296 FALLACIES. 



at hand to aid the efforts and correct the aberrations of indi- 

 viduals, it is only from the more perfect sciences, from those 

 of which the subject-matter is the least complicated, that 

 opinions not resting on a correct induction have at length, 

 generally speaking, been expelled. In the departments of 

 inquiry relating to the more complex phenomena of nature, 

 and especially those of which the subject is man, whether as 

 a moral and intellectual, a social, or even as a physical being ; 

 the diversity of opinions still prevalent among instructed 

 persons, and the equal confidence with which those of the 

 most contrary ways of thinking cling to their respective tenets, 

 are proof not only that right modes of philosophizing are not 

 yet generally adopted on those subjects, but that wrong ones 

 are : that inquirers have not only in general missed the 

 truth, but have often embraced error; that even the most 

 cultivated portion of our species have not yet learned to 

 abstain from drawing conclusions which the evidence does not 

 warrant. 



The only complete safeguard against reasoning ill, is the 

 habit of reasoning well; familiarity with the principles of correct 

 reasoning, and practice in applying those principles. It is, 

 however, not unimportant to consider what are the most 

 common modes of bad reasoning ; by what appearances the 

 mind is most likely to be seduced from the observance of true 

 principles of induction ; what, in short, are the most common 

 and most dangerous varieties of Apparent Evidence, whereby 

 persons are misled into opinions for which there does not exist 

 evidence really conclusive. 



A catalogue of the varieties of apparent evidence which are 

 not real evidence, is an enumeration of Fallacies. Without 

 such an enumeration, therefore, the present work would be 

 wanting in an essential point. And while writers who included 

 in their theory of reasoning nothing more than ratiocination, 

 have, in consistency with this limitation, confined their 

 remarks to the fallacies which have their seat in that portion 

 of the process of investigation ; we, who profess to treat of the 

 whole process, must add to our directions for performing it 

 rightly, warnings against performing it wrongly in any of its 



