by a comparison of particular pheno- | obtained by abstraction from the first mena, so, when obtained, the mode and second? Thus we see the tenin which we apply it to other pheno- dency of general conceptions, as soon mena is again by comparison. We as formed, to substitute themselves compare phenomena with each other as types for whatever individual obto get the conception, and we then jects previously answered that purcompare those and other phenomena pose in our comparisons. We may, with the conception. We get the perhaps, find that no considerable conception of an animal (for instance) number of other objects agree with by comparing different animals, and this first general conception, and when we afterwards see a creature that we must drop the conception, resembling an animal, we compare and beginning again with a different it with our general conception of an individual case, proceed by fresh comanimal; and if it agrees with that parisons to a different general congeneral conception, we include it in ception. Sometimes, again, we find the class. The conception becomes that the same conception will serve, the type of comparison. by merely leaving out some of its circumstances; and by this higher effort of abstraction we obtain a still more general conception; as in the case formerly referred to, the scientific world rose from the conception of poles to the general conception of opposite properties in opposite directions; or as those South-Sea islanders, whose conception of a quadruped had been abstracted from hogs, (the only animals of that description which they had seen,) when they afterwards compared that conception with other quadrupeds, dropped some of the circumstances, and arrived at the more general conception which Europeans associate with the term.

And we need only consider what comparison is, to see that where the objects are more than two, and still more when they are an indefinite number, a type of some sort is an indispensable condition of the comparison. When we have to arrange and classify a great number of objects according to their agreements and differences, we do not make a confused attempt to compare all with all. We know that two things are as much as the mind can easily attend to at a time, and we therefore fix upon one of the objects, either at hazard or because it offers in a peculiarly striking manner some important character, and, taking this as our standard, compare it with one object after another. If we find a second object which presents a remarkable agreement with the first, inducing us to class them together, the question instantly arises, in what particular circumstances do they agree? and to take notice of these circumstances is already a first stage of abstraction, giving rise to a general conception. Having advanced thus far, when we now take in hand a third object, we naturally ask ourselves the question, not merely whether this third object agrees with the first, but whether it agrees with it in the same circumstances in which the second did? in other words, whether it agrees with the general conception which has been

These brief remarks contain, I believe, all that is well-grounded in the doctrine that the conception by which the mind arranges and gives unity to phenomena must be furnished by the mind itself, and that we find the right conception by a tentative process, trying first one and then another until we hit the mark. The conception is not furnished by the mind until it has been furnished to the mind; and the facts which supply it are sometimes extraneous facts, but more often the very facts which we are attempting to arrange by it. It is quite true, however, that in endeavouring to arrange the facts, at whatever point we begin, we never advance three steps without forming a general conception, more or less distinct and

precise; and that this general contained some agreement, something ception becomes the clue which we which can be predicated in common instantly endeavour to trace through of a number of objects, we have obthe rest of the facts, or rather, be- tained a basis on which an inductive comes the standard with which we process is capable of being founded. thenceforth compare them. If we But the agreements, or the ulterior are not satisfied with the agreements consequences to which those agreewhich we discover among the pheno- ments lead, may be of very different mena by comparing them with this degrees of importance. If, for intype, or with some still more gene- stance, we only compare animals acral conception which by an additional cording to their colour, and class those stage of abstraction we can form from together which are coloured alike, we the type; we change our path and form the general conceptions of a look out for other agreements: we white animal, a black animal, &c., recommence the comparison from a which are conceptions legitimately different starting-point, and so gene- formed; and if an induction were to rate a different set of general concep- be attempted concerning the causes tions. This is the tentative process of the colours of animals, this comwhich Dr. Whewell speaks of, and parison would be the proper and which has not unnaturally suggested necessary preparation for such an the theory that the conception is sup- induction, but would not help us plied by the mind itself, since the towards a knowledge of the laws of different conceptions which the mind any other of the properties of animals; successively tries, it either already while if, with Cuvier, we compare and possessed from its previous experi- class them according to the structure ence, or they were supplied to it in of the skeleton, or, with Blainville, the first stage of the corresponding according to the nature of their outact of comparison; so that, in the ward integuments, the agreements subsequent part of the process, the and differences which are observable conception manifested itself as some- in these respects are not only of much thing compared with the phenomena greater importance in themselves, but not evolved from them. are marks of agreements and differences in many other important particulars of the structure and mode of life of the animals. If, therefore, the study of their structure and habits be our object, the conceptions generated by these last comparisons are far more "appropriate" than those generated by the former. Nothing, other than this, can be meant by the appropriateness of a conception.

§ 4. If this be a correct account of the instrumentality of general conceptions in the comparison which necessarily precedes Induction, we are now able to translate into our own language what Dr. Whewell means by saying that conceptions, to be subservient to Induction, must be "clear" and "appropriate.'

If the conception corresponds to a real agreement among the phenomena; if the comparison which we have made of a set of objects has led us to class them according to real resemblances and differences; the conception which does this cannot fail to be appropriate, for some purpose or other. The question of appropriateness is relative to the particular object we have in view. As soon as, by our comparison, we have ascer,

When Dr. Whewell says that the ancients, or the schoolmen, or any modern inquirers, missed discovering the real law of a phenomenon because they applied it to an inappropriate instead of an appropriate conception, he can only mean that in comparing various instances of the phenomenon, to ascertain in what those instances agreed, they missed the important points of agreement, and fastened upon such as were either imaginary,

ral does in morals and politics to the present day.

for some hypothesis of a possible place, or a possible point of resemblance, and then look to see whether the facts agree with the conjecture.

For such cases something more is required than a mind accustomed to accurate observation and comparison. It must be a mind stored with general conceptions, previously acquired, of the sorts which bear affinity to the subject of the particular inquiry. And much will also depend on the natural strength and acquired culture of what has been termed the scientific imagination; on the faculty possessed of mentally arranging known elements into new combinations, such as have not yet been observed in nature, though not contradictory to

It would thus, in my view of the matter, be an inaccurate mode of expression to say, that obtaining appropriate conceptions is a condition precedent to generalisation. Throughout the whole process of comparing phenomena with one another for the purpose of generalisation, the mind is trying to make up a conception; but the conception which it is trying to make up is that of the really important point of agreement in the phenomena. As we obtain more knowledge of the phenomena themselves, and of the conditions on which their important properties depend, our views on this subject naturally alter; and thus we advance from a less to a more "appro-any known laws. priate" general conception, in the progress of our investigations.

We ought not, at the same time, to forget that the really important agreement cannot always be discovered by mere comparison of the very phenomena in question, without the aid of a conception acquired elsewhere; as in the case, so often referred to, of the planetary orbits.

The search for the agreement of a set of phenomena is in truth very similar to the search for a lost or hidden object. At first we place ourselves in a sufficiently commanding position, and cast our eyes around us, and if we can see the object, it is well; if not, we ask ourselves mentally what are the places in which it may be hid, in order that we may there search for it: and so on, until we imagine the place where it really is.

But the variety of intellectual habits, the purposes which they serve, and the modes in which they may be fostered and cultivated, are considerations belonging to the Art of Education: a subject far wider than Logic, and which this treatise does not profess to discuss. Here, therefore, the present chapter may properly close.

CHAPTER III.

OF NAMING, AS SUBSIDIARY TO
INDUCTION.

§ 1. Ir does not belong to the present undertaking to dwell on the importance of language as a medium of human intercourse, whether for purposes of sympathy or of information. Nor does our design admit of more And here too we require to have than a passing allusion to that great had a previous conception or know- property of names on which their ledge of those different places. As functions as an intellectual instruin this familiar process so in the ment are, in reality, ultimately dephilosophical operation which it illus-pendent-their potency as a means of trates, we first endeavour to find the lost object or recognise the common attribute, without conjecturally in voking the aid of any previously acquired conception, or, in other words, of any hypothesis. Having failed in this, we call upon our imagination

forming and of riveting associations among our other ideas: a subject on which an able thinker* has thus written :

"Names are impressions of sense,

* Professor Bain.

* This sentence having been erroneously understood as if I had meant to assert that belief is nothing but an irresistible association, I think it necessary to observe that I analysis either of reasoning or of belief, express no theory respecting the ultimate two of the most obscure points in analy tical psychology. I am speaking not of the powers themselves, but of the previous conditions necessary to enable those powers to exert themselves; of which conditions I am contending that language is not one, senses and association being sufficient without it. The irresistible§ 2. Observation and Abstraction, association theory of belief, and the diffithe operations which formed the sub-culties connected with the subject, have ject of the two foregoing chapters, been discussed at length in the notes to. are conditions indispensable to induction: there can be no induction where