PHYSICAL METHOD. 5G3 



those of observation a posteriori. Khhcr of these processes wlieii di- 

 vorceil from tlie otlior tHiniiiisht;s in vuhu? ;ts the sul))(!ct iinTt!;uscs in 

 complication, and tliis in so rapid a ratio as soon to become •■ntirely 

 worthless; but the reliance to be placed in tin* concurrence of the two 

 sorts of evidence, not only does not diminish in anythinj^ like the same 

 proportion, but is not necessarily much diminished at all. Nothinuf 

 more rosuUs than a disturbance in the order of precedency of the two 

 processes, sometimes amountinji; to its actual invei-sion : insomuch that 

 instead of deducint^ our conclusions by reasonin-,', and vc'riiyinir thrm 

 by observation, we in some cases bcfrin by obtaining tlicm conjccfu- 

 rally from specific experience, and afterwards connect them with the 

 principles of human nature by ii j)riori reasonings, which reasonings 

 are thus a real A'erilication. 



The greatest living authority on scientific methods in general, and 

 the only philosopher who, with a competent knowledge of those 

 methods, has attempted to characterize the Method of Socioloqry, M. 

 Comte, considers this inverse order as inseparably inherent in the 

 nature of sociological speculation. He looks upon the social science 

 as essentially consisting of generalizations from history, verified, not 

 originally suggested, by deduction from the laws of Imman nature. 

 Such an opinion, from such a thinker, deserves the most serious con- 

 sideration ; but though I shall presently endeavor to show the emi- 

 nent importance of the truth which it contains, I cannot but think that 

 this truth is enunciated in too unlimited a manner, and that there is 

 considerable scope in sociological inquiry for the direct, as well as for 

 the inverse. Deductive Method. 



It will, in fact, be shown in the next chapter, that there is a kind of 

 sociological inquiries to which, from their prodigious complication, the 

 method of direct deduction is altogether inapplicable, while by a hajijiy 

 compensation it is precisely in these cases that we are ablo to obtain 

 the best empirical laws: to these inquiries, therefore, the Inverse 

 Method is exclusively adapted. But there are also, as will presently 

 appear, other cases in which it is impossible to obtain from direct ob- 

 servation anything worthy the name of an empirical law ; and it for- 

 tunately happens that these are the very cjises in which the Direct 

 Method is least affected by the objection which undoubtedly must al- 

 ways affect it in a certain degree. 



We shall begin, then, by lo<jking at Sociology as a science of direct 

 Deduction, and considering what can be accomplished in it, and under 

 what limitations, by that mode of investigation. We shall, then, in a 

 separate chapter, examine and endeavor to characterize the inverse 

 process. 



§ 2. It is, in the first place, distinctly apparent that Sociology, con- 

 sidered as a system of deductions a priori, cannot be a science of pos- 

 itive predictions, but only of tendencies. We may be able to con- 

 clude, from the laws of human nature; apjdied to the circumstances of 

 a given state of society, that a particular cause will tjperatc in a cer- 

 tain maimer uiih-ss counteracted ; but we can never be assured to 

 what extent (»r amount it will so (jpcrate, (»r allirm with certainty that 

 it will not be counteracted; because we can seldcun know, even ap- 

 proximatively, all the agencies which may coexist with it, and still less 

 calculate the collective result of so many combined elements. Tho 



