LAW OF CAUSATION. 



225 



reproduce, the effect, or else to coun- 

 teract some force tending to destroy 

 it. And this may be a convenient 

 phraseology ; but it is only a phrase- 

 ology. The fact remains, that in some 

 cases (though these are a minority) 

 the continuance of the conditions 

 which produced an effect is necessary 

 to the continuance of the effect. 



As to the ulterior question, whether 

 it is strictly necessary that the cause, 

 or assemblage of conditions should 

 precede, by ever so short an instant, 

 the production of the effect, (a question 

 raised and argued with much ingenuity 

 by Sir John Herschel in an Essay 

 already quoted,*) the inquiry is of no 

 consequence for our present purpose. 

 There certainly are cases in which the 

 effect follows without any interval per- 

 ceptible by our faculties ; and when 

 there is an interval, we cannot tell by 

 how many intermediate links imper- 

 ceptible to us that interval may really 

 be filled up. But even granting that 

 an effect may commence simultane- 

 ously with its cause, the view I have 

 taken of causation is in no way practi- 

 cally affected. Whether the cause and 

 its effect be necessarily succes.sive or 

 not, the beginning of a phenomenon 

 is what implies a cause, and causation 

 is the law of the succession of phe- 

 nomena. If these axioms be granted, 

 we can afford, though I see no neces- 

 sity for doing so, to drop the words 

 antecedent and consequent as applied 

 to cause and effect I have no objec- 

 tion to define a cause, the assemblage 

 of phenomena, which occurring, some 

 other phenomenon invariably com- 

 mences, or has its origin. Whether 

 the effect coincides in point of time 

 with, or immediately follows, the 

 hindmost of its conditions, is im- 

 material. At all events, it does not 

 precede it ; and when we are in doubt, 

 between two co-existent phenomena, 

 which is cause and which effect, we 

 rightly deem the question solved if we 

 can ascertain which of them preceded 

 the other. 



• ^way«, pp. ag^-aeS- 



§ 8. It continually happens that 

 several different phenomena, which 

 are not in the slightest degree de- 

 pendent or conditional on one another, 

 are found all to depend, as the phrase 

 is, on one and the same agent ; in 

 other words, one and the same phe- 

 nomenon is seen to be followed by 

 several sorts of effects quite hetero- 

 geneous, but which go on simultane- 

 ously one with another ; provided, 

 of course, that all other conditions 

 requisite for each of them also exist. 

 Thus, the sun produces the celestial 

 motions, it produces daylight, and it 

 produces heat The earth causes the 

 fall of heavy bodies, and it also, in its 

 capacity of a great magnet, causes the 

 phenomena of the magnetic needle. 

 A crystal of galena causes the sensa- 

 tions of hardness, of weight, of cubical 

 form, of grey colour, and many others 

 between which we can trace no inter- 

 dependence. The purpose to which the 

 phraseology of Properties and Powers 

 is specially adapted is the expression 

 of this sort of cases. When the same 

 phenomenon is followed (either subject 

 or not to the presence of other con- 

 ditions) by effects of different and 

 dissimilar orders, it is usual to say 

 that each different sort of effect is 

 produced by a different property of 

 the cause. Thus we distinguish the 

 attractive or gravitative property of 

 the earth, and its magnetic property : 

 the gravitative, luminiferous, and ca- 

 lorific properties of the sun : the 

 colour, shape, weight, and hardness 

 of a crystal. These are mere phrases, 

 which explain nothing, and add no- 

 thing to our knowledge of the subject, 

 but considered as abstract names 

 denoting the connection between the 

 different effects produced and the 

 object which produces them, they are 

 a very powerful instrument of abridg- 

 ment, and of that acceleration of the 

 process of thought which abridgment 

 accomplishes. 



This class of considerations leads to 

 a conception which we shall find to be 

 of great importance, that of a Perma- 

 nent Cause, or original natural agent. 



