid, any two points being taken in a
plane, the straight line joining them lies wholly within the
plane.' The notions within ' and ' without ' must be got
from our manifold experience of extended bodies .
Solid Bulk. Also incommunicable by any simpler notions.
If we seem to define it by combining the notions of ' planes '
'directions,' &c., we in reality repeat ourselves ; for these very
notions were attained by a mass of experiences including
solid bulk or volume.
The elementary notions now enumerated being once obtained
from experience, the remaining notions of geometry are defin-
able by referring to these. No new appeal to the senses is
absolutely required in defining a right angle, a circle, a triangle,
a square ; although we are constantly aided by concrete re-
presentations in understanding these notions.

Axioms of Mathematics.
6. The Axioms of Mathematics should conform to the
conditions of an axiom, namely, (1) they should be real
208 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

propositions, and (2) they should be underivable from any

other principles within the science.

An axiom is, in the first place, a real proposition, and not a

verbal or essential proposition. The axioms are the ground-
work of all the reasonings in the science, but no reasoning
can be based on merely verbal propositions.
In the next place, the axiom should be absolutely funda-
mental and underivable within its own science. All that is
characteristic ofthe axiom is surrendered , if we admit deduced
principles. The axioms are the undeducible grounds of all
the deductions.
It is not a proper account of an axiom to say that it is a
self-evident proposition, or a proposition assented to as soon as
pronounced. This may or may not be the case. Some axioms
are self evident, others not ; and many principles that are
self-evident are not to be received as axioms.
Axioms of Mathematics as a whole. -The axioms of Mathe-
matics as a whole, requisite to be given at the threshold of
Arithmetic, are at least these two-' Things equal to the same
thing are equal to one another,' and ' The sums of equals are
equals .' These are real propositions, inductions from experi-
ence, and undeducible from one another. Whether they are
sufficient for all purposes, will appear afterwards. Both are
demanded by the processes of Arithmetic.
Axioms of Geometry. -As it has been the practice to teach
Arithmetic to " beginners, not as a reasoned or deductive
science, but as a series of rules given upon authority, and
merely confirmed by their actual results, the mathematical
axioms usually confront the learner for the first time at the
beginning of Geometry, which from early ages has aspired
to be, not merely a body of correct rules for measuring mag-
nitude, but a perfect type of deductive reasoning. As thus
presented, the axioms of all Mathematics are so mixed up
with matters belonging to geometry in particular, as to seem
exclusively geometrical in their bearing, These axioms, made
familiar to us by Euclid, have to be tried by the two tests
already laid down.
In Euclid's original text, there occur twelve axioms (or
common notions κοιναὶ ἔγγοιαι) . Others have been added by
modern editors ; it is not unusual to give fifteen. The two
first in the enumeration are the two already mentioned as
unquestionable axioms, conforming to both the criteria. The
five succeeding are--
 AXIOMS OF EUCLID. 209

(3) If equals be taken from equals, the remainders are

equal.
(4) If equals be added to unequals, the wholes are un-
equal .
(5) If from unequals, equals be taken, the remainders are
unequal.
(6) Doubles of the same are equal .
(7) Halves of the same are equal.
Now, these are all real propositions, and therefore not dis-
qualified by the first condition ; but as they are all very easily
deducible from the two first, they fail to comply with the
second condition. They are not axioms proper, but deduc-
tions or corollaries from axioms, and should be demonstrated .
If we are to call them axioms, there is nothing to prevent us
from calling any real proposition whatever an axiom. It
violates the very essence, the first demand, of a deductive
science to take for granted without proof whatever can be
proved from another principle within the science.
The eighth axiom, Things that coincide, or have the same
boundary, are equal,' violates the first test of an axiom ; it is
not a real proposition, but a definition of equality. ' Coincid-
ing ' and ' being equal ' are not two facts but the same fact in
two statements of language, the one being given as the expla-
nation of the other. Equality as applied to extended magni-,
tude is coincidence to the senses ; to prove.equality we prove
coincidence. Of Equality no definition can be given in the
last resort ; it is the feeling of similarity or identity as applied
to quantity. But in dealing with the special kind of quantity
considered in geometry, there is a convenience in specifying
the test of equality belonging to the case-namely, the visible
coincidence of the boundaries of the two things compared-
lines or plane figures. The supposed axiom is therefore the
geometrical statement and adaptation of the fundamental and
indefinable notion of equality.
6
The ninth axiom is The whole is greater than its part."
This also violates the first test ; it is not a real proposition ;
the predicate is not different from the subject. It is a pro-
perty implicated in the common fundamental notion that
gives a meaning to addition, subtraction, whole, part. The
concrete experience implied by all these words is one and the
same experience, and in it is implicated the fact that what we
call a sum is greater than any one of the amounts summed
up ; or what we call a whole is greater than any of the parts.
We could not possess the notion of whole and part without
14
210 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

possessing the fact that the whole is a larger magnitude than

the part. If, therefore, there be any necessity for distinctly
announcing this peculiar aspect of the great fundamental
notion of addition, it should be given as one of the forms of
expressing the notion of Addition, when that notion is first
introduced at the threshold of Arithmetic.
The tenth axiom, ' All right angles are equal ' is implicated
in the definition of a right angle ; and should be stated as an
appendage to that definition .
The eleventh axiom, in Euclid's text, is a difficult theorem
preparatory to the propositions respecting parallel lines. It
is usually given in a modified and simpler form, Thus (by
De Morgan)- If a straight line be taken, and a point
exterior to it ; of all the straight lines that can be drawn
through the point, one only will be parallel to the first- men-
tioned straight line.' In whatever form given, it is not an
axiom, but a proposition deducible from the definition of paral-
lel lines ; in fact, it ought to appear among the Theorems of
the first book, unless, indeed, it be so nearly identified with
the definition of parallels that it can be given as a mere various
wording or obvious implication of that definition ; which,
however, is hardly the case.
Euclid's twelfth (and last) axiom is famous in the History
6
of Philosophy : Two straight lines cannot enclose a space.'
It is not a real proposition, but merely an iteration of the
very fact of straightness. The pro forma definition of this
indefinable notion is ' When two lines cannot coincide in two
points without coinciding altogether, they are called straight
lines. Now it is a synonymous variety of the expression
6
coinciding altogether,' that there should be no intervening
space. That the lines should be straight ' and that they
6
should enclose a space ' would be a contradiction in terms.
This axiom must, accordingly, be rejected ; the phrase ' not
enclosing a space ' being transferred to the definition of
straightness, as an emphatic obverse iteration of coinciding
altogether.' We might express it thus-' When two straight
lines cannot coincide in two points without coinciding alto-
gether, that is, without excluding an intervening space, they
are called straight lines.'
In the modern texts of Euclid, there are added to the list of
6
axioms such propositions as the following . If two things be
equal, and a third be greater than one of them, it is also
greater than the other.' This is clearly demonstrable from
the proper axioms, coupled with the notions of greater and less.
 POSTULATES. 211

More notable is the argumentum a fortiori, occasionally im-

ported into Logic, although in its nature strictly mathematical.
If A be greater than B, and B greater than C, much more is
A greater than C. Every one readily assents to this principle
as an induction from facts of their own observing. If it can-
not be deductively inferred from the two proper axioms, it
will have to be received as a third axiom. Probably, however,
mathematicians would be able to demonstrate it, if not directly,
at least by reductio ad absurdum, from those axioms.
Another example of a proposed axiom is the following :
' Of all lines that conjoin two points, there must be one with
none less ; if only one, that is the least.' If there is any
necessity for enunciating this circumstance, it should be
given as implicated in our experience of lines ; its opposite is
a contradiction in terms ; the very meaning of ' least ' is that
there can be nothing less.
The bringing forward of axioms at every new stage of
Geometry is wholly at variance with the deductive character
of the science. There may be required a class of principles,
intermediate between the axioms proper and the demonstrated
theorems ; but they should not be confounded with the primary
foundations of the science ; they should have a name distinct
from ' axiom.' If inconvenience were now to arise from drop-
ping the name in connexion with these preliminary principles,
some emphatic designation should be adopted for the really
fundamental truths- Axioms-in-chief,' ' Axioms proper,' ' In-
demonstrable assumptions,' ' Final Inductions .'
The Postulates.—These are the groundwork of the construc-
tive part of Geometry-the problems, as distinguished from
the theorems. It is Euclid's plan to carry on, side by side, a
series of problems of construction and a series of theorems ; the
constructions being required for demonstrating the theorems.
These constructions, however, have an independent value for
practical applications ; the land measurer follows Euclid's
method in throwing out a perpendicular from the side of a
field. Now, in constructing, as in demonstrating, something
must be assumed at the outset ; and these assumptions are
to be the fewest possible. Accordingly, Euclid starts with
demanding three operations- drawing a straight line from
one point to another, prolonging a given straight line, and
describing a circle ; in concrete, he requires the student to
have a ruler and a pair of compasses ."
* "The Postulates which are prefixed to Book I. require us to admit that
certain geometrical operations may be performed, without respect to the
 212 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

It is averred that, in the course of Euclid's demonstrations,

tacit assumptions are occasionally made, such as should have
been placed among his axioms. Thus, in the fourth proposi-
tion, there is an assumption that a figure may be lifted and
turned upon itself without change of form. This, however, is
part and parcel of that great step, the very earliest to be made.
in geometrical proof, whereby the comparison of two plane
figures is achieved . As regards the first proposition, Mr. De
Morgan points out two postulates that should have been
explicitly given with the others ; and, for the twelfth, two
more postulates are necessary (Companion to the British
Almanack, for 1849) .

The leading branches of Mathematics : -Arithmetic.

8. The foundations of Arithmetic are the two proper
Axioms of all Mathematics, the Definitions of the funda-
mental operations-Addition, &c., and the Definitions of
the Numbers. The Propositions flow deductively from
these Axioms and Definitions combined.
The Axioms being premised, the Operations understood
and the Numbers defined, the deduction or demonstration of
the Propositions easily follows.
The Propositions of Arithmetic affirm or deny the equival-
ence in amount of numbers differently aggregated. The follow-
ing are examples. Six and seven is equal to nine and four,
to ten and three, &c.; that is, a row ofsix and a row of seven
would be the same total aggregate as a row of nine and a row
of four. These are propositions of addition. As there is one
standard mode of expressing aggregates the decimal system,
the arithmetical propositions usually take the form of stating
other modes of aggregation as equivalent, or not, to a given
decimal aggregation ; nine and five is fourteen (the decimal
aggregate-ten and four). There are corresponding proposi-
tions of subtraction ; nine taken from fourteen leaves five.
manner of performing them. In fact, they appeal to our conceptions, and
for all the purposes of reasoning might be expressed thus :
Any two points may be conceived to be joined by a straight line.
Any terminated straight line may be conceived to admit of unlimited
extension.
A circle may be supposed to have any position for its centre, and a
radius of any magnitude.
The following is another postulate of the same kind, which we shall
have occasion to refer to hereafter :-
A straight line passing through any point may be conceived to be paral-
lel to another straight line.' (CHALLIS ON CALCULATION, pp. 63-4.)
 PROOF OF THE PROPOSITIONS OF NUMBER. 213

The proof of such propositions is the application of the

axioms to the definitions of the numbers as already given :
the axioms are the major premises, the definitions the minors.
Thus, to prove that three and four is seven, in other words,
that a row of three together with a row of four is the same
as a row of seven. We may proceed as follows :-
By the definition , 3 is 2 + 1 (or again 1 + 1 + 1 ) .
Hence, 4+ 3 is the same as 4 + 1 + 1 + 1.
Now 4 + 1, = 5 ; 5 + 1 = 6 ; and 6 + 1 = 7.
The warrant for these substitutions is the law " the sums of
equals are equal, ' applied thus :-
1 + 1 + 1 = 3.
Hence 4 + 1 +1 +1 (7) = 4 + 3.
Arithmetical probation thus, at the outset, creeps along by
a unit at a time ; when, in that way, larger leaps are estab-
lished, the deductions are much shorter. For example, we
can construct and commit to memory a table for the addition
of every two numbers up to ten (2 and 3, 2 and 4, &c).
Propositions of multiplication- six times eight is forty-
eight-are a mere extension of the process of addition . The
celebrated multiplication table embodies 144 of these proposi-
tions, and, by implication an equal number of propositions of
division.
Thus, while the affirmation 3 and 1 is 4,' is a verbal pro-
position (being declaratory of the meaning of 4), 2 and 2
is four ' is a real proposition deduced from the induction ' the
sums of equals are equal.' This last is sometimes called a
necessary truth, but it is not necessary in the sense of an
identical or implicated truth ; it is true only if the above
axiom be true. It is sometimes called self-evident, but that
merely means that it is very rapidly appreciated ; it is essen-
tially of the same scientific character as 16 times 16 is 256,
which would not be called self-evident.
As there is no limit to Numbers, so there is no limit to the
propositions asserting (or denying) the equivalence of numbers
differently stated .

Algebra.

9. The vast mechanism of Algebra rests upon the funda-

mental axioms of all Mathematics. It is a great extension
of the compass of Arithmetic depending upon using sym-
bols of numbers, and signs of operation, for actual numbers
and actual operations.
214 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

No new principles of reasoning or computation are intro-

duced into Algebra ; its foundations are solely the axioms
common to all mathematics. Its characteristic feature is, in
the place of actual numbers, to employ symbols representing
numbers generally ; and, for the actual operations of addition,
subtraction, multiplication, division, to use signs of opera-
tion, +, -, X , ÷ , &c.
Numbers are no longer compared by their actual amount,
but by their modes of formation. One number is regarded as
made up of others formed in a particular way, shown by the
signs of operation. A number a is given as made up of the
sum of b and c, as b + c ; or of the product of b and c, as bc ;
or of the square of b, b² . On this scheme the one number is
said to be a function of the others ; and the science of Algebra
is said to be the calculus of Functions.
The simple functions of numbers are few, being the ex-
pression of the elementary relationships -addition, subtraction ,
multiplication, division, powers, roots, logarithms, sines.
Mr. Challis distinguishes between Algebra and the Calculus of
Functions. He restricts Algebra to the instrumentality and mani-
pulating of Equations. Algebra is a more highly generalized
scheme of symbolical expression than Arithmetic ; it represents
quantities by letters, a, b, x, y, which may have any numerical
value, the only thing considered being their relationships to one
another, as sums, differences, products, roots, &c. The Calculus of
Functions is a still farther step in the same direction. It uses
symbols to show that one quantity has relationships to others,
without condescending on any one form of the relationship ; f (x)
expresses that a certain quantity is made up of some modifications
of x, without saying what they are. It operates generally upon
the form y = f(x) . One leading and important enquiry is to find
the symbolical expression, when the variable x receives a certain
increment h, and becomes f(x + h). This gives birth to distinct
theorems,called Taylor's Theorem, Maclaurin's Theorem, Lagrange's
and Laplace's Theorems, and conducts to the Differential Calculus.
10. Algebra shows the equivalence of different opera-
tions ; and thereby gives the means of resolving the one
into the other.
This is to extend the propositions of Arithmetic . By study-
ing the Algebraic forms, we find that the square of a sum
(a + b) is equivalent to the squares of the separate factors
added to twice their product (a² + b² + 2 a b) ; no matter
what the numbers are.

11. The use of signs of operations readily leads to ex-

 OPERATIONS OF ALGEBRA. 215

pressions not interpretable into any actual facts ; and the

distinctive business of Algebra is to define and justify all
its combinations.
Subtraction in Arithmetic cannot be performed without
something to subtract from ; the Algebraic sign -, may be
prefixed to a number irrespective of this fact. Not only so, but
the number so qualified may be formally subjected to all the
operations performable upon real numbers. We may suppose
two negative quantities multiplied together, a process not to
be realized in fact. There is a still greater departure from
possibility in placing a negative quantity under the sign for
extracting the square root, — I, √ ---- a.
It is necessary to qualify the rules for the cardinal opera-
tions of Arithmetic, in their extension to Algebraic quantities,
by explaining the conditions of the use of the signs : —to lay
down and demonstrate such rules as ' minus multiplied by
plus gives minus ;' minus multiplied by minus gives plus.'
Although the demonstration of such rules is a matter for
logical discussion, we do not enter upon it here . Mathe-
maticians usually satisfy themselves in all such cases by an
appeal to the verification of experience ; to which they append
some form of deductive proof. But deductive proofs in such
matters would never be trusted by themselves, or in the
absence of verifications. Thus, 6 minus multiplied by minus
makes plus,' is shown by manipulating the product of two
differences as a -- b, by c -- d ; where it is seen that only by
this rule can we obtain a correct result.

12. The highest form of the Algebraical problem is the

RESOLUTION OF EQUATIONS.
This contains all the preceding processes, and applies them
in an advantageous manner to disentangle complicated relation-
ships of numbers.
In an Equation, two expressions known to be equal are
placed against one another ; as-
13 x + 2 a - b = 6 x —c .
By applying the fundamental axioms of equality, and a few of
the convenient derivatives from them (the differences of equals
are equal, equal multiples and equal quotients of equals are
equal, the squares, square roots, &c., of equals are equal ), the
equation may be so manipulated that there may stand, at last,
on one side, the quantity x (whose value is desired) , and, on
the other, a function made up of a, b, c, to the exclusion of x ;
216 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS .

strict equality being preserved at every step of the transform-

ing operation. No logical difficulties are involved in this
refined and powerful machinery ; while it may be quoted as
happily exemplifying the intervention of the axioms and
derivative propositions of equality .
Geometry.
13. Some of the more difficult logical questions arising
out of Geometry- those relating to the Definitions, Axioms,
and Postulates have been already considered ; it remains
to advert to the order of topics.
Every science reposes alike on Definitions and on Axioms ;
which accordingly are stated at the outset. Generally speak-
ing, the Definitions come first, the Axioms next. But the
Axioms of Geometry may be supposed already given, as the
indispensible basis of Arithmetic, and, therefore, need only to
be recited along with any corollaries or derivatives especially
required in Geometry.
It would be advisable to state first of all the concrete basis
of Geometry-to give the notions attainable only from concrete
experience. These have been already enumerated . To make
a broad separation between these ultimate indefinable notions,
and the properly definable, the expositor might interpose the
review of the Axioms, especially dwelling upon their inductive
character, and drawing the line between the fundamental and
the derivative. At this stage the teacher should allow himself
the fullest latitude of concrete illustration.
Next would follow the remaining Definitions in order of
derivation or dependence. Frequently, corollaries are given
also ; but these are not proper, or mediate, inferences ; they
are mere equivalents of the definition, not to be denied with-
out self-contradiction . Such are, only one straight line can
be drawn between two points ; ' ' all right angles are equal.'
No mediate inference can be drawn from a Definition without
the introduction of an axiom ; a truly deductive process,
amounting to a theorem.
Euclid's three first propositions are problems or construc-
tions. The first theorem is the real start of the Geometrical
concatenation ; namely, the fourth proposition- establishing
the equality throughout of the two triangles having two sides
and the included angle equal. This is the sole basis of geo-
metrical comparison, the commencing stride that renders pos-
sible all the subsequent assertions as to the equality and
 EUCLID'S FOURTH PROPOSITION. 217

inequality of triangles, parallelograms, &c. The proof of the

proposition is peculiar ; the operation made use of is never
again repeated ; namely, the ideal placing of the one triangle
upon the other. Here, in fact, we have an inevitable appeal
to experiment or trial in the concrete ; just as in the defini-
tions and the axioms, we must take our first lessons from the
manipulation of actual objects. Euclid, by his mode of stat-
ing the demonstration, professedly goes through a process of
pure deduction, all the time that he requires us to conceive an
experimental proof. He appears to be using merely an illus-
tration in the concrete ; but if his readers had not made actual
experiments of the kind indicated, (doubtless the same ex-
periments as gave the original notions of line, angle and sur-
face) they could not be convinced by the reasoning in the de-
monstration.
That a proposition should appear to be proved without
appealing to an axiom (either directly or indirectly), shows
that the proposition cannot be real ; the subject and predicate
must be identical. The proof rests solely on definitions ; but
a definition by itself cannot advance us a step. The propo-
sition must, in fact, be a mere equivalent of the notions of
line, angle, surface, equality- a fact apparent in the operation
ofunderstanding these notions. It is implicated in the experi-
ence requisite for mastering the indefinable elements of Geo-
metry ; and should be rested purely on the basis of experience. *
The 5th proposition is what really constitutes Euclid's first
demonstration by a genuine process of reasoning. In it, there
is a legitimate deduction from the axioms common to all
mathematics, conjoined with the induction, falsely called a
demonstration, given as the 4th proposition. The axioms
applied are, the proper axiom, ' the sums of equals are equal,'
6
and the derivative, the differences of equals are equal .'
14. It is the characteristic of elementary Geometry to
maintain the concrete reference to diagrams, which gives
the subject to appearance, but only to appearance, an
inductive or experimental character.

* Mr. CHALLIS remarks, on the Fourth Proposition, that the proof rests
on no previous proposition, and appeals only to the simplest conceptions
of space. This proposition is proved by the principle of superposition,
neither requiring, nor admitting of, any other direct proof.' A casual
observation of Mr. De Morgan's is well exemplified by Euclid's attempt
to demonstrate this fundamental assumption-- the Conversion of identity
by help of a syllogism is reasoning in a circle.'
218 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS .

All symbolical reasonings are liable to mistake. Not to

speak of the slips that the reasoner himself may commit
unknowingly, there is often a failure of adaptation between
the laws of the symbols and the laws of the matter they are
applied to. For this the remedy is the constant verifica-
tion of the results . Now, in Geometry, an actual figure is
always before the eyes, and the effect of every construction
and every step of reasoning is judged of by actual inspection.
When the direction is given to join the opposite angles of a
quadrilateral, there is apparent to the glance the division of
the figure into two triangles . For the most part, Euclid offers
no other proof of this class of consequences. Sometimes he
applies the reductio ad absurdum in such cases, as in the proof
that the tangent to a circle falls without the circle.
So long as Geometry is discussed in the concrete, or by
naming lines, angles, circles, the mind must conceive them in
the concrete, which would be impracticable without the help
of diagrams. In Algebraic Geometry, the concrete form is
exchanged for numerical equivalents, to be manipulated accord-
ing to the laws of operation in Arithmetic or Algebra ; a
rectangle is no longer a fact of space but a product of numbers
or symbols ; a curve is an equation . The student is cautioned
6
by Mr. De Morgan that, although the names square ' and
'cube ' are transferred to Algebraic quantities, as a², a³, the
names mean different things from geometrical squares and
cubes.
Algebraic Geometry.
15. The expression of Geometrical quantities by Algebra,
while depriving the mind of the assistance of the diagrams,
greatly enlarges the power of demonstration and inference.
Compare Euclid's 2nd book with the same propositions
algebraically rendered ; the one is laborious, the other com-
paratively easy.
The great device of Descartes, for expressing curves alge-
braically by co-ordinates whose relation in each case could be
stated in a formula, opened up a new field of mathematics.
The conic sections became comparatively easy ; and curves of
a still higher order that would have baffled common geometry
were brought under investigation. The method was also an
essential prelude to the Differential calculus .
16. Algebraic Geometry furnishes specific rules for the
embodiment and for the interpretation of formulæ. The
rest is pure algebra.
 INCOMMENSURABLES. 219

It is easy to embody a rectangle, in terms of the sides ; an

algebraic product is sufficient for the purpose. Angles may
be expressed by their proportion to the circle, that is by their
subtended are, and also by their sines, tangents, &c. Curves
are given by co-ordinates on the Cartesian plan . The rules of
embodiment are also the rules of interpretation. But as there
is frequent danger of overstepping geometrical conditions by
algebraical operations, the interpretation must be continually
verified. Mathematics is the slipperiest of sciences ; its ana-
lytical processes are full of pitfalls ; but luckily, it is the easiest
to keep right by verification. The arithmetical symbols 0 and
1 are used with a latitude that makes them ambiguous, unless ,
for each case, there is a distinct understanding made and ad-
hered to.

The Higher Calculus.

17. The representation of continnous quantity, by means
of numbers, in certain cases, fails to give a neat or definite
result.

Continuous quantity, as exemplified in lines and in motions,

must be supposed to be broken up into equal portions in order
to be expressed numerically, and thereby to be made the
subject of arithmetical computation. In certain instances, the
division cannot be made without a remainder. Hence arises
a peculiar difficulty.
In vulgar fractions, first emerges the peculiar case of incom-
mensurable quantities, that is, quantities that have no common
measure. In Geometry, the side and diagonal of a square are
incommensurable ; if the side be divided into equal divisions,
no matter how many, these divisions will not apply to the
diagonal without a remainder. So with the diameter and the
circumference of a circle.
18. The solution of Incommensurables, and the acom-
modation of numbers to continuous quantities generally,
can only be approximate. A variety of modes have been
devised, at bottom the same, for working out the approxi-
mation.
Mathematicians long struggled to evade the difficulty before
acknowledging the true character of the solution. A great
number of persons refused to believe that the diameter and
circumference of a circle would for ever remain incommensur-
able.
220 LOGIC OF MATHEMATICS.

Euclid's definition of proportionals is deservedly admired

for its ingenuity in endeavouring to comprise incommensurable
quantities ; but it is not satisfactory. A competent judge
(De Morgan) remarks, first, the want of obvious connexion
between it and the ordinary well-established ideas of propor-
tion ; secondly, its involving an idea of infinity ; and lastly,
the apparent unlikelihood that any quantities exist capable of
satisfying the definition. The difficulties can be met only by
the method of approximation, on which is based the whole
structure of the higher or transcendental analysis .
The first application of the approximate methods was to the
quadrature of the circle, as given in Euclid. The process
there given is commonly called the method of Exhaustions.
The gist ofthe matter lies in the proposition- A circle being
given, two similar polygons may be found, the one described
about the circle the other inscribed within it, such as shall
differ by a space less than any given space.' These last words
give the idea running through all the processes, named the
Theory of Limits, Prime and Ultimate Ratios, Infinitesimal
Quantities. A curve line can never be a straight line, but by
diminishing the arc, the approximation of the two increases,
until at last we pass not only beyond any sensible error, but
beyond any error that may be assigned. Thus an arc may be
said to be the limit of its chord ; the area of a circle may be
said to be identical with an inscribed, or a described, polygon
of an infinite number of sides. Now as the polygon consists
of a series of triangles with a common apex in the centre, the
area of the polygon is equal to half the product of the radius
and the sum of the bases, or chords ; and by diminishing these
chords without limit, they become identical with the circum-
ference of the circle.
The method of Exhaustions was applied by Archimedes to
the quadrature of the parabola, and to the solid measurement
of the cone, sphere, and cylinder ; all which give neat solutions,
or expressions in finite terms. The subsequent developments
were left for modern times, after the discovery of algebra ; and
they advanced as algebra and its applications to geometry
advanced. The Fluxions of Newton and the Differential Cal-
culus of Leibnitz were the great algebraic embodiments.
These methods contained a new order of quantities, called
Fluxions (by Newton) and Differential Co-efficients (by Leib-
nitz), formed from ordinary quantities on considerations grow-
ing out of the method of Limits, and resolved back again on
the same laws. The quantities once created, the operations
 TWO DEPARTMENTS OF PHYSICS. 221

were treated as pure algebra, and mathematicians left them to

be justified by their results, rarely attempting to render a rea-
son for the assumptions lurking under them. Hence, such
attacks upon the system as Berkeley's famous sarcasm, that
the fluxional calculus operated upon the ghosts of departed
quantities. The neglect to assign the true basis of the cal-
culus, and the treating it from first to last as a pure algebraic
assumption, culminated in Lagrange ; against whom Whewell
and De Morgan have reclaimed, and have provided the neces-
sary reconciliation of the algebra with the conditions of the
various problems to be solved ; showing that approximation
and compromise must be beld as essential to the operation.

CHAPTER II.

LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

1. It has been seen (Introduction) that the branch of

science termed Natural Philosophy or PHYSICS is divided
into two parts -Molar Physics and Molecular Physics.
The aggregate called Natural Philosophy scarcely admits of
definition, until separated into distinct departments - Molar
Physics, or Motion in Mass, and Molecular Physics, or Motion
in Molecule.
The Physics of Masses, Molar Physics, includesthe pheno-
mena of Motion and Force, as belonging to bodies in the
aggregate. Such are the phenomena of planetary motions, of
falling bodies, rivers, winds, &c.
The Physics of Molecules, Molecular Physics, relates to the
motions and forces operating between particles or molecules,
these being of a degree of minuteness far beyond the reach of
the human senses. The phenomena representing such notions
and forces, are the Aggregations into masses ; Cohesions and
Adhesions generally ; Heat ; Electricity ; Light. Reserva-
tion is made of the peculiar form of molecular force, called
Chemical force, as having a character and consequences
peculiar to itself.
222 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

MOLAR PHYSICS.
Divisions of the Subject.
2. The Abstract Branches, comprising Motion and
Force in general, and susceptible of Deductive and Mathe-
matical treatment are these :
Mathematics of Motion -Kinematics.
Forces (1) in Equillibrio -Statics.
Forces (2) causing Motion- Dynamics.
The Concrete Branches are-
Mechanic Powers and Solid Machinery.
Hydrostatics and Hydro-dynamics.
Aerostatics and Pneumatics..
Acoustics.
Astronomy.

Notions of Molar Physics.

3. In Physics, are pre-supposed the Notions (as well as

the Propositions) of Mathematics. Only those special to
the science are here reviewed.
Motion-Rest.- This antithetic couple is the fundamental
conception of Physics, and is probably an ultimate experience of
the human mind. We obtain the idea of Movement by a
peculiar employment of our active energies, assisted by sen-
sation. We also obtain a knowledge of the varieties of move-
ment -quick, slow, uniform, varying, straight, curved, con-
tinuous, reciprocating, pendulous, wave-like, &c. The
modes that depend upon degree, or Velocity, are part of the
ultimate experience of motion as such ; those characterized by
shape or Form have a property common to mere extension.
Force. This is without doubt the most fundamental notion
of the human mind ; in the order of evolution, it concurs with,
if it is not prior to, both motion and extension. It cannot be
defined except in the mode peculiar to ultimate notions. The
feeling that we have when we expend muscular energy, in
resisting or in causing movement, is unique and irresolvable.
Inertia, Resistance, Momentum.- These names designate our
experience of force from the objective side, or as embodied in
the things of the object world. The occasion of calling forth
our feeling of energy when referred to an external fact is Re-
sistance, Inertness, Momentum, or External Force- all signi-
 NOTIONS OF MOLAR PHYSICS. 223

fying the same thing. This great fact must be learnt, in the
first instance, by each one's separate experience ; the best mode
of scientifically expressing it is a matter for discussion .
Matter is Extension , coupled with Force or Inertia. Any-
thing extended and at the same time possessing force, either
to resist or to impart motion is Material.
Mass, Density, Solidity, are derived notions ; they are ob-
tained by putting together Force and Extension or Volume:
The Mass is the collective Force of a body, shown by its degree
of Resistance, and also by its degree of Momentum when
moving at a given rate. The Density is the degree of space
concentration ; a given power of resistance, with a smaller
bulk or volume, is a greater Density. Solidity, when not sig-
nifying the solid state of matter generally, as opposed to liquid
or gas, is another name for Density.
Impact is a phenomenon expressed by means of Space or
Extension, Motion , and Force. It is one mode of imparting
or communicating momentum, and is a test or measure of Force.
Attraction is definable by Extension, Motion, and Force.
It is a mode of communicating Force, distinct from Impact,
and in some respects simpler. Among its specific examples
are Gravity, Cohesion , Adhesion, Magnetism, Electrical Attrac-
tion, (Chemical Attraction ) .
Repulsion is definable by reference to the same fundamental
notions. It also is a mode of imparting or redistributing
force, and differs from Attraction only in the way that it
changes the relative situation of the masses concerned . It is
exemplified in the Expansive energy of Gases in their ordinary
state, in the Expansion of Liquids and Solids from rise of
temperature and after compression ( called Elasticity) . The
Polar Forces-Magnetism , Electricity, &c., exercise, along with
Attraction, a counterpart Repulsion.
By still farther combining these primary notions, we obtain
-Equilibrium, Composition and Resolution, Resultant, Virtual
Velocity, Centripetal, Centrifugal, Tangential force, Projectile.
To Mechanics belong Specific Gravity, Centre of Gravity,
Stability, Oscillation, Rotation, Percussion, Pendulum,
Mechanic Power, Machine, Work, Friction.
In Hydrostatics, occur Liquid, Liquid Pressure, Liquid
Level, Displacement, Flotation, Column of liquid Hydrometer.
In Hydro-dynamics, Liquid Motions, Efflux, Discharge,
Liquid Waves, Pumps, Water-wheels, Propellers.
În Aerostatics and Pneumatics, Air, Atmosphere , Expansion
of Gases, Suction, Flow of Gases, Undulations, Barometer,
Anemometer.
224 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

In Acoustics, Sound, Pitch, Timbre, Vibrations, String ;

Note, Echo, Harmony.
In Astronomy, Sun, Planet, Satellite, Comet, Aerolite,
Bolid, Star, Nebula, Orbit, Ecliptic, Year, Month, Day, Eclipse,
Transit, Parallax, Aberration, Right Ascension, Declination,
Eccentricity, Node, Apside, Perihelion , Perturbation, Libration,
Precession, Nutation, Tides.

Propositions of Molar Physics.

4. These are of the following classes :-(1) The Induc-
tions of Force and Motion ; (2) The Deductive Propria
asserting the quantitative relationships of Motion and
Force ; (3) Empirical laws of the concrete phenomena.
(1) The great Inductions, commonly called the Laws of
Motion, are the axioms of the science. These will be con-
sidered afterwards. They are all quantitative in their expres-
sion. Another fundamental Induction is the Law of Gravity.
(2) The science being pre-eminently Deductive, its proposi-
tions are for the most part deductions from the axioms. Such
are- the propositions of the Composition and Resolution of
Motions and Forces ; the proposition called the ' law of Areas ;'
the principle of the Mechanic Powers ; the principles of the
pendulum ; the law of liquid pressure ; the principle that con-
nects fluid motion with fluid support ; the laws of the propa-
gation and the reflection of sound.
All these matters are stated in the form of real propositions,
which, however, may be deduced from the axioms or induc-
tions of the science applied to the particular cases as scientifi-
cally defined . For example, the law of fluid pressure is a
proposition to this effect. C At any point in a fluid at rest, the
pressure is equal in all directions ; the subject of the proposi-
tion supposes a fluid at rest, a point taken in it, and considera-
tion given to the pressure ; the predicate is ' equality in all
directions.' The proof is deductive, and ultimately rests on
the axioms of motion and force, together with the definition of
fluidity, although the proximate majors are the propositions of
the Composition of Forces.
Subsidiary to the working out of the science are the propo-
sitions expressing the quantities of motion, force, &c., existing
in actual things. Thus, besides the Law of Gravity, we have
a statement of the numerical amount of gravity at the earth's
surface ; also the relative gravities of different solids and
fluids. These numerical propositions are called the data,
 DEFINITION OF MOTION. 225

constants, or co-efficients of the science, and are ascertained by

observation and experiment .
(3) There are certain empirical laws obtained by observa-
tion or experiment . Such are the laws of the Strength of
Materials (to some extent Deductive) , the laws of Friction,
the Motion of Projectiles (partly Deductive), the Flow of
Rivers, the Spouting of Liquids, the Compression of Liquids
and of Gases, the Diffusion of Sound, the action of Vibrating
Strings, &c. These are all real propositions ; they are in their
nature propria, or deducible from ultimate principles ; but, in
the present state of knowledge, they must be gained by direct
experiment.

Definitions of Molar Physics.

5. As in Mathematics, so in Physics, there are certain
properties that are ultimate, and incommunicable by lan-
guage ; being known by each one's independent experi-
ence. Nevertheless, it is open to us to consider the best
mode of generalizing and stating this experience.
The facts named Motion, Force, Matter, are understood only
by our concrete experience of the things denoted by the names.
But our crude observations may be rectified by more careful
comparisons, and may be reduced under precise general state-
ments. Moreover, as in Mathematics, we may select the
aspect most suitable as a point of departure for our deductive
reasonings.
Definition ofMotion. - Of the fact of motion no knowledge
can be imparted ; there is nothing simpler to express it by :
6
change of place ' is not more intelligible than ' motion.' We
must assume that each one understands motion both generically,
and in its degrees ( capable of numerical statement) ; and also
in such simpler modes as straight or divergent. The more
complex movements are then definable. Velocity means degree
of motion. The only thing needing to be expressed formally
is the measure of Motion or Velocity with reference to Space
and to Time ; these last-named elements being presupposed as
themselves intelligible.
Matter, Force, Inertia. These are three names for substan-
tially the same fact. At the bottom, there is but one experi-
ence, although varied in the circumstances, namely, the
experience of putting forth muscular energy in causing or in
resisting movement. To this experience we give the names
Force and Matter, which are not two things but one thing ;
15
226 LOGIC OF PHYSICS,

of which Inertia is merely another expression . It is pure

tautology to define one of these terms by the others ; matter
is nothing except as giving the experience called also force ;
force is only matter moving, or obstructing movement.
Matter, however, affects us in other ways than by the mus-
cular feeling of resistance or of expended energy. It is always
extended, and in most cases visible, and also tangible. Are
we not, then, to include these facts in the definition ? No,
and for these reasons :- - ( 1 ) Extension is not confined to
matter ; it belongs also to empty space ; therefore, though a
predicate of all matter, extension is not the exclusive charac-
teristic of matter. (2) Visibility and Tangibility belong to
many kinds of matter, but not to all matter ; hence, these
properties cannot be the defining characters of matter in
general, or of all matter ; they are to be reserved as properties
of the kinds of matter wherein they occur ; solids and liquids,
for example. Accordingly, the only fact occurring in all
matter is the fact expressed by resistance, force, or inertia ;
all which are names for a single phenomenon. This phenome-
non, when fully examined, and generalized to the utmost, has
two different aspects , which we may separate in expression , but
cannot separate in nature ; the one is the resistance to move-
ment by bodies, whether at rest or in motion, and the other,
the imparting of movement or momentum by being in motion.
The first aspect of resistance is the more popular meaning of
inertia ; the second aspect, the imparting of movement, is the
popular view of force ; but in the scientific consideration of
the subject, these are but one property.
The definition of Matter and of Inertia, or Inert substance,
is, therefore, but one. It generalizes our familiar experiences
of resisting motion and of communicating motion, which
always concur in the same thing. Fully expressed , it amounts
to the statement given in the First Law of Motion . We are
entitled to lay down as the fundamental or defining attribute
of matter, in whose absence matter is not, that if once at rest
it remains at rest, and if once in motion, it continues moving
in a straight line. To put it from rest to motion, moving
matter must be employed ; to arrest its course, matter, either
in motion or at rest, must be opposed to it. All this is
involved in the very meaning of matter. We cannot divide
these expressions, and assign one as the defining mark of
matter, and the other as a predicate distinct from the defini-
tion. No one has ever succeeded in constituting a REAL
proposition out of these properties. The appearance of a real
 DEFINITION OF MATTER. 227

proposition could be given only by assuming as the meaning of

matter the imperfect view entertained by the unenlightened
mind (which, owing to adverse appearances and imperfect
knowledge, does not fully recognize the persistence of moving
matter), and giving as the predicate the scientifically recti-
fied generalization of matter ; but when this generalization is
attained, it is wholly embodied in the definition of matter ; it
cannot furnish one fact as a defining property and reserve
another as a predicate. There is a definition of Inertia ; there
is no law.
Thus, then, the persistence in a state of rest or in a state of
uniform rectilineal motion , is the meaning of Inertia, and of
Matter in general ; in which meaning there is an unavoidable
implication of active resistance, and active communication of
motion. The difficulty is to find an expression to comprehend
all these aspects of one indivisible property. Matter at rest
operates at one time in dead resistance, at another time in
using up force by itself passing into motion ; matter in motion
may resist movement, or it may generate movement ; but,
these are not a plurality of properties ; we cannot suppose one
of them separated from the others. The definition employs
plurality of phrases in order to encompass a unity.
Matter and Inertia being thus defined by one stroke, Force
is merely another reference to the same fact. Inert Matter in
motion is the most characteristic expression or aspect of Force,
and is adopted as its numerical measure ; but we cannot ex-
clude from the idea the consideration of matter at rest. In
measuring force by moving matter, we mean matter transferred
from rest to motion, or from one rate of motion to a quicker ;
this is force as generated. Again, the force is manifested in
the abatement of the motion, in reducing bodies to the state
of rest ; this is force as expended .
As there is but one fact underlying Matter, Inertia, Force,
so there is but one measure. A larger quantity of matter, or
inertia, is the same as a larger expenditure of force to change
the matter from rest to a given pace of motion. The ultimate
measure is the human consciousness of expended energy.
There is a palpable impropriety in the expression, given as a
law, ' The amount of inertia increases with the quantity of
matter ; ' the two properties stated are but one fact.
To sum up. Each person by their own experi
ence must
become acquainted with the concrete examples of matter and
force. A comparison of all varieties of the phenomenon re-
veals the presence of a common feature , at bottom one and
228 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

indivisible, but variously manifested as resistance, as a source

of movement-as persistence in rest or in uniform rectilineal
movement. To this many-sided unity, we give the names
Matter, Inertia, Force, which have a common definition and a
common estimate. The word Matter is the concrete name,
while Inertia and Force are the asbtractions for what is com-
mon to all matter.
Mass, Density.- Mass is the quantity of matter, measured in
the mode already described, namely, by the expenditure re-
quisite to change the body's state by a given amount. When
the Mass is given, and also the volume, or bulk, we obtain the
Density. Volume and Mass rightly precede Density, in order
of definition. Messrs Thomson and Tait make Density pre-
cede Mass .
Momentum is a convenient name for Force ; its measure is
the mass multiplied by the velocity. The unit of force or
momentum is some unit of mass, multiplied by a unit of velo-
city. Mass is usually estimated by weight, but this is to
anticipate the consideration of gravity, which should be ex-
cluded from the elementary definitions of motion, matter, and
force.
The defining of the notions following on these--Impact,
Attraction, Repulsion, Gravity, Cohesion, &c. - presents no
logical difficulties. They are all derivative notions, their
elements being the above named primary notions coupled with
those of mathematics ; and they are defined as such, although
concrete examples may be given to aid the understanding of
the more difficult abstractions.
Thus, Impact is the transfer of force from one body to
another by physical concourse ; the direction communicated
being the direction possessed . Attraction is the continued gene-
ration of moving force shown in the mutual approach of two
bodies ; Repulsion is the generation of force leading to the
mutual recess of bodies. Gravity is the attraction inherent,
persistent, and unchangeable in all matter, being proportioned
to the mass, and extending to all distances, at a uniform rate of
decrease.

Axioms of Molar Physics.

6. The chief axioms of the science are usually stated

under the title-Laws of Motion.
In the statement of these laws verbal and real proposi-
tions are confounded.
 NEWTON'S LAWS OF MOTION. 229

Newton's First Law-' Every body perseveres in its state

of rest or of uniform rectilineal motion, unless compelled to
change that state by impressed forces '-is merely the full
expansion of the definition of matter, inertia, or body. It no
doubt expresses more than the vague unscientific notion of
matter, but no more than is absolutely inseparable from
matter. It is a verbal and not a real proposition-a definition
disguised as a proposition. ' Body ' means what Newton pre-
dicates of it ; withdraw from ' body ' all that the law affirms
and implies, and there would be nothing left. If a body did
not persevere in its state of rest or motion, until disturbed by
another force, it would not possess the most elementary con-
ception that we can form of body, the property of resistance.
Of the various modes of exhausting the aspects of body,
matter, inertia, force, it may be doubted whether Newton's is
the most felicitous. At all events, the attempt would succeed
better, if the statement were in the only legitimate guise—a
Definition.
Newton's Second Law is-' Change of Motion is proportional
to the impressed force, and takes place in the direction of that
force.' This law assumes the fact of the communication or
transfer of motion, and affirms, although not in the best man-
ner, the quantitative equivalence of what is given with what
is received .
The Third Law is- To every action there is always an
equal and contrary re-action ; or the mutual actions of any
two bodies are always equal and oppositely directed.' More
shortly expressed thus- Action and Reaction are equal and
contrary.' Objections have often been taken to the word
6
Re-action' in this law. The meaning put upon it by Newton
is gathered from his own illustrations. His examples are of
two classes. The first puts the case of impact, as in pressing
a body, or in drawing it by some solid medium as a cord or a
rod. There is, to say the least, great awkwardness in repre-
senting the communication of force by impact, in these terms :
' when we push a stone with the hand , the hand is pushed
back by the same force as the stone is moved forward ;' or
' a horse towing a boat is dragged backwards by the same force
as the boat is dragged forwards. ' The more natural expres-
sion is that when one moving body gives motion to another,
it loses exactly the momentum that it communicates ; or that
on the re-distribution of force or momentum nothing is lost.
Now, if there be any real affirmation in the Second Law, it is
this and nothing else.
230 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

The other class of examples given by Newton comprises a

distinct case, and the only case that gives the appearance of
propriety to the word ' re-action .' It is the communication of
momentum by distant attraction (or repulsion). When one
body attracts a second, the second equally attracts the first ;
the attractions are mutual and equal ; the momenta produced
are exactly the same in each. This is a fact of great import-
ance in nature and deserves to be singled out ; indeed, it is
the only case of communicated momentum where the result is
unaffected by disturbances that interfere with exact calcula-
tions.
Now this is to be regarded as a separate induction. It is
fully consistent with the principle of the conservation of
momentum, under re- distribution, as represented by impact,
and has some inherent probability in its favour, but still
requires the confirmation of experience . Ingenious reasons
might be given, why no other result should arise, but there is
no infallible deductive cogency in applying the Law of Conser-
vation, founded on impact, to the equality of mutual attrac-
tions.
Searching thus through the three Laws of Motion, we
encounter only one principle- the principle of Conservation
of Force under re-distribution. The second law has no mean-
6
ing but this. That change of motion is proportional to the
impressed force ' with difficulty escapes from being a verbal
proposition, for there is no other measure of force but ' change
of motion,' imparted, or impartible momentum. The assertion
would have no reality but for the circumstance that a moving
body encounters another body and changes the state of that
other body-urging it to move or arresting its movement.
This is a supposition not made in the bare definition of force ;
and, therefore, we do something more than repeat the defini-
tion, when we affirm that the force imparted to the second
body is lost to the first. Now, this is all that the Third Law
contains ; only that law brings into prominence the distinct
case of force arising by attraction or repulsion at a distance.
Discarding, therefore, the present First Law, as being but the
definition of Inertia, we may condense the second and third
into a single statement declaring the Conservation of Force or
Momentum, under re-distribution, whether by impact, or by
attraction or repulsion . This is the one axiom of the Science ;
its foundations are inductive. It is a partial statement,
applicable to molar forces, of the all- comprehending law ofthe
Conservation of Force. Indeed, in the limitation to molar
 ONLY ONE LAW OF MOTION. 231

force, the principle is not strictly true ; it is true with regard

to attractions and repulsions, and hence in Astronomy no
error is committed in applying it ; it is not true of impacts ;
there is always force lost in a mechanical collision, or in the
transfer by machinery ; the lost mechanical momentum re-ap-
pearing as molecular momentum or heat.
Newton's second law has been considered as a way of pro-
viding for the case of the communication of movement to a
body already moving in some other direction. A force impel-
ling in any direction will accomplish its full effect in that
direction, even although the body should be already in motion
in some different direction ; as when a ship sailing in a
westerly current is propelled by a north wind. This is the
foundation of the law of composition of Motion and Force, but
it is still only an application of the principle of Conservation
of Momentum under re-distribution . Direction as well as
amount are included in the principle ; a body moving in a
certain direction, and imparting momentum, imparts it in its
own direction, and in no other. Before affirming the Law of
Conservation in its full generality, we are bound to verify it
for this case as well as for mutual attraction ; it has been veri-
fied, and is affirmed accordingly.
The so-called ' Principle of Virtual Velocities ' is a hypo-
thetical expression of the Law of Conservation suited to various
mechanical applications, such as the demonstration of the
mechanic powers . We cannot prove the statical proposi-
tion of the lever, without supposing it to move. Dynamically
the law of the mechanical powers is the only one consistent
with the Conservation of Force ; and the dynamical proof is
given as the statical by the supposition of a very small motion .
7. The second great Induction of Molar Physics is the
Law of Gravity.

The Law of Gravity associates the two distinct properties—

Inertia and Gravity, and declares the one to be proportioned
to the other, throughout all varieties of matter. The Law is
sufficiently expressed thus :-Every portion of matter attracts
every other portion, the attraction in each being in proportion
to the mass (or inertia), and inversely as the square of the
distance.
This Law has been frequently referred to, in previous parts
of this work, as the one unequivocal case of two co-extensive
properties, constituting a proposition fully reciprocating, and
convertible by simple conversion .

1
232 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

In consequence of the law, gravity is a fit measure of inertia.

Our unit of force (so much inertia with so much velocity) is a
given weight, say a pound, moving at so many feet per second.
Concatenation and Method of Molar Physics.
8. The branches of Molar Physics follow a Deductive
arrangement. The Abstract departments are purely deduc-
tive ; the Concrete unite Deduction with Experimental
determinations.
The great division into Statics and Dynamics -Equilibrium
and Movement-exhausts the abstract portion of the subject.
These are thoroughly mathematical in their structure ; the
propositions and demonstrations are worked out according to
Geometry, Algebra, or the higher Calculus, respectively. A
preliminary mathematical department is constituted , which
6
has been termed Kinematics,' containing propositions that
assume only the fact of Motion, together with mathematical
elements. The Composition and Resolution of Motions, under
every possible variety of complication, are mathematically de-
veloped under this branch ; it being also applicable to Optics.
The theorems are then found to be transferable to Statical and
to Dynamical Problems, which regard Motion as the result
and the essential fact of Force, whose full expression is the
product of Motion or Velocity and Mass.
The Concrete Branches are : -I. The Mechanic Powers, and
Machinery generally (fluid action not included). Here there
is an application of the deductive laws, but these have to be
modified bythe molecular structure of bodies ; and the modifi-
cations are ascertained experimentally. The laws of friction,
of stress and strain, of molecular transfer in impacts, &c., are
the subject of experiment almost exclusively. Where deduc-
tion is applied, it must be submitted at every step to experi-
mental confirmation .
II. Hydrostatics and Hydro-Dynamics, or abstract Statics and
Dynamics applied to Liquids. There is here also the employ-
ment of experiment to find out the modifications of dynamical
laws due to the molecular structure of liquids. There is a
farther use of experiment, in aid of the deductive process
itself, which is apt to be foiled by the complications of fluid
mobility.
III. Aerostatics and Pneumatics comprise the treatment of
gaseous bodies, to which the foregoing remarks also apply.
IV. Acoustics treats of vibrations of the air and other bodies,
 CONCRETE DEPARTMENTS OF MOLAR PHYSICS. 233

constituting the agency of Sound. Here we have the transition

from the molar to the molecular ; but the mode of dealing
with the phenomenon (through the similitude of pendulous
and wave motions) has close alliances with the preceding
molar branches. In this department, however, experiment
predominates over deduction.
V. Astronomy might be taken either first or last among
the Concrete branches. It departs the least from abstract
Statics and Dynamics ; which is owing to the purity of the
gravitating force ; their being no friction and, in the celestial
region, no resistance. It is deductive throughout ; yet, owing
to the great mathematical difficulties, the deductions must be
checked by continual observation ; while to observation alone
we owe the knowledge of the co-efficients or constants.
In Astronomy, there are various problems that draw upon
the other concrete branches of molar physics, and even upon
molecular physics ; so that the position of priority among the
concrete branches has to be qualified . The tides, the physical
constitution of the sun and the planets, the theory of solar and
planetary heat and light- are examples of these far-branching
portions of the subject.

MOLECULAR PHYSICS.

9. In Molecular Physics, the phenomena have reference

to the action of the component molecules of matter.
The chief subjects are-
Molecular Attractions- Cohesion, &c.,
Heat,
Light,
Electricity.
The primary assumption, axiom, or induction of Molecular
Physics is to the effect that the masses of matter are composed
of small particles, atoms, or molecules, attracting or repelling
each other in various modes, and possessing intestine motions.
This is a real proposition respecting matter, and not a mere
repetition of its defining property-Inertia . It is pre-emi-
nently hypothetical in its character ; that is, the evidence for
it is only the suitability to express the phenomena open to the
senses ; as, for example, the solid, liquid, and gaseous forms
of bodies, the heat or temperature of bodies, luminous and
electrical effects.
234 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

Notions of Molecular Physics.

Molecule, Atom.- It is known as a fact that every kind of
matter is made up of very minute portions, called atoms or
molecules ; the limit of minuteness being hitherto unascer-
tained. By supposing attractions and repulsions between the
atoms, we can represent the varieties of solid, liquid, and gas,
as well as the imponderable forces- heat, &c. The phenomena,
however, require that there should be different orders of
atoms or molecules ; the ultimate atoms being grouped into
complex atoms, and those again, perhaps, into still higher com-
pounds. Thus, the Cohesion atom, the Hea tatom, the Chemical
atoms, the Solution or Diffusion atom, are all hypothetically
distinct, the assumptions being varied to suit the appearances.
The definition of the atom or molecule,* therefore, is hypo-
thetical and fluctuating ; the only constant assumption is a very
minute element gifted with attractions and repulsions, by which
is brought about the aggregation into masses.
MOLECULAR ATTRACTIONS -PROPERTIES OF MATTER. Nume-
rous important notions arise out of this departraent of Physics,
which discusses the various modes of aggregation of material
masses, and their causes, real or hypothetical.
Solid, Liquid, Gas. -These names for the three states of
matter, have already occurred under Molar Physics, and must
there have been defined up to a certain point. The exhaustive
definition of the various forms of solidity falls under Molecular
Physics. I shall indicate, for ulterior ends, what seems the
best arrangement or succession of the properties of Solids.
Crystal. Antithesis of amorphous. The crystal is not difficult
to define. The common fact is a regular and constant geo-
metric form as determined by the angles of the faces or
boundary planes. A substance, for example, always found in
cubes, or with right-angled solid angles, is a crystal ; a sub-
stance that has no regular or constant form is amorphous ;
such is a cinder. Subsidiary to the main idea, are the notions
-face, axis, nucleus, cleavage, fracture-and the several systems
* Although the adjective ' molecular' is used in the broad contrast with
the molar, while the substantive'molecule' also confirms to the usage, a
more specific meaning has lately been attached to the molecule, in con-
tradistinction to the atom .' An atom is supposed to be chemically indi-
visible ; a molecule is the smallest combination believed to exist separately.
There is a hydrogen atom represented by H ; but the hydrogen molecule
is HH, or H 2. The molecule of Phosphorus and of Arsenic is each
composed of four atoms. All this belongs to the hypothetical part of
Chemical Combination.
 MOLECULAR ATTRACTIONS. 235

of crystals- Tesseral, Tetragonal, &c.; also Isomorphism,

Dimorphism, Allotropy.
Hard, Elastic, Tenacious, Ductile, Malleable. These are
names for a series of important attributes of solid bodies, to
which there is a corresponding series of contrasting properties
-soft or flexible, unelastic, brittle, inflexible, inductile or unmal-
leable. They are mostly distinct properties, although to some
extent related . They are all strictly definable, and measurable
in amount or degree by given tests . Hardness is the resistance
to change of form, as by scratching or dinting ; Elasticity is
the rebound from compression. Tenacity is opposed to being
pulled asunder. Ductility is tenacity under the process of
being drawn out into wire ; if the hammer is employed, the
substance is called Malleable.
Viscosity is a softness approaching to liquidity. All bodies
capable of having their form indefinitely altered, and resisting
the change with a force proportioned to the alteration, are
called Viscous Bodies . ' ( J. Clerk Maxwell) .
Cohesion (Homogeneous attraction) . Definable as the mutual
attraction of particles of the same substance, as iron, flint, or
ice. The crystalline structure, hardness, and other qualities in
the previous enumeration, may be expressed as different
degrees and modes of cohesive energy. Cohesion is therefore
the hypothetical summary of the properties just named ; and
its modes are to be accommodated to represent these with
accuracy . A crystal must have one mode of cohesion, a
lump of clay, a different mode. The limits of cohesion are
small ; two plates of ground glass will cohere strongly if in
close contact, but will not attract one another through a sen-
sible distance.
Adhesion (Heterogeneous attraction ). A wide-ranging phe-
nomenon. It is defined - the attraction of particles of one
substance for particles of a different substance, as when glue
sticks to wood , mortar to stone, water to wood, &c. Cements,
Capillary action , Solution, Absorption of Gases, Alloys-all
suppose this mode of action . To express the full details-
which substances attract which, and with what degrees of
force-requires a great many propositional statements, most
conveniently given in the mineral or the chemical description
of each substance. Under the present head, the general
results should be presented.
Diffusion, Osmose. These are properties extending beyond
what is implied in solution, and even anticipating Chemical
processes. Still , they are the immediate sequel to the preced-
236 LOGIC OF PHYSICS .

ing group of phenomena. Their definition is a generaliza-

tion of the phenomena brought to light by the researches of
Graham.
Crystalloid, Colloid, Dialysis. - By extending the application
of Osmose, Graham arrived at a distinction among bodies,
expressed by the antithesis-Crystalloid and Colloid, whose
definition is in the highest degree pregnant with important
attributes. ( 1 ) The colloid state is a mode of the anti-crystal-
line or amorphous modification of matter. (2) The colloids are
inert chemically, they are not powerful as acids or bases. (3)
In their own form, they have peculiar powers ; as soft and
semi-liquid they allow other substances to diffuse in them.
(4) Still more important is their instability, their readiness to
pass into change, and gradually to sink down towards the
deadness and fixity of the crystal ; during which process they
are sources of molecular power. These two last peculiarities
fit them to play a part in living structures, into which they
enter largely as constituents (albumen, fibrine, starch, &c., are
colloids) . ( 5 ) Colloids, while permeable by bodies of the
crystalloid class, as salt and sugar, are impermeable to each
other ; a most important law, on which Graham has founded
his method of Dialysis, and which is the explanation of many
interesting phenomena.
Effusion, Diffusion, and Transpiration (of gases).—These are
the phenomena parallel to the foregoing as manifested in gases ;
they have a modified definition accordingly.
Such is an orderly statement of the great leading notions of
the initial branch of Molecular Physics. They all demand
strict definition, and a separation of defining properties from
predicated properties, according to the best logical method.
Descending into the very depths of molecular action, they un-
avoidably anticipate other parts of molecular physics, and even
of Chemistry ; but this is not avoidable by any arrangement.
The priority of position is justified by the circumstance that
Cohesive Force is the inalienable attribute of all kinds of
matter, and is the counter-force to the great total of Energy
expressed by the Correlated Forces--Heat, &c. Matter is what
we find it, on the one hand, through the opposing play of
internal cohesions, and on the other hand through the repulsion
derived from the transferable energy of the universe. It is
as Heat, Electricity, and Chemical Force, that this energy
ab extra counter-works internal cohesion ; just as, in the
capacity of mechanical momentum, it counter-works Gravity
on the great scale of molar movements.
 DEFINITION AND PROPOSITIONS OF HEAT. 237

HEAT. The next department in order is the primary and

the typical form of molecular energy, in the great circle of
Conserved or Persistent Forces . The leading notion - Heat
itself is the only one attended with logical difficulties of defi-
nition . Properly speaking it is an ultimate, indefinable, in-
communicable notion, and its essential character is subjective.
Each of us must be referred to our own sensations of heat and
cold in their different degrees, which sensations are unique
and not to be confounded with any others. Nor is there any
perplexity in generalizing the particulars, with a view to a
comprehensive definition, as there is with matter and inertia ;
he that has one or a few experiences of change oftemperature
knows all.
The physical or objective counterparts of this unmistakeable
subjective experience are numerous and various, and belong to
strictly physical investigation. The most obvious are the
increase of bulk by warmth, and the so called destruction,
(more properly re-construction) of material masses . A great
and protracted effort of generalization has been requisite to
encompass all the manifestations of this physical correlate of
a familiar feeling, and to embrace the whole in a unity of
expression. Even at the present moment, the generalized
unity rests upon a hypothetical assumption, true in the main
fact, but uncertain in the shaping, and as yet imperfectly adap-
ted to the multiplicity of the thermal phenomena. Heat,
physically, is a mode of molecular motion, exchanging on a
definite rate with mechanical momentum, as well as with the
other molecular modes termed Electricity and Chemical force.
If we define Heat by its subjective phase, the great physical
generalization is a predicate of concomitance, constituting a
real proposition. If we use the subjective fact merely as a
clue to the objective, and insist on making the definition ob-
jective, this property is then the defining property, from which
would flow innumerable deductive attributes (propria) ; while
there would be propositions (either propria or concomitants)
affirming the relationships of heat to other forces, and also the
material collocations or arrangements connected with the
transmutation.
The notions involved in the various phenomena of Heat, give
the heads of the science ; they are all definable by generaliza-
tion, and their elucidation needs abundant reference to facts in
the concrete :-Conduction, Convection, Radiation, Reflexion,
Absorption, Diathermacy, Refraction, Specific Heat, Latent
Heat, Melting, Freezing, Evaporation, Condensation, Ebulli-
238 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

tion, Boiling Point, Distillation, Tension of Vapour, Dew

Point, Heat of Combination, Calorific equivalents.
LIGHT. - The exact position of this subject in a strictly
studied arrangement of topics is somewhat dubious. In some
important points, it has a close alliance to Heat ; its manifesta-
tion in a body is almost always dependent on a certain
temperature. Moreover, as an influence radiating through
space, it has not only great similarity to heat, but also is
singularly open to mathematical treatment. Still, being as
yet imperfectly understood in its reciprocation with the cor-
related forces, it does not stand to heat on the same footing as
electrical and chemical force. But for the close and easy
transition from Electricity to Chemistry, we might put Light
at the end of Molecular Physics. Or, as having abstruse
chemical relationships, it might succeed to Chemistry. Thus,
the position actually accorded is owing to a seeming prepon-
derance in favour of one out of several alternatives.
Light, like heat, must have a subjective definition to start
with ; and, in this view, it has the same freedom from ambi-
guity. But as Sight is a highly objective sense, we can incor-
porate with the subjective property the objective particulars
—radiation and transmission in space - which are revealed at
once to the luminous sensibility.
We may give the definition thus :-Light expresses a dis-
tinct state of mind known only to individual self-consciousness,
to which state is added the objective experience of an emana-
tion from a material body to the eye, whereby we become
cognizant of the characteristic properties of matter named
visible.
The subsidiary notions are the main topics of the science :-
Transparent, opaque, translucent, shadow ; Incidence, Refrac-
tion, Index of Refraction, Lens, Image, Reflexion , Mirror,
Caustic, Focus, Colour, Spectrum, Complementary_Colours ,
Dispersion, Chromatic Aberration , Diffraction, __ Rainbow,
Double Refraction , Polarization, Interference, Undulatory
Theory .
So far as these topics are concerned, the science of optics
depends upon no extraneous source beyond Mathematics, and
might have precedence of all the other subjects of molecular
physics. The connexion of Light with Heat, with Electricity,
and with Chemistry, would then fall under these several
departments.
ELECTRICITY. -As the denotation of Electricity takes in—
Magnetism Voltaic Electricity Magneto-Electricity
Friction Electricity Electro-Magnetism Thermo-Electricity-
 CHARACTERS OF ELECTRIC FORCE. 239

it is no easy matter to find an exact connotation for the

general name. Two properties may be put forward : ( 1 )
Polarity, and (2) Current action. As regards the first,
Polarity, there is uniform agreement in all the modes ; and,
moreover, the polar attribute is prominent and pervading, and
imparts a destinctive character to all the phenomena. Still,
in carrying out the idea, we are met by the ambiguous phe-
nomenon, named by Faraday, Diamagnetism, a force mani-
fested by the magnet upon heavy glass and certain other
substances, but without polarity, being equal repulsion by both
poles. This phenomenon, however, must be held in suspense
in the meantime, and not allowed to interfere with the defini-
tion on so vital a point.
The second characteristic of the Electric Forces, is their
being carried to any distance, through solid conductors, so as
to discharge themselves at any point. In ordinary chemical
action, as in the double decomposition of two salts, the sub-
stances must be in contact ; but by an electrical arrangement,
the oxidation of zinc in one vessel, may lead to the decompo-
sition of water in another. This important point of commu-
nity makes a strong alliance, although with differences, between
the electric forces.
These two leading features, coupled with subjection to the
great Law of Conservation, are all that can be at present
brought under the connotation of Electricity as a whole. The
different branches have each their special definition, attainable
by the same generalizing process. Definitions are also to be
provided for the subsidiary notions- Magnetic Poles, Meri-
dian, Declination, Inclination ; Electrics, Non-Electrics, Con-
duction, Insulation, Circuit, Induction, Charge, Discharge,
Electrical tension ; Electrolysis, Electrodes.

Propositions of Molecular Physics.

Axiom of Conservation of Force. -At the threshold of mole-
cular physics, there must be provided a statement of the Law
of Conservation, in all its compass, or as embracing alike the
molar and the molecular forces . Although the law cannot
be fully comprehended at this stage, yet some attempt should
be made to exemplify its workings as Heat, as Electricity, and
as Chemical force, and also to point out the mutual conversion
of all the modes - molecular and molar. The law is the pre-
siding axiom of molecular Physics, and of Chemistry, and
through them reaches the domain of Physiology. It is every-
where the sufficing explanation of the origin of Force ; leaving
240 LOGIC OF PHYSICS.

to be investigated, the arrangements, situations, or circum-

stances, attending on the manifestation of force in each par-
ticular case .
Other propositions of Molecular Physics.-The various notions
or defining properties being clearly characterized, we may
readily ascertain what class of predicates usually go with
them so as to constitute the real propositions of the science.
Thus, with reference to the first department- Molecular Attrac-
tions, or the Properties of Matter, from which are excluded
whatever comes under Heat, Electricity, and Chemistry-the
atom or molecule being defined, we have, as real propositions,
the following : Matter is composed of atoms ; ' ' the atoms of
matter attract each other.' This last proposition being one of
wide generality, there fall under it many special propositions,
or modes of attraction, for different kinds of matter ; but, in
this department, we are perpetually disposed to palm off
verbal propositions for real -as in affirming that hard bodies
have a powerful atomic cohesion. Examples of strictly real
propositions are these :-crystals are hard bodies, that is, the
cohesion of crystallization is intense in degree ; crystals
are usually brittle, or the cohesion of crystals is of a short
range. Again, with regard to Adhesion, there is an import-
ant inductive generalization , that bodies of a nearly similar
nature are those possessing mutual adhesion ; thus metals
adhere in solders and in alloys, earthy bodies, in cements and
in cohesive mixtures, and so on. Farther, the Diffusive
volume of a gas is inversely as the square root of its density.
These are propositions of co-inhering attributes, verified
only by wide and exhaustive agreement through the whole
sphere of the things concerned .
Another large class of propositions under the same depart-
ment includes the numerical expressions of the degrees of the
different attributes. These are the constants of the department,
and need no farther remark.
The propositions of Heat have the reality arising in the
concomitance of subject and object facts. Apart from this,
they may be classified under the following heads. The first
class takes in the deductions from the law of Conservation,
confirmed by observation and induction :-such are the facts
of the dilatation of bodies by heat, of which fusion and eva-
poration are special manifestations. There is herein comprised
a wide field of natural phenomena ; and many specific state-
ments are needed to cover the variety of modes in different
substances. Another class of propositions affirm, in their
 PROPOSITIONS OF HEAT. 241

several modes, the great molecular property named Conduction,

a property with numerical degrees ; while important laws of
dependence or concomitance connect this property with the
molecular properties of bodies. Radiation next demands to
be considered, a fact with geometrical aspects and correspond-
ing predicates ; this part of the subject having a considerable
parallelism to the leading facts ofOptics. The specific rates.
of radiation of different bodies may be numerically ascertained,
and laws enounced, whose character is jointly deductive and
inductive. Absorption is another predicate, and similar
remarks apply to it.
The exhaustion of the consequences of the Law of Conserva-
tion, would require a statement of the mode of deriving heat
from Mechanical force (crushing, collision, or friction) , and
from the other molecular forces ; and also the situations or
arrangements whereby it returns to these again ; the case of
producing mechanical force having been given under the great
fact of Dilatation.
On the whole, propositions of heat are ( 1 ) Derivatives from
Conservation ; (2) Constants, or numerical measures of the
various phenomena for different bodies ; (3) Laws connecting
manifestations of heat with molecular structure ; (4) Laws of
situation, or conditions of the transmutation of Heat, to and
from, the other energies, with the constants, expressing the
rates of equivalence.
The foregoing account may suffice to exemplify the propo-
sitions of molecular physics. Were we to proceed to LIGHT,
we should find a statement of definite phenomena -called
radiation, refraction, reflexion , dispersion , colour -all expressed
under numerical and geometrical relations. We should also
find some cases of concomitance of attributes, as Double Re-
fraction and Polarization. The connections of Light with
Heat and with Chemical Force, being underivable from the
great Law of Conservation, must be given as empiical induc-
tions of co-inhering attributes, some of them of considerable
generality, as the connexion of light with temperature ; others
narrow and special, as in the chemical relations.
ELECTRICITY has the advantage of being fully correlated with
the other forces. It involves, however, great complexity of
arrangements, as conditions of its manifestation in the various
species ; whence the propositions are greatly occupied in stating
these arrangements or collocations ; many ofthem being hidden
in the molecular depths of bodies, and rendered in hypothetical
language.
16
 242 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY .

Predominant Methods of Physics.

10. Physics has been seen to be partly Deductive, and

partly Inductive. The Inductions principally relate to
Cause and Effect ; while, in Molecular Physics, there are
inductions of Co-inhering Attributes. The principles of
Definition are appealed to, and more especially for the
primary notions ; but there is scarcely any opening for
Classification.
As a Deductive Science, Molar Physics is a branch of applied
Mathematics, checked and controlled by the perpetual reference
to facts.
As an Inductive Science, Physics makes an unsurpassed
display of the machinery and resources of Observation and
Experiment. It also shows to advantage all the Methods of
Experimental Elimination . The facts being subject to the
great law of Conservation, the deeper experimental problems
consist in ascertaining the collocations or arrangements for
transmuting or evolving the different modes of force. The
researches and discoveries relating to Heat, Electricity, and
Light have this character to a very large degree.
The Hypotheses of Physics exemplify all the forms of Hypo-
thesis formerly laid down. The chief instances-the Dynamical
Theory of Heat, the Undulatory Theory of Light- have already
been adduced in expounding the general subject. Another
hypothesis of inferior weight and character is the two Elec-
trical Fluids, for representing the polar phenomena of Elec-
" tricity.

CHAPTER III.

LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY .

1. The relationships of Chemistry to all the departments

of Molecular Physics are intimate and sustained. The
special fact of the science is given in the name Chemical
Attraction.
Chemistry deals with the union and the separation of ele-
ments ; it regards all the substances of nature as either simples
 REAL PREDICATIONS OF CHEMISTRY. 243

or compounds ; the manner of union or composition being

special to the science. There are unions not chemical ; as
when bodies are pulverized and mixed together without farther
intimacy. There is a still more intimate union in solution,
which, however, also comes short of chemical union.
2. Chemical Attraction, or Union , involves these facts :
(1) The Properties are definite. (2) In the act of union,
there is Heat evolved. (3) The chief properties of the
elements disappear.
A fourth mark, which may either enter into the definition,
or be reserved as a predicate, is that chemical union takes
place between dissimilar substances, while solution or adhesion
is between similars. If reserved as a predicate, this property
will be one of the properties forming real propositions, as ex-
emplified in next section.
It is not necessary here to exemplify these defining proper-
ties. In a work of chemistry, it would be advisable to offer
in advance a few illustrative cases, as a preparation for enter-
ing on the systematic detail.
This disposes of the leading notion of Chemistry, being the
essence or connotation of the name, the Definition of the
Science. A mistake in Logic is made when these properties
are stated as real propositions ; they are not predicated of a
subject called Chemical Attraction, they constitute or make up
that subject.

3. The Propositions, or real predications, of Chemistry

relate (1) to the circumstances, or conditions of Chemical
change, (2) to the substances that undergo the change.
( 1 ) When we have defined the fact of Chemical union,
(with its correlative and implicated facts, Decomposition,
Simple Body, Compound Body) , we have to state the various
circumstances, conditions, or modifying influences of Chemical
change. This constitutes numerous real predications, of great
theoretical and practical moment.
(2) The enumeration of substances that combine together
chemically, or that bring about chemical decompositions yields
a large mass of real propositions, under the general predicate
of Co-existence, or Co-inhering attributes. Oxygen com-
bines with hydrogen, and forms water ; sulphuric acid decom-
poses chalk, common salt, &c.
The expressions for the definite combining numbers are real
propositions, corresponding to the ' constants' of Physics.
244 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY.

The relation of Chemical Force to the other Correlated

Forces may be re-iterated at the commencement of the subject ;
although, as with the other preliminary statements, the under-
standing of it will grow with the unfolding of the future details.
Arrangement and Methods of Chemistry.
4. The division of Chemistry is into INORGANIC and
ORGANIC.
Inorganic Chemistry is laid out under the succession of
the Simple Bodies.

The distinction of Inorganic and Organic would exemplify

definition with a broad doubtful margin. The basis of the
distinction is the circumstance that a large class of highly
important substances can be obtained only from living bodies ;
such are starch, sugar, albumen. This peculiarity of origin is
associated with two other peculiarities, namely, the limited
number of elements in organic bodies, and the great complexity
of the chemical constitution. There would be a convenience in
adopting all the three facts as a complex definition of Organic
bodies, from which, by antithesis or negation, we have the
definition of the Inorganic.
The Chemistry of the Inorganic or Mineral world comes
first ; and its method of arrangement is to adopt some succes-
sion of the Simple Bodies, and under them, to distribute the
various Compounds.

Classification of the Simple Bodies or Elements.

5. The Simple Bodies, or Elements, are divided, in the
first instance, into Metals and Non-Metals. Although
there are transition elements, as Tellurium and Arsenic,
the distinction is founded on important differences.
The Metals have certain prevailing characteristics, but yet
in a varying degree, and with occasional exceptions. (1) Most
striking are the visible properties -Opacity, Lustre, and Colour.
Metals are opaque; they have thepeculiar lustre termedmetallic ;
and their colour is white or grey, with the exceptions - Gold,
Copper, and Titanium ? which are yellow. (2) They are solid,
Mercury and Hydrogen being notable.exceptions. The solidity
is usually joined with compactness of structure, as shown in
the properties - hardness and tenacity. (3) They are com-
paratively good conductors of Heat. (4) They are conductors
of Electricity. ( 5) They are Electro-positive. (6) They com-
 METALS AND NON- METALS CLASSIFIED. 245

bine chemically with the Non-Metals. (7) Their compounds

with Oxygen are for the most part Buses, and not Acids.
The question is not here raised how far some of these pro-
perties are implicated in others. Since the implication is not
obvious, the properties are provisionally given as distinct. A
more important remark, from the logical point of view, is the
occurrence of exceptions to almost all the properties. In the
complex defining of natural objects, we must be prepared for
this circumstance, which does not render the classification vain
or nugatory. Although mercury is a liquid we neither sur-
render the property of solidity, nor exclude it from the class.
Solidity is wanting only in two ; and mercury has all the
other six properties. This is probably one of the cases where
Whewell would desiderate a type, or average representative
specimen, some metal possessing in fair measure all the
prevailing characters.
The Non- Metals are defined by the antithesis of the above
group of properties. As regards Light they are not uniformly
opaque, and when opaque, they are, except selenium, wanting
in lustre. There is only one Gaseous metal, there are four
gaseous non-metals. They are non-conductors of Electricity,
and Electro-negative. Their compounds with oxygen (one of
their number) tend to Acids, and not to Bases.
Whenever a classification is possible, there must be common
properties, and these are possible to be stated . Still, in the
usage of Chemical writers, the statement of the generic pro-
perties of the classes ' metal ' and ' non-metal,' does not dis-
pense with the repetition of these in the detail of the species.
The Natural History methods, not being susceptible of exten-
sive application in Chemistry, are hardly attended to, even
where admissible. Nevertheless, as the situations arising in
the classification of the Simple Bodies are highly illustrative
of situations in Botany and in Zoology, we may follow out
the present case a little farther.
6. Both Metals and Non-Metals are sub-divisible into
smaller classes or groups .

In the Metals, there are certain groups that have important

affinities- such are the Alkali-Metals (Sodium, &c. ), the
Alkaline- Earth Metals (Barium, &c.) , the Earth- Metals
(Aluminium, &c. ), the Noble Metals (Mercury, Silver, Gold,
&c. ) remarkable for refusing combination. A group is also indi-
cated by the important fact-exceptional to the tendency of the
metals as a whole- namely, forming acids with oxygen. Afew,
246 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY.

presenting analogies to iron, make an Iron group- Manganese,

Cobalt, Nickel, Chromium, Uranium. A certain amount of
resemblance suggests the juxta-position of Zinc, Cadmium and
Magnesium. ( Miller's Chemistry, I. 11 ) .
The expository succession adopts the order of greatest
resemblances. The succession is necessarily linear, and leads
inevitably to the wide removal of bodies that agree in some
important particulars. The idea is sometimes conceived of a
circular, or superficial arrangement for bringing together
resembling bodies on two sides ; while, by a diagram of solid
dimensions, each body may be brought into relationship on
three sides. Still, the expository order can follow but one
course, indicated by the maximum of resemblance ; and pro-
vision has to be made under each body for indicating agree-
ments between it and bodies in other groups.
There can scarcely be any doubt as to the propriety of
placing the substances of strongest chemical affinity at one
end of the line ( Hydrogen, Potassium, &c.), and of weakest
affinity at the other end (the noble metals).
The Non-Metals ( 13 in number) contain a few groups, and
some isolated individuals. The halogen group of Berzelius-
Chlorine, Bromine, Iodine, and Fluorine ; and the sulphur group
-Sulphur, Phosphorus, Selenium, and Tellurium- are classed
as having considerable and important resemblances. Silicon
and Boron have points in common : and their suffix on was
given to show some small analogy between them and carbon.
The substance of most marked isolation is Nitrogen ; while
Oxygen is pre-eminent by the catholicity of its chemical
affinities.
By unanimous consent, Oxygen has precedence. The second
place is variously assigned. To take up Hydrogen could
never have been strongly justified , and is now less so than ever.
For the single advantage of having Water brought forward at
an early stage, a leap is taken to the extreme opposition ,
making the last first. Most is to be said in favour of Nitro-
gen, as the second body. Remarkable for its chemical neu-
trality, it also gives an opportunity for dwelling on the
mechanical peculiarities of gaseous elements ; and it may be
followed up by the consideration of the Atmosphere- a me-
chanical admixture of Oxygen and Nitrogen.
Except to hurry on to familiar and interesting combinations
there is no need to bring forward carbon among the very
first ; the nearest kindred to oxygen is found in the halogens
-Chlorine, &c . To these might follow Carbon, and perhaps
 PLACE OF EXPOSITION OF COMPOUNDS. 247

Boron and Silicon, while the Sulphur group would close the
array. Leaving the question open, whether Carbon, Silicon,
and Boron, should one or all precede or follow the Sulphur
group, the rule of arranging by the maximum of agreement
on the whole would be best carried out thus :-
Oxygen, Chlorine, Carbon, Sulphur,
Nitrogen, Bromine, Boron, Phosphurus,
Iodine, Silicon, Selenium,
Fluorine, Tellurium .
Since the exposition of Chemistry follows a certain order of
the Simple Bodies -the Non-Metals first, and the Metals next—
some consideration is necessary in order to assign a place for
the Compounds, which far outnumber the Elements. As it
would be inconsistent with the very nature of the subject to
separate the Compounds from the Simples, seeing that the
chemical characters of a simple body are expressed by its
forming compounds with other bodies, the Compounds must
be interpolated in the exposition, and appended to such of the
Simple Bodies as they are most intimately allied with.
Hence there will always be a choice of positions ; the com-
pound ' water ' may be attached either to the element oxygen ,
or to the element hydrogen.
There is one obvious consideration applicable to this peculiar
emergency. A compound need not be brought forward for
full description till all its elements have been stated ; water
may wait till hydrogen is given ; carbonic acid may follow .
carbon, oxygen being previously given ; the salts may be
appended to the metals that are their bases. Yet this arrange-
ment is not without its disadvantage. The element given
last may not be considered the most important in regard to
the characters ; thus hydrogen is the completing element of
so many important compounds, as, for example, the hydrogen
acids, that, supposing it placed at the head of the metals, it
would be followed by an enormous crowd of compound sub-
stances ; many of which would seem more naturally related to
other elements, as the acids to their several radicles- nitrogen,
chlorine, sulphur, &c.
The difficulty in this particular instance may be supposed
to be got over, by the expedient of bringing on hydrogen soon
after oxygen. The operation, however, begins by an act of
violent transposition that may be expected to land us in some
other fix. And so it is. Enabling us without loss of principle
to attach the acids to their several radicles- nitric acid to
nitrogen, &c., the proposed step compels an abrupt stoppage
248 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY.

where there is a natural transition, namely from the acids to

the salts. In point of fact, the barrier is always forced at this
point ; the salts are brought in, notwithstanding that the
metallic bases are still far ahead. Thus, after all, the trans-
planting of hydrogen from its proper allies merely postpones
an inconsistency for one moment.
On the other hand , it may be maintained that the proper
place of the important hydrogen compounds is after hydrogen ;
its most characteristic feature being to constitute and com-
plete these compounds . The class ' hydrogen acid ' is connoted
by the presence of hydrogen ; sulphuretted hydrogen and
sulphuric acid are more in place among hydrogen acids than
among sulphur compounds. This alone would be a strong
reason for not bringing on hydrogen till the end of the non-
metals, in which are contained the other acid constituents.
If these acids are disposed of first, the interest of hydrogen is
used up ; except as composing water, everything about it is
become stale.

Descriptive Characters of Chemical Substances.

7. The description of bodies in Chemistry, whether the
Simple Bodies or Compounds, should coincide with the
expository order of the properties -physical and chemical.
In Chemistry, no less than in the Natural History sciences,
a regular and uniform plan, in the descriptive arrangement, is
more than an aid to memory ; it is farther an instrument of
investigation. The plan adopted in Chemistry, slightly modi-
fied, will serve also in Mineralogy .
The Chemist professedly exhausts the physical as well as
the chemical characters of each substance . Hence the scheme
should comprise both groups in the best order of succession ;
which order, as regards physical properties, is seen in the
exposition of Molecular Physics. There are some open points
of arrangement, chiefly with reference to the Crystalline form
and the Optical properties. Apart from these, the succession
would be Molecular Cohesion, Heat, Electricity. If the
CRYSTALLINE form is viewed in the first instance as a purely
geometrical fact, it might take precedence of all Physical
properties. TheOPTICAL properties, stated as such, without
enquiring into their connexions with molecular structure or
with chemical arrangements , might be given next. The
priority of these two properties would have the expository
advantage of mentioning first what soonest strikes the senses ;
 ORDER OF DESCRIPTIVE CHARACTERS. 249

the eye taking the lead in the scrutiny of whatever is visi-

ble.
To the Crystalline and Optical properties might succeed the
SPECIFIC GRAVITY.
Next in order would be the properties hypothetically re-
sumed as modes of COHESION :-Hardness, Tenacity, Elasticity.
There would then succeed the properties summed up in
ADHESION :-Solution, Diffusion, Osmose, Effusion and Trans-
piration (of gases).
The relations to HEAT, are given in the following proper-
ties -Rate of Delatation ; Melting and Boiling Tempera-
tures ; Conduction ; Specific Heat, Latent Heat, Radiation ,
Absorption, Refraction, Polarization.
Relations to ELECTRICITY :-Magnetic Property ; Conduction
or Insulation of Friction Electricity ; Conduction or Insulation
of Voltaic Electricity ; place in the Electro-positive to Electro-
negative series ; place in the Thermo- electric series.
The CHEMICAL properties are-Chemical Composition (if not
an Element) ; the bodies that the substance combined with ;
the circumstances of the combinations ; and the agency of
each in decompositions.
Of these characters, two- Adhesion and Chemical Attrac-
tion- are by their nature correlative characters ; they involve
the mutual action of at least two substances. With reference
to them, the property of any one body is relative to some
second body ; a substance is not universally adhesive, nor
universally disposed to chemical unions. Hence the account
of the Adhesive and the Chemical properties is complicated
and not easy to manage. There is from this cause, an especial
difficulty in giving an adequate notion of the bodies that
happen to come first ; indeed it is impossible to do justice to
Oxygen, for example, until a great many more bodies are
described, namely, the long list that oxygen combines with.
The proper course, in such circumstances, is to avow the
difficulty, and not to expect that a learner can receive other
than an inadequate or half notion of Oxygen, until he has
come on to the full description of such bodies, as Carbon, Sul-
phur, Hydrogen, and a few of the metals.

Examples of Description.
(1) Light.- A gas. Transparent and colourless. Index of
Refraction 1.00027.
(2) Specific Gravity 1.1056 ; the atmosphere being 1 .
(3) Adhesion for other substances. -Solubility in water, from
 250 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY.

about one twentieth to one thirtieth of its bulk ( .04114 at

32° F.; .02989 at 59° F.) .
(4) Relations to Heat.- Rate of Dilatation not stated. As
· regards the temperatures of Liquefaction and Freezing, has
never been liquified, although condensed to of its bulk.
Specific Heat, about one fourth of water (.2405).
(5) Relations to Electricity. - Is a magnet at common tem-
peratures. In the Voltaic series, it is at the head of electro-
negative elements .
(6) Chemical relations . Speaking generally, it is the most
widely-combining element in nature. With a doubtful excep-
tion (fluorine) , it combines with every known element ; not
merely its natural opposites, the metals, but non-metals like-
wise. Classes of leading importance in chemistry are com-
pounds of oxygen with the other elements ; the oxides of the
metals are what are termed bases ; the oxides of the non-
metallic elements are generally acids. With Hydrogen, it
yields water. The act of combining with Carbon, either alone,
or along with hydrogen, is the most familiar example of
violent and rapid chemical union, with evolution of heat and
of light, and is termed ' combustion .'
The peculiar circumstances attending the combinations of
oxygen vary with the character of the second element. Thus,
in the leading fact- Heat of combination - the maximum
evolved is with Hydrogen ; Carbon yields one fourth of that
amount ; Phosphorus, about a sixth ; Sulphur, about a
fifteenth ; Zinc, Iron, Tin, about a twenty-sixth .
Atomic number, 16.
As regards the conditions of entering into combination,
there is great variety, from the extreme of readiness at the
ordinary temperature of the atmosphere, to the extreme of
indifference, conquered only by the aids to combination,
namely, artificial condensation , heat, the electric spark, the
contiguity of chemical action already begun, &c. Part ofthe
peculiarity is due to the state of oxygen itself : —which may
be either in the ordinary atmospheric dilution ; or prepared
apart free from any other gas ( whereby all combinations are
acclerated) ; or, lastly, in combination with other bodies as
in water (a powerful oxidizer) ; in the nitrates, in chlorate of
potash- which salts permit of the liberation of their contained
oxygen in a highly concentrated form .
Local spread of Oxygen.- Need not be here detailed.
Modes of obtaining Oxygen.
I doubt the propriety of including, under Oxygen, any more
 OXYGEN DESCRIBED . 251

detailed account of the oxygen compounds. There are better

opportunities afterwards, under the several elements that form
the other members of the compounds, -carbon, hydrogen, the
metals, &c. Nor is it necessary to bring forward Combustion,
of which a sensational use is commonly made, in the descrip-
tion of oxygen. A disproportionate prominence is thereby
given to what is, strictly speaking, incidental only to some of
the modes of oxidation, and is found in other chemical com-
binations if they happen to be rapid and energetic. Combustion
is a special thesis under the general head- Chemical Union, its
conditions, and circumstances- and is of great importance
both theoretically and practically, but it need not be appended
to Oxygen. If involving too much anticipation of details to
be given in the preparatory view of Chemical Combination
(where, however, it might be briefly indicated) , it might be
brought in at some convenient point, by way of digression,
as for example, at the end of Carbon, the chief element in
ordinary combustion.
OZONE.-A supposed allotropic form of Oxygen, under
which the oxygen is rendered more active in entering into its
various combinations.
The specific gravity of ozone is greater than of oxygen.
Adhesion. It is not soluble in water, nor in acids or in
alkalies ; but it is soluble in iodide of potassium.
Relations to Heat.- Its active character is destroyed by a
temperature not much above boiling water.
Relations to Electricity. -The transmission of a series of
electric sparks through dry oxygen is one of the modes of
producing it.
Odour. It has a characteristic odour, whence its name.*
Chemical properties.— While it does not combine with any
substance but those that oxygen combines with, it combines
at temperatures, and under circumstances where oxygen does
not combine. Hence it is a powerful oxidizing agent- in oxi-
dizing metals, in destroying vegetable and animal compounds,
in bleaching, in purifying the air from miasmata, in stimulating
the respiratory organs.
Modes ofpreparing Ozone.
Remarks on Ozone.t-It is interesting to note the power of
electricity to give a new combining aptitude to oxygen.
* Taste and Odour may provisionally be given after Electricity, and
before Chemical properties. They are doubtless a consequence of Chemi-
cal re-actions.
+ The heading ' Remarks' is intended, among other uses, to avoid the
 252 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY .

NITROGEN.-A gas.
As regards Light, transparent, colourless ; Refracting In-
dex, 1.0093.
Specific gravity.-.9713. Atmosphere 1 .
Adhesion. Water dissolves about a thirtieth of its bulk at
ordinary temperatures .
Relations to Heat. -Dilatation not stated . Never been
liquefied. Specific Heat, slightly less than Oxygen, .2368.
Relations to Electricity. - Next to oxygen in the Electro-
negative series.
Chemical relations.- Nitrogen enters into a very limited
number of compounds. Where it does combine, it is sin-
gularly inert, or indisposed to enter into combination ; de-
manding to be placed in the most stimulating conditions.
Many interesting consequences in vegetable and in animal life
are traceable to this peculiarity .
Compounds with Oxygen.-Recited in so far as illustrating
Nitrogen.
Compounds with Hydrogen. -Ammonia, &c.
Compounds with Carbon. -Cyanides.
Spread of Nitrogen.-Modes of obtaining it. Remarks :-
• bearings upon Chemical theory.
The next example is a solid element.
CARBON.-A solid, in two states- crystallized Diamond, and
amorphous Graphite. These occur in such a degree of purity
that they may be taken as typical of the element.
(Diamond).-The Crystallization, Optical Properties, Speci-
fic Gravity, need not be here recited .
Cohesion. The hardest body known ; hence at the top of
the scale of mineral hardness.
Adhesion.-A very important circumstance as regards other
forms of carbon, but not ascertainable in the diamond itself.
Relations to Heat.-Is not fused or volatilized by the highest
known heat ; is not known to exist either as liquid or as vapour.
An intense heat merely reduces it to a black opaque mass.
Relations to Electricity.-A non-conductor. Carbon has a
high relative place in the Electro-negative series (place given) .
Before stating the chemical relations, a similar recital should
be given for the other form, Graphite.
Chemical relations. The range of elements combining with
carbon comprises-Oxygen, Nitrogen, Hydrogen, Phosphorus,
Sulphur, and many Metals, especially Iron. It does not enter
confusion and perplexity of introducing speculative considerations into
the methodical description.
 DESCRIPTIVE METHOD. 253

into combination unless at high temperatures, and then com-

bines with rapidity and copious evolution of heat.
Compounds with Oxygen.- Carbonic Acid, Carbonic Oxide
(described at full length).
With Nitrogen.- Cyanogen ; alluded to.
The other compounds may be postponed.
Spread and Sources of Carbon.-Impure Forms.
Remarks on Carbon.-Combustion .
These examples are sufficient for the purpose of indicating
a systematic mode of describing the elementary bodies. They
would apply equally to compounds. In them, however, the
chemical relations involve another circumstance, namely, the
modes of decomposition.
In certain of the elements, the chief practical interest is
found in impure forms-alloys, or mixtures with other in-
gredients ; for example, Iron. Still, it is desirable, for theo-
retical completeness and consistency, to advert, in the first
instance, to a pure or typical form, in order to know what the
substance is in itself, both physically and chemically. The
alloys or mixtures may then be given ; but before their
practical bearings are touched upon, their properties are
to be recited as illustrating the changes brought about by.
mixture, thereby contributing facts to the inductive laws
of Adhesion.

8. In Descriptive Method, it is of importance not to

mix explanations and theorizings with the description.
In describing a quality, the first thing is to state precisely
what it consists in, or how it is discriminated . Moreover, the
whole series of qualities should be gone through, in the first
instance, and no attempt made to connect them with one
another, or with other properties, in general laws. This
last operation should always be kept distinct. The remark
applies to every science where description enters.
9. When bodies are closely allied in their nature, and
are in consequence grouped as genera, their differences
should be exhibited in marked contrast.
The Halogens among the non-metals, the Metals of the
Alkalies, &c., make groups or genera, with agreeing peculiari-
ties. These points of agreement are stated at the outset, so
as to abbreviate the details of the species. Attention should
next be given to contrasting pointedly the agreeing members
among themselves. Thus Sodium and Potassium agree to a
254 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY .

very large extent ; and after the agreements, the differences

should be given in a tabular antithesis.
10. The generalities of Chemistry are Empirical Laws.
The Atomic Theory is commonly said to be the highest
generalization of Chemistry. This, however, must be
guardedly stated so as not to confound definition with pro-
positions. The nature of Chemical Attraction is expressed in
a complex definition (Definite numbers, Production of Heat,
Merging of elements). There may be real predication in
declaring these three facts to be conjoined ; and their con-
junction may be resolved into higher laws, or converted from
an empirical to a derivative conjunction .
The propositions, in connexion with Chemical action, that
have in the highest degree the character of real concomitance,
are those that affirm the conditions, arrangements, or situa-
tions attendant on combination and on decomposition .
For example, Combination requires proximity of the ele-
ments, and is favoured by all the circumstances that aid
proximity, as liquefaction ; it is resisted by strong cohesive or
adhesive forces, and proceeds as these are released. It is
brought on by elevation of temperature in numerous instances.
It is induced by the electric spark ; which may operate by
mere rise of temperature, but more probably by polarizing the
atoms. It is promoted by concurring combinations ; it accom-
panies decompositions. These are all empirical laws. They
are, moreover, statements as to general tendency, and need to
be accompanied, each with a schedule, stating the individual
substances and situations of their applicability.
Many other laws might be cited :-The celebrated law of
Berthollet, regarding the double decomposition of salts ; the
laws that simple substances exhibit the strongest affinities, -
that compounds are more fusible than their elements,—that
combination tends to a lower state of matter- from gas down
to solid.
As Empirical laws, these have no other verification but
Agreement ; they are only surmised to be laws of causation ;
they are limited to adjacent cases .
11. The ultimate generalizations of Chemistry must fall
under the Law of Conservation of Force, and must express
the most generalized conditions of the re-distribution of
Chemical Force.
The Law of Persistence over-rides every phenomenon of
 HYPOTHESES IN CHEMISTRY. 255

change, but it must be accompanied in each case with laws of

Collocation. In Chemistry, there must be indicated the pre-
cise conditions of chemical re-distribution, whether in com-
bination or in decomposition. It is necessary to find out, in
the most general form, the situation or situations that bring
about chemical change, in either direction . If this can be
comprehended in one law, that will be the highest, the ulti-
mate law of Chemistry, the Chemical appendage of the Law of
Conservation. The Empirical laws above quoted will then
have the improved character attaching to Derivative laws.
12. Chemistry contains, as a part of its nature, nume-
rous Hypotheses. These are mainly of the class named
Representative Fictions.
То express in the most general terms the numerous pheno-
mena of combination and decomposition, certain arrangements
of the component elements of the compounds are assumed
hypothetically. It is a fact that sulphate of potash contains
certain proportions, by weight, of sulphur, oxygen, and potas-
sium ; it is a hypothesis that the salt is made up in the
particular way shown by the formula KO, SO,, being a binary
compound of two other compounds.
The Atomic Theory of Dalton contained a generalization of
facts embedded in Hypothesis. The facts were the fixed pro-
portions of bodies combining chemically ; the hypothesis, that
each substance is composed of atoms, and that, in chemical
union, an atom of one substance joins with one, or with two,
or with more atoms of another ; there being always a neat
numerical relation without remainder. No one now regards
this as more than a representative fiction, unsusceptible of
any other proof than its facility in expressing the facts.
The Constitution of Salts is the great battle ground of
chemical hypotheses, being the key to the entire structure of
chemical representation. There is, however, a perfect under-
standing as to the nature of the proof to be offered for the
rival hypotheses, namely, the suitability to comprehend the
greatest number of chemical re-actions, or combinations and
decompositions. It is a question purely chemical, and not in
anywise logical in the sense of demanding attention to be re-
called to neglected logical principles .
As examples of the subordinate hypothetical points , we may
quote the singular idea of supposing an element to continue
with itself-hydrogen with hydrogen, chlorine with chlorine,
and so on ; a very great stretch, seeing that opposition of ele-
256 LOGIC OF CHEMISTRY .

ments is a predicate of chemical union. A better example of

a likely hypothesis is the proposal to assign to bodies of dif-
ferent properties, having the same ultimate constitution, a dif-
ferent proximate constitution ; as formic ether and acetate of
methyl. The bold hypothesis of Gerhardt and Griffin- to re-
gard as two substances, iron when entering into proto- salts,
and when entering into sesqui-salts, and the same with all other
elements producing sesquioxides- was considered as a relief
from otherwise inextricable difficulties.
The hypothesis of the Atom, or lowest chemical constituent
is now coupled with another hypothetical entity-the molecule
representing the smallest number of atoms of each substance
supposed to possess separate action. Thus the molecule
of nitrogen is said to be made up of 2 atoms ; the phosphorus
and arsenicum molecules, 4 atoms, and so on.
When a number of different salts are in the same solution,
as in a mineral water, it is a matter of hypothesis which acid
is attached to which base. (Miller's Chemistry, II. 824.)
The class of Scientific Hypothesis consisting of unverified
theories, does not require special mention in Chemistry. Apart
from the representative fictions, essential and permanent in the
science, there are no hypothetic forces or agents. The great
prevailing agent or cause of chemical change is, and can only
be, a molecular aspect of the great primeval force named under
the Law of Conservation. Until the supplement of this law,
as regards chemical transformation- the universal conditions
or collocations - be worked out, there will be many hypotheti-
cal collocations, which will be susceptible of final proof or
disproof.
Nomenclature and Classification of Chemistry .
13. The Nomenclature and the Classification of Chemi-
stry involve these points :-(1) The use of a symbol for
each elementary substance ; (2) The expression of the
ultimate constitution of compounds ; (3) an expression of
the supposed proximate constitution of each compound in
a manner suited to its re-actions with other bodies.
(1) The symbolical notation has the advantage of affording
a brief and yet full expression to the most complicated com-
pounds, rivalling, in this respect, the notation of Mathematics.
It also enables bodies of like composition to be readily classed,
and their class indicated to the eye.
The nomenclature for expressing in terms the various bodies
 CHEMICAL NOTATION. 257

is made up of the names of the elements - Oxygen, Carbon,

Iron, Silver-and of a systematic mode of uniting these in
compounds -carbonic acid, carburet of iron, &c. Only binary
compounds are stateable in this way ; a higher combination is
expressed in some supposed binary resolution -sulphuric acid ,
acetate of potash, chloride of formyl. Substances like sugar,
starch, albumen, are given in their familiar names . Hence
double naming is, in Chemistry, a special and limited process ;
and has no analogy to the names of species in Botany and
Zoology.
(2) The notation exhibits the ultimate constitution of all
compound bodies, by stating their constituents and the pro-
portions of each ; H₂O is the analysis of water ; F O, protoxide
of iron ; F, O3, peroxide or sesquioxide.
(3) The symbols are farther accommodated to give the
hypothetical upbuilding of the elements in complicated com-
pounds ; as in the theory of Salts. The ultimate analysis gives
the amount of oxygen in a compound, and the formula states
in what ways the oxygen is supposed to be distributed ; an
oxygen salt, in the old theory was a binary compound of
two oxidized radicles, the oxide of a non-metal (as sulphur)
and of a metal (as iron ) ; sulphate of iron (protoxide ) SO, Fe O.
The analytical ( or Empirical) formula of acetic acid is C, H, O.;
of the rational or hypothetical formula, there are no less than
seven renderings (Miller's Chemistry, vol. III , p. 6).
14. A desideratum in Chemical Nomenclature is the
statement of the structural Heat of the bodies.
The formula H, O is given indifferently for steam, water,
and ice ; although the exact difference of structural heat in
the three admits of numerical statement. Calling ice H,2 O ;
we may call water H, O + 180° ; steam H, O + 1180°, on
the usual reckoning of the heat of boiling and of evaporation.
Farther, when Hydrogen and Oxygen combine, there is
a great evolution of structural heat, which is lost to the com-
pound ; a provision might be made for indicating the exact
figure, which has been found out by experiment ; a certain
minute quantity would be attached to H, O, on this account,
and about one fourth of that quantity to C O₂.

17
 CHAPTER IV.

LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

1. Biology is the Science of Living Bodies- Plants and

Animals ; its exact definition is the definition of Life.

Definition of Life.
2. Life is to be defined by a generalization of what is
common to Living Bodies.
The Denotation of the term Living Body is well fixed ;
there is scarcely even a debateable margin between the
Organic and the Inorganic worlds.
Choosing Assimilation as a characteristic fact of bodily life,
and Reasoning, as an example of mental life, and contrasting
both with the characters of dead matter, Mr. Herbert Spencer
arrives at the following highly complex definition : —
1. Life contains a process or processes of change.
2. The change is not a simple or individual act, but a series
or succession of changes.
3. Life involves a plurality of simultaneous, as well as suc-
cessive changes .
4. The changes are heterogeneous, or various in character.
5. The various changes all combine to a definite result .
6. Finally, the changes are in correspondence with external
co- existences and sequences.
In sum :-Life is a set of changes , simultaneous and succes-
sive, combined to a definite result, and in correspondence with
external circumstances. Or, in a briefer form, Life is the
continuous adjustment of internal relations to external rela-
tions.
So carefully has the comparison been conducted, that no
exception could be taken to any part of this definition . Every
one of the particulars occurs in all living bodies, and in no
kind of dead matter. The apparent defect of the definition is
omission ; it does not express or seem to suggest points that
strike the ordinary observer. For example, there is no allusion
to the organized structure, at the foundation of which is the
peculiar constituent known as the cell, or nucleated corpuscle.
Again, there is no mention of the individual and independent
 ELEMENTS OF LIVING BODIES. 259

existence of living bodies ; with which is also associated the

cycle of birth, growth, and death.
These omissions, real or apparent, might be defended or
explained on one of three different grounds.
First, it might be said, that the facts mentioned, although
present and conspicuous in many or in most living bodies, are
not found in all, and therefore cannot be adopted into the
general definition, They can be taken notice of only in
defining the classes or subdivisions of the whole kingdom of
animated nature. This remark would be a sufficient justifica-
tion, if it were true ; but it is not true, at least to the extent
of excluding the mention of the circumstances from the
definition.
Secondly, it might be said, that the definition does not aim
at being exhaustive, but only at being discriminative ; while
it is based on essential characters, it does not profess to give
all the essential characters. Enough is given to prevent us
from ever confounding a plant or an animal with a stone ;
but there is no intention of stating every feature that separates
living bodies from the inanimate world.
To this the obvious reply would be, why should all the
essential characters not be given ? There is no apparent
reason for omitting in the statement whatever can be dis-
covered as common to the whole department of animated
nature.
Thirdly, it might be alleged, that the aspects in question
although not appearing on the surface of the definition, are
yet implicated on it, and are unfolded in the due course of the
exposition. The definition, it may be said, goes to the root of
the matter ; while all else branches out from that, and is duly
unfolded in the subsequent exposition of the science.
In order, however, to bring forward at once whatever can be
assigned as general characters of living bodies, whether
primary or derived , we shall re-cast the definition, and dis-
tribute it under the heads-Constituent Elements, Structure,
and Functions.
3. I. Living bodies are constituted from elements com-
mon to them with the inorganic world.
The chief constituents of Living bodies are these four-
Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen ; the last, Nitrogen,
being most abundant in animals. To these are added, in
smaller proportions, Phosphorous, Calcium, Sulphur, Chlorine,
Fluorine, Sodium, Potassium, Iron, Magnesium, Silicon.
260 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

The various properties, Physical and Chemical, belonging

to the several elements are found operative in their organized
form . All the mechanical and molecular laws are traceable
in living bodies.
Chemically considered , organic bodies, are exceedingly
complex compounds. The department of Organic Chemistry
is devoted expressly to these compounds. According to the
chemical reckoning, a single atom of an organic substance, as
sugar, starch, albumen, contains hundreds of simple chemical
atoms ; the atom of albumen is said to be made up of 880
atoms of the four chief organic elements.
II. With reference to STRUCTURE .
(1) Living bodies possess a peculiar structural complexity,
commonly called the Organized Structure. Associated with our
notions of life is a certain mechanism, or machinery, very
various in its extent and complication in individuals ; attain-
ing in the higher animals a degree of complicated adjustment
unequalled in any other department of nature. Such struc-
tures as the eye, the ear, the brain, of human beings are, in
our conceptions, the very acme of structural mechanism.
It is now known that the ultimate constituent of all the
variety of structures is a microscope element called a cell, or
nucleated corpuscle ; by whose aggregations and transforma-
tions, tissues are formed, which tissues make up the organs.
It is true that in certain low forms, both plants and animals,
the cellular structure is not apparent, and therefore its visible
peculiarities namely, the bounding pellicle and internal
nucleus are not absolutely essential ; still, we cannot omit
from the definition an arrangement so completely bound up
with all living nature, the few apparent exceptions being
equivocal .
(2) Another prominent feature of the living structure is
Individuality, or individuation. Living matter instead of exist-
ing in vast continuous masses, like rock, is separated into
distinct individuals. As with other peculiarities, however,
there is an ambiguous margin here also. In animal life gene-
rally, and in plant life generally, we have no misgiving as to
individual existence ; men, sheep, forest oaks, are all distinct
and separate. Still, a scientific definition must grapple with
the whole field of cases, having merely the requisite latitude
of a small doubtful margin. Mr. Spencer defines the indi-
vidual, with reference to his definition of Life, as any concrete
whole performing within itself, all the adjustments of internal
 LIVING STRUCTURE AND FUNCTIONS. 261

to external relations, so as to maintain its own existence.

This definition, to a certain extent anticipates Function, but
so does any adequate statement of Structure ; the separation
of Structure and Function is one of great logical convenience,
but, in nature, the two things are inseparable.
With Individuality there is closely associated, in our con-
ceptions of living beings, the Cycle of existence, the derivation
of one living being from others, and the necessary termination
of each individual's existence, after a definite career. Here,
too, we may seem to anticipate what belongs to Function.
(3) We may not improperly state in connexion with struc-
ture, and as following on Individuality, a circumstance so
notorious, that to omit it from the comprehensive statement of
life would appear inexplicable, namely, the vast Variety of
Forms and Structures. Uniformity, comparatively speaking,
pervades dead matter ; variety is the characteristic of living
substances. The different forms of Plants and of Animals
count by thousands ; there are upwards of one hundred
thousand species of Plants, and a still greater number of
Animal Species ; while of every one of these distinct species,
there is an indefinite unceasing multiplication of individuals,
nearly, although not absolutely alike.
One of the chief demands of Biological science is to find an
orderly arrangement for such a host of various forms. This
makes Biology, inter alia, a science of Classification.
III. As to FUNCTIONS.
The living structure is essentially active, changing, productive
and its most characteristic points must have reference to these
activities. Here we may embrace the substance of Mr.
Spencer's definition, in two principal heads-Change, and
Adjustment to external circumstances.
(1 ) A definite combination of changes, simultaneous and
successive.
(2) An adjustment to external circumstances.
(3) It must seem unpardonable, however, not to bring out
into prominent statement at the outset, that very remarkable
phenomenon of living bodies, to which there is no exception,
namely, Assimilation, or the power of an existing organized
particle, to impart its own organization to an adjoining particle
having the proper chemical constitution . This magic touch
of vitality, has only a faint parallel among inanimate bodies ;
combustion, and chemical combinations generally, make but a
small approach to it. Its lesser manifestations are in the
262 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

renewal, by nutrition, of the living tissues ; its culmination

is in the throwing off of the germ, or seed, apparently homo-
geneous and structureless, but possessed of interior markings
that decide whether its future is to be a man or an oak ; a
white man, or a negro ; a flat nosed or an aqulline-nosed man
or woman. We may not be able to consider whether this
great property be essential and fundamental, or whether it
be derived from other properties, already given in the defini-
tion.
We may repeat under this head, the peculiarity above
adverted to, under individuality of structure-the Cycle of
existence, or birth, growth, and death.
(4) It cannot be irrelevant to the comprehensive definition
to advert to the connexion of Mind with Living Bodies.
True, this is not a concomitant of all living bodies, yet it
appears only in connexion with the living form. When we
make the first great division of life, into Plants and Animals,
we obtain the more precise boundary of the mental manifesta-
tions. Still, at the very outset, we are interested to know
that this characteristic manifestation appears only in the
department of living structures.
The foregoing definition professes to leave out no fact that
can be found inhering in all living bodies . The first requisite
in defining is to be exhaustive ; it is an after operation, of
great scientific interest, to trace the dependence of one or
more properties upon the others, and to assign what appears
to be the ultimate and underivable properties. At present,
however, all such derivation is but tentative and hypothetical,
and therefore, is not suitable to be brought forward at the
commencement of the subject. Provisionally, these various
peculiarities are to be held as distinct ; no one being assign-
able as a derivative of another.

Divisions of Biology.

4. The Divisions of Biology are in conformity with the

Definition.

The first part of the Definition refers to the Organic Chemi-

stry of Life. This subject is partly given under Chemistry ,
and partly as the Introduction to Biology.
The two other parts of the definition suppose a separate
consideration of Structure and of Function. We should fully
understand the reasons and the limits of this separation.
 STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION VIEWED SEPARATELY. 263

These two facts are inseparable in the reality. But as, in

less complicated subjects than Life, we have often to make
abstraction of some qualities to the exclusion of others where
there is no actual separation possible, so in the present case
we find it advisable to consider Structure by itself, before
viewing it as connected with Function.
Yet this separation may be carried to an unjustifiable
extreme. As soon as the mind has perfectly comprehended a
structural arrangement, we are prepared to enter upon the uses
or functions of that arrangement. Indeed, while the know-
ledge of the structure is still fresh, the knowledge of function
should be imparted . Function completes and fixes the idea
of structure, in so far as the two are manifestly connected .
The only reason for not following up the account of structure,
with the account of function, for every distinct living organ,
would be the necessity of viewing Function as a connected
whole, and therefore not to be entered or unless it could be
given as a whole. For example, the Function of Digestion
could not be entered on till the entire group of alimentary
organs were structurally described.
The separation of the two subjects is carried to a question-
able extreme in the special Biology of man ; Anatomy and
Physiology being, by present convention, treated in distinct
works, and taught by distinct teachers in the schools. The
just middle plan would be to include both in one work, and
to append to the Anatomy of each organ- Bones, Muscles,
Heart, &c.- the Physiology or function.
In the usual treatment of Plant Biology, Structural Botany
is given first, Physiological Botany next (in the same treat-
ise) ; the student being made to wait for the account of
Function in any organ until Structure has been gone through
in every organ. The justifying reasons are probably these :- :-
( 1 ) It is possible to carry provisionally the whole structure
in the mind, without the assistance that function would give ;
and (2) there is a convenience in treating function as an un-
broken whole.
In Animal Biology, the branch called Comparative Anatomy
takes each organ apart, giving both structure and function,
and exhausting the varieties of each through the animal series.
Structure has to be viewed, in its successive modifications,
through the cycle of the individual life. This is called
Embryology. A still more extended view is the considera-
tion of successive structures in the hereditary line, where
there may occur changes requiring to be taken account of,
264 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

being the initial step of the new biological department called

Evolution.
It is proper to generalize to the utmost the wide variety of
structures, and to exhibit all the generalities apart as giving
a mental command of the entire field. Such generalities
would be called General Morphology, and General Embryology.
FUNCTION, Or Physiology, is an account of all the living pro-
cesses, in the most convenient order ; all those changes con-
stituting Life-changes simultaneous and successive, contri-
buting to a definite result, and adapting each organism to the
environment. Here there is an unlimited scope for inductions,
and for deductions, confronting and correcting one another.
The high generalities of Function comprehending all Life, if
such there be, would form à General Physiology.
The subject of Evolution involves the mutual actions and
modifications of Structure and Function. It deals with the
general truth that when external circumstances demand and
prompt an increase of function (as when an animal is called to
exert unusual muscular energy) the structure is liable to be
increased, and thus to increase the function apart from stimu-
lation. This is one way of the supposed re-action of Structure
and Function. Another way is by Mr. Darwin's Natural
Selection, or Survival ofthe Fittest. The carrying out of these
principles is the substance of the great Biological Hypothesis
of Development or Evolution.
Biology can to a certain extent be treated as a whole, there
being certain things common to living beings-Constituents,
Structure, Function and Evolution ; it would then have to be
divided, as has always been usual, into Plant Life and Animal
Life ; each of these subjects being subdivided according to the
plan above laid down for the whole.

Remaining Notions of Biology.

The general definition of Life has been seen to carry with
it the definitions of Organization, Cell, Protoplasm, Assimi-
lation, Individual, Germ, Reproduction, Growth, Death.
The specializing of the structures and functions introduces
many other Notions.
Plant-Animal. —The greatest line of demarcation in living
bodies is between Plants and Animals ; these are the two
highest genera of living bodies, a perfect dichotomy of the
whole. Allowing for a doubtful margin, the distinctive
characters are numerous and important. As in all dichoto-
mies, we have the advantages of a definition by Antithesis.
 PARTS AND PROCESSES OF PLANTS. 265

The leading characters may be stated in contrast thus :-

PLANT. ANIMAL.
Number and complexity of Tissues, Organs, and Functions.
Small Great
Local habitation.
Fixed Moveable (Locomotion)
Food materials.
Inorganic Organic
Mode of reception of Food.
Absorption Reception into a mouth
and stomach
Process of nutrition.
Deoxidation Oxidation,
Tissue. Organ. Vessel.-These are comprehensive parts or
constituents of the organized structure, as made up of cells ;
they are common to all living bodies, and admit of exact
definition. There is a difference between the Tissue and the
Organ ; one Organ, as the stomach, may contain several
tissues. Each Tissue is analyzed into a distinct cell structure,
which is its defining peculiarity as regards structure, to which
there also corresponds a certain kind of activity or function.
Thus, the nervous tissue is made up of nerve fibres and nerve
cells, in a special aggregation ; these are connected with the
peculiar activity or function called nerve function, or the
manifestation of nerve force.
The view of Plant Life contains the definitions of the
structural parts of the plant.
Cellular Tissue Integument (Stomata, Hairs, Glands)
Vessels Root
Vascular Tissue Stem
Leaves
Inflorescence (Flower, Fruit, Germ).
From the enormous number and variety of plants, a great
effort is needed to present these parts in their widest gener-
ality ; while the general idea must be accompanied with a
classified detail of modifications.
Definitions must also be given of the processes of Plant
Life.
Osmose Flowering
Exhalation Vigils of Plants
Transpiration Sexual union
Secretion Impregnation
Irritability and Contractility Fecundation
Defoliation Germination
Circulation, sap, capillarity Propagation.
266 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

A set of notions, parallel but more numerous and compli-

cated, belong to the description of Animal Life as a whole.
The modifications of the ultimate materials are described as
blastema or matrix, crystals, protoplasm, granules, homogeneous
membrane, vesicles, nuclei, nucleated cells, simple fibres, nucleated
fibres, compound fibres, and tubes. These are compounded into
the characteristic TISSUES -Cellular, Adipose, Vascular, Carti-
laginous, Osseous, Muscular, Elastic, Epithelial, Nervous. The
ORGANS are Bones, Muscles, Alimentary Canal, Respiratory
Organs, Heart and Blood Vessels, Sympathetics, Skin, Brain,
Senses, Reproductive Organs. The FUNCTIONS follow the
Organs ; and in several instances, give these their distinctive
names.
The Classification of Plants and of Animals gives scope for
Definition as applied to the several grades.
5. In these detailed Notions, we have the analysis of the
Living Organism-Plant or Animal.
An organism is by its very nature a complexity. In a
scientific consideration this complexity has to be resolved into
the related parts-organs, tissues, constituents. The laws of
structure are laws of relations of the parts to each other ;
and if our analysis has hit the natural partition, it is the basis
of our subsequent statements, in propositions, of the natural
relations. If the analysis is inexact, no exact propositions can
be grounded on it.

Propositions ofBiology
6. The Laws and Propositions of Biology differ in their
logical character, according as they relate to Structure or
to Function.
First, as to STRUCTURE .
The propositions or laws of Structure, affirm co-existence,
as order in place, between the different parts of living bodies.
Human Anatomy is a vast congeries of such propositions .
How far the co-existences are ultimately dependent on Causa-
tion, rests with the theory of Evolution. In the meantime,
they are to be regarded mainly as Co-existence without Causa-
tion.
These propositions may be special to individuals and limited
groups of individuals ; or they may be generalized over very
wide areas . The narrow class is exemplified in human Ana-
tomy, and in all specific descriptions whether of plants or of
 PROPOSITIONS OF ANIMAL STRUCTURE. 267

animals. High generalities, realizing the scientific ideal of

Biology, are not wanting. For example, in Plants-all the
parts are homogeneous in structure ; or, as otherwise expressed,
the flowers are modified leaves ; the monocotyledonous mode
of germination co -exists with the endogenous mode ofgrowth ;
flowering plants are generally multiaxial ; complexity of struc-
ture is accompanied with permanence of form. In Animals,
we have the anciently observed coincidence of ruminant sto-
mach, cloven hoof, and horns ; the grouping of mammalian
characteristics- mammæ, non-nucleated red blood- corpuscles ,
two occipital condyles, with a well- ossified basi-occipital, each
ramus of the mandible composed of a single piece of bone and
articulated with the squamosal element of the skull.
Viewed, in the first instance at least, as co-existences with-
out causal connexion, these propositions must be verified by
agreement through all nature, and held as true only to the
extent observed. "
There are numerous and striking co-existences between
Structure and External circumstances, the so- called Adapta-
tions of one to the other ; but in these there is a great pre-
sumption of cause and effect ; they furnish the best support to
the doctrine of Evolution.
There are likewise laws of causation, more or less traceable,
in the operation of all the outward agents. Thus, Heat,
Light, Air, and Moisture, are essential or causal conditions of
the growth of plants. Light is necessary to the colour of the
leaves. The oxygen of the air is an indispensable condition
of all animal life. Many other laws of causation are occupied
in expressing the agency of different kinds of food , of medi-
cines, &c .
There are laws of cause and effect, in the mutual actions of
different organs, in each individual plant or animal. Thus,
in animals, the digestive organs affect, and are affected by
the circulation, the muscles, and the brain.
7. Next as to FUNCTION, or Physiology.
The propositions here affirm Cause and Effect. The process
of Digestion, for example, is an effect of the contact of food
material with the complicated alimentary organs . In like
manner, every organ of every living being has a function,
more or less assignable.
It is a deduction from the permanence of Matter, established
since the researches of Lavoisier as a law of nature, that what-
ever materials exist in plants and in animals, must be sup-
268 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

plied as a condition of their growth. Plants being constituted

from Carbon, Oxygen, Hydrogen, Nitrogen (in small portions),
and Saline bodies, -must find all these elements in the earth
or in the air. The animal tissues being highly nitrogenous,
animals must have nitrogenous food. The gastric juice con-
tains hydrochloric acid, whence the necessity of salt as an
article of food.
8. The law of the Conservation of Force, and all the
subordinate generalizations of Molecular Physics and
Chemistry, are carried up into Biology.
The law of Conservation holds true in organic changes, and
is a deductive key to the phenomena . Every manifestation
of force in a living body- mechanical energy, heat, decom-
position of compounds,-is derivable from some prior force of
exactly equivalent amount.
The laws of Cohesion, Adhesion (in all the forms- Solution,
Capillary Attraction, Diffusion , Osmose, Transpiration), Heat,
Light, Electricity, and the laws of Chemical combination and
decomposition, are carried up into organic bodies . In the
present advanced state of knowledge respecting these laws,
there are many deductive applications of them to the pheno-
mena oflife. The complications of Biology are thus, in part,
susceptible of being unravelled by pure deduction.
So far as concerns Force, or energy, in any shape, there is
nothing special to living bodies. As regards Collocation,
there is the peculiarity of the organized structure. It is not
correct to speak of Vital Force in any other sense than the
molecular and chemical forces, operating in a new situation.
It would be strictly proper to speak of a Vital Collocation of
elements, under which the molecular forces put on new
aspects, although never inconsistent with the primary law of
Conservation. Thus the nerve force is something new, not as
regards its derivation from an antecedent equivalent of force,
but as regards the singularity of the nerve structure, which
leads to a new mode in the manifestation of the force.

9. In the department of Function, there are necessarily

many Empirical Inductions.
Excepting the deductions from Physics and Chemistry,
every law of Biology must be considered as empirical. There
are, however, some empirical laws established by an agree-
ment so wide and sustained that they are considered , for the
present, as laws of nature. Still, no such laws can be held as
 PROPOSITIONS OF FUNCTION. 269

absolutely certain. Notwithstanding the agreement in favour

of the derivation of living beings from germs or seed, there is
yet a possibility of spontaneous generation.
The following are examples in Plants. Vegetable cells
absorb fluids, elaborate secretions, and form new cells ; they
also unite to form vessels. Roots absorb material from the
soil, in part by osmotic action. The sap circulates under the
influences of heat and light, and the actions going on at the
surfaces of the leaves and of the roots. In flowering plants,
reproduction is performed by the access of the pollen to the
ovules. Fruit succeeds to fecundation. Seeds germinate in the
presence of heat, moisture, and air, with absence of light.
There is something very unsatisfactory in the inductions of
Vegetable Physiology. Some of them are now obvious results
of the law of Conservation ; as for example, the influence of
Heat at all stages of vegetable growth. The great lack is in
the intermediate steps of the process ; what happens in the
interval between the incidence of heat and air in the leaves,
and the elaboration of the sap, the setting free of oxygen, &c.
But this is the defective part of our knowledge of all the
organic processes.
In the functions of Animals, there are numerous empirical
inductions. Thus the conditions of Muscular contractions are
well known by experimental research ; they are the presence
of blood, and the stimulus of the nerves. That blood should be
necessary is a consequence of the law of conservation ; muscular
force must be derived from some prior force. That non-azotized
materials are sufficient for causing muscular energy could be
known only by experiment. Again, the circumstances affecting
the heart's action, are empirical inductions ; so is the fact
that the red corpuscles of the blood carry the oxygen for the
tissues. The processes of Digestion are stated in the form of
empirical inductions. The same holds of Urination and Re-
spiration. Farther, the multiplied actions concerned in
Impregnation, Germination, and Growth, are ascertainable
only as empirical laws. All the functions of the Brain and
the Senses are given in propositions of the same character.
That exercise (within limits) strengthens all the animal
organs has long been established as an Empirical Law. Mr.
Darwin is disatisfied with the physiological reason or deriva-
tion of the law ; to him, therefore, it remains empirical.
These empirical inductions are to a certain small extent
controlled by high generalities, and are in so far derivative.
The law of Conservation is a check upon many of them ; and
270 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

the special laws of Molecular Physics and of Chemistry are

seen at work in some. But in such a process as Digestion, the
recognized physical and chemical actions are thwarted by
deeper forces, of which we have only an empirical statement.
The most potent instrumentality of deductive explanations at
present known is that furnished by the researches of Graham
on Transpiration, Diffusion, Osmose, and Capillarity.
Animal Mechanics, and the propulsion of the fluids by the
heart's action, are susceptible of a complete deductive treat-
ment, through the applications of Mechanics and Hydrostatics.
This is well exemplified by Dr. Arnott, in his ' Elements of
Physics.'
Logical Methods of Biology.
10. In Biology, the facts are open to Observation and
to Experiment ; although with some limitation owing to
the peculiarities of the living structure.
The difficulties attending the observation of living beings
are greatly overcome by such instruments as the microscope,
stethoscope, laryngoscope, ophthalmoscope , &c ., and by the
chemical examinations of the various products. Accident
sometimes lays open the interior, as in the case of Alexis St.
Martin, through whom was obtained invaluable results as to
digestion.
11. Through the variety of the cases presented by Biology,
there is great scope for elimination by the methods of
Agreement and Concomitant Variations.
The means of varying the circumstances by the comparison
of instances , agreeing and yet disagreeing, is very extensive.
From the number of different vegetable and animal species,
each structural peculiarity is presented under the greatest
possible variety ofaccompaniments. And this is only one part
of the case . In every individual there is scope for additional
comparisons in the different stages of its existence, the method
of Embryology. Lastly, the occurrence of monstrosities still
farther contributes to the desired variation of circumstances.
In these three ways, the opportunities of plying the Methods
of Agreement and Concomitant Variations are exceedingly
multiplied .
Thus, an examination of the structure of the eyes, in their
rudimentary types in the lowest animals, and in their succes-
sive phases of growth in the higher, has both suggested and
 CHANCE AND PROBABILITY. 271

proved (as some believe) that an eye is a modified portion of

the skin.
Mr. Owen enumerates seven different modes of carrying out
comparisons of the animal structures (Vertebrate Animals,
Vol . I. Preface) .
The use and limits of the Deductive Method in Biology have
been sufficiently adverted to in previous remarks. Some
notice may be taken of the applications of Chance and Proba-
bility.
12. There are many biological conjunctions of wide,
but not of uniform concurrence . Such cases must be dealt
with according to the rules for the Elimination of Chance.
When a concurrence, although not universal, is, neverthe-
less, more frequent than chance would account for, we are
bound to recognize a natural tendency, or some law of nature
liable to be defeated by other laws. For example, the con-
currence of superiority of mental power with superior size of
brain, although liable to exceptions, is yet very general, and
far more than chance can account for. Hence we must regard
this as an established law, with occasional liability to be
defeated. We are not at liberty to predict it of every instance,
but only with a probability proportioned to the observed fre-
quency as compared with the failures.
13. It is a result of the great complicacy of vital pro-
cesses, that many inductions are but approximately true ;
and, therefore, are to be reasoned on according to the
principles of Probable Evidence.
The prevalence of approximate generalizations is a mark of
the increased complicacy of the Biological processes, as com-
pared with the processes in Physics and in Chemistry.
The best that can be done, in this state of things, is to ob-
tain statistics of the actual occurrence of certain conjunctions.
There is a large department, of modern creation, termed Vital
Statistics, which enables us to reason on vital phenomena with
the degree of probability belonging to each case. It is thus
that we can infer the proportions of mortality at different ages,
and the proportion of male to female births. When Agricul-
tural Statistics shall have been continued for a sufficient time,
the recurrence of good and bad harvests will be capable of
being stated with numerical probability.
14. Many of the propositions of Biology are defective in
numerical precision.
272 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

In Physical and Chemical facts, it is usually possible to

measure numerically the degree of the qualities. Thns most
of the properties of a mineral can be stated with numerical
precision ; others, as colour, and fracture, can be referred to
a known type. But when we say a certain amount of exercise
strengthens the organs, while a greater amount weakens them,
we leave the estimate very vague. Change of air is said to
invigorate the powers, but there are no precise reckonings,
either in the general or in particular cases, of how much invi-
goration may be expected from a definite change. So, the
influence of altered circumstances on breeds and on races is
given in vague indeterminate language, and must be taken
with great latitude.
Hypotheses of Biology.
15. The character of the science requires the utmost
aids that can be afforded by well-contrived Hypotheses.
Biology has all the difficulties of Molecular Physics and
Chemistry as regards the impalpable nature of the constituent
parts in living bodies, and its own additional complications
from the organized structure.
The hypotheses of Biology are of all the varieties enu-
merated in the general chapter on the subject ( INDUCTION,
chap. XIII . ). Some assume a real cause, as the Development
Hypothesis ; others assume unreal or unknown agencies, as
the supposed adherence to Type or plan ; a third class would
claim to be Representative assumptions.
Of the first class, we may cite, as instances involving the
smallest amount of peril in the assumption, the unverified
deductions from general laws of the inorganic world, such as
the molecular and chemical laws. These powers of cohesion,
adhesion, solution, osmose, &c., are assumed as operating in
the living body, but the deduction from them is not sufficiently
exact to be fully verified. Hence there is much that is hypo-
thetical in the theories of oxidation , of animal heat, of secre-
tion, &c. From the known chemical inertness of Nitrogen,
Mr. Herbert Spencer draws some remarkable inferences in
explanation of the vegetable and animal processes (Biology,
I. 8).
Development Hypothesis. - This renowned speculation , with
all its boldness, has the characters of a legitimate hypothesis ;
it assumes a real agency, a vera causa ; its difficulties lie in
showing that the supposed agent is equal to the vastness of
the results.
 HYPOTHESES. 273

Properly speaking there is no rival hypothesis. The Special-

Creation view is a phrase that merely expresses our ignorance.
Its power of explanation is confined to making a comparison ;
it assigns to the living species that have successively appeared
in the course of ages the same mode of origin as the earliest
species of all, and as the whole framework of the universe ; în
origin that must for ever be inconceivable to the human mind.
As the physical theorists who speculate upon cosmical develop-
ment the formation of suns and planets-start with the
assumption of matter spread out over a great amplitude of
space, and coming together by gravity, so the biological theo-
rists assume a primeval start, either of living broods, or of
matter ready to become organized under particular circum-
stances. Now the value of any scientific explanation of life is
measured by its capability of tracing the whole of organized
nature to the fewest primitive assumptions.
The modification of plants and animals in the course of
generations is a fact. It happens even in the same external
circumstances ; while under alteration of circumstances, the
changes become vastly greater. Now, if any means can be
assigned whereby some of the modified forms are kept alive
while all the others perish, the deviations are rendered per-
manent. Mr. Darwin provides an instrumentality of this
nature in what he calls Natural Selection, or the preservation
of the fittest in the struggle of life. It has been his endeavour
to accumulate a vast multitude of facts showing the principle
in operation, many of them inexplicable on any other suppos:-
tion. Herbert Spencer, Huxley, Hooker, Wallace, and others,
have contributed to the support and elucidation of the hypo-
thesis.
The occurrence of allied species in the same geographical
area, and the wide differences in character of the species in
localities widely apart, are adapted to the doctrine of deve-
lopment and not to any other view as yet provided . Again,
says Mr. Darwin-' How inexplicable is the similar pattern of
the hand of a man, the foot of a dog, the wing of a bat, the
flipper of a seal, in the doctrine of independent acts of
creation ! how simply explained on the principle of the natural
selection of successive slight variations in the diverging
descendants from a single progenitor !' In the course of
time and change, certain parts originally useful have become
superfluous ; and their retention in the useless condition is
intelligible only on a hypothesis of descent.
So long as the Development Hypothesis tallies with a very
18
274 LOGIC OF BIOLOGY.

large number of facts, and is not incompatible with any, it is

a legitimate and tenable hypothesis ; and its worth is propor-
tioned to the extent of the phenomena that it explains, com-
pared with those that it fails to explain.
Hypothesis of Reproduction. —The reproduction of each living
being from one or from two others, through the medium of a
small globule which contains in itself the future of a definite
species, is the greatest marvel in the whole of the physical
world ; it is the acme of organic complication.
Mr. Herbert Spencer and Mr. Darwin have recently pro-
mulgated hypotheses to represent this process. (Spencer,
Biology, I. , 253 ; Darwin, Domestication, II., 357). The two
views have a good deal in common, and might be taken
together. Mr. Darwin's, however, ventures farthest, and
may be here quoted as exemplifying a biological hypothesis.
He prepares the way by generalizing all the different modes
of reproduction- whether unsexual or sexual. The unsexual
modes, as buds and fissure, are to be held as identical with
the processes for maintaining each organ in its integrity, for
the growth or development of the structure, and for the
restoration of injured parts. And it seems to be a tenable
supposition that the sexual mode of reproduction is a mere
modification of the same general fact.
The hypothesis then is that each egg, or seed (of the female)
and each spermatozoon, or pollen grain (of the male) is already
a vast aggregation, a world in itself. It is made up of a host
of smaller bodies, which may be called gemmules, with all the
properties of growth or reproduction commonly attributed to
cells in general ; this host is different in each species. For
every separate part of the animal or plant to be formed, down
to a feather, there are distinct gemmules of the type of that
part, and unfolding to produce it by ordinary growth. Every
animal contains circulating through it the undeveloped gem-
mules of all its organs, and parts of organs ; a complete set is
bound up in the ovum of the animal (or plant) , and by due
expansion reproduces the new individual complete at all points.
Something must be assumed as determining them to fall into
their places ; but that there is no absolute fixity in this respect,
Mr. Darwin shows by the frequent occurrence of misplaced
organs ; this, he thinks, favours the view of the multitudinous
gemmules, and refutes any hypothesis of a formed microcosm
existing in the seed, to which supposition there are many other
hostile facts.
grasp, reconcile, and generalize the facts, is an ample
 HYPOTHESES. 275

justification of this bold venture ; by the nature of the case,

we can never hope to penetrate the precise operation, nor yet
to arrive at a supposition that shall exclude every other. It
is, however, an important appendage to whatever hypothesis
may be formed of the great vital fact named Assimilation .

CHAPTER V.

LOGIC OF PSYCHOLOGY.

1. Psychology, or the Science of Mind, comprises both

Mind proper, and its alliance with Matter, in the animal
body.

Definition of Mind.
2. The ultimate antithesis of all knowledge is called the
antithesis of Object and Subject.
The object world coincides with the property called Exten-
sion ; whence the Subject, or Mind, is definable by antithesis
as the Unextended . A tree is extended ; a pleasure, a thought,
a desire, have nothing in common with extended things.
3. By the method of Particulars, Mind is definable as
possessing the three attributes named Feeling, Volition,
and Intellect.
Feeling is exemplified by pleasures and pains ; Volition is
action prompted by Feelings ; Thought, or Intellect, contains
the processes known as Memory, Reason, Imagination, &c.
All our emotions are included under Feeling ; our sensa-
tions are partly Feelings and partly Intellectual states .
The positive definition of the Mind is also a Division,, and
must conform to the laws of Logical Division..

Concomitance ofMind and Body.

4. To the Definition of Mind, we must add the Con-
comitance of the Body.
The concomitance of Mind and Body is a conjunction alto-
gether unique. The extreme facts of human experience-the
subject and the object, mind and extended matter- are found
in union. We cannot say with certainty whether the union is
276 LOGIC OF PSYCHOLOGY.

a case of causation, or a case of co-inhering attributes . It

stands apart.
5. The union of Mind and Body must hold throughout.
While many, from Aristotle downwards, have held that
portions of the mind are unconnected with bodily processes,
no one denies that mind is to some extent dependent on the
body. But all have failed in every attempt to draw a line
between the functions that are dependent, and those that are
supposed independent of bodily organs.
6. The concomitance of the two radically distinct
phenomena gives the peculiar characteristic of the science.
Every fact of mind has two sides.
Every feeling has its mental side known to each one's own
consciousness, and its physical side, consisting of a series of
physical effects, some superficial and apparent, others deep
and intricate.
It depends upon circumstances whether, and how far, these
physical adjuncts should be brought forward in the scientific
exposition of the mind. On the one hand, if they are
unvarying in their concomitance, they can hardly be excluded.
without impairing our knowledge of the mental part. On
the other hand, it is a bare possibility that the mental pheno-
mena, being radically distinct and unique, may be studied
better by making entire abstraction of the physical accompani
ments. Moreover, much depends upon the degree of insight
actually possessed respecting the nervous system and the
various organs related to the mind. It might be expedient at
one stage of knowledge to drop these from the view, and at
another stage to take them up.
In point of fact, until the present century, only a very small
number of philosophers gave systematic attention to the
physical implications of mind ; the chief being Plato, Aristotle,
Hobbes, and Hartley. In spite of the crudity of their know-
ledge of physiology, they all (with perhaps the exception of
Plato) gained most valuable psychological hints by means of
that knowledge. The physiology of the present century
having placed the whole subject on a new vantage ground,
the attention to the physical side may be expected to be much
more rewarding.
Thus, on one side, Psychology is a department of Animal
Biology, and subject to biological laws. The all-pervading
law of Persistence of Force extends to the physical concomi-
 DEFINITION OF MENTAL PROPERTIES . 277

tants of mind, and is pregnant with consequences of the

utmost practical value.
On the other side, Psychology presents a unique phenome-
non-individual self- consciousness - to which there is no
forerunner in any of the previously enumerated sciences .
Still, the methods and spirit of scientific enquiry, as exhibited
in these other sciences, are of value in the study of mind in
its psychical side. States of consciousness have degrees of
intensity and duration ; they are single or compound ; they
aid or thwart one another ; they have their laws of emergence,
increase, decline ; in all which particulars they observe
analogies to physical forces ; so that the intellectual habits of
accurately estimating physical agencies may, with due allow-
ances, be of service in dealing with the complications of mind.
The two-sidedness of the phenomena appears in language.
The terms of mind had all an objective origin ; and, while
some of them have now an almost exclusively subjective
meaning-as pleasure, pain, feeling, thought, sweetness, fear,
conscience, remorse, -others have also an objective reference,
as shock, emotion, excitement, avidity, irritation . In these
last, the language is ambiguous ; we cannot always tell
whether the physical or the mental is aimed at. There is,
morover, a liability to represent the mental fact as a physical
fact.

Other Notions of Psychology.

Consciousness. -The most difficult word in the human voca-
bulary . It concentrates in itself all the puzzles of metaphysics.
If it were strictly synonymous with Mind, it would be defined
accordingly. But the object, or extended world, is inseparable
from our cognitive faculties ; so that a wordthat expresses
every conscious state whatever is wider than mind, strictly so
called ; it comprises both matter and mind. Hence, if ' con-
sciousness ' be the name for all sentient states, it is the widest
word that we can employ, in fact, there is no meaning corre-
sponding to it ; like Existence, it is a fictitious addition of the
two highest genera. To state these separately, we must have
the double epithets Subject-consciousness and Object- con-
sciousness ; which, however, give only the meanings - Object
and Subject.
Sensation.-A word with several distinct meanings . In the
first place, it may either cover the physical operations con-
nected with the exercise of our senses, or it may be restricted
to the purely mental state arising therefrom. In the next
278 LOGIC OF PSYCHOLOGY.

place, inasmuch as the senses give us feelings in the purest

form (pleasures and pains) and also intellectual discrimina-
tions, the ground work of our ideas, -sensation may be used
for either class. In the third place, there is a contrast of
Sensation with Perception, or between the immediate effect
on the mind, and the associated effects ; colour and visible
magnitude are sensations, distance and true magnitude are
perceptions.
The special modes of sensation, together with muscular
feeling, are ultimate states of the mind, to be defined solely
by individual reference . Resistance, Motion, Warmth, Diges-
tive Sensibility, Taste, Smell, Touch, Hearing, Sight,-as
states of feeling, must be known by independent experience.
Emotion. The emotions are a department of the feelings,
formed by the intervention of intellectual processes. Several
of them are so characteristic that they can be known only by
individual experience ; as Wonder, Fear, Love, Anger. These
stand very near the ultimate elements of human feeling.
Many, however, are evidently derived ; such are, in an emi-
nent degree, the Esthetic and the Ethical emotions.
Phases of Volition .-The definition of the Will, or Volition,
is a part of the definition of mind as a whole. Will, as con-
trasted with Feeling, is a unity, indivisible. Yet, there are
various aspects or modifications of it, that receive names.
Motive is the feeling that prompts the will in any one case ;
the motive to eat is the pain of hunger, or the pleasure of eat-
ing, or the pain of defective nutrition. Deliberation supposes
conflicting motives. Resolution is a volition with the action
adjourned. Desire is ideal volition , either as preparatory to
the actual, or in lieu of it. Belief is preparedness to act,
for a given end, in a given way.
Intellectual States. In the Intellect, we have three fun-
damental processes -Discrimination , Similarity, Retentiveness
or Revivability ; all requiring actual experience in order to be
understood. Discrimination is another word for the fundamental
fact called Relativity and also Contrast. Similarity , or agree-
ment in difference, is a distinct fact of the mind ; the sensi-
bility corresponding to it is unique ; and it is one of the most
iterated of human experiences. Retentiveness and Revivability
describe a great characteristic of our mental nature, for which
we have other designations, as Idea, Memory, Recollection ; it
can be defined only by reference to actual experience ; al-
though the figurative words - retention, revival, resuscitation,
seem to be a definition by the medium of other notions.
 ESSENTIAL AND REAL PREDICATION. 279

The complex intellectual faculties-Reason, Imagination,

&c., are defined each by its proper department of exercise ;
thus, Reason is the power of drawing conclusions from pre-
mises, or the scientific faculty. To this definition may be
appended, as a real predicate, the derivation from the ultimate
intellectual elements just named.
Psychology contains scope for Classification, both according
to Logical Division , and according to Ramification or Compo-
sition. The ultimate sensibilities-namely, the Senses, the
elements of Intellect, and the Simple Emotions — are classified
as genera and species, and according to Logical Division.
The compound faculties and sensibilities, as the popularly
named Intellectual Powers, and the Complex Emotions, are
classified solely by Ramification ; their classes do not comply
with Logical Division.

Propositions of Mind.
7. The complexity of many of the Notions of Mind
gives rise to Essential Predications.
Mind itself being defined (positively) by the union of three
distinct and irresolvable characteristics, there may be proposi-
tions affirming the concomitance of these three facts ; as
Feeling is accompanied with Volition and with Intelligence.
When we say that Mind (as a whole) feels, wills, remembers,
we give a verbal or essential predication.
So with many other notions. Such simple feelings as fear,
love, anger, if defined, would have a plurality of circumstances.
That such circumstances are united, may be a real predica-
tion ; but when any one of them is predicated of the name,
the proposition is essential. ' Anger makes one delight in
retaliation ' is a purely verbal predication.
Our common talk on mind is full of Essential propositions.
His vices were condemned, his virtues praised. Prudence
keeps a man out of difficulties. The strongest motive deter-
mines action.

8. The conjunction of Mind and Body is a real predi-

cation ; it being understood that the definition of Mind is
restricted to subjective facts .
This holds throughout the detail of feelings, volitions, and
thoughts. When the name for an emotion is the subject of a
proposition, and the physical accompaniments are affirmed,
the predication is real : - Fear depresses the vital organs ' is
 280 PSYCHOLOGY OF LOGIC.

an affirmation of concomitance. ' The hope of the reward

quickened his speed ' conjoins a motive to the will (a feeling)
with the bodily part of a voluntary act.
9. The three leading functions , given as the Definition
of Mind (Discrimination, Agreement, Retentiveness), are
unfolded in predications .
That Mind discriminates is an Essential proposition ; yet the
full account of the fact of Discrimination, Relativity, or Con-
trast, demands numerous propositional statements, many of
them real. Not to re-iterate the double- sidedness of every
mental fact, the conditions, circumstances, and limitations of
each of these leading properties are enounced in propositions
that are in no sense verbal.
(1) Thus, we speak of the law of Relativity, expressed as
the concomitance of consciousness with change of impression,
This is the general statement ; and constitutes a real predication
by virtue of the distinctness of the two facts - change of im-
pression (physical, in great part), and consciousness (strictly
mental).
(2) Retentiveness, Revivability, Contiguous Association, are
names for a fundamental property of mind, which in its expo-
sition takes the form of a law. A certain condition or situa-
tion has to be assigned (the reception of present impressions),
and to this is attached as a real predicate, the property of
being retained, revived, remembered. The various modifying
circumstances (engagement of attention, physical vigour, &c. )
are real propositions in subordination to the main principle :
It is a grand generalization, resuming, explaining, and ren-
dering precise the media axiomata of acquisition, as regards
intellectual growths, emotional growths, and volitional growths,
Under it are given numerous affirmations as to the derivation
of complex phenomena from simpler, the unfolding of thoughts
and emotions, and the evolution of the mature mind from its
primary elements. This is commonly called the Analysis of
the Mind. The proof of such assertions rests partly on the
consciousness of the hearer, and partly on indirect reasonings.
Thus, the proof that Beauty is a compound, and not a simple
Emotion, is that we can consciously identify its constituents.
The same with the Moral Sense. The indirect proofs are, the
absence of the Feeling prior to certain opportunities of mental
association. (See § 12. )
(3) The Law of Similarity, or Agreement in Difference, is,
for the same reasons, an inductive generalization of real
 LAWS OF MIND. 281

concomitance. ' Present states of feeling, &c. , tend to revive

their like among former states, notwithstanding a certain
amount of difference.' As before, there are required many
subsidiary propositions to express all the qualifying circum-
stances of this wide generality.
Another important law of the mind is sometimes described
as the law of the Fixed Idea, namely, that ideas tend to act
themselves out ; as when the sight of yawning makes us yawn,
merely by giving us the idea of the act.
10. There may be laws of the rise, continuance, and
subsidence of Feelings.

The connotation of each distinct mode of feeling, whether

sensation or emotion, indicates both its character as feeling,
and its mental antecedent. The laws connecting mind and
body, predicate its physical side ; the laws of Relativity and
of Retentiveness contain additional predicates. To all these
may be added inductions as so the rise, continuance, and sub-
sidence ofFeeling ; which laws, like every other, have a physical
side, and may possibly, on that side, be generalized into still
higher laws.
Like all sciences where simple elements contribute to form
compounds, Psychology contains affirmations respecting the
composition of feelings and other states. The assertion is
made, for example, that Beauty, Conscience, Imagination, are
not simple facts, but are compounded of certain assignable
elements .
Among the ordinary predications respecting living beings,
we may mention the passing of the various capabilities into
action. This extends to mind. I walk, speak, reason, wonder,
desire, &c., are examples ; to all such belongs the reality of
predication.

Logical Methods of Psychology.

11. In Psychology, special importance attaches to the
ultimate Analysis of the phenomena.
In all sciences, we desiderate an accurate and thorough-
going analysis of the phenomena. It is only an ultimato
analysis that can be the groundwork of the most general pre-
positions respecting them .
In proportion to the difficulty of ascertaining and proving
the facts in detail, is the value of an ultimate analysis, whereby
we can reduce to a minimum the number of independent
282 LOGIC OF PSYCHOLOGY.

assertions. When we know the component parts of an Emo-

tion, for example, Beauty, the Moral Sentiment, or Veneration,
we can apply our experience of the parts to correct and con-
firm our experience of the totals.
12. The proof of a Psychological Analysis is (1) the
feeling of identity between the compound and the parts.
This must be a matter of individual self-consciousness.
That the Moral Sentiment contains a feeling of obedience
to authority, under dread of punishment, is proved by each
one's being conscious of the presence, in the compound, of
that special element.
13. An Analysis is proved (2) by the identity of the
consequences and collaterals of a feeling. This will
afford an Objective proof.
That the Religious Sentiment contains an element of Fear,
is proved by identity in the Expression and the Actions
dictated by the state.
14. The greatest difficulty is felt in establishing the
sufficiency of an Analysis.
This is a difficulty in all cases where there is great com-
plexity in the phenomena. We may identify the presence of
certain elements, without being able to show that these are
the whole. Where the quantity of the elements can be
measured, as in Chemistry, we can prove the analysis by
casting up their sum. Where quantity is not exactly esti-
mable, as in many biological facts, and in nearly all psycho-
logical facts, this check is indecisive.
For example, some have maintained that Benevolence is
exclusively made up of self- regarding elements. Others,
while admitting the presence of these elements, deny that
they account for the whole. Owing to the vagueness of our
estimates of quantity in mind, the dispute cannot be decided
by a process of summation in ordinary cases. We must
proceed by varying the circumstances, and by finding
instances where self-regarding elements are either wanting, or
so small in amount, as to be obviously unequal to the effect
produced. Such an instance is found in the pity called forth
by the punishment of great criminals.
15. The Inductions of Mind bring into play the Experi-
mental Methods.
 LOGICAL METHODS IN MIND. 283

The great Law of Concomitance of Mind and Body must be

proved by the Method of Agreement. We must show that
the whole of the facts of mind-Feelings, Volitions, Thoughts,
are at all times accompanied by bodily processes. The case
has something of the peculiarities of the Law of Causation.
We can prove the concomitance in a vast number of cases ;
while in many mental exercises, as in meditative reflection,
the physical processes almost escape detection from their
subtlety. These instances, however, although unable to
confirm the proposition, are not opposed to it ; and they
do nothing to invalidate the force of the unequivocal in-
stances.
We can do more than establish a law of concomitance of
mind and body generally. We can, by the methods of Elimi-
nation, ascertain the exact bodily processes connected with
mental processes. On this determination, we can bring to
bear all the Experimental Methods.
The Law of Relativity is established by Agreement, and, in
a remarkable manner, by Concomitant Variations.
The Intellectual Laws, called Retentiveness and Similarity,
are established , both in general terms, and as respects their
peculiar conditions, by all the methods.
16. From the circumstance that, in Psychology, we have
attained to laws of high generality, there is great scope for
the Deductive Method.
While every one of the great laws above enumerated is
fruitful in deductive applications, the instance that perhaps
best exemplifies the Deductive Method of enquiry, considered
as a supplement to Induction, is the Law of Conservation or
Correlation, applied to Mind, through the physical supports.
By this law, every mental act represents a definite, although
not numerically expressible, physical expenditure, which must
be borne by the physical resources of the system. The deduc-
tive consequences of this fact are innumerable. A few
instances may be briefly suggested . Great mental labour or
excitement is accompanied by corresponding physical waste,
which is so much subtracted from the total of the physical
forces available for the collective necessities of the system .
Again, great expenditure in one mode of mental exertion, if not
at the expense of the more properly bodily functions, is at the
expense of other mental functions ; and so on. Now to such
cases, we may apply the deductive process, in all its stages ;
there is a prior Induction, there may be a process of Calcula-
284 LOGIC OF PSYCHOLOGY.

tion so far as the case admits ; there should be a Verification,

both from isolated facts and from empirical laws.
These Deductive applications are a valuable check upon the
loose empiricisms so abundant in the subject of mind, and
are the best testimony to the use of a science of psychology,
in spite of its imperfections. There are empirical generaliza-
tions on the points just alluded to, namely, the incompatibility
of great expenditure in one direction of effort, with great
expenditure in other directions. Now, by the Law of Conser-
vation, such empiricisms receive their definite limitations, and
the exceptions are fully accounted for.

17. The Psychological mystery of the union of Mind

and Body is the severest test of logical Explanation.
Enough was said in this head, under the chapter relating to
Explanation.

Empirical and Derivative Laws in Mind.

18. There are in Mind many Empirical Laws, but, as a

consequence of the attainment of high generalities, there
are also Derivative Laws.

From the complication of the physical adjuncts of mind,

considered as the culmination of Biology, we may expect
many of the Inductions to be purely empirical, and as such
narrowly limited in time, place, and circumstances.
The phenomena of Dreaming can be stated only as Empirical
Laws, with a certain aid from hypothesis.
We have only pure empiricisms to express the operation of
stimulating drugs upon the emotional states ; whereas the
laws that state the operation of food or mutriment can be
derived.
Hence, a very great number of the inductions of mind may
be traced as Derivations of these higher laws, whereby they
attain a greater certainty and compass of application. All
the rules for aiding memory are easy deductions from the
great law of Retentiveness. The effects of Novelty, and Con-
trast, are derived from the Law of Relativity.
Strictly speaking, the supreme laws of mind-Relativity.
Retentiveness, Similarity, &c., are but a high order of em-
piricisms. They are not ultimate laws of nature, like
Gravity and the Persistence of Force. They are, however,
exhaustively verified through the whole of mind ; and are
 HYPOTHESES. 285

applicable in accordance with the extent of their verification.

We properly treat them as the highest or ultimate laws of the
department, and employ them deductively in tracing out
derivative laws.

Hypotheses in Mind.
19. The principal examples of Hypotheses, in the logical
sense, are to be found in the great problems of analysis-
namely, Innate Ideas, External Perception, and the Will.
Perhaps the instance most in point is Perception. On this
subject, there prevails the assumption of an independent
material world and a series of independent minds, brought
into mutual contact ; an assumption that has the great recom-
mendation of easily and simply expressing all the common
phenomena. It has, however, the serious drawback of being
self- contradictory ; whereas the view that avoids the con-
tradiction is lumbering and unmanageable in its application to
express the facts, and hence the backwardness to receive it, as
a substitute for the other.
This is an extreme case of a hypothesis believed solely be-
cause it squares with the appearances. Not only is there an
absence of proof otherwise, but there is flagrant self-contra-
diction, which ought to be considered as a complete disproof.
Among the unexplained phenomena of mind, we are to in-
clude Dreaming. One hypothesis on this subject is a real
cause, namely, the partial activity or wakefulness of the brain.
It is a fact well established that the brain may be either alive
or dormant in all degrees. Now if we assume wakefulness in
certain parts, and dormancy in others, we may account for
many of the appearances of dreaming, sonnambulism , and
mesmerism. The hypothetical element is the selection of the
parts, namely, the senses, and the centres of voluntary move-
ment. The coincidence of the facts with what would follow
on this assumption is a considerable probability in favour of the
hypothesis.
It is a well-known fact that when a chain of ideas has often
passed in succession, and when the last link of the chain is
more important than the intermediate links, we pass at once
from the first to the last, the others not appearing in conscious-
ness at all. The oblivion has been the occasion of various
hypotheses. (1 ) According to Stewart, the intermediate steps
are passed so rapidly as to be forgotten. (2 ) According to
Hamilton, it belongs to the class of latent mental processes
286 LOGIC OF CHARACTER.

(3) According to J. S. Mill, there is a direct association formed

between the first and the last, and the others disappear alto-
gether from the chain. All the three suppositions refer to
real agencies ; all might operate in the case supposed. Con-
sequently, the decision turns upon whether the effect of any
one is exactly equal to the effect observed. Allowing for the
standing difficulty of computing mental forces, we may say
that, on the whole, the last most nearly coincides with the
phenomenon.
The exact character of the human mind at birth is a hypo-
thesis of the second class of scientific hypothesis, a fictitious
representation that has no groundwork but fitness to express
the subsequent manifestations.
The minds of other human beings and of animals are con-
ceived by us hypothetically as expressing the appearances upon
the analogy of our own conscious experience .
Chance and Probability in Mind.
20. The complications of the phenomena of Mind pre-
vent us from attaining laws of universal application. In
many instances, we must state our propositions as more
or less Probable.
The influence of Education is not in all instances certain .
The Law of Retentiveness is sure in its operation, but its
various complicated conditions may not always be complied
with. A training in good conduct, in most cases, but not in
all, makes a good moral character ; a training in vice is
generally, but not uniformly, perverting. Adversity, in many
instances, but not in all, improves the disposition.
LOGIC OF CHARACTER.
21. The SCIENCE of CHARACTER has reference to the
proportionate development of the sensibilities and powers
in different Individuals. It presupposes the Science of
Mind.
Human beings in general have certain susceptibilities to
Feeling, powers of Volition, and aptitudes of Thought ; all
which possess degree, and may be unequally manifested in
different persons . Hence, an individual mind is not suffi-
ciently described by its participation of our universal mental
nature ; but must be represented according to the proportion-
ate development of the several Feelings, &c., common to
 BASIS OF THE SCIENCE OF CHARACTER. 287

humanity. We are all liable to Fear ; we all possess Tender

Affection ; but some more, some less .
It is impossible to state these peculiarities of character
except in the language applicable to mind universally ; or to
analyze a character without having first analyzed the mind.
The basis of any Science of Character must, therefore, be
the ultimate analysis of the Mind . There should be ascer-
tained, as far as possible, the native and irresolvable Feelings,
and the attributes of Volition and of Thought. If a mind
were like a mineral, the statement of the degrees of these
various fundamental attributes would be the account of a
character. But the mind is a thing of indefinite growth,
adaptation, acquisition ; its first cast is greatly altered before
the end ; and, as what we usually desiderate is the character
of a full-grown man or woman, we must provide an account
of the acquired, as well as of the native powers.

The proper view to take of Phrenology is to regard it as a

science of Character, accompanied with a theory of external
indications. It furnishes a professedly ultimate Analysis of
the Mind. It farther endeavours to connect each mental
power or susceptibility with a local habitation in the brain,
outwardly manifested by the shape of the head . This addi-
tion, although highly convenient, is not necessary to constitute
a science of character.
22. In the description of characters, there is obviously
wanted a scale of degree.
The difficulties attending the quantitative estimate of mind
are a serious drawback in the science of character. Yet it is
impossible not to make the attempt to distinguish more and
less in the various mental attributes.
The ordinary mode of procedure is this. In each separate
peculiarity-emotional, volitional and intellectual- we form
an estimate of the general average of persons known to us.
Above and below this average, we use the indefinite adjectives
of quantity, much, great, very great, small, very small, defi-
cient, and so on.
The scale of Phrenology includes a wide range of degrees,
probably beyond what can be practically discriminated and
agreed upon.
Our most correct appreciations of quantity in mind, rest
upon an objective basis. Thus, a slow learner can be com-
pared with a moderate or a quick learner, through the lengths
288 LOGIC OF CHARACTER.

of time required by each for a given amount of acqui-

sition. This objective method admits of a considerable
amount of precision, and is the chief hope of attaining
quantitative accuracy in the Science of Mind.
23. The native Elements of Character would be con-
veniently represented under the three heads-Activity,
Feeling (Emotional), Intellect.

The detailed account of these elements is the adaptation of

the psychological analysis of the mind, to the statement of the
basis of character.
The mental elements might be prefaced by an account of
the important physical organs implicated in mental processes,
so far as regards their physical characteristics. The Brain,
the Muscular System, the Digestive System, &c., of each
individual, might be regarded, in the first instance, from the
objective side, or as viewed by the physiologist and physician.
These organs have all bearings, direct, or indirect, on character.
In recounting the native elements of Activity, Feeling, and
Thought, we need to single out for special consideration the
Intellectual Retentiveness, as being the expression of the
possibilities of growth, acquisition, or education . This is the
foremost law of mind, with reference to the moulding or
Formation of Character, the means of transforming the various
native tendencies into an artificial cast. The educability of a
character needs to be looked at by itself ; a thing only to be
determined by actual experiment of the progress in given cir-
cumstances. The schoolmaster, after a certain length of pro-
bation, judges whether a pupil will succeed in Mathematics, in
Language, or in Drawing.
24. In estimating Character, whether in fact or in
expectation, we must never drop out of sight the Law of
Conservation, under the guise of the Limitation of the
Powers.

The accurate judgment of an individual either as exhibited

at any one time, or as regards the possibilities of transforma-
tion, must depend upon the precision of our allowance for the
Limitation of the Powers. Dealing with persons averagely
constituted, we cannot expect a development above average
in one region without a falling off in some other ; and so on,
through all varieties of assumption as to the extent of the
powers on the whole, and as to the proportions of each.
 INFLUENCES ON CHARACTER. 289

25. The subordinate laws of Character are the statement

of the operation of Circumstances on the Formation of
Character. These must be handled in detail, under the con-
fluent lights ofactual experience and of the superior laws.
The circumstances that influence character are various and
inexhaustible. They afford a wide exemplification of Induc-
tion coupled with Deduction- Empirical Laws transferred
into Derivative. They also exemplify the prevailing laxity in
the use of the method of Agreement.
The leading circumstances are such as these :- :-
I. The physique of the individual, viewed from its purely
physical side ; the comparative strength or weakness of the
different physical organs. A whole series of consequences
to the character follow from the purely physical endowments.
Great muscular strength gives a certain direction to the activi-
ties and pursuits, whatever be the proper mental tendencies.
II. The physical treatment of the system, in all that regards
nourishment and the adjuncts of health. The consequences
of these are the greater or less total of force, to be distributed
among the various functions, including the supports of mind.
Climate, town or country life, poverty or affluence, indulgence
or temperance, are obvious elements ofthis computation.
-
III. Natural surroundings, as they affect the mind- the
activities, feelings, or intelligence. Differences have often been
pointed out as between mountaineers and tenants of the plains,
between sea-faring nations and those in the interior of conti-
nents, between rural and urban populations. Not much
precision has as yet been gained in the expression of those
differences . But, if studied by the double method of induction
and deduction, they may yield important laws.
It is a clear deductive truth that variety of impressions must
enlarge the compass of the intellect. It is not so obvious what
will be the effects on the feelings ; the aesthetic sensibilities,
for example, are not quickened by nature alone ; they usually
need another stimulus. Incessant familiarity with scenes of
grandeur has less effect (on the Law of Relativity) than alter-
nation of these with others of a tamer sort.
IV. Modes of Industry, or habitual occupation, give a
notorious bent to the character . The effects of occupation or
profession have been a subject of frequent observation ; many
of the consequences being apparent. The soldier, the sailor,
the tiller of the ground , the trader, the priest, have each the
stamp of their calling.
19
290 LOGIC OF CHARACTER.

V. The Surrounding Society moulds the individual as to

feelings, and as to modes of thinking, in ways too numerous
to exhaust, but yet capable of being stated with remarkable
precision. The inductive empiricisms on the one hand, and
the deductive principles, on the other, conspire to express the
remarkable assimilation of the individual to the society ;
while it is not difficult to point out its limitations, the circum-
stances being given. The religious, ethical, and political
opinions of each person are, in the great mass of cases, the
exact reflex of what prevails in the society about him.
VI. The express Education given by the schoolmaster
should be added to the moulding influence of general society .
This element admits of being clearly stated. A people
sent regularly to school like the Scotch, or the Germans,
acquires a distinct superiority of intellectual and moral
character. Under this head, attention must be paid to the
educational influence of Institutions ; as, for example, an
established church.
VII. The amount of Liberty permitted to individuals by
the state, and by society, has a vast influence on character.
The revolutions that have achieved enlargements of individual
freedom, as the Protestant Reformation, are experiments of
Difference, showing the impetus given to progress by Liberty.
Political freedom is not exactly the same thing as Self-
government, but is not complete without that addition . This
too is an instrumentality for moulding the character.
VIII. Many Social Institutions, Laws and Customs, apart
from the general fact of Freedom with Self-government,
exercise on character an influence that may be studied and
assigned. The tenure and descent of Property, the Marriage
Laws, improved means of Communication, are obvious in-
stances.
From the foregoing remarks, will sufficiently appear the
Notions, the Propositions, and the logical Methods of the
science of Character. It will be advisable, farther, to note
the heads of Classification ; which will serve as an important
preparation for the Logic of Politics.

Classification of Characters.
26. The classification of Characters is not a proper
classification according to the Natural History mode.
We could not, except by a useless fiction, arrange charac-
ters in Orders, Genera and Species . The real distinction be-
 PECULIARITIES OF CHARACTER. 291

tween characters is expressed by the higher or lower degree

of some one or more of the ultimate elements of character.
And we do not find characters agreeing in a plurality of
common attributes, excepting so far as the elevation of one
peculiarity implies the depression of some others ; and hence
we have no basis of generic or specific agreements. The only
possible way of giving an exhaustive account of characters is
to assume by turns a higher degree of each peculiarity-
Active, Emotional, Intellectual, and to state the appearances
connected with that ; whence by obverse inference we could
gather the concomitants of the low degree in each case.
Thus, we could indicate the general consequences of an unusual
pitch of Natural or Spontaneous Energy ; of the Emotional
Temperament on the whole, and of any of the special suscep-
tibilities to Feeling or Emotion, as Organic Sensibility, Sight,
Tender Emotion.
There is no limit to the possible modes and varieties of
character arising out of the conjunctions of different faculties
in excess or in defect. These conjunctions, however, must be
governed by the laws of their elements ; so that their explana-
tion is purely deductive, under the check of actual cases .
27. The details of Character are thus the account of the
separate peculiarities, followed by the analysis and expla-
nation of such select conjunctions as are often found, and
are of practical importance.
Under the head of Action, we have important varieties-as
indolence, general or partial, fitfulness of energy, and steady
persistence. The Emotional character is yet more varied ;
under it we have the dispositions expressed by sensual, sensu-
ous, sociable, reverential, irascible, egotistical, and so on.
The aspects of Intellect are more numerous still ; general
ability, general stupidity, aptitude for language, for science,
for art, for business, and many other still more special modes.
The attributes involved under Conscience are a very mixed
product. That predominance of the Love of Gain- manifested
from ancient times by the Jews, and in modern times by the
English, and the peoples sprung from them- ought to be
traceable to constitutional foundations coupled with circum-
stances. The sense of Dignity, united with respect for the
Forms of Law, and the regard to the Practical and Concrete-
as combined in the ancient Roman-offer an interesting subject
for analysis and explanation.
292 LOGIC OF MINERALOGY.

The distinctive characters of the Sexes are to be sought

by the same analytic procedure. These refer us to physical
foundations, as well as to mental elements and to the opera-
tion of circumstances.
The problems of character take a practical shape in Educa-
tion ; being an enquiry into the means of moulding character
according to prescribed types - Active, Emotional, Intellectual.
The experience of the educator is the verification of the
deduced maxims.
Under the Logic of Politics, there will be a further occasion
for applying the science of character.

CHAPTER VI.

SCIENCES OF CLASSIFICATION.

MINERALOGY.

1. Mineralogy is a Concrete, Descriptive, Classificatory

science, referring to the solid inorganic constituents of the
globe.
A Mineral is defined as a solid homogeneous body,
having a definite chemical composition and a definite
crystalline form .
Mineralogy brings forward no new laws or operations. It
merely applies mathematical, physical, and chemical laws to
the inorganic solid constituents of the globe. Moreover, it is
not so much engaged in tracing physical sequences as in
arranging and classifying the multitudinous materials we find
in the earth's crust. Its laws are laws of co-existence, as
Co-inherence of Attribute.
The science of Mineralogy is in close connexion with
Chemistry. Had Chemistry attained its present advanced
shape at an earlier period, there might have been no separate
science of minerals. But for the comprehensive treatment of
all material elements whatsoever, under Chemistry, there
might be an objection to the exclusiveness of Mineralogy, in
refusing to take account of liquid and gaseous bodies, as
water and air. Yet, seeing that all these are sufficiently given
in Chemistry, there is no need for repeating them in another
 MINERALS DEFINED. 293

science ; and Mineralogy retains its special and restricted

scope, which is to treat of substances presenting form as well
as definite composition.
The chief advantage of detaching Mineralogy from Chemis-
try is to enable minerals to be more fully described in their
minute varieties, and to be more comprehensively classified.
The separation relieves Chemistry of a burden, and allows a
fresh start in the process of classifying.
Definition of a Mineral. - Into the definition of a mineral,
two main facts enter, and these dictate the whole plan of the
science :-Chemical Composition and Crystalline Form. As
regards the first point, minerals are either simple bodies or
chemical compounds ; and as chemical compounds, they must
be homogeneous substances, and not conglomerations of
different material like a piece of pudding stone or of granite ;
such conglomerates are not minerals but rocks ; quartz is a
mineral, gneiss is a rock.
As regards the second part of the definition, minerals have
a definite Form ; a fact associated with their homogeneous
character. The simple substances in their purity, and the
definite chemical compounds, when in their highest degree of
consolidation, assume definite crystalline shapes ; and the
occurrence of these shapes is a further guarantee of the homo-
geneous nature of the material, allowance being made for
the property called isomorphism, or the existence of similar
forms in different materials, which permits of their crystallizing
together.
The definition excludes clay, sand, and soils, these being for
the most part heterogeneous, as well as formless.
The deposits from organic bodies, as coal, amber, and
mineral resins, are improper minerals ; they have neither
purity nor form .

I. Arrangement of Mineral Characters.

2. The exhaustive statement of Characters, in Minera-
logy, is substantially the same as in Chemistry.
Under the Logic of Chemistry, we discussed the guiding
principle of arrangement of characters, namely, to follow the
expository order of the properties : from which was deduced
the following sequence .
I. Crystalline Form.
II. Optical properties, including Refraction, Double Refrac-
tion and Polarization ; Colour ; Lustre.
294 LOGIC OF MINERALOGY.

III. Specific Gravity.

IV. Cohesive properties, namely, Hardness, Tenacity, Elas-
ticity. To these three heads are reducible Brittleness, Duc-
tility, Malleability.
V. Adhesion. This means the cohesive union of different
substances, without chemical affinity ; the leading cases are
solutions, alloys, and cements. It might be the head for
entering the composition of those bodies that are treated as
alloys and not as chemical compounds. The isomorphous
unions are of this nature.
VI. Relations to Heat. Rate of Dilatation by increased
temperature ; Melting and Boiling points ; Conduction of
Heat ; Specific Heat ; Radiation, Absorption, Refraction, and
Polarization of Heat. This is the exhaustive array of proper-
ties having reference to heat ; and probably includes more
than the mineralogist is ever accustomed to state, they being
unknown for the greater number of minerals.
VII. Relations to Electricity : -Magnetic property ; Con-
duction or Isolation of Electricity ( Frictional and Voltaic) ;
place in the Electric series, from Electro-positive to Electro-
negative ; place in the Thermo-Electric series.
VIII. Chemical properties. The mineralogist is not sup-
posed to transcribe the whole chemistry of each substance.
For his purposes a selection is made of chemical re-actions
useful in mineral testing.
Occasionally minerals have Taste and Odour.
How far any of these properties can be related, by general
laws of Causation or of Co -existence, with any other proper-
ties, is an important enquiry falling under Molecular Physics,
and is not especially the business of the mineralogiat. Such
laws of connexion as may be established, simplify the study of
minerals, by making one property the index of another. That
there are such laws is certain ; several have been noticed in
former connexions (Book III. , Chap. III. § 3). These laws,
however, do not, as yet, dispense with the separate statement
of the properties above given, although they may give to
several of them a derivative character.
The fact of there being laws of connexion of the properties
has an important bearing on the next head .
II. The Maximum of Affinity of Minerals, as guiding their
Classification.
3. It has to be seen what classification of minerals best
complies with the golden rule.
 BASIS OF MINERAL CLASSIFICATION. 295

To bring together things that have in common the greatest

number of leading attributes, is the first condition of a classi-
fication. Now we have above enumerated eight different
groups of mineral characters ; and the question arises, which
of all these should be the groundwork of the arrangement into
classes.
There are two suppositions that, if true, would facilitate
the decision. First, if by the discovery of laws of mutual
connexion, any one of the groups of properties were a key to
one or two other groups, there would be a reduction of the
total number of alternatives . Thus, if Crystallization were
related to the modes of Cohesion, or if Electrical and Chemical
properties were found to be allied, we should be able to assume
one of the allied members as representing both.
Again, if any one group of properties, by intrinsic import-
ance, and apart from the association with another group, had
an obvious and marked predominance, such group would be
properly chosen to give the lead in the classification. In this
point of view, for example, the Crystalline arrangement might
be fairly preferred to either Heat or Electricity.
On both grounds, preference is to be given to these two
characters ; namely, Chemical Composition and Crystalline
Form . Accordingly, these are employed as the groundwork
of classification. Minerals are first divided according to their
Chemical Composition ; and farther subdivided according to
their Crystallization . In the mineral collection of the British
Museum, arranged by Mr. Maskelyne, no other property is
employed as a basis of division .
In the older classifications, other characters were made use
of. The system of Mohs proceeded on Crystalline form, Hard-
ness, and Specific Gravity. Now, Hardness, which we may
otherwise express as cohesive energy, must be a result of the
molecular forces and arrangements accompanying chemical
constitution and crystallization, and, from this circumstance
alone, is peculiarly unsuited to be a primary foundation of
classes. Again, Specific Gravity may likewise be viewed as a
yesult of the molecular arrangements, under which the ulti-
mate particles attain to greater or less proximity.
The arrangement of Weiss is in its chief basis chemical ; his
primary division into Orders is governed by chemical compo-
sition purely:-Oxidized Stones, Saline Stones, Saline Ores ,
Oxidized Ores, Native Metals, Sulphuretted Metals, Inflam-
mables. In subdividing the Orders into Families, he brings
into play other considerations. Thus, importance in the com-
 296 LOGIC OF MINERALOGY.

position of rocks, or in the geological stratification of the globe,

determines such families as Quartz, Felspar, Mica, Hornblende,
Garnet. Again, the precious stones, or gems, notwithstanding
diversity of chemical composition, have a remarkable agree-
ment in such characters as hardness, tenacity, high specific
gravity without metallic aspect, transparency, vivid colours.
We may, however, fairly doubt whether either of those two cir-
cumstances is enough tojustify mineralogists in departing from
the arrangement according to the great primary attributes-
Composition and Form. In such cases, a supplemental arrange-
ment should be made for the specific object in view, without
distorting the one principal scheme. The geologist, to prepare
for describing the stratification of the earth's crust, may select,
and array for his own purpose, the predominating mineral
constituents. And, with a view to the popular interests ofthe
subject, the mineralogist may bring together into one group
all the substances that combine the most highly fascinating
properties of external appearance.
The arrangement in the British Museum can be briefly re-
ferred to, as carrying out the scheme according to Composition
and Form .
The first division is into NATIVE ELEMENTS, or Simple Bodies,
and COMPOUNds.
In arranging the Native Elements, there is an inversion of
the usual order in Chemistry ; the Metals precede the Non-
metals. This is owing to the predominance of the fact of
Solidity in the mineralogical view of the earth's constituents.
The native metals, therefore, come first of all ; and in deciding
their arrangement among themselves, no farther chemical
circumstance is taken into account ; the reference is solely to
Crystallization .
Under the first System of Crystallography, the Cubic, are
arranged, Copper, Silver, and Gold. Under the fourth System,
the Hexagonal or Rhombohedral, are the isomorphous metals,
Arsenic, Antimony, and Bismuth ; and the same forms brings
into continuity with these the rare metal, Tellurium.
The Non-metallic native elements are Carbon and Sulphur ;
Carbon being found in the two mineral forms-Diamond and
Graphite.
Compound Minerals. - The native metals occur often as
alloys ; and these are included with the simple minerals ; an
alloy is not a chemical compound. The chemical combination
of the metals takes place chiefly with the non-metals ; the
prominent instances of combination with other metals, are the
 MINERAL COMPOUNDS. 297

compounds with the Arsenides - Arsenic, Antimony, Bismuth.

Accordingly, the Arsenides, &c., are the commencing division
of compound minerals ; the subdivisions, as in the native
elements, being according to form. The three elements
Tellurium, Selenium, and Sulphur, are chemically grouped
together, under the name ' thionid ' elements, and their com-
pounds with the metals-Tellurides, Selenides, Sulphides—
are next in order ; there being subordinate arrangements
according to the crystalline systems, which are nearly all
represented. There are also divisions according to still higher
compounds, as when Arsenides, &c., unite with Sulphides ;
which higher compounds succeed in order to the simple com-
pounds.
The next division comprises compounds of the Metals with
the non-metallic group- Chlorine, Iodine, Bromine , Fluorine-
the ' halogens.' Under these fall certain conspicuous substan-
ces- -Common Salt, Calomel, Sal ammoniac, Fluor Spar, &c .
The remaining first rank Division of compound minerals is
the Compounds of Oxygen- a division of enormous extent, and
progressive complication. The chief subdivisions are there-
fore chemical, the distinctions ofcrystalline form being reserved
for the final subdivisions. Commencing with bodies having
the lowest equivalents of oxygen-the Monoxides , we are led
to the higher equivalents-the Sesquioxides and Binoxides ;
under each of these heads, the farther subdivision is according
to crystalline systems. Next are the Oxygen Salts, of which
the Carbonates are an extensive group of minerals, divided by
their crystalline forms into Prismatic, Rhombohedral, and
Oblique. After these come the Silicates, a large, varied, and
important class of minerals, subdivided chemically in the first
instance, and by crystalline form in the end. To these succeed
Borates and Nitrates. The final groups are Phosphates and
Arseniates, which, in consequence of the isomorphisms of cor-
responding compounds of Phosphorus and of Arsenic, cannot
be classified apart.
If it be the fact that the two properties -Chemical Compo-
sition and Crystalline Form- have a commanding prominence
in minerals overshadowing the others, or else carrying these
along with them, the foregoing classification is in the highest
degree natural or philosophical, being accordant with the rule
of the maximum of resemblance.

4. The Chemical Composition and the Crystalline form

also give the proper boundaries of Species.
298 LOGIC OF MINERALOGY.

The question as to the boundaries of species presents no

theoretical difficulties on the above scheme. Every native
element, and every definite chemical compound, would consti-
tute a well-marked species, an Infima Species, or lowest kind.
If the same element, or the same compound, has two allotropic
forms, as Carbon, these are distinct mineral varieties , but
would not be proper species.
The practical difficulties attending mineral species arise
from combinations not chemical, where the elements may be
in all proportions ; as in the isomorphous compounds , the
alloys, and the admixture of foreign ingredients generally.
Such instances are proper varieties, and receive distinctive
names and separate descriptions whenever the difference is of
a marked kind.

III. Classification by Grades.

5. The Grades in Mineral Classification are used merely
for arrangment, and not for shortening the description of
Mineral Species .
In the scheme of Weiss, there are three grades - Orders,
Families, and Species ; an irrelevant and illusive semblance of
the classification in Botany and in Zoology, where the
several gradations-the Orders, Families, &c. — are each ac-
companied with a definition, or enumeration of common
characters . A Mineral Order, on the other hand— as Oxidized
Stones, Native Metals -is accompanied with no definition , and
suggests no common characters beyond what is gathered from
the name . So with the Families. The familyQuartz ' in
the order ' Oxidized Stones ' is not defined as a family ; there
are no characters assigned as common to all the species of
the quartz family. There is a title OXIDIZED STONES, a
sub-title QUARTZ ; and then commences the enumeration of
species ; so that each specific description contains all the
characters of that species, exactly as if it stood alone in the
world. The Gradation, therefore, is a Division, but not a
Classification.
In the scheme of the British Museum, the division begins
with the dichotomy of Native Minerals and Compounds. The
Native Minerals are not again divided formally ; they are
simply arranged in the order of crystalline systems. The
Compounds involve various subdivisions, which could easily
be laid out in the tabular form . As there is no systematic
treatise on Mineralogy based on the scheme, we do not know
 UNIFORMITY IN STATEMENT OF CHARACTERS. 299

whether the gradation could be properly converted into a

system of Orders and Families, in the proper sense, with an
enumeration of the characters of those orders and families ;
but, in all likelihood, no such attempt would be made . Neither
Chemistry nor Mineralogy can gain much by straining the
parallel of Botany and Zoology in this respect.

IV. Marking of Agreement and Difference.

6. The exhibition of Agreement and Difference in Mineral
description is gained in the following ways.
(1) By observing a uniform plan.
(2) By proximity of species according to the maximum
of agreement .
(3) By select comparisons.
(4) By select contrasts.
From the absence of defining characters in the higher divi-
sions (except as indicated by the significance of the names)
the best means of stating agreements is wanting. If the nature
ofthe case does not permit of the operation of giving characters
to Orders and Families, we must proceed by other ways.
(1. ) A uniform plan in the statement of the characters gives
a facility of comparing any one species with any other. This
is carried out in works on Mineralogy, although not with all
the aids that typography might afford .
(2. ) It necessarily follows from a good classification that the
species placed in close proximity have the most numerous
points of agreement, or the fewest points of difference. When
native metals are arranged in crystalline forms, the contiguous
species have a very large amount of similarity, and compara-
tively few dissimilarities . This produces on the reader the
effect of a classification by grades, with agreements stated at
each grade .
(3) The mind receives great assistance from separate tables
of agreements, on select properties. Thus, it is convenient to
tabulate the minerals falling under distinct crystalline forms ;
those having the same specific gravity ; the same hardness,
&c. This is a great supplemental aid to the mental comparison
of individuals.
(4) Select contrasts. When important minerals are nearly
allied, and apt to be confounded , they should be brought into
direct comparison, through a statement of the agreeing feat-
ures, and a tabular contrast of the differences. For example,
Platinum and Palladium have a very close resemblance, and
300 LOGIC OF MINERALOGY.

might have their agreeing characters given together, and their

differences formally contrasted.
V. Index Classifications of Minerals.
7. For the ready determining of Minerals, recourse may
be had to Index Tables .
The properties apparently most suitable are- Crystal-
lization ; Transparency, Lustre and Colour ; Specific
Gravity ; Hardness ; Chemical and Blow-pipe re-actions.
Of the two chief modes of constructing an Index—a succes-
sion of Dichotomies, and Tabulations- the first is exemplified
in Botany, the second seems adapted to the present state of
Mineralogy. The thing requisite is to tabulate all known
minerals according to every one of these properties, so that
when any one property is ascertained, a reference to the table
for that property will show what group it belongs to, and
thereby limit the search. The discovery of a second property,
in like manner, gives a reference to a second table, and
reduces the choice still farther.
The first table- Crystalline Forms-would be arranged in
the order of the crystalline systems, and the important
varieties of each, and would also be adapted as far as possible
to the indications of the goniometer, which measures the
angles.
The Optical properties, Transparency, Translucency, Lustre,
Colour, might demand several tabulations-one for modes of
Transparency and Translucency, another for Lustres, a third
for Colours. There are doubts, however, as to the practical
utility, for purposes of discrimination, of the table of colours ;
since, although colour is an important mark in pure substances,
the admixture of colouring matters is so frequent as to render
the test misleading .
A Table of Specific Gravities would be useful as a means of
testing. Many substances are well marked by specific gravity.
The different varieties of the important group of Dolomites,
or magnesian lime stone, are most conveniently distinguished
by this test.
Hardness being reduced to a scale of degrees, and being
easily tested, is a valuable aid to discrimination ; for which
end there should be a table of minerals according to degrees
of Hardness.
With a view to Blow-pipe and Chemical testing, there are
needed corresponding tables for each characteristic appear-
 CHARACTERS FROM PARTS OF PLANTS. 301

ance ; as fusibility or imfusibility, solubility in acids, &c.

This is merely a modification of the methods of Practical
Chemistry.
Each of the Index tables might contain columns for the
other important index properties, so as to give all the charac-
ters at a glance.
These tables farther point out Agreements among minerals,
and furnish one of the modes given for that purpose under the
preceding head. Their use in suggesting Laws of Co existence
or of Causation, among the properties of bodies, is sufficient
to give them a place among the Arts of Discovery.
BOTANY.

I. Arrangement of Plant Characters.

8. The arrangement of the characters of Plants follows
the expository order of the parts of the Plant.
This is the principle already exemplified in Mineralogy, and
applicable to all sciences of classification.
In a complete system of Botany, the First Division- Struc-
tural and Morphological Botany-enumerates the parts of
Plants as a whole ; giving a generalized and methodical
account of all the structures found in all known plants.
Commencing with the constituent Tissues of Plants, this
division includes- Cells and Cellular Tissue ; Vessels and
Vascular Tissue ; the Contents of the Vegetable Tissues-
starch, gum, sugar, oils, resins, &c.; the Integumentary
Tissues as hairs, glands, and other appendages.
Plants differ in the modes of these constituent Tissues.
Thus, the Acotyledons are cellular plants without vessels , or else
vascular plants with scalariform vessels ; the Monocotyledons
and Dicotyledons are vascular plants with spiral vessels and
stomata.
The Organs or parts of Plants are divided into Nutritive
and Reproductive. The nutritive are the Root, Stem, and
Leaves ; the reproductive, the Flowers, and Fruit. An enume-
ration is given of all the different forms assumed by each organ
throughout the entire assemblage of vegetable species . There
might be, under each separate peculiarity, a tolerably exhaus-
tive reference to the plants possessing it. By such means the
information respecting species is repeated in a different form.
To this department of general Botany succeeds Vegetable
Physiology, which, however, has only an indirect bearing on
the Classification of plants. Any peculiarity of function in an
302 LOGIC OF BOTANY.

individual species would be stated under the organ concerned.

Thus, some cellular plants, as Oscillatorias, have undulating
movements in the cells ; and some, as Confervæ and Diato-
macea, conjugate, that is, unite their cells in reproduction,
by means of an interposed tube.
The next great division, called Taxological Botany, embraces
the Classification of Plants, with the Description of each .
The principles of Classification will be considered under the
subsequent heads. The order of Description is the order of
the parts in Structural Botany, as above quoted : -Cellular
Tissue, Vascular Tissue, Contents of Cells ; Root, Stem,
Leaves, Flower, Fruit.
In referring to a work of Botany for the description of any
given plant, we shall not find, as in Mineralogical treatises ,
a consecutive and exhaustive account of characters . Two cir-
cumstances stand in the way of such a description.
In the first place, the system of grades, which is inoperative
in Mineralogy, is thoroughly worked in Botany. Hence to
exhaust the characters of a species, we must ascend through
all the grades, collecting the characters of each, and uniting
them in one series. The characters of the 6 Common Haw-
thorn' are distributed ( 1 ) under the species so named, (2) under
the genus Hawthorn ' (Crataegus), (3 )" under the family
' Rose ' Rosaceae), (4) under the class, Dicotyledon ." By
assembling the common characters of the class, the family,
the genus, and the species, in the proper order, we should
have a full description of the Hawthorn.
In the second place, most works on Botany do not profess
to exhaust the known character of species, or to give under
each species the whole of the information that exists respect-
ing it ; so that even after collecting the characters from all
the gradations, we have not the full knowledge of the species.
The reason is, partly, that botanical treatises are usually con-
fined to the humbler function of determining or identifying
plants ; partly, that the full information, while very volumi-
nous, is seldom asked for ; and partly, it is to be feared, from
vacillating between the two ends - determination and informa-
tion.
II. The Maximum of Affinity of Plants as guiding their
Classification.
9. In considering the characters of plants, with a view
to classification, we find the order of description to be also
the order of relative importance.
 CONCOMITANCE OF TISSUES AND ORGANS. 303

The circumstance that most of all gives importance to a

character is the number of other characters that go along
with it. Supposing all the characters of equal intrinsic
value, any one that represents three others is four times the
value of one that represents only itself.
There is a correspondence or concomitance of characters in
the fundamental parts of plants- Elementary Tissues, Nutri-
tive Organs, and Reproductive Organs-which facilitates
natural groupings . When we assume as a basis any one of
this class of characters, we secure at once a large amount of
Agreement. Isolated characters, as Colour and Odour, give no
help to classification.
Now it is found that the Elementary Tissues are the most
important in this view ; next are the Nutritive Organs ; and
lastly, the Reproductive Organs. Certain forms of the Ele-
mentary Tissues are accompanied with definite modes in the
Organs, both nutritive and reproductive. By the Tissues
alone, Plants are divided, in the first instance, into Cellular
and Vascular ; the Cellular comprising the lower tribes, as
Lichens, Seaweeds, and mushrooms ; the Vascular, the higher
flowerless plants and the flowering plants. Thus, the dis-
tinction marks the lower and higher in organization.
In the Nutritive organs, the embryo is the part of greatest
importance ; on it rests the grand ternary division into Acoty-
ledons, Monocotyledons, and Dicotyledons, which represents
numerous and important differences, and is, therefore, in the
highest degree a natural or scientific division. Second in
importance to the embryo, or seed, is the root, on which is
based a triple division -Heterorhizal, Endorhizal, and Exor-
hizal. After the root comes the stem, by which is marked the
great division into Exogenous and Endogenous, together
with the farther division into Acrogenous and Thallogenous.
In the Reproductive System, the stamens and the pistils
оссиру the first place ; these were the chief basis of the Linnean
Artificial or Index system. They are the essential organs in
the Phanerogamia, or flowering plants ; and have an analogue
in Cryptogamia, or flowerless plants . Next to these in value
is the fruit ; and after it, the floral envelopes ; and finally, in
flowering plants, are found the inflorescence and bracts.
Thus, by classing according to the characters that carry with
them the greatest number of other characters, there is gained
the maximum of affinity on the whole. On the great leading
divisions this is effectually secured. The difficulties arise in
disposing of the families or Natural Orders, of which a large
304 LOGIC OF BOTANY.

number is included in the immediately superior classes (or

sub-classes) ; 66 Natural Orders are contained in the first sub-
class of the Dicotyledons (Thalamiflora) . It is impossible to
arrange these upon any one principle of succession or conti-
guity ; whence such devices as circular arrangement, double
placing, &c. After describing any one Natural Order, Lindley
exhibits it diagramatically in the centre of four other orders
-right, left, above, beneath- so as to show its alliances on
different sides.
A still greater difficulty is presented by the transition
classes, which, with reference to the others, are denominated
aberrant, as departing from a recognized assemblage of
characters. At the end of the enumeration of a class is some-
times given detached an anomalous or aberrant member,
which, however, by the very fact of its isolation, is a new
class. The genus Spleenwort (in the FERN family) is a re-
markably well-characterized and natural genus ; yet a few
species are scarcely to be distinguished from some species of
Shieldfern and Polypody, except by the sori.

III. Classification by Grades.

10. Botany is the happiest example of Classification by
Grades.
It is a peculiar circumstance in Botanical classification, that
the higher divisions are made upon the more fundamental
characters (the Tissues) ; that the next sub- divisions are upon
characters next in order of importance (the Roots, &c. ) The
Natural Orders or Families are characterized by general
structure, but especially the Flowers and the Fruit. The
characters of the Genus are a continuation of those in the
Order. In the Species, the differential marks embrace Stem,
Leaf, and Flowers. The tendency of this arrangement is
to reduce to comparative insignificance the distinctions of
Species.
For practical purposes, great interest attaches to the various
products or deposits in plants-starch, sugar, gum, oil, resins,
&c. These special products often prevail through Natural
Orders, while sometimes they attach to Genera, and sometimes
to Species.
The motives for settling the lowest Species, as distinguished
from Varieties, were formerly stated. Constancy or perma-
nence of characters is one of the conditions. Thus the Water
Ranunculus assumes many striking variations of form, which
 SPECIES OF PLANTS . 305

have been regarded as specific distinctions ; but from their

inconstancy, and their dependence upon situation, they are
more correctly deemed Varieties. So, Colour is a character
that must be generally withheld from specific marks, and
given as a variety.
A plurality of important characters is the best workable test
of a species. The sweet orange and the bitter orange are re-
garded as Varieties ; the lemon is held to be a distinct Species ;
the points of difference between the sweet and bitter orange
are fewer than the differences between the orange and the
lemon.
In the inferior forms of Plants, the specific marks are often
very limited in number, although they may refer to organs
high in the scale. Thus, in the Ferns, the limitation of both
genera and species has always been a matter of difficulty. The
chief reference is the fructification, or the arrangement of the
seed ; a character of high fixity and permanence in plants
throughout. In grasses too, the limits ofthe numerous genera
are not clearly fixed, -a proof of the fewness of available
characters.
The apparatus of Grades necessarily collapses when the
organization is not of a sufficiently high order to allow of a
series of halting places with important community of attri-
butes. The eight, ten, or twelve steps of descent that may be
interpolated in the more elaborately organized Dicotyledonous
Orders, are reduced to three or four in the Grasses and Ferns ;
while it may be difficult to maintain even that number in the
•
Fungi, Lichens, and Sea-weeds.

IV. Marking of Agreement and Difference.

11. The system of Grades so far provides for the state-
inent of Agreements .
We have frequently called attention to Agreement and
Difference as the fundamental facts of all knowledge. The
more thorough the provision for exhibiting these two facts,
the better will the subject matter be known and understood.
By forming a class, we indicate a community of attributes ;
and everything should be done to exhibit the Agreement
plainly. The tabular form is more particularly suited to
characters that can be expressed shortly. It is a grand
mistake to suppose that the forms and typography of ordinary
composition are suited to the generic and specific descriptions
of plants or of minerals. The different heads of the descrip-
20
306 LOGIC OF BOTANY.

tion are seized with difficulty when scattered indiscriminately

over the printed lines- sometimes at the beginning, and some-
times at the middle or at the end. Any remark on a character,
by way of commentary, or explanation, involving the composi
tion of one or more sentences, should be printed in the compact
form of ordinary composition ; but the broken, unsentenced
description of characters should be exclusively tabular. Such
expressions have already the reality of a table, and to deprive
them of the form, in order to make them seem composition, is
to withhold the only advantageous mode of presenting them
to the mind. Thus to take the genus Ranunculus described as
below* :-
The first sentence, containing a very general remark, may
6
stand as it is, out of the tabular form : Annual or perennial
herbs, sometimes entirely aquatic ;' this should be coupled
with the sentence that comes after the description, as to the
geographical spread of the genus. The proper descriptive
characters are strictly matter for a table, thus ::-
-
Leaves, entire, or more or less divided .
Flowers, usually yellow or white.
Sepals, 5, very rarely reduced to three.
Petals, 5 or sometimes more, each with, &c.
Stamens, usually numerous.
Carpels, numerous, without awns, &c.
As tabular arrangements are hard reading, they may be
relieved and lightened by remarks and illustrations, or by
adding information that properly takes the form of regular
composition.
12. Considerable nicety attends the exhibition of Differ-
ences, there being, except in dichotomies, no regular
method.
Numerous examples have already been given of stating
difference by pointed contrast. When more than two things
are compared, this is impracticable. Still, the value of the
pointed contrast, as appealing to the most fundamental sensi-
bility of the human mind, should never be lost sight of. We
may, for example, select for comparison among the numerous
* Annual or perennial herbs, sometimes entirely aquatic. Leaves entire
or more or less divided. Flowers usually yellow or white. Sepals 5,
very rarely reduced to 3. Petals 5, or sometimes more, each with a
thickened hollow spot at the base, often covered by a minute scale.
Stamens usually numerous. Carpels numerous, without awns, in a globu-
lar or oblong head, each containing a single ovule attached near its base.
 STATEMENT OF DIFFERENCES. 307

species of a genus all the twos that are most liable to be con-
founded.
If the differing species of a genus, or the differing genera of
a family, differed throughout ; that is, if no two agreed in any-
thing but in the common features of the higher class, the
pointed contrast would still be effective. Thus three objects
might be contrasted on a single feature, differing in all the
three. The actual case, however, is that differing species have
many partial agreements ; of six species, three may agree in
some one point, four in another, and so on. In this state of
things, we might carry out a little farther the exhibition of
Agreements. We might give Nos. 1, 3, 4, 6, as agreeing
in certain features ; 2, 4, 5, as agreeing in others. An
additional plan is to modify the statement of the generic agree-
ments thus :—-Feature A is possessed by all except No. 2 ;
Feature B is possessed by 1, 4, 6 ; Feature C by 2, 4, 5, 6, and
so on (adopting the tabular form).
For example, Lindley constitutes an ' Alliance ' or Sub-class,
Berberales, in which he places seven Natural Orders, dis-
tinguished by the Flowers, Stamens, Pistils, &c.; but with
partial agreements, thus—
Flowers ; regular and symmetrical. All the seven, except
Fumariaceæ.
Placenta ; axile in four (naming them) , parietal in two,
sutural in one.
Stamens ; alternate in four, opposite in three.
Every device that brings clearly into the view either Agree-
ments or Differences is vital to the understanding and the re-
collecting of the characters of the various classes. Whenever
there is occasion or scope for the exhibition of agreement and
difference, the manner of it should be prominent and even
ostentatious ; often the best course is to detach the statement
from the ordinary form of composition, and to put it in tabular
array or contrast, as already exemplified.
It is a rule of good exposition not to mix up the description
of characters with reflections and theories as to their causes
or explanations. This applies especially to all subjects where
the descriptions are long and complicated. The following is
an improper mixture of the two modes- The odours of flowers,
as well as their colours, vary much. The sources of odours in
flowers are very obscure. They are often traced to the presence
offragrant volatile oils in resins. The effluvia are ofsuch a subtle
nature as to elude chemical analysis. Some flowers are odori-
ferous only in the evening. This is the case, &c. " The sen-
308 LOGIC OF ZOOLOGY,

tences in italics should have been withheld until the facts

respecting the prevalence of odours had been first stated.
V. Index Classification of Plants.
13. From the circumstance of passing through the
Linnæan classification , so well adapted to the ready deter-
mination of plants, Botany affords the best example of
an Index Classification .
We may retain for this purpose the Linnæan system in its
literal form ; or we may have recourse to the modified schemes
of recent Botanical writers. The principle is the same. We
commence with certain characters, having alternative modes ;
and the key or index informs us what classes each mode points
to. A second character is then examined, its alternatives
found, and the corresponding classes discovered. (See Lind-
ley's Vegetable Kingdom, Bentham's British Flora, &c. )
LOGIC OF ZOOLOGY.
14. The difficulties of Zoological Classification relate
to the multitude and the complication of the Animal King-
dom.
The multitude of the objects to be arranged, and the com-
plication of even the lowest forms, distinguish Zoology from
all other classificatory sciences. There are certain partial
compensations. As compared with Minerals, the organs of
Animals present numerous relations of concomitance ; and as
compared with Plants, the Animal Kingdom falls in a remark-
able degree, under a lineal series, or consecutive development.

I. Characters of Animals.
15. We must look for the characters of Animals in the
division of the animal system into constituent Organs.
The Animal, like the Plant, is made up of Tissues and
Organs, which have a certain amount of sameness, with
variety, throughout the entire Animal Kingdom. The enu-
meration of these belongs to Biology ; Connective tissue,
Elastic tissue, Adipose tissue, Cartilage, Bone, Muscle, Nerve,
Vascular tissue, Blood corpuscles, &c. In Zoology, however,
the Tissues are viewed mainly in the Organs ; and Zoological
characters are characters of organs . There is not the same
use made of distinction of Tissue, as we have seen in Botany.
The basis of Zoological Classification is the division of the
 COMPARATIVE ANATOMY AND ZOOLOGY. 309

Animal system into Organs. These, with their functions, may

be variously arranged, there being two natural groups ; (1)
the Vegetative Organs and Functions (Nutritive and Repro-
ductive) - Digestion, Absorption, Circulation, Nutrition,
Secretion, Excretion, Respiration, Generation, Development ;
(2 ) the higher Animal Organs - Locomotion , the Senses,
the Brain.
In all these various organs, characters may be sought ;"
there being none but what are subject to variation throughout
the Animal series. The Anatomy of Vertebrates comprises
the following parts :-Skeleton, Muscles, Brain and Senses,
Teeth, Alimentary Canal and Appendages, Absorbents, Circu-
lation, Respiration , Urinary organs, Skin, Generative Organs .
The Blood is also a source of distinction in the larger divisions-
as between Vertebrate and Invertebrate, Warm-blooded (Birds
and Mammals) and Cold-blooded (Fishes and Reptiles).
The grand separation, common to all classificatory sciences,
between the General and the Special Departments, in the
Animal Kingdom, gives birth to the two subjects, —Compara-
tive Anatomy and Zoology. As in Mineralogy, and in Botany,
these should repeat and support one another, giving the same
information in two different forms.
The Comparative Anatomy arrangement, besides settling
the selection and the order of Zoological characters, is a most
powerful instrument of generalization. The exhibition of each
successive organ in all varieties and modifications, discloses
many aspects otherwise hidden ; and places the more general
and fundamental peculiarities in a strong light. Much of
the insight that we at present possess regarding the brain is
due to Comparative Anatomy. Too great pains cannot be
given to the perfecting ofthe Comparative Method ; and the
grand secret is the lucid presentation of agreements and of dif-
ferences.
16. There being, in Animals, a number of distinct
organs, a search is made for Laws of Concomitance be-
tween them.

It is a part of Biology, and an indispensable aid to Zoology,

to find out the correspondences or laws of concomitance
between the different organs- Moving Organs, Nervous
System, Digestion, Reproduction, &c.
These laws occur under various aspects . Some are empiri-
cal generalizations, such as the coincidence of the ruminant
characteristic with the cloven foot and horns on the frontal
310 LOGIC OF ZOOLOGY.

bone. Other coincidences are mutually related, and are part

and parcel of the development of the species ; as the advance
of the brain with the muscular system, the reproductive
organs, and the organs generally. The fact of increase of
organization as a whole implies laws of concomitant advance-
ment of all the leading organs. The connexion between an
animal's organs and its circumstances or conditions of life is
not a law of co-existence, but of mutual implication ; it does not
give us two independent facts, but the same fact on two sides.
All references to the element of each species- water, air,
earth, the body of another animal-are to be held as merely
illustrating the nature of the organs.
The best established laws of concomitance in the animal
organs, on which depends the existence of a science of Zoo-
logy, as distinguished from a Comparative Anatomy of ani-
mals, are liable to exceptions. Sometimes a single species
will mar the unanimity of an entire Division, like Amphioxus
among fishes. It is clear, however, that such exceptions are
to be mentioned, and then disregarded . They do not even
prevent us from supposing that the characters whose con-
junction they violate are united by cause and effect ; for
although causation permits no exceptions, it may be ocasionally
counteracted.
The more we can exhaust the relations of correspondence
or concomitance, and the more precisely we can express them,
the better are we prepared for the great classifying operation
that makes up Zoology. The full import of the remark will
appear under the next head.
It might seem superfluous to insist on preserving a regular
order in the statement of Characters throughout the whole
scheme- whether in the Comparative Anatomy or in the
Zoology, seeing no one can follow out comparisons that are
not uniformly expressed.

II. The Maximum of Affinity as giving the Classes.

17. The choice of Classes follows the maximum of agree-
ments in the several organs.
The existence of Laws of Concomitance indicates the possi-
bility of finding animal groups that agree in two, three, or
more organs, or important modifications of organs. The
zoologist grasps at this circumstance, in order to form his
leading classes.
In appearance, but only in appearance, there is another
 BASIS OF CLASSIFICATION. 311

principle of grouping. Some one organ is chosen as the basis

of classification ; for example, the Reproductive system , which
gives the name to Mammalia. In reality, however, such choice
is made not on account of the organ by itself, but on account
of the number of its alliances.
An extreme supposition will place this fact in a clearer
light. Let us imagine that every one of the leading organs,
or systems,-Nervous, Reproductive, &c.—was wholly uncon-
nected in its modifications with every other organ ; that the
nervous system might vary through all possible modes
without any corresponding variation in anything else. Under
such circumstances, we might have a comparative anatomy of
each organ, but no concurrence of organs. Zoology would
be incompetent and non- existent. The only possible classifi .
cation would be according to the Comparative Anatomy ofthe
several organs . We might assign a superior dignity to
same one organ, as the Brain, and give it a priority in arrange-
ment, and a preference in study ; but after the entire animal
kingdom had been exhaustively arranged under the comparative
anatomy of the Nervous System, the same operation would
have to be repeated under the other systems ; the work would
then be finished ; being substantially the present science of
Comparative Anatomy, without the relief that is at present
afforded, to the overwhelming mass of details, by laws of
Concomitance .
Accordingly, the justification of preferring one organ as the
classifying basis, is avowedly its alliances. The taxonomic
value of the placenta ' in Mammalia is the number of charac-
ters that it carries along with it. 'Man, the Apes, the Insec-
tivora, the Cheiroptera, the Rodentia, -are all as closely con-
1nected by their placental structure as they are by their general
affinities' (Huxley). The real motive to the grouping is not the
placental structure, but the general affinities.
We may make another illustrative supposition . If all the
organs were strictly co-equal in development and in modifica-
tions ; if the Nervous System, the Muscular System , the
Reproductive System, &c., were all modified in strict concomi-
tance, there would be no such thing as a preference organ
whereupon to base classification ; the Reproductive organs
could be no more a clue to the ' general affinities ' than the
digestion, or the respiration . There would be no mention of
a special basis ; general affinity would alone be prominent .
It would appear, however, that the constituent systems of
the animal organization are not co-equal and concomitant in
312 LOGIC OF ZOOLOGY.

their changes ; some carry with them more, and some less, of
general affinity or concomitance. Taking the whole Animal
Kingdom, we find that the Nervous System is by far the most
important basis of classification ; the reason being that the
organs generally cannot advance without a corresponding rise
in the regulating and co-ordinating organ. There cannot be
an extension of the muscular apparatus without an extension
of the brain ; while the muscular apparatus itself implicates
many other parts of the system.
Next to the Nervous System is that part of Reproduction,
embracing the mode of Development of the animal from the
germ upwards. We have already seen how far this governs
the divisions and sub-divisions of the Mammalia ; their very
name is founded on it.
If, for the sake of illustration , it were asked what would be
the worst organ for classifying upon-the one that undergoes
the greatest degree of unconnected or isolated variation,-the
answer would probably be the Heart.

III. Classification by Grades.- Species.

18. It being assumed that each class is formed on the
maximum of affinities, the number of grades is regulated
by the occurrence of a succession of suitable groupings.
The grades, or halting- places, are a relief to the burden of
numerous common characters ; but there is no need to con-
stitute them where the amount of resemblance is inconsider-
able.
In the higher Vertebrates, a succession of six, seven, or more
grades is admissible and advisable ; while the attempt to con-
stitute Natural Orders, Genera and Species, in the Protozoa,
is misplaced and savours of pedantry.
In Mammalia , the distinctions of Species may be numerous
and important ; profound differences separate the Lion and
the Tiger, the Horse and the Ass. In Birds, on the other
hand, the species often turn upon small and nice peculiarities.
Of the three hundred species of Parrots, it is impossible that
there can be specific differences either numerous or important ;
the Psittacos erithacus, for example, is distinguished as grey,
with tail red ! The domesticated varieties of the horse, dog,
and cat, have wider differences than many species, or even
genera, of the lower animal tribes. The differences between
a Negro and a Caucasian (varieties of the Species- Man) pro-
 AGREEMENT AND DIFFERENCE. 313

bably surpass in number the distinctions between two Natural

Orders ofInfusoria.
In some cases, there occurs a single character so bold and
remarkable as to satisfy our utmost demands for a specific
distinction . Such is the extraordinary electrical organ in cer-
tain fishes. The species of the Gymnotus named electricus, is
sufficingly marked by this single feature, in whose presence
the describer abstains from all further specification .
IV. Marking of Agreement and Difference.
19. Zoology depends greatly on the rule of parallel
array for Agreements, and of pointed contrast for Differ-
ences.
The characters of classes, high or low, should be thrown
into the form most advantageous to the reader, that is, the
tabular arrangement, with appended remarks and comment-
aries in ordinary typography .
For example, the characters of AVES (reckoned sufficient for
discrimination, although inadequate asinformation) are these:-
Reproduction :-oviparous
Respiration -air- breathing
Heart:-four cavities, as in the Mammalia
Integument :-feathers
Teeth -wanting ; substitute horny jaws
Locomotive Organs :-the anterior limbs are wings.
Besides these characters much is to be said as to the points
ofcommunity, in the Nervous System, the Digestive System,
and other parts .
For the statement of Difference we may select Mr. Huxley's
primary division of Birds into three classes ; an instance where
the pointed contrast may be extended to three members :-
SAURURE RATITE CARINATE
Metacarpal Bones
Not ankylosed Ankylosed Ankylosed
Caudal Vertebra and Tail
Longer than body Shorter Shorter
Crest of Sternum
None Present
Barbs of the Feathers
Disconnected Connected.
There are several other characters of the second and third
classes, and no more of the first. Hence, we might have put
the first against the two others as a whole, and then worked
out the present contrast upon these two.
314 LOGIC OF ZOOLOGY.

Not merely in the formal exhibition of generic and specific

characters, but in every incidental comparison of one class
with another, the statement of Agreements and of Differences
should always be clear, emphatic, and ostentatious.

V. Index Classification .
20. An Index Classification for Zoology might choose.
between the two alternatives-the tabular and the dichoto-
mous.
The Tabular method has already been suggested for Mine-
ralogy, and will again be brought up for Diseases. The
Dichotomous method is carried to perfection in Botany.
A tabular plan could be based upon Comparative Anatomy ;
there being given, under every peculiar mode of each organ, a
complete list of all animals possessing that mode. Thus,
there would be a table of the species conforming to each
grouping of the Teeth, so that the discovery of such grouping
in any given specimen would decide the animal as one of the
list. A second character being noted as present in the speci-
men would direct to a second list, where the animal must
appear ; the choice is now narrowed to such as are common
to both lists. A third, and a fourth character, being followed
out in the same way, would reduce the choice to still smaller
limits ; and eventually the enquirer would be guided to the
proper Species.
The dichotomous method of Botany, if fully adapted to
Zoology, as it might obviously be, would be still better.
The want of an Index is less felt in Zoology because of the
better marked specific distinctions, at least until we descend
to the inferior tribes, where there are numerous species,
slightly marked. It would be pre-eminently necessary for
Birds, among Vertebrate animals, and for the Invertebrate
Orders generally. It is less necessary for Mammalia, except
in a collection of unusually vast extent.
 CHAPTER VII.

LOGIC OF PRACTICE.

1. The Practical Sciences are defined by their several

ENDS.
Medicine is the practical science having for its end Health.
Grammar and Rhetoric have for ends the perfection of the
instrument of Language.
2. There is one crowning end, the sum of all other ends,
namely, Happiness or Well-being.
People desire Health in order to be happy. There can be
no end beyond human enjoyment-the gaining of pleasure
and the averting of pain.
3. The final end of all pursuit must be assumed or
granted ; it cannot be proved.
No proof can be offered of the position that Happiness is
the supreme end of human conduct. We must be satisfied
with the fact that mankind make it the end . As all proof
consists in referring the point in question to something more
fundamental, there must be at last something taken for
granted on its own account. Such is Happiness, the highest
crowning end. Men desire Happiness, either for themselves
or for others, as the goal of all endeavour.
4. There is, however, a want of perfect unanimity as to
the final end. Some even deny that Happiness is the end ;
while there may be great difference of opinion as to the
nature of the happiness to be sought.
The end set up by some, as the final end of all, is Virtue.
To those that embrace this view consistently, there is no
reply ; there is no possible appeal from a fundamental end.
We may, however, enquire whether any class of persons do
consistently and thoroughly maintain virtue, and not happi-
ness, to be the sole end of all endeavours. Wherever there is
inconsistency, an argument is possible .
Now, in reply to the setting up of Virtue, or mere self-
denial, as an end, we may urge, first, that the conduct of man-
kind shows that, in the great mass of cases, they regard virtue
316 LOGIC OF PRACTICE .

as a means to happiness. The virtue of Howard consisted not

in the fatigues and privations suffered from his journeys, and
from visiting squalid dungeons ; it was in the amount ofhuman
misery that he relieved.
Secondly, the position that Virtue is an end is almost
uniformly coupled with the assertion that, in the long run,
Virtue is Happiness ; which is merely another way of assign-
ing Happiness as the end.
Thirdly, the thorough carrying out of the position that
Virtue, in the form of ascetic self-denial, which is Virtue
dissociated from Happiness, is the ethical end , would be tanta-
mount to abolishing the difference between good and evil,
with which virtue itself is identified . Virtue, in the sense sup-
posed, flourishes in misery ; the more miserable we are, the
greater scope we have for virtue ; the more miserable we
make other people, the more scope we give them for virtue.
Again, Happiness may be allowed as the end, and yet there
may be wide differences of view in the interpretation of the
end. The partizans of virtue may re-appear on this ground,
affirming that Happiness is only to be found in Virtue or
Duty, not in enjoyment and in the absence of pains. The
reply proceeds as before ; are these reasoners thoroughly
consistent with themselves ? If they are, they cannot be
refuted ; if they are not, they may.
Great variety of opinion may be held as to the beings whose
happiness is to be sought. Are we to seek our own happiness
solely, or the happiness of others solely, or partly the one and
partly the other ? How far are we to extend our regards-
to our own kinsmen, to our fellow citizens, to humanity in
general, to the lower animals ? In none of these points is
argument possible, unless where people are inconsistent, which
they need not be. We cannot reason a person into the adop-
tion of other people's happiness as an end, unless such person
has already of his own accord embraced some doctrine that
involves this, as for example, the profession of Christianity.
Neither can we offer any reason for extending sympathy to
the lower animals. An education of the feelings is the only
mode of enlarging people's sympathies. No man can be argued
out of a consistent selfishness.
 CHAPTER VIII.

LOGIC OF POLITICS.

1. Politics, in the largest sense, refers to the action of

human beings in Society.

The notion of Society can be gained only by each one's

individual experience. The first example of it is the Family,
which contains a plurality of persons in mutual co- operation,
withcommand andobedience. The earliest notions of authority,
law, command, obedience, punishment, superior, inferior, ruler,
subject,--are gained from the various aspects of the small
domestic circle.
The larger aggregations of the school, village, parish, town-
ship, church, &c. , repeat all those aspects of the family, while
dropping the incidents special to the family.
2. The science of Politics, as a whole, is either Theoreti-
cal or Practical.
Under the Theoretical Science of Politics must be described
the structure or organization of Political Society ; this being
equally essential as a preparation for the Practical Science .
All the leading terms of Politics must be defined ; all the parts
of the Political system explained . To this preliminary branch,
Sir G. C. Lewis applies the designation ' Positive Politics, '
In the second place, the Theoretical Science traces cause
and effect in political institutions, as facts of the order of
nature ; in the same way as Physics and Chemistry describe
cause and effect in inorganic bodies, and Biology in living
bodies. The theoretical department of Society would state,
upon evidence of fact, conjoined with reasonings from human
nature, what are the consequences of given institutions . To
quote from Sir George Lewis :- :-
' It assumes that we know what a state is ; what are its functions ;
what are the conditions necessary for its existence ; by what in-
struments it acts ; what are its possible relations with other states.
Starting from this point, it inquires how certain forms of govern-
ment, and certain laws and political institutions, operate ; it seeks .
from observed facts and from known principles of human nature,
to determine their character and tendency ; it attempts to frame
propositions respecting their probable consequences, either uni-
318 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

versally, or in some hyyothetical state of circumstances. Thus it

may undertake to determine the respective characters of monarchy,
aristocracy, and democracy ; it may show how each of these forms
of government promotes the happiness of the community, and
which ofthem is preferable to the other two. It may inquire into the
operation of certain modes of preventing crimes-as police, -of
criminal procedure, and of legal punishment, such as death, trans-
portation, imprisonment, pecuniary fines, and it may seek to
determine the characteristic advantages and disadvantages of each,
in certain assumed conditions. It may inquire into the operation
of different systems of taxation-of laws respecting trade and
industry—of modes of regulating the currency—of laws regulating
the distribution of property with or without will-and other
economical relations. It may lay down the conditions which
render it expedient to govern a territory as a dependency ; or
which tend to promote the prosperity of a new colony. It may
define the circumstances which ensure the permanence of national
confederacies , and it may inquire what are the rules of interna-
tional law which would tend to promote the uninterrupted main-
tenance of peace.
' It seeks to lay down general theorems respecting the operation
and consequences of political institutions, and measures them by
their utility or their capacity for promoting the welfare of the
national community to which they are applicable. Propositions
of this sort may lead (though not by so direct a road as is often
supposed) to preceptive maxims ; but they are themselves merely
general expressions of fact, and they neither prescribe any course
of conduct, nor do they predict any specific occurrence ; though,
from the generality of their form, they may relate as much to the
future as to the past.'
The Theoretical Science of Society is sometimes expressed
"
as the Philosophy of History," or the accounting upon general
principles of cause and effect for the actual course of political
events, the growth of institutions, the progress and decay of
nations. History, in the ordinary signification, recounts these
things in the detail ; the Philosophy of History generalizes the
agencies at work, and endeavours to present the whole as fol-
lowing out certain great leading ideas. A few writers have
aimed at establishing such generalities - Vico, Montesquieu ,
Millar, Condorcet, Auguste Comte, &c.
Practical Politics consists of maxims of political practice.
Here we have to suppose an end,--the welfare of the com-
munity, or any other mode of stating the political end .
This necessarily appears with more or less prominence in all
political treatises. Aristotle's work is a search after the best
government. Machiavel's treatises are preceptive or practical.
Locke does not formally enquire after the best constitution ,
 SCIENCES COMPRISED IN POLITICS. 319

but under the guise of what is necessary to a state, he insinuates

certain political forms, and certain legislative principles.
Sound method requires that a writer should, in the first
instance, separate the Theoretical from the Practical.

3. The entire department of Political Science at the pre-

sent day comprises several sciences.
It has been found practicable and convenient to withdraw
from the wide region of human society, certain subjects that
can with advantage be cultivated apart, and thus to reduce the
complication of political enquiries .
(1) The first of these is Jurisprudence. This is a distinct
branch bearing on the form of Law, as apart from its substance.
It teaches how laws should be expressed, with a view to their
satisfactory interpretation by the Courts ; it embraces evidence,
and the principles and procedure for the just administration
of the laws. It does not consider the choice and gradation of
punishments, but explains how they should be legally defined,
so as to be applied in the manner intended by the legislator.
(2 ) International law is the body of rules agreed upon by
independent nations for regulating their dealings with each
other, both in peace and in war. It includes, for example,
questions as to the Extradition of Criminals, and the right of
Blockade at Sea.
(3) Political Economy, or the science ofthe production and
distribution of Wealth, relieves the political philosopher of a
considerable part of his load. The legislation regarding Pro-
perty in Land, Trade, Manufactures, Currency, Taxation , &c. ,
is guided by the enquiries of Political Eeconomy. Within its
own sphere, this science has the same logical character as the
mother science. It has its definitions, its principles or laws,
partly inductive and deductive, and its methods, which are
the ordinary logical methods.
(4) Statistics is a branch of the Science of Society, admit-
ting of being cultivated separately. It furnishes the facts and
data of political reasoning in the most complete and authentic
form.

4. The subjects remaining to Political Science, are (1)

the Form of Government, and (2) Legislation on all topics
not otherwise embraced.
The different Forms of Government, their precise defini-
tion, and their several tendencies, constitute the foremost
problem ofthe political science. The discussion of Monarchy,
320 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

Aristocracy, Democracy, enters into every treatise called

political.
In immediate connexion with this subject, if not a part of
it, is the distribution of the functions of government, into
Legislative, Administrative and Judicial ; the delegation of
the powers of government to subordinate authorities, as in
provincial, local, or municipal government.
These subjects are sometimes considered as exhausting the
sphere of Politics ; but in a very narrow, although distinct
signification of that sphere. Thus, Mr Mill remarks,-" To
attempt to investigate what kind of government is suited to
every known state of society, would be to compose a treatise
on political science at large.'
It must, however, be matter of enquiry how a government,
when constituted , is to discharge its functions. This supposes
that the functions are classified and defined ; an operation
involving one very important enquiry in Politics, namely, the
proper Province of Government.
There are certain things that Government must undertake,
in order to fulfil its primary ends ; such are Defence, and
the Preservation of Life and Property.
There are other things that government may or may not
undertake as the Support of Religion, Education, Postal com-
munication, the maintenance of Roads, main Drainage, and
other works of general utility.
5. The curtailment of Individual Liberty is a necessary
effect of government ; and the degree of this curtailment
is a vital consideration in Political theory.
In order that men may act together in society, each must
in part subordinate their own actions and wishes to the
general scheme. Obviously, however, individual liberty,
which is in itself a chief element of well-being, should be
restricted in the least possible degree ; and the burden of
proof must always lie upon the proposer of restraint.

The Structure of Political Society.

6. The preliminary branch of the Social Science, con-
tains the Definition of Political Society, and of all the
Relationships and Institutions implied therein.
This is the part of the subject entitled by Sir G. C. Lewis
Positive or Descriptive Politics. It teaches what is essentially
involved in the idea of political government. It explains the
 THE POLITICAL STRUCTURE . 321

necessary instruments of government ; as a law, rights and

obligations, sanctions, executive commands, and the like. It
neither enquires into the operation and tendency of institutions
(which is Theoretical Politics), nor urges the preference of
one to others (Practical Politics) . It explains the meaning of
monarchy, aristocracy, democracy, but does not teach which
is the best form. It shows what is the nature of punishment,
but does not say which punishments are the most efficacious.
It expounds the relations of master and free servant, and of
master and slave, but does not trace their bearings on the
welfare of the parties concerned. It explains the nature of a
dependency, without arguing the question- Should colonies
have a separate government . It shows what are the acts
constituting an exchange, and the difference between barter
and a money equivalent, but does not dwell upon the advan-
tages of exchange in facilitating trade. (Methods of Reasoning
in Politics, vol. I., p. 54 ) .
The fundamental notions of Political Society -Sovereignty,
Law, Command , Duty, Sanction, Obligation - are treated of
by John Austin as a part of the special science of Jurispru-
dence. That these notions are at the basis of Jurisprudence
is beyond doubt. Still, in a completely formed Political
Science, they would be given once for all at the outset, under
the head of the Structure of Political Society, and would need
only to be referred to by the Jurist.
7. The very fact of Political Society involves a series of
primary notions, forming a mutually implicated , or corre-
lative group .
Government. This is the essential fact of political society ;
to define it, or any one ofits numerous synonyms - Sovereignty,
Authority, Ruler, Political Superior-is to define political
society. The definition must be gathered from the Particulars
common to Political Societies. It is given by Sir G. C. Lewis,
as follows :-" When a body of persons, yielding obedience to
no superior, issue their commands to certain other persons to
do or to forbear doing certain acts, and threaten to punish the
disobedience of their commands by the infliction of pain, they
are said to establish political or civil government."
Closely examined, this definition contains the very terms to
be defined -for example, superior and command-so that it is
not a definition suited to inform the ignorant. It is rather of
the nature of the first definitions of geometry (Line, Angle,
&c.) which do not communicate notions, but employ terms to
21
322 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

fix with more precision the boundaries of notions already

gained from experience. We should require, in the first
place, to know political societies, in concrete instances ; and
the definition would teach us the corresponding abstraction or
generality.
Austin (Province of Jurisprudence Examined ) endeavours
to build up the definition from its simplest assignable elements.
Starting with Command, he defines this as ' the expression or
intimation of a wish, to be followed with some evil, if not
complied with.' This involves only such facts of human nature
as wish, expression, non-compliance, infliction of evil. In the
notion of Command, as thus defined we have nearly all that
is signified by Government, Sovereign, Superior, Authority.
We have only to specify the persons intimating the wish (to
some other persons) and following up the non-compliance with
the infliction of pain.
The supposed command is a Law. The evil to be inflicted
is a Sanction, Penalty, or Punishment. The persons addressed
are Subjects, Inferiors ; they are placed under Obedience, Duty,
Obligation. The aggregate of persons comprised within the
scope of the same commands, is a Political Society, a Community,
a People. They are in the Social state, as opposed to the state
of nature.
Moral Right and Wrong must be referred to the same com-
plex fact.
8. Government is usually said to have three distinct
functions-Legislative, Executive, and Judicial ; each one
giving birth to a numerous class of notions.
Legislature. The power of making general commands uni-
versally applicable, under given circumstances, is called
Legislation ; it is the most extensive and characteristic func-
tion of government. The process is very different under
different forms of government. In every shape, there are
implied as subsidiary notions— statute, and its synonyms, pub-
lication or proclamation, enactment and repeal, &c.
Executive, Administration. — Implies performance ofthe speci-
fic acts occurring from day to day, in the exigencies of society
-organizing and directing the military force, negotiating with
foreign governments, appointing the officials of government,
erecting public works, &c. In this function, the government
is said to use ministers, to issue orders, to receive and issue
despatches, reports, to superintend all functionaries.
Judicial. A distinct function of government, usually en-
 THE POLITICAL STRUCTURE 323

trusted to a separate class of persons. It supposes impedi-

ments to the commands and operations of government, either
in the way of misunderstanding , or of disobedience. These
are removed by Judicial Institutions, called Courts of Law,
presided over by Judges, said to administer Justice, according
to a definite Procedure, and rules of Evidence. The ramified
arrangements belonging to these several heads are detailed and
defined by the special science of Jurisprudence.
With all varieties of government there must exist these
three functions ; in rude governments, they are exercised by
the same persons ; in civilized governments, they are more
or less divided between different persons.
9. Under ' Form of Government,' there is a number of
structural modes, for which there are specific designations.
The Form of Government brings out the designations
Monarchy, Aristocracy, Democracy, Republic, Mixed Govern-
ment, Balance of Power, Constitution.
The logical division of Forms of Government is into the
government of one person ( Absolute Monarchy ) and the govern-
ment of more than one (Republic or Commonwealth). If, in
the second alternative, the governing body is small, the
government is an Aristocracy ; if the power is lodged in the
majority of adult citizens, the government is a Democracy.
Such names as Limited Monarchy, Constitutional Monarchy,
mean either Aristocracy or Democracy ; they indicate the
form of monarchy, but the reality of another power. A
Mixed Government is a mere semblance ; some one of the con-
stituents is in point of fact the sovereign.
Aristocracy, where it prevails, makes a division of the
people into Nobility and Commonality. Often the governing
body is a hereditary nobility.
Representative Government, the growth ofmodern Democracy,
is a leading notion of Political Science. The meaning is that
the whole people, or a large portion, exercise the ultimate
controlling power, through the deputies periodically elected by
themselves. In the ancient republics, the corporate or col-
legiate action lay with an assembly of all the citizens, or of as
many as could be got together.
The operations of corporate government give birth to the
political elements expressed by assembly, deliberation and
debate, decision by a majority, chairman, election, suffrage.
10. The Functions or Business of government introduce
many structural elements .
324 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

The first function of a political society being defence, there

is a large institution corresponding, called the War Organiza-
tion-Army and Navy.
The protection of the members of the society from one
another is either by an application of the War force, that
is the soldiery, or by a separate force called Police.
These two leading institutions involve many others. An
official machinery, or bureaucracy, is interposed between the
sovereign power and the actual instruments. For paying the
cost, there must be a levy of Taxes, with a bureaucracy
corresponding.
If the government undertakes public works-roads, bridges,
public buildings, means of communication- it becomes a sort of
industrial management on the large scale.
The coining of money is a proper function of government.
The regulation ofbargains and contracts of every description,
as well as the enforcing of them, is a matter for the state. The
marriage contract, in particular, the relations and rights ofthe
different members of the family, are under state control.
A Church Establishment, whether incorporated with the
civil government, as is most usual, or existing apart, is a vast
social machinery with elements and terms corresponding, all
admitting of definition.
11. In a society spread over a wide territory, there must
be a division into local governments, duly subordinated
to the chief or Central Authority.
This originates the terms Central, Centralization, and Local,
Provincial, or Municipal government and institutions. A small
locality may represent in miniature nearly all the features of
the entire society. The delegation of power to the locality
may be small or may be great. Moreover, the Form of
Government of the entire cociety repeats itself in the localities.
If the sovereign is an absolute monarch, the local authority is
absolute in the local sphere ; such is the oriental satrap, and
the viceroy of the absolute European monarch.
12. The Province of Government marks the line between
Public and Private management .
The habitual industry or every day avocations of the mass
of the people must be left to themselves. Their manner of
subsistence, their recreations and amusements, are also their
own choice ; although governments have often interposed to
regulate all such matters.
 ORDER AND PROGRESS. 325

13. The mutual bearings of Public and Private Institu-

tions are so numerous, that a statement of the Political
structure is incomplete without the Private Institutions.
The Industry of the People is an important element of the
state politically. So are their Recreations, Tastes, Opinions,
Literature, and Science. However much the government ab-
stains from control in these matters, its operations in its proper
sphere are influenced by every one of them. An agricultural
community gives a peculiar character to the entire action of
its government. A community largely occupied in foreign
trade involves the government in relations with foreign coun-
tries.

14. The good or ill working of the Political system

leads to a variety of situations, requiring the consideration
of the political reasoner.
When the government fails to accomplish its main functions
-defence, protection, justice, &c.- it receives the designations,
' bad government,' ' mis-government. ' Its badness may con-
sist in partiality to individuals, which is injustice ; in not
adhering to its own published regulations ; in the capricious
introduction of changes ; in preying upon the community by
exactions, or by affronts,
When the government is excessive in its restraints on indi-
vidual movements, it is called despotical, tyrannical, oppressive ;
and the re-action or revolt is Political Liberty. When it
meddles with what might be left to private management, it is
said to over-govern ; the euphuistic phrase is a paternal govern-
ment.
The emphatic expression Social Order means, in the first
place, that the government, whether good or bad, is obeyed ;
the opposite state is Anarchy, Revolt.
Order is also contrasted with Progress, Improvement, or
Civilization. Those things that maintain the existing structure
in its integrity are said to minister to Order ; while the agen-
cies that raise the society to a higher pitch of improvement,
are said to minister to Progress. In point of fact, the opposi-
tion between the two is very slight ; what is good for one is,
with very trifling allowances, good for the other (Mill's Re-
presentative Government, chap. II) .
326 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

THEORETICAL POLITICS.
15. The Laws, Principles, or Propositions, of political
society, together with the Methods of Investigation, consti-
tute Theoretical Politics .
The foregoing head, including the Analysis of the Social
Structure, the meaning of State of Society, the Notions of
Politics- is preparatory to the enunciation of the Laws of
Society, so far as known. These Laws are best discussed in
the theoretical form ; they may afterwards be changed into
the practical or preceptive form, that is, into maxims of the
Political Art.

16. The Laws of Society may be either Laws of Co-

existence, or Laws of Succession, of the different parts of
the Social Structure. In both cases, they are laws of
Cause and Effect.
The complex structure of Political Society involves many
relationships of Co-existence and of non- coexistence . Some
arrangements always carry with them some other arrange-
ments ; some things are repugnant to other things . The re-
mark was made by Volney that the plains are the seat of
indolence and slavery, the mountains of energy and liberty.'
But whatever co-existences and repugnances can be predicated
generally are dependent on causation.
Again, we may take any one part of the social structure as
a cause, and lay down the laws of its effects ; as when we
describe the consequences arising in a given state of society,
from an absolute monarchy or from a state church .
We may even take up an entire state of society, with all its
mutual actions, and endeavour to trace its future destiny.
This is the large problem of the Philosophy of History.
But for devices of simplification, such problems would be
wholly unworkable ; the complication of elements could not
be embraced by the human mind . We should need to fasten
upon some single agency, either comprehending, or outweigh-
ing the others, whose solitary operation will give the key to
the entire problem. The state of opinion and enlightenment
of a community is an example of those over-mastering cir-
cumstances.
Human Character as a Political Element.
17. As the subject-matter of Political Science is human
 POLITICAL ETHOLOGY. 327

beings, the characteristics of humanity must enter as a

primary element.
If all human beings were alike, either wholly or in those
points concerned in political action, the construction of a
political society, whether easy or not, would be but one pro-
blem . But there are wide differences as regards peculiarities
of character essential to the working of the political scheme.
The differences between an American Indian, a Hindoo, a
Chinaman, a Russian, an Englishman, an Irishman , an Italian,
taken on the average, are such as to affect seriously the struc-
ture and the workings of political institutions. Given a certain
Form of Government, or a certain constitution of Landed
Property, the tendencies would alter greatly under these
various types of character.
The theory of Society consists in stating how human beings
will act under a given social arrangement ; it is, therefore,
essentially a special application of the laws of mind and char-
acter. Hence a thorough knowledge of whatever Psychology
can teach would be a preparation for this study.
Yet, all parts of human nature are not equally concerned in
political action ; the ethical qualities of Honesty, Industry,
Steadiness of Purpose, are more vital than the Artistic sensi-
bilities.
Moreover, Politics is concerned only with the characteristics
that appear in collective bodies. The politician leaves out of
account all those individualities that are merged when men act
together in a body ; that is, the qualities occuring merely
in scattered individuals and in minorities. Whence, national
character is a much simpler phenomenon than individual
character ; as the flow of a river in mass is a simpler physical
problem than the molecular adjustments of the liquid state.
18. A Political Ethology would be a modified science of
character, consisting (1) of a selection of the qualities that
appear in national character, and (2) of the laws of their
operation.
(1 ) Following the divisions and subdivisions of character,
as formerly sketched (p. 288), we should have to bring out into
prominence all that arise in human beings when working
collectively.
Thus, to commence with ACTION, in the form of Spontaneous
Energy. Prior to an account of the various motives that
induce men to activity, there is a notable peculiarity of cha-
328 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

racter in the degree of the energetic disposition itself. Now

this shows itself, as high or as low, in whole nations, and is of
importance as respects both the Form of Government and
many other political arrangements. The inhabitants of tempe-
rate climates are superior in natural energy, irrespective of all
modes of stimulation . to the dwellers either in the tropics or
in the arctic circles. The English and Anglo-American
peoples are probably at the top of the scale.
Now this attribute has numerous social bearings. It favours
private industry and the accumulation of wealth, an effect
leading to many other effects. It is both directly and indirectly
hostile to monarchical or despotical rule, and is, therefore, the
parent and the guardian of liberty.
In like manner, we might survey in detail the FEELINGS,
Sensibilities, or Emotions of the mind, and mark those that
have social significance, and those that appear in men col-
lectively. Thus, the Tender Sentiments, or the Sociability of
the Mind, when strong, draw human beings together in society,
and favour the cohesion of states as well as of families. Again ,
the strength and the mode of the Sentiment of Power may be
a collective peculiarity, with national consequences . The
conjunction of tender feeling, as patriotism within our own
nation, with the love of domination beyond, is a peculiarity
often repeated .
The INTELLECTUAL qualities that stand out in national pro-
minence are too numerous to be touched upon. It was an
intellectually minded people, the Greeks, that began all the
civilization flowing from science or philosophy. There is a
certain depth of ignorance and incapacity that renders the
higher modes of Political society impossible. A signal failure
in either of the intellectual virtues- prudence and sympathy,
is incompatible with political union.
( 2) The next part of Political Ethology is an account ofthe
tendencies of these various characteristics, and of the means
whereby they themselves are modified . The general science
of character embraces this investigation on the wide scale, and
the present department is a special application of the principles.

Propositions of Theoretical Politics.

19. The Political Structure, or Organism, being defined ,
the Laws of Theoretical Politics are the laws of Cause and
Effect, traceable in the working of the several Institutions.
What are the consequences of Absolute Monarchy, or of
 CAUSE AND EFFECT. 329

Democracy ; of Castes ; of Entails ; of Free Trade ; of Poor

Laws ; of Indissoluble Marriage ; of State Churches ? These
are a few of the enquiries of Political Science ; they are strictly
enquiries of Cause and Effect. Given any of these institutions
as causes, the effects may be sought. Again, given certain effects,
as the repression of agrarian crimes, the impartial administra-
tion ofjustice, the encouragement of trade, we may seek for
causes. This is really the same problem in a different form .
To all intents and purposes, the one enquiry is- Given a cause,
required the effect ?
It is not uncommon for political philosophers to entertain
such problems, as What are the effects of Monarchy, Aristoc-
racy, Democracy, in general ; what are the effects of Slavery
in general, that is, under all circumstances, under every possible
variety ofhuman character. Now, with such strongly-acting
causes as Absolute Monarchy, there may be assigned certain
universal tendencies so decided as to be seldomwholly defeated.
There are points in common to the despotism of a single person
in all countries and times. The possession of power, whether
on the great scale or on the small, operates with remarkable
uniformity. This is a psychological tendency whose free
course is best seen in politics ; where, by the necessities of
the case, individuals have to be entrusted with power in a
large amount. The same consideration renders the workings
of slavery uniform to a high degree.
20. The Propositions of Political Science range between
two extremes ; on the one extreme are propositions affir-
ming universal tendency, and, on the other, propositions
affirming specific effects in limited cases.
(1) The propositions affirming a universal tendency are
exemplified above. Similar propositions may be found respect-
ing every institution of human society. In many institutions,
however, the tendencies are difficult to find out, and are so
liable to be defeated by other causes, that their enunciation
has scarcely any value. For example, the operation of guilds,
or privileged corporations, admits of no definite statement
with reference to all possible circumstances. The division of
land into large or small properties may have opposite effects
in different social states.
Nevertheless, the attempt should be made to generalize the
tendencies both of the Forms of Government, in their detailed
varieties, and of all the leading Institutions growing out of
legislative action. It is equally indispensable to estimate the
330 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

precise worth of this class of propositions, to be aware of their

infirmities, and of the cautions needed in applying them.
There are prevailing tendencies of every important Institution
-of the Succession of Land, of Direct or Indirect Taxation,
of Religious Endowments, and the rest. The affirmations re-
specting these are only probable ; they afford a certain pre-
sumption of what will actually happen in individual cases.
The special departments-Political Economy and Jurispru-
dence -share the burden of these difficult problems .
(2) Propositions confined in their range to limited circum-
stances, to a narrow field of observation, may be so qualified
as to state the causation with almost perfect exactness. Thus
if we confine our views to communities in similar climates, of
the same race, of nearly the same advancement in general
intelligence, we can formulate with comparative precision the
tendencies of a given institution, whether the Form of Govern-
ment, or any of the other leading social elements. These
Limited or Partial Theories are the really valuable parts of
Political Science ; they afford the guidance in the art or prac-
tice of Politics.
With a view to these propositions, there must be a division
and subdivisions of communities into classes . An example of
such a classification is given by Sir G. C. Lewis, as follows : -
' One large classification of communities for the purpose of
a common predication is- 1, those communities which are in
a wild and unsettled state, such as the African and Indian
savages, the Bedouin Arabs, the Nomad Tartars ; 2, those
Oriental communities which live under a regular political
government, but whose social state is nevertheless fixed and
unprogressive, such as the Turks, the Persians, the Hindus,
the Chinese, the Japanese ; 3, Christian communities partaking
of the modern European civilization. '
Setting aside the first class, as affording too limited a field
for political data, Sir G. C. Lewis institutes a comparison and
contrast between Oriental and European communities, showing
the numerous important peculiarities that may be affirmed of
each of the two classes as a whole. The following are some
leading points of the contrast.
ORIENTAL . EUROPEAN.
Government.
Despotical Free
By Delegation Direct from the centre
International Law.
Rude Intricate, forming a bal-
ance of power
 LIMITED OR PARTIAL THEORIES. 331

Laws-Civil and Religious codes.

Interwoven Distinct
Marriage.
Polygamy Monogamy
Women.
Secluded At large
Status ofthe Labourer.
Slavery Civil Freedom
Punishments.
Cruel Mild
Dress.
Loose Closely fitting
Alphabet.
Intricate Simple
Form of Literature.
Poetry and mystical prose Argumentative prose.
Numerous propositions of Cause and Effect could be laid
down respecting these peculiarities, connecting them with
one another, and with the Climate and Physical Situation, the
Physical and Mental Constitution, and the Historical Ante-
cedents of the oriental races.

Methods of Theoretical Politics.

21. As in all other sciences, there must be Observation
of Facts.
In Political Observation, there are special peculiarities
amenable to logical canons. The education of a political
observer is scarcely in any degree, as in the physical sciences,
an education of the senses ; it consists mainly of intellectual
habits.
22. The Facts of Politics coincide with authentic His-
tory or Narrative.
The individual occurrences that, when generalized, make
up political principles, have to be correctly recorded, with all
the circumstances essential to the link of causation. The
sequence of events in a revolution must be stated exactly as
they occurred, and in sufficient fulness to give the conditions
of canse and effect.
The rules of historical evidence are a branch of Inductive
Logic, and as such they are given elsewhere ( Appendix, I) .
They have in view principally the number and the nature of
the testimonies needed to establish the truth of a past event.
332 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

A farther exercise of discrimination is requisite in the political

historian, namely, to include all the circumstances entering
into the chain of causes, and to separate accompaniments
that have only a poetic interest. To do this, the his-
torian must be himself a political philosopher ; he must
know that the dazzling glitter of spears in the sun has nothing
to do with the fighting strength of an army, that the stature,
complexion, voice, or dress of Charles I. had no bearing upon
his quarrel with his parliament. In short, as regards the
relevance of facts and circumstances, the narrator must under-
stand what it is to trace cause and effect in history. ' In
order to frame a coherent narrative, some theory of causation
is necessary ' (Lewis) .
23. In Politics was first developed the reducing of
observations to the form called Statistics ; definable as the
observation, registration, and arrangement of such facts as
can be given in numbers.
The cultivation of statistics was first owing to the impetus
given to political economy by the French economists ; it being
possible to state in numbers the most material facts regarding
trade, currency, taxation, production, population, &c . The
subject now comprises matters relating to all branches of
political observation ; Population, Births, Marriages, Deaths,
Occupations, Diseases, Crimes, Pauperism, Education.
Statistics gives an entirely new precision both to Theoretical
or Speculative Politics, and to the operations of government.
The increase or diminution of pauperism or of crime, in a large
country, could be judged only in the vaguest manner without
statistical returns from the officials concerned . The govern-
ment would be at the mercy of accidental displays, and of
circumstances where the impressions are exaggerated . A
bread riot in a particular locality, an outrage of appalling
accompaniments, would distort the judgment of the nation, as
to the general state of destitution or of crime.
24. The causes of erroneous observation in Politics, are
partly common to the sciences generally, and partly special
to the political science.
Indolence and inattention, the love of the marvellous,
æsthetic likings and dislikings, the support of a favourite
theory, are operative in politics as elsewhere. The more
special sources of bias in the political department are admira-
tion of individual actors, party feeling, and, where practice is
 POLITICAL EXPERIMENTS. 333

concerned , direct personal interest. As a matter of course,

these corrupting motives extend their influence to the general-
izing no less than to the observing of facts.
Politics deals with human beings, whose springs of action
are in the mind ; while observation relates only to outward
appearances, from which the mental states are obtained by
inference. The right performance of this process of inference
is an operation based on Psychology, and guided by the rules
of Inductive Logic. That Charles I. was executed is a fact ;
the motives of Cromwell and the Puritans in executing him
are a matter of difficult inference ; requiring us to apply laws
of human nature (veracity, bias, &c. ) , to what the actors said
and did in connexion with the fact. The secrecy of motives
is the characteristic of many ethical maxims.
Experiment in Politics.
25. Experiment, in the strict scientific meaning, is usu-
ally regarded as inadmissible in Politics . The substitutes
are (1 ) the sudden introduction of extraordinary influences,
and (2) the practical operations of government.
It is not possible to submit a society to the process em-
ployed in studying a metal, or in detecting the laws of Heat
or Magnetism. A political community cannot be manipulated
with a view to excluding artificially this or that agency, iso-
lating it from all but known circumstances.
( 1) Some of the advantages of experiment are derivable
through the introduction of a new and extraordinary influence
into the society- such as a famine, a commercial crisis, an
insurrection, an epidemic, an invasion, a new invention, as the
steam engine, a religious revolution. The Irish potato famine
of 1845, is adduced by Lewis as a case in point. The influence
of this terrible calamity laid bare the evils in the state of the
Irish poor, and disclosed the secret springs in the social
economy of the people, as effectually as could have been done
by an artificial experiment contrived for that purpose.
(2) It is the very nature of government, especially an im-
proving government, to be trying experiments. Every new
law is an experiment. There being an object to be achieved
by the law, the public is supposed to be interested in watching
the effects of the measure. A Police is organized, and the
effects upon crime observed. A Poor Law is introduced, and
the consequences traced. So every great innovation is a new
agent in society, which is followed by definite effects. The
334 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

experiments are not always free from ambiguity ; there may

be concurring agencies either defeating or exaggerating the
results ; hence a demand for the precautions of the various
Inductive Methods.
Causation in Politics.
26. In Political Causation, the predominating fact is
Collocation ; there is seldom, yet occasionally, an appeal
to Conservation.

A political sequence is always immersed in a host of arrange-

ments, positive or negative ; and although impelling forces
must always be present, the result is dependent in a pre-emi-
nent degree upon the direction given to these forces. Thus,
political rising depends less upon the greatness of an impel-
ling force, than upon the direction given to forces always
present. The demand for thirty shillings of ship money from
John Hampden was the turning point of the English Revolu-
tion.
Yet in dealing with human nature, whether as individuals
or political masses, any omission to allow for the principle of
Conservation, in the form of Limitation of Human Energy,
will lead to mistakes. Thus, a politician that would expect
an Art-loving people like the Italians, Germans, or French, to
take on the energy of the English in business and in politics,
without becoming less artistic, would be guilty of overlooking
the law of Limitation.
27. In Political Causation, it is especially necessary to
keep in view the entire aggregate of conditions, positive
and negative, entering into the cause.
When Luther preached against Indulgences, and when
Hampden refused to pay ship money, these were merely a single
condition out of a large assemblage concerned in bringing
about the great events that ensued . Hence, the historian
considers it requisite to describe the whole of the surroundings
in the state of society at the time, but for which the conse-
quences would not have arisen.
To seek the cause of a political event in a single cir-
cumstance is a perversion of the political problem. The
most enlightened reasoners and historians are accustomed to
state the case as an enquiry into the causes of a phenomenon .
The phrase is not strictly correct ; the entire aggregate of
antecedents is properly the cause ; but as bringing forward the
 DEFECTS OF THE METHOD OF AGREEMENT. 335

idea ofplurality of circumstances, conditions, or collocations,

the mistake is on the right side. The causation of the French
Revolution was a vast aggregate of prior arrangements in the
state of the French nation, together with numerous circum-
stances in the world at large.

The Method of Agreement in Politics.

28. The Method of Agreement enters into political
investigation, but not without shortcomings.
Like every other inductive enquirer, the political reasoner
first collects his facts ; then compares them with a view to
attaining laws of concomitance, which he farther verifies by
Agreement, as a method of Elimination .
This has always seemed the obvious course. When Aris-
totle enquires into the effects of Despotical or of Democratical
government, he collects examples of each, and looks out for
the attendent peculiarities. By an inductive determination,
founded on Agreement, we are accustomed to connect differ-
ent forms of government with lower or with higher stages of
civilization.
The first peculiarity of the inductive problem of society, as
affecting the sufficiency of the Method of Agreement, is the
mere number of concomitant circumstances in a state of
society. The cause A, say Despotism, works in conjunction
with such a large variety of other circumstances, ―climate,
race, history, institutions in detail- B C D E F, &c., - that
we can hardly find in the whole area of our experience a
sufficiently diversified series of instances to eliminate them all,
and find A followed in every instance by a.
Worse than the mere number of accompaniments is plurality
of causes with intermixture of effects. Whatever results might
really flow from Despotism- whether discontent and insurrec-
tions, or the repression of men's energies and the arrest of
prosperity and progress-could flow from other social agencies ;
the effect a, an actual effect of A, might also be an effect of
C, F, H. This would not prevent a from being always present
with A ; it would rather in some instances make it supera-
bundantly present ; yet, as proving too much, it would be fatal
to the evidence. An apparently more paralyzing instance would
be, when the effect a, properly belonging to A, is neutralised
by some accompanying agent D ; one of the commonest of all
occurrences in politics. Hardly any effect of absolute monarchy
is better substantiated than the discouragement of intellectual
336 LOGIC OF PRACTICE.

activity generally ; yet this did not follow at once on the

imperial despotism of the Roman Empire ; the prior impetus
acquired under free institutions was for a long time unspent.
So, a law designed to produce a certain effect, may really be
acting as intended ; but the effect may be frustrated by
evasions, or by passive resistance to its enactments. Restric-
tious on trade are adverse to commercial prosperity ; yet the
effect may happen to be counteracted by other circumstances.
The United States of America, in the abundance of land to be
occupied, can prosper under many arrangements that would be
ruinous to Great Britain.

The other Experimental Methods.

29. The Method of Difference may be exemplified in
Political Cause and Effect.
The introduction or withdrawal of a single agent, followed at
once by a definite change in other respects, is our most cogent,
as well as our shortest proof of causation. In the complications
of Political Society, we cannot always be sure that only the
one innovating circumstance is present ; so many unseen
operations being always at work. This source of ambiguity is
practically overcome when an agent suddenly introduced, is
almost instantaneously followed by some other change ; as when
the announcement of a diplomatic rupture between two nations
is followed the same day with a derangement of the money
market .
According as the supposed change is more gradual in its
introduction, and the consequences slower in their develop-
ment, the instance is less and less a decisive example of differ-
ence. The deterioration of value is saved only when we are
sure that every other thing has remained the same. A new
religion introduced into a nation, remarkably stationary in its
other institutions, would be held as the cause of all the subse-
quent changes.

30. Agreement in Absence may be advantageously re-

sorted to in Politics.
We compare the cases of the presence of Poor Laws, of
Commercial Restrictions, of a Standing Army, of Local Self-
Government, -with the cases of the absence of these institu-
tions ; and if any circumstances uniformly present in the one
are uniformly absent in the other, the force of proof is greatly
augmented.
 DEDUCTION IN POLITICS. 337

30. Concomitant Variations is employed in tracing

political causation.
There is a marked concomitance , in the History of England,
between the growth of Free Institutions, and the progress of
the nation, both materially and intellectually. This may be
compared with the inverse instances of Greece and Rome,
where, by a gradual process, the extinction of liberty was
ultimately followed by intellectual and social decay. Even
all these instances, in the complications of Politics, may not
be final ; yet they afford a very high presumption of cause and
effect
The Deductive Method.

31. The Deductive Method, in conjunction with the

Inductive or Experimental Methods, must be regarded as
the mainstay of political investigation.
Neither the Deductive Method alone, nor the Inductive
Methods alone, can be trusted in the complications of the
social science. Their mutual consilience or confirmation, is
requisite in order yield trustworthy conclusions.
Pure Deduction appears to most advantage in following out
the tendencies of separate agents. This is the • motive for
subdividing the Social Science into branches, as Political
Economy, &c. The tendency of the single motive of the
desire of wealth can be studied apart from other tendencies.
An essential part of political deduction consists in tracing
the wide operation of the Sentiment of Power, in the various
degrees of its development among human beings, and under
all circumstances. The deduction should comprise a wider
area than mere political situations.
The Sociability of mankind, their Sympathies, the grades of
Intelligence, have consequences traceable by a purely deduc-
tive operation .
We might even venture a certain way in the second deduc-
tive process -Calculation or computation of concurring agen-
cies ; as Wealth, Power, Sociability, Sympathy, with Habits,
Customs, &c. Here, however, we become aware of the help-
lessness of the deductive method by itself. Having no correct
quantitative estimate of the separate agents, our attempt to
combine them in a quantitative sum, is entirely hopeless. The
errors of calculation may be so wide as radically to vitiate the
conclusions .
It is the third step of Deduction - Verification- that gives
22
338 LOGIC OF POLITICS .

the method all its weight, by joining it with Inductions. In

point of fact, politicians in applying the conjoint methods
usually have an inductive or empirical generality presented in
the first instance ; which induction they compare with the
deduced tendencies of the agents concerned . Thus the work-
ing of despotism is first given as an empirical generalization
from history ; we then compare these alleged results with the
deductive consequences of the love of power, and all other
human motives, both of the ruler and the ruled, entering into
the situation. Such maxims as the following require, for
their verification, the consilience of induction and deduction.—
The possessors of supreme power, whether One, Few, or
Many, have no need of the arms of reason ; they can make
will prevail.' The governments most distinguished for
sustained vigour and ability have generally been aristocracies.'
The deductive reasons in favour of this last position are
founded on the consequences of devoting a small number of
men exclusively to public business.
Thus, the usual course of the Deductive Method is to lay
hold of a number of empiricisms, derived from history and
political experience, and to subject them to the test of deduction,
thereby converting them into derivative laws. Considered as
inductive generalities, everything should be done for them
that can be done by strict compliance with the Inductive
Methods ; after which they are to come into comparison with
the deductive results of the tendencies concerned.
Among Empiricisms demanding to be confronted with
deductive conclusions, we may instance thefollowing—' modern
civilization tends to collective mediocrity,' (J. S. Mill) ; ' unity
in religion is unfavourable to civil interests ' (G. C. Lewis) ;
' there is no necessary connexion between hereditary royalty
and hereditary nobility ' ( ib) ; the human race is on the
whole progressive ' ; ' there is a constant relation between the
state of society and the state of intellectual speculation '-
(Comte).
Deductive confirmation is especially needed in assigning the
causes of some one historical event. Unless there happen to
be other events closely analogous, our inductive basis is of the
slenderest kind ; succession may be taken for causation with-
out any check. Thus, the account of the rise of free institu-
tions, in modern Europe, must be far more deductive than
inductive.
The introduction of Christianity into Europe co-existed with
so many other changes, that its consequences cannot easily be
 EMPIRICAL AND DERIVATIVE LAWS. 339

eliminated. Our only means of varying the instances is to

take the separate nations apart ; but in none of them was this
one cause introduced singly. Hence any inference as to the
political and other results of Christianity would want much
deductive confirmation ; and we find that this method is
largely appealed to . The tendencies of the Christian religion
are laid out deductively, and the attempt is made to show their
coincidence with the facts. To be properly checked, a similar
deduction should be made of all other tendencies- as Greek and
Roman influences, and the mental endowments of the European
races ; which subtracted from the total would give a case of
the Method of Residues.
In the foregoing brief allusion to the Deductive Method is
included a reference both to Empirical and to Derivative Laws.
The subject of Politics furnishes pertinent examples of the
limitation of Empirical Laws, and in a less degree of Derivative
Laws, to adjacent cases. There is safety in extending an em-
pirical law only to the same territory, the same time, and
similar circumstances . When a ten pound suffrage had sub-
sisted in Britain for thirty years, with good effects , it was a
small matter to risk the extension to a seven pound or a six
pound franchise, on the mere faith of the empirical coincidence ;
whereas, the sudden transition to universal suffrage, could not
be relied on from the same empiricism. The consequences of
such a step, if computable at all, could be computed only by
the aid of deductive reasoning-by the establishment of a deri-
vative law. A well-informed, sagacious, and unbiassed reasoner,
might be trusted to predict, within certain limits of error, the
probable issue of such an extension of the franchise ; but only
by a superior handling of the deductive method.
The Method of Residues being properly a Deductive Method,
is occasionally valuable. It takes the problem on a varied
aspect ; as in the case of Christianity already referred to.
In applying the methods of Agreement and of Difference, to
single out a cause, our prior knowledge of the general adequacy
of the cause, prepares us to receive the inductive evidence,
without the misgivings that we must feel when we know
nothing on this head .

Hypotheses in Politics.

32. In Politics, we are seldom under the necessity of

assuming an unknown agency ; the known forces of human
nature are the sufficing causes. Our assumptions refer to
340 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

the presence, and the amount, of the supposed agent ; and

these may be proved by their exactly tallying with the
facts.
Assumptions are perpetually made regarding the conduct
of human beings under all circumstances. The passions of
Power, Pride, Fear, the Self-interest of men, their Sympathies,
are all real or genuine causes. There may be doubts which of
them produced a certain line of conduct ; and we may apply the
logical conditions of hypotheses to solve the doubt. If any one's
actions tally precisely with the consequences of Love of Power,
we receive this coincidence as so far a proof of the hypothesis.
But the proof is completed only by showing that the action
does not tally with any other motive ; a thing that we cannot
always be certain of. The execution of Charles I. might have
resulted from the fears of the Puritans, from their revenge,
from their ideas of justice, from their interpretation of the
designs of providence. A proof from hypothesis would have
to show that the act coincided fully with the tendencies of only
one of all the supposable motives.

Simplification of the Political Problem.

33. There are various modes of reducing the complica-
tions of Politics. Several of these have already been
glanced at.

(1) By studying Institutions separately, due regard being

had to their mutual action. This is that primary Analysis of
Society which is the groundwork of scientific method through-
out. There may be difficulty in making the isolation, and yet
allowing for mutual influence ; but any other method is
hopeless.
(2) In modern political theory, much stress is laid upon
the distinction between Order and Progress ; and we are
recommended to study separately the influences tending to
Order or Stability, and the influences tending to Progress or
Improvement. The advantage of this separation is chiefly to
divide the field of study, for the ease of the understanding.
It has been shown by Mr. J. S. Mill (Representative Govern-
ment, Chap . II . ) that the two interests cannot be absolutely
separated ; there can neither be Progress without Stability,
nor Stability without Progress ; yet the problem of Society is
greatly simplified by first studying each by itself, and then
paying attention to their reciprocal action.
 SIMPLIFYING OF POLITICS. 341

Mr. Mill has traced, by the combined Inductive and Deduc-

tive Methods, the conditions of Stability in any society, and
has referred them to the following heads :-(1 ) An education of
the citizens calculated to impart a self-restraining discipline ;
(2) a feeling of allegiance or loyalty to something ; (3) an
element of cohesion among the members of the same state. It
is apparent that all these causes, while arising from the
inductive comparison of societies, may also be fairly deduced
from general principles of the human mind ; the consilience of
the two results being essential to the proof.
(3) In the variation of political circumstances, the proposi-
tions of society would be numerous beyond calculation, but
for the eminently scientific device of embodying a limited
number in their exact circumstances and conditions, so that
they may be varied at pleasure. It may be a question whether
certain public works should be overtaken by the central
government or by the local government ; as bridges, roads,
prisons, &c. Now the decision of this question in any one
case, if accompanied with all the circumstantials that govern
the decision , is the decision for innumerable other cases, even
although differing considerably from one another. Thus, if
the central government undertakes the work, avowedly and
solely because the locality cannot bear the expense, this decides
also the opposite case, where the locality can bear the expense.
It is thus that legal judgments, if accompanied with a full
statement of reasons, may apply to a wide range of differing
cases. And so also with all reasoned conclusions in politics.
The very same proposition that declares the consequences of a
despotism in given circumstances, implies the variation of the
consequences in degree, as the despotism varies in degree ;
and the reversal of the consequences by the substitution of
freedom. All such adaptations and principles are to be held
as of the nature of deductions, for which inductive verification
is desirable according to the extent of departure from the case
embodied.
(4) Attention has already been called to the circumstance
that Politics deals with men collectively, and not individually.
In the view of the politician, a million of human beings is a
less complicated thing than a single individual. The large
scale of the operation reduces its complications . The maxims
for governing a nation (in a certain rude way) are simpler
than the maxims for managing single persons, if we have to
consider all the minute peculiarities of each. The Foreign
Minister, who has to transact business with one individual,
342 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

may have his ingenuity and patience more severely taxed than
the Home Minister, who deals with the mass of a nation.
The limits of the proposition are contained in the reasons of it
(as just remarked) ; if the mass of the community breaks up
into individualities, by social discord, there is an end to the
facility arising from collectiveness of action .
(5) Not the least important simplification of the Political
Problem, whether for theory or for practice, is the Limitation
of the Province of Government- the transferring of business
from Public to Private management. The tendency of all
societies has been to Over-government ; and the relaxation of
this is one of the favourable symptoms of existing societies.
The proper province of government is a question to be solved
according to the circumstances of the time. A state religion
may be suitable under one state of things and unsuitable in
another ; so great are the advantages of disburdening the civil
ruler of such a charge that a case must always be made for
retaining it.
Fallacious Methods in Politics.

34. These are for the most part implicated in the state-
ment of the sound methods.

(1) The exclusive employment of the Experimental Methods is

shown to be insufficient in the complications of Politics. How
much more so is mere Agreement without the studied variation
of circumstances demanded by the method ; and yet such is
the usual procedure of untutored minds. Thus, any institution
whatever is pronounced beneficial, because the country has
prospered under it. This is the grossest form of empiricism.
The careful employment of the Experimental Methods would
avoid such errors ; but would still be inadequate.
(2) A purely Deductive Politics is equally at fault. Even
starting from the best Psychology, and the best Ethology elabo-
rated with an express eye to Politics, we should never be able
to infer tendencies . with perfect precision, still less to compute
the sum of a plurality of tendencies . With the highest skill
in psychology, with the best possible appreciation of the ave-
rage development of the great leading attributes of the mind,
in a given race of men, and with the closest attention to
physical and other circumstances, —we should still break down
in the attempt to say, how a community formed from such a
race, could prosper under either a despotic or a democratic
government, with or without a religious belief.
 THE POLITICAL END . 343

Allusion has been made to the error of seeking a political

cause in a single circumstance, instead of an aggregate situa-
tion, or group of circumstances .
(3) . Sir G. C. Lewis has fully illustrated the assumption of
false and fictitious causes in Politics. Such are mythical or
legendary causes ; fictions of law ; and the supposed social
contract suggested by Grotius, and formally argued by Hobbes.
PRACTICAL POLITICS.

35. In every Practical Science, we must begin by setting

forth the End. In Politics, as in Ethics, this may be
variously viewed.
In most practical sciences, there is no dispute as to the end.
In Ethics, and in Politics, the case is different. Even, when
parties agree to call the end ' human happiness,' they differ in
the meaning attached to it.
In antiquity, the Athenian and the Spartan Ideals of So-
ciety were totally different ; so much so that, on the basis of the
same Theoretical Principles of Society, the rules of Practice
would be distinct. The end in the Roman Republic was the
power and glorification of the State. A leading design of the
Spanish rule of America was the conversion of the nations to
Catholicism.
According to some, the end of the political machine is good
government, or the best mode of carrying out the primary
objects of Defence, Security, &c. , on whose account society
exists. If a despotism accomplishes this best, a despotism is
the best government ; if not, not.
Others, as Mr. Mill, maintain that the cultivating of the
energies of the people is an end independently valuable. When
this is coupled with the farther assertion, that by such means
alone can a high standard of government be maintained , then
both parties agree as to the end, but differ as to the means.
It is, however, possible to maintain that a worse government by
the people themselves, is preferable to a better that excludes
them.
Another way of expres
sing the same antithesis of ends is to
contrast passive enjoyment with free action . It may be held ,
on the one side , that what gives the greatest amount of sentient
pleasure with the least pain, is the highest ideal of society ;
and , on the other, that what allows the greatest scope to liberty
and individuality , with or without mere sentient enjoyment, is
absolutely the best .
344 LOGIC OF POLITICS.

These different modes of conceiving the ends of society have

a great influence on actual practice. The ' paternal govern-
ments ' will not conform to the plan of leaving to the individual
the utmost liberty compatible with the liberty of others.
36. The Political end being stated, the principles of
Theoretical Politics are all convertible into maxims of
Practice.
The principles of Causation in society, when stated as laws
of the order or succession of events, are theoretical principles ;
when stated as rules for effecting a given object, are practical
principles or maxims. Discussing theoretically the work-
ings of Democracy, we trace certain tendencies of the predo-
minance of the numerical majority, and the tendencies of
certain political arrangements to counteract these ; whereupon,
having in view the end of allowing no class unlimited ascend-
ency, we lay down as a maxim or rule the providing of such
checks.
Theoretical politics enounces the proposition that certainty
of punishment is more deterring than severity ; practical
politics converts this into the precept, —Make punishments
certain rather than severe.
The requisites of Stability above laid down are convertible
into maxims for attaining stability. So with the theoretical
conditions of Progress.
Although Practical Politics is thus Theoretical Politics
over again, with the addition of well defined ends , there are
great advantages in laying out the subject in both forms, we
being aware that the substance is the same. The theoretical
form is the one most convenient for investigation ; while the
repetition of the principles in the preceptive dress, if done so
as not to confuse the mind, is both suggestive and corrective.
Moreover, it is only by the separate treatment of the two
departments, that we do full justice to the special point raised
in the practical department- the political end. The full
handling of the various modes of viewing the end would
justify a long preliminary chapter of Practical Politics.
It has been well pointed out by Sir G. C. Lewis that the
propositions of politics are ordinarily cast at random , some-
times in the theoretical, sometimes in the practical mould.
' The more haste, the worse speed ' is theoretical ; ' festina
lente,' is practical .
Much of Theoretical Politics may be unavailing for practice,
at least the limited practice of a given country and time. The
 PRACTICAL DEVICES IN POLITICS. 345

theory of Politics, in its most imposing pretensions, compre-

hends the Philosophy of Universal History, much of which is
of limited practical application. Hence the practical branch
is content with selecting a portion of what has been elaborated
in theory.
Again, the practical mode of selection has the farther pecu-
liarity of altering the arrangement or grouping of the political
dicta. In the theoretical investigation, the general tendencies of
different institutions are described in a methodical array-
Forms of Government, War organization, Police, Justice, &c.
With a view to a practical end, we borrow from many differ-
ent parts of the theoretical exposition, the specific links of cause
and effect conjoined in a peculiar structure, as for example, the
Poor Law of a given country. This is the prevailing form of
all practical departments with reference to the allied theoreti-
cal sciences.
Many of the greatest social devices have originated exclu-
sively in the hands of men of practice, and have been stated
first in the practical shape ; being afterwards enounced in
theoretical propositions. Such are the English Constitution,
the union of Local Management with Central control and
Inspection, the system of fastening Responsibility upon the
real authors of political acts. Mr. Mill regards as one of the
most valuable securities yet devised for good government, the
device that grew up in the East India Company's rule, namely,
to associate the chief administrator with a Council to advise,
but not to compel ; thus leaving the responsibility upon a
definite individual .

CHAPTER IX.

LOGIC OF MEDICINE .

1. The scope of the Practical Science of Medicine is

given by the Definition of the correlative couple-Health
and Disease.

The phenomenon, expressed by Health on one side and

Disease on the obverse, is indefinable ; it is an ultimate fact of
human experience like Life itself, of which it is a unique mode
or manifestation. The attempt to convey a notion of Disease
to a person that had never seen or experienced any examples
346 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

of disease, would entirely fail. To call it a perverted Life

Process ' is to give an analogical phrase, but as the phenome-
non is unique, analogy gives no assistance.
Thus, although Disease is a highly complex fact, yet so
novel are its manifestations, that we must define it by the
methods adopted for our simplest experiences, as resistance,
motion, colour, line, angle. We must refer to a number of
examples in the concrete, and generalize these into a com-
prehensive statement, which the examples make intelligible.
After we become acquainted with a certain number ofdiseases,
the others can be understood by description alone.
It is barely possible that without actual experience of In-
flammation, one might form a constructive notion of it from
its technical characters- objective and subjective . The objec-
tive characters- redness, swelling, heat-might be conceived ;
the pain also, if otherwise known to us, could be called to
view, and united with the other symptoms ; and the mind
might laboriously fuse the whole together. This is only not
impossible. But the greatest powers of description in the
expositor, combined with the highest constructive faculty in
the learner, would break down in the endeavour to realize
Fever. The subjective experience, being one unknown to a
person that had never been out of health, would be unintelli-
gible in the reference.
A few experiences of Disease give a meaning to the corre-
lative notion- Health ; whence we can define disease negatively,
by the infringement of Health. The positive definition, would
be the result of the comparison of all the modes of derange-
ment, the generalization of diseases ; but writers usually
remain content at the outset with the negative statement ; in
other words, they define Health, by assuming the knowledge
of a few specimens of disease. Health, in its most complete
acceptation up to this time is the absence of all the 1146 dis-
eases put down in the ' Nomenclature of Disease.'
The science of Medicine is an adequate description of all
these forms of derangement, or departure from Health, with
a viewto suggest means for averting or removing them. This
practical end implies an extensive knowledge of causation with
reference to Disease.
As regards the large number of Diseases, the complicacy of
their characteristics, and the existence of generic and specific
agreements and differences among them, impart to the science
of Medicine a certain community with the Natural History,
or classificatory sciences- as Mineralogy, Botany and Zoology.
 BIOLOGY AS THE BASIS OF MEDICINE. 347

The analogy to the two last is still closer through the circum-
stance of evolution, or the succession of stages, in most dis-
eases.

Sciences preparatory to Medicine.

2. Disease being a state ofthe Human system, the science
of medicine rests immediately on the part of Biology, called
Human Anatomy and Physiology.
All animals, and even plants, are liable to abnormal action,
or disease. The consideration of the subject, however, reaches
the highest development in connection with human beings.
Animals share in many of the human diseases, and have some
special to themselves.
When we name Biology, we may be supposed to exhaust
the sciences preparatory to medicine. Strictly speaking this
is true ; inasmuch as all other knowledge applicable to disease
is applicable through biological science. Yet it is well to advert
emphatically to the inorganic sciences- Natural Philosophy
and Chemistry- which, in their present improved condition,
yield many suggestions bearing at once on the medical art.
Physics, in both its divisions- molar and molecular, Chemistry
-both Inorganic and Organic, are full of applications to
medical biology. The medical man, in order to derive the full
benefit of these scienes, needs to study them apart, as well as
in their applications in Human Physiology.
Intermediate between Human Physiology and the Practice
of Physic, are the exhaustive enquiries into special organs,
and special functions ; as exemplified in the work of Dr. Parkes
on Urine, and in the researches of Dr. Edward Smith, Prof.
Haughton, and others, as to Food, Muscular Power, Respira-
tion, and other applications of Physics and Chemistry, with
experimental checks and verifications.

Pathological, based on Physiological, Analysis.

3. The Analysis of the Organism for Physiological
purposes is likely to prove a basis of Pathological analysis.
It being found that the greater number of Diseases are
localized in separate organs or tissues, we are aided , in class-
ing diseases, by a full enumeration of all those independently
diseasable parts. Now, Physiology reckons up the separate
tissues and organs of the body ; and Pathology enquires
whether these are all separately subject to disease. The
classification of diseases (with the exception of what are
348 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

termed general diseases) is made to follow the physiological

division of the organs- Brain and Nervous System, Senses,
Circulation, Absorbent System, Ductless Glands, Respiratory
System, Digestive System, Urinary System, Generative
System, Organs of Locomotion, Cellular Tissue, Skin. And
inasmuch as most of these systems are complicated groups of
organs, for example, the Digestive System, a farther sub-
division is made of localities of disease- as Teeth, Gums,
Tongue, Salivary Glands, Stomach, Intestines, Liver, &c.
This Anatomical arrangement of the seats of disease would
be of little value, did not diseases confine themselves to
separate organs, while exercising a secondary influence on
adjoining and connected parts, or on the general system.
Thus, a disease may accomplish its entire course in the
bronchia, the stomach, or the kidney, with no farther injury
to the rest of the system than arises from disturbing the
balance. When one member of a business establishment is
incapacitated, a certain deranging effect is felt throughout the
whole ; but that effect is a different thing from the incapacity
of one making the incapacity of another.
The point for the pathologist to consider, therefore, is
what parts and tissues may be saparately diseased . This is
to push the local analysis of disease to the very utmost. Each
of the parts, thus distinguished, must be supposed to have
independent vigour or weakness, as measured by the energy
of function, and by the resistance to deranging causes.
Even in properly local diseases, however, there must be
more or less tendency to affect adjoining or connected organs ;
and there is thus a scale of kindred established between each
organ and the rest ; disease of the stomach affects the intestines
and the liver before the lungs or the kidney.
It must be admitted , however, that the alliance of local con-
nexion is apt to be overborne by the distant alliances established
through the two carrying organs- the blood and the nerves.

4. The analysis of physiological Functions is also an ana-

lysis of diseased actions.

Every function performed by an organ may be affected in

disease ; and, in some cases, one function may fall into disorder
independent of the others. Thus the liver has a plurality of
functions ; and disease may consist in changing one, with no
more than an indirect result upon the rest. The pathologist
needs to avail himself of this analysis likewise.
 GENERAL PROCESSES IN DISEASE. 349

5. A farther analysis must be made of morbid Products,

or substances generated in disease, and unknown in the
same localities during health.
This is a department special to morbid Anatomy, or Patho-
logy ; and is prosecuted by the assistance of chemical analysis,
and microscopical examination . All such products are to be
carefully ascertained, classified, and described . After an
account of the characters of each, some mention might be
made of the diseases wherein they severally manifest them-
selves. Finally, their causes, known or supposed, might be
given. But care is to be taken not to jumble up all these
three expositions in one.
There is a close and natural connexion between the account
of new morbid deposits and the morbid alterations of the
several tissues. The same method needs to be followed with
these ; each morbidly transformed structure being described
with reference to all its appearances and re-actions, ascertained
by chemical, microscopical, or other means ; the description to
be followed as before by mentioning the diseases wherein each
occurs, together with any assignable causes of the change.
Enumeration of Diseased Processes-General Pathology.
6. The numerous diseases affecting the various organs of
the body, as well as those attacking the whole, consist in
the repetition of a small number of diseased processes. Such
are Inflamation, Congestion, Hæmorrhage, Degeneration,
Tumours, & c.
7. The process called ' Fever ' is considered as a general
disease.

Upwards of twenty forms of diseased process can be enume-

rated ; Fever and Inflammation taking the lead . This is doubt-
less a great means of simplifying disease, although, in the
specific varieties of the different processes, there is a consider-
able burden of detail. Inflammation is pretty much the same
in all organs ; being similarly caused, and similarly brought
to a termination.
It is proper to give a general and comparative account of
every one of these processes, adverting to their modes and
varieties, before taking up the special diseases where they
enter. Chapters on Fever in general, and on Inflammation in
general, are usually provided in advance of the detailed de-
scription of diseases.
350 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

General Therapeutics.

S. The generalizing of Diseases, through the recurrence

of a limited number of diseased process, suggests the
generalizing of Remedial agencies.
By way of anticipating the remedies for the special diseases,
there is the same propriety in taking a general view of
remedial agencies, as in taking a general view of diseased
processes ; the one being made possible by the other. Very
great advantage accrues from studying each remedial agent,
not apart from all particulars, which would be absurd, if it were
possible, but in connexion with all particulars.
For example, that remarkable fact called by the various
names -metastasis, counter-irritation, derivation, revulsion—
should be discussed at the outset on a comparative survey of
its characters in all variety of circumstances. This is the
only means of gaining a clear and steady grasp of its compass
and limitations, or of the causative conditions of its working.
Again, a similar generalized view should be taken of the
process called Stimulation, whereby, through a variety of
means, nervous action is heightened, with an increase of other
dependent functions.
The justification of a General Therapeutics, to assist both
in investigating disease, and in treasuring up knowledge for
use, is apparent in the great number of diseases that have no
specific. Take Typhus, for example. The only directions
given relate to the employment of the general remedies
adapted to the symptoms of the disease ; cold affusion or
cooling drinks for the main fact- excessive heat ; stimulants
to resist the depression of the powers ; purgatives when the
bowels are confined ; sudorifics, &c.
Although the removal of the cause of a disease, with the
occasional plying of the opposite, must always be a large part
of Therapeutics, it does not make the whole. When the
poison of typhus has once entered the blood, the removal of
the cause is irrelevant ; the effects are already produced, and
must be counteracted by new agencies. Hence, we have first,
General Causes of Diseases, with Hygiène (which a know-
ledge of causes may fairly exhaust) ; secondly, General Thera-
peutics, as counterworking the derangement actually produced .
General Therapeutics might thus conveniently follow the
general account of the Causes of Disease. The two branches are
closely connected without being identical. The general causes
 DEFINITIONS OF MEDICINE. 351

are such as- Hereditary Constitution ; Atmospheric causes

(Miasmata, Cold, Heat, Light, Electricity, moisture) ; unsuit-
able Food and Drink ; Over-exertion or Excesses ; deficient
Sleep ; insufficient Exercise ; Poisons, &c. &c. In the account
ofthese noxious agents is implicated the branch called Hygiène,
or warding off diseases by avoiding their causes, under which
are indicated, obversely, the causes of that vigour of the organs
which we measure by the distance placed between us and dis-
ease.
The Materia Medica usually contains a Therapeutical classi-
fication of Medicines ; as Tonics, Exhilarants, Narcotics ,
Emetics, Purgatives, Sudorifics, Diuretics, &c. The minute
detail of properties under each of these classes, occurring in
the larger works on Materia Medica, is to a great extent a
repetition of general Therapeutics.
Notions of Medicine.—Definition and Classification of
Diseases.
9. Of Disease on the whole, there is no definition that
is of any value ; defining begins with the special appear-
ances of disease.
The very best generalization that can be given of Disease on
the whole, is too vague to furnish any useful indications.
When we begin to specify morbid appearances, and, under the
name of a Disease, to group those that are connected in the
same outbreak, we are enabled to construct definitions, often
short of absolute precision, yet faithful to the great mass of
actual instances.
The Notions of disease concern (1 ) diseased processes, and
(2) diseases. The diseased processes include Fever, Inflam-
mation, Congestion, Hæmorrhage, Dropsy, Atrophy, Hyper-
trophy, Degeneration, Tumours, Parasites, Calculus, Functional
weakness, &c. Of these various processes, we may specify as
distinguished for their prevalence in common diseases- Fever,
Inflammation, Degeneration, and Functional derangement.
Fever.-Fever is a general state entering into many diseases,
and now susceptible of being characterized in its generic char-
acter. Mainly through the careful observations of Dr. Parkes,
a generalization of Fever has been arrived at, such as to con-
ciliate all the appearances. The generalization is expressed
by the simple fact- Elevation of Temperature.' A rise of
temperature in the body generally, to the extent of 4° of
Fahrenheit, is a state of Fever ; while the increase may pro-
ceed to 6°, 8°, or even 12° Fahrenheit.
· 352 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

As there is no circumstance characteristic of Fever in

general, but this one fact, and its implications or consequences,
this is the complete definition of the febrile state. Any expla-
nation or illustration of it should consist in stating a variety
of instances showing the elevated temperature.
The following definition is encumbered with statements not
belonging to the definition—' A complex morbid state accom-
panying many diseases as part of their phenomena, more or
less constantly and regularly, but variously modified by the
specific nature of the diseases which it accompanies. It
ESSENTIALLY CONSISTS IN ELEVATION OF TEMPERATURE, which must
arise from an increased tissue change, and have its immediate
cause in alteration of the nervous system.' The first sentence is
a pure superfluity. The setting apart of Fever for separate
consideration, as a preliminary to the discussion of particular
febrile diseases, implies what is therein stated—that fever is a
morbid state, and that it accompanies many diseases . All
such wordiness should be sedulously avoided in definitions.
A different criticism applies to the expressions given in italics
-'arising from an increased tissue change,' ' having its imme-
diate cause in alteration of the nervous system .' These are
not idle phrases, but describe circumstances of radical import-
ance. Why, then exclude them from the definition ? The
reason is that the complications of disease require the separate
discussion of whatever can be separately discussed with ad-
vantage ; and, almost everywhere in medicine, it is advan-
tageous to separate the description of the fact, from the
enquiry into the causes of the fact. A definition should give
whatever is essential to the determining of a fact or pheno-
menon. It should not assign the causes, nor deduce the
consequences of the phenomenon ; this is to advance beyond
definition to predication, and should be a distinct expository
statement.
It is a proper appendage to the definition, to enumerate the
ordinary superficial appearances of fever, which constituted
its definition before the exact generalization was arrived at,
' hot skin, quick pulse, intense thirst, scanty and high-coloured
urine ;' at the same time subjecting these symptoms to a critical
examination, so as to point out their shortcomings.
The fact of Elevated Temperature being sufficiently shown
by an appropriate selection of particular cases, the important
predications above alluded to may be taken up. From the
Law of Conservation, as applied to the animal economy, there
must be an increase of tissue change to support the heat, and
 DEFINITION OF FEVER. 353

the endeavour should be made to assign this tissue change in

its exact circumstances, and numerous outlying effects. The
account of fever is not complete without this development.
The conclusions of Dr. Parkes, obtained by a large induction,
and corroborated deductively by the Law of Conservation, are
most valuable . ' The increase of temperature may be (or is
frequently) attended with increased elimination ; and therefore
presumably with increased tissue change.' Again, what seems
to contradict the general law of Conservation, the products
of metamorphosis, as judged by the excreta, may be diminished
in febrile cases.' The contradiction, however, is only apparent
for there is good evidence in such cases, of an undue retention
of excreta, which makes one of the bad accompaniments of
fever. Careful observations prove that while the actual
amount of excreta is small, the tissue-change may still be great.
It is obvious that this topic involves a great amount of
detail, ascertainable only by observation, although checked by
the general law of definite changes accompanying definite
results . The state of every organ, and the alterations in all
the excretions - pulmonary, urinary, cutaneous, intestinal,
&c. -need to be exactly gathered from the facts, and made a
clue to the windings of the special febrile disease.
The second predicate given with the foregoing definition—
' the alterations in the nervous system ' -also deserves to be
illustrated , proved and unfolded, in a separate section.
Other important predications extend the discussion of fever :
such are the procuring cause, and the course or evolution, in
so far as belonging to fever generally.
The foregoing outline represents the exhaustive account of
Fever, as a diseased process. We began with the intention of
illustrating definition in Medicine ; but, it was advisable, once
for all, to show the boundary between legitimate definition and
predication, which is habitually disregarded in medical sub-
jects to the detriment of the handling, both in a logical point
of view, and as regards expository clearness. The filling
up of the sketch would be the account of Fever, coming under
a previous heading-' Enumeration of Diseased Processes '
(§ 6.)
Inflammation. The complication of this state is very consider-
able ; but the method is plain. We must separate the
definition from the predications ; and, in the definition, we
may separate the superficial appearances of the ordinary
diagnosis, from the essential fact, or facts of the state.
First as to the definition. The traditional characters of inflam-
23
354 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

mation are the four facts-redness, swelling, heat, pain-which

are a tolerably close approximation. There might be a con-
venience in briefly illustrating these points, as a prelude to the
improved generalization that can now be afforded .
Even then, however, the only correct course is to adhere
in the first instance to a description of the characters, for the
purposes of identification ; refraining from all remarks bearing
on the causes or explanation of the several symptoms. The
kind of redness, its various hues, the more or less extensive
prevalence of the mark, -are the points proper to the eluci-
dation of the property as a defining and diagnostic circum-
stance ; the same rigid plan to be followed with the three
remaining symptoms. The triumph of the expositor's art
in this effort would be, that no one could ever mistake the
inflammatory redness, swelling, or the rest.
The appearances being thus expounded with all the neces-
sary enforcement, it is admissible to consider how far they
may be connected, either by implication, or as cause and effect,
with one another, or with circumstances still more funda-
mental. It is then easy to point out that the fact of congestion
is a very important addition to our knowledge, and, ifimparted
on the plan now stated, re-acts on our previously obtained
knowledge, by resuming in a single statement all the four facts,
and still more, by accounting for the failures of one or other
of these in particular instances.
The faulty mixing up of description with causation is exempli-
fied in the following sentences regarding Inflammation :—' -'Very
often the pain is a "bulking or throbbing pain-every beat of
the heart makes itself felt in the tender part. The pain of inflam-
mation results no doubt, from the implication of the nerves in the dis-
eased processes.' 'Speaking generally, therefore, there is more pain
felt in external inflammation, because there are more nerves of com-
mon sensation.'
It is next to be seen what better account can be given of
inflammation, grounded on the superior physiology and ob-
servations of recent times. The definition of Dr. Aitken* is
* A complex morbid process characterized ,- (1 . ) By a suspension of the
concurrent exercise of function among the minute elements of the tissue
involved ; (2. ) By stagnation of the blood and abnormal adhesiveness of
the blood discs in the capillary vessels contiguous to the tissue-elements
whose functions are suspended ; (3. ) By contraction of the minute arteries
leading to the capillaries of the affected part, with subsequent dilatation
and paralysis of the contractile tissue of the affected blood- vessels. The
nutritive changes between the blood and the minute component elements
of the affected tissue become visibly altered, and although an appreciable
exudation does not necessarily follow, yet a constant tendency betrays
 DEFINITION OF INFLAMMATION. 355

very exhaustive, but might be disburdened of various points

more suitable to predication. The following appear to be the
essentials of the enumeration.
(1 ) Suspended function of the tissue involved. - It appears
from the observations, that an alteration of the tissue-such
as to impair its proper functions, that is, its relations to the
blood in the way of absorbing nourishment, and its secreting
or other functions- is the primary fact, the starting point of
the subsequent changes.
(2). Stagnation of the blood.
(3) . Abnormal adhesiveness of the blood discs in the capillaries
adjoining.
(4) . Contraction ofthe minute arteries supplying the capillaries
of the part, followed by dilatation and loss of contractile power.
(5) . A tendency to exudation, varying according to circum-
stances .
Not until each of these constituent facts is made intelligible,
and verified by references to observation , should any discussion.
be commenced as to their causative connexions among them-
selves, or with other facts. The description being first ren-
dered complete and intelligible, there is the greatest interest in
trying to show, for example, that the first fact-suspended func-
tion of tissue- leads to the blood derangements afterwards
enumerated ; and that the heat, redness , swelling , and pain, in
the old enumeration, follow as effects from the train of cir-
cumstances, as given in the definition .
The new growths and deposits should be reserved for dis-
tinct predication . So also should be the cause or event ofthe
attack, whether favourable or unfavourable.
The extreme variations of degree in morbid states, originate
appearances scarcely short of differences of kind ; and these
have to be explicitly enumerated, as specific modes of the main
phenomenon. A distinct consideration should be given to
such an important accompaniment as fever, and to the con-

itself to the occurrence of an interstitial exudation, but which, under

proper regimen and proper remedies, is often abortive. When an exuda-
tion follows as a result of the inflammatory state, it is apt to be associated
with an unhealthy condition of the blood, and of the blood plasma, and
to be associated with varied forms of new growth, according to, - (1 .)
The elementary structure in which it occurs ; (2. ) The special zymotic,
constitutional, or local disease with which this complex morbid process
may co-exist ; and (3. ) According to the progress of the inflammation,
the amount and suddenness of the effusion, the extent of tissue involved,
the diminished vascularity, and the powers of absorption of the surround-
ing parts.'
356 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

ditions of it . (the chief being probably severity of the local

attack, and poisonous virulence).
The hypothetical views started, in the absence of a theory,
to connect the whole cycle of circumstances should be given
last ofall.
To frame definitions of Degeneration and Functional Disease,
beyond the statement of the palpable appearances so named,
would involve hypothetical considerations, such as require to
be admitted into medicine, with due regard to their exact
value.
Correlative with the definitions of Health and Disease
generally, are those of the important words Constitution, Tem-
perament, Diathesis, indicating a hypothetical permanent con-
dition of the system, manifested by the tendency to incur or
to resist diseases ; and more especially diseases of enfeblement
and degeneration. A weak chest, a strong stomach, suscep-
tible nerves, are modes of stating in a useful form such actual
occurrences, as that certain persons are easily affected with
chest disease, or resist the agencies of stomachic disorder, and
so on. They suggest the mode of life best fitted in each case
to ward off attacks of disease.
Definition of specific Diseases. - The very general states
above quoted exemplify definition under the greatest simplicity,
as respects the number of characters, although not as respects
the generalizing and seizing of the true characters. When
we proceed to the more concrete forms of disease, Typhus,
Gout, Pleurisy, Neuralgia, Jaundice, &c. , we have the general
processes, Fever and the rest, with many various accessories,
constituting the specific characters of the individual affections.
Consequently, the definitions are apt to be voluminous in their
statement ; and there is still more need of method.
Examples have now been given of the two different modes of
medical definition ; the one corresponding to Diagnosis, and
framed with a view to identify a disease by such signs as are
best accessible ; the other, the most complete generalization of
the essential fact or facts of the disease, which facts may or
may not lie upon the surface. The first is requisite for
distinguishing diseases ; the second, for understanding them.
Let us take an example. Gout is defined by Dr. Garrod—
' A specific form of articular inflammation, invariably accom-
panied with uric acid in the blood, and the deposition of
urate of soda in the affected tissues .' The positions given to
the words ' specific ' and ' accompanied ' suggest what was
probably not in the author's mind. Strictly interpreted, the
 DEFINITION OF SPECIFIC DISEASES. 357

language means— -Gout is articular inflammation of a specific

character ( not described) ; it has, for concomitants, uric acid
in the blood, and deposits of urate of soda. The real mean-
ing must be presumed to be- Gout is articular inflammation ,
specifically marked by uric acid, &c.
This definition is one of those advanced generalizations,
attained in some diseases, which penetrate to the essential
features ofthe disease, without fully expressing the symptoms.
A detailed account of the symptoms is therefore added, first
under the title ' Description of an attack of Gout, and of the
progress of the disease ' (a sort of popular history of a case),
and secondly, under ' Phenomena occurring during an acute
Gouty Attack, ' where there is a more rigid and systematic
analysis into ( 1 ) Febrile Disturbance, and (2) Local Appear-
ances.
"
Again, Small-Pox is thus defined (Dr. Aitken). The pro-
duct of a specific and palpable morbid poison, which is
reproduced and multiplied during the course of the malady.
( 1). After a definite period of incubation a remittent fever is
established and followed by an eruption on the skin, and
sometimes on the mucous surfaces, with other concomitant
and occasionally succeeding affections (2). The eruption on the
skin passes through the stages of pimple, vesicle, pustule, scab ;
and leaves marks or cicatrices on its site (3) . The disease
runs a definite course, and, as a rule, exhausts the suscepti-
bility of the constitution to another attack (4). '
Here we have, in sentences ( 2) and ( 3) , the leading symp-
toms of the disease, which, when elucidated at full, make up,
as far as book description can go, the characters whereby the
disease is known and discriminated . Sentence ( 1 ) does not
properly belong to the definition, but to the predication ; the
cause of a disease must always be accounted a predicate.
Sentence (4) contains two statements, first, the disease runs
a definite course, ' which surely is true of many other diseases ,
if not of nearly all ; second, it exhausts the susceptibility of
the constitution to another attack,' a most pertinent circum-
stance, but still better reserved for a predicate or concomitant,
than mixed up with the defining marks.
Influenza is thus defined by Dr. Parkes :-' An epidemic
specific fever, with special and early implication of the naso-
laryngo-bronchial mucous membrane ; duration definite of
from four to eight days ; one attack not preservative in future
epidemics.' The transposition of the epithet ' specific ' is
desirable : An epidemic fever, specially characterized by
358 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

early implication, &c.' This definition also is a summary of

symptoms, and nothing more. The author proceeds, under
6
the head Symptoms ' to describe the general course of the
6
disease, and under Consideration of the Special Symptoms
to analyze them in the detail ; Temperature, Condition of the
Skin, Nervous and Muscular Symptoms, Respiratory System,
Circulation, Digestion, &c.
All the facts stated in the Definition may be fairly allowed
as defining circumstances, with the exception perhaps of the
last 6 one attack not preservative in future epidemics,' which
might be reserved for predication. Doubtless, if we had a
generalization of the central or fundamental fact of the
disease, this would take place among deductive consequences,
or propria. But we do not need it in a definition consisting
of a summary of the symptoms.
The following sentence commences Dr. Buzzard's definition
of Scurvy: A peculiar state of mal-nutrition, supervening
gradually upon the continued use of a dietary deficient in
fresh vegetable material, and tending to death, after a longer
or shorter interval, if the circumstances under which it arose
remain unaltered .' Here we have first a theory or hypothesis
of the essence of the disease (a state of mal- nutrition) , secondly,
its cause, and thirdly, an announcement of its dangerous
character. All this is extraneous to the definition, which is
given unexceptionably (as a summary of symptoms) in what
succeeds to the above quotation.

Propositions of Medicine.
10. The Real Predications of Medicine, as contradistin-
guished from the Essential or Defining Propositions, fall
under distinct heads.
The coupling of the Essential characters, even although
numerous, is Definition , and not Real Predication. Nay
farther ; the modified characters shown in different constitu-
tions and different circumstances, should be held as a part, or
as an appendage, of the Definition. Real propositions may
arise in connexion with these modifications when certain cir-
cumstances are alleged to intensify or to resist the diseased
action.

11. The first class of Real Predications comprises In-

ferences or propria from the Essential characters of a Dis-
ease.
 PROPOSITIONS IN MEDICINE. 359

Having given the defining marks, in their ultimate state-

ment, together with the important modifications and varieties,
we can by the help of general principles- Physical, Chemical,
Biological, or Pathological- draw many conclusions bearing
on the treatment of the disease. It would be easy, for ex-
ample, to unfold a great many facts respecting Fever, from
the Law of Conservation, the laws and facts of Organic Che-
mistry, & c. The maintenance of an excessive temperature,
with less than the ordinary nourishment, involves waste or
inanition of the organs, and the formation of special products
of wasted tissue ; with many other consequences under given
situations. This deductive process, when based on well
ascertained generalities, affords propositions capable of great
precision and certainty.
12. The second class of Real Predications consists of
the Causes of Disease.
A Disease is one thing, its cause is another thing ; proposi-
tions of Causation, are, therefore, in their nature, strictly real.
Their importance demands a distinct and separate enunciation.
Implicated with the great subject of Hygiène, or Health
preservation, there is a body of information respecting the
General Causes of Disease. It is all one thing to know what
are the means to keep the body in health, and what will cause
loss of health.
Many forms of disease are due at once to the disproportion
between the expenditure and the nutrition of the system.
The diseases of exhausted organs-functional weakness and
degeneration of the muscles, the brain, the stomach, the lungs,
the heart, the kidney-are of this class.
To the same general head should be referred nearly every-
thing meant by Predisposing Causes of Disease. There are
many diseases that do not spring up unless by poison or infec-
tion from without ; called Zymotic Diseases. As the poison
of many ( but not of all) such diseases may be resisted by a
healthy system, any circumstances that destroy general
vigour, or weaken particular organs, are called predisposing
causes ; as when cholera attacks constitutions exhausted by
intemperance, or by insufficient food, or by ill- ventilated
dwellings.
It is less easy to generalize the various influences expressed
as Infection, Epidemic poison, Miasmata, &c. This is one
great field for Representative Hypotheses in Medicine.
Under each separate Disease, an account is given of the
362 LOGIC OF MEDECINE.

16. The Elimination of Chance is of great value in

Medicine. Its groundwork is Medical Statistics.
Nowhere more than in Medicine may laws of Causation be
defeated ; there is rarely such a thing as a simple cause yield-
ing a simple effect. Hence, the necessity of ascertaining
whether a coincidence is more frequent than would be ac-
counted for by chance. The cinchona bark sometimes fails to
cure ague, yet its general efficacy is satisfactorily established.
To prove the efficacy of medicines as a whole, in opposition
to some speculators that ascribe all cures to nature (aided by
repose and regimen) the physicians of a French hospital
made the experiment of withholding drugs from all the patients
for a certain time. The conclusion seemed to be that the
mortality was not increased, but the recoveries were more
protracted. This was a competent inference from statistics .
The difficulties in obtaining a statistical proof of the action
of a remedy in a given disease are exactly those already
mentioned respecting the use of Agreement in the same
determination.* A large hospital statistics is better than the
inferences of a single physician in private practice, and yet
may come short of the proof. There should always be obtained,
s— cases with, and cases without,
if possible, a parallel statistics-
the treatment in question. The statistics of cholera treatment
may be alleged in favour of many modes ; but none appear to
be decisively established.
Statistics, as applied to Scarlet Fever, has shown that a
second attack is extremely rare ; that the ages of two and
three are most susceptible to the disease ; and that the maxi-
mum of prevalence is in October, November, and December,
and the minimum in April, May, and June.
The Deductive Method.
17. The scope of the Deductive Method in Medicine is
co-extensive with the number of well-established generali-
ties than can be appealed to.
The sciences applicable to Medicine- Physics, Chemistry,
and Biology-yield a considerable number of these fertile
generalities. The science itself contains few of a very com-
manding character, but a considerable number that have a
sufficient range for deductive operation, and for converting
empirical into derivative laws. All the propositions of general
* See an estimate of these difficulties in Dr. Barclay's work on Medical
Errors, p. 35.
 HYPOTHESES. 363

causation in medicine, the laws of general Therapeutics, the

laws of the action of drugs on the system generally, have
sufficient breadth to control and correct empirical practice ;
and the mastery of these, as well as of the more commanding
principles of the preparatory sciences, increases the power of
the physician. The physiology of Food as regards the various
forces of the system, muscular, heat-giving, nervous, & c. ,
and the products of elimination, -is pregnant with deductive
consequences, both in warding off and in curing disease.
The experimental methods are greatly at fault with slow-
acting causes ; and hence deduction is pre-eminently desirable
in such points as the influence of alterative medicines, stimu-
lants, climatic influences, and modes of life. Only a thorough-
going statistics, or a deduction from general principles, can
dispose of the doubts that arise on such points.

Hypotheses in Medicine.

18. Medical Science is largely dependent on Hypotheses.

As a department of applied Biology, Medicine needs all the
aids rendered by hypotheses in the mother science, and some
special to itself. The great biological fact-Assimilation-
takes on a new aspect in the production and spread of Disease.
The first and simplest case of Hypothesis, the assuming of
an agent known to exist, but not known as present in ade-
quate amount in the given case, is abundantly exemplified .
Thus, the origin of contagious disease is ascribed hypotheti-
cally to various real agents, and among others, to actual
living organisms. The effects tally in a general way with
such an agency. What remains is to find whether they tally
closely at all points. The hypothesis, however, receives a
powerful support from individual cases where the presence of
an animalcule, or living germ, appears to be actually estab-
lished . The alternative, and older, hypothesis is that organic
particles, in a state of change or activity, are thrown off from
one living body and infect another, such particles not being
complete organisms or the germs of organisms. This hypo-
thesis may seem to assume less than the other, but in reality
it assumes a class of particles not distinctly proved to exist.
A strong analogy may be pleaded for them, in the supposed
communication of morbid action within the system ; the action
of the poison of small pox must be the same on the blood
of the innoculated patient as on the original patient. Yet the
aerial effluvia of typhus may consist of something more
364 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

definitely organized than the supposed active particles. Fer-

mentation by yeast is found to be due to an animalcule.
The Representative Fiction is indispensable in Medicine,
and its rules and properties need to be well understood.
Diseased appearances, like all manifestations of living bodies,
are the superficial outcome of a vast concatenation of hidden
changes. These intermediate links are in great part unknow-
able ; yet, by following the clue of what we know, we may so
conceive or imagine them, as thereby to unite the appearances
in a consistent whole. When an organ is liable to derange-
ment from slight causes, we prononnce it weak, which is merely
to express the fact in another word ; when, however, we assign
such circumstances as that its tissue has degenerated or
changed, that it has very little tendency to assimilate nutri-
ment from the blood, or that the superior exercise of all the
other organs of the body withholds from it the fair amount of
blood and nerve force, we employ convenient hypotheses,
which are more or less in keeping with the facts.
As regards the two leading diseased processes - Fever, and
Inflammation-probably no hypothesis yet framed adds any-
thing to the facility of conceiving or of generalizing the facts.
Supposing the different fevers generated each by a specific
virus, or animated body, we cannot even in imagination sup-
pose a connexion between the structure of the infecting
element, and the specific characteristics of the fever ; as in the
difference between typhus, scarlet fever, or intermittent fever.
Indeed, we cannot form a plausible supposition as to the
intermediate link that connects a certain infecting substance
with the febrile state generally. The difficulty here is exactly
the difficulty in representing the facts of living action.
Hypothesis appears to more advantage in connexion with
what is termed Functional Degeneration, Functional weakness,
strength and weakness of parts. Great convenience attaches
to the use of such phrases as healthiness, robustness, vigour,
constitutional force-which are modes of stating the absence
of disease under circumstances that usually provoke it. We
may increase the value of this class of terms, by hypothetical
interpolations, to the following effect :-
Assuming an average healthy system to begin with, we
know by reasonable inferences, ( 1 ) that every one of the organs
needs an equable supply of blood, with more or less aid from
the nervous centres, and (2) that each organ is capable of a cer-
tain amount of exertion. Suppose now, that by any cause,
either the nutrition is below the mark, or the exertion above
 HYPOTHESIS OF DEGENERATION. 365

it, or both . It is the nature of the system not to show im-

mediately the effects of such a mal-proportion , yet there must
be an immediate effect ; the overwork , or the defective nutri-
tion, of a single day does not leave the organ exactly as it was ;
we are entitled to assume that there is superinduced a minute
structural change, or degeneration , perceptible only after many
repetitions , but actually realized. Suppose the disproportion
of expenditure and supply to continue for a length of time ;
the first outward symptoms will probably be, that the organ is
enfeebled in some duty that is required of it, and becomes
positively disordered under influences that, in its regular con-
dition, it would have successfully resisted. At this point,
degeneration or structural change has made a decided ad-
vance ; another equal advance would bring down the organ to
the bare performance of its functions ; a third would be utter
suspension and death. Now, we have here scope for a
great variety of suppositions, as to the relative condition
of all the organs in the body. We can represent the constitu-
tional peculiarities at birth , by the proportionate dispositions
of the several organs-nerves, muscles , lungs, digestion - to
appropriate nutriment, and to become vigorous or the oppo-
site ; we can state to ourselves the practical mode of redressing
the inequality, namely, by restraining the vigorous organs from
their tendency to impoverish the rest, and by giving greater
opportunity to the nourishment ofthe weak. We can also state
the rationale of the constitutional treatment of diseases, viz. ,
the placing of the weakened organs in such a position as to
increase their nutriment and abate their over- exertion . We
can giv ae hypo thet ical acc oun t of the deg ene rat ion of or-
gans such as the heart and kidney, which often show no
signs until the structure has reached a mortal disease . We
should, moreover, feel no surprise at the sudden breaking down
of constitutions reputed strong ; the popular eye sees only the
prosperity of those organs that cast a dash and a glare -the
muscles , the stomach , and the brain. The deeper glance dis-
closes the degeneracy of the heart, the lungs, the kidney,
following on the very strength of these ostentatious members
of the system.

Classification of Diseases.

19. There being upwards of one thousand recognized

Diseases, they may, like other great aggregates, come
under a regular Classification.
366 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

Diseases may fall under a classified arrangement, like

Minerals, Plants, or Animals, attention being given to the
peculiarities of the department.
I. Order of Characters. - In Mineralogy, and in Botany, a
strict order of characters is observed. This is disregarded in
Zoology, and also in Medicine, from difficulties that can be
readily assigned. There is every likelihood, however, that
both sciences would gain by a systematic arrangement of char-
acters, avoiding the sacrifice of the spirit to the letter.
In a work to be afterwards referred to (p. 367 ) , the remark
is made that the labour of analyzing and comparing clinical
observations would be greatly lightened, and the precision of
the observations themselves increased, if the records of these
were in every instance arranged on an uniform plan.'
One obvious precaution is to make the outward symptoms
precede the subjective. Thus, of the usual marks of inflam-
mation, the pain should come last. In nervous diseases, the
physical symptoms should be fully enumerated before entering
upon the mental symptoms ; the two classes are then viewed in
such a way as to check and confirm each other.
II. Maximum of Affinities. - The propriety of classing
Diseases by their closest resemblances is sufficiently allowed
in the abstract ; the difficulties in execution are not logical,
but pathological .
III. Arrangement by Grades. - The formality of Grades is
observed in the classification of Diseases, but without the full
carrying out of what it involves. There is something of lax-
ness attending the use of the method even in Chemistry, the
statement of the points of community of the higher grades
being sometimes given, and sometimes not, without any
apparent reason.
Occasionally there is vacillation as to whether diseases are
different in species, or mere varieties. Little importance
attaches to the question ; and the workable criterion is the
comparative number and persistence of the distinctive marks.
IV. Statement by Agreement and Difference. - Everything
already said on this head applies to the exposition of Diseases.
The systematic and orderly stating of Agreements, and the
pointed contrast in Difference, have the same efficacy here as
elsewhere. Under the heading ' Diagnosis,' it is usual to
mention the closely resembling diseases, and to indicate the
diagnostic marks. For example, Roseola is distinguished
from Scarlet Fever, thus :-the eruption in Roseola is gene-
rally confined to the chest. When the diagnostic points are
 INDEX CLASSIFICATION. 367

two or more, they might be set forth in the formal manner

already exemplified.
20. V. Index Classification .— For Medicine, an Index
Classification might be provided on the tabular plan.
This aid to the discrimination of Disease is still wanting.
Probably, it would be best attempted, in the first instance, on
the tabular plan. A basis is afforded in a small work, pub-
lished by the Medical Society of Observation, with the title
'What to Observe in Medical Cases .'
The work professes to lay out in order an exhaustive state-
ment of all the appearances connected with each bodily organ,
besides adverting to the external circumstances of the patient.
The enumeration commences with the Skin, which is followed
by the organs of Locomotion, Digestion, Respiration, Circula-
tion, Lymphatics, Urinary Organs, Organs of Generation, Brain
and Nerves, Vascular Glands.
As an example, I quote the varieties of the Pulse :-' Radial
Pulse :-number ; -size and force ; large, small, thready, equal,
unequal, strong, feeble ; -resistance ; soft, compressible, hard,
incompressible ; -rhythm ; regular, irregular, intermittent ; -
time as compared with that of heart's impulse ; -artery tortuous,
rigid. Special characters of pulse ; jerking, bounding, undula-
tory, continuous (one pulse appearing to run into the following),
vibrating, quick, tardy, vermicular, tremulous, reduplicate.-
Effects of posture on pulse (its number and other characters).—
Phenomena of pulse in one arm as compared with the other.'
The authors have evidently studied exhaustiveness to
begin with. It is possible, however, to be too minute ;
distinctions that are not marks of anything else are worthless
and may be an encumbrance. The next step, therefore,
should be to abridge and group the symptoms with a view to
the maximum of significance.
There being obtained a methodical array of symptoms
under each organ, the mode of proceeding with a view to an
Index is to append to each symptom a list of the diseases
where it occurs . Should a symptom appear in only one
disease (as urate of soda in gout) the occurrence of the symp-
tom would decide the disease at once. Should a symptom
appear in three diseases, its occurrence points to one of those
three diseases.
. By appending, to every symptom of value in diagnosis, a
complete list of diseases, there is provided a means of deter-
mining every disease according to the knowledge of the time.
One symptom refers us to one list, containing two, three, or
368 LOGIC OF MEDICINE.

four diseases ; a second symptom leads to another list. If on

comparison, there is found only one disease common to the
two lists, the diagnosis is complete. Ifthere are two or three
common to both lists, a third symptom must be sought out
with its corresponding entries, by which the alternations are
again reduced ; and so on, till the concurrence of symptoms
points to a single disease.
"
Suppose, for illustration, that ' Irregularity of the Pulse
appears as symptom. According to Dr. Watson, this may
attend ( 1 ) disease within the head ; (2 ) organic disease of the
heart ; (3 ) simple disorder of the stomach ; (4) debility, and
a prelude to stoppage of the heart's action from asthenia.
Now supposing the tabulation of symptoms and of diseases
complete upon this plan, and supposing a second symptom in
the case under enquiry had opposite to it a list, agreeing with
the first only in the entry ' simple disorder of the stomach,'
the diagnosis is made out by two easy references.
Owing to obvious causes- -the great number of diseases
accompanying particular symptoms, the occasional ambiguity
of actual diseases by the failure of some of their usual symp-
toms, and the imperfection of the terminology of symptoms,-
the best scheme that could be given would be imperfect.
This would not, however, prevent it from being a boon to the
student, and an occasional aid to the experienced practitioner.
It does not supersede, but indicates, the reference to the
systematic works on Medicine and Pathology, which are the
authorities in the last resort.
 BOOK VI.

FALLACIES .

CHAPTER I.

MILL'S CLASSIFICATION OF FALLACIES.

Mr. Mill regards all fallacies as divisible into two great

heads - Fallacies of SIMPLE INSPECTION, and Fallacies of INFER-
ENCE. By the first class he understands those cases where a
presumption is created in favour of a fact or doctrine, on the
mere inspection of it, and without any search for evidence ;
natural prejudices are comprised under that head. By the
second class he understands erroneous conclusions from sup-
posed evidence. This class is subdivided according to the
nature of the evidence simulated ; which may be deductive,
inductive, &c. A special division is indicated under the title
' Fallacies of Confusion,' where the error arises, not in the
link between premises and conclusion, but in the incorrect
handling of the premises themselves.
There are thus five distinguishable classes of Fallacy, as set
forth in the table :-
Fallacies

1. Fallacies a priori.
1 of Simple Inspection
(Inductive
from evidence Fallacies ( 2. Fallacies of Observation
distinctly 3. Fallacies of Generalization
conceived Deductive
Fallacies 4. Fallacies of Ratiocination
from evidence
indistinctly · 5. Fallacies of Confusion
of Inference/ conceived

I. Fallacies of Simple Inspection, or a priori Fallacies. - Re-

fraining from the discussion of the question, which this desig-
nation might raise, what are the ultimate facts or premises at
24
370 MILL'S CLASSIFICATION OF FALLACIES.

the foundation of all reasonings, Mr. Mill adduces first the

tacit assumption that the same order obtains among the objects
of nature as among our ideas of them—that if we always think
of two things together, the two things must exist together.
He illustrates this tendency by numerous popular superstitions,
as ' talk of the devil and he will appear,' &c. He also cites-
the philosophy of Descartes, which, from the mere conceptions
of the mind, inferred the existence of corresponding realities ;
the doctrines that whatever is inconceivable is false, ' ' that
a thing cannot act where it is not ' ( applied by Newton to
"
show the necessity 6of a gravitating medium), that matter
cannot think, ' that space is infinite,' that nothing can be
made out of nothing,' that ' nature always acts by the simplest
means.' An allied Fallacy, or prejudice, is the tendency to
presume a correspondence between the laws of the mind and
the laws of external things, of which one form is expressed
- whatever can be thought of apart exists apart.'
thus :—'
From this springs the personifying or re-ifying of Abstractions,
as in the doctrine of Realism, and in mystical theories gene-
rally, whether it be the mysticism of the Vedas, or the mysti-
cism of Hegel ; all which proceeds on ascribing objective
existence to subjective creations- feelings, or ideas.
Another kindred fallacy consists in representing nature as
under the same incapacity with our powers of thought ; the
great example being the celebrated Principle of Sufficient
Reason, adduced in explanation of many first truths, such as
the laws of motion.
' That the differences in nature correspond to the received
distinctions of language, ' is another wide spread and baneful
prejudice, which particularly weighed upon Greek philosophy,
being prominent in the reasonings of Aristotle, and from which
Bacon was unable to set himself free, as is shown by his futile
attempts to find a common cause for everything that goes
under a common name, as heat, cold, &c.
Lastly, there has existed the prejudice that the conditions
of a phenomenon will resemble the phenomenon '-like pro-
ducing like : as that motion must necessarily arise from the
impact of a moving body ; that a sharp taste must be brought
about by sharp particles ; that our sensations must be copies
of external things ; that the law of causality can hold only
between what is homogeneous, whence there can be no causa-
tion between mind and matter ; that the Deity must have the
exact perfections discoverable in nature.
II. Fallacies of Observation. - These do not apply to the
 GENERALIZATION.- RATIOCINATION. 371

operation of observing, for which there is no logic strictly so

called, but to the omissions and partialities in collecting facts
with a view to the generalizing process. There may be Non-
observation, or Mal-observation ; the one leaves out pertinent
instances, the other distorts or misrepresents what is observed .
Non- observation explains the credit given to fortune-tellers,
to quacks, and to false maxims ; the cases favourable being
noted, and the other forgotten. The motive in this class of
fallacies is a strong pre- conceived opinion or wish to find the
dictum true. Farther, the Non-observation may be, not of
instances, but of material circumstances, as when it is stated
that lavish expenditure alone encourages industry, the circum-
stances being overlooked that savings are capital for the
employment of labour.
Under Mal- observation may be placed the chief mistake
connected with the proper act of observing, namely, the con-
founding of a perception with a rapid inference, or the mingling
up of inferences with facts. This is the common infirmity of
uneducated witnesses and narrators of events.
III. Fallacies of Generalization. — These are errors in the
employment of the Inductive process. The chief instances
adduced are these : -All inferences extended to remote parts
of the universe, where no observation or verification can be
carried ; all universal negatives and propositions asserting
impossibility (not being contradictions in terms) ; the theories
professing to resolve all things into some one element, ofwhich
the most notable instance is the attempt to resolve states of
consciousness into states of the nervous system ; the placing
of empirical laws, arrived at per enumerationem simplicem , upon
the footing of laws of causation, largely exemplified in reason-
ings upon society ; the vulgar form of the same fallacy, desig-
nated post hoc, ergo propter hoc ; and the fertile class of False
Analogies. Under the same head are specified Bad Classifica-
tions, or the asserting under one term, things that have little
or no community ; of which the Greeks gave examples in such
terms as Motion, Generation and Corruption.
IV. Fallacies of Ratiocination . These comprise the errors
against the laws of the Syllogism. Mr. Mill, however, properly
includes under them the fallacies connected with the Conver-
sion and Equipollency of Propositions ; remarking that the
simple conversion of the universal affirmative, and the errone-
ous conversion of Hypotheticals are among the most frequent
sources of error. Of this last class, is the maintenance of some
favourite doctrine, on the ground that the inferences from it
372 MILL'S CLASSIFICATION OF FALLACIES.

are true. Connected with the Opposition of Propositions is

the confounding of the contrary with the contradictory of a
statement. Vicious syllogisms, whether from undistributed
middle, or from illicit process, are the more noted instances of
this class of fallacies. There may be also included the fallacy
of changing the premises, occurring frequently in the argument-
ative discourses of unprecise thinkers (the schoolmen's a dicto
secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter) ; exemplified in the once
favourite theory that whatever brings in money enriches. '
Under the same head might be placed the misapplication of
general truths, or the supposition that a principle true in the
abstract must hold under all sets of circumstances.
V. Fallacies of Confusion. The first class under this desig-
nation is Ambiguity of Terms. As there is no limit to that
form of confusion, a logician can only select a few random
instances ; those chosen by Mr. Mill are scarcity of money, '
' influence of property, ' ' theory,' ' the church, ' the ' laudable'
in a Stoical argument in Cicero's De Finibus, ' I ' in Descartes'
argument for the being of God, ' necessity,' ' same,' ' force,'
' infinite,' ' right ; ' to which he adds examples of the fallacy
of Composition and Division, as strictly belonging to the same
class .
The second division is Petitio Principii, otherwise called
' arguing in a circle,' of which there are abundant examples.
A certain species of terms received from Bentham the desig-
nation question-begging appellatives, ' because they begged a
question under the guise of stating it ; such is the word ' Inno-
vation.' Plato, in the Sophistes, has an argument to prove
that things may exist that are incorporeal, because justice
and wisdom are incorporeal, and they must be something :
thereby begging the question that justice and wisdom are
things existing apart or in themselves . One of the most re-
markable examples of fallacy is furnished by the political
theory
6 of Hobbes and Rousseau, known as the theory of the
social compact.' We are supposed bound by the promise
entered into by our ancestors before society was called into
existence ; but there is no such thing as an obligatory promise
until society has first been formed .
The third class of Fallacies of Confusion is the Ignoratio
Elenchi. It is exemplified in most of the replies to the popu
lation doctrines of Malthus. A still more signal instance is
the stock argument against Berkeley's doctrine of the non-
existence of matter ; Johnson's kicking the stone was not the
point denied in the ideal theory.
 CHAPTER II.

THE POSITION OF FALLACIES.

The setting apart of a distinct chapter to the consideration

of the errors against the laws of reasoning and evidence seems
at first sight an incongruous proceeding . We cannot separate
a law from its violations ; the one implicates the other. When
good reasoning is exhibited, there must be exhibited at the
same time the coresponding bad reasoning . If the rule be
given that the middle term of a syllogism must be distributed
once, whoever understands the rule must conceive, at the
same time, cases of its fulfilment and cases of its non-fulfil-
ment. If the method of Difference requires that the instances
compared shall coincide in every particular save one, we are
instructed by it that the method fails if any two instances do
not coincide to this extent. If a good classification involves
identity on one or more points of importance, there is implied
in the same statement that a grouping under one name, with-
out any important community, is a bad classification, a
' fallacy ' of classification.
Any one would recognize the absurdity of a grammar that
would reserve for a chapter at the end all the examples of
grammatical errors. Yet such is apparently the plan pursued
in Logic. The grammarian, indeed, frequently provides a
separate collection of errors by way of practice to the pupil,
but these are additional to what necessarily and properly
occur under the rules that they severally violate ; this, how-
ever, is not avowed by the logician as the nature of his
chapter on Fallacies.
Without entirely exonerating works on Logic from the
inconsistency of distributing between two departments of the
subject the fulfilment and the violation of the same rules, we
can assign certain circumstances that account for the prevail-
ing usage. The main circumstance is the narrowness of the
field of logical precepts, from Aristotle down to the present
generation. The part of reasoning reduced to rules was
almost exclusively restricted to the syllogistic or deductive
departments ; hence, in the exemplification of those rules, no
errors could come to light except such as violated the forms
374 THE POSITION OF FALLACIES .

of syllogism. But the Greeks had surveyed human knowledge

wide enough to be aware that many errors passed current
that could not be reduced to errors of syllogism. The logician,
therefore, was driven to one of two alternatives-to make no
allusion to some of the most notorious failings and mistakes of
the human understanding, or to provide a chapter for enumer-
ating such mistakes entirely apart from the body of logical
theory. It was characteristic of Aristotle to choose the second
alternative-to be inconsistent rather than to be incomplete.
His treatise on Fallacies comprises errors against the Syllo-
gism, which he could not omit noticing under the Syllogism
(Undistributed Middle, Illicit Process) ; but these are a small
part of the mass of Fallacies ; and the rest he had not
any theory for. He had no Inductive Logic (or only mere
traces which his followers wiped away) , and therefore he had
no place for the exhibition of the rules sinned against by post
hoc, ergo propter hoc. For want of a thorough-going discussion
of the department of Classification and Definition , he could
not exhibit the errors connected with general language under
precepts for the classifying ofthings and the defining of
terms.
It has been seen, however, that even the thorough-going
Logic of Mr. Mill does not dispense with a ' Book ' on Fallacies.
This is explained in part, but only in part, by the author's
adhering to the usage of all former logicians, while using bis
own extended system to re-arrange the recognized examples,
and to introduce new ones. Yet all the fallacies in the
second, third, and fourth classes ( Observation, Generalization ,
Ratiocination) might with the utmost propriety be absorbed
into the body of the work. The account of the inductive and
deductive processes unavoidably quotes derelictions from the
sound performance of these processes, which derelictions are
identical with the fallacies treated of under the heads just
named.
The case is different with Mr. Mill's first and last classes
(Simple Inspection and Confusion). The chapters on these
heads contain matter that would not readily find a place in
the systematic exposition of the logical methods . To take the
first class, Fallacies of Simple Inspection, or a priori. Under
these, the author dilates on certain fallacious tendencies of
the mind, the generating causes of errors. Now, the logician
might say that his business is to show how errors are to be
checked and corrected, not how they arise in the imperfections
of the human constitution . If he is to handle this subject, he
 NATURAL CORRUPTION OF THE INTELLECT. 375*

could not with propriety take it up in the detail of the

Deductive and Inductive Methods ; he would need to be
allowed a corner apart. The demand is irresistible . It would
be most inexpedient to agitate , under the Syllogism , or under
the Experimental Methods , enquiries as to the fallacious ten-
dencies of the natural mind. Granting that all the deductive
and inductive fallacies , and the mistakes of classification and
definition , were taken up into the main body of the work, the
fallacies a priori, if included at all, must receive a separate
handling . Some doubts might be raised as to the logician's
title or obligation to enter upon the subject, but there could
be none as to his allocating a distinct chapter to the considera-
tion of it.
Socrates was the first person to urge strongly the natural
corruption of the human intellect, and the need of a very
severe remedial discipline, which, in the shape of personal
cross-examination, he was wont to apply to his fellow Athen-
ians. The theme was not again taken up in a vigorous
manner, until Bacon composed the first book of the Novum
Organum. The elucidation of the inevitable miscarriages of
the untutored understanding, intellectus sibi permissus, and the
classification of idola -false lures, in that renowned work,
instead of being laid to heart and followed up by fresh ex-
amples, became a matter of mere parrot repetition. The next
person to treat the subject independently, and to go systemati-
cally over the ground, was Mr. Mill, in his chapter entitled
' Fallacies a priori.' So important is the subject, and yet so
far is it distinct from the proper field of Logic, that it might
be embodied in separate treatises. It is a kind of homily or
preaching, a rousing address on human frailty ; and although
the logician is the person most likely to be impressed with the
evil consequences, he is not the only person qualified to illus-
trate them ; while the points to be adduced in the exposition
are not precisely such as fall under either the deductive or the
inductive logic.
Mill's concluding head ' Fallacies of Confusion, ' still remains
extra-logical. The extension of the field of logic does not enable
this class to be absorbed. They cannot be adduced as violating
inductive, any more than deductive precepts. In reality, they
are owing to the defective acquaintance with the subject matter
of the reasonings, and to a low order of intellectual cultivation
generally, rather than to misapprehending logical method. A
considerable stretch of the logician's province is implied in
the taking up of this class of errors. The ground that they
376 FALLACIOUS TENDENCIES OF THE MIND.

cover is boundless and indefinable ; no man can foreshadow

the intricacies, the incoherences, the perplexities, the entangle-
ments, possible to the human understanding. The only
circumstance that justifies the attempt to handle them syste-
matically is the great frequency of a few leading forms ; in
consequence of which they can be, to some extent, treated
comprehensively. Mr. Mill's three classes of examples-
Ambiguous Terms, Petitio Principii, Ignoratio Elenchi- have
this character of extensive recurrence. Moreover, in the
elucidation of such classes, there come to view many prominent
and practical errors, thus opportunely laid bare.
From these considerations, it follows that the most defensible
course to be pursued in regard to Fallacies is to absorb into
the main work all those that are the direct violation of logical
precepts ; and to handle, in the chapters apart, the Fallacious
tendencies of the human mind, and the Fallacies of Confusion.
This is not to debar the assembling of additional examples in
a supplement or appendix ; it being understood that these are
merely in continuation of the examples already furnished in
the regular course.

CHAPTER III.

FALLACIOUS TENDENCIES OF THE MIND.

The Fallacious tendencies of the mind may be traced through

an enumeration of the sources of Belief.
The state of Belief is a form or manifestation of our activity.
The import and measure of Belief is the readiness to act in the
direction indicated by the thing believed. A man's belief in
the wholesomeness of a regimen is shown by his energy and
persistence in adhering to it.
There are three distinct sources of belief. I. The inherent
Activity of the System-the disposition to act through mere
spontaneous vigour. II. The influence of the Feelings,
Emotions, or Passions. III. The Intellectual Associations, or
acquired trains of thought. Excepting under the last head,
there is nothing to guarantee soundness of belief, or the accord-
ance ofthe thing believed with the reality .
 OUR EARLY BELIEFS OVER-VAULTING. 377

I. Inherent Activity of the System.

From the spontaneous and inherent vigour of the system, we
are induced to act somehow, to change out of the passive into
the active condition, and to continue that activity while the
energies are unexhausted, and while there is freedom from ob-
struction. There is no enquiry beforehand as to the proper
course or direction to act in ; opposition is not presumed until
actually encountered. A way now open is supposed to be al-
ways open ; the mind does not anticipate any future termination
or obstacle. Blind confidence is the primitive attitude of our
mind. It is only through the teaching of experience that we
suppose any limit to our career of action.
This state of mind shows itself in our early beliefs, which
may be described generally as over-vaulting ; as presuming
that what holds now and here, will hold then and there and
everywhere . The following are instances :-
We are disposed to assume that, as we feel at the present
moment, we shall feel always. After a certain number of
checks, the tendency is somewhat restrained , but it continues
very strong all through early life, and is seldom entirely
conquered at any age.
We begin life by reckoning with the utmost confidence that
other persons feel exactly as we do. After lengthened experi-
ence, this primitive tendency is greatly subdued, although
perhaps in few minds is it fully sobered down to the measure
of the actual facts. The consequences are shown in our not
allowing for differences of character, in our inability oven to
conceive of types departing widely from ourselves. Without
being the sole origin of intolerance, this tendency greatly
ministers to that prevailing vice of mankind. We can with
difficulty avoid judging all men, in all circumstances, by the
standard suited to ourselves and our own circumstances.
From one or a few instances we are ready to infer a law
applicable without limit. The mere infant parodies the induc-
tive process ; the most ignorant of human beings are the
most unrestrained generalizers . From an acquaintance with
one or two Frenchmen, Italians, or Russians, we conclude the
characters of the entire nation. We feel assured that a
remedy found to answer in a particular case will answer uni-
versally. Happening to visit a place during fine weather, we
are led to suppose that the weather there is always fine. The
word ' always ' is a familiar expletive to vent our generalizing
temper.
378 FALLACIOUS TENDENCIES OF THE MIND.

We presume that the state of things familiar to us, prevails

everywhere. Not only are we indisposed of ourselves to
anticipate and conceive different arrangements, natural and
social, but we hold out against the very existence of such.
The king of Siam's energetic repudiation of ice was a genuine
display of the natural man.
Without making formal generalizations upon a single in-
stance, we are disposed to outrun our facts, to extend the
present into the distant and the future. It is always more
congenial to make leaps in the dark, than to abide strictly by
what we actually know. We have no sympathy with any one
proposing to restrain gravitation to the solar system, where it
can be proved to operate ; our natural desire is to extend it
everywhere, with or without positive evidence.
To identify, to assimilate, to generalize, constitute one of
the two great functions of science. Yet there is often a
necessity for restraining the too great ardour for these pro-
cesses. We identify and assimilate, without real likeness,
thus giving birth to bad analogies, and irrelevant comparisons ;
we over-assimilate and over-generalize. We rush blindly on
the search after Unity, Simplicity, Fraternity.
It is a result of the primeval tendency to follow out a lead
to unbounded lengths, that we so strongly assert the Law of
Causation, irrespective of the facts that have gradually estab-
lished its certainty. We have a subjective assurance that bears
no proportion to the objective proofs. We shall never be in a
position to assert the law, by the force of legitimate evidence,
with the confidence that we feel respecting it.
That human nature is the same in all ages is affirmed, not
from a careful examination of the records of the human race,
but because the affirmer has not laid himself in the way of
checks to the natural tendency to reason from the near to the
distant. The doctrine is more behoven to ignorance than to
knowledge.
The most of Mr. Mill's Fallacies of Simple Inspection are
referable to the tendency now discussed. That we should
make our thoughts the measure of things, ' which is done in
so many celebrated speculations, is the result of the inherent
pushing activity of the system, the determination to proceed
in a course once entered on, until a check is met with, and
even in spite of a good many checks. ' That the conceivable
is necessarily true,' and ' the inconceivable necessarily false '
are merely various expressions of the same fact.
6
The supposition that the effect resembles the cause, ' that
 PERVERSION OF THE FEELINGS. 379

' like produces like ' also grows out of the mind's incontinent
tendency to assimilate, or identify, the repugnance to depart
from a familiar type until compelled by a power from without.
The reasonings of ancient philosophy frequently exhibit this
fallacy, especially in the subject where it has most frequently
operated, the relations of mind and body. Thus Aristotle
reasons that Intellect, as well as Sense-must be corporeal,
since it has to deal with corporeal things ; and Like can be
comprehended only by Like.

II. Influence of the Feelings.

The perverting influence ofthe Feelings, in matters oftruth,
has been more generally noticed, than the perversions due to
inherent activity. That men have in all ages been biassed by
their interests, their fears, their antipathies, their likings, their
poetic ideals, their religious sentiments,-is one of the most
widely-received and least contested doctrines of human nature.
Many of Bacon's Idola are prejudices of the feelings ; the
idola theatri relate to the poetic, artistic, or ideal cravings of
the mind ; the idola tribus ( which would properly include the
other) comprise all the fallacious tendencies common to men
generally, in opposition to individual peculiarities ( idola specus) ;
they therefore necessarily include the feelings. Mr. Mill gives
fewer illustrations of the influence of feeling, than of the influ-
ence of activity as above explained.
The operation of the feelings is partly through the will, and
partly on the intellect. What gives us pleasure urges the will
for its pursuit ; and our activity, in whatever way prompted ,
carries belief with it. We believe that the things that we like
are free from harm, if not beneficial- our favourite dishes,
stimulants, amusements. The effect of liking is to induce action
in a given course, which is a power for belief, able to surmount
a certain degree of hostile evidence.
The obverse is also implied. What offends, annoys, or dis-
pleases us is avoided ; the will is against it ; and we have a
corresponding difficulty in believing it to be a proper object of
pursuit, or in any way commendable.
The other mode of working on the feelings is through the
Intellect. A strong feeling, whether pleasurable or painful,
occupies and detains the thoughts, and excludes for the time
all other subjects. If it be pleasurable, the detention is at the
maximum ; but even pain has power to engross us. Hence,
under great excitement, thoughts alien to the state of feeling
of the time, are not allowed to rise to the view ; we judge
380 FALLACIOUS TENDENCIES OF THE MIND

upon one-sided facts and views. An orgie of pleasure renders

us unable to entertain disagreeable facts ; a fright allows us to
see nothing but danger.
The present purpose will be served by the following enume-
ration of perverting states of feeling : ( 1 ) Self-interest gene-
rally ; (2) Sympathy ; ( 3) Special Emotions. Such is the
order found convenient for illustrating the Oratory of the
Feelings (English Composition and Rhetoric, p. 201 ).
Self-Interest. This comprises our pains and pleasures gene-
rally (to the exclusion of our Sympathies) , whether from sense,
from emotion, or from the associated and comprehensive ends,
as Wealth and Power. That men believe according to their
self-interest hardly needs illustration. Not only does each
man endeavour to deceive others, he generally succeeds in
deceiving himself when his interests are at stake. We have
all great difficulty in seeing the faults of an institution that
we profit by; the arguments of a highly paid priest for his
own form of religion, or of a lawyer for lucrative forms of
procedure, are regarded with suspicion. The grossest forms
of error, the most noxious practices will be vindicated by per-
sons whose worldy position depends upon them.
Among the particular pleasures and pains making up the
great aggregate of self-interest, we may signalize some as
especially unfavourable to truth. Indolence, or the aversion to
labour, the source of so many moral obliquities, is the parent of
intellectual error. The ascertainment of truth demands a kind
of labour that the average human being dreads and abhors ;
hence the acquiesence in such views as come easiest to hand.
That unqualified extension of the present to the distant, the
past, and the future, which we have seen to grow out of the
inherent activity of the system, is still farther recommended
by the saving of toil. Excessive identification, generalization,
and simplication are other expressions for the same tendency ;
while complication, and incoherent details, are preferred to a
simplifying generalization that would cost great labour.
One form of self-denial requisite for getting at truth is to
withstand the influence of the present, and the palpable. A
present impression has a commanding potency. The inherent
tendency to assume that what is will be, is aggravated by any
unusual impressiveness of the present fact. The first victory
of a campaign elates the conquering army with confidence in
the future.
The Sympathies. -The sympathetic tendency of our nature
while antagonizing self-interest, and the errors thereby induced,
 EXCESSIVE SYMPATHIES. 381

is a source of errors peculiar to itself. In making us chime

in with the feelings and views of those about us, it perpetuates
opinions that have once got a footing ; so that the world is
sometimes dependent for a move in advance, on the revolt of
an excessive egotist.
The disposition to see as much good as possible in our
fellow-beings has nursed various fallacious judgments. Thus
it is said of errors, that they are almost always partial or half
truths ; which may be the case with certain errors, but cer-
tainly not with all, probably not with the majority. An error
has usually some show of fact to rest upon ; but we cannot
say that the ante-copernican doctrines of Astronomy were
half truths ; that the sun and stars move round the earth,
was a total mistake. That despotic government favours the
happiness and the improvement of mankind does not deserve
to be called a half truth. It is the conversion of a few ex-
ceptional instances into a general canon.
Another fallacy of excessive sympathies is that what has
been in the past has always been more or less suitable to the
time and circumstances. Thus, slavery, it is said, however
disapproved of now, was once necessary and suitable. Perse-
cution for opinions was the fitting accompaniment of an early
state of civilization. Feudality and hereditary monarchy may
now cease to be essential, but were so in former times. Such
encomiums on the past need to be received with great mis-
givings. To justify them fully, we must maintain, first, that
the good of mankind has been the chief motive of the founders
and supporters of the actual institutions of every age ; and,
secondly, that men's ingenuity of contrivance has been always
on a level with their necessities . We cannot say that it was
essential to human society that the Greeks of the time of
Pericles or of Xenophon should be sold as slaves, when they
happened to be taken in war ; such men could have been
induced to work by the motive of pay.
The Special Emotions. - The consideration in detail of a few
of the leading emotions will bring to view the more specific
sources of fallacy arising from the feelings. Their operation
is still mainly due to their being pleasures or pains ; although
there is in emotion also the influence of mere excitement ,
irrespective of pleasure, in occupying the mind and directing
the trains of thought.
We may remark first on the Emotional Temperament
generally, or, as it is also called, the Sanguine Temperament,
the effect of which is to dwell upon the good side of every-
382 FALLACIOUS TENDENCIES OF THE MIND.

thing. Men endowed with this peculiarity over-estimate all

that is good in their prospects, and in the prospects of the
world generally. They are optimists as regards both the
present and the past. They fall into the last named error—
that whatever was, was right. Mere sympathy, without
the sanguine temperament, might not so readily fall into that
mistake. The opposite temperament works in the opposite
direction ; it is the source of disheartening views of things,
and forebodings of disaster. The fluctuations of the mental
tone in each individual have temporarily a like influence on
the beliefs.
The emotional temperament indulges in delightful ideal con-
ceptions, from which are excluded the stern features of the
reality. Hence the fallacious picture of a beneficent despot-
the blessings of absolute authority in good hands - which
occupies the minds of sentimentalists, and plays into the
hands of real oppressors.
The emotions of Novelty and Wonder have been often
descanted on as sources of corruption . They disincline men
to any facts, views, or theories, that have not in them a dash
of the marvellous. It is difficult to get good observations on
the mental faculties of the lower animals, from the wish to
invest everything about them with mystery and wonder. The
same cause preverts the records of travellers in foreign
countries. Even physical phenomena that have anything
marvellous about them are difficult to observe with precision ;
and the statements of unscientific persons are generally
untrustworthy . The fondness of the human mind for exag-
geration and hyperbole renders a great part of human speech
untrue to fact.
The Emotion of Fear, superadded to mere aversion or dis-
liking, unhinges and debilitates the mind, disposing men to
dark and dismal views of things, and fitting them to be the
slaves of whoever has the power to terrify. Under the shape
of Superstition, the susceptibility to fear has held mankind in
captivity to innumerable delusions , especially in all that per-
tains to the supernatural. As the enemy of science, supersti-
tion is dwelt upon by Bacon with peculiar emphasis.
The feelings of Love, tenderness, affection, amiability, which
are distinct from sympathy proper, although always in some
degree fused with it, are corrupters of the intellect, by creating
a disposition favourable to whoever is loved ; hence the parti-
alities of affection and friendship, the incapability of seeing
anything wrong in one's country, sect, or party. In the
 SELF - PERSONAL DIGNITY.-ÆSTHETIC FEELINGS. 383.

higher compounds, termed Admiration and Reverence, there is

a still greater power to sway the judgment of the individual.
Deference to great authorities, and to the prevailing views of
society, and the readiness to admit compromises, may be traced
to the loving and sociable dispositions. The same dispositions
are easily led into the worship of antiquity, which is the senti-
mental stronghold of blind conservatism.
The emotions of Self-the special circle of Vanity, Con-
ceit, Pride, Feeling of Dignity-in proportion to their power,
disturb the judgment of what is true. The respect for our
own opinions, because they are ours, the plans, devices,
theories of our own concocting, the value set upon everything
that touches ourselves, —are snares in the way to truth. Our
egotism even comprehends family, friends, party, and nation ;
to all of whom, as being related to ourselves, we attribute a
superior wisdom. National prejudice is one of the great ob-
structives of political progress.
The sense of Personal Dignity operates to pervert our views
in a remarkable degree. Many prevalent doctrines are recom-
mended by their supposed contribution to the dignity of human
nature. A leading argument in favour of the Immateriality of
the Mind or Soul is expressly grounded in the greater dignity
of the immaterial essence. The doctrine of Free-will is sup-
posed to elevate human nature by the ennobling function of
autonomy, self-government, or judicial arbitration. The
modern hypothesis of Development is objected to as offending
our ancestral pride. The exceeding sinfulness attributed to
human nature by the Calvinist would be highly unpalatable,
but for the tribute indirectly paid to our self- importance.
Our emotions ofAnger, like Fear, are manifestations superin-
duced upon mere pain. Revenge, antipathy, hatred, party
spirit, are forms of the irascible feeling, and are antagonistic,
in a conspicuous degree, to the ascertaining of truth. Calumny,
the expression of anger, connotes falsehood.
We may conveniently group under the Esthetic Feelings, a
variety of emotional states, of which the central and special
mode is Artistic Harmony, but which involve also many of the
other emotions-as Novelty, Wonder, Love. They are the
emotions aimed at in poetry and in works of Art, and contain
a large mass of powerful feeling. Many false systems of
philosophy, and numerous petty errors and perversions, are
to be ascribed to this department of our emotional suscepti-
bilities. Thus in the ancient world, the minds of philosophers
were dominated by the idea of symmetry, proportion, order,
384 FALLACIOUS TENDENICIES OF THE MIND

and harmony. Pythagoras was entranced by the mystery of

number ; Plato followed him ; and Aristotle was not exempt
from the spell. But the predominant source of fallacy quotable
under the present head was the supposed Perfection, Dignity,
and Becomingness of certain arrangements in nature, which
included numerical considerations among others. The superior
worthiness of fire was declared in the Pythagorean philosophy ;
and even in the later Copernican controversy an argument was
founded on the circumstance that the new system placed fire,
the noblest element, in the centre of the universe. So only
Mind, according to Plato, in Philebus , is sufficiently dignified
to create the world. In the recital by Socrates, in Phædon,
of the phases ofhis intellectual history, on the subject of Cause,
the doctrines of Thales and Anaxagoras are set aside because
they do not recognise the becoming as a power in the world.
The adherence to the circular form of the planetary orbits,
because of its perfection, was inveterate in the cool mind of
Aristotle. The planets could be only six, because that was a
perfect number.
The dictation of a plan to Nature on a supposed propriety
has run through all times. Even in hard business affairs of
trade, Aristotle held it was against nature that money should
breed money, that is, pay interest on loans. Lamarck argues
that a Polype cannot have Sensibility, because it would be
contrary to the plan that Nature is obliged to follow in all her
works (Lewes's Aristotle, p. 97).
The fiction of Unity, which carried away the early Greek
philosophers, partly proceeds from over-assimilation, and partly
ministers to artistic emotion. The absolute unity of mind
is still worshipped by German philosophers. Herbart and
others, rather than admit the radically distinct nature of Feel-
ing, Will, and Intellect, insist upon regarding Intellect or
Cognition as the basis of the two others.
The artistic sublime dictates such exaggerations as ' Let
justice be done, though the world collapse ; ' Truth is great
and all-prevailing. ' Only a mind driven off its calm centre
by the sublime of Force can exclaim ' Might is Right. ' The
fallacy that makes Artistic Harmony the test of truth, almost
inevitable in poetry, is deliberately maintained in Wordsworth's
Essay on Epitaphs, and in his prose criticisms.
The allegation is often made, on instances garbled to chime
in with an amiable sentiment, that great men derive their
mental power chiefly from their mothers.
The influence of aesthetic qualities-beauty, sublimity, har-
 INTELLECTUAL ASSOCIATIONS. 385

mony, propriety- is constantly operating to twist the under-

standing. The architecture, music, and colouring employed
in religion, indispose the worshipper to canvass the validity of
the doctrines. The art of the orator involves the tickling of
the sense, and the charms of style. Such subjects as History,
Criticism, Morality, the Human Mind, where literary polish is
more or less attended to, are liable to distortion through that
circumstance. Of Rhetorical devices, only a few are subser-
vient to truth ; while a great many are hostile.
The interests of Morality and Religion, have, in almost
every age and country been thought to require a habitual
exaggeration of the pleasures of virtue and the miseries of vice.
Plato was the first openly to recommend the pious fraud of
preaching doctrines, in themselves false, as being favourable
to morals and social order. And although only one society in
modern times - the Jesuits - has formally avowed the same
principle, there has been a wide-spread disposition to put it in
practice. Various apologists for Christianity have contended
that, even supposing it untrue, it ought to be propagated on
account of its beneficial consequences .

III. Influence of Associations.

Belief is not founded in the intellect ; yet the intellectual
associations confirm tendencies pre-existing, and contribute to
belief both in the true and in the false. When two things have
been often associated together in the mind, the impetus thus
acquired, in passing from the one to the other, counts as a
force of belief. We are disposed , by our inborn activity, to
proceed upon whatever we are told, there being no counter-
acting tendency present ; the frequent repetition of the same
declaration enhances our disposition to believe it. The force
of iteration is one of the leading causes of men's beliefs. What
has often been said, and seldom or never contradicted, is all-
powerful with the mass of mankind.
Thus, one part of the influence of education, and of prevail-
ing opinions, is due to an intellectual link, whose growth could
be arrested by mere counter iteration . The same influence is
at work confirming our modes of looking at things. There
may be no reason, beyond the adhesion generated by length
of time, why a man is reluctant to entertain a new opinion,
and yet this may be enough to render his conversion impracti-
cable. It was remarked that Harvey's doctrine of the circu-
lation was admitted by no physician past forty. Among our
habits, we are to reckon beliefs. The inveteracy ofpreconceived
opinions is in great part due to their being long cherished.
25
 CHAPTER IV.

FALLACIES OF CONFUSION.

These fallacies cannot usually be produced as direct contra-

ventions of logical method. Many of them depend on imper-
fect acquaintance with the subjects under discussion . A
certain number may be regarded as snares of language
(Bacon's idola fori) . A logical discipline is good as against
many ; and their detailed exposure may have a slightly forti-
fying influence. As already remarked, an exhaustive treat-
ment is not possible ; but certain genera may be selected as
being both prevalent and deleterious.

Fallacies of Language.
Ambiguous and ill- defined terms. - The Fallacies of Equivoca-
tion of the scholastic logic are fallacies of ambiguous langu-
age ; for which the remedy is an exact definition of all
leading terms, and an adherence to the meaning so settled.
It is one criterion of an advanced science to have its terms
defined . In subjects not raised to scientific precision, we may
expect vagueness in the use of language. The Mathematical
and the Physical Sciences were the first to make progress in
this direction ; only in recent times has the progress been
extended to the Moral Sciences - Psychology, Ethics, Politics,
Law, Political Economy.
The exemplification of ambiguous words has no limit, unless
we adopt some principle of selection. For a work on Logic,
the most appropriate examples are terms ofleading importance
whose ambiguity is still a cause of error and perversion.
The word Nature ' is full of ambiguity. Butler pointed
out three meanings. Sir G. C. Lewis, after a lengthened
examination of particular uses of the word, found that they
fall under two classes :-(1 ) A positive idea, as expressing
essence, quality, or disposition ; (2 ) A negative idea as excluding
art, or human regulation and contrivance. This last meaning
occurs in the phrase state of nature, used to designate man's
existence before the introduction of law, government, and the
arts of civilization. As human interference may sometimes be
 AMBIGUITY OF TERMS. 387

good and sometimes bad, the meaning9 of nature varies accord-

ingly. When men's ' natural rights are spoken of, there is
great doubt as to what is intended. ' Every man has a natural
right to his liberty '-is a jumble of uncertain sounds ; ' natural'
being probably used in Lewis's second acceptation, as the
antithesis of art, regulation, and interference.
' Liberty ' has various meanings . It is not merely the absence
ofcoercion or restraint, as being at large instead of being impri-
soned ; it extends also to the possession of powers, rights, and
status ; thus in a community where there are slaves, being impri-
soned ; it extends also to the possession of powers, liberty is a
distinction, and freemen compose a privileged order of the state.
The ambiguities of ' Moral ' have been previously adverted
to. Even in the one specific meaning of ' right and wrong,'
it has a fluctuating signification, and has given occasion to
erroneous views. The criterion of 6 moral and ' immoral,'
in the accurate meaning, is Law ; a moral act is imposed by a
superior ; hence a supreme power cannot do an immoral, any
more than an illegal act. When the Deity is said to have a
' moral ' nature, the word must be supposed to mean simply
6
goodness,' or else ' equity,' both which qualities may attach
to a supreme legislator ; the sovereign power may do a mis-
chievous act, and may be guilty of partiality or unfairness as
between one man and another ; which, however, is not the
connotation of immoral or illegal, according to the proper
definition of the terms. The sovereign has no moral duties ;
his acts create these for his inferiors.
The confusion of law in the juridical sense, with Law as the
uniformity of nature, is exemplified in Butler's chapter on the
Moral Government of God. Butler calls the ' course of Na-
ture ' a government, merely on the ground that it induces
precautions to avoid pain. But these precautions have nothing
moral in them ; they may be used for criminal ends. Guy
Fawkes most faithfully obeyed the laws of nature, when he
placed his barrels of gunpowder so as to ensure the blowing
up of Parliament, while he arranged for firing them in safety
to himself. It is the object of a Law proper to prevent men
from injuring one another ; the uniformity of nature lends.
itself equally to good and to evil conduct.
The word Utility ' has a narrow sense opposed to Art,
elegance, and refinement ; and a wider sense (as in the Utility
theory of Morals) , comprehending the whole circle of human
gratifications and well-being.
' Self ' has several meanings, which have to be disentangled
in ethical reasonings.
388 FALLACIES OF CONFUSION.

The words ' same, ' ' identity,' have often been commented
on. Similarity or sameness is a matter of degree, and in this
consideration alone lies the ambiguity. A human being is
called the same person all through life, although in many
respects changed.
:
Probability ' is not always used in its proper meaning,
namely, the expression of what is true, not in every case, but in
most. Not unfrequently, the two sets of cases, pro and con,
are called the probabilities for and against a thing. The
wind blows from the east, say three days in seven, and from
the west four days in seven ; the proper expression then is,
there is a probability of four to three in favour of west wind
on a given day. To say that the probabilities are four in
favour of, and three against, a west wind leads to a confounding
of the probable with the improbable. A vacillation between the
meanings is observable in Butler's Introduction to his Ana-
logy. He correctly expresses the nature of probability when
he speaks of there being a greater presumption upon one side
of a question than upon another, and remarks that if there be
the slightest preponderance, prudence requires us to act
accordingly. He goes on, however, to say that, in questions
of great consequence, we have to be content with probabilities
even lower ; that is, where there is an equal balance on both
sides ; nay, even to less than this ; in other words, we are to
act with the majority of cases against us, which is to believe
in the improbable.
The play of ambiguity is seen in the remark of Aristotle-
" That which is naturally good is good and pleasant to the good
man ;' an equivocation too closely resembling what occurs in
Plato's argument to show that the wrong-doer, if unpunished,
is more miserable, than if he were punished. " The wrong-doer '
6
says Plato, when punished suffers what is just ; but all just
things are honourable ; therefore he suffers what is honourable.
Now all honourable things are so called because they are either
agreeable, or profitable, or both together. Punishment is not
agreeable; it must therefore be profitable or good. Whence the
wrong-doer when punished suffers whatis profitable orgood, &c. '
Separate meanings ascribed to separate words. - This is one of
the greatest snares of language. There is a strong tendency
in the mind to suppose that each word has a separate meaning,
and to be misled by tautologies and alterations of phraseology.
The ramifications of this tendency are numerous and subtle ;
they include the master fallacy of Realism, or the conversion
of Abstractions into Realities.
 DREAD OF CHANGES IN LANGUAGE . 389

The strong verbal associations formed with all our opinions

and views make us alarmed when it is proposed to withdraw
the customary phrases in favour even of such as are more
suitable. Stillingfleet complained that Locke's doctrine con-
cerning Ideas had almost discarded Substance out of the
world. This feeling has been manifested against all the great
innovations of philosophy. Because the Cartesian doctrine of
Mind and Matter, as two distinct things, is declared to be
gratuitous and destitute of proof, people are shocked as if
Mind were done away with. The same revulsion is experi-
enced towards Berkeley's attempt to reconcile the contradic-
tion ofthe prevailing mode of regarding Perception. Whately
disposes of Hume's objection to miracles ' as contrary to the
Course of Nature, ' by the retort that, according to him, there
is no such thing as a Course of Nature, there being nothing
but ideas or impressions on the mind of the individual. The
unproducible entity ' Substance ' is upheld in man's minds by
the force of the word.
The fallacy of the Identical Proposition is due to there being
two different names for the same thing :-
There's ne'er a villain dwelling in all Denmark,
But he's an arrant knave.
Ferrier complains of the phrase Perception of Matter, ' as a
a duplication of words for one fact, leading people to suppose
that there are two facts . So, between antecedent and conse-
quent, in Causation, there is interposed the name ' power,'
to which there is nothing corresponding ; the fact being
sufficiently stated by the uniform sequence of the antecedent
and its consequences .
There is a difficulty in satisfying men's minds that Resist-
ance, Force, Inertia, Momentum, Matter, are all one fact. So
with the terms Motion, Succession , Direction , Distance, Situa-
tion, Extension—which are modifications of one fundamental
fact-Movement and the possibility of movement.
The giving reality to Abstractions is the error of Realism
and is not as yet fully conquered . Space and Time are
frequently viewed as separated from all the concrete experi-
ences of the mind instead of being generalizations of these in
certain aspects . Certain things are said to be ' out ofall relation
to Time,' which should mean that such things have no suc-
6
cession and no endurance. Time as the innovator,' is either
an unapt metaphor, or nonsense. So, ' Truth ' in the abstract
is a fiction ; the reality is a number of true propositions.
' Chance ' lingers in men's minds as an independent existence,
390 FALLACIES OF CONFUSION.

instead of an assertion of identity between certain concrete

situations.
The word ' Existence ' in its most abstract form refers to a
supposed something attaching alike to the Object and to the
Subject, over and above Quantity, Succession, and Co -existence,
which are attributes common to both. The only meaning of
the word is the Object together with the Subject ; for which
addition we also employ the synonymous names, Universe,
Being, Absolute, Totality of Things. To predicate existence
of matter or mind is pure tautology. Existence ' means
matter or mind, or both, as the case may be. The only use of
the word is to express Object or Subject indiscriminately,
there being occasions when we do not need to specify either.
The valuable distinction, struck out by Aristotle, of Poten-
tial and Actual , is made the occasion of giving reality to
fictions. The potentiality has no meaning but by a reference
to actuality ; the power of moving means motion in given
circumstances. 'Educability ' means education under certain
conditions. Hamilton has created a fictitious intellectual
faculty under the name ' Conservative Faculty ;' a pure re-
duplication of his ' Reproductive Faculty.' We know nothing
of the conservation of thoughts, except that under certain
circumstances they are recalled or reproduced.
Unsuitable phraseology and unreal questions. - Many purely
artificial perplexities have arisen from applying to a subject
terms incongruous to its nature. The words ' true ' and ' false
are properly applicable to knowledge or affirmations respect-
ing the order of the world ; they cannot be applied to pleasures
and pains except by mere metaphor. A false pleasure ' is an
incongruous jumble, like a ' loud circle ' or a ' bright toothache.'
Aristotle puts the question- Is happiness praiseworthy ?'-
to which there is no proper answer, because there is no proper
meaning.
The old puzzle respecting Motion is due to the improper use
of language. Motion means ' change of place.' The puzzle is
brought about by insisting that the phenomenon shall be
expressed as in a place, that it shall be either in one place or
in another. If we give way to this arbitrary restriction of
language, we must allow, with Hamilton and many others,
that Motion can be shown to be impossible.
Allusion has already been made (p. 134) to the unsuitability
of the word hypothesis ' to express abstract notions, as the
definitions of Geometry.
The application of terms of Extension and Local Position
 FALLACIES OF SUPPRESSED RELATIVE. 391

to the mind has been the source of factitious puzzles and arti-
ficial mysteries . ' How the immaterial can be united with
matter, how the unextended can apprehend extension, how
the indivisible can measure the divided , —this is the mystery
of mysteries to man ' ( Hamilton's Reid , p. 886) . The answer
is, no attempt should be made to express the union of mind
and matter in the language that would be suitable to the
union of one extended thing with another.
The most conspicuous example of an artificial difficulty
created by incongruous language is the celebrated Free- will
theory. The sequences of the Will consist of feelings followed
by actions ; they exemplify mental causes giving birth to
activity, and are broadly contrasted with the physical prime
movers -as water and steam -which are devoid of any mental
element. There is no mystery in these peculiar sequences
except the mystery of the union of mind and body, formerly
remarked on (p. 127) . The introduction of the idea of Free-
dom or Liberty into the voluntary operation is totally without
relevance ; and the consequence has been a seemingly insoluble
problem, a mesh of inextricable contradictions,
Fallacies of Relativity.- A large class of Fallacies consist in
denying or suppressing the correlatives of an admitted fact.
According to Relativity, the simplest affirmation has two
sides ; while complicated operations may involve unobvious
correlates. Thus the daily rotation of the starry sphere is
either a real motion of the stars, the earth being at rest, or an
apparent motion caused by the earth's rotation. Plato seems
to have fallen into the confusion of supposing that both stars
and earth moved concurrently, which would have the effect
of making the stars to appearance stationary.
Every mode of stating the doctrine of innate ideas commits ,
or borders upon, a Fallacy of Relativity, provided we accept
the theory of Nominalism. A general notion is the affirma-
tion of likeness among particular notions ; it, therefore, subsists
only in the particulars. It cannot precede them in the evolu-
tion of the mind ; it cannot arise from a source apart, and
then come into their embrace. A generality not embodied
in particulars is a self- contradiction unless on some form of
Realism.
Kant's autonomy, or self-government of the will, is a fallacy
of suppressed relative. No man is a law to himself ; a law
co-implicates a superior who gives the law, and an inferior
who obeys it ; but the same person cannot be both ruler and
subject in the same department.
392 FALLACIES OF CONFUSION.

In Ethical questions there are examples of suppressed rela-

tives. Thus, it is often set down as essential to the highest
moral virtue, that law and obligation should embrace every
act of human life , that the hand of authority should never be
unfelt. Now, authority means operating by penalties, and
appeals exclusively to the selfishness of men's nature. Uni-
versal obligation is universal selfishness , which is not what is
intended by the supporters of the doctrine.
The view is sometimes expressed that the civil magistrate is
bound to support (by public establishment) the true religion ;
which, however, can mean only what he thinks the true reli-
gion ; and the correlative or consequence is that he is bound
to establish a false religion, provided he believes it to be the
truth . This is an offshoot of the fallacy arising from the
suppression of the subject mind in affirmations. An affirma-
tion correlates with an affirmer ; a truth supposes a believer.
(See Part First, p . 80).
A Fallacy of Relativity is pointed out, by Mr. Venn, in the
doctrine of Fatalism ; a doctrine implying that events, depend-
ing upon human agency, will yet be equally brought to pass
whether men try to oppose, or try to forward them. (Logic
of Chance, p . 366).
The doctrine of Relativity is carried to a fallacious pitch,
when applied to prove that there must be something absolute,
because the Relative must suppose the non--Relative. If there
be Relation, it is said, there must be something Un-related,
or above all relation. But Relation cannot, in this way, be
brought round on itself, except by a verbal juggle. Relation
means that every conscious state has a correlative state ; which
brings us at last to a couple ( the subject-mind, and the object
or extended world). This is the final end of all possible cogni-
tion. We may view the two facts separately or together ;
and we may call the conjunct view an Absolute (as Ferrier
does), but this adds nothing to our knowledge. A self- con-
tradiction is committed by inferring from ' everything, is
relative,' that'something is non-relative.'
Fallacies of Relativity often arise in the hyperboles of
Rhetoric . In order to reconcile to their lot the more humble
class ofmanual labourers, the rhetorician proclaims the dignity
of all labour, without being conscious that if all labour is
dignified, none is ; dignity supposes inferior grades ; a moun-
tain height is abolished if all the surrounding plains are raised
to the level of its highest peak. So, in spurring men to
industry and perseverance, examples of distinguished success
 BEGGING THE QUESTION.- SHIFTING THE GROUND . 393

are held up for universal imitation ; while , in fact, these cases

owe their distinction to the general backwardness .
Petitio Principii.
Petitio Principii, Petitio Quesiti, arguing in a circle, begging
the question- are names for a fallacy always included by
logicians in the List of Fallacies. To assume somewhere in
the premises the very point to be proved is frequent in dealing
with ultimate truths. The attempts to prove causation or the
uniformity of nature usually take it for granted in some form
or other. The inductive syllogism is a petitio principii. As
another instance, suppose, on the one hand, the continuity of
motion were given as the proof of Persistence of Force, and
on the other hand, the Persistence of Force given as the proof
of the continuity of motion, the argument would revolve in a
circle.
A chemical writer (Gmelin ) assigns as the cause of chemical
decomposition by superadded bodies leading to new com-
pounds, that the forces tending towards the new compounds
are stronger than those maintaining the old.
Hamilton remarks that Plato, in Phædon, demonstrates the
immortality of the soul, from its simplicity, and in the Re-
public, demonstrates the simplicity from the immortality.
Ignoratio Elenchi .
Ignoratio Elenchi, shifting the ground, or answering to the
wrong point, is committed in many controversies. An example
is furnished in the controversy relating to a Moral Sense.
The opponents of the doctrine urge as an argument against
a primitive or intuitive moral standard, that different nations
differ widely in their notions of what is right and wrong.
The reply is, that although they differ in the substance of the
moral code, they agree in holding some things to be right and
morally obligatory. This, however, is shifting the ground.
The reason for appealing to an implanted sense of Right was
to obtain for certain moral precepts a higher authority than
human convention could give. It was not to prove us endowed
with a sense that something or other is a moral obligation, but
to establish the obligation of certain assigned rules (the
morality of our own time).
In books on Practical Ethics, there is usually a chapter on
'Our duties to ourselves.' Like the autonomy of the Will, this
is a Fallacy of Relativity, being a contradiction of the very
idea of duty, which implies a superior authority. The diffi-
394 LOGICAL FALLACIES.

culty is met by shifting the ground ; the allegation being

that the care of our person and our interests is a duty to
society and to God.
The ' Fallacia accidentis ' and the ' a dicto secundum quid
ad dictum simpliciter ' might be brought under ' shifting the
ground .' The meaning of a term is changed in its application ;
water quenches thirst,' does not mean ' boiling water.' So, the
pleasures of duty are not pleasures attaching to it as duty, or
as self- sacrifice, they are incidental consequences of the situa-
tion, through the reciprocal conduct of the other party.
False Analogies.
The irrelevant comparison, or unsuitable analogy, is a usual
form of confused and erroneous thinking, especially in the
older philosophy. It abounds in Plato (see especially Timæus)
and is not unfrequent in Aristotle ; it is also prevalent in
Bacon's attempts at scientific investigation.
A familiar but highly illustrative example is the comparison
of the history of a nation to the life of man, in respect of birth,
growth, maturity, and inevitable decay. The comparison is
irrelevant ; the likeness palpably fails in the most important
points. A nation's losses are repaired ; the physical failure
of a human being is irreparable.
The reply to all such comparisons is to indicate the failure
of identity. They are false minor propositions ; and the false-
hood is exposed by pointing out the dissimilarity of the subject
with the subject of the major. They are of the same nature
as a pleading in law where the relevance is unsound. The
remedy is found in hostile criticism .

CHAPTER V.

LOGICAL FALLACIES.

There may be advantage in providing a supplemental collec-

tion of examples of Logical Fallacies properly so called , that is,
violations ofthe prescribed Logical rules and methods ; it being
fully understood that the exemplification of the rules them-
selves, in the regular exposition, unavoidably affords instan-
ces of their neglect or failure.
 EQUIVALENCE, DEDUCTION, AND INDUCTION. 395

The proper arrangement of such an additional collection

(unless made promiscuous to test the ingenuity of the student)
is the arrangement of the general subject. Following the
order- Deduction, Induction, Definition- we should commence
with Deductive or Syllogistic Fallacies.
Since, however, a separate department, preparatory to the
Syllogism, is made up of Equivalent Forms, called also Im-
mediate Inference, and since mistakes may be committed in
this department ( some of them the proper sources of syllogistic
fallacies ) , the first clsss of Fallacies should be Fallacies of
EQUIVALENCE, or of Immediate InfERENCE. The chief heads where
fallacies occur are the Opposition of Propositions, and Conversion.
The acutest minds have been snared by confounding the
Contrary with the Contradictory, of Propositions. The
reverse of wrong is right ' should be ' The reverse of wrong
contains something that is either right or indifferent .' 'There
are objections against a vacuum ; but one of them must be
true : the guarded statement is, if there be not a universal
plenum, there must be some unoccupied space, or vacuum .'
The chief fallacy of Conversion is Simple Conversion of A ;
' all the geometrical axioms are self-evident ; all self-evident
truths are axioms .' The connection of this mistake with the
usual fallacies of syllogism, was sufficiently pointed out,
The proper DEDUCTIVE FALLACIES are errors against the
syllogistic forms and canons. They are mainly resumed in
Undistributed Middle and Illicit Process, which again usually
involve the simple conversion of A. But for the snare of
language that leads to this inadvertence, a fallacy of syllogism
would be comparatively rare.
The INDUCTIVE FALLACIES include the most frequent and the
gravest of logical mistakes. Their exemplification would
naturally follow the expository order of the subject of Induc-
tion . We might commence with erroneous views of the nature
of Cause, such as the suppression of important conditions and
collocations. We might also connect with this part of the
subject the error of assigning more causes than a pheno-
menon needs. It is involved in the very idea of cause, that
the effect is in exact accordance with the cause ; hence,
the proof that more causes were operative than the effect
needed , defeats itself. If we have an adequate cause for
slavery, or for the subjection of castes, or classes, in the mere
love of domination on the part of the stronger, the explanation
that the state of society demands such an arrangement is of
no value. This is the error called ' proving too much.'
396 LOGICAL FALLACIES.

Next are the Fallacies from insufficient employment or

neglect of the Methods of Elimination. Under Agreement
falls the mistake (exemplified in Medicine) of confounding
induction with multiplication of instances, without variation
of circumstances. Mr. Mill's Fallacies of non- observation
likewise sin against the methods. An induction is not com.
plete till all the instances, or representatives of them all, have
6
been examined. Paley, in affirming that happiness is equally
distributed through all classes of the community,' must have
left out of account the larger part of the facts.
The assertion that ' Species are never transmuted,' even
although not disproved by positive instances to the contrary,
would require an examination of facts far beyond what has>
ever been made. Leibnitz generalized his ' Law of Continuity
from a few unquestionable instances, without verifying it
through all nature.
The fallacious inferences named ' Non causa pro causa,'
' Post hoc ergo propter hoc,' are fallacies of the inductive
methods. Some circumstance coupled with an effect is held
to be its cause, without due elimination . Thus, the luxury in
the Roman empire is said to have been the cause of its down-
fall ; commercial restrictions, in spite of which trade has
prospered, are made the cause of prosperity.
The fallacy of not recognizing Plurality of Causes will be
apparent from what was advanced on that subject. So, the
fallacy of trusting to the Inductive Methods in Intermixture
of Effects was necessarily involved in the reasons given for
coupling Deduction with Induction.
Under Secondary Laws, there is obviously involved the
fallacy of applying a general law to a concrete instance, or to
an intermediate law, without the due modifications ; as if we
were to infer from the Law of Gravity that all the planets are
falling direct to the sun.
Fallacies of Explanation were expressly exemplified. A
non-compliance with the logical conditions of Hypotheses
would yield fallacies on that subject.
FALLACIES OF DEFINITION would, in the first place, express
the use of ill- defined terms. Again, the failure to satisfy the
methods and rules of Classification is a sin against Logic.
We need but instance the wide prevalence of the error of
Cross-divisions. Bacon is prolific of divisions and sub-divisions,
which are never logical. His four classes of Idola are not
mutually exclusive ; his Prerogative Instances will be after-
wards remarked on.
 APPENDIX .

F. -ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS.

The common idea in the correlative couple- Analysis and

Synthesis-is difficult to express adequately, owing to the
variety of its applications. Chemical Analysis , Mathematical
Analysis, Logical Analysis, with the corresponding Syntheses,
have a basis of agreement but with points of difference.
The general idea of Analysis is separation ; of Synthesis,
composition or combination . Yet the contrast does not alto-
gether correspond to the distinction of Abstract and Concrete.
Analysis is Abstraction , but Synthesis is not the negative or
the absence of Abstraction ; it is not the un- abstracted Con-
crete. While the scientific man is, by the law of his being, an
analyst, the poet or artist, who does not analyze but combines ,
is not a synthesist. Synthesis in contrast with analysis, is
combining after analyzing ; it is using the results of analysis
with a view to construction.
The simplest exemplification of the two correlated processes
is seen in CHEMICAL Analysis. The Chemist operates upon an
unknown mixture or combination of material bodies, as a
newly discovered mineral, a water, a strange product from a
furnace, the stomach of a poisoned man. He separates and
identifies the various ingredients of the compound. Given
the water of a mineral spa, he states exactly what saline
bodies, and gases are dissolved in it, and what is the amount
of each .
The obverse Synthesis would consist in making up the given
compound by means of the several elements in their proper
proportions. Thus, having ascertained the precise constituents
of a mineral water, it is then possible to form the water artifi-
cially, If the artificial water is exactly identical with the
natural water, both the analysis and the synthesis are successful
and complete. It is by the analysis, however, that the
synthesis has been possible. The analysis is the foundation of
a new means of production ; it enables us not merely to imitate
and rival the spontaneous products of nature, but also, if need
398 ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS .

be, to vary those products on a definite plan or purpose. We

may introduce beneficial variations into the syntheses of
mineral waters. So, having analyzed some crude substance
medicinally valuable, we may artificially compound it, first,
literally (which proves the sufficiency of the analysis), and
next with improved adaptations for the end.
The most notable application of Chemical synthesis is to
the formation of organic compounds in the laboratory. By a
foregone analysis, the chemist has discovered the constituent
elements of these compounds, and the peculiarities of their
union ; he then uses his knowledge to re-produce by laboratory
processes what has been produced in the course of living
growth. In this way, urea, acetic acid, and many other or-
ganic products have been obtained by laboratory synthesis.
Such synthetic efforts are the trophies of analysis.
Our next example may be termed LOGICAL Analysis ; it is
the ordinary Scientific Analysis, the peculiar case of Mathe-
matics being reserved . Here, Analysis is substantially iden-
tical with generalization, whether of the notion or of the pro-
position. What Synthesis is will appear presently.
The processes of assimilating, identifying, classing, general-
izing, abstracting, defining, are the various sides , aspects or
stages, of one fundamental operation. Now Analysis is merely
a farther aspect, another side, ofthe same proteus. To identify,
classify, and abstract, is to separate or analyse, so far as the
case admits ; the separation being no longer actual, as in
Chemistry, but mental or ideal. To identify and classify
transparent bodies, is to make abstractive separation, or ana-
lysis, of the property called transparency ; or to view its func-
tions, powers, or agencies alone and apart from all the other
powers possessed by the individual transparent bodies . Water
is liquid, but this aspect is disregarded ; diamond has extra-
ordinary refractive power but no notice is taken of it ; the
two substances are studied merely in their agreement in what
we call transparency.
Now the investigation of nature turns exclusively on this
abstractive separation . Bodies are constituted with a cluster
of powers or properties inseparably combinated, yet each
pursuing its independent course without any disturbance from
the others. Water, as transparent, has a power exactly iden-
tical with diamond and rock crystal, as transparent ; the other
peculiarities wherein the two bodies stand widely contrasted
have no relevance, exercise no interference, as regards the
transparency. Hence, the mind, having very limited powers
 ANALYSIS MEANS ABSTRACTION AND INDUCTION. 399

of attention, and being easily impeded and thwarted by dis-

tracting circumstances, finds the advantage of neglecting all
allied properties, and concentrating its powers on the one
subject of study at the time.
Thus, Abstraction and Analysis, if not identical, are the
same fact viewed with a slight difference . Abstraction means
separately viewing one point of agreement, and leaving all
other accompaniments in the shade ; the transparency is
studied by itself, the specific gravity and all other incorpo-
rated properties being left out of sight. Analysis means the
very same thing ; only, proceeding a little farther, it supposes
that every one of the powers of a given concrete, as water,
may be abstracted by turns, -transparency, liquidity, specific
gravity ; so that water as a whole may be analyzed, or sepa-
rated (mentally) into a number of different powers, whose
enumeration is a full account of the agency of water.
The farther we push abstraction and generalization, the
farther we push Analysis . When, after generalizing all
mechanical movements, and forming an abstract idea, or
analytic separation of molar or mechanical force, we proceed
to identify mechanical momentum with molecular forces, we
make a new analysis ; we separate the property of force from
its exclusive connexion with the movements of masses, and
view it as the movement of matter, whether in larger or in
smaller aggregates.
It is now requisite to assign a correlative meaning of Syn-
thesis . As Analysis is the ideal separation and separate exhi-
bition of all the functions of a concrete thing, as water, iron,
blood, Synthesis is the re-statement of the whole in their
aggregate. Its efficacy would be shown in supposing a new
aggregate, as a liquid diamond, a metal with all the properties
of lead except its corrosion . It would also be exemplified in
the act of communicating, by description, the knowledge of a
mineral, apart from a concrete specimen.
Another step is inevitable. As these abstractive properties,
or notions, are what enter into the inductive generalizations of
nature, each inductive law being two or more coupled together,
Analysis becomes applied to Inductive discovery. There can
be no wide induction without a correspondingly wide genera-
lization of at least two notions, that is, without an equivalent
analytic separation. The summit of generalization, in the
notions Quantity, Inertia, Gravity, Persistence, is the summit
of Analysis. The highest generalities of Mind are attained
through the most thorough Analysis of Mind.
400 ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS.

The employment of Analysis to signify Induction appears in

Aristotle, and pervades the logicians after him. ( See Mansel's
Aldrich, App. G. , Hamilton's Logic, II., 2). By an easy
transition, Synthesis would be applied to Deduction. The
deductive operation of following out the law of gravity to
lunar perturbations, to the tides, to precession, &c. , would be
called synthetical, as reuniting abstract elements into new
combinations. Having mastered the laws of central force,
and the composition of forces, Newton deduced or inferred the
orbits of bodies governed by other forces than gravity.
Synthesis, however, scarcely applies to simple Deduction,
the following out an induction to a new case, as when we infer
the death of the reigning pope from the mortality of the men
that have died . There is no element of combination in such
cases, there is but the filling up of the Induction, which is
only formally complete so long as any particulars are still
outstanding. The synthetic operation is best realized by the
complex deductions, or the union of several deductive laws to
a composite or concrete case-a secondary law.
There is nothing gained by using the terms Analysis and
Synthesis to the Inductive and Deductive processes respec-
tively. We may show in what way the application is proper
or admissible, and that is all.
The use of the Syllogism may be expressed as analyzing or
separating, out of regard to our mental infirmity, the three
parts of a step of reasoning, so that they may be studied in
separation. The premises, instead of being confused together,
can be looked at apart, and each judged on its merits in its
isolated condition. This is an advantage belonging to Method,
or Discovery. Wherever a separation of this kind can take
place, a great relief is given to the understanding, with a
corresponding enlargement of its powers.
An accountant separates his columns of debit and of credit,
and classifies under different heads payments that relate to
different subjects and follow different rules.
Grammatical Analysis may be followed by Grammatical
Synthesis, as in constructing sentences upon new types sug-
gested by putting together the component elements in various
ways.
Criticism is a species of analysis ; and the composition of
an Oration or a Poem, by the guidance of critical and rheto-
rical rules, is a strictly synthetic operation ; the previous
analysis is the foundation of the method. Composition, with-
out any rules, is not synthesis.
 MATHEMATICAL ANALYSIS. 401

It is a weakness of the unscientific man to suppose that a

concrete thing, as, for example, a political institution, can be
viewed only as a whole- that its operations are an indivisible
totality. Thus, the obtaining of justice by the procedure in a
court of law is through a series of steps and processes - raising
the action, appearing by counsel, summoning a jury, and so
on. The effect of the whole being good, the un-analyzing mind
distributes the merit equally over all the parts, and is shocked
when a doubt is raised as to the utility of any one constituent,
as, for example, the jury.
To advert finally, to the special instance of Mathematical
Analysis and Synthesis. A new step in geometry may be
taken either by analysis or by synthesis. The various Geo-
metrical properties are said to have been first discovered, by
analysis, while in exposition they are in the form of synthesis ;
which is not strictly the fact ; we may proceed from the known
to the unknown in both ways ; discovering new properties by
synthesis no less than by analysis.
Let us take Synthesis first, as suiting the case of a science
whose onward march is by the way of Deduction. Let us
assume that a certain proposition has been arrived at, no
matter how, say, ' Parallelograms on the same base, and be-
tween the same parallels, are equal. ' Now any one consider-
ing this proposition might readily see, that the axiom of
mediate equality applied to it, would show that the same
thing might be predicated of equal bases ; such an inference.
would be an effort of pure deduction, or the skilful combin-
ing of two already established propositions to yield a new
third proposition. So, by a repetition of the same apposite
union of truths possessed , one might also infer that ' Tri-
angles on the same base, or on equal bases, and between the
same parallels, are equal.' By farther combinations , the rea-
soner might go on to deduce or infer the 47th, and so forth.
All which is a purely synthetic operation ; and geometrical
truths may be evolved to any extent in this way. Corollaries
are usually deductive inferences, of short leap, from the main
proposition. The operation is seldom one of simple deduc-
tion, there is usually a certain concurrence of two or more
propositions to the new result ; and the mental effort lies in
bringing these together. Geometrical synthesis and deduc-
tion are thus the same thing .
What then is Geometrical Analysis ? Is it Induction ? We
are told that it proceeds from the unknown to the known. If
one were to suspect or surmise (without being sure) that the
26
402 ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS.

square of the hypothenuse of a triangle is equal to the sum of

the squares of the sides, and assuming it, were to endeavour
to connect it by a thread of geometrical reasoning with the
established propositions of geometry, the operation would be
called analytic or regressive, as compared with the synthetic
or progressive course above described . Yet in reality, the
mental operation is substantially the same in both ; the two
differ only in superficial appearance, like the enquiry from
cause to effect, aud from effect to cause. Assuming the truth
of the surmise first, we have to consider what prior proposi-
tions would be requisite to support it ; and, again, what other
propositions would support these ; until we come at last
upon admitted theorems . The real operation at each step is
a deductive one ; we feign a proposition and try its conse-
quences ; if these coincide with the case, such proposition or
propositions are what we need ; and if they are found among
the true propositions of geometry, we have made good our
point ; we have proved our surmise, and put it in the train of
geometrical deductions.
The facilities for this inverted deduction are so greatly mul-
tiplied by Algebra as to give to the algebraic processes the
designation analytical ' by pre- eminence. In an Algebraic
equation, we work backward from the known to the unknown ;
yet it is by a series of properly deductive operations — the
application of axioms and theorems already established.
Algebraic Geometry is called ' Analytical ; ' the more recon-
dite processes of Algebra are called the Higher Analysis.
Thus, while Synthesis has throughout a reference to the
deductive and combining processes of science, Analysis relates
to generalization or induction, everywhere except in Mathe-
matics, where it is merely the mode of deductive synthesis
adapted to the solution of special problems. The geometer,
when he has no special end in view, evolves new propositions
by direct or progressive synthesis ; when he has a problem to
work out, he confines his deductions to those that lie in the
approaches to the desired solution. The course of discovery
in a Deductive science can be only Deductive ; it consists in
following out generalities in hand to new applications ; usually
by combining several in one application . The art, the labour,
lies in the union of several propositions to a result. The
operation must be tentative ; it cannot be foretold ; yet it is
amenable to a certain general method, which practice instils,
and which is not altogether beyond the reach of precept.
 BACON ON THE NECESSITY OF FACTS. 403

G.- GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.

Previous to Mr. Mill, the principal contributors to the Logic
of Induction were Bacon, Newton, Herschel, and Whewell.
BACON.- The essential part of the service rendered by Bacon
to Science was his protest in favour of basing generalities on a
patient collection and accurate comparison of facts . It was
too much the custom, he complained, to ' just glance at experi-
ments and particulars in passing ;' in place of this, he proposed
to dwell duly and orderly among them.' With the whole
force of his eloquence he discouraged flighty speculation and
rash conjecture, and urged that generalities must be founded
upon a wide comparison of particulars.
Following up his emphatic enunciation that men must have
done with rash speculations and rashly abstracted notions, if
they desire to make progress in their knowledge of Nature, he
devised modes of elucidating truth by the comparison of
instances on a methodical plan. He directs the arrangement
of facts in three different tables . The first table is to contain
instances agreeing in the presence of the phenomenon to be
investigated ; this he calls a Table of Essence and Presence
(Tabula Essentiae et Praesentiae) . The second table is to con-
tain instances wanting in the phenomenon, but otherwise
allied to the instances where the phenomenon occurs, each
instance corresponding as far as possible to some one instance
in the first table ; this he calls the Table of Deviation, or of
Absence in Allied Instances ( Tabula Declinationis, sive Absen-
tiae in Proximo). The third table contains the phenomenon in
different degrees, and is called the Table of Degrees or Table
of Comparison (Tabula Graduum, sive Tabula Comparitiva) .
The constitution of the three Tables is exemplified upon an
enquiry into the phenomenon of Heat ; for the prosecution of
which are assembled no less than 27 instances agreeing in the
presence of heat, 32 allied instances agreeing in its absence,
and 41 instances of heat manifested in different degrees.
The three Tables seem designed for the convenient applica-
tion of the three leading methods of Inductive elimination—
Agreement, Difference, and Concomitant Variations ; but we
must not suppose that Bacon realized anything like the
precision of those methods. He did not conceive the idea of
choosing his instances so that they should differ in every point
but the phenomenon under investigation, agreeing only in that
-the fundamental idea of the method of Agreement. Nor did
he conceive the idea of the decisive method of Difference, the
404 GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.

choice of two instances agreeing in every point save the given

phenomenon. Having collected his Tables of Instances, he
went to work by excluding according to certain canons the
irrelevant instances, then making a hypothesis or guess at the
truth, and finally verifying this by farther enquiry.
Bacon takes especial credit for his process of Exclusion or
Rejection. He contrasts it with the popular method of pro-
ceeding by Simple Enumeration, that is, by counting only the
favourable instances, overlooking the unfavourable ; and he
claims to be the first to make it prominent. The problem of
Induction being to find such a quality as is always present or
absent with the given quality, and always increases or
decreases with it, ' ' the first work of true induction is the
rejection or exclusion of the several qualities which are not
found in some instance where the given quality is present, or
are found in some instance where the given quality is absent,
or are found to increase in some instance where the given
quality decreases, or to decrease when the given quality
increases.'
It will be observed that this process of exclusion, although
a great advance upon generalizing without regard to contra-
dictory instances, is very rudimentary. Bacon does not dis-
tinguish between laws of simple Co-existence and laws of
Causation. The first of his principles of Rejection is suited
only to the establishment of co - existences, and amounts to this,
that we are not to declare two qualities universally concomi-
tant, if in certain instances we find one absent when the other
is present. His other principle of rejection is the reverse of
the method of Concomitant variations, a disproving of causal
connexion on account of independent variation ; and applies
to causation alone.
As to the modes of certifying the hypothesis allowed after
this process of collecting and sifting instances -the Logic of
Proof, Bacon has left us but a fragment. Of his nine divi-
sions of aids to Induction, he completed only the first, Prero-
gative Instances. Under this head, he dictates a farther
enquiry into particulars, and dwells upon instances of special
value to the inquirer, calling them Prerogative from that cir-
cumstance. To call this division of his subject an aid to
induction is misleading ; we expect to find an account of
instances particularly suitable for founding inductions upon,
and find instead illustrations of various maxims applicable to
Definition, Observation, and even Experiment, as well as some
specially adapted for Inductive Elimination.
 BACON'S INDUCTIVE METHODS. 405

It is among the Prerogative Instances, if anywhere, that we

are to look whether Bacon had conceived any practical device
for bringing the process of Exclusion or Elimination to a po-
sitive result, as is done in the modern methods of Agreement
and Difference . Under the heading of Solitary Instances, we
do find a crude approach to the selection of instances implied
in these methods. Solitary Instances are either instances
that exhibit a phenomenon without any of its usual accom-
paniments, as colour produced by the passage of light through
a prism ; or instances agreeing in everything except some
particular phenomenon, as different colours in the same piece
of marble. He says in a vague way that such instances
shorten very much the process of Exclusion . They contain
really all that is demanded for the methods of Agreement and
Difference. Yet in Bacon's hands they are comparatively
useless, and, as part of his method, could not even furnish a
suggestion for more perfect contrivances. The reasons are to
be found in his vague conception of the problem of Induction.
His methods of Exclusion are of avail only for problems of
Cause and Effect ; they are superfluous for problems of simple
concomitance, a single instance of disunion being sufficient to
disprove such a connexion ; yet he speaks throughout as if
his elaborate comparison of instances were designed only to
prove two properties co-existent. To this confusion he was
inevitably led by the subjects he proposed to investigate. He
seems to have thought principally of investigating abstract
qualities of bodies, such as density, weight, colour, volatility,
porosity, heat ; his purpose being to establish their Form, by
which he seems to have vaguely understood something inva-
riably present with these qualities and endowing them with
their peculiar nature. Such an investigation gave ample
scope for numerous assemblages of instances ; but the methods
of sound knowledge were not likely to be perfected in a region
that can be approached only by hypothesis.
Under Migratory Instances, keeping still in view the same
class of subjects, he recommends attention to cases where
qualities are produced in bodies ; giving, as examples the pro-
duction of whiteness by pounding glass and by agitating water
into froth. From this we gather that he was sensible in a
measure of the advantage of studying the introduction of a
cause into known circumstances, although in his narrow field
of investigation it could lead to no result.
In these two first instances we see how far he anticipated
the Methods of Agreement and of Difference. Few ofthe other
406 GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.

twenty-five instances bear strictly on the Inductive Process.

With Migratory Instances, he compares Instances ofCompanion-
ship or Enmity, such as the universal concurrence of heat with
flame, and the universal absence of consistency in air ; just as
when a change is produced, we must seek the cause in some
added influence , so when a quality is always present in a sub-
stance, we must seek the cause in some property of that sub-
stance. In Striking or Shining Instances, and Clandestine
Instances , he urges the importance of the two extremes in a
variable phenomenon. His seventh and eighth Instances,
Singular Instances ( as the magnet among stones, quicksilver
among metals) , and Deviating Instances ( individual monstro-
sities ) , are important for a like reason ; their novelty sharpens
investigation. His twelfth case, Instances of Ultimity or Limit,
is of the same nature. The five last go together ; the stimu-
lating efficacy ascribed to them is a favourite topic with
Bacon, and is the real characteristic of several other Instances.
Instances of Alliance or Union and Instances of Divorce, the
thirteenth and fourteenth, form a natural couple. The one
constitute instances reconciling apparent contradictions ; the
heat of the Sun cherishes, the heat of Fire destroys ; a con-
ciliatory instance is found in the growth of grapes in a house
heated by fire. The second constitute instances disproving
an alleged universal connection ; it is asserted that Heat,
Brightness, Rarity, Mobility are always found together ; we
point to air, which is rare and mobile but neither hot nor bright.
In exemplifying Instances Conformable or of Analogy, he
breaks clean away from Inductive caution ; he gives as ana-
logous cases the gums of trees and most rock gems, and refers
the splendour and clearness of both products to the same
cause, fine and delicate filtering. Such fancies show how little
Bacon was removed from the rash speculation he condemned
in the works of his predecessors.
His fourteenth case, the famous Instantia Crucis (Fingerpost
Instance), is mentioned in the Chapter on Hypotheses, § 7,
(p. 135) , and is there placed in its true light as an instance
decisive of rival hypotheses. Such instances are otherwise
called Decisive and Judicial or Oracular and Commanding.
These are all the instances that have a direct bearing on
Induction. Of the remainder, two are of importance for Defi-
nition, the fifth and the ninth, Constitutive Instances, and
Bordering Instances. Constitutive instances give the constitu-
ents of a complex notion ; Bordering instances make the
baffling transition border between two classes.
 PREROGATIVE INSTANCES OF BACON. 407

Five instances are classed together as Instances of the Lamp,

or of First Information ; and relate to Observation . Under
Instances of the Door or Gate he comments on artificial aids to
the Senses-the Microscope, the Telescope, and measuring
rods. By Summoning or Evoking Instances, he means indica-
tions of things not directly accessible to observation ; such
are the pulse and the urine, as symptoms of the condition of
the human body. Instances of the Road, otherwise called
Travelling and Articulate Instances, display stages of growth
and of other gradual changes :-the study of these is strongly
recommended. Supplementary Instances or Instances of Refuge
are said to supply us with information when the senses entirely
fail us ; when we cannot remove an agent altogether we may
vary its influence, and when a phenomenon defies observation
we may study analogous phenomena. Dissecting or Awakening
Instances are such as great effects produced by small causes ;
they appeal to our wonder, and stimulate enquiry.
The seven concluding instances embody advice on the prac-
tical conduct of investigations. The four first of the seven
instruct us how to attain precision by definite determination
and measurement (Mathematical or Measuring Instances) ; the
three last how to economize our resouces (Propitious or Bene-
volent Instances) . The Mathematical Instances are Instances
ofthe Rod or Rule, otherwise called of Range or of Limitation
(where measurement of Space is required ) ; Instances of the
Course (measurement of Time) ; Instances of Quantity, or Doses
of Nature (where attention is called to the quantity of an
agent) ; and Instances of Strife or Predominance, under which
title he gives a confused enumeration of various ' Motions,' or
tendencies to motion, and represents the movements of bodies
as determined by the victory of one or other of these conflict-
ing tendencies -for example, when water runs out of a crack,
the motion of Continuity is overcome by the motion of Greater
Congregation (the tendency of bodies to the ground) . Nothing
could be more fanciful and illogical than this enumeration of
' Motions . ' The Propitious Instances are- Intimating In-
stances, which point out what is most useful to mankind ;
Polychrest Instances or Instances of General Use, (contrivances
useful for a variety of purposes, as various modes of excluding
air from bodies to prevent decomposition) ; finally, Instances
of Magic, the use of small causes to produce great effects.
We have given no account of the tenth division , Instances
of Power, otherwise Instances of the Wit or Hands of Man. It
is partly identical with awakening Instances : we have singled
408 GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.

it out here as containing a homily against being led away by

admiration of skilful contrivances from better ways of accom-
plishing the same end.
In concluding this brief account of the Baconian method
we may reiterate that the merit of Bacon lay neither in the
machinery he provided nor in the example he set, but in the
grand impulse he gave to the study of facts.
NEWTON. Newton cannot be said, any more than Bacon,
to have made a direct contribution to the methods either of
Discovery or of Proof; but he set an example of rigorously
cautious enquiry that did more than all the precepts of Bacon
to raise the standard of Proof, and to purify science of fanciful
hypotheses. He even went to an extreme and was over-
rigorous in his requirements of proof ; such was his dislike to
making hypotheses (in the sense of assuming causes not
known to exist) , that he wished to banish them from science
altogether.
The Rules of Philosophizing (Regula Philosophandi) pre-
fixed to his Principia were long quoted as authoritative.
Although worded with an express view to the establishment
of Gravitation, they are necessarily applicable to other induc-
tive generalizations.
The Frst rule is twofold, and may be thus explicated .
(661 ) " Only real causes " (veræ causæ, actually existing causes)
are to be admitted in explanation of phenomena." We have
stated the limits to this under Hypotheses (p. 131 ) . (2 ) " No
more causes are to be admitted than such as suffice to explain
the phenomena." This is an echo of the maxim known as
' Occam's razor ' (' Entia non sunt multiplicanda præter neces-
sitatem ' ), and means that when one cause is proved to be
present in sufficient amount for the effect, we are not at
liberty to suppose the presence of other causes . From a few
words of explanation affixed to the rule, we should gather that
he meant also to suggest that there was a presumption in
favour of an explanation accounting for the phenomena by the
fewest agencies -a special pleading for his theory of gravita-
tion : Nature does nothing in vain , and a thing is done in
vain by several agents when it can be done by a smaller
number.'
The Second rule is-" In as far as possible, the same causes
are to be assigned for the same kind of natural effects." For
example, respiration in man and in beasts ; the fall of stones
in Europe and in America. An aspect of the Uniformity of
Nature designed to favour his view of Solar attraction as the
 NEWTON'S RULES OF PHILOSOPHIZING. 409

same kind of effect with the attraction of the Earth for the
Moon or for terrestrial bodies.
The Third-"Qualities of bodies that can neither be increased
nor diminished in intensity, and that obtain in all bodies
accessible to experiment, must be considered qualities of all
bodies whatsoever." Another aspect of the Uniformity of
Nature, also specially adapted to his extension of Gravity to
the heavenly bodies.
The Fourth In philosophical experiment, propositions
collected from phenomena by induction, are to be held, not-
withstanding contrary hypotheses, as either exactly or ap-
proximately true, until other phenomena occur whereby they
are either rendered more exact or are proved liable to excep-
tions.' This is indirectly aimed at the Cartesian explanation of
the celestial movements by Vortices, the word hypothesis being
used in an opprobrious sense, as involving an element of fancy
operating upon imperfectly known materials. The rule may
be held to imply that the test of a theory is its accordance
with facts, which is not altogether correct.
HERSCHEL. Sir John Herschel devotes a considerable por-
tion of his Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy to an
account of the principles on which Physical Science relies
for its successful prosecution, and the rules by which a syste-
matic examination of Nature should be conducted, with illus-
trations of their influence as exemplified in the history of its
progress.' His introductory chapters on this head reiterate
with greater clearness the admonitions of Bacon ; enforcing
recourse to experience as the sole fountain of knowledge,
illustrating the dangers of prejudice, and urging the import-
ance of recording observations with numerical precision.
Farther, he dwells upon the value of Classification and
Nomenclature ; although he suggests no leading principles for
either process . In these preliminary remarks we recognize
the sagacity of the practised experimenter ; but it is when he
comes to analyze what is involved in the notion of Cause, and
to state his rules of philosophizing, that we become fully aware
of the advance made in the investigation of Nature since
Bacon and Newton, and of the advantage possessed by the
expounder of scientific method in having a large body of
successful observations and experiments to generalize from .
From the characters implied in the connexion between
cause and effect, he derives nine ' propositions readily appli-
cable to particular cases, or rules of philosophizing. ' Four of
them , the second, seventh, eighth, and ninth, are the four
410 GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.

Experimental Methods ; which are stated with sufficient pre-

cision, although not exalted into the prominence given them by
Mr. Mill as the sufficing and only methods of Proof. By
Herschel in fact, the four rules are regarded solely as aids to
Discovery ; the idea of Proof does not seem to have crossed
his mind. His other rules are more purely suited for Dis-
covery. The first is a more precise statement of Bacon's main
principle of Exclusion , the foundation of the methods of Agree-
ment and of Difference : -' that if in our group of facts there
be one in which any assigned peculiarity or attendant circum-
stance is wanting or opposite, such peculiarity cannot be the
cause we seek.' The third is we are not to deny the exist-
ence of a cause in favour of which we have a unanimous
agreement of strong analogies , though it may not be apparent
how such a cause can produce the effect, or even though it
may be difficult to conceive its existence under the circum-
stances of the case ' : —a maxim identical with the principle of
analogy, that we may sometimes infer the presence of one
phenomenon from the presence of another, although no causal
connection has been established between them. As an example
he states that though we do not know how heat can produce
light, we yet conclude that the sun is intensely hot because it
is vividly luminous. The fourth rule is that ' contrary or
opposing facts are equally instructive for the discovery of
causes with favourable ones.' The fifth recommends the
tabulation of facts in the order of intensity in which some
peculiar quality subsists,'-perhaps the most valuable art of
Discovery. To this precept Herschel very properly appends
that the value of the device may be frustrated by the interfer-
ence of counteracting or modifying causes. The sixth rule
6
reminds the enquirer that such counteracting or modifying
causes may subsist unperceived,' and urges attention to them
as a means of explaining exceptions.
In some general remarks following the enunications of his
rules, he illustrates the necessity of combining Deduction with
Induction in complicated enquiries, and explains the nature
of Empirical Laws, glancing at the fact that they are limited
in their application to new cases, without stating more pre-
cisely what their limits are.
'
The concluding chapter treats of the higher degrees of
Inductive Generalization, and of the formatiou and verification
of theories.' He insists that the assumed agents must be
·
veræ causa, such as we have good inductive grounds to
believe do exist in nature.' The value and the test of a hypo-
 WHEWELL'S FACTS AND IDEAS. 411

thesis he places in its accordance with the facts, and its enabling
us to predict facts before trial.'
WHEWELL. The scheme of the late Dr. Whewell's Novum
Organum Renovatum commends itself as strikingly thorough
6
and exhaustive. It professes to be a revision and improve-
ment of the methods by which Science must rise and grow,'
founded upon a comprehensive History of Scientific Discovery
and a History of Scientific Idcas. Now, theoretically, there
could be no more perfect way of elaborating a body of maxims
for the aid of the discoverer, than to pass in review, chronolo-
gically or otherwise, the great physical discoveries that have
been made, and to study the essentials of the process in each
case.
The distinguishing feature of Whewell's scientific writings
is his persistent driving at an antithesis that he conceives to
be fundamental, between Ideas or Conceptions and Facts.
This antithesis is the shaping principle of his system and
meets us at every point. It regulates the division of his
history into two parts : the History of Scientific Ideas tracing
the gradual development of the so- called ideas, such as Cause
Affinity, Life, that form the subject- matter of various depart-
ments of science ; and the History of Scientific Discovery, illus-
trating how by the instrumentality of Ideas (the highest
generalities) , and of Conceptions (the lower generalities) , the
particular facts of Nature are united and bound together.
The same antithesis divides scientific method into two pro-
cesses. Generalization consisting not in evolving notions from
a comparison of facts, but in superinducing upon facts con.
ceptions supplied by the mind. There are two requisites to
satisfy before this operation can be perfected, namely, that the
Conceptions be clear and distinct, and that they be ' appro-
6
priate to the Facts, capable of being applied to them so as
to produce an exact and universal accordance : ' whence there
are two scientific processes, the Explication of Conceptions and
the Colligation ofFacts.
The grand problem of Science is to superinduce Ideas or
Conceptions upon Facts. The business of the discoverer after
familiarizing himself with facts, is to compare them with con-
ception after conception, in the view of finding out after a
longer or shorter process of trial and rejection, what concep-
6
tion is exactly appropriate ' to the facts under his consider-
ation. When the investigator has at length, by a happy guess,
6
hit upon the appropriate conception, he is said to colligate'
the facts, to bind them into a unity.' No distinction is
412 GROWTH OF THE LOGIC OF INDUCTION.

drawn in this operation between the generalization of Notions

and the generalization of Propositions ; the difference between
them is merged in the one grand purpose of procuring for
facts clear and appropriate conceptions.
It is difficult to understand what he supposes to have been
the origin of the conceptions thus superinduced upon facts.
He speaks of them as being struck out in the gradual march
of Science by the discussions and reflections of successive
thinkers, a view not inconsistent with their derivation from
the comparison of particulars and the gradual evolution of
deep and pervading agreements. But he says also that they
are supplied by the mind, while facts are supplied by sense ;
and the language he holds regarding the suiting of facts with
their appropriate ' conceptions, is consistent only with the
assumption that the mind is a repository of conceptions accu-
mulated there independently of the experience of particulars.
By this initial severance of generalities from the particulars
they repose upon, he excluded from his method definitions
formed by the comparison of facts and the precise statement
of common features. He rather decries the value of Definition,
and allows it no place of hononr in his Explication ofConceptions.
The meaning of a conception is, he thinks, oftener apprehended
from an axiom than a definition-another instance of his total
neglect of the distinction between notions and propositions.
His ' methods employed in the formation of Science ,' the
title of the third Book of the Novum Organon, are three in
number, Methods of Observation, Methods of obtaining clear
Ideas, and Methods of Induction. As a preliminary to Obser-
vation, he recognises an Analysis or Decomposition of Facts.
Under Observation, he discusses chiefly the modes of obtaining
precise measurement ; he speaks also of the education of the
senses, but does not attempt to lay down any definite precepts
farther than recommending the study of Natural History and
the practice of Experimental manipulation . His Methods ofac-
quiring clear scientific ideas, are neither more nor less than
the study of the various departments of science where the
ideas occur ; the very method that would be recommended by
a preceptor believing in the evolution of general notions from
particulars. An aid to the acquisition of clear ideas is Discus-
sion.
We find no trace of the three leading Experimental Methods
in his Methods of Induction, nor indeed of any methods of
Proof. He conceived that his province was to furnish arts of
Discovery, in so far as anything was of avail beyond natural
 WHEWELL'S METHODS OF INDUCTION. 413

sagacity ; and he seems to have thought slightingly of the

efficacy of the Three Methods as a means to the attainment of
new laws. His principal arts of Discovery are given under
6
the title of Special Methods of Induction applicable to Quan-
tity." The Method of Curves is a device for making apparent
to the eye the result of observations on the concomitant varia-
tion of two phenomena. It consists in drawing a curve of
which the observed quantities are the Ordinates, the quantity
on which the change of these quantities depends being the
Abcissa.' The Method of Means is the familiar device of
eliminating the effects of a constant cause from the conjoined
effects of accidental accompaniments by striking an average of
several observations . The Method of Least Squares is a some-
what complicated supplement to the Method of Means. When
more than one mean is proposed, they are each compared with
the series of actual observations ; the deviations from each
case in the series are squared, and the mean is affirmed to be
most probable, the sum of whose squares is lowest in amount.
The Method of Residues is the method we described under that
name.
Under the title of ' Methods of Induction depending on
Resemblance,' he illustrates the Law of Continuity ( ‘ that a
quantity cannot pass from one amount to another by any
change of conditions, without passing through all intermediate
magnitudes according to the intermediate conditions ' ) ; the
Method of Gradation, a name given to the process of proving
that things differ not in kind but in degree) ; and, in the
Method of Natural Classification, enforces the importance of
grouping objects according to their most important resem-
blances.
Perhaps the most valuable part of the Organon is the con-
cluding Book on the Language of Science. Of this subject
Whewell had made a special study ; his aphorisms on the
requisites of philosophical language contain nearly all the
important points.
H.-ART OF DISCOVERY.
It was the distinction of Mr. Mill's handling of Logic to
draw a clear and broad line between the Art and Science of
Proof and the Art of Discovery. The main business of Logic,
according to him, is the proving of propositions ; only in an
incidental way does it aid in suggesting them.
There is, in the laws of evidence well understood , a power-
ful indirect incitement to original discovery. A thorough
414 ART OF DISCOVERY.

means of testing whatever is propounded for acceptance leads

to the rejection of the false, and, consequently to a renewed
search, ending at last in the true. For this reason alone
would discovery be more rapid in the Mathematical and
Physical sciences, where verification is easy, than in the
Mental, Moral, and Political sciences, where the facts are
wanting in the requisite precision. Kepler was not left in any
doubts as to whether he had arrived at the true law of the
periodic times of the planets ; psychologists could not so
easily satisfy themselves as to the thorough-going concomitance
of mind and body.
The Arts and methods of Discovery embrace ( 1 ) the Facts,
that is, Observation ; and (2) the Reasonings on Facts, namely,
Deduction, Induction , and Definition ; which are all compre-
hended in the one process, generalization.
As regards the accumulation of Facts, there is little to be
said, and that little is apparent at a glance. Facts are ob-
tained by active search, enquiry, adventure, exploration. For
some, we must travel far, and visit many countries ; for others
we have to lie in wait till occasions arise. For a third class,
we have to institute experiments, involving contrivance and
devices, and the creative ingenuity of the practical mind ; all
which is itself a department of discovery, the least of any
amenable to rules.
The arts of Observing were remarked on, in the Introduc-
tion, as being special for each department, and not a fit sub-
ject for general logic . The precautions common to all kinds
of observation, in regard to accuracy and evidence, would be
worthy of being recited, provided there could be given a suffi-
ciency of illustrative instances to make the desired impression.
From the limitation of the human faculties, the highest
powers of observation are not usually accompanied with high
speculative force. Hence, among other consequences, a not
unusual misdirection of the energies of great observers.
Passing from the region of fact, we come to the region of
Generality. A number of individual observations being sup-
posed, the next thing is to discover agreements among them-
to strike out identities wherever there are points to be identi-
fied ; these identities ending either in Notions or in General
Principles. It may seem a work of vast labour to exhaust
all the facts of the material and of the mental world ; it is not a
less labour, although of a different kind, to exhaust all the
identities among the facts.
Although the main condition of success, in bringing about
 PSYCHOLOGICAL AIDS TO DISCOVERY. 415

identities, is a peculiar intellectual aptitude, belonging to some

men in a pre-eminent degree ; yet there are aids, methods,
and precautions, for increasing the power. Some of these
aids are suggested by intellectual psychology, others grow out
of the methods unfolded in logic.
The methods growing out of the psychology of the intellec-
tual powers are briefly these :-to possess the mind of a large
store of the related facts ; often to refresh the recollection of
them ; to come into frequent contact with subjects that seem
likely to afford comparisons and analogies ; not to stand too
near any one set of facts so as to be overpowered by their
specialities ; not to be engrossed with the work of observing
the facts ; and in general, as to matters of great difficulty, to
keep the mind free from attitudes and pursuits antagonistic
to the end in view.
Newton alternately devoted himself to mathematics and to
the observation and collection of facts in the various subjects
of natural philosophy ; and this alternation doubtless makes
the perfect physical enquirer.
Frequently an identification has to be embedded in some
conception apart from the facts ; as Kepler's laws in numerical
and geometrical statements, the law of sines, &c. In such
cases, proximity to the sources of the conceptions will help to
bring about the coalition. If mathematical relations, the
mathematical knowledge should be kept fresh, and so with
other subjects . These constructing instances alone give any
meaning to Whewell's much iterated antithesis of Fact and
Idea. The identification and generalization of facts often
happens without any ' idea,' any central form, or representa-
tive beyond the facts themselves ; there is no idea for a circle
but round things, abstractedly viewed ; and no idea for gravity,
but gravitating bodies compared and regarded in their points.
of agreement. In certain other cases, a conception is obtained
(not from any intuitive source , but) from some already existing
generalization, either in the same department, or in another
department. The idea ' for embracing water, waves, and
sound vibrations, was found by Newton in the ' Pendulum ;'
and apart from the facts themselves, no better ' idea ' has yet
been given .
The connexion of Body and Mind has its ' idea ' yet to seek.
There has hitherto prevailed the bad idea of External and In-
ternal. In short, the most suitable comparison wherein to em-
brace the relation has not been obtained fromany source, intuitive
or other. One approximation is a union of distinct states.'
416 ART OF DISCOVERY.

The arriving at difficult identifications, that is, the tracing

of similarities shrouded in diversity, by such devices as have
been advanced in logic with a more special eye to proof, may
be viewed in the first place with regard to generalization as
such ; not distinguishing the notion from the principle or
proposition. What pertains specially to the induction of the
general proposition, namely, the concomitance of distinct pro-
perties, is best considered apart.
Under the Deductive Method (p. 96) attention was called
to three helps to the discovery of generalities-multiplication
of instances, close individual scrutiny of instances, and selec-
tion of the least complicated instances. A wider view of the
available resources must now be taken. We have to see how
far the thorough explication of the reasoning processes, and of
all the adjuncts to reasoning, called forth by the comprehen-
sive Logic of Proof, can be brought to bear also in the striking
out of suggestions to be submitted to proof or disproof.
The first great practical lesson derivable from Logic, and
applicable in a much wider sphere than proof, is to impress us
with Generality as the central fact of science and of all know-
ledge transcending individuals. After we have gained posses-
sion of a certain range of facts, the next great aim is to
generalize them to the uttermost . This is not all. In pro-
portion to the compass of any agreement, ought to be the
pains taken with it, and the prominence given to it. We
have urged, under the Logic of Medicine, the prime import-
ance ofgeneralizing the Diseased Processes and General Thera-
peutics, because of the wider compass of their application. In
everything else, the rule holds. The biologist should take no
rest until he has exhaustively accumulated instances of the
great fact of Assimilation, under every possible variation of
circumstances. In like manner, the physical concomitants of
mental processes need to be searched out in all their innumer-
able modes, in order to rise to the generalities of the connexion.
The severest etiquette of the most punctilious system of
ranks and dignities in society is as nothing compared with the
graduation of estimate and of respect to be shown to generali-
ties of different grades. It is a grave logical misdemeanour
ever to give an inferior generality precedence over a superior,
or to treat the two as of equal consequence, or even for a
moment to be unaware of their relative standing. We may
give all due consideration to the phenomenon of falling bodies
as a wide fact co- extensive with the surface of the earth ; but
in presence of the superior sway of the law of gravity through-
 VALUE OF ORDER AND METHOD. 417

out the solar system, the terrestrial fact must sink into a
second place in our esteem .
The next great application of Method, as an aid to discovery,
consists in the use of the various Forms or Formalities, ela-
borated with a view to proof. This is the largest part of the
present subject.
Logicians have always striven to set forth the value of Order,
method, and explicitness, in complicated statements. Hamil-
ton's dictum - making explicit in the statement what is implicit
in the thought-has been received as a happy enunciation of
one function of logic. Mr. Mill remarks,- One of the great
uses of a discipline in Formal Logic, is to make us aware when
something that claims to be a single proposition, really con-
sists of several, which, not being necessarily involved one in
another, require to be separated, and to be considered each by
itself, before we admit the compound assertion.' This is the
disentangling or analyzing function of the syllogism, and is
deservedly extolled as perhaps its highest utility. It is a
direct remedy for the weakness of the mind formerly adverted
to (p.398).
We may, however, go farther back than the exposition of
Syllogism for valuable aids growing out of the logical formali-
ties. All the Equivalent Propositional Forms are instrumental
as means of suggestion . They enlarge the compass of any
given proposition, by unfolding all its implications ; many of
these not being disposed to rise to view of themselves, or
Iwithout the stimulus of the formal enunciation . Of all the
modes of Equivalence, probably the Obverse is the most fruit-
ful and suggestive ; this has become apparent on many occa-
sions, in the course of the present work ; we may instance
especially negative defining. Next in value is Conversion ; the
converting ofA by its legitimate form is a check to the blunder
of supposing the subject and predicate co-extensive in uni-
versal affirmations ; and the arresting of the mind on the road
to impending error seldom ends there, but is also a start in
the search for truth. Even the immediate inference from the
Universal to the Particular is suggestive of facts not previously
in the view.
Much could be said as to the unsystematic but wide-ranging
mode of Equivalence by Synomyous terms, or by varying the
ways of expressing the same proposition. Although some-
what ensnaring, this is a fruitful and suggestive operation.
Its power consists in resuscitating from the stores of the past
all the various known examples of the proposition ; to which
27
418 ART OF DISCOVERY .

also may be added even illustrations and analogies. We know

from many celebrated instances, how mere opulence of phrase-
ology gives the semblance, and occasionally the reality, of
superior insight. The Shakespearian wisdom, the stirring
apothegms of Pope, have their source, not in the scientific
process of the intellect, but in the suggestiveness of exuberant
phraseology.
The Methods of INDUCTIVE Elimination, both directly and
indirectly assist in Discovery. The collection and comparison
of instances, to comply with the method of Agreement as a
method of proof, will in many cases lead to new and improved
generalizations. A man can scarcely go through the labour
requisite for establishing a law of high generality upon ade-
quate evidence, without adding to his knowledge of the law.
Especially is this likely to happen in working the Method of
Agreement, whose exigencies are exactly those of inductive
discovery.
The same remark applies to the union of Agreement in
Absence with Agreement in Presence ; and there is the addi-
tional force and incisiveness that always belongs to the working
of the negative side.
The method of Residues, to which Sir John Herschel called
special attention, was by him expressly commended as an aid
to Discovery.
The importance of Concomitant Variations has already been
signalized, and will be again referred to.
Without dwelling farther on the specific virtues of the
several methods, we would call attention to the value of a
complete scheme of Inductive Proof, in urging a search for
instances to fill up all its requirements. He that has thoroughly
mastered the experimental methods, desires to bring up in
favour of every important principle a series of particulars
under each one of them separately ; an operation as fertile for
discovery as it is thorough-going for proof or disproof.
The remark is not confined to the methods of experimental
elimination . The greater number of propositions or laws may
derive evidence through the Deductive Method, and through
Chance and Probability also. The wish to satisfy all possible
methods of establishing a law is a wholesome stimulus to
enquire after the very facts that improve the character and
extend the application of the law. The consilience of Induc-
tion and Deduction is the very highest art that the human
intellect can command, not merely for proving difficult propo-
sitions, but for getting hold of propositions to be proved.
 INDUCTIVE ELIMINATION. 419

All this is to repeat in another shape, and in a grander

sphere, the function of the Syllogism in insisting that there
should be produced an explicit major and an explicit minor
premise in any pretended ratiocination. Every inductive in-
stance should be viewed in its proper character, by reference
to the method that it subserves. An instance of Agreement
should be given as such ; a Deductive proof should be quoted
under that description. If the Logical rules are not arbitrary,
but founded on a correct analysis of the scientific processes,
the conscious reference to them, on all different occasions,
must be a relief and a comfort to the perplexed enquirer.
The Deductiveoperation, understood not formally as in the
syllogism, but really and materially, as in finding new appli-
cations and extensions of inductions, is a pure generalizing
process. It consists in identifying particulars with other par-
ticulars, exactly as in the properly inductive operation. It is
the same march of mind continued and prolonged. An induc-
tion so called is merely a certain collection of particulars, with
a generalized expression superadded ; deduction is the bring-
ing in of new particulars. The difference of the two is not in
the mental operation ; it is in the end that is served. The
inductive particulars are those necessary for giving the gen-
eralized expression , and for proving it as a law of nature ; the
subsequent deduced particulars, not being required for esta-
blishing the generality, receive illumination from the other
class. In both cases the effort of discovery is identical ; it is
the bringing together in the mind by the force of resemblance
a host of particular facts from all times, places, and subjects.
Before the induction is gained, the particulars contribute to
its establishment ; after it is gained, the new particulars are
receivers and not givers of benefit.
The processes included under DEFINITION- the canons for
Defining, General Naming, and Classification -are processes
of Discovery directly, and of Proof indirectly. Mr. Mill calls
them subsidiary to Induction, meaning Inductive Proof.
Every step indicated under those several heads has an imme-
diate efficacy either in suggesting generalities, or in purifying
them from ambiguity, perplexity, and confusion . It is impos-
sible to make a single well concerted move in any of the paths
marked out in these several departments without gaining an
enlargement of views, or the means of some future enlarge-
ment.
Everything of the nature of an antidote to inadvertent and
confused thinking, everything that reduces information to the
420 ART OF DISCOVERY.

shape best suited for recollection and reference, everything

that facilitates the comparison of resembling facts- must be
enrolled among the means of Discovery. These various ends
are explicitly aimed at by the prescriptions contained under
Definition, Naming, and Classification. To substantiate the
allegation would be to rehearse the methods explained
under those heads. The amassing of particulars, positive and
negative, with a view to Definition, is the express act of gen-
eralization, and brings with it discoveries of concomitance, as
well as generalizes notions. All the devices of Naming are
intended primarily to ease and assist the understanding in
arriving at new truths. The machinery of Classification is still
more strikingly the economizing of the faculties in amassing
and in manipulating knowledge.
When the generalizing process has expressly in view the
discovery of laws, or concurring properties, a most material
help (as formerly seen) is afforded by Tabulation, espe-
cially according to a scale of degree. Failing this, great stress
is always laid upon extreme instances. These are the glaring
and striking instances of Bacon and Herschel (see the Re-
search on Dew, p. 68) . The method of exhibiting gradation
by Curves is considered one of the best ways of suggesting
numerical laws.
Mr. Darwin has given an account of the steps that led him
to propound the doctrine of Development under Natural
Selection. It affords an interesting commentary on the fore-
going enumeration of the causes that prompt original sugges-
tions.
'When I visited, during the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, the
Galapagos Archipelago, situated in the Pacific Ocean about
500 miles from the shore of South America, I found myself
surrounded by peculiar species of birds, reptiles, and plants,
existing nowhere else in the world. Yet they nearly all bore
an American stamp. In the song of the mocking- thrush, in
the harsh cry of the carrion-hawk, in the great candlestick-
like opuntias, I clearly perceived the neighbourhood of
America, though the islands were separated by so many miles
of ocean from the mainland, and differed from it in their
geological constitution and climate. Still more surprising was
the fact that most of the inhabitants of each separate island
in this small archipelago were specifically different, though most
closely related to each other. The archipelago, with its innu-
merable craters and bare streams of lava, appeared to be of
recent origin ; and thus I fancied myself brought near to the
 CONSTRUCTIVE INVENTION. 421

very act of creation . I often asked myself how these many

peculiar animals and plants have been produced : the simplest
answer seemed to be that the inhabitants of the several islands
had descended from each other, undergoing modification in
the course of their descent ; and that all the inhabitants of
the archipelago had descended from those of the nearest land ,
namely America, whence colonists would naturally have been
derived . But it long remained to me an inexplicable problem
how the necessary degree of modification could have been
effected , and it would have thus remained for ever, had I not
studied domestic productions, and thus acquired a just idea
of the power of Selection . As soon as I had fully realized this
idea, I saw, on reading Malthus on Population, that Natural
Selection was the inevitable result of the rapid increase of all
organic beings ; for I was prepared to appreciate the struggle
for existence by having long studied the habits of animals .
(Domestication, vol. I., p. 9).
Throughout the entire logical scheme, the analytic separation
already insisted on, is an invaluable help to the faculties under
the complications of natural phenomena. To enable us to view
separately whatever can be separately viewed is the motive
for such artificial divisions as Structure and Function in
biology, Physical Side and Mental Side in psychology, Order
and Progress, Theory and Practice in politics, Conservation
and Collocations in cause and effect, Description and Explana-
tion everywhere.
The process of Invention in the Arts and business of life, is
amenable to the general rule of keeping the mind fresh upon
the most likely sources. The mere cogitating process in prac
tical constructions is exactly the same as in the solving of
geometrical or other problems. Certain data are given, a
certain construction is required ; there is an intervening chasm
that has to be bridged. The habit of analytical separation is
of avail in this instance also. The mind should steadily view
one point at a time, drawing out connexions with each by
turns. Thus, to take a simple geometrical construction : given
the vertical angle, the base, and the altitude of a triangle to
construct it. Now the base is given, and we have to follow
out the deductions and implications of the two other data-
altitude and vertical angle- with a view to arrive at some
known process that will construct the triangle. Let us con-
sider separately what the altitude will suggest. Now, a
certain fixed altitude implies that the apex of the triangle will
lie somewhere in a line parallel to the base ; consequently, if
 422 ART OF DISCOVERY.

we draw such a parallel, we limit the place of the apex to that

line. Turn next to the given angle. Considering how to
erect upon a given base a triangle with a given vertical angle,
we are reminded that upon the given base may be constructed
an arc of a circle, such as will contain that angle. The next
step is to find a means of constructing the proper arc ; the
operation of discovery is exactly the same ; and brings us at
length to some construction that we can perform. We then
unite our two threads hitherto followed out in separation.
The parallel line first suggested, and the arc next found out,
give by their intersection an apex to the desired triangle. It
is our previous knowledge that must forge the links of con-
nexion between what is given and what is required ; but the
analytic habit concentrates the attention by turns on each
datum, and each outgoing from it ; and this is probably the
utmost that mere art or method can do for us in constructive
inventions.
The uncertainty as to where to look, for the next opening in
discovery, brings the pain of conflict and the debility of
indecision. This is a case fit to be met by the collective
wisdom of a generation . There might at intervals be held a
congress on the condition-of- science question, to decide, accord-
ing to all the appearances, what problems should be next
taken up.
Lessons may be drawn from the history of Errors, as well as
of Truths. All the fallacies are beacons both in discovery and
in proof. Every source of confusion is an incubus on inven-
tion. More particularly, the excessive devotion to the con-
crete, and to the artistic interests nourished by it, may amount
to a total disqualification for scientific originality, whose very
existence is in the domain of abstraction.
Certain widely prevailing tendencies of natural phenomena
have been indicated as of value in prompting discovery. Such
are the Law of Continuity, and the maxim that Nature works
by the Simplest Means. Both these principles are uncertain
in their scope ; which, however, does not prevent them from
being used to give suggestions ; it only disqualifies them from
being conclusive evidence. If we are careful to verify our
hypotheses, we are at liberty to obtain them from any source.
Still, the mind that has become largely conversant with the
ways of nature will find many more fruitful sources of sugges-
tion than either of those principles.
 RECITAL OF FACTS. 423

I.-HISTORICAL EVIDENCE.
Two leading branches of Evidence, applied in practical life,
are Legal Evidence and Historical Evidence. The two depart
ments have much in common. The evidence both in courts of
law and in matters of history is probable, and approaches to
certainty by the summation of probabilities.
The following abstract of Historical Evidence represents
the maxims in use among historians at the present day, as
summarized by Sir G. C. Lewis.

The object of History is the recital of facts- of events that

have actually occurred.
In the case of contemporary history, the writer may be able
to rely upon his own observations, or upon original documents
obtained from authentic sources. Personal knowledge was
the basis of much of Xenophon's Anabasis, Polybius' History,
Cæsar's Gaelic War, and Lord Clarendon's History of the
Rebellion. But the greater part even of contemporary history
must repose on the evidence of witnesses.
To a historian, not himself cognizant of the events he nar-
rates, the sources of information fall under one or other of
two classes ( 1 ) Monuments, ruins, coins, and generally all
ancient remains ; and (2) the evidence of Witnesses . From
the former exclusively is derived whatever we know of the
pre-historic age ; in the same way as geology is built on in-
ferences drawn from fossils and the nature and position of
rocks. It is only with regard to history resting upon the tes-
timony of witnesses that rules of historical evidence apply.
Two points demand the notice of one seeking to verify any
alleged historical fact. ( 1 ) Does the evidence of the witness
exist in an authentic shape ? and (2) Is it true ? The first
regards the accuracy wherewith the evidence has been trans-
mitted to us ; the second, the worth of the evidence itself.
The means of knowledge of the witnesses, the goodness of
their memory, their judgment, their general veracity, their
special interests, -are all to be considered. This the historian
has in common with a jury or a judge, except that he has to
deal with men long since dead, and whose character there is
more or less difficulty in ascertaining . What forms the pecu-
liar subject- matter of rules of historical evidence is not there-
fore the worth of the evidence, but the accuracy of its trans-
mission.
The supreme canon of historical evidence is that all testi-
424 HISTORICAL EVIDENCE.

mony must be contemporary, or received directly or through

trustworthy tradition, from contemporaries. Whenever any
event is related in histories written after the time, and not
avowedly founded on contemporary testimony, the proper
mode of testing its historical credibility is to enquire whether
it can be traced up to a contemporary source. If this cannot
be done, we must be able to raise a presumption that those
who transmitted it to us in writing received it, directly or
through a trustworthy tradition, from contemporary testi-
mony. If neither of these conditions can be fulfilled, the
event must be considered as incurably uncertain, and beyond
the reach of our actual knowledge .' (Lewis's Methods of
Politics, I. 270.)
This rule is universally recognized as inclusive ; whatever
is established by such testimony is credible. There is not,
however, the same unanimity, in admitting it as exclusive; or that
whatever is not authenticated by external evidence is uncer-
tain. A stringent application of the rule makes such havoc of
ancient history, that many learned men have been tempted to
exercise their ingenuity in trying to pick out of the mass of
tradition some certain indications of the true course of events.
The same impulse that first led to the invention of fabulous
history-an inability to rest content with a background of
historical ignorance--now misleads critics and historians.
They expect by a species of historical divination to strip off
the false additions to the ancient stories-to sift from the
fables the grains of genuine fact. Yet it would seem as if the
utmost that could be gained would be that the event may have
happened as supposed. To prove that the event did happen,
nothing can make up for the want of external attestation.
Internal improbability may enable us to doubt or disbelieve
an alleged fact ; internal probability cannot assure us that the
fact was as alleged ; the only decisive evidence is the testi-
mony of credible witnesses.
The difference between the internal and the external stand-
ards of evidence appears remarkably in the results of their ap-
plication. Sir G. C. Lewis, refusing to admit internal con-
sistency or plausibility as a warrant for belief, rejects the
accepted History of Rome down to the war with Pyrrhus.
Niebuhr, on the other hand, divides this period into three
parts that, in his opinion, differ greatly in historical value.
The era of Romulus and Numa (80 years) he considers wholly
fabulus ; from Tullus Hostilius to the first Seccession of the
Plebs (179 years) is mythico-historical, a twilight of fable
 TRANSMISSION OF WRITTEN EVIDENCE. 425

and fact ; from the Secession of the Plebs to the war with
Pyrrhus (213 years) is solid history. It would perhaps be
too much to condemn Niebuhr's efforts on a priori grounds.
To what extent a license of guessing may be permitted will
best be seen when it has been tried by different men. If the
result should be a general concordance of opinion, we might
reasonably infer that the ancient narratives, although they
conceal, nevertheless betray the truth. If, however, this
method lead to irreconcileable and endless diversity of opinion,
it must cease to be regarded as valuable or trustworthy.
Evidence may be transmitted in two ways, by writing or by
oral tradition. These may be considered separately.
The value of a written memorial consists generally in this,
that its credibility is not impaired by the mere action of time.
An English mathematician named Craig held that all testi-
mony was enfeebled by mere lapse of time, and thus the evi-
dence of Christianity would at length be reduced to zero.
Assuming that that event would coincide with the end of the
world, he calculated when the end would come. Laplace
adopts the same view, and says that even in spite of printing,
the events that are now most certain, will, in the course of
ages, become doubtful. But this must be regarded as an error.
The only deterioration that a document can suffer from mere
lapse of time is the increased difficulty of weighing the credi-
bility of the writer. A written memorial has none of the
disadvantage of a statement handed down orally from one
person to another, and losing value at each transmission.
Yet the evils of transmission are not wholly overcome even
with written records. Two doubts may arise, (1 ) whether the
writing is ascribed to its real author, and (2 ) whether it is free
from interpolation and mutilation.
' In many cases the original memorial is preserved ; as in
ancient inscriptions upon stone, brass, or other durable ma-
terial. Such are the inscriptions, in the arrow-headed cha-
racter, on the Babylonian bricks, and on other Assyrian
monuments ; the hieroglyphics engraved on the remains of
Egyptian architecture ; and the numerous Greek and Latin
inscriptions found in different parts of Asia Minor, Africa, and
Europe, and belonging to different ages. Ancient coins, with
their legends, are another original record of the same kind, as
well as historical sculptures or paintings, such as the bas-reliefs
on the column of Trajan, or the Bayeux tapestry. Ancient
documents, likewise, containing the authentic records of many
important events and public acts, are preserved in the original
426 HISTORICAL EVIDENCE .

in national archives. Such, for instance, is Domesday- book, the

rolls of Parliament, court records, charters, and other official
registers and documents kept in public depositories.' (Lewis,
I. 201).
In authenticating books and documents, whose safe- keeping
is not specially provided for, great difficulty is often experi-
enced. A mere tradition regarding the origin of a document
would be exposed to nearly all the doubts that attach to oral
6
tradition. Hence the importance of archives, chartularies,
public libraries, and other safe places of deposit, which are
under the care of trustworthy guardians, appointed and con-
trolled by public authority. The law of England requires
that written documents , before they can be tendered as evid-
ence, be produced from the proper place of custody.
The difficulty of ascertaining the genuineness of ancient
books, is forcibly illustrated by the controversy regarding the
Platonic Dialogues. Until the close of last century, thirty- six
dialogues were attributed to Plato on the authority of Thra-
syllus, whose list dates from about the commencement of the
Christian era. As, however, Plato died more than three
hundred years before, the canon of Thrasyllus stands in need
of corroboration and support. Most of the German Critics
allow it very little weight, and test each dialogue upon
own evidence, external or internal, but chiefly internal. This
unavoidably gives rise to great diversity of opinion, and there
is little agreement as to what ought to be rejected or retained.
Ast, the least sparing critic, leaves only fourteen out of thirty-
six. Mr. Grote, on the other hand, discards the German
criticism, and putting little stress upon the indications of
authorship contained in any reputed dialogue of Plato, searches
for more decisive evidence, so far as it can be got, in the
history of the books mentioned by Thrasyllus.
Plato died B.C. 347, and left his works to the care of the school
continued under Xenophanes and Speusippus. We do not
possess any list of their master's works resting on their autho-
rity, and the first solid ground we reach (apart from the few
incidentally mentioned or alluded to by Aristotle) is an extract
from the works of the Grammaticus Aristophanes, who lived
at Alexandria from B.C. 260 to B.C. 184. He comes thus a
century after Plato, and nearly two centuries before Thra-
syllus. He divided the dialogues into trilogies, and several
of these are mentioned by Diogenes Laertius. They are re-
markable as containing the names of some of the compositions
that are least acceptable to the critics, and that would be hard
 EXAMPLE OF PLATO'S DIALOGUES. 427

to vindicate on internal evidence. These are Leges, Epinomis,

Minos, Epistolae, Sophistes , Politicus. It would be interest-
ing to know what means Aristophanes had of distinguishing
the genuine from the spurious works, if any such then existed.
For two centuries after the death of Plato, the Academy
was kept up as a philosophical school, with an unbroken suc-
cession of presidents . The chief treasure of the school was
the works of the master. It cannot be too much to assume
that there was provided a safe custody for the MSS . of Plato,
and a ready means of verifying any alleged works. Plato is
better off in this respect than any of his great contemporaries,
Socrates, Demosthenes, Euripides, or Aristophanes .
Aristophanes, the Grammaticus, was head of the Alexan-
drian Library. He was taught by Callimachus, who preceded
him in the office of Chief Librarian. Callimachus is the author
6
of the Museum ,' a general description of the Alexandrian
Library ; and less important authors than Plato, as e.g, Demo-
critus, are mentioned by him. It is then highly probable that
such a library as that of Alexandria would contain copies of
one of the foremost Greek philosophers. And, considering
the ease of verification, it is most likely that the Librarian
would assure himself that his copies were authentic.
There were, in the time of Thrasyllus, spurious dialogues.
Whence came these, and by what criterion did he discard
them ? If Aristophanes and Thrasyllus (who appears also to
have been connected with Alexandria) depended upon the lib-
rary there, they must be allowed to speak with great weight ;
but if they proceeded wholly or partially upon internal evidence,
they have less claims on our attention than the better-equipped
modern critics. Mr. Grote supposes that the spurious works
were made for the demand in Greece and Asia Minor, and
for the library started by the Kings of Pergamus as a rival to
the Alexandrian.
So much for the difficulty of settling the real authorship.
The other point to be determined is the freedom of existing
copies from spurious additions or omissions, accidental or
intentional.
In the first place, errors will accidentally creep in, by the
mere act of copying. It is impossible to guarantee strict
accuracy in transcription. This is recognised in jurisprudence,
and the English law refuses to admit any copy where the
original can be produced. But the reason of the law does not
apply with the same force in history. A very slight alteration
in a deed might sometimes alter the meaning of it ; and, more-
428 HISTORICAL EVIDENCE.

over, there is often an exceedingly powerful temptation to

tamper with deeds . Now, the value of a copy of MS .
depends on its accuracy, and the motives for falsifying history
are far weaker. It is therefore considered that the works of
classical authors are preserved to us substantially as they were
when published. Such variations as there are do not affect
the general accuracy of the copies that have reached us.
In the second place, changes may be made intentionally, to
suit a purpose. We are told that Solon inserted a verse in
the Iliad with a view to confirm the title of the Athenians to
the possession of Salamis. At an early period, authentic lists
or canons of authors and their works were prepared to guard
against deception. Short writings are most easily forged, and
hence there are numberless forgeries of letters ; but we find
examples of falsification at greater length in the poems of
Ossian. Ecclesiastical writings contain many forgeries, made for
the purpose of propagating or confirming opinion. The motive
for executing forgeries is often to make money by arousing
curiosity ; but in such cases as Ossian, it is merely the pleasure
of deceiving the world. Literary forgeries are generally
detected by internal evidence- by inconsistencies, anachron-
isms, imitations of subsequent writers, and other marks of
recent composition .
When we have sufficient assurance that a work is both
authentic and genuine, written by its reputed author, and not
tampered with in the course of transmission, we have still to
consider the worth of the testimony. Besides examining our
author's means of information-whether he writes as an eye-
witness or at second hand, or at what other remove from eye-
witnesses- we must enquire into his character for veracity and
his motives to depart from the truth .
There is often intentional perversion or suppression of the
truth, especially in Autobiography, as Caesar's Gallic Wars,
and Napoleon's Memoirs of his Campaigns. Vanity, a love of
the marvellous, and party spirit, operate in the same direction.
There are Catholic and Protestant histories of the Reforma-
tion ; Whig and Tory histories of England. The accounts. of
modern campaigns and military operations differ very much
according to the side the writer belongs to. Many inaccuracies
arise from not taking the trouble to investigate the truth .
History may be blended with fiction for a didactic or moral
purpose, as in Xenophon's Cyropædia.
The ancient historians departed from strict truth, by intro-
ducing into their works speeches composed by themselves .
 MYTHICAL HISTORY. 429

One fourth of the history of Thucydides is composed of such

speeches. Lucian thought it a sufficient excuse for introduc-
ing fictitious speeches, that they were suitable to the charac-
ter of the speaker, and appropriate to the subject. Polybius
is the only writer of antiquity who condemns the practice, for,
he says, the object of the historian is not to astonish the reader,
but to record what was actually done or said. This opinion
has been followed by modern historians, and the manufacture
of speeches has therefore ceased. The same thing, however,
in substance, is still done, although introduced as part of the
history, namely, interpreting acts and suggesting motives.
It is a great, though perhaps not uncommon, error, to treat as
history what thus owes its origin to conjecture.
"
Another perversion of history is mythical history. The
original author of such a legend must, no doubt, be at first
conscious that it is the spontaneous product of his own inven-
tion, unattested by any external evidence. But the fiction is
suggested by prevailing ideas and feelings ; it interweaves
existing facts and customs into its texture ; it furnishes an
apparent support to institutions or practices for which the
popular mind seeks an explanation ; it fills a void which is
sensibly felt, and supplies food for an appetite whose demands
are at once urgent and general. The inventor of such a legend,
therefore, differs altogether from the author of a novel or
romance, who lays before the public a tale avowedly fictitious,
and which they accept as such.' Examples may be found in
Greek mythology, in the fabulous heroes of medieval chivalry,
and in the lives of medieval saints. Such legends have a use,
not as describing events, but as throwing a reflected light on the
circumstances and character ofthose who invented, believed, and
circulated them . The most difficult case to the historian
is not pure mythology, but the blending of myth and history,
which lures men on to search for fact, but leaves them un-
able to distinguish it from fiction. The history of Greece,
from the first Olympiad to the Persian war, and of Rome,
from Tullus Hostilius to the Punic wars, illustrates this inter-
mediate period of twilight and uncertainty.
The second mode of transmitting evidence-ORAL TRADITION,
loses credit very rapidly with the lapse of time. An account
of an event, diminishing in evidentiary value at each remove
from the original eye-witness, very soon ceases to have any
value at all. This has always been more or less recognized .
Polybius confined himself to what he learned from eye-
witnesses of the preceding generation, and thus begins his
430 HISTORICAL EVIDENCE.

consecutive history about twenty years before his birth.

Newton thought that oral tradition might be trusted for 80
or 100 years ; and Volney remarks that the Red Indians had
no accurate tradition of facts a century old.
The average value of oral tradition may be enhanced in
various ways . During the panic caused by the mutilation of
the Mercuries, and the fear of treasonable attempts to esta-
blish a despotism, the Athenians recurred to the government
of Pisistratus and his sons, which had begun nearly 150 years
and ended 100 years before that time. Thucydides describes
the Athenians as referring, entirely by oral tradition, to the
attempt by Cylon -a fact at the time 180 years old . That
event had however created a hereditary curse in the powerful
family of the Alcmaeonidae, and the memory of it was revived
at different times by public acts. The Dies Alliensis, the
anniversary of the fatal battle of the Allia, was doubtless kept
up by uninterrupted usage from B.C. 390. Festivals, emblems,
antiquated offices, serve to fix tradition, and keep alive the
recollection of events. The Interrex, in Rome, who continued to
be appointed during the Republic in the vacancy of the consul-
ship, was a reminiscence of a period of elective kings. The
King of the Sacrifices, like the King Archon at Athens, is also
a decided indication of the regal period. There were, more-
over, many buildings, monuments, and public places in Rome
associated with the names of kings. The existence of laws,
like the Twelve Tables, inscribed on metal or stone, may serve
to perpetuate a correct oral tradition .
Rubino, the author of a work on the early Roman Constitu-
tion, has laid down some rules on this subject. He divides
oral tradition into two classes, one referring to the constitution,
and the religious and civil institutions connected with it, the
other embracing the more common material of history, wars,
negotiations, and the striking events that give interest to the
history of Rome. This last alone was committed to the ex-
clusive keeping of oral tradition , and was much more liable
to error and uncertainty than the traditions relating to the
constitution. To some extent, constitutional usage implies a
knowledge of precedents. Such information in all probability
existed at the beginning of the Second Punic war ; but it
might not reach far back without the help of documents.
There is no reason to suppose that accurate knowledge would
have gone back beyond a century. It is not possible to draw
any broad line between constitutional history, and the common
events of history ; we could not discuss the changes in the
 1
ARGUMENT.-- CATEGOREMATIC . - DICTUM. 431

English Constitution during the seventeenth century, without

a knowledge of the events that gave birth to them.
There is one case where oral transmission makes an approach
to the value of transmission by writing. This happens when
the memory is assisted and checked by a set form of words,
especially if the form be metrical. Cæsar tells us that the
secrets of the Druidical religion were contained in a great
number of verses, in committing which to memory a druid
would spend twenty years of his life. In like manner, the
Iliad and Odyssey were perpetuated by a race of professional
reciters and rhapsodists .

K.- EXPLANATION OF SOME LOGICAL TERMS.

The following terms, not being deemed essential to any of

the important doctrines of Logic, may not have been made
fully understood in the previous exposition. As they occasion-
ally occur in logical discussions, short explanations of them
are here appended .
ARGUMENT is used in several different senses. Apart from
its more popular significations, a disputation, a chain of rea-
soning, and even a chain of events (the argument of a play) ,
its meaning is not fixed and uniform among logicians. Some
apply it to an entire syllogism, premises and conclusion, some
to the premises only as the grounds of the conclusion, while
Hamilton maintains that its proper meaning is the middle
notion in a reasoning, ' what is assumed to argue something.'
So Mansel holds that the word should be applied only to
the Middle Term.
CATEGOREMATIC .-A distinction is drawn between words that
can stand alone as subject or predicate of a proposition, as
man, stone (Categorematic) ; and words that can stand only
in company with other words, as all, none (Syncategorematic).
DICTUM DE OMNI ET NULLO.- This applies directly to the First
Figure alone. It is usual to give similar principles for the
other Figures, and among these we may notice the dicta given
by Mr. Mansel in his notes on Aldrich (p . 86) .
' Principle of second figure. Dictum de Diverso. If a cer-
tain attribute can be predicated (affirmatively or negatively)
of every member of a class, any subject of which it cannot be
so predicated , does not belong to the class.
Principles of third figure. I. Dictum de exemplo. If a
certain attribute can be affirmed ofany portion ofthe members
432 EXPLANATION ON SOME LOGICAL TERMS.

of a class, it is not incompatible with the distinctive attributes

of that class. II. Dictum de excepto. If a certain attribute
can be denied of any portion of the members of a class, it is
not inseparable from the distinctive attributes of that class. '
ENTHYMEME.-A syllogism with one of its premises sup-
pressed in the enunciation. Hamilton argues against the
prominence given to Enthymeme as a division of syllogisms,
on the ground that they are not a special form of reasoning,
but only an elliptical mode of expression. He also shows
(what is done more elaborately by Mr. Mansel ) that Aristotle
understood by Enthymeme not an elliptical syllogism, but
' a syllogism from signs and likelihoods,' or a syllogism with
the major premise only probable.
IGNAVA RATIO or Sophisma pigrum is the master fallacy of
Fatalism. It might be classed with fallacies of Non-observa-
tion. The Fatalist argues that, if a thing must happen, it
will happen whether he interfere or no ; overlooking that his
own agency is one of the co-operating causes.
INTUITIVE - SYMBOLICAL. - We often employ words and sym-
bols without fully realizing their meaning. This Leibnitz
called Symbolical as distinguished from Intuitive, Knowledge,
ideas and sensations fully realized in consciousness. We can
conceive a yard, a mile, or even ten or twenty miles, in
the full reality of the extent ; but of the distance between the
earth and the moon, the sun, or one of the fixed stars, we have
no proper conception ; we may, however, express such dis-
tances in figures, which are intelligible as such. This would
be a symbolical conception.
MODALS . (See Part I., p. 99 ) . The opposition of Pro-
positions has been applied to Modals, in the following state-
ments.
If the matter be necessary, all affirmatives must be true, and
all negatives false,
If the matter be impossible, all negatives must be true, and
all affirmatives must be false.
If the matter be contingent, all particulars must be true, and
all universals false.
Here the meaning of necessary ' is no more than univer-
sally true, as all men are mortal, all matter gravitates. ' Im-
possible ' is universally false ; all men are gods. ' Contin-
gent' means partly true and partly false ; Some men are wise.
PORPHYRY'S TREE. -This is a tabular arrangement showing
different grades of generality. The example chosen ranges
from the summum genus Substance, to the infima species Man,
 PROPHYRY'S TREE. 433

ending with two individuals. It may be exhibited thus, in a

form better described by the Greek name, Porphyry's Ladder
(κλίμαξ) :-
:-
Substance
Corporeal Incorporeal
(Body)
Animate Inanimate
(Living Body)
Sensitive Insensitive
(Animal)
Rational Irrational
(Man)
Socrates Plato

PREDESIGNATE is a term applied by Hamilton to propostions,

having their quantity expressed by one of the signs of quan-
tity, All, None, & c. The contrasting term is Preindesignate.
The terms commonly used in logic are Definite, Indefinite.
SIMPLE APPREHENSION is defined by Whately as the opera-
tion of the mind by which we mentally perceive or form a
notion of any object. ' It is the same as Perception, whereby
we know things in the actual or concrete-a house, a tree.
By another faculty, designated Abstraction, we conceive things
in the general.
SUFFICIENT REASON.- Under this title Leibnitz stated the
law of Causality. Everything that exists must have a ' suffi-
cient reason ' for its existence. The attempt has been made to
prove certain truths, such as the law of perseverance of uni-
form motion in a straight line, on the ground that no suffi-
cient reason can be given why a body should either lose its
velocity or deviate to one side or the other. The same line of
remark has been used with the principle of virtual velocities.
SOPHISMA POLYZETESEOS and SOPHISMA HETEROZETESEOS are
two ingenious Greek Sophisms. The first was alluded to
under Definition. Choosing a word having a doubtful margin
of application, the sophist asks whether it applies to such and
such a case, and goes on putting the question to one contiguous
case after another, until he has drawn the respondent palpably
beyond the range of the word, when he demands the difference
between the last case admitted and the first refused. Such
words as heap, calf, &c., are suitable : the sophist asks - Was
it a calf to-day, will it be a calf to-morrow, next day, and so
on ; the respondent cannot say on what day it ceases to be a
calf, and becomes a heifer. The Heterozeteseos (Sophism of
28
434 EXPLANATION ON SOME LOGICAL TERMS.

Irrelevant Question) decoys a person into committing himself

by a categorical answer- Have you cast your horns ?—If
you answer, I have ; it is rejoined, Then you have had horns :
if you answer, I have not, it is rejoined, Then you have them
still.'
 GENERAL INDEX .

ABSTRACTION, allied to Analysis, ii., 399 | Agreement, an aid to Discovery, ii.,

Abstract Ideas, dispute regarding, i., 5 418
Abstract name, completion of genera- in Absence, basis of, ii., 49
lizing process, i., 52 Universal, the sole evidence for In-
value and abuse of, i., 53 ductive truths, ii., 7
Accidens, i. , 76 the test of uniform co-existence, ii.,
Accidentis, fallacia, i., 276 14
Activity, a source of fallacies, i ., 377 proof of concomitant properties in
Adjectives, connotative, being genera- Natural kinds, ii., 15
lized names, i., 49 the sole Inductive Method , ii., 47
Equivocatio, i., 275 fundamental mode of Proof, ii., 114
A dicto secundum quid ad dictum Algebra, notions of, ii., 202
simpliciter, i., 277, ii., 372, 394 account of, ii., 213
Esthetic emotions, a source of fallacy, highest operation of, ii., 215
ii., 383 Algebraic Geometry, notions of, ii.,
A dicto simpliciter ad dictum secun- 202
dum quid, i., 276 account of, ii., 218
Affinity, chemical, defined, ii., 243 All, two meanings distinguished by
maximum of, ii., 187 De Morgan, i., 187
in Mineralogy, ii., 294 Ambiguity of terms, ii., 372, 386
in Botany, ii., 302 Amphibolia, i., 275
in Zoology, ii , 310 Analysis, Chemical, ii., 397
in diseases, ii., 366 Logical, ii., 398
Afortiori, i., 164 allied to Abstraction, i., 39, ii., 399
Agreement, intellectual property of, applied to Induction, ii. , 400
i., 3 Grammatical, ii., 400
the basis of Reasoning, i., 8 Critical, ii., 400
basis of Definition, ii , 155 Mathematical, ii., 401
defines the limits of Explanation, preliminary to elimination, ii., 42
ii., 121 in Psychology, ii., 281
stated in classification, ii., 192 in Society, ii., 340
inthe arrangement of chemical ele- conformed to rules of division, ii.,
ments, ii., 246 197
statement of, in Mineralogy, ii. , 299 an aid to Discovery, ii., 421
in Botany, ii., 305 Analytic judgment, i., 76
in Zoology, ii., 313 Analogy, as a form of Inference, ii.,
in diseases, ii., 366 143
Method of, ii., 49 does not amount to Proof, ii., 143
fundamental maxim of, ii., 48 examples of, ii., 145
in Biology, ii., 270 Analogies, false, ii., 142, 394
in Politics, ii , 335 Analogical Hypotheses, ii., 147
in Medicine, ii. , 360 Animals and Plants contrasted, ii., 265
frustrated by plurality of causes, Antecedence, invariable, not causa-
ii., 78 tion, ii., 38
protected against plurality of causal usually complicated, ii., 41
causes, ii., 79 Apprehension, simple, ii., 433
436 INDEX.

Approximate Generalizations, ii., 135 | Calculus, account of, ii., 218

probability of stated in numbers, ii., Canons of Syllogism, i., 149
136 according to Hamilton, i., 151
how brought nearer certainty, ii., special for each Figure, i., 152
138 Canons, special, derived from Axiom,
open to sophistry, ii., 139 i., 163
A priori, applied to knowledge, i., 10 Categorematic, ii., 431
Argument, ii ., 431 Categories, of Aristotle, i., 263
Aristotelian contrasted with Baconian Categorical Imperative, meaningless,
logic, i., 244 ii., 146
Arithmetic, definitions of, ii. , 203 Causation, law of, i., 20, 226
ultimate notions of, ii., 204 uniformities of, as a branch of Logic,
account of, ii., 212 ii., 9
proof in, ii. , 213 law of, expressed, ii., 15
Associations, a source of fallacy, ii , obverse denied, ii., 16
385 three aspects of, ii., 17
Astronomy, its place among the practically viewed, ii., 17
Sciences, i., 232, 238 scientific, ii., 19
Averages, ii., 91 fallacy of, ii., 20
Axiom of Syllogism, various forms as Conservation of Force, ii. 21
discussed, i., 155 as an instrument of elimination., ii.,
proof of, in experience, i., 159 46
Hamilton's forms, i., 160 unfolded in three maxims of elimi-
as given by Thomson, i. , 161 nation, ii., 47
as given by De Morgan, i., 162 induction of, ii., 113
not derivable from the Laws of rests on Agreement alone, ii., 115
Thought,' i., 162 as an Empirical law, ii., 115
Axioms, nature of, i., 224 discriminated from Co-existence, ii.,
requisites of, i., 224 51
only two Mathematical, i., 224 not distinguished from Co-existence,
of Inductive origin, i., 225 ii., 404
propositions of, in Biology, ii., 267
BACON, contributions to inductive in Politics, ii., 326, 334
methods, ii., 403 contradiction of incredible, ii., 149
Belief, the nature of, i., 12 Cause, an alleged intuition, i., 11
inherently excessive, ii., 377 to be sought among the antecedent
law of, explains intense convictions, circumstances, ii., 37
i., 225 not proved by invariable antece-
Biology, scope of, ii. 258 dence, ii., 38
divisions of, ii., 262 the unconditional invariable ante-
notions of, ii., 264 cedent, ii., 38
propositions of, ii., 266 material, formal, efficient, final, ii ,
conservation of Force in, ii., 268 18
Empirical laws in, ii., 268 Causes, composition of, ii., 38
logical methods of, ii. , 270 combination of, ii., 97
Hypotheses of, ii., 272 real, ii., 129
as basis of Medicine, ii., 347 Chance, computation of, a resource
Body, substance of, i. , 262 under Intermixture of Effects,
Body and Mind, ii., 127, 146, 275 ii., 83
Botany, arrangement of characters in, coincidence explained , ii. , 85
ii., 301 principle of computation, ii., 86
maximum of affinity in, ii. , 302 applicable where othermethods fail,
grades in, ii., 304 ii., 86
agreement and difference in, ii., 305 combined with law, ii., 89
peculiarity in exhibition of differ- submerging a small uniformity, ii.,
ences, ii. 306 89
index in, ii., 308 in Biology, ii., 271
in Psychology, ii., 286
CALCULUS, notions of, ii., 202 in Medicine, ii ., 362
 INDEX. 437

Chance, elimination of, an aid to Dis- Co-existence, and Succession, common

covery, ii., 418 to subject and object experi-
Character, Science of, based on Psy- ence, i., 258
chology, ii., 286 Collective names, singular or general,
elements of, ii., 288 i., 48
as affected by Conservation, ii., 288 Colligation of Facts, ii., 411
influences on, ii., 289 Collocation of Circumstances, ii., 21
not classified like Natural History, degrees of complexity, ii., 30
ii., 290 elliptically spoken of as the Cause,
peculiarities of, ii., 291 ii., 32
human, in Politics, ii., 326 as Potential Energy, ii., 34
Characters, descriptive, sequence of the effect of expended force, ii., 35
ii., 184 in Politics, ii., 334
in Chemistry, ii., 248 Colony, example of positive definition,
in Mineralogy, ii., 293 ii., 158
in Botany, ii., 301 Colour, not intrinsically objective, i.,
in Zoology, ii., 308 259
Chemical force, conservation of, ii., 25 Complex Propositions, howfar matter
combination, not a union of forces, of Logic, i., 85
ii., 40 Complications of Cause and Effect,
defined by contrast, ii., 163 11., 41
Chemistry, fundamental fact of, ii., Compositionis et Divisionis, fallacia
242 i., 276
propositions of, ii., 243 Comprehension , i., 50
arrangement and methods of, ii., 244 practically more important than ex-
elements of classified, ii., 244 tension, ii., 103
descriptive method of, ii. , 248 Hamilton's syllogism in, criticized,
agreement and difference in, ii., 253 i., 180
empirical laws in, ii., 254 Conceptualism, i., 6
law of Conservation in, ii. , 254 Concept, formation of, ii., 153
hypotheses in, ii., 255 Conception, formal, i., 243
nomenclature of, ii., 256 Concomitance, discovery of laws of,
notation of, ii., 257 ii., 189
Class, two meanings of, definite and in Zoology, ii., 309
indefinite, i., 50 Concomitant, a predicable, i., 76
Classification, golden rule of, ii., 153, separable and inseparable, i., 77
185 Variations, ii., 62
Methods of, ii., 184 fundamental maxim of, ii. , 48
descriptive characters in, ii., 184 interrupted by critical points, ii.,
grades of, ii., 188 64
terminates with Species, ii., 190 as a means of suggestion, ii., 64
statement of agreements and dif- tables of for Discovery, ii., 65
ferences in, ii. 192 under intermixture of effects, ii.,
Index, ii. 194 83
of Characters, ii. 290 in Biology, ii., 270
Sciences of, ii., 292 in Politics, ii ., 337
an aid to Discovery, ii., 420 in Medicine, ii., 361
Co-existence, one of the three Uni- Concrete names, i., 54
versal Predicates, i., 103 Conditional Propositions, i., 85
as Order in Place, i., 103 Syllogism, involves no inference, i.,
as Co-inherence of Attributes, i., 117
104 Confusion, fallacies of, ii., 372, 386
uniformities of, as a branch of Lo- Consciousness, ii., 277
gic, ii., 9, 13 testimony of, i., 267
induction of, ii., 11 Connotation, of General Names, i., 49
proof of by Universal Agreement, Conservation of Force, law stated, ii.,
ii., 14 21
propositions of, in Biology, ii., 266 proved by universal agreement, ii.,7
in Politics, ii. 326 explained, ii., 20, 22
438 INDEX.

Conservation, evidence of, ii., 114 Deductive Method, in Medicine, ii.,

has same proof as Causation, ii., 36 362
not an a priori conception, ii., 37 alone, insufficient in Politics, ii.,
in Chemistry, ii., 254 342
in Biology, ii., 268 Sciences, how constituted, i., 216
in Medicine, ii., 359 Definition, as verbal predication, i., 71
under re-distribution, ii., 230 exhaustive and unexhaustive, i., 71,
in Character, ii., 288 72
Consistency, Principle of, i., 14, 108, explained, i., 38, ii., 154
247, 272 fundamentals of, ii., 155
Contiguity, extension of names Positive Method of, ii., 156
through, ii., 173 margin of transition, ii., 160
Continuity, law of, empirical, ii., 108 Negative Method of, ii., 162
a help to Discovery, ii., 413, 422 deductive, ii., 165
Continuous Comparison, ii., 65 the language of, ii., 165
Contradiction, principle of, i., 16 by synonyms, ii., 166
Contradictory, propositions, i., 93 per genus et differentiam, i., 74, ii.,
misapplication of the name, i., 94 166
Contraries, expression of made precise by Analysis, ii., 166
by De Morgan, i ., 56 notions not susceptible of, ii., 168
basis of De Morgan's additions to mixed with Real predication, ii.,
syllogism, i. , 184 352, 357
Contrary propositions, i., 92 fallacies of, ii., 396
Contrast, in defining, ii., 155 neglected by Whewell, ii., 412
animals with plants, ii., 265 an aid to Discovery, ii., 419
exhibition of in Chemistry, ii. , 253 De Morgan, divisions of Terms, i., 51
Conversion, Simple, i., 113 on Positive and Negative names,
Fallacies of, i., 114 i., 56
by Limitation, per accidens, i., 114 enumeration of Propositions, i., 90
obverted, or by Negation, or Contra- additions to syllogism, i., 182
position, i., 116 Demonstration, based on Induction,
Copula, i., 44 i., 219
meanings of, i., 182 Denotation, of General Names, i., 49
Correlative names, i., 55 Derivative laws, ii., 104
Correlation of Forces, see Conserva- various kinds of, ii., 104
tion limited application of, ii., 106
Credibility, consistency with proved of wider application than Empiri-
inductions, ii., 149 cal, ii., ÎÎ2
Crystallization, an example of Agree- in Politics, ii., 338
ment, ii., 54 Description, of chemical bodies, ii., 248
explanation of confirmed by Joint not to be mixed with explanation,
Method, ii., 61 ii., 253, 354
Curves, method of, ii., 413, 420 Descriptive terminology, ii., 177
characters, sequence of, ii., 184
DEDUCTION, first principles of, i., 17 Development hypothesis, ii., 272
explained, i., 40 Dew, research on, an example of
why placed before Induction and elimination, ii., 68
Definition, i., 41 Dictum de omni et Nullo, i., 155
laws of, i., 247 Difference, Method of, fundamental
as general presumption, ii., 54 maxim of, ii., 48
involves observation of facts, ii., 95 explained, ii., 57
two stages of complexity, ii. , 97 where indecisive, ii., 59
simple, extension of a law, ii., 97 in Politics, ii., 336
combination of causes, ii., 99 in Medicine, ii., 361
fallacies of, ii. , 395 exhibition ofin Chemistry, ii., 253
Deductive Method, three requisites of, Differences, statement of, in classifica-
ii., 95 tion, ii., 192, 299
in Psychology, ii., 283 in Botany, ii., 305
in Politics, ii., 337 difficult in Botany, ii., 306
 INDEX . 439

Differences, statement of, in Zoology, Existence, means Object and Subject

ii., 313 indiscriminately, ii., 390
in Diseases, ii., 366 Experience, the source of knowledge,
Differentia, i., 73 i., 9
Dignity, a source of fallacies, ii., 383 the proof of the Axiom of the
Dilemma, i., 121 Syllogism, i., 159, 226
Discovery, Art of, ii., 413 the proof of Causation, i., 226
distinguished from Proof by Mill, Experiment, advantages of, ii., 43
ii., 413 in Biology, ii., 270
three aids to, ii., 96 in Politics, ii., 333
secondary in Logic, ii., 97 Experimental Methods, apply only to
Disease, definition of, ii. , 345 Cause and Effect, ii., 10
Disjunctive Propositions, i., 85 deductive, in character, ii., 47, 115
Disjunctive Syllogism, involves no in- explained, ii., 49
ference, i., 119 examples of, ii., 67
Division, an aspect of classification, frustration of, ii., 76, 82, 83
ii., 195 in Psychology, ii , 282
rules of, ii., 196 in Politics, ii., 342, 335
a mode of grades, ii., 197 in Medicine, ii., 360
fails with undefined classes, ii ., 198 how far anticipated by Bacon,
Documents,invalidated bytwo doubts, ii., 403, 405
ii., 425 given by Herschel, ii., 410
neglected by Whewell, ii., 412
EFFICIENT CAUSE, ii., 18 Experimentum crucis, ii., 135
Electricity, Conservation of Force in, Explanation of Nature, a joint effect
ii., 27 ii., 117
characters and branches of, ii., 238 intermediate links, ii., 118
Elimination, of Cause and Effect, ii., subsumption of laws, ii., 119
41 limits of, ii., 121
weapons of, ii., 46 fallacious, ii. , 124
is Proof, ii., 49 Extension, i., 50
of chance, ii., 84 fundamentalproperty of the Object,
Empirical laws, explained, ii., 103 i., 259
various kinds of, ii., 104 Evidence, assertions beyond reach of,
criteria of, ii., 105 incredible, ii., 152
limited application of, ii., 106 Historical, ii., 423
established by Universal Agree- supreme canon of, ii., 423
ment, ii., 7 internal and external, ii., 424
more precarious than derivative, two modes of external, ii., 425
ii., Î12 transmitted by writing, ii., 425
in Chemistry, ii. , 254 transmitted orally, ii., 429
in Biology, ii., 268
in Psychology, ii. 284 FACTS AND IDEAS, ii., 411, 415
in Politics, ii., 338 Fallacies, Aristotelian and Scholastic,
Enthymeme, ii., 432 i., 275
Equality, uniformities of, as a branch Whately's division, i., 278
of Logic, ii., 9 Mill's classification of, ii., 369
Equality and inequality, one of the a priori, ii., 369
three Universal Predicates, i., of observation, ii., 370
103 of generalization. ii. , 371
Equivalence of propositions, i., 107 of ratiocination, ii., 371
Equivalent terms, as an aid to Dis- of confusion, ii ., 372, 386
covery, ii., 417 position of, ii., 373
Essential attributes, i., 74 extralogical, ii., 375
predication, in Psychology, ii., 279 tendencies to, ii., 376
Excluded Middle, principle of, i., 17 logical, ii., 394
Exclusion, Bacon's process of, ïï., 404 knowledge of, aids discovery, ii.
Existence, has no real opposite, i. , 59 422
propositions of elliptical, i., 107 in Politics, ii., 342
440 INDEX.

Fear, a source of fallacy, ii., 382 Government, definition of, ii., 321
Feeling, two-sided, i., 2 functions of, ii., 322
Feelings, a souree of fallacy, ii., 379 local and central, ü., 324
Fever, definition of, ii., 351 defines Public and Private, ii., 324
Figures, i., 136 Grades of generality, great importance
relative value of, i., 146 of, ii., 416
reasons for different, i., 146 in classification, ii., 188
Figuræ dictionis, fallacia, i., 276 Statement of, suited to discovery of
Final Cause, ii., 18 concomitance, ii., 189
Food, an example of positive defini- in Mineralogy, ii., 298
tion, ii., 158 in Botany, ii., 304
Force, definition of, ii., 21 in Zoology, ii., 312
chief predicates of, ii., 21 in Diseases, ii., 366
Conservation of, i., 21 Gravity, an example of Hypothesis,
Form and Matter, i., 241 11., 130
Formal Logic, too narrow, i., 246 contradiction of, incredible, ii., 149
Cause, ii., 18
thinking explained, i., 242 HAMILTON, additions to syllogism, i.,
requires inductive verification, i., 178
250 Quantification of Predicate, i., 178
Freedom of the will, ii., 114, 391 syllogism in Comprehension criti-
Functions of living bodies, ii., 261 cized, i., 180
Function and Structure viewed sepa- Health-Disease, indefinable, ii., 34
rately, ii., 263 Heat, generated by collision, ii., 23
conservation of, ii., 24
GENERAL NAME, explained, i., 48 unprofitable dissipation of, ii., 25
Generality, Names classed according definition of, ii., 237
to, i., 47 heads of the science of, ii., 237
higher and lower, i., 54 propositions of, ii., 240
degrees of, in Notions, i., 64 structural, should be stated in che-
fixed grades of, in Botany, and in mical formulæ, ii., 257
Zoology, i. , 65 Herschel, contributions to Induction,
degrees of, in Propositions, i., 78 ii., 409
of Proposition follows Notion, i., History, Philosophy of, ii., 318
78 basis of Politics, ii., 331
as classifying Propositions, i ., 78 perversions of, ii., 428
as a basis of Definition, ii. , 155 Homonymia, i., 275
Generalization, identical with Expla- Hypothesis, various meanings of, ii.,
nation, ii., 116 128
the highest ambition of Science, of known agencies desirable, ii., 129
ii., 126 of a new agent permissible, ii., 131
approximate, ii., 135 as a representative fiction, ii., 132
fallacies of, ii., 371 differs from geometrical abstrac-
excessive tendency to, ii., 378 tions, ii., 134
as an art of Discovery, ii., 49, 414 analogical, ii., 147
Genus and species, moveable names, in Chemistry, ii., 255
except in Natural History, i., in Biology, ii., 272
65 in Psychology, ii., 285
a predicable, i., 73 in Politics, ii., 339, 443
Geometry, notions of, ii., 202 in Medicine, ii., 363
definitions of, ii., 204 Hypothetical Inference, i., 116
ultimate notions of, ii., 206
axioms of, ii., 208 IDEA AND FACTS, ii., 411, 415
postulates of, ii., 209 Identification of a Minor, when diffi-
order of topics in, ii., 216 cult, i. , 218
proof of Euclid's fourth proposition not an induction, ii., 5, 98
in, ii., 217 Identity, principle of, i., 16
Glaring instances, ii., 406, 420 Idola, Bacon's, ii., 379
Government, forms of, ii., 319, 323 Ignava Ratio, ii., 432
 INDEX. 441

Ignoratio elenchi, i. , 277, ii. , 372, 393 | Jurisprudence, ii., 318

Immediate Inference, i., 107
by Added Determinants, i. , 109 KNOWLEDGE, the act of, includes al-
fallacies of, ii., 395 ways two things, i., 3
Import of Propositions, i., 100 conjoins Agreement and Difference,
Hobbes's view, i. , 100 i., 4
not the reference of something to of two kinds, called Object and
a class, i., 101 Subject, i., 5
Inconceivability of the opposite, ex- Individual or Concrete, and General
plained, i., 223 or Abstract, i., 5, 22
rejected as ultimate test of truth origin of in Experience, i., 9
i., 268 limited by our sensibilities, i., 13
Incredibility, inconsistency with nature and classification of, i., 21
proved inductions, ii., 149 should be true, i., 22
Index, to a classification, ii., 194 conveyed in propositions, i., 44
in Mineralogy, ii., 300 relativity of appears in language, i. ,
in Botany, ii., 308 54
in Zoology, ii., 314 Kinds, i. , 63
in Diseases, ii., 367 exemplify co-inhering attributes, ii.,
Individual, our idea of, a conflux of 11
generalities, i., 7
Induction, first principles of, i., 19 LANGUAGE, truths expressed in, i., 42
explained, i., 40, ii. , 1 fallacies of, ii., 386
would furnish Formal processes, i., Law, confused meanings of, i., 245, ii.,
252 387
a branch of Logic, i., 253 metaphorical use in ' Laws of Na-
improperly so called, ii., 3, 5 ture,' ii., 9
cannot be brought under the syllo- involved in Government, ii. , 322
gism, ii., 3 combined with Chance, ii., 89
a prerequisite of deduction, ii., 95 Laws of Nature, by preeminence, ii., 9
in difference of subject, ii., 141 Liberty, ii., 320
postulate of, i., 272 Life, definition of, ii., 258
fallacies of, ii., 395 Light, undulatory theory of, ii. , 131
growth of, ii., 403 commutation of not established, ii.,
Inductive, Discovery, ii. , 96 28
Methods an aid to Discovery, ii., production of, an example of Agree-
418 ment, ii., 56
Syllogism, ii., 3 definition and subsidiary notions of,
Infimæ species, i., 63 ji., 238
Inflammation, definition of, ii., 353 Likeness and Unlikeness, common to
Intermixture of Effects, ii., 80 subject and object experience,
in Politics, ii., 335 i., 257
in Medicine, ii., 361 Love, a source of fallacy, ii., 382
International law, ii., 318
Intuition, an alleged source of know- MARGIN, doubtful, in definition, ii., 160
ledge, i., 10 Mathematics, Logic of, ii ., 199
Intuitive-symbolical, ii., 432 the best example of a Deductive
Invention, how assisted, ii. , 421 Science, i., 249, ii., 199
notions of, ii., 200
JOINT METHOD of Agreement and propositions of, ii., 202
Difference, ii., 61 definitions of, ii., 203
counteractiveto pluralityof causes, axioms of, ii., 207
ii., 80 leading branches of, ii. , 212
in Politics, ii., 336 Materia Medica, ii., 351
in Medicine, ii., 361 Method, expresses part of the function
an aid to Discovery, ii., 418 of Logic, i., 35
Judgment, formal, i., 243 an aid to Discovery, ii., 417
as a synonym for proposition, i., 80 Mind, substance of, i., 262
its significance with Aristotle, i., 80 definition of, ii., 275
442 INDEX .

Mind, difficult to estimate quantity | Names, loosely extended, ii., 172

in, 287 transitive application of, ii., 173
Mind and Body, ii., 127, 146, 275 class, ii., 179
Mineralogy, Scope of, ii., 292 of generalities should be short, ii.,
relations to Chemistry, ii., 292 180
arrangement of characters in, ii., new, ii. , 180
293 precautions in appropriating old,
maximum of affinity in, ii., 294 ii., 182
grades in, ii., 298 expressive, ii., 184
agreement and difference in, ii., 299 different, held to imply different
index for, ii., 300 things, ii., 388
Material Cause, ii., 18 improper use of, ij., 390
Material, names of, singular, i. , 48 Naming, General, value of, ii., 171
Matter, as Resistance, i., 259 first requisite of, ii., 172
defined by positive method, ii. , 161 second requisite of, ii., 177
by negative method, ii., 163 Nature, explanation of, ii., 116
constitution of, a hypothesis, ii., ambiguity of the word, ii. , 386
133 Negation, variously expressed, i., 58
Force, Inertia the same fact, ii., 225 Negative names. i., 55
physical properties of, ii., 234 singular or plural, i., 57
Mechanics, ii., 232 of a real property also real, i., 58
Medicine, scope of, ii. , 345 Necessary Truth, i., 14
based on Biology, ii., 347 Necessity, meanings of-certainty, i.
definitions of diseases in, ii., 351 220
general diseases in, ii., 349, 351 implication, i., 221
specific diseases in, ii., 356 inconceivability of the opposite,
propositions of, ii., 358 223
experimental methods in, ii , 36) Nerve force, conservation of, ii., 28
elimination of chance in, ii., 362 Newton, contributions to Induction,
the deductive method in, ii., 362 ii., 408
hypotheses in, ii., 363 Nomenclature, ii., 182, 184
classification in, ii., 365 of Chemistry, ii., 256
Minor, identification of, not an in- Non causa pro causa, i., 277
duction, ii., 5 Non sequitur, i., 277
Mnemonics, i., 147 North East wind, an example of
Modals, i., 99 ; ii., 432 Agreement, ii., 53
Molar forces, conservation of, ii., 22 Nota nota est nota rei ipsius, i., 156
Molecular attractions, ii., 234 Notation, of Chemistry, ii., 257
Molecular forces, enumerated, ii. , 24 Notion and Proposition, not distin-
Motion, laws of, reduced to one, ii., guished by Whewell, ii., 412
228 Notions, contrasted with Propositions,
Monarchy, example of positive defi- i., 61
nition, ii., 157 disguised as Propositions, i., 66
Moods, i., 138 of singular or plural constitution,
usual enumerations justified, i., 153 i., 63
Muscular Irritability and Putrefaction, indefinable, ultimate, ii., 168
an induction, ii., 73
Mystery, ii., 126 OBJECT, analysis of, i., 256
attributes special to, i., 259
NAMES, why considered at beginning Object-Subject, highest real couple,
of Logic, i., 45 i., 59
defined, i., 46 greatest ofall antitheses, i., 255
denote things not ideas of things, i., attributes common to, i., 257
46 Observation, why not a department of
variously classified, i., 47 Logic, i., 36
De Morgan's divisions of, i., 51 the basis of Induction, ii., 4
go in couples, i., 54 compared with Experiment, ii., 43
meaning of increases with opposite, in Biology, ii., 270
i., 60 in Politics, ii. , 331
 INDEX. 443

Observation, erroneous, causes of, ii., | Politics, Theoretical, other experi-

332 mental methods in, ii., 336
fallacies of, ii., 370 deductive method in, ii., 337
as an art of Discovery, ii., 414 hypotheses in, ii., 339
Opposition, of propositions, i., 92 simplifying of, ii., 340
error in common square, i., 94 fallacious methods in, ii., 342
amended square, i., 97 Practical, End in, ii., 343
Aristotle's square, i., 98 based on Theoretical Politics, ii .,
Obversion, formal, i., 109 344
material, i. , 111 origin of political devices in, ii.,
Order, valuable aid to Discovery, ii., 345
417 Porphyry's tree, ii., 432
Order and Progress, ii. , 325, 340 Positive names, i., 55
description of, ii., Post hoc ergo propter hoc, i., 277
Oxygen, 24exemplary
9 Postulate, the universal, i., 266
Potential energy, ii., 29
PARITY of Reasoning, ii., 5 an aspect of Collocation, ii., 34
Pathology, general. ii. , 349 Practice, logic of, ii., 315
Per genus et differentiam, ii., 155, 166 maxims of, in Politics, ii., 345
Persistence of Force, see Conserva- Predesignate, ii., 433
tion. Predicables, i., 73
Petitio Principii, i., 277, ii., 372, 393 Predication, verbal, i., 76
Physics, Molar, divisions of, abstract confounded with real, i., 68
and concrete, ii., 222 in plural notions, i., 69
notions of, ii., 222 in Natural Kinds, i., 69
propositions of, ii., 224 verbal not tautological, i., 70
definitions of, ii., 225 final analysis of, i., 262
axioms of (laws of motion), ii., 228 Predicates, three universal, i. , 102
concatenation and method of, ii., Mr. Mill's scheme of, i., 106
232 Premises, i., 135
Physics, Molecular,departments of, ii. Prerogative Instances of Bacon, ii.,
233 404
notions of, ii., 234 Presentative and Representative , i., 7,
propositions of, ii., 239 242
predominant methods of, ii. , 242 Primary qualities of matter, i., 259
Plants and Animals contrasted, ii., 265 Probable Inference, explained, ii. 135
Plato's dialogues, how authenticated, may be estimated, ii. , 136
ii., 426 how made more precise, ii., 138
Plurality of Causes, ii. , 16 Probability, ii., 90
how far subject to uniformity, ii., explained, ii., 91
16 principle of, ii., 91
bearing of, on the Experimental rules of, ii., 92
Methods, ii., 77 applied to Causation, ii., 94
in Politics, ii , 335 an approximate generalization, ii.,
in Medicine, ii., 361 136
Plurium Interrogationum, i. , 278 comparison of, ii., 151
Political Economy, ii. , 318 in Biology, ii., 271
Politics, two divisions of, ii , 317 in Psychology ii. , 286.
embraces several sciences, ii., 319 ambiguity of the word, ii., 388
province of, ii , 319 Progress and Order, ii., 325, 340
Descriptive, ii., 320 Proof or Evidence, the scope of Logic,
Theoretical, defined, ii., 326 i., 34 ; ii., 49
propositions of, ii., 328 Proposition, a, contains two names,
universal propositions of, ii., 329 and two notions, i., 44, 62
limited propositions of, ii. , 330 verbal, i., 67
methods of, ii., 331 Propositions, i., 78
experiment in, ii., 333 Proprium, i., 74
causation in, ii., 334 exemplified in Mathematics, ii., 202
method of agreement in, ii., 335 Psychology, scope of, ii., 275
444 INDEX.

Psychology, subordinate notions of, Relativity of Proposition follows No-

ii., 277 tion, i. , 79
propositions of, ii., 279 Relative terms, for special relation-
logical methods of, ii., 281 ships, i. , 60
empirical and derivative laws in, ii., names, i , 55
284 Representative Fictions, ii. , 132
hypotheses in, ii., 285 in Medicine, ii., 364
chance and probability in, ii., 286 Residues, Method of. ii., 49, 65
suggesting arts of Discovery, ii., 415 in Politics, ii., 339
a Concrete Science ? i. , 238 an aid to Discovery, ii., 418
Resistance, i., 259
QUALITY, of Propositions, Affirmative
or Negative, i., 83 SANGUINE TEMPERAMENT, a source of
an ineradicable distinction, i., 83 fallacy, ii., 381
designations of, i., 84 Science, the perfect form of Know-
Quantification of Predicate, i., 86 ledge, i., 23
makes two propositions in one, i ., characteristics of, i., 23
88 problem of, as conceivedby Whewell,
additions to syllogism, basis of, i., ii., 411
178 Sciences, classified, i. , 25
Quantity, of Propositions, Total or Abstract and Concrete, i., 25
Partial, i., 81 Abstract, i., 25
Universal and Particular, inapt Concrete, i., 28
names , i., 82 Practical. i., 28
Indefinite, i., 82 defined, ii., 315
one of the three Universal Predi- Classification of, Bacon, i., 229
cates, ii., 103 D'Alembert, i., 230
common to Object and Subject ex- Encyclopedia Metropolitana, i.,
perience, i., 257 230
subject-matter of Mathematics, ii., Neil Arnott, i., 231
199 Comte, i., 231
designations of, i., 81 • Herbert Spencer, i., 232
sciences of, Deductive, i., 103 criticism of Spencer's scheme, i.,
uniformities of, as a branch of Logic, 236
ii., 9 Secondary qualities of matter, i., 259
Laws, importance of, ii., 102
RATIOCINATION, fallacies of, ii., 371 Self-interest, a source of fallacy, ii ,
Realism, i., 5 380
fallacy of, ii., 389 Series, Classification by, ii. , 65
Reasoning, used in defining Logic. i., Serial order, in classification, ii., 187
30 Similarity, law of, i., 3
founded on Similarity, i., 8, ii., 140 the foundation of Reasoning, i , 8 ;
from particulars to particulars, i., ii., 140
209 basis of scientific explanation, ii.,
chain of, reducible to a series of 116
syllogisms, i., 215 extension of names through, ii., 172,
causes of, complicated, i., 217 175
formal, i., 243 Singular Name explained, i , 48
Reductio ad impossibile, i., 141. Propositions, syllogism of, i., 159
Reduction, i., 147 Smelling, due to oxidation, induc-
Relativity, law of, i., 2 tively proved, ii., 67
Names classed according to, i., 54 Society, notion of, ii. , 317
universal, i., 61 structure of, ii., 320
as affecting Notions, i., 66 Solid defined by positive method, ii.,
as classifying Propositions, i., 78 160
as a basis of Definition, ii., 155 by negative method, ii., 163
basis of an enumeration of things, Sophisma Heterozeteseos, ii., 433
i., 255 Pigrum, ii., 432
fallacies of, ii. , 391 Polyzeteseos, ii., 433
 INDEX. 445

Sorites, or heap, ii., 160, 433 Synthetic judgment, i., 76

Space, an abstraction, i., 11
characterized, i., 259 TABULATION, as an Index Classifica-
Species, a predicable, i., 73 tion, ii., 300, 367
Species, importance ofinclassification, as an aid to Discovery, ii. , 420
ii., 190 Tabular arrangement, Bacon's, ii., 403
infima, ii,, 191 Terminology, descriptive, ii., 177
in Mineralogy, ii. , 298 Terms, of syllogism, ii., 134
in Botany, ii., 305 Therapeutics, general, ii., 350
in Zoology, ii., 312 Things, enumeration of, i., 254
Statistics, Political, ii. , 319, 332 Mr. Mill's enumeration of, i., 263
Medical, ii., 362 Thought, Laws of, i. , 16, 243
Structure of Living Bodies, ii., 260 definition of Logic, i., 30
and Function viewed separately, ii., too limited to make a Universal
263 Postulate, i. , 267
Subject, explained, i., 257 Time, an abstraction, ii. , 10
attributes special to, i. , 261 Tradition, oral, value of, ii., 429
Subject-Object, highest real couple, i., approaching to written evidence,
59 u., 431
greatest ofall antithesis, i., 255 Truths, known immediately, i., 82
attributes, common to, i. , 257 known by the mediation of other
Substance, a supposed intuition, i., 11 truths, i., 32
fundamental attribute, i. , 262
Succession, one of the three Universal ULTIMATE LAWS OF NATURE, limited
Predicates, i., 105 in number, ii., 123
as Order in Time, i ., 105 Uniformity of Nature, supposed in
as Cause and Effect, the chief part Deduction, i., 19
of Induction, i., 106 enters into Theoretical Logic, i., 247
Sufficient Reason, ii , 370, 433 the ultimate major premise of all
Sumption and Subsumption, i., 146 Induction, i., 273
Syllogism, defined, i ., 133 a plurality not a unity, ii., 8
examples of, i., 165 axiom of, fundamental, i ., 227
additions to by Hamilton, i. , 178 Uniformities among effects of same
by de Morgan, i. , 182 cause, ii., 105
by Boole, i., 190 limited in application, ii., 111 112
Numerically Definite, i., 188 of remote causal connexion, ii., 104
functions and value of, i., 207 Universe, of a term, i., 56
how far a material process, i., 211
axiom of, reposes on experience, i., VANITY, a source of fallacies, ii., 382
226 Variation of circumstances , ii., 43
an aid to Discovery, ii., 419 Verification, ii., 100
of the Will, meaningless, ii., 146 in Politics, ii., 337
Sympathy, a source of fallacies, ii., Vera Causœ, ii., 129
380
Symbolical-Intuitive, ii., 432 WHEWELL, Contributions to Induc-
Symbols, of Propositions, i., 86 tion, ii., 411
Synonymous Propositions, i., 123 Wonder, a source of fallacy, ii., 382
Synonyms, definition by, ii., 166
as an aid to Discovery, ii., 417 ZOOLOGY, difficulties of, ii., 308
Synthesis, Chemical, ii., 397 arrangement of characters in, ii., 308
Logical, ii., 399 laws of Concomitance in, ii., 309
does not apply to Simple Deduction, maximum of affinity in, ii., 310
ii., 400 grades in, ii., 312
Grammatical, ii. , 400 agreement and difference in, ii., 313
Mathematical, ii. , 401 index in, ii., 314
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