JOHN STUART MILL'S PHILOSOPHY TESTED. 



89 



" Before we can be at liberty to conclude that 

 something is universally true because we have 

 never known an instance to the contrary, we must 

 have reason to believe that, if there were in Na- 

 ture any instances to the contrary, we should have 

 known of them. This assurance, in the great ma- 

 jority of cases, we cannot have, or can have only 

 in a very moderate degree. The possibility of 

 having it is the foundation on which we shall see 

 hereafter that induction by simple enumeration 

 may in some remarkable cases amount practically 

 to proof." 



Then he refers to the twenty-first chapter, of 

 which the most important passage has already 

 been quoted. Mill allows that there is an ap- 

 parent inconsistency, but asserts that it is only 

 apparent. The precariousness of the method of 

 simple enumeration is in an inverse ratio to the 

 largeness of the generalization. As the sphere 

 widens, this unscientific method becomes less and 

 less liable to mislead; and the most universal 

 classes of truths — the law of causation, for in- 

 stance, and the principles of number and of ge- 

 ometry — are duly and satisfactorily proved by 

 that method alone ; nor are they susceptible of 

 any other proof. 1 This is Mill's position, when 

 driven to find a basis for his system. 



But, then, why does Mill denounce this induc- 

 tive process as loose, and uncertain, and insuffi- 

 cient, if it is really, as now appears, the basis 

 of all certainty in induction ? How can that be 

 unscientific upon which all science rests ? Why 

 make the whole treatment paradoxical by such 

 a sentence* as this?— "For the justification of 



1 Chapter xxi., section 3, at beginning, in the third 

 and subsequent editions only. 



2 Same chapter, fourth section. In revising this 

 article I discover that this truly paradoxical statement 

 does not appear in the earlier editions of the "System 

 of Logic," having been first introduced in the third 

 edition. Later on it disappears again, and in the sev- 

 enth and subsequent editions the section commences 

 as follows: "The assertion that our inductive pro- 

 cesses assume the law of causation, while the law of 

 causation is itself a case of induction, is a paradox, 

 only on the old theory of reasoning, which supposes 

 the universal truth, or major premise, in a ratiocina- 

 tion, to be the real proof of the particular truths which 

 are ostensibly inferred from it." Here Mill slides into 

 a different position ; but, did space admit, it could be 

 made apparent that this theory of the syllogism quite 

 excludes him from making the universal law of causa- 

 tion the warrant for inductive processes. According 

 to Mill, the evidence for a general truth is resolvable 

 Into the particular ones on which it is founded, so 

 that Mill's new position amounts to saying that certain 

 past acts of induction are a warrant for future acts. 

 But where was the warrant for the past acts ? It is 

 absolutely impossible to meet all Mill's arguments, 

 because, as each new difficulty presents itself, he in- 



the scientific method of induction as against the 

 unscientific, notwithstanding that the scientific ul- 

 timately rests on the unscientific, the preceding 

 considerations may suffice." 



But Mill, though he appears to have ex- 

 plained the inconsistency successfully, has not 

 really cleared himself. He is yet in a coil of dif- 

 ficulties. I now want to know precisely what 

 this loose kind of induction is. Logic, as Mill 

 clearly stated in his Introduction, is the Science 

 of Proof. In so far as belief professes to be 

 founded on proof, the office of logic is to supply 

 a test for ascertaining whether or not the belief 

 is well-grounded. The purpose of Mill's treatise 

 is thus concisely set forth : l 



" Our object, then, will be, to attempt a correct 

 analysis of the intellectual process called Season- 

 ing or Inference, and of such other mental opera- 

 tions as are intended to facilitate this : as well as, 

 on the foundation of this analysis, and pari passu 

 with it, to bring together or frame a set of rules or 

 canons for testing the sufiiciency of any given evi- 

 dence to prove any given proposition." 



Now, I want to know where, in Mill's treatise, 

 is to be found the analysis of this process of 

 induction per enumerationem simplicem? And 

 where is the set of rules and canons for perform- 

 ing it ? On this process, as we have found, ulti- 

 mately rests the proof of all truths, both of 

 mathematical science and of causation ; what- 

 ever we prove by the four experimental methods 

 is really proved by the underlying inductive pro- 

 cess on which their validity depends. Mill's logic 

 is supposed to present the most thorough analy- 

 sis of the foundations of our knowledge, and he 

 himself put it forth professedly as intended to 

 clear up the real nature of the evidence of math- 

 ematical and physical truths. 2 



It was above all things necessary that Mill 

 should have analyzed and described this process 

 of " simple enumeration " with care and com- 

 pleteness, because it is the basis of his whole 

 empirical system. Where is the analysis ? 

 Where are the rules of the method ? If we 

 search the treatise, we find the process men- 

 tioned here and there, but, strange to say, almost 

 always in a depreciatory and scornful manner. 



It is a loose, rude, uncertain, insufficient, fal- 

 lible, unscientific, precarious — even a vicious pro- 

 cess. Such are the epithets which Mill applies 



vents anew explanation, regardless, or rather oblivi- 

 ous, of consistency with his old ones. 



1 Introduction, section 7, second paragraph. 



2 Autobiography, p. 226, quoted in Contemporary 

 Review for January, 1878, p. 274 (Popuxab Science 

 Monthly Supplement, No. X., p. 328). 



