BOOK VI. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 



REFLECTIONS ON THE RESULTS AND LIMITS OF 

 SCIENTIFIC METHOD. 



Before concluding a work on the Principles of Science, 

 it will not be inappropriate to add some remarks upon 

 the limits and ultimate bearings of the knowledge which 

 we may acquire by the employment of scientific method. 

 All science consists, it has several times been stated, in the 

 detection of identities in the action of natural agents. The 

 purpose of inductive inquiry is to ascertain the apparent 

 existence of necessary connection between causes and 

 effects, expressed in the form of natural laws. Now so far 

 as we thus learn the invariable course of nature, tlie future 

 becomes the necessary sequel of tlie present, and we are 

 brought beneath the sway of powers with which nothing 

 can interfere. 



l>y degrees it is found, too, that the chemistry of 

 organised substances is not entirely separated from, but is 

 contiimous with, that of earth and stones. Life seems to 

 be nothing l)Ut a special form of energy which is mani- 

 fested in heat and electricity and mechanical force. The 

 time may come, it almost seems, when the tender me- 

 chanism of the brain will be traced out, and every thought 

 reiluced to the expenditure of a determinate weigiit of 



