.326 RELIGIOUS VIEWS. 



inferences may properly be described by the 

 word Deduction. On the other hand, the very 

 different process by which a new principle is 

 collected from an assemblage of facts, has been 

 termed Induction ; the truths so obtained and 

 their consequences constitute the results of the 

 Inductive Philosophy ; which is frequently and 

 rightly described as a science which ascends 

 from particular facts to general principles, and 

 then descends again from these general principles 

 to particular applications and exemplifications. 



While the great and important labours by 

 which science is really advanced consist in the 

 successive steps of the inductive ascent, in the 

 discovery of new laws perpetually more and more 

 general ; by far the greater part of our books of 

 physical science unavoidably consists in deductive 

 reasoning, exhibiting the consequences and ap- 

 plications of the laws which have been disco- 

 vered ; and the greater part of writers upon 

 science have their minds employed in this pro- 

 cess of deduction and application. 



This is true of many of those who are con- 

 sidered, and justly, as distinguished and profound 

 philosophers. In the mechanical philosophy, 

 that science which applies the properties of mat- 

 ter and the laws of motion to the explanation of 

 the phenomena of the world, this is peculiarly 

 the case. The laws, when once discovered, oc- 

 cupy little room in their statement, and when no 



