x1 PHENOMENA OF ORGANIC NATURE 3638 
a very great man, let people say what they will of 
him; but notwithstanding all that he did for 
_ philosophy, it would be entirely wrong to suppose 
that the methods of modern scientific inquiry 
originated with him, or with his age; they origin- 
ated with the first man, whoever he was; and 
indeed existed long before him, for many of the 
essential processes of reasoning are exerted by the 
higher order of brutes as completely and effectively 
as by ourselves. We see in many of the brute 
creation the exercise of one, at least, of the same 
powers of reasoning as that which we ourselves 
employ. 
The method of scientific investigation is nothing 
but the expression of the necessary mode of work- 
ing of the human mind. It is simply the mode 
at which all phenomena are reasoned about, ren- 
_ dered precise and exact. There is no more differ- 
- ence, but there is just the same kind of difference, 
between the mental operations of a man of science 
and those of an ordinary person, as there is between 
_ the operations and methods of a baker or of a 
butcher weighing out his goods in common scales, 
and the operations of a chemist in performing a 
_ difficult and complex analysis by means of his 
balance and finely-graduated weights. It is not 
that the action of the scales in the one case, and 
the balance in the other, differ in the principles of 
_ their construction or manner of working; but the 
beam of one is set on an infinitely finer axis than 
