PHYSICAL METHOD. 501 



observed facts : and these are called the empirical laws of the 

 phenomena. We have, therefore, to inquire, whether any 

 similar preparatory process can be performed on the facts of 

 the social science; whether there are any empirical laws in 

 history or statistics. 



In statistics, it is evident that empirical laws may some 

 times be traced ; and the tracing them forms an important part 

 of that system of indirect observation on which we must often 

 rely for the data of the Deductive Science. The process of 

 the science consists in inferring effects from their causes ; but 

 we have often no means of observing the causes, except through 

 the medium of their effects. In such cases the deductive 

 science is unable to predict the effects, for want of the neces 

 sary data ; it can determine what causes are capable of pro 

 ducing any given effect, but not with what frequency and in 

 what quantities those causes exist. An instance in point is 

 afforded by a newspaper now lying before me. A statement 

 was furnished by one of the official assignees in bankruptcy, 

 showing among the various bankruptcies which it had been 

 his duty to investigate, in how many cases the losses had been 

 caused by misconduct of different kinds, and in how many by 

 unavoidable misfortunes. The result was, that the number of 

 failures caused by misconduct greatly preponderated over those 

 arising from all other causes whatever. Nothing but specific 

 experience could have given sufficient ground for a conclusion 

 to this purport. To collect, therefore, such empirical laws 

 (which are never more than approximate generalizations) from 

 direct observation, is an important part of the process of 

 sociological inquiry. 



The experimental process is not here to be regarded as a 

 distinct road to the truth, but as a means (happening acci 

 dentally to be the only, or the best, available) for obtaining 

 the necessary data for the deductive science. When the im 

 mediate causes of social facts are not open to direct observa 

 tion, the empirical law of the effects gives us the empirical law 

 (which in that case is all that we can obtain) of the causes 

 likewise. But those immediate causes depend on remote 

 causes ; and the empirical law, obtained by this indirect mode 



