CO-EXISTENCES INDEPENDENT OF CAUSATION. 



379 



§ 2. But these same considerations 

 compel us to recognise that there 

 must be one class of co-existences 

 which cannot depend on causation ; 

 the co-existencea between the ulti- 

 mate properties of things — those pro- 

 perties which are the causes of all 

 phenomena, but are not themselves 

 caused by any phenomenon, and a 

 cause for which could only be sought 

 by ascending to the origin of all 

 things. Yet among these ultimate 

 properties there are not only co-exist- 

 ences, but uniformities of co-existence. 

 General propositions may be, and are, 

 formed, which assert that whenever 

 certain properties are found, certain 

 others are found along with them. 

 We perceive an object ; say, for in- 

 stance, water. We recognise it to be 

 water, of course, by certain of its pro- 

 perties. Having recognised it, we 

 are able to iffirm of it innumerable 

 other properties, which we could not 

 do unless it were a general truth, 

 a law or uniformity in nature, that 

 the set of properties by which we 

 identify the substance as water al- 

 ways have those other properties con- 

 joined with them. 



In a fonner place,* it has been ex- 

 plained in some detail what is meant 

 by the Kinds of objects ; those classes 

 which differ from one another not by 

 a limited and definite, but by an in- 

 definite and unknown, number of dis- 

 tinctions. To this we have now to 

 add, that every proposition by which 

 anything is asserted of a Kind, affirms 

 an uniformity of co-existence. Since 

 we know nothing of Kinds but their 

 properties, the Kind, to us, is the set of 

 properties by which it is identified, and 

 which must of course be sxifficient to 

 distinguish it from every other kind.t 



* Book i. chap. viL 



t In some cases, a Kind is sufficiently 

 identified by 8ome one remarkable pro- 

 perty ; but most commonly sevenil are re- 

 quired, each property, considered lingly, 

 being a joint property of that and of other 

 Kinds. The colour and brightness of the 

 diamond are common to it with the p.iste 

 from which false diamonds are made ; its 

 eictohedral form is common to it with alum 

 and magnetic iron ore ; but the colour and 



In affirming anything, therefore, of a 

 Kind, we are affirming something to 

 be uniformly co-existent with the pro- 

 perties by which the kind is recog- 

 nised ; and that is the sole meaning 

 of the assertion. 



Among the uniformities of co-exist- 

 ence which exist in nature, may hence 

 be numbered all the properties of 

 Kinds. The whole of these, however, 

 are not independent of causation, but 

 only a portion of them. Some are 

 ultimate properties, others derivative ; 

 of some, no cause can be assigned, 

 but others are manifestly dependent 

 on causes. Thus, pure oxygen gas is 

 a Kind, and one of its most un- 

 equivocal properties is its gaseous 

 form : this property, however, has for 

 its cause the presence of a certain 

 quantity of latent heat ; and if that 

 heat co\ild be taken away, (as has 

 been done from so many gases in 

 Faraday's experiments,) the gaseoue 

 form would doubtless disappear, to- 

 gether with numerous other properties 

 which depend on, or are caused by, 

 that property. 



In regard to all substances which 

 are chemical compounds, and which 

 therefore may be regarded as products 

 of the juxtaposition of substances 

 different in Kind from themselves, 

 there is considerable reason to pre- 

 sume that the specific properties of 

 the compound are consequent, as 

 effects, on some of the properties of 

 the elements, though little progress 

 has yet been made in tracing any 

 invariable relation between the latter 

 and the former. Still more strongly 

 will a similar presumption exist when 

 the object itself, as in the case of 

 organised beings, is no primeval agent, 

 but an effect, which depends on a 

 cause or causes for its very existence. 

 The Kinds therefore which are called 



brightness and the form together identify 

 its KinI, that is, are a mark to ug that it 

 is combustible ; that when burnt it pro- 

 duces carbonic acid ; that it cannot be cut 

 with any known substance ; together with 

 many other ascertained properties, and 

 the fact that there exist an indefinite num- 

 ber still unascertained. 



