216 



INDUCTION. 



CHAPTER VII. 



OF OBSERVATION AND EXPERIMENT, 



§ 1. It results from the preceding exposition, that the process of 

 ascertaining what consequents^ in natui-e, are invariably connected 

 with what antecedents, or in other words what phenomena are related 

 to each other as causes and effects, is in some sort a pi'ocess of analysis. 

 Tha.t every fact which begins to exist has a cause, and that this cause 

 must be found somewhere among the facts which immediately pre- 

 ceded its occuiTence, may be taken for certain. The whole of the 

 present facts are the infallible result of all past facts, and more inmie- 

 diately of all the facts which existed at the moment previous. Here, 

 then, is a great sequence, which we know to be uniform. If the whole 

 prior state of the entire universe could again recur, it would again be 

 followed by the whole present state. The question is, how to resolve 

 this complex uniformity into the simpler uniformities which compose 

 it, and assign to each portion of the vast antecedent that portion of the 

 consequent which is attendant upon it. 



This operation, -which we have called analytical, inasmuch as it is 

 the resolution of a complex whole into the component elements, is 

 more than a merely mental analysis. No mere contemplation of the 

 phenomena, and partition of them by the intellect alone, will of itself 

 accomplish the end we have now in view. Nevertheless, such a men- 

 tal partition is an indispensable first step. The order of nature, as per- 

 ceived at a first glance, presents at every instant a chaos followed by 

 another chaos. We must decompose each chaos into single facts,' 

 We must leai-n to see in the chaotic antecedent a multitude of dis- ' 

 tinct antecedents, in the chaotic consequent a multitude of distinct 

 consequents. This, supposing it done, will not of itself tell us on 

 which of the antecedents each consequent is invariably attendant. To 

 determine that point, we must endeavor to effect a sej)aration of the 

 facts from one another, not in our minds only, but in nature. The 

 mental analysis, however, must take ]ilace first. And every one 

 knows that in the mode of performing it, one intellect diflers im- 

 mensely fi-om another. It is the essence of the act of obsei-\'ing ; for the 

 observer is not he who merely sees the thing which is before his eyes, 

 but he who sees what parts that thing is composed of To do this 

 well is a rare talent. One person, from inattention, or attending only 

 in the wrong place, overlooks half of what he sees ; another sets down 

 much more than he sees, confounding it with what he imagines, or 

 with what he infers; another takes note of the hind of all the circum- 

 stances, but being inexpert in estimating their degree, leaves the 

 quantity of each vague and uncertain; another sees indeed the whole, 

 but makes such an awkward division of it into parts, throwing things 

 into one mass which require to be separated, and separating others 

 which might more conveniently be considered as one, that the result 

 is much the same, sometimes even worse, than if no analysis had been 

 attempted at all. It would be possible to point out what qualities of 

 mind, and modes of mental culture, fit a person for being a good 

 obsei-ver ; that, however, is a question not of Logic, but of the. theory 



