408 



FALLACIES. 



3. It is next to be remarked that all generaliza- 

 tions which profess, like the theories of Thales, Demo- 

 critus, and others of the early Greek philosophers, to 

 resolve all things into some one element, or, like many 

 modern theories, to resolve phenomena radically dif- 

 ferent into the same, are necessarily false. By radi- 

 cally different phenomena I mean impressions on our 

 senses which differ in quality, and not merely in 

 degree. On this subject what appeared necessary 

 was said in the chapter on the Limits to the Expla- 

 nation of Laws of Nature ; but as the fallacy is even 

 in our own times a common one, I shall touch upon 

 it somewhat further in this place, 



When we say that the force which holds the 

 planets in their orbits is resolved into gravity, or that 

 the force which makes substances combine chemically 

 is resolved into electricity, we assert in the one case 

 what is, and in the other case what might, and pro- 

 bably will ultimately, be a legitimate result of induc- 

 tion. In both these cases, motion is resolved into 

 motion. The assertion is, that a case of motion, which 

 was supposed to be special, and to follow a distinct 

 law of its own, conforms to and is included in the 

 general law which regulates another class of motions. 

 But, from these and similar generalizations, counte- 

 nance and currency has been given to attempts to 

 resolve not motion into motion but heat into motion, 

 light into motion, sensation itself into motion (as in 

 Hartley's doctrine of vibrations) ; states of conscious- 

 ness into states of the nervous system, as in the ruder 

 forms of the materialist philosophy ; vital phenomena 

 into mechanical or chemical processes, as in some 

 schools of physiology. 



Now I am far from pretending that it may not be 

 capable of proof, or that it would not be a very 



