CHARACTER OF THE EXPERIMENTALIST. 239 



conclusive/ In this position the question remains to the 

 present day ; it may be that the effect was too slight to 

 be detected, or it may be that the arrangments adopted 

 were not suited to develope the particular relation which 

 exists, just as Oersted could not detect electro-magnetism, 

 so long as his wire was perpendicular to the plane of 

 motion of his needle. But these are not matters which 

 concern us further here. We have only to notice the pro- 

 found conviction in the unity of natural laws, the active 

 powers of inference and imagination, the unbounded licence 

 of theorizing, combined above all with the utmost dili- 

 gence in experimental verification which this remarkable 

 research manifests. 



Reservation of Judgment. 



There is yet another characteristic needed in the 

 philosophic mind ; it is that of suspending judgment 

 when the data are insufficient. Many people will express 

 a confident opinion on almost any question which is put 

 before them, but they thereby manifest not strength, but 

 weakness and narrowness of mind. To see all sides of a 

 complicated subject, and to weigh all the different facts 

 and probabilities correctly, may require no ordinary 

 powers of comprehension. Hence it is most frequently 

 the philosophic mind which is in doubt, and the ignorant 

 mind which is ready with a positive decision. Faraday 

 has himself said, in a very interesting lecture*, ' Occa- 

 sionally and frequently the exercise of the judgment 

 ought to end in absolute reservation. It may be very 

 distasteful, and great fatigue, to suspend a conclusion ; 

 but as we are not infallible, so we ought to be cautious ; 

 we shall eventually find our advantage, for the man who 



Printed in ' Modern Culture/ edited by Youmans, p. 219. 



