246 REASONING. 



if it be still doubtful whether Socrates, or any other 

 individual you choose to name, be mortal or not, the 

 same degree of uncertainty must hang over the asser- 

 tion. All men are mortal: that the general principle, 

 instead of being given as evidence of the particular 

 case, cannot itself be taken for true without exception, 

 until every shadow of doubt which could affect any 

 case comprised with it, is dispelled by evidence 

 aliunde ; and then what remains for the syllogism to 

 prove ? that, in short, no reasoning from generals to 

 particulars can, as such, prove anything : since from a 

 general principle you cannot infer any particulars, 

 but those which the principle itself assumes as fore- 

 known. 



This doctrine is irrefragable ; and if logicians, 

 though unable to dispute it, have usually exhibited a 

 strong disposition to explain it away, this was not 

 because they could discover any flaw in the argu- 

 ment itself, but because the contrary opinion seemed 

 to rest upon arguments equally indisputable. In the 

 syllogism last referred to, for example, or in any of 

 those which we previously constructed, is it not 

 evident that the conclusion may, to the person to 

 whom the syllogism is presented, be actually and bond 

 fide a new truth? Is it not matter of daily experience 

 that truths previously undreamt of, facts which have 

 not been, and cannot be, directly observed, are 

 arrived at by way of general reasoning ? We believe 

 that the Duke of Wellington is mortal. We do not 

 know this by direct observation, since he is not yet 

 dead. If we were asked how, this being the case, we 

 know the duke to be mortal, we should probably 

 answer, Because all men are so. Here, therefore, 

 we arrive at the knowledge of a truth not (as yet) 

 susceptible of observation, by a reasoning which 



