22 NATURE AND DESIGN OF THIS WORK. [CHAP. I. 



tical records, over and above those the discovery of which re- 

 quires no such aid, would so far compensate for the labour in- 

 volved as to render it worth while to institute such investigations 

 upon a proper scale of magnitude, is a point which could, per- 

 haps, only be determined by experience. It is to be desired, 

 and it might without great presumption be expected, that in 

 this, as in other instances, the abstract doctrines of science should 

 minister to more than intellectual gratification. Nor, viewing 

 the apparent order in which the sciences have been evolved, and 

 have successively contributed their aid to the service of mankind, 

 does it seem very improbable that a day may arrive in which si- 

 milar aid may accrue from departments of the field of knowledge 

 yet more intimately allied with the elements of human welfare. 

 Let the speculations of this treatise, however, rest at present 

 simply upon their claim to be regarded as true. 



20. I design, in the last place, to endeavour to educe from 

 the scientific results of the previous inquiries some general inti- 

 mations respecting the nature and constitution of the human 

 mind. Into the grounds of the possibility of this species of in- 

 ference it is not necessary to enter here. One or two general 

 observations may serve to indicate the track which I shall endea- 

 vour to follow. It cannot but be admitted that our views of 

 the science of Logic must materially influence, perhaps mainly 

 determine, our opinions upon the nature of the intellectual facul- 

 ties. For example, the question whether reasoning consists 

 merely in the application of certain first or necessary truths, 

 with which the mind has been originally imprinted, or whether 

 the mind is itself a seat of law, whose operation is as manifest 

 and as conclusive in the particular as in the general formula, or 

 whether, as some not undistinguished writers seem to maintain, 

 all reasoning is of particulars ; this question, I say, is one which 

 not merely affects the science of Logic, but also concerns the for- 

 mation of just views of the constitution of the intellectual facul- 

 ties. Again, if it is concluded that the mind is by original 

 constitution a seat of law, the question of the nature of its sub- 

 jection to this law, whether, for instance, it is an obedience 

 founded upon necessity, like that which sustains the revolutions 

 of the heavens, and preserves the order of Nature, or whether 



