FUNCTIONS AND VALUE OF THE SYLLOGISM. 135 



original ; and if no error appears, he 

 recognises that the transcript has 

 been correctly made. But we do not 

 call the examination of the copy a 

 part of the act of copying. 



The conclusion in an induction is 

 inferred from the evidence itself, and 

 not from a recognition of the suffi- 

 ciency of the evidence : as I infer that 

 my friend is walking towards me be- 

 cause I see him, and not because I 

 recognise that my eyes are open, and 

 that eyesight is a means of knowledge. 

 In all operations which require care, 

 it is good to assure ourselves that the 

 process has been performed accurately; 

 but the testing of the process is not 

 the process itself; and, besides, may 

 have been omitted altogether, and yet 

 the process be correct. It is pre- 

 cisely because that operation is omitted 

 in ordinary unscientific reasoning, 

 that there is anything gained in cer- 

 tainty by throwing reasoning into the 

 syllogistic form. To make sure, as 

 far as possible, that it shall not be 

 omitted, we make the testing opera- 

 tion a part of the reasoning process 

 itself. We insist that the inference 

 from particulars to particulars shall 

 pass through a general proposition. 

 But this is a security for good reason- 

 ing, not a condition of all reasoning ; 

 and in some cases not even a security. 

 Our most familar inferences are all 

 made before we learn the use of 

 general propositions : and a person of 

 untutored sagacity will skilfully apply 

 his acquired experience to adjacent 

 cases, though he would bungle griev- 

 ously in fixing the limits of the appro- 

 priate general theorem. But though 

 he may conclude rightly, he never, 

 properly speaking, knows whether he 

 has done so or not ; he has not tested 

 his reasoning. Now, this is precisely 

 what forms of reasoning do for us. 

 We do not need them to enable us 

 to reason, but to enable us to know 

 whether we reason correctly. 



In still further answer to the ob- 

 jection, it may be added that— even 

 when the test has been applied, and 

 the suflficiency of the evidence recog- 



nised, if it is suflicient to support the 

 general proposition, it is sufl&cient 

 also to support an inference from par- 

 ticulars to particulars without passing 

 through the general propositions. The 

 inquirer who has logically satisfied 

 himself that the conditions of legiti- 

 mate induction were realised in the 

 cases A, B, C, would be as much 

 justified in concluding directly to the 

 Duke of Wellington as in concluding 

 to all men. The general conclusion 

 is never legitimate, unless the particu- 

 lar one would be so too ; and in no sense 

 intelligible to me can the particular 

 conclusion be said to be drawn from 

 the general one. Whenever there is 

 ground for drawing any conclusion at 

 all from particular instances, there is 

 ground for a general conclusion ; but 

 that this general conclusion should 

 be actually drawn, however useful, 

 cannot be an indispensable condition 

 of the validity of the inference in the 

 particular case. A man gives away 

 sixpence by the same power by which 

 he disposes of his whole fortune ; but 

 it is not necessary to the legality 

 ot the smaller act that he should 

 make a formal assertion of his right 

 to the greater one. 



Some additional remarks, in reply 

 to minor objections, are appended.* 



* A writer in the " British Qaarterly 

 Review " (August, 1846), in a review of tliis 

 treatise, endeavours to show that tlier* is 

 no petitio principii in the syllogi-m, by 

 denying that the proposition, All men are 

 mortal, asserts or sissumes that Socrates is 

 mortal. Insupport of tliis denial, Reargues 

 that we may, and in fact do, admit the 

 general proposition tliatall men are mortal, 

 without having particularly examined the 

 case of Socrates, and even without know- 

 ing whether the individual so named is a 

 man or something else. But tliis of course 

 was never denied. That we can and do 

 draw conclusions concerning cases speci- 

 fically unknown to us is the datum from 

 which all who discuss this subject must 

 set out. The question is, in what terms 

 the evidence or ground on which we draw 

 these conclusions may best be designated 

 — whether it is most correct to say, that 

 the unknown case is proved by known 

 Crises, or that it i.s proved by a general pro- 

 position including both sets of cases, tlie 

 unknown and the known? I contend for 

 the former mode of expression. I hold it 



