EXAMPLES OF THE FOUR METHODS. 



285 



difficult to discover, the reduction of 

 the argument to formulae such as are 

 here presented to us." The grand 

 difficulty, they said, is to obtain your 

 syllogism, not to judge of its correct- 

 ness when obtained. On the matter 

 of fact, both they and Dr. Whewell 

 are right. The greatest difficulty in 

 both cases is first that of obtaining 

 the evidence, and next, of reducing it 

 to the form which tests its conclusive- 

 ness. But if we try to reduce it with- 

 out knowing what it is to be reduced 

 to, we are not likely to make much 

 progress. It is a more difficult thing 

 to ^Kolve a geometrical problem than 

 to judge whether a proposed solution 

 is correct ; but if people were not able 

 to judge of the solution when found, 

 they would have little chance of find- 

 ing it. And it cannot be pretended 

 that to judge of an induction when 

 found is perfectly easy, is a thing for 

 which aids and instruments are super- 

 fluous ; for erroneous inductions, false 

 inferences from experience, are quite 

 as common, on some subjects much 

 commoner, than true ones. The busi- 

 ness of Inductive Logic is to provide 

 rules and models, (such as the Syllo- 

 gism and its rules are for ratiocina- 

 tion,) to which, if inductive argu- 

 ments conform, those arguments are 

 conclusive, and not otherwise. This 

 is what the Four Methods profess to 

 be, and what I believe they are uni- 

 versally considered to be by experi- 

 mental philosophers, who had prac- 

 tised all of them long before any 

 one sought to reduce the practice to 

 theory. 



The assailants of the Syllogism had 

 also anticipated Dr. Whewell in the 

 other branch of his argument. They 

 said that no discoveries were ever 

 made by syllogism ; and Dr. Whe- 

 well says, or seems to say, that none 

 were ever made by the Four Methods 

 of Induction. To the former objec- 

 tors, Archbishop Whately very per- 

 tinently answered, that their argu- 

 ment, if good at all, was good against 

 the reasoning process altogether ; for 

 whatever cannot be reduced to syllo- 



gism is not reasoning. And Dr. 

 Whewell's argument, if good at all, 

 is good against all inferences from 

 experience. In saying that no dis- 

 coveries were ever made by the Four 

 Methods, he affirms that none were 

 ever made by observation and ex- 

 periment ; for assuredly if any were, 

 it was by processes reducible to one 

 or other of those methods. 



This difference between us accounts 

 for the dissatisfaction which my ex- 

 amples give him ; for I did not select 

 them with a view to satisfy any one 

 who required to be convinced that ob- 

 servation and experiment are modes 

 of acquiring knowledge : I confess 

 that in the choice of them I thought 

 only of illustration, and of facilitating 

 the conception of the Methods by con- 

 crete instances. If it had been my 

 object to justify the processes them- 

 selves as means of investigation, there 

 would have been no need to look far 

 off, or make use of recondite or com- 

 plicated instances. As a specimen of 

 a truth ascertained by the Method of 

 Agreement, I might have chosen the 

 proposition " Dogs bark." This dog, 

 and that dog, and the other dog, 

 answer to A B C, A D E, A F G. 

 The circumstance of being a dog 

 answers to A. Barking answers to 

 a. As a truth made known by the 

 Method of Difference, " Fire bums " 

 might have sufficed. Before I touch 

 the fire I am not burnt ; this is B C ; 

 I touch it, and am burnt ; this is A B 

 C, a B C. 



Such familiar experimental pro- 

 cesses are not regarded as inductions 

 by Dr. Whewell ; but they are per- 

 fectly homogeneous with those by 

 which, even on his own showing, the 

 pyramid of science is supplied with 

 its base. In vain he attempts to 

 escape from this conclusion by laying 

 the mofet arbitrary restrictions on the 

 choice of examples admissible as in- 

 stances of Induction : they must 

 neither be such as are still matter of 

 discussion (p. 265), nor must any of 

 them be drawn from mental and 

 social subjects (p. 269), nor from 



