THE COMPOSITION OF MIND 



three quarters ; he primarily infers a short time 



— a time indefinitely conceived as certainly less 

 than ten minutes, and certainly more than one." 

 Doubtless he may in an instant proceed to cal- 

 culate the exact length of the time ; yet, as it 

 will not be denied that even before calculating 

 he has a vague notion of the interval, it must 

 be admitted that his inference, though ultimately 

 quantitative, is, at the outset, only qualitative. 

 Between the two kinds of reasoning, therefore, 

 the only difference is the degree of definiteness 

 to which they are respectively developed. 



Bearing in mind these mutually harmonious 

 conclusions — which alike imply the assertion 

 that, between the highest and the lowest kinds 

 of reasoning employed by civilized man, the 

 difference consists solely in the complexity of 

 the relations contemplated, and in the greater 

 or less definiteness with which these relations 

 are cognized as equal or unequal, like or unlike 



— let us now advance a step farther. Already, 

 in the course of the foregoing analysis, the essen- 

 tial similarity between reasoning and classifica- 

 tion has been vividly brought before us. We 

 have now to scrutinize this similarity somewhat 

 more closely. 



To cite an example with which we are already 

 familiar : when our astronomer, some thirty 

 years ago, observed that certain irregularities 

 in the motions of Uranus still remained un- 



