CHAPTER XXV.

THE GROUNDS OF DISBELIEF.

The result of examining evidence is not always belief, or even

suspension of judgment, but is sometimes positive disbelief. This can

ensue only when the affirmative evidence does not amount to full proof,

but is based on some approximate generalisation. In such cases, if the

negative evidence consist of a stronger, though still only an

approximate, generalisation, we think the fact improbable, and

disbelieve it provisionally; but if of a complete generalisation based

on a rigorous induction, it is disbelieved by us totally, and thought

impossible. Hence, Hume declared miracles incredible, as being, he

considered, contrary to a complete induction. Now, it is true that _in

the absence of any adequate counteracting cause_, a fact contrary to a

complete induction is incredible, whatever evidence it may be grounded

on; unless, indeed, the evidence go to prove the supposed law

inconsistent with some better established one. But when a miracle is

asserted, the presence of an adequate counteracting cause _is_ asserted,

viz. a direct interposition of an act of the will of a Being having

power over nature. Therefore, all that Hume proved is, that we cannot

believe in a miracle unless we believe in the power, and _the will_, of

the Deity to interfere with existing causes by introducing new ones; and

that, in default of such belief, not the most satisfactory evidence of

our senses or of testimony can hinder us from holding a seeming miracle

to be merely the result of some unknown natural cause. The argument of

Dr. Campbell and others against Hume, however, is untenable, viz. that,

as we do not disbelieve an alleged fact (which may be something

conforming to the uniform course of experience) merely because the

chances are against it, therefore we need never disbelieve any fact

supported by credible testimony (even if contrary to the uniform course

of experience). But this is to confound _improbability before the fact_,

which is _not_ always a ground for disbelief, with _improbability after

the fact_, which always is.

Facts which conflict with special laws of causation are only improbable

before the fact; that is, our disbelief depends on the improbability

that there could have been present, without our knowledge, at the time

and place of the event, an adequate counteracting cause. So, too, with

facts which conflict with the properties of _kinds_ (which are

uniformities of mere coexistence not proved to be dependent on

causation), that is, facts which assert the existence of a new _kind_;

such facts we disbelieve only if, the generalisation being sufficiently

comprehensive, some properties are said to have been found in the

supposed new _kind_ disjoined from others which always have been known

to accompany them. When the assertion would amount, if admitted, only to

the existence of an unknown cause or an anomalous _kind_,

_unconformable_, but, as Hume puts it, _not contrary_ to experience, in

circumstances so little explored, that it is credible hitherto unknown

things may there be found, and when prejudice cannot have tempted to the

assertion, one ought neither to admit nor to reject the testimony, but

to suspend judgment till it be confirmed or disproved from other

sources. Only facts, then, which are contradictory to the laws of

Number, Extension, and Universal Causation (since these know no

counteraction or anomaly), or to laws nearly as general, are improbable

after, as well as before the fact, and only these we should term

_absolutely impossible_, calling other facts _improbable_ only, or, at

most, _impossible in the circumstances of the case_.

Between these two species of improbabilities lie _coincidences_; that

is, combinations of chances presenting some unexpected regularity

assimilating them in so far to the results of law. It was thought by

d'Alembert that, though regular combinations are as probable as others

according to the mathematical theory, some physical law prevents them

from occurring so often. Now, stronger testimony may indeed be needed

to support the assertion of such a combination as, e.g. ten successive

throws of sixes at dice, because such a regular series is more likely

than an irregular series to be the result of design; and because even

the desire to excite wonder is likely to tempt men to assert the

occurrence falsely, though this probability must be estimated afresh in

every instance. But though such a series _seems_ peculiarly improbable,

it is only because the comparison is tacitly made, not between it and

any one particular previously fixed series of throws, but between all

regular and all irregular successions taken together. The fact is not in

itself more improbable; and no stronger evidence is needed to give it

credibility, apart from the reasons above mentioned, than in the case of

ordinary events.

BOOK IV.

OPERATIONS SUBSIDIARY TO INDUCTION.

CHAPTER I.

OBSERVATION AND DESCRIPTION.

The mental process which Logic deals with, viz. the investigation of

truth by means of evidence, is always a process of Induction. Since

Induction is simply the extension to a class of something observed to be

true of certain members of it, Observation is the first preliminary to

it. It is, therefore, right to consider, not indeed how or what to

observe (for this belongs to the art of Education), but under what

conditions observation is to be relied on. The sole condition is, that

the supposed observation should really be an observation, and not an

inference, whereas it is usually a compound of both, there being, in our

propositions, besides observation which relates only to the sensations,

an inference from the sensations to the objects themselves. Thus

so-called errors of sense are only erroneous inferences from sense. The

sensations themselves must be genuine; but, as they generally arise on a

certain arrangement of outward objects being present to the organs, we,

as though by instinct, infer this arrangement even when not existing.

The sole object, then, of the logic of observation, is to separate the

inferences from observation from the observations themselves, the only

thing really observed by the mind (to waive the metaphysical problem as

to the _perception_ of objects) being its own feelings or states of

consciousness, outward, viz. Sensations, and inward, viz. Thoughts,

Emotions, and Volitions.

As in the simplest observation much is inference, so, in describing an

observed fact, we not merely describe the fact, but are always forced to

class it, affirming the resemblance, in regard of whatever is the ground

of the name being given, between it and all other things denoted by the

name. The resemblance is sometimes perceived by direct comparison of the

objects together; sometimes (as, e.g. in the description of the earth's

figure as globular and so forth) it is inferred through intermediate

marks, i.e. deductively. When a hypothesis is made (e.g. by Kepler, as

to the figure of the earth's orbit), and then verified by comparison

with actual observations, Dr. Whewell calls the process Colligation of

Facts by appropriate Conceptions, and affirms it to be the whole of

Induction. But this also is only description, being really the ordinary

process of ascertaining resemblance by a comparison of phenomena; and,

though subsidiary to Induction, it is not itself Induction at all.

CHAPTER II.

ABSTRACTION, OR THE FORMATION OF CONCEPTIONS.

_This Chapter is a digression._

Abstract Ideas, that is, General Conceptions, certainly do exist,

however Metaphysics may decide as to their composition. They

_represent_ in our minds the whole classes of things called by the

general names; and, being implied in the mental operation whereby

classes are formed, viz. in the comparison of phenomena, to ascertain in

what they agree, cannot be dispensed with in induction, since such a

comparison is a necessary preliminary to an induction, and more than two

objects cannot well be compared without a type, in which capacity

conceptions serve.

But, though implied in the comparison, it does not follow that, as Dr.

Whewell supposes, they must have existed in the mind prior to

comparison. Sometimes, but only sometimes, they are pre-existent to the

comparison of the particular facts in question, being, as was Kepler's

hypothesis of an ellipse, familiar conceptions borrowed from different

facts, and _superinduced_, to use Dr. Whewell's expression, on the facts

in question. But even such conceptions are the results of former

comparisons of individual facts. And much more commonly (and these are

the more difficult cases in science) conceptions are not pre-existent

even in this sense; but they have to be got (e.g. the Idea of Polarity)

by abstraction, that is, by comparison, from among the very phenomena

which they afterwards serve to arrange, or, as Dr. Whewell says, to

_connect_. They seem to be pre-existent; but this is only because the

mind keeps ever forming conceptions from the facts, which at the time

are before it, and then tentatively applies these conceptions (which it

is always remodelling, dropping some which are found not to suit

after-found facts, and generalising others by a further effort of

abstraction) as types of comparison for phenomena subsequently

presented to it; so that, being found in these later stages of the

comparison already in the mind, they appear in the character simply of

types, and not as being also themselves results of comparison. Really

they are always both; and the term _comparison_ expresses as well their

origin as (and this far more exactly than to _connect_ or to

_superinduce_) their function.

Dr. Whewell says that conceptions must be _appropriate_ and _clear_.

They must, indeed, be appropriate relatively to the purpose in view (for

appropriateness is only relative); but they cannot avoid being

appropriate (though one may be more so than another) if our comparison

of the objects has led to a conception corresponding to any real

agreement in the facts: the ancients' and schoolmen's conceptions were

often absolutely inappropriate, because grounded on only apparent

agreement. So, again, they must be _clear_ in the following sense; that

is to say, a _sufficient number_ of facts must have been _carefully

observed_, and accurately _remembered_. It is also a condition (and one

implied in the latter qualities) of clearness, that the conception

should be _determinate_, that is, that we should know precisely what

agreements we include in it, and never vary the connotation except

consciously.

Activity, carefulness, and accuracy in the observing and comparing

faculties are therefore needed; the first quality to produce

appropriateness, and the latter two, clearness. Moreover, _scientific

imagination_, i.e. the faculty of mentally arranging known elements into

new combinations, is necessary for forming true conceptions; and the

mind should be stored with previously acquired conceptions, kindred to

the subject of inquiry, since a comparison of the facts themselves often

fails to suggest the principle of their agreement; just as, in seeking

for anything lost, we often have to ask ourselves in what places it may

be hid, that we may search for it there.

CHAPTER III.

NAMING AS SUBSIDIARY TO INDUCTION.

As reasoning is from particulars to particulars, and consists simply in

recognising one fact as a mark of another, or a mark of a mark of

another, the only necessary conditions of the exertion of the reasoning

power are senses, to perceive that two facts are conjoined; and

association, as the law by which one of the two facts raises up the idea

of the other. The existence of artificial signs is not a third

_necessary_ condition. It is only, however, the rudest inductions (and

of such even brutes are capable) that can be made without language or

other artificial signs. Without such we could avail ourselves but little

of the experience of others; and (except in cases involving our intenser

sensations or emotions) of none of our own long past experience. It is

only through the medium of such permanent signs that we can register

uniformities; and the existence of uniformities is necessary to justify

an inference, even in a single case, and they can be ascertained once

for all.

General names are not, as some have argued, a mere contrivance to

economise words. For, if there were a name for every individual object,

but no general names, we could not record one uniformity, or the result

of a single comparison. To effect this, all indeed, that are

_indispensable_, are the abstract names of attributes; but, in fact, men

have always given general names to objects also.

CHAPTER IV.

THE REQUISITES OF A PHILOSOPHICAL LANGUAGE, AND THE PRINCIPLES OF

DEFINITION.

Concrete general names (and the meaning of abstract names depends on the

concrete) should have a fixed and knowable connotation. This is easy

enough when, as in the case of new technical names, we choose the

connotation for ourselves; but it is hard when, as generally happens

with names in common use, the same name has been applied to different

objects, from only a vague feeling of resemblance. For, then, after a

time, general propositions are made, in which predicates are applied to

those names; and these propositions make up a loose connotation for the

class name, which, and the abstract at about this same period formed

from it, are consequently never understood by two people, or by the same

person at different times, in the same way. The logician has to fix this

fluctuating connotation, but so that the name may, if possible, still

_denote_ the things of which it is currently affirmed. To effect this

double object (which is called, though improperly, defining _not the

name but the thing_), he must select from the attributes in which the

denoted objects agree, choosing, as the common properties are always

many, and, in a _kind_, innumerable, those which are familiarly

predicated of the class, and out of them, if possible, or otherwise,

even in preference to them, the ones on which depend, or which are the

best marks of, those thus familiarly predicated. To do this

successfully, presumes a knowledge of all the common properties of the

class, and the relations between them of causation and dependence. Hence

the discussion of non-verbal definitions (which Dr. Whewell calls the

Explication of Conceptions) is part of the business of discovery. Hence,

too, disputes in science have often assumed the form of a battle of

definitions; such definitions being not arbitrary, but made with a view

to some tacitly assumed principle needing expression.

We ought, if possible, to define in consonance with the denotation. But

sometimes this is impossible, through the name having accumulated

_transitive_ applications, in its gradual extension from one object, in

relation to which it connotes one property, to another which resembles

the former, but in quite a different attribute. These _transitive_

applications, even when found to correspond in different languages, may

have arisen, not from any common quality in the objects, but from some

association of ideas founded on the common nature and condition of

mankind. When the association is so natural and habitual as to become

virtually indissoluble, the _transitive_ meanings are apt to coalesce in

one complex conception; and every new transition becomes a more

comprehensive generalisation of the term in question. In such cases the

ancients and schoolmen did not suspect, what otherwise they carefully

watched for, viz. ambiguities: not Plato, though his Comparisons and

Abstractions preparatory to Induction are perfect; not even Bacon, in

his speculations on Heat. Hence have sprung the various vain attempts to

trace a common idea in all the uses of a word, such as _Cause_

(Efficient, Material, Formal, and Final _Cause_), _the Good_, _the Fit_.

When a term is applied to many different objects agreeing _all_ only in

_one_ quality (e.g. things _beautiful_, in _agreeableness_), though

_most_ agree in something besides, it is better to exclude part of the

denotation than of the connotation, however indistinct: else language

ceases to keep alive old experience, alien perhaps to present

tendencies. In any case, words are always in danger of losing part of

their connotation. For, just one or two out of a complex cluster of

ideas, and sometimes merely the look or sound of the word itself, is

often all that is absolutely necessary for the suggesting another set of

ideas to continue the process of thought; and consequently, some

metaphysicians have even fancied that all reasoning is but the

mechanical use of terms according to a certain form. If persons be not

of active imaginations, the only antidote against the propensity to let

slip the connotation of names, is the habit of predicating of them the

properties connoted; though even the propositions themselves, as may be

seen from the way in which maxims of Religion, Ethics, and Politics are

used, are often repeated merely mechanically, not being questioned, but

also not being felt. Much of our knowledge recorded in words is ever

oscillating between its tendency, in consequence of different

generations attending exclusively to different properties in names, to

become partially dormant, and the counter-efforts of individuals, at

times, to revive it by tracing the forgotten properties historically in

the almost mechanically repeated formulas of propositions; and, when

they have been there rediscovered, promulgating them, not as

discoveries, but with authority as what men still profess to believe.

The danger is, lest the formula itself be dismissed by clear-headed

narrow-minded logicians, and the connotation fixed by them (in order

that the denotation may be extended) in accordance with the present use

of the term. Then, if the truths be at any time rediscovered, the

prejudice is against them as novelties. The _selfish_ theory of morals

partly fell because the inconsistency of received formulas with it

prompted a reconsideration of its basis. What would have been the result

if the formulas attaching odium to selfishness, praise to

self-sacrifice, had been dismissed, if this indeed had been possible!

Language, in short, is the depositary of all experience, which, being

the inheritance of posterity, we have a right to vary, but none to

curtail. We may improve the conclusions of our ancestors; we should not

let drop any of their premisses; we may alter a word's connotation; but

we must not destroy part of it.

CHAPTER V.

THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE VARIATION IN THE MEANING OF TERMS.

The connotation of names shifts not only by reason of gradual

inattention to some of the common properties, which, if language were

ruled by convention alone, would be in their entirety both the perpetual

and the sole constituents of the connotation; but also from the

incorporation in the connotation, in addition to these, and often,

finally, to the _exclusion_ of them altogether, of other circumstances

at first only casually associated with it. These collateral associations

are the cause why there are so few exact synonymes; and why the

dictionary meaning, or Definition, is so bad a guide to its uses, as

compared with its history, since the latter explains the law of the

succession by showing the causes which determined the successive uses.

Two counter-movements are always going on in language. One is

generalisation, by which words are ever losing part of their

connotation, and becoming more general. This arises, partly from men,

such as historians and travellers, using words, especially those

expressing complicated mental and social facts strange to them, in a

loose sense, in ignorance of the true connotation; partly, from known

things multiplying faster than names for them; partly, also, from the

wish to give people some notion of a new object by reference to a known

thing resembling it however slightly. The other movement is

specialisation; and by it words (even the same words which, as, e.g.

_pagan_ and _villain_, later get generalised in a new direction) are

ever taking a fresh connotation, through their denotation being

diminished. Specialisations often occur even in scientific nomenclature,

a word which expressed general characters becoming confined to a

specific substance in which these characters are predominant. So it is

when any set of persons has to think of one species oftener than of any

other contained in the genus: e.g. some sportsmen mean partridges by the

term _birds_. But, as ideas of our pleasures and pains and their

supposed causes, cling, most of all, by association to what they have

been once connected with, the great source of specialisation is the

addition of the ideas of agreeableness or painfulness, and approbation

or censure, to the connotation. And hence arises the fallacy of

_question-begging_ names referred to later on.

It is the business of logicians not to ignore, for they cannot prevent,

transformations of terms in common use, but to trace and embody them,

and men's half unconscious reasons for them, in distinct definitions.

CHAPTER VI.

TERMINOLOGY AND NOMENCLATURE.

Not only must words have a fixed and knowable meaning; but also, no

important meaning should be without its word: that is, there should be a

name for everything which we have often to make assertions about. There

should be, therefore, first, names suited to describe all the individual

facts; secondly, a name for every important common property detected by

comparing those facts; and, thirdly, a name for every _kind_.

First, it conduces to brevity and clearness to have separate names for

the oft-recurring combinations of feelings; but, as these can be defined

without reference back to the feelings themselves, it is _enough_ for a

_descriptive_ terminology, if there be a name for every variety of

elementary feeling, since none of these can be defined, or indicated to

a person, except either by his having the sensation itself, or being

referred through a known mark to his remembrance of it. The meaning of

the name when given to a feeling is fixed, in the first instance, by

convention, and must be associated _immediately_, not through the usage

of ordinary language, with the feeling, so that it may at once recall

the latter. But even among the elementary feelings, those purely mental,

and also sensations, such as those from disease, the identity of which

in different persons cannot be determined, cannot be exactly

_described_. It is only the impressions on the outward senses, or those

inward feelings connected uniformly with outward objects (and,

consequently, sciences, such as botany, conversant with outward

objects), which are susceptible of an exact descriptive language.

Secondly, there must also be a separate name for every important common

property recognised through that comparison of observed instances which

is preparatory to induction (including names for the classes which we

artificially construct in virtue of those properties). For, although a

definition would often convey the meaning, both time and space are

saved, perspicuity promoted, and the attention excited and concentrated,

by giving a brief and compact name to each of the new _general

conceptions_, as Dr. Whewell calls them, that is, the new results of

abstraction. Thenceforward the name nails down and clenches the

unfamiliar combination of ideas, and suggests its own definition.

Thirdly, as, besides the artificial classes which are marked out from

neighbouring classes by definite properties to be arrived at by

abstraction, there are classes, viz. _kinds_, distinguished severally by

an unknown multitude of independent properties (and about which classes

therefore many assertions will be made), there must be a name for every

_kind_. That is, besides a terminology, there must be a nomenclature,

i.e. a collection of the names of all the lowest _kinds_, or _infimae

species_. The Linnaean arrangements of plants and animals, and the French

of chemistry, are nomenclatures. The peculiarity of a name which belongs

to a nomenclature is, not that its meaning resides in its denotation

instead of its connotation (for it resides in its connotation, like that

of other concrete general names); but that, besides connoting certain

attributes which its definition explains, it also connotes that these

attributes are distinctive of a _kind_; and this fact its definition

cannot explain.

A philosophical language, then, must possess, first, precision, and next

(the subject of the present chapter), completeness. Some have argued

that, in addition, names are fitted for the purposes of thought in

proportion as they approximate to mere symbols in compactness, through

meaninglessness, and capability of use as counters without reference to

the various objects which, though utterly different, they may thus at

different times equally well represent. Such are, indeed, the qualities

enabling us to employ the figures of arithmetic and the symbols of

algebra perfectly mechanically according to general technical rules.

But, in the first place, in our direct inductions, at all events,

depending as they do on our perception of the particulars of the

agreement and difference of the phenomena, we could never dispense with

a distinct mental image of the latter. Further, even in deduction,

though a syllogism is conclusive from its mere form, if the terms are

unambiguous, yet the _practical_ validity of the reasoning depends on

the hypothesis that no counteracting cause has interfered with the truth

of the premisses. We can assure ourselves of this only by studying the

phenomena at every step. For it is only in geometry and algebra that

there is no danger from the Composition of Causes, or the superseding of

one set of laws by another; and that, therefore, the propositions are

categorically true. In sciences in general, then, the object should be,

so far from keeping individualising peculiarities out of sight, to

contrive the greatest possible obstacles to a merely mechanical use of

language: we should carefully keep alive a consciousness of its meaning,

by referring, by aid of derivation and the analogies between the ideas

of the roots and the derivatives, to the origin of words; and as words,

however philosophically constructed, are always tending, like coins, to

have their inscription worn off, we should be ever stamping them afresh.

This we shall effect, if we contemplate habitually, not the _formulas_

which record the laws of the phenomena (for, if so, the formulas will

themselves progressively lose their meaning), but the phenomena whence

the laws were collected; and we must conceive these phenomena in the

concrete, and clothe them in circumstances.

CHAPTER VII.

CLASSIFICATION, AS SUBSIDIARY TO INDUCTION.

Every name which connotes an attribute thereby divides, but only

incidentally, all things, known and unknown, real and imagined, into two

classes, viz. those which have, and those which have not the attribute.

But sometimes the naming itself is but the secondary and subsidiary, and

the classification, the primary object. The general problem of such

classification is, to provide that things shall be thought of in such

groups, and the groups in such an order, as will best promote the

remembrance and ascertainment of their laws. Its subjects are _real

things_ exclusively, but _all_ real things, since, to place one object

in a group, we ought to know the divisions of nature at large.

Any property may be the basis for a classification; but those best

suited are properties which are causes, or, next, as the cause of a

class's chief peculiarities seldom serves as its diagnostic, any effect

which is a sure mark both of the cause and of the other effects. Only a

classification so grounded is scientific; the same also is not technical

or artificial, but natural, and emphatically _natural_ (as compared with

classifications in an inferior degree also _natural_, which are based on

properties important with reference to the reasoner's special practical

objects), when the classification is based on those properties which

would most impress one who knew all the properties, but was not

interested particularly in any one. Further, it is a great

recommendation of a classification, that it groups together things of

like general aspect; but this is not a _sine qua non_: a group may be

_natural_ even if based on very _unobvious_ properties, provided these

are marks of many other properties, though certainly then there should

be also some more obvious property to act as a mark of the unobvious

ones which form the real basis.

As the first principle of _natural_ classification is that the classes

must be so formed that the objects composing each may have as many

properties in common as possible to serve as predicates, all _kinds_

should have places among the _natural_ groups, since the common

properties of _kinds_, and, therefore, the general assertions that can

be made about them, are innumerable. But _kinds_ are too few to make up

the whole of a classification: other classes also may be eminently

_natural_, though marked out from each other only by a definite number

of properties. Of neither sort of _natural_ groups is Dr. Whewell's

theory _strictly_ true, viz. that every _natural_ group is not

determined by definition, that is, by definite characters which can be

expressed in words, but is fixed by Type. He explains that a type is an

example of any class, for instance, a species of a genus, which

possesses all the characters and properties of the genus in a marked

way; that round this type-species are grouped all the other species,

which, though deviating from it in various directions and degrees, yet

are of closer affinity to it than to the centre of any other group; and

that this is the reason why propositions about _natural_ groups so often

state matters as being true not in all cases, but only in most. Now,

there is a truth, but only a partial truth, in this doctrine. It is

this: in forming _natural_ groups, species which want certain of the

class-characters, some one, and others another, are classed with those

(the majority) that have them all, because they are more like (that is,

in fact, have more of the common characters of) that particular group

than of any other. On account of the feeling of vagueness hence

engendered, we certainly, in deciding if an object belong to the group,

do generally (and _must_, when the classification is made expressly with

a view to a special inductive enquiry) refer mentally, not as a

substitute for, but in illustration of the definition of the group, to

some standard specimen which has _all_ the characters well developed.

But not the less, therefore, are all _natural_, equally with all

artificial, groups framed with distinct reference to certain definite

characters. In the case of _kinds_, a few characters are chosen as marks

of the rest. In the case of other _natural_ groups, the formation of the

larger groups, into which we collect the _infimae species_, is suggested

indeed by resemblance to types (since we form each such larger group

round a selected _kind_ which serves as its exemplar); but the group

itself, when formed, is determined by definite characters.

Class names should by the mode of their construction help those who have

learnt about the thing, to remember it, and those who have not learnt,

now to learn, by being merely told the name. This is best effected, in

the case of _kinds_, when the word indicates by its very formation the

properties it connotes. But this is seldom possible. For, though a

_kind_-name connotes not all the _kind_-properties, but some only which

serve as sure marks of the rest, even these have been found too many to

be included conveniently in a name (except in Elementary Chemistry,

where every compound substance has one distinctive index-property, viz.

the chemical composition). A subsidiary resource is to point out the

_kind's_ nearest natural affinities. For instance, in the binary

Nomenclature of Botany and of Zoology, the name of every species

consists of the name of the _natural_ group next above, with a word

added expressive of some quality in the nature or mode of discovery, or

what not, of the particular species itself. By this device (obtaining at

present only in Botany and Zoology), as well is the expression, in the

name, of many of the _kind's characters_ secured, as the use of names

economised, and the memory relieved. Except for some such plan, what

hope of naming the 60,000 known species of Plants?

CHAPTER VIII.

CLASSIFICATION BY SERIES.

The object of Classification generally is to bring our ideas of objects

into the order best fitted for prosecuting inductive enquiries into the

laws of the phenomena generally. But a Classification which aims at

facilitating an inductive enquiry into the laws of some special

phenomenon, must be based on that phenomenon itself. The requisites of

such a classification are, first, the bringing into one class all

_kinds_ of things which exhibit the phenomenon; next, the arranging

them in a _series_, according to the degrees in which they exhibit it.

Such a classification has been largely applied in Comparative Anatomy

and Physiology (and these alone), since there has been found a

recognisable difference in the degree in which animals possess one main

phenomenon, viz. Animal Life.

This arrangement of the instances, whence the law is to be collected, in

a series, is that which is always implied in and is a condition of _any_

application of the method, viz. that of Concomitant Variations, which

must be used when conjoined circumstances cannot easily be separated by

experiment. But sometimes (and it is so in Zoology) the law of the

subject of the special enquiry (e.g. Animal Life) has such influence

over the general character of the objects, that all other differences

among them seem mere modifications of it; and then the classification

required for the special purpose becomes the determining principle of

the classification of the same objects for general purposes.

To recognise the identity of phenomena which thus differ only in degree,

we must assume a type-species. This will be that _kind_ which has the

class-properties in their greatest intensity (and, therefore, most

easily studied with all their effects); and we must conceive the other

varieties as instances of degeneracy from that type.

The divisions of the series must be determined by the principles of

_natural_ grouping in general (that is, in effect, by natural affinity);

in subordination, however, to the principle of a natural series; that

is, in the same group must not be placed things which ought to occupy

different points of the general scale.

Zoology affords the only _complete_ example of the true principles of

rational classification, whether as to the formation of groups or of

series. Yet the same principles are applicable to all cases (to art and

business as well as science) where the various parts of a wide subject

have to be brought into mental co-ordination.

BOOK V.

FALLACIES.

CHAPTER I.

FALLACIES IN GENERAL.

The habit of reasoning well is the only complete safeguard against

reasoning ill, that is, against drawing conclusions with insufficient

evidence, a practice which the various contradictory opinions,

particularly about the phenomena relating to Man, show to be even now

common, and that too among the most enlightened. But, to be able to

explain an error is a necessary condition of seeing the truth; for,

'Contrariorum eadem est Scientia.' Consequently, a work on Logic must

classify Fallacies, that is, the varieties of Apparent Evidence; for

they _can_ be classified, though not in respect of their negative

quality of being either not evidence at all, or inconclusive, yet in

respect of the positive property they have of _appearing_ to be

evidence.

As Logic has been here treated as embracing the whole reasoning process,

so it must notice the fallacies incident to any part of it (not to

Ratiocination merely), whether arising from faulty Induction, or from

faulty Ratiocination, or from dispensing wholly with either or both of

them. It does not treat of errors from negligence, or from inexpertness

in using right methods, nor does it treat of errors from moral causes,

viz. Indifference to truth, or Bias by our wishes or our fears; for the

moral causes are but the _remote_ and _predisposing_, not the _exciting_

causes of opinions; and therefore inferences from them, since they must

always involve the intellectual operation of admitting insufficient

evidence as sufficient, really come under a classification of the things

which wrongly _appear_ evidence to the _understanding_.

Fallacies may be arranged, with reference either to the cause which

makes them (erroneously) appear evidence, or to the particular kind of

evidence they simulate. The following classification is grounded on both

these considerations jointly.

CHAPTER II.

CLASSIFICATION OF FALLACIES.

The business of Logic is, not to enumerate false opinions, but to

enquire what property in the facts led to them, that is, what

peculiarity of relation between two facts made us suppose them

habitually conjoined or disjoined, and thus regard the presence or

absence of the one as evidence of that of the other. For every such

property in the facts, or our mode of considering them, there is a

corresponding class of Fallacies.

As the supposed habitual connexion or repugnance of two facts may be

admitted, either as a self-evident and axiomatic truth, or as itself an

inference, the first great division is into Fallacies of Simple

Inspection or _a priori_ Fallacies, and Fallacies, of Inference. But

there is also an intermediate class. For, sometimes an inference is

erroneous through our not conceiving what our premisses precisely are,

and from our therefore substituting new premisses for the old, or a new

conclusion for the one we undertook to prove; and this is called the

Fallacy of Confusion. Under this head, indeed, of Fallacies of

Confusion, might strictly be brought almost any fallacy, though falling

also under some other head: for, some of the links in an argument,

especially if sophistical, are sure to be suppressed; and, it being left

doubtful which is the proposition to be supplied, we can seldom tell

with certainty under _which_ class the fallacy absolutely comes. It is,

however, convenient to reserve the name _Fallacy of Confusion_ for cases

where Confusion is the _sole_ cause of the error.

Cases, then, where there is more or less ground for the error in _the

nature of the apparent evidence itself_, the evidence being assumed to

be of a certain sort, and a false conclusion being drawn from it, may be

classed as Fallacies of Inference. According as the apparent evidence

consists of particular facts, or of foregone generalisations, we call

the errors Fallacies of Induction or of Deduction. Each of these

classes, again, may be subdivided into two species, according as the

apparent evidence is either false, or, though true, inconclusive. Such

subdivisions of the Fallacy of Induction are respectively called, in the

former case, Fallacies of Observation (including cases where the facts

are not directly observed, but inferred), and, in the latter, Fallacies

of Generalisation. Among Fallacies of Deduction, those which proceed on

false premisses have no specific name, for they must fall under one of

the other heads of Fallacies; but those, the premisses of which, though

true, do not support the conclusion, compose a subdivision, which may be

specified as Fallacies of Ratiocination.

CHAPTER III.

FALLACIES OF SIMPLE INSPECTION; OR, A PRIORI FALLACIES.

There must be some _a priori_ knowledge, some propositions to be

received without proof; for there cannot be a chain suspended from

nothing. What these are is disputed, one school recognising as ultimate

premisses only the facts of our subjective consciousness, e.g.

Sensations, while Ontologists hold that the mind intuitively, and not

through experience, recognises as realities other existences, e.g.

Substances, which are suggested by, though not inferrible from, those

facts of consciousness. But, as both schools, in fact, allow that the

mind infers the _reality_ from the _idea_ of a thing, and that it may do

this unduly, there results a class of Fallacies resting on the tacit

assumption that the objects in nature have the same order as our ideas

of them. Hence not only arose the vulgar belief that facts which make us

think of an event are omens foreboding (e.g. lucky or unlucky names), or

even causing its occurrence; but even men of science both did and do

fall into this Fallacy. The following dogmas express the different forms

of this error:--

1. [Greek: a]. _Things which we cannot help thinking of together must

coexist_; thus Descartes held that, because existence is involved

(though really only by the thinker himself) in the idea of a geometrical

figure, a thing like the idea must exist. [Greek: b]. _Whatever is

inconceivable is false._ The latter proposition has been defended by

drawing a distinction between the principle, and its possibly wrong

application to facts, e.g. to Antipodes; but how can we ever know that

it has been rightly applied? Coleridge, again, has distinguished between

the unimaginable, which he thinks may possibly be true, and the

inconceivable, which he thinks cannot be; but Antipodes were imaginable

at the same period when they were inconceivable. In fact, as even to

Newton it seemed inconceivable, that a thing should act where it is not

(e.g. that the sun should act upon the earth without the medium of an

ether), simply because his mind was not familiar with the idea, so it

_may_ be with _our_ incapability (if not, indeed, resulting merely from

our limited faculties) of _conceiving_, e.g. that matter cannot think;

that space is infinite; that _ex nihilo nihil fit_. Leibnitz's tenet

that all _natural_ phenomena must be explicable _a priori_, and the

further assumption by some that Nature always acts by the simplest, i.e.

by the most easily conceivable means (and that, therefore, e.g. the

heavenly bodies have a circular movement), exhibit vividly this Fallacy

of Simple Inspection.

2. _Whatever can be thought of apart, or has a separate name, exists

apart as a separate entity_, e.g. Nature, Time, qualities, as e.g.

Whiteness, and, worst of all, the Substantiae Secundae. Mysticism is this

habit of ascribing objective existence to the subjective creations of

the mind, and reasoning from them to the things themselves.

3. _A fact must follow a certain law, because we see no reason for its

deviating from it in one way rather than in another._ This, which is the

same as the Principle of the Sufficient Reason, has been used to prove

the Law of Inertia (the very point to be proved, viz. that only external

force can be a sufficient reason for motion _in a particular direction_,

being assumed), and also the First Law of Motion, the argument being, in

the latter case, that a moving body, if it do _not_ continue of itself

to move uniformly in a straight line, must deviate right or left, and

that there is _no reason_ for its going one way more than the other: to

which the answer is, that, apart from experience, we could not know

whether or not there were a reason. Geometers often fall into this

Fallacy.

4. _The differences in nature must correspond to our received

distinctions_ (in names and classifications). Thus, the Greeks thought

that, by determining the meanings of words, they ascertained facts.

Aristotle usually starts with 'We say thus or thus.' So, with the

_Doctrine of Contrarieties_, in which the Pythagoreans and others

assumed that oppositions in language imply similar ones in nature.

Hence, too, the ancient belief in the essential difference between the

laws of things terrestrial and things celestial, and in man's

incapability of imitating nature's works. Bacon's error (which vitiates

his inductive system) was analogous, in looking (either through his

eagerness for practical results, or a lingering belief that causes were

the sole object of philosophy) for the cause of given effects rather

than the effects of a given cause. Hence sprang his tacit assumption

(and that in enquiries into the causes of a thing's sensible qualities,

where it was especially fatal), that in all cases, e.g. of heat or cold,

the _forma_, or set of conditions, is _one_ thing. A similar notion,

viz. that each property of gold, as of other things, has its one

_forma_, produced the belief in Alchemy.

5. The conditions of a phenomenon often do resemble the phenomenon

itself, e.g. in cases of Motion, Contagion, Feelings; but it is a

Fallacy to suppose that _they must or probably will_. By this fancied

law men guided their conjectures. Thus, the _Doctrine of Signatures_

was, that substances showed their uses as medicines by external

resemblance, either to their supposed effect, or to the disease. So, the

Cartesians, and even Leibnitz, argued, that nothing physical but

previous motion could account for motion, explaining the human body's

voluntary motions by Nervous Vibrations or by Animal Spirits. Hence,

too, the inference that there is a correspondence between the physical

qualities of the cause, and like or like-named ones, either of the

phenomenon (e.g. between sharp particles and a sharp taste), or of its

effects (e.g. between the redness of Mars, and fire and slaughter as

results of that planet's influence). In metaphysics, the Epicureans'

doctrine of _species sensibiles_, and the moderns' of _perception

through ideas_, arose from this fallacy (combined with another, viz.

that a thing cannot act where it is not). Again, the conditions of a

thing are sometimes spoken of even as though they were the thing itself.

Thus, in the Novum Organon, heat (i.e. really the conditions of the

feeling of it) is called a kind of motion; and Darwin, in his Zoonomia,

after describing _idea_ as a kind of _notion of external things_,

defines it as _a motion of the fibres_. Cousin says: 'Tout ce qui est

vrai de l'effet est vrai de la cause,' though, the reverse _might_ be

true; and Coleridge affirms, as _an evident truth_, that mind and

matter, as having no common property, cannot act on each other. The same

fallacy led Leibnitz to his _pre-established harmony_, and Malebranche

to his _occasional causes_. So, Cicero argues that mental pleasures, if

arising from the bodily, could not, as they do, exceed their cause; and

Descartes, that the Efficient Cause must have all the perfections of the

effect. Conversely Descartes, too, and persons who assail, e.g. the

Principle of Population by reference to Divine benevolence (thus

implying that, because God is perfect, therefore what _they_ think

perfection must obtain in nature), assume that effects must resemble

their causes.

CHAPTER IV.

FALLACIES OF OBSERVATION.

A fallacy of Observation (the first of the three fallacies of Proof) may

be either negative or positive.

1. The former, which is called Non-observation, is a case, not of a

positive mis-estimate of evidence, or of the proper faculties (whether

the senses or reason) not having been employed, but simply of the

non-employment of any of the faculties. It arises ([Greek: a]) from

neglect of instances. Sometimes this is when there is a stronger motive

to remember the instances on the one side, and the observers have

neglected the principle of the Elimination of Chance. Hence (the mind,

as Bacon says, being more moved by affirmative than by negative

instances) the belief in predictions, e.g. about the weather, because

they occasionally turn out correct; and the credit of the proverb, that

'Fortune favours fools,' since the cases of a wise man's success through

luck are forgotten in his more numerous successes through genius. But a

preconceived opinion is the _chief_ cause why opposing instances are

overlooked. Hence originate the errors about physical facts (e.g. of

Copernicus's foes, and friends, too, about the falling stone), and _a

fortiori_, on moral, social, and religious subjects, where yet stronger

feelings are involved.

The fallacy of Non-observation may occur ([Greek: b]) from neglect, not

of the material instances wholly, but of some material facts in them,

e.g. in cases of cures by quack remedies (such as Kenelm Digby's

'sympathetic powder'), of some attendant fact (as exclusion of air from

a wound, rest, regimen, and the like) which really worked the cure.

Sometimes the neglected fact is one ascertainable, not by the senses,

but by reasoning, which has been overlooked. Thus, Cousin's argument

that, if the sole end of punishment were to prevent crime by

intimidating intending criminals, the punishment of the innocent,

indiscriminately with the guilty, would have the same effect, ignores

the fact that the innocent would then be equally intimidated, and so the

punishment would be of no use as an example to criminals. So, in

Political Economy, where the effects of a cause often consist of two

sets of phenomena, the one obvious, the other deeper under the surface,

and exactly contrary, the latter is often neglected. This was why the

rapidly spent capital of the prodigal was supposed formerly to employ

more labour than the invested savings of the parsimonious, and the

purchase of native goods to encourage native industry more than the

purchase of foreign.

2. The error in Mal-observation, which is the _positive_ kind of

Mis-observation, is not the overlooking facts, but the seeing them

wrong. It arises from mistaking what is in fact inference (as much

_must_ be, whenever we try to observe or to describe) for perception,

which is infallible evidence of what is really perceived. The

Anti-Copernicans, when they appealed to common sense, made this mistake.

So do untrained persons generally in describing facts, especially

natural phenomena (e.g. apothecaries and nurses in stating symptoms),

and that, too, in proportion to their ignorance. We might expect this,

since usually the actual perceptions of the senses (e.g. the colour and

extension) are not of interest, except as marks whence to draw

inferences about something else (e.g. about the body, to which these

qualities belong). Painters, therefore, to know what the sensation

actually was, have to go through a special training. But this confusion

of inference with perception is still more likely in highly abstract

subjects; and, consequently, in these, mere, and often false inferences,

have continually been regarded as intuitive judgments.

CHAPTER V.

FALLACIES OF GENERALISATION.

This class includes whatever errors of generalisation are not mere

blunders, but arise from some wrong general conception of the inductive

process. Only a few kinds can be noted. 1. Under this Fallacy come

generalisations which _cannot_ be established by experience, e.g.

inferences from the order in the Solar System to other and unknown parts

of the universe; and also, except when a particular effect would

contradict either the laws of number and extension, or the universal law

of causality, all inferences from the fact that _we_ have never known of

a particular effect to its impossibility. 2. Those generalisations also

are fallacious which resolve, either, as in early Greece, all things

into one element, or, as often in modern times, impressions on the

senses, differing in quality, and not merely in degree, into the same;

e.g. heat, light, and (through vibrations) sensation, into motion;

mental, into nervous states; and vital phenomena, into mechanical or

chemical processes. In these theories, one fact has its laws applied to

another. It may possibly be a condition of that other; but even then the

mode in which the new fact is actually produced would have to be

explained by its own law, and not by that of the condition. 3. Again,

generalisations got by Simple Enumeration, fall under this Fallacy. That

sort of Induction 'precario concludit,' says Bacon, 'et periculo

exponitur ab instantia contradictoria, ... ex his tantummodo quae praesto

sunt pronuncians.' The ancients used it; and in questions relating to

man and society, it is still employed by _practical_ men. By it men

arrived at the various examples of the formula, _Whatsoever has never

been_ (e.g. a State without artificial distinctions of rank; negroes as

civilised as the white race) _will never be_; which, being inductions

without elimination, could at most form the ground only of the lowest

empirical laws. Higher empirical laws can be got, when a phenomenon

presents (as no negation can) a series of regular gradations, since

something may then be inferred from the observed as to the unobservable

terms of the series. Such is the law of man's necessary progression, in

contradiction to the above formula. But even this better generalisation

is similarly, though not as grossly, fallacious as the preceding, when,

though not itself a cause, but only a summary expression for the general

result of all the causes, it is accepted as _the_ law of human changes,

past and even future. So, empirical generalisations, from present to

past time, and from the character of one nation to that of another, are

similarly fallacious when employed as causal laws. 4. This Fallacy

occurs, not only when an empirical is confounded with a causal law, but

when causation is inferred improperly. The mistake sometimes lies in

inferring _a posteriori_ that one fact must be the cause of another

(e.g. the National Debt, or some special institution, of England's

prosperity), because of their casual conjunction; at other times, in

assuming _a priori_ that one of several coexisting agents is the sole

cause, and then deducing the effects from it exclusively. The latter is

properly False Theory. It has been exemplified in medicine by the

tracing of all diseases by one school, to viscidity of the blood, by

another, to the presence of some acid or alkali, and, in politics, by

the assumption that some special form of government or society is

absolutely good. 5. In False Analogies (which fall under this Fallacy)

there is no pretence of a conclusive induction. The argument from

Analogy is the inferring, in the absence of evidence either way, that an

object resembles a second object in one point, because it is seen to

resemble it in another point, which either is not known to be connected

with the first by causation (as, that the planets must be inhabited

because they obey the same astronomical laws with the earth, which is),

or which is known to be, not, indeed, its cause or its effect, but

either one of a set of conditions, which together are its cause, or an

occasional effect of its cause. Now, persons (usually from poverty, not

from luxuriance, of imagination) often overrate the weight of true

analogies; but the fallacy specially consists in inferring resemblance

in one point from resemblance in another, when the evidence is not only

not in favour of, but even positively against the connection of the two

by way of causation. It is so in the argument in favour of absolutism,

on the ground of its resemblance to paternal government in the one point

of irresponsibility, as though the assumed benefits of paternal rule

flowed from this quality. Similarly fallacious are the inferences,

through analogies, from the liability to decay of bodies natural to that

of bodies politic; from the supposed need of a _primum mobile_ in nature

to that of an irresponsible power in a state; and from the effects of a

decrease of a country's corn to the effects of a decrease of its gold

(the utility of which, but not of corn, depends on its value, and its

value on its scarcity). Such, also, were the Pythagorean inferences that

there is a music of the spheres, because the intervals between the

planets have the same proportion as the divisions of the monochord; and,

again, that the movements of the stars as being _divine_ must be

regular, because so are those even of orderly _men_. So, Aristotle and

other ancients supposed perfection to obtain in all natural facts,

because it appeared to exist in some; and so, the Stoics tried to prove

the equality of all crimes by reference to various similes and metaphors

(as, that the man held half an inch below the surface will be drowned as

certainly as the man at the bottom of the sea; and that want of skill is

shown as much in steering a straw-laden boat as a treasure galleon on to

the rocks). But, in fact, the connection by causation between the known

and the inferred resemblance, which is _assumed_ by these metaphors, is

the very thing which they are brought to prove. The real use of such

cases of analogy as metaphors is that they serve, not as an argument,

but as an assertion that one exists. Though they cannot prove, they

sometimes suggest the proof, and point to a case in which the same

grounds for a conclusion have been found adequate. Such are d'Alembert's

classification of successful politicians as either eagles or serpents;

and the statement, as an argument for education, that, in waste land

weeds will spring up; and such is _not_ Bacon's inference from the

levity of floating straw to the worthlessness of the _extant_ scientific

works of the ancients.

The great source of fallacious generalisation is bad classification, by

which things with no, or no important, common properties, are grouped

together. Worst is it, when a word which commonly signifies some

definite fact is applied to other facts only slightly similar. Bacon

(who has himself thus erred in his enquiries into heat) specifies, as

examples of this, the various applications (got, by unscientific

abstraction, from the original sense) of the word 'wet,' to flame, air,

dust, and glass, as well as to water. The application by Plato,

Aristotle, and other ancients, of the terms Generation, Corruption, and

[Greek: kinesis] to many heterogeneous phenomena, with a mixture of the

ideas belonging to them severally, caused many perplexities, which may

be noticed under Fallacies of Confusion.

CHAPTER VI.

FALLACIES OF RATIOCINATION.

These fallacies (to which the name _Fallacy_ is commonly applied

exclusively) would generally be detected if the arguments were set out

formally; and the value of the syllogistic rules is, that they force the

reasoner to be aware what it is that he is really asserting. The

frequent errors in processes such as Conversion and Opposition, which

are in appearance, though not in reality, inferences from premisses, may

for convenience be here referred to. Such are the simple conversion of

an universal affirmative; the corresponding error in a hypothetical

proposition of inferring the truth of the antecedent from that of the

consequent; and the confusing of a contrary with a contradictory, which

amounts, in practice, to mistaking the reverse of wrong for right. But

fallacies of Ratiocination properly lie in syllogisms. They commonly

resolve themselves, when in a single syllogism, into the having more

than three terms, whether covertly, as through an undistributed middle,

or an illicit process, or avowedly. But the most dangerous and the

commonest of these fallacies arise in a chain of argument from _changing

the premisses_. One of the obscurer forms of this is the fallacy _a

dicto secundum quid_ (i.e. with a qualification, or condition,

expressed, or, more usually, understood) _ad dictum simpliciter_. Thus,

the Mercantile Theory was in favour of prohibiting all trade which tends

to carry out more money than it brings in, on the ground that money is

riches, though it is so only if the money can be _freely_ spent. Such,

too, was the argument (used to support the doctrine that tithes fall on

the landlord) that, because now the rent of tithe-free land exceeds that

of tithed land, the rent from the latter would be increased by the

abolition of all tithes. There was a similar fallacy in the use of the

maxim, that individuals are the best judges of their pecuniary

interests, against Mr. Wakefield's scheme for concentrating settlers.

Cases in which the condition of _time_ is dropped, fall under this same

particular fallacy, as, when the maxim that prices always find their

level, is construed as meaning that they are always _at_ their level. It

is the same with the reasoning (especially in political and social

subjects), upon principles, which are true in the absence of all

modifying causes, as though no such causes _could_ exist. Other

analogous fallacies are those _a dicto simpliciter ad dictum secundum

quid_ (the converse of the preceding), and _a dicto secundum quid ad

dictum secundum alterum quid_.

CHAPTER VII.

FALLACIES OF CONFUSION.

Under this head come all fallacies which arise, not so much from a false

estimate of the probative force of known evidence, as from an indistinct

conception what the evidence is.

1. Thus, where there is an ambiguous middle, or a term used in different

senses in the premisses and in the conclusion, the argument proceeds as

though there were evidence to the point, when, in fact, there is none.

This error does not occur much in direct inductions, since the things

themselves are there present to the senses or memory; but chiefly, in

Ratiocination, where we are deciphering our own or others' notes. The

ambiguity arises very often from assuming that a word corresponds

precisely in meaning with the root itself (e.g. _representative_), or

with cognate words from the same root, called _paronymous_ words (as,

_artful_, with _art_). Other examples of ambiguities are; 'Money,'

which, meaning both the currency and also capital seeking investment, is

often thought to be scarce in the former sense, because scarce in the

latter; 'Influence of Property,' which, signifying equally the influence

of respect for the power for good, and of fear of the power for evil,

which is possessed by the rich, is represented as being assailed under

its former form when attacked really only under the latter; 'Theory,'

which, because applied popularly to the accounting for an effect apart

from facts, is ridiculed, even when expressing, as it properly does, the

result of philosophical induction from experience; 'The Church,' which

refers (as in the question of the inviolability of _Church_ property)

sometimes to the clergy alone, sometimes to all its members; 'Good,' in

the Stoic argument that virtue, as alone _good_ (in the Stoic sense),

must therefore include freedom and beauty, because these are _good_ (in

the popular sense). So, the meaning of 'I' shifts from _the laws of my

nature_ to _my will_, in Descartes' _a priori_ argument for the being of

a God, viz. that there must be an external archetype whence I got the

conception, for if _I_ (i.e. _the laws of my nature_) made it, _I_ (i.e.

_my will_, and not, as it should consistently be, _the laws of my

nature_) could unmake it; but _I_ (i.e. _my will_) cannot. In the

Free-Will controversy, 'I' is used ambiguously for volitions, actions,

and mental dispositions, and 'Necessity' both for _Certainty_ and for

_Compulsion_. From the application of 'same,' 'one,' 'identical,' which

primarily refer to a single object, to several objects because

_similar_, grew up (for the purpose of accounting for the supposed

_oneness_ in things said to have the _same_ nature or qualities) both

the Platonic _Ideas_, and also the _Substantial Forms_ and _Second

Substances_ of the Aristotelians, even though the latter did see the

distinction between things differing both _specie_ and _numero_, and

those differing _numero_ only. And thence, too, sprang Berkeley's proof

of the existence of a Universal Mind from the supposed need of such a

Being to harbour, in the interval, the idea, which, one and the same

(really, only two _similar_ ideas), a man's mind has entertained at two

distinct times. The difficulty in _Achilles and the Tortoise_ arises

from the use of _infinity_, or, _for ever_, in the premisses, to

signify a finite time which is infinitely divisible, and, in the

conclusion, to signify an infinite time. Thus, again, 'right' is used to

express, both what others have no right to stop a man from doing, and

also what it is not against his own duty to do; both what people are

entitled to expect from, and also what they may enforce from others. The

Fallacy of Composition and Division, i.e. the use of the same term in a

syllogism, at one time in a collective, at another in a distributive

sense, is one of the Fallacies of Ambiguous Terms. Examples of it are

the arguments, that _great men_ (collectively) could be dispensed with,

because the place of any particular great man might have been supplied

(i.e., in fact, by some other great man); and, that a high prize in a

lottery may be reasonably expected (by _a certain individual_, viz.

oneself), because a high prize is commonly gained (_by some one or

other_).

2. In Petitio Principii, the premisses are not even verbally sufficient

for the conclusion, since one premiss is either clearly the same as the

conclusion, or actually proved from it, or not susceptible of any other

proof. Men commonly fall into it, through believing that the premiss

_was_ verified, though they have forgotten how. But the variety, termed

Reasoning in a Circle, implies a conscious attempt to prove two

propositions reciprocally from each other. This formal proof is not

often attempted, except under the pressure of controversy; but, from

mistaking mutual coherency for truth, propositions, which cannot be

proved except from each other, are often _admitted_, when expressed in

different language, without other proof. Frequently a proposition is

presented in abstract terms as a proof of the same in concrete, as, in

Moliere's parody, 'L'opium endormit parcequ'il a une vertu soporifique.'

So, some qualities of a thing selected arbitrarily are termed its nature

or essence, and then reasoned from as though not able to be counteracted

by any of the rest. 'Question-begging appellatives,' particularly, are

cases of Petitio Principii, e.g. the styling any reform an _innovation_,

which it really is, only that _innovation_ conveys, besides its

dictionary meaning, a covert sense of something extreme. Thus, in

Cicero's De Finibus, 'Cupiditas,' which usually implies vice, is used to

express certain desires the moral character of which is the point in

question. Again, the infinite divisibility of matter was assumed by the

argument which was used to prove it, viz. that the least portion of

matter must have both an upper and an under surface (which, as every

other Fallacy of Confusion, when cleared up, appears as a fallacy of a

different sort, under shelter of which, as indeed in ratiocinative

fallacies generally, the mere verbal juggle at first escapes detection).

Such, again, was Euler's argument, that _minus_ multiplied by _minus_

gives _plus_, _because_ it could not give the same as _minus_ multiplied

by _plus_, which gives _minus_. So, some ethical writers begin by

assuming, that certain general sentiments are the _natural_ sentiments

of mankind, and thence argue that any which differ are morbid and

_unnatural_. Thus, lastly, Hobbes and Rousseau rested the existence of

government and law on a supposed social compact, and not on men's

perception of the interests of society, which, however, could be the

only ground for their abiding by such compact if a fact.

3. In Ignoratio Elenchi, or, the Fallacy of Irrelevant Conclusion, the

error lies not either in mistaking the import of the premisses, or in

forgetting what they are, but in mistaking what is the conclusion to be

proved. Sometimes, a particular is substituted for the universal as the

proposition needing proof, and sometimes, a proposition with different

terms. Under this fallacy come the cases, not only of proving what was

not denied, but of disproving what was not asserted; e.g. the argument

used against Malthus (whose own position was, that population increases

only _in so far as not kept down_ by prudence, or by poverty and

disease), that, at times, population has been nearly stationary; or

again, that, in some country or other, population and comfort are

increasing together, Malthus himself having asserted that this might be

so, if capital has increased. Similarly, even Reid, Stewart, and Brown

(not merely Dr. Johnson) urged that Berkeley ought, if consistent, to

have run his head against a post, as though the non-recognition of an

occult _cause_ of sensations implies disbelief in any _fixed order among

them_.

BOOK VI.

ON THE LOGIC OF THE MORAL SCIENCES.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

Many complex problems have been resolved through the use of the

Scientific Methods, and thus only. The most complex of all problems are

the problems relating to Man himself; and of them those concerned with

the Mind and Society have never been scientifically resolved. They can

be rescued from empiricism, if at all, only by being submitted to some

of the methods already characterised as applicable to science in

general. Which of these methods must be selected, and why; what are the

causes of previous failures; and what degree of success now is possible

or probable, will be considered in this book, when a preliminary

objection (_based on the theory of free will_), that men's actions are

not, like other natural events, subject to invariable laws, has been

first removed.

CHAPTER II.

LIBERTY AND NECESSITY.

The theory of _free will_, viz. that the will is determined by itself,

and not by antecedents, was invented as being more in accordance with

the dignity of human nature and our consciousness of freedom, than

_philosophical necessity_. The latter doctrine, in laying down simply

that our volitions and actions are invariable consequents of our

antecedent states of mind, and that, given our motives, character, and

disposition, other men could predict our conduct as certainly as any

physical event, states indeed nothing which is in itself either

contradicted by our consciousness, or degrading; yet the doctrine of

causation, as applied to volition, is supposed, from the natural

tendency of the mind to imagine falsely that a mysterious constraint is

exercised by _any_ antecedent over the consequent, to imply some state

of dependence which our consciousness does contradict. Moreover, the

erroneous notion that something more than uniformity of order and

capability of being predicted is meant, has been favoured by the use of

the ambiguous term _necessity_ (which, it is true, commonly implies

irresistibleness), to signify simply that the given cause will be

followed by the effect subject to all possibilities of counteraction by

other causes. Most necessarians have been themselves deceived by the

expression: they are apt to be partially fatalists as to their own

actions, with a weaker spirit of self-culture than the believers in

free-will, and to fail to see that the fact of their character being

formed _for_ them, that is, by their circumstances, including their own

organisation, is consistent with its being formed _by_ themselves, as

intermediate agents, moulding it in any particular way which they may

_wish_. The belief that the _wishing_ is excited by external causes,

e.g. by education, casual aspirations, and experience of ills resulting

from our previous character, can be of no practical harm, and does not

conflict with our feeling of moral freedom, that is, of power, _if we

wish_, to modify or conquer our own character.

The ambiguity of the word _motive_ has also caused confusion. A motive,

when used to signify that which determines the will, means not always or

only the anticipation of a pleasure or a pain, but often the desire of

the action itself. The action having finally become by association in

itself desirable, we may get the habit of willing it (that is, get a

_purpose_) without reference to its being pleasurable. We are then said

to have a confirmed character.

CHAPTER III.

THERE IS, OR MAY BE, A SCIENCE OF HUMAN NATURE.

Any facts may be a subject of science, if they follow one another

according to constant laws; and this, whether, although the ultimate

laws are known, yet, of the derivative laws on which a phenomenon

directly depends, either _none_, as in Meteorology, or, as in Tidology,

_only_ the laws of the greater causes on which the chief part of a

phenomenon directly depends, have been ascertained, and not those of all

the minor modifying causes; or, as in Astronomy (which is therefore

called an _exact_ science), both the ultimate laws are known, and also

the derivative laws as well of the greater as of all the minor causes.

The science of Human Nature cannot be exact, the causes of human conduct

being only approximately known. Hence it is impossible to predict _with

scientific accuracy_ any one man's acts, resulting as they do partly

from his circumstances, which, in the future, cannot be precisely

foreseen, and, partly, from his character, which can never be exactly

calculated, because the causes which have determined it are sure, in the

aggregate, not to be entirely like those which have determined any other

man's. But approximate generalisations, though only probably true as to

the acts and characters of individuals, will be certainly true as to

those of masses, whose conduct is determined by general causes chiefly;

and they are therefore sufficient for political and social science. They

must, however, be connected deductively with the universal laws of human

nature on which they rest, or they will be only low empirical laws. This

is the text of the next two chapters.

CHAPTER IV.

THE LAWS OF MIND.

By the laws of mind (i.e. as considered in this treatise, the laws of

mental phenomena) are meant the laws according to which one state of

mind is produced by another. If M. Comte and others be right in saying

that, in like manner with the mental phenomena called sensations, all

the other states of mind have for their proximate causes nervous states,

there would be no original laws of mind, and Psychology would be a mere

branch of Physiology. But at present, this tenet is not proved, however

highly probable; and, at all events, the characteristics of those

nervous states are quite unknown; consequently the uniformities of

succession among the mental phenomena, which undoubtedly do exist, and

which are not proved to result from more general laws, must be

considered as the subject of a distinct science called Psychology. We

can ascertain only by experiment the simple laws of Mind, such as--1.

That a state of consciousness can be reproduced in the absence of the

cause which first excited it (i.e. that every mental impression has its

idea), and--2. That these secondary mental states themselves are

produced according to the three laws of ideas. But the complex laws are

got from these simple laws, according either to the Composition of

Causes, when the complex idea is said to _consist of_ the Simple Ideas,

or to chemical combination, when it is said to be _generated by_ them.

Hartley and Mr. James Mill indeed hold _all_ the mental phenomena to be

generated by chemical combination from simple ideas of _sensation_,

however unlike to the alleged results; but even though they had proved

their theory, employing the Method of Difference, and not only the

Method of Agreement (which latter itself they have used only partially),

we should still have to study the complex ideas themselves inductively,

before we could ascertain their sequences.

The analytical enquiry (neglected alike by the German metaphysical

school, and by M. Comte) into the general laws of mind, will show that

the mental differences of individuals are not ultimate facts, but may be

referred generally to their particular mental history, their education

and circumstances, but sometimes also to organic differences influencing

the mental phenomena, not directly, but through the medium of the

psychological causes of the latter. Men's animal instincts, however, are

probably, equally with the mere sensations, connected directly with

physical conditions of the brain and nerves. Whether or not there be any

direct relation between organic causes and any other mental phenomena,

Physiology is likely in time to show; but at least Phrenology does not

embody the principles of the relation.

CHAPTER V.

ETHOLOGY, OR THE SCIENCE OF THE FORMATION OF CHARACTER.

Till the Empirical laws of Mind, i.e. the truths of common experience,

are _explained_ by being resolved into the causal laws (the subject of

the last chapter), they are mere approximate generalisations which

cannot be safely applied beyond the limits in which they were collected

by observation. But this does not prove aught against the universality

and simplicity of the ultimate mental laws; for the same is the case

with the empirical laws even in astronomy, where each effect results

from but few causes; _a fortiori_, therefore, will it be so in regard to

man's character, which is influenced by each of his circumstances, which

differ in the case of each nation, generation, and individual. But

though mankind have not one universal character, yet there exist

universal laws of the formation of character. These universal laws

cannot be discovered experimentally, i.e. either by artificial

experiment, since we can seldom vary the experiment sufficiently, and

exclude all but known circumstances, or by observation, since, even in

the most favourable instances for the latter, viz. National acts, only

the Method of Agreement can be applied. Observation has its uses in

relation to this subject; but only as verification of the results

arrived at by the Deductive Method. The Deductive Method must be

employed to obtain the laws of the formation of character. They are got

by supposing any given circumstances, and then considering how these

will, according to the general laws of mind, influence the formation of

character. So, contrary to Bacon's rule, laid down wrongly as universal,

for the discovery of principles, the highest generalisations must be

first ascertained by the experimental science of Psychology; and then

will come what is in fact a system of corollaries from the latter

science, viz. Ethology, i.e. (as dealing only with tendencies) the

_exact_ science of human character, or of education both national and

individual, and which has for its principles the middle principles

(_axiomata media_) of mental science. It does not yet, but it will soon,

exist as a science. Its object must be to determine, from the general

laws of mind, combined with man's general position in the universe, what

circumstances will aid or check the growth of good or bad qualities, so

that the Art of Education will be merely the transformation of these

middle principles into precepts and their adaptation to the special

cases. But at every step these middle principles, got by deduction, must

be verified _a posteriori_ by empirical laws, and by specific experience

respecting the assumed circumstances.

CHAPTER VI.

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS ON THE SOCIAL SCIENCE.

Political and social phenomena have been thought too complex for

scientific treatment. Practitioners hitherto have been the only

students; and so, as in medicine, before the rise of Physiology and

Natural History, _experimenta fructifera_, and not _lucifera_, have been

sought. The scheme of such a science has even been thought quackery,

through the vain attempts of some theorists to frame universal precepts,

as though their failure (arising from the variety of human

circumstances) proved that the phenomena do not conform to universal

laws. Social phenomena, however, being phenomena of human nature in

masses, must, as human nature is itself subject to fixed laws, obey

fixed laws resulting from the fixed laws of human nature. The number and

changefulness of the data (unlike those of Astronomy) will prevent our

ever predicting the far future of society. But, when general laws have

been ascertained, an application of them to the individual circumstances

of a given age and country will show us the causes and tendencies of,

and the means of modifying, its actual condition. A consideration of two

methods, erroneously used for this science, viz. the Experimental or

Chemical, and the Abstract or Geometrical, will introduce us to the true

one.

CHAPTER VII.

THE CHEMICAL, OR EXPERIMENTAL, METHOD IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCE.

The followers of this method do not recognise the laws of social

phenomena as merely a composition of the laws of individual human

nature. They demand specific experience in all cases; and they attempt

to make effects, which depend on the greatest possible complication of

causes, the subject of induction by observation and experiment. The

attempt must fail; for, we can neither get by experiment appropriate

_artificial_ instances, nor, by observation, _spontaneous_ instances

(from history), with the circumstances enough varied for a true

induction. Neither the _direct_ nor the _indirect_ Method of Difference

can be applied, for we cannot find either two single instances differing

in nothing but the presence or absence of a given circumstance (the

_direct_), or two classes respectively agreeing in nothing but the

presence of a circumstance on one side and its absence on the other (the

_indirect_). Then, again, the Method of Agreement is of small value,

because social phenomena admit the widest plurality of causes; and so

also is that of Concomitant Variations, on account of the mutual action

of the coexisting elements of society being such that what affects one

affects all. The Method of Residues is better suited to social enquiries

than the other three. But _it_ is not a method of pure observation and

experiment. It presupposes that we know, by previous deduction from

principles of human nature, the causes of part of the effect. But if

thus part of the truths are, why may not all be, ascertained by

Deduction, and the experimental argument be confined to the verifying of

the deductions?

CHAPTER VIII.

THE GEOMETRICAL, OR ABSTRACT, METHOD.

The Methods of Elementary Chemistry are applied to social phenomena from

carelessness as to, or ignorance of, any of the higher physical

sciences: the Geometrical Method, from the belief that Geometry, that

is, a science of coexistent, not successive facts, where there are no

conflicting forces, is, and that the now deductive physical sciences of

Causation, where there are conflicting forces, are _not_, the type of

deductive science. Thus, it seems to have been supposed by many

philosophers, that each social phenomenon results from only one force,

one single property of human nature. For instance, Hobbes assumed (eking

out his assumption by the fiction of an original contract), that

government is founded on fear. Even the scientific Bentham School based

a general theory on one premiss, viz. that men's actions are always

determined by their interests, meaning probably thereby, that the bulk

of the conduct of any succession, or of the majority of any body of men,

is determined by their private or worldly interests. They inferred

thence, that those rulers alone will govern according to the interest of

the governed, whose selfish interests are identified with it (forgetting

that, apart from the philanthropy and sense of duty of many, the

conduct of _all_ rulers must be influenced by the habits of mind, both

of the whole community, and also of their own class in it, and by the

maxims of their predecessors). Lastly, they laid down that this sense of

identity of interest with the governed is producible only by

responsibility (whereas the personal interest of rulers often prompts

them to acts, e.g. for the suppression of anarchy, which are also for

the interest of the governed). In fact, this school was pleading for

parliamentary reform, and saw truly, that it is against the selfish

interests of rulers that constitutional checks are needed, and that, in

modern Europe, a feeling in the governors of identity of interest, when

not active enough, can be roused only by responsibility to the governed.

Their mistake was, that they based on just these few premisses a general

theory of government, in forgetfulness that such should proceed by

deduction from _the whole_ of the laws of human nature, since each

effect is an aggregate result of many causes operating now through the

same ones, now through different ones, of these laws.

CHAPTER IX.

THE PHYSICAL, OR CONCRETE DEDUCTIVE, METHOD.

The complexity in social effects arises from the number, not of the

laws, but of the data. Therefore, Sociology, i.e. Social Science, must

use the Concrete Deductive Method, compounding with one another the laws

of all the causes on which any one effect depends, and inferring its law

from them all. As in the easiest case to which the Method of Deduction

applies, so in this, the most difficult, the conclusions of

ratiocination must be _verified_ by collation with the concrete

phenomena, or, if possible, with their empirical laws; and then the only

effect of an increase in the complication of the subject will be a

tendency to a disturbance, and sometimes even to an inversion (which,

indeed, M. Comte thinks inseparable from all Sociological enquiries) in

the order of the two processes, obliging us, first, to conjecture the

conclusions by specific experience, and then verify them by _a priori_

reasonings showing their connection with the principles of human nature.

Sociology is a system not of positive predictions, but of tendencies. Of

tendencies themselves, not many can be laid down as true of all

societies alike. Even in the case of any single feature of society, the

_consensus_ which exists in the body politic, as in the body natural,

makes it uncertain whether a cause with a special tendency in one age or

country will have quite the same in another. General propositions,

therefore, in this deductive science, as, to be true, they must be

hypothetical, and state the operation of a given cause in _given

circumstances_, so, to be of any utility, should be limited to those

classes of facts, which, though influenced by all sociological agents,

are yet influenced _immediately_ by a few only, certain fixed

combinations of which are likely to recur often. Thus, Political

Economy, taking the one psychological law that men prefer a greater gain

to a smaller, and ignoring every other motive, except what are

perpetually adverse principles to this, viz. men's aversion to labour

and desire of present costly pleasures, assumes, in enquiring what acts

this desire of gain will produce, that, within the department of human

affairs, where it is actually the main end, it is the _sole_ end. Yet

its general propositions are of great practical use, even though it thus

provisionally overlooks as well miscellaneous concurrent causes (with

some exceptions, as e.g. the principle of population), as also the fact

of the non-existence elsewhere of the conditions of any one particular

country (e.g. the peculiarly British mode of distribution of the produce

of industry among three classes). Another hypothetical or abstract

science, which can be carved out of Sociology, is the as yet unexplored

Political Ethology, i.e. the theory of the causes which determine a

people's, or age's, type of character, which collective character,

besides being the most interesting phenomenon in the particular state of

society, is the _main_ cause of the social state which follows, and

moulds _entirely_ customs and laws. The neglect of national diversities

sometimes (as e.g. the assumption by our political economists, that in

commercial populations everywhere, equally as in Great Britain and

America, all motives yield to the desire of gain) vitiates only the

practical application of a proposition; but when the national character

is mixed up at every step with the phenomena (as is the case in

questions respecting the tendencies of forms of government), the

phenomena cannot properly be insulated in a separate branch of

Sociology.

As in Ethology and other deductive sciences, so in Statistics and

History there are empirical laws. The immediate causes of social facts

are often not open to direct observation; and the deductive science can

determine only what causes produce a given effect, and not the frequency

and quantities of them; in such cases, the empirical law of the causes

(which, however, can be applied to new cases only if we know that the

remoter causes, on which these latter causes depend, remain unchanged)

must be found through that of the effects, the Deductive Science relying

then for its data on indirect observation. But, in the separate branches

of Sociology, we cannot obtain empirical laws by specific experience. It

is so particularly (on account both of the number of the causes, and

also the fewness of the instances to be compared with the one in point)

when the effect of any one (e.g. Corn Laws) of many simultaneous social

causes has to be determined. We can, however, in such cases, verify

_indirectly_ a theory as to the influence of a particular cause in given

circumstances, by seeing if the same theory accounts for the _existing_

state of actual social facts which that cause has a tendency to

influence.

CHAPTER X.

THE INVERSE DEDUCTIVE, OR HISTORICAL, METHOD.

The _general_ Science of Society, as contrasted with the branches,

shows, not what effect will follow from a given cause under given

circumstances, but what are the causes and characteristic phenomena of

States of Society generally. A _State of Society_ is the simultaneous

state of all the chief social facts (e.g. employments, beliefs, laws).

It is a condition of the whole organism; and, when analysed, it

exhibits uniformities of coexistence between its different elements.

But, as this correlation between the phenomena is itself a law resulting

from the laws which regulate the succession between one state of society

and another, the fundamental problem of Social Science is to find these

latter laws. The form of this succession, by which (on account of the

exceptionally constant reaction, in social facts, of the effects, i.e.

human character, on their causes, i.e. human circumstances) one social

state is ever in process of changing into a different one, is now

allowed to be, not, as in the solar system, a cycle, but a _progress_

(by which is not here _necessarily_ meant _improvement_, whatever the

fact may be). In France it has been thought, that a law of progress, to

be found by an analysis of the course of history, would enable us to

predict the whole future. But such a law would be empirical, and not

true beyond its own facts; for the succession of mental and social

states cannot have an independent law. Empirical laws must indeed be

found; or a _general_ Science of Society would be impossible: for, the

character of any one generation is so much the result of the characters

of all prior ones, that _men_ could not compute so long a series from

the elementary laws producing it. But the empirical laws, when found (as

they can be, since the series of the effects as a whole is ever growing

in uniformity), must be shown by deductions to be, if not the only

possible, or even the most probable, at least possible, consequences of

the laws of human nature.

The empirical laws of society are uniformities, either of coexistence,

or of succession. The former are ascertained and verified by Social

Statics (which is the theory of the _consensus_, i.e. the mutual actions

and reactions, of contemporaneous social elements); the latter, by

Social Dynamics (the theory of Society considered as in a state of

progress). As to Social Statics--there is, M. Comte thinks, a perpetual

reciprocity of influence between all aspects of the same organism, and

to such an extent, that the condition of any one which we cannot

directly observe can be estimated by that of another which we can. There

is, he considers, such an interdependence, not only between the

different sciences and arts among themselves, but between the sciences

in general and the arts in general, even between the condition of

different nations of the same age, and between a form of government and

the civilisation of the period. Social Statics will ascertain for us the

requisites of stable political union: it will enquire what special

circumstances have always attended on such union, increasing and

decreasing in proportion to its completeness; and will then verify these

facts as requisites by deducing them from general laws of human nature.

Thus, history indicates as such requisites and conditions of free

political union: 1. A system of educational discipline checking man's

tendency to anarchy; 2. Loyalty, i.e. a feeling of there being

something, whether persons, institutions, or individual freedom and

political and social equality, which is not to be, at least in practice,

called in question; 3. That which the Roman Empire, notwithstanding all

its tyranny, established, viz. a strong sense of common interest among

fellow-citizens (a very different feeling, by the bye, to mere

antipathy to foreigners).

Social Dynamics regards sequences. But the _consensus_ in social facts

prevents our tracing the leading facts in one generation to separate

causes in a prior one. Therefore, we must find the law of the

correspondence not only between the simultaneous states, but between the

simultaneous changes of the elements of society. To find this law,

which, when duly verified, will be the scientific derivative law of the

development of humanity, we must combine the statical view of the

phenomena with the dynamical. Fortunately, the state of mankind's

speculative faculties and beliefs, being the prime agent of the social

movement, furnishes a clue in the maze of social elements, since the

order of human progression in all respects will mainly depend on the

order of progression of this prime agent. That the other dispositions

which aid in social progress (e.g. the desire for increased material

comfort) owe their means of working to this (however relatively weak a

propensity it may be) is a conclusion from the laws of human nature; and

this conclusion is in accordance also with the course of history, in

which internal social changes have ever been preceded by proportionate

intellectual changes. To determine the law of the successive

transformations of opinions all past time must be searched, since such

changes appear definitely only at long intervals. M. Comte alone has

followed out this conception of the Historical Method; and his

generalisation, to the effect that speculation has, on all subjects,

three successive stages, has high scientific value.

The Historical Method will trace the derivative laws of social order

and progress. It will enable us both to predict the future, and (thus

founding the noblest part of the Political Art) partly to shape it. At

present, both the Science and the Art are in the rudiments; but they are

progressing.

CHAPTER XI.

THE LOGIC OF PRACTICE, OR ART; INCLUDING MORALITY AND POLICY.

Practical Ethics, i.e. Morality, is an art; and therefore its Method

must be that of Art in general. Now, Art from the major premiss,

supplied by itself, viz. that the end is desirable, and from the

theorem, lent by Science, of the combinations of circumstances by which

the end can be reached, concludes that to secure this combination of

circumstances is desirable; if it also appear practicable, it turns the

theorem into a rule. Unless Science's report as to the circumstances is

a full one, the rule may fail; and as, in any case, rules of conduct

cannot comprise more than the ordinary conditions of the effect (or they

would be too cumbrous for use), they must, at least in moral subjects,

be considered, till confronted with the theorems, which are the reasons

of them, provisional only. Practical maxims, therefore, till so

confronted, are not universally true even for a given end, much less for

conduct generally, and must not be used, as they are by the

_geometrical_ school, as ultimate premisses.

Any particular art consists of its rules, _together with_ the theorems

on which they depend; and Art in general consists of the truths of

Science; only these must be arranged in the order most convenient, not,

as in Science (which is an enquiry into the course of nature), for

thought, but for practice. Intermediate scientific truths must be framed

to serve as first principles of the various arts: and through them the

end or purpose of an art will be connected with the means for realising

the conditions of its attainment. The end itself, however, is defined by

the art, not by the science. Each art has one first principle or major

premiss which does not, as the propositions of Science, assert that a

thing _is_ or _will be_, but recommends it as what _ought to be_. A

scientific theory, however complete, of the history and tendencies of

society does not show us (without Teleology, i.e. the Doctrine of Ends)

what are the preferable ends. Art itself has its Philosophia Prima, for

ascertaining the standard of ends. There can be but one such standard or

general principle to which all rules of practice should conform; for, if

there were several, a higher yet would be needed, as umpire when they

disagreed. In Morality the felt need of a standard has been sometimes

supplied by the hypothesis of intuitive moral principles: but a standard

would still be wanted for the other two branches of the Art of Life,

viz. Prudence or Policy, and Taste; and _their_ standard when found

would serve for Morality as well. The true standard, or general

principle, is, _the promotion of the happiness of_ ALL _sentient

beings_. This is not the _sole_ end; for instance, ideal nobleness of

will or conduct should be pursued in preference to the _specific_

pursuit of happiness; but all ends whatsoever must be justified and

should be controlled by it.

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