134 INDUCTION. 



the more general it is, the greater amount of experi- 

 ence it is derived from, and the greater therefore is 

 the probability that if exceptions had existed, some 

 would already have presented themselves. 



For these reasons, it requires much more evidence 

 to establish an exception to one of the more general 

 empirical laws than to the more special ones. We 

 should not have any difficulty in believing that there 

 might be a new Kind of crow; or a kind of bird resem- 

 bling a crow in the properties hitherto considered 

 distinctive of that Kind. But it would require 

 stronger proof to convince us of the existence of a 

 kind of crow having properties at variance with any 

 generally recognised universal property of birds ; and 

 a still higher degree if the properties conflict with any 

 recognised universal property of animals. And this 

 is conformable to the mode of judgment recommended 

 by the common sense and general practice of mankind, 

 who are more incredulous as to any novelties in nature, 

 according to the degree of generality of the experience 

 which these novelties seem to contradict. 



9. Still, however, even these greater generaliza- 

 tions, which embrace comprehensive Kinds, containing 

 under them a great number and variety of infimcs 

 species, are only empirical laws, resting upon induction 

 by simple enumeration merely, and not upon any 

 process of elimination, a process wholly inapplicable 

 to the kind of case. Such generalizations, therefore, 

 ought to be grounded upon an examination of all the 

 infimcB species comprehended in them, and not of a 

 portion only. We cannot conclude, merely because 

 a proposition is true of a number of things resembling 

 one another only in being animals, that it is there- 

 fore true of all animals. If, indeed, anything be true 



