50 
Blaisdell—The Methods of Science , 
much not by any one several dominant quest which they are 
severally making, as not by any certain principle of procedure 
which may constitute of itself a science under whose guidance 
they all find it comfortable to proceed—somehow a solar force 
that keeps them all in their orbits, as the pastor I heard, hold¬ 
ing together by the law of his master principle the people who 
came to him to learn the how of living. 
It is in the mind of some, perhaps all, when they think deeply 
on the subject, that there is such an over-guidance for scientific 
study. It was an earlier habit to call logic queen of the sci¬ 
ences, and though, possibly since the present century began to 
assert itself, in some directions logic has had put upon it inter¬ 
pretations which would, if they were true, set the matter in 
doubt, I have thought it might be well to raise the question 
anew. There is nothing that adds more zest and courage to 
travel through strange regions than to know the relation of 
our route to other routes which run along by or cross our own, 
and the relation of them all to some fixed point. The planets 
that constitute one system must be interested to know that the 
splendid orbs which constitute a neighboring one are ordered in 
their moving by a great central luminary; the mighty and 
separate systems that inhabit the illimitable sky to-night must 
be happy, it would seem, that the same gentle touch of gravita¬ 
tion keeps them in their individual integrity and holds them all 
in placid unity, as a mother keeps her flock in the sweet home 
of childhood. It does seem as if there were sweet instincts of 
science, felt by such men as Faraday, which, while we are apt 
in the ardor of pursuit to neglect them, we do well in moments 
such as these to let have all the recognition they may find rea¬ 
son for. I shall venture to ask your thought to a few hesitant 
suggestions regarding logic as having for its domain the methods 
of scientific procedure, or, as written upon the program of our 
meeting, “The methods of science as constituting the domain of 
logic.” Logic, the pastor to whom the scientific student comes 
to learn the methods of his procedure; logic, mistress and law of 
science. 
I need scarcely say that the problem of scieyice is the tran¬ 
scribing into modes of the mind of the objective facts of the uni¬ 
verse of real being. The child begins the process in making 
