64 THE BIOLOGY OF DAILY LIFE. 



CHAPTEK VI. 



THE PROTOPLASM THEORY PARTICULARIZED, AND TESTED 

 BY FACTS, AND RE-STATED WITH THE NECESSARY 

 CORRECTIONS. 



HERSCHEL, in his "Discourse on the Study of 

 Natural Philosophy" (Chapter VII.), lays down the 

 three ways by which we arrive at general laws. 



" We have next to consider the laws which re- 

 gulate the action of these our primary agents ; 

 and these we can only arrive at in three ways : 



" 1st. By inductive reasoning ; that is, by 

 examining all the cases in which we know 

 them to be exercised, inferring, as well as cir- 

 cumstances will permit, its amount or intensity 

 in each particular case, and then piecing toge- 

 ther, as it were, these disjecta membra, gene- 

 ralizing from them, and so arriving at the laws 

 desired. 



"2nd. By forming at once a bold hypo- 

 thesis, particularizing the law, and trying 

 the truth of it by following out its conse- 

 quences and comparing them with facts ; or, 



" 3rd. By a process partaking of both these, 

 and combining the advantages of both without 

 their defects, viz., by assuming indeed the 

 laws we would discover, but so generally ex- 

 pressed that they shall include an unlimited 

 variety of particular laws ; following out the 



