544 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



peated in a letter that which I heard her say, and if we ask what 

 would appear the character of the evidence to one who, some fifty 

 years hence, had "before him the advertisement, the representation, and 

 the letter, we shall see that the alleged fact would be thought by him 

 incontestable. Only if, after weary search through all the papers and 

 periodicals of the time, he happened to come upon a certain number 

 of the Lancet, would he discover that this combination was not that 

 of two heads on one body, but that of two individuals united back to 

 back, with heads facing opposite ways, and severally complete in all 

 respects, except where the parts were so fused as to form a double 

 pelvis, containing certain pelvic viscera common to the two. If, then, 

 respecting facts of so simple and so easily-verifiable a kind, where no 

 obvious motive for misrepresentations exists, we cannot count on true 

 representations, how shall we count on true representations of social 

 facts, which, being so diffused and so complex, are so difficult to ob- 

 serve, and in respect of which the perceptions are so much perverted 

 by interests, and prepossessions, and party feelings ? 



In exemplifying this difficulty, let us limit ourselves to cases sup- 

 plied by the life of our own time ; leaving it to be inferred that if, in 

 a comparatively calm and critical age, sociological evidence is vitiated 

 by various influences, much more must there have been vitiation of 

 such evidence in the past, when passions ran higher and credulity was 

 greater. 



Those who have lately become conscious of certain facts are apt to 

 suppose those facts have lately arisen. After a changed state of mind 

 has made us observant of occurrences we were before indifferent to, 

 there often results the belief that such occurrences have become more 

 common. It happens so even with accidents and diseases. Having 

 lamed himself, a man is surprised to find how many lame people there 

 are; and, becoming dyspeptic, he discovers that dyspepsia is much 

 more frequent than he supposed when he was young. For a kindred 

 reason he is prone to think that servants do not behave nearly so well 

 as they did during his boyhood not remembering that in Shake- 

 speare's day the service obtainable was similarly reprobated in com- 

 parison with " the constant service of the antique world." Similarly, 

 now that he has sons to establish in life, he fancies that the difficulty 

 of getting places is much greater than it used to be. 



As witnesses to social phenomena, men thus impressed by facts 

 which did not before impress them, become perverters of evidence. 

 Things they have suddenly recognized, they mistake for things that 

 have suddenly come into existence; and so are led to regard as a 

 growing evil or good, that which is as likely as not a diminishing evil 

 or good. Take an example or two : 



In generations not long passed away, sobriety was the exception 

 rather than the rule : a man who had never been drunk was a rarity. 



