XL] PHILOSOPHY OF INDUCTIVE INFERENCE. 225 



Concerning every event we shall have to determine its 

 probable conditions, or the group of antecedents from which 

 it probably follows. An antecedent is anything which 

 exists prior to an event ; a consequent is anything which 

 exists subsequently to an antecedent. It will not usually 

 happen that there is any probable connection between an 

 antecedent and consequent. Thus nitrogen is an antece- 

 dent to the lighting of a common fire ; but it is so far from 

 being a cause of the lighting, that it renders the combustion 

 less active. Daylight is an antecedent to all fires lighted 

 during the day, but it probably has no appreciable effect 

 upon their burning. But in the case of any given event it 

 is usually possible to discover a certain number of ante- 

 cedents which seem to be always present, and with more 

 or less probability we conclude that when they exist the 

 event will follow. 



Let it be observed that the utmost latitude is at present 

 enjoyed in the use of the term cause. Not only may a 

 cause be an existent thing endowed with powers, as 

 oxygen is the cause of combustion, gunpowder the cause 

 of explosion, but the very absence or removal of a thing 

 may also be a cause. It is quite correct to speak of the 

 dryness of the Egyptian atmosphere, or the absence of 

 moisture, as being the cause of the preservation of 

 mummies, and other remains of antiquity. The cause of 

 a mountain elevation, Ingleborough for instance, is the 

 excavation of the surrounding valleys by denudation. It 

 is not so usual to speak of the existence of a thing at one 

 moment as the cause of its existence at the next, but to 

 me it seems the commonest case of causation which can 

 occur. The cause of motion of a billiard ball may be the 

 stroke of another ball ; and recent philosophy leads us to 

 look upon all motions and changes, as but so many mani- 

 festations of prior existing energy. In all probability 

 there is no creation of energy and no destruction, so that 

 as regards both mechanical and molecular changes, the 

 cause is really the manifestation of existing energy. In 

 the same way I see not why the prior existence of matter 

 is not also a cause as regards its subsequent existence. All 

 science tends to show us that the existence of the universe 

 in a particular state at one moment, is the condition of its 

 existence at the next moment, in an apparently different 



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