416 LOGIC OP THE MORAL SCIENCES. 



At the threshold of this inquiry we are met hy an objec 

 tion, which, if not removed, would be fatal to the attempt to 

 treat human conduct as a subj ect of science. Are the actions 

 6f human beings, like all other natural events, subject to 

 invariable laws ? Does that constancy of causation, which is 

 the foundation of every scientific theory of successive pheno 

 mena, really obtain among them ? This is often denied ; and 

 for the sake of systematic completeness, if not from any very 

 urgent practical necessity, the question should receive a deli 

 berate answer in this place. We shall devote to the subject a 

 chapter apart. 



