OBSERVATION AND DESCRIPTION. 187 



consciousness, namely, its outward feelings or sensations, and 

 its inward feelings its thoughts, emotions, and volitions. 

 Whether anything else remains, or all else is inference from 

 this ; whether the mind is capable of directly perceiving or 

 apprehending anything except states of its own consciousness 

 is a problem of metaphysics not to be discussed in this place. 

 But after excluding all questions on which metaphysicians 

 differ, it remains true, that for most purposes the discrimina 

 tion we are called upon practically to exercise is that between 

 sensations or other feelings, of our own or of other people, and 

 inferences drawn from them. And on the theory of Observa 

 tion this is all which seems necessary to be said for the pur 

 poses of the present work. 



3. If, in the simplest observation, or in what passes for 

 such, there is a large part which is not observation but some 

 thing else ; so in the simplest description of an observation, 

 there is, and must always be, much more asserted than is con 

 tained in the perception itself. We cannot describe a fact, 

 without implying more than the fact. The perception is only 

 of one individual thing; but to describe it is to affirm a con 

 nexion between it and every other thing which is either 

 denoted or connoted by any of the terms used. To begin 

 with an example, than which none can be conceived more 

 elementary : I have a sensation of sight, and I endeavour to 

 describe it by saying that I see something white. In saying 

 this, I do not solely affirm my sensation ; I also class it. I 

 assert a resemblance between the thing I see, and all things 

 which I and others are accustomed to call white. I assert 

 that it resembles them in the circumstance in which they all 

 resemble one another, in that which is the ground of their 

 being called by the name. This is not merely one way of 

 describing an observation, but the only way. If I would 

 either register my observation for my own future use, or make 

 it known for the benefit of others, I must assert a resemblance 

 between the fact which I have observed and something else. 

 It is inherent in a description, to be the statement of a resem 

 blance, or resemblances. 



