420 INDUCTION. 



state of the entire universe should ever recur a second 

 time, (which, however, all experience combines to 

 assure us will never happen,) all subsequent states 

 would return too, and history would, like a circulating 

 decimal of many figures, periodically repeat itself: 



Jam redit et virgo, redeunt Saturnia regna. . . . 

 Alter erit turn Tiphys, et altera quse vehat Argo 

 Delectos heroas ; erunt quoque altera bella, 

 Atque iterum ad Troiam magnus mittetur Achilles. 



And though things do not really revolve in this 

 eternal round, the whole series of events in the history 

 of the universe, past and future, is not the less capable, 

 in its own nature, of being constructed a priori by any 

 one whom we can suppose acquainted with the original 

 distribution of all natural agents, and with the whole 

 of their properties, that is, the laws of succession 

 existing between them and their effects : saving the 

 infinitely more than human powers of combination 

 and calculation which would be required, even in one 

 possessing the data, for the actual performance of the 

 task. 



8. Since everything which occurs in the universe 

 is determined by laws of causation and collocations of 

 the original causes, it follows that the coexistences 

 which are observable among effects cannot be them- 

 selves the subject of any similar set of laws, distinct 

 from laws of causation. Uniformities there are, as 



ever of causation) is that he invariably does act in conformity to 

 his character, and that any one who thoroughly knew his cha- 

 racter could certainly predict how he would act in any supposable 

 case; they probably would not find this doctrine either contrary to 

 their experience or revolting to their feelings. And no more than 

 this is contended for by any one but an Asiatic fatalist. ,. 



