CHAP. XIV.] EXAMPLE OF ANALYSIS. 225 



affirmed that any one may be true. Such a result is a truism 

 a mere necessary truth. Still it contains the only answer which 

 can be given to the question proposed. 



I do not deem it necessary to vindicate against the charge of 

 laborious trifling these applications. It may be requisite to en- 

 ter with some fulness into details useless in themselves, in order 

 to establish confidence in general principles and methods. When 

 this end shall have been accomplished in the subject of the pre- 

 sent inquiry, let all that has contributed to its attainment, but 

 has afterwards been found superfluous, be forgotten. 



