GENERAL OUTLINE OF METHOD u 



discussion of their grounds and significance would not be con 

 venient at the present stage of our investigations. For the purpose 

 of enumeration we may conveniently reduce them to the follow 

 ing: 



I. We should select as starting point the simplest, easiest, most 

 familiar objects of thought. What is simplest and easiest to un 

 derstand, will, however, depend on the amount and kind of 

 knowledge already possessed by the seeker ; and will, therefore, be 

 relative and variable. Each must determine, from his own know 

 ledge, what element or elements of the particular subject-matter 

 under investigation may be most easily grasped by him. 



Whether what is simplest in itself is simplest for us, will be 

 largely determined by the nature of the subject-matter in hand. 

 Looked at in itself, the abstract, universal principle or law is 

 simpler, less complex in content, than any concrete fact under it : 

 e.g. the law of gravitation than the fall of an apple ; * but it is not 

 always this simple, abstract aspect of reality that comes first 

 under our notice or is most familiar to us. Of some aspects of 

 reality it is the widest and most general truths that are most 

 easily grasped, as in the case of the axioms of the rational 

 sciences ; and then the method employed will be mainly syn 7 

 thetic. Oftener, however, it is the concrete, complex, many- 

 sided fact of sense with which we are most familiar^ as in the 

 data of the inductive sciences ; and then the method employed 

 will be mainly analytic. 



II. We should proceed from the known to the unknown, GRADU 

 ALLY, step by step, in an orderly, logical sequence of thought, and 

 not hastily, irregularly, &quot; PER SALTUM&quot;. 



To secure this, we must observe carefully all the canons of 

 definition, division, reasoning, demonstration, etc. Failure in 

 the observance of these canons will usually expose us to error, 

 and will inevitably involve inversion, repetition, and consequent 

 confusion. Innumerable examples of those defects have been 

 instanced from the order followed in Euclid s elements of 

 geometry. 2 The importance of explicitly examining and test 

 ing every step of our progress cannot be exaggerated. In no 

 other way can thoroughly scientific knowledge be either secured 

 or retained in the mind : whereas, on the other hand, a clearly 

 perceived, logical, organic connexion between truth and truth is 

 necessarily a powerful aid to memory. 



1 WELTON, op. cit., p. 216. &quot; ibid., p. 225. 



