GROUND OF INDUCTION. 345 



Whether there would be this inconsistency or not, may be 

 a matter of long and delicate inquiry ; but unless there would, 

 we have no sufficient ground for the major of the inductive 

 syllogism. It hence appears, that if we throw the whole 

 course of any inductive argument into a series of syllogisms, 

 we shall arrive by more or fewer steps at an ultimate syllogism, 

 which will have for its major premise the principle, or axiom, 

 of the uniformity of the course of nature.* 



It was not to be expected that in the case of this axiom, 

 any more than of other axioms, there should be unanimity 

 among thinkers with respect to the grounds on which it is to 

 be received as true. I have already stated that I regard it as 

 itself a generalization from experience. Others hold it to be a 

 principle which, antecedently to any verification by experience, 

 we are compelled by the constitution of our thinking faculty to 

 assume as true. Having so recently, and at so much length, 

 combated a similar doctrine as applied to the axioms of mathe 

 matics, by arguments which are in a great measure applicable 

 to the present case, I shall defer the more particular discussion 

 of this controverted point in regard to the fundamental axiom 

 of induction, until a more advanced period of our inquiry.f 



* But though it is a condition of the validity of every induction that there 

 be uniformity in the course of nature, it is not a necessary condition that the 

 uniformity should pervade all nature. It is enough that it pervades the par 

 ticular class of phenomena to which the induction relates. An induction con 

 cerning the motions of the planets, or the properties of the magnet, would not 

 be vitiated though we were to suppose that wind and weather are the sport of 

 chance, provided it be assumed that astronomical and magnetic phenomena are 

 under the dominion of general laws. Otherwise the early experience of mankind 

 would have rested on a very weak foundation ; for in the infancy of science it 

 could not be known that all phenomena are regular in their course. 



Neither would it be correct to say that every induction by which we infer 

 any truth, implies the general fact of uniformity as foreknown, even in reference 

 to the kind of phenomena concerned. It implies, either that this general fact 

 is already known, or that we may now know it : as the conclusion, the Duke of 

 Wellington is mortal, drawn from the instances A, B, and C, implies either 

 that we have already concluded all men to be mortal, or that we are now entitled 

 to do so from the same evidence. A vast amount of confusion and paralogism 

 respecting the grounds of Induction would be dispelled by keeping in view these 

 simple considerations. 



f Infra, chap. xxi. 



