342 FALLACIES. 



inference ; and yet, because the premisses are false, or 

 because we have inferred from them what they will 

 not support, our conclusion may be erroneous. But 

 a case, perhaps even more frequent, is that in which 

 the error arises from not conceiving our premisses 

 with due clearness, that is, (as shown in the preceding 

 Book*,) with due fixity : forming one conception of 

 our evidence when we collect or receive it, and another 

 when we make use of it ; or unadvisedly and in gene- 

 ral unconsciously substituting, as we proceed, diffe- 

 rent premisses in the place of those with which we set 

 out, or a different conclusion for that which we 

 undertook to prove. This gives existence to a class 

 of fallacies which may be justly termed Fallacies of 

 Confusion ; comprehending, among others, all those 

 which have their source in language, whether arising 

 from the vagueness or ambiguity of our terms, or from 

 casual associations with them. 



When the fallacy is not one of Confusion, that is, 

 when the proposition believed, and the evidence on 

 which it is believed, are steadily apprehended and 

 unambiguously expressed, there remain to be made 

 two cross divisions, giving rise to four classes. The 

 Apparent Evidence may be either particular facts, or 

 foregone generalizations ; that is, the process may 

 simulate either simple Induction, or Deduction: and 

 again, the evidence, whether consisting of facts or 

 general propositions, may be false in itself, or, being 

 true, may fail to bear out the conclusion attempted to 

 be founded upon it. This gives us, first, Fallacies of 

 Induction and Fallacies of Deduction, and then a sub- 

 division of each of these, according as the supposed 

 evidence is false, or true but inconclusive. 



Supra, p. 226. 



