General Methods 67 



enthusiasm, indifference, prejudice, or carelessness, to 

 assume the general to be true when it is not. Thus: 

 A hat is passed around in church for contributions to 

 the mission fund. It is assumed that this contribu- 

 tion is to be money. After the collection an account 

 of the money contributed is to be rendered to the 

 assembly. You take out one contribution after the 

 other, and finding one nickel after another, you jump 

 at the conclusion, not only that (i) everything in the 

 hat is money, but that (2) it is all nickels. It turns 

 out, however, that this is an error; for one rascal, hav- 

 ing no sympathy with missionary activity, has con- 

 tributed a button instead of a nickel. Hence the dis- 

 crepancy in results. Conclusion (i) is a result of 

 error in deduction, and (2) error in induction. Then, 

 too, we may select unconsciously such a major premise 

 as will sustain the conclusion sought. General terms 

 are often misleading, therefore, because (i) they may 

 have more than one meaning, (2) they may be supposed 

 to include what they do not include. 



This method may interfere with observation, the 

 mind being satisfied with the inference drawn from 

 the general idea, which is too often merely a vague one. 



Its advantages lie in the fact that, if the major premise, 

 the general, is true, the conclusion must be true also. 

 It is equivalent to a mathematical demonstration; 

 and it is often said that nothing short of such a demon- 

 stration can be considered positively true. Manifestly, 

 unless we assume that the general is innate, the mind 

 has first to acquire the general notion or arrive at the 

 general concept; and, consequently, this method 

 should be avoided until such a time when the general 

 idea is really present in the mind. Hence its advan- 

 tages become most apparent when used in connection 

 with the inductive method. 



2. THE INDUCTIVE METHOD is passing from the 

 particular to the general. Thus by observing a number 



