286 THE SCIENCE OF LOGIC 



individual event at a definite point of space and time, or about 

 the happening of a whole class of such events, but about the 

 happening of a more or less definite proportion of events of a 

 certain class within more or less definite limits of space and time. 

 Suppose, for instance, it has been observed to have rained on an 

 average three days in the week during the past twenty years in 

 a certain district. We may be morally certain that if the 

 general climatic conditions of the district continue unchanged 

 we shall have the same average in the future. 



But, furthermore, knowing as we do that these results were 

 the outcome of numerous natural causes interacting according to 

 undiscovered laws, we have no reason to doubt that closer and 

 more prolonged and detailed scrutiny of all the climatic condi 

 tions of that district, and of other districts, may gradually enable- 

 us to bring to light these laws, or some of them. Of course, no 

 induction has yet brought to light the laws that have deter 

 mined the given condensation of vapour and consequent rainfall ; 

 nor has any probable hypothesis as yet suggested what these 

 laws may be. The phenomenon itself is so complex, the ante 

 cedent and concomitant conditions of such condensations of 

 vapour in the atmosphere as lead to rain, are so manifold, their 

 action and interaction so intimate and elusive, that it has been 

 impossible, so far, to determine the exact influence of each 

 elementary factor, and to formulate the law of their combined 

 activities. 1 Provisionally, therefore, we have recourse to statistics : 

 we catalogue the greatest possible number of instances, note their 

 frequency and their coincidences with other occurrences, in the 

 hope of discovering some clue to a causal connexion (243). We 

 measure the rainfall during the different seasons of the year, per 

 week, per day, per hour, etc., noting the altitude and other geo 

 graphical conditions, the direction of the winds, etc. We draw 

 up tables of all those various coincidences in the hope that sooner 

 or later we may be able to eliminate the irrelevant circumstances, 

 to trace the recurrence of the phenomenon to its natural causes, 

 and bring to light the laws of their activity. 



Or, again, the ratio of male to female births has been in 

 vestigated, for over 200,000,000 children. For nearly two cen 

 turies the numbers of each sex born have been found to be 

 practically equal without any exception whatever of time or 



1 Cf. example (of monsoons) quoted above, 222, from Mr. JOSEPH S Logic, pp. 

 444-5- 



