EXPLANATION OF LAWS. 553 



of its failure,, exceeding those which can affect either 

 of the more immediate sequences, A B and B C. The 

 tendency of A to produce C may be defeated by what- 

 ever is capable of defeating either the tendency of A 

 to produce B, or the tendency of B to produce C ; it 

 is therefore twice as liable to failure as either of those 

 more elementary tendencies ; and the generalization 

 that A is always followed by C, is twice as likely to 

 be found erroneous. And so of the converse gene- 

 ralisation, that C is always preceded and caused by 

 A ; which will be erroneous not only if there should 

 happen to be a second immediate mode of production 

 of C itself, but moreover if there be a second mode of 

 production of B, the immediate antecedent of C in the 

 sequence. 



The resolution of the one generalisation into the 

 other two, not only shows that there are possible 

 limitations of the former, from which its two elements 

 are exempt, but shows also where these are to be looked 

 for. As soon as we know that B intervenes between 

 A and C, we also know that if there be cases in which 

 the sequence of A and C does not hold, these are 

 most likely to be found by studying the effects and 

 the conditions of the phenomenon B. 



It appears, then, that in the second of the three 

 modes in which a law may be resolved into other 

 laws, the latter are more general, that is, extend to 

 more cases, and are also less likely to require limi- 

 tation from subsequent experience, than the law which 

 they serve to explain. They are more nearly uncon- 

 ditional ; they are defeated by fewer contingencies ; 

 they are a nearer approach to the universal truth of 

 nature. The same observations are still more evi- 

 dently true with regard to the first of the three modes 

 of resolution. When the law of an effect of com- 



