SECT. 25.] Induction. 225 



you at a rate assigned by these statistics, knowing that in 

 the long run all will come right so far as we are concerned. 

 You are also consumptive, it is true, and we do not know 

 what proportion of the English are consumptive, nor what 

 proportion of English consumptives die in Madeira. But 

 this does not really matter for our purpose. The formula, 

 nine in ten die, is in reality calculated by taking into account 

 these unknown proportions; for, though we do not know 

 them in themselves, statistics tell us all that we care to 

 know about their results. In other words, whatever un 

 known elements may exist, must, in regard to all the effects 

 which they can produce, have been already taken into 

 account, so that our ignorance about them cannot in the 

 least degree invalidate such conclusions as we are able to 

 draw. And this is sufficient for our purpose.&quot; But precisely 

 the same language might be held to him if he presented 

 himself as a consumptive man ; that is to say, the office 

 could safely carry on its proceedings upon either alternative. 

 This would, of course, be a very imperfect state for the 

 matter to be left in. The only rational plan would be to 

 isolate the case of consumptive Englishmen, so as to make 

 a separate calculation for their circumstances. This cal 

 culation would then at once supersede all other tables so 

 far as they were concerned; for though, in the end, it could 

 not arrogate to itself any superiority over the others, it 

 would in the mean time be marked by fewer and slighter 

 aberrations from the truth. 



25. The real reason why the Insurance office could 

 not long work on the above terms is of a very different 

 kind from that which some readers might contemplate, and 

 belongs to a class of considerations which have been much 

 neglected in the attempts to construct sciences of the dif 

 ferent branches of human conduct. It is nothing else than 

 V - 15 



