METHOD OF DISCOVERY. 57 



in a general manner, and wind up by saying that, 

 "After all, you know, the principles and method of 

 this author are totally opposed to the canons of the 

 Baconian philosophy." Then everybody applauds, as 

 a matter of course, and agrees that it must be 

 so. But if you were to stop them all in the middle 

 of their applause, you would probably find that 

 neither the speaker nor his applauders could tell you 

 how or in what way it was so ; neither the one nor 

 the other having the slightest idea of what they mean 

 when they speak of the " Baconian philosophy.^' 



You wiU understand, I hope, that I have not the 

 slightest desire to join in the outcry against either 

 the morals, the intellect, or the great genius of Lord 

 Chancellor Bacon. He was undoubtedly a very great 

 man, let people say what they will of him; but not- 

 withstanding all that he did for philosophy, it would 

 be entirely wrong to suppose that the methods of 

 modern scientific inquiry originated with him, or with 

 his age ; they originated with the first man, whoever 

 he was ; and indeed existed long before him, for many 

 of the essential processes of reasoning are exerted by 

 the higher order of brutes as completely and effectively 

 as by ourselves. We see in many of the brute creation 

 the exercise of one, at least, of the same powers of 

 reasoning as that which we ourselves employ. 



The method of scientific investigation is nothing but 

 the expression of the necessary mode of working of the 

 human mind. It is simply the mode at which all phe- 

 nomena are reasoned about, rendered precise and exact. 

 There is no more difference, but there is just the same 



