CHAPTER V.

WAS THE METHOD NEW, USEFUL, AND BACON'S OWN?

BACON'S Method, and the scientific spirit which animates his works, have been indicated in the foregoing chapters. His philosophical importance is to be measured by that Method and that Spirit ; not by any scientific discoveries. A mind so richly stored as his could not fail to illustrate his writings with manifold graces of style and with pregnant aphorisms. Accordingly, his Method having been established, and having done its work and been superseded, nothing remains for our profit but these very graces and aphorisms. The great Reformer may excite our admiration, historically; his Method excites no admiration for its present intrinsic value. We have a more perfect Method; the processes of scientific investigation are better understood; but we are never in communion with his vast and penetrating intellect, without acknowledging his greatness, for his remarks are often as applicable now as when first written. Hence the frequency of quotations from Bacon; and these quotations, as Dr. Whewell observes, are more frequently made by metaphysical, ethical, and even theological writers, than they are by the authors of works on Physics. For the present generation, then, whatever the value of Bacon's works, Bacon's Method is useless. Some modern writers have asserted

that it was always useless; and this assertion has been supported by arguments so plausible, that they demand attention.

The objections made to Bacon's Method are of three kinds 1st. It was nothing new; 2nd. It was useless as a guide to investigation; 3rd. It was already latent in the scientific spirit then abroad, and must have been elicited by some one sooner or later.

"It was nothing new." This is a very frequent objection. We select two of the most worthy antagonists, the Count Joseph de Maistre and Mr. Macaulay. The former has written a long chapter to prove that Bacon's Induction is nothing more than the Induction of Aristotle; and Mr. Macaulay, who adopts the same opinion, devotes several vivacious pages to show that everybody unconsciously practises this Method. M. de Maistre's Examen de la Philosophie de Bacon, is a vehement attack upon Bacon, written with the celebrated author's usual vivacity, but with more than his usual arrogance and passion. As there are many things in Bacon either hasty, inexact, or partaking of the prejudices and errors of his age, his antagonist is at no loss to find matter for ridicule; but when he treats of Bacon's Method and Spirit as contemptible puerilities, he only excites in the dispassionate reader a smile. What are his arguments against Bacon's Method? First, That Aristotle had analysed it before him; secondly, That Induction is only one form of a syllogism.

It is true that Aristotle told us what Induction was; but it is not true that he analysed it, as Bacon has done; nor did he ever pronounce it to be the Method of inquiry: on the contrary, it only

served him as one of the means of ascertaining truth, and was not half so much employed as the Syllogism. Bacon asserts Induction to be the only Method, and has no words too strong to express his scorn of the syllogism "which may catch the assent, but lets the things slip through." In short, as Dugald Stewart observes, we might as well declare that the ancients had anticipated Newton because they too used the word "attraction," as that Aristotle anticipated Bacon because he too speaks of "Induction.”*

But M. de Maistre says that Induction and Syllogism are the same. "At bottom, what is Induction? Aristotle clearly saw it: It is a syllogism without the middle term—(ἔστι δὲ ὁ τοιοῦτος συλλογισμὸς τῆς πρωτης καὶ ἀμέσου προτάσεως.

prior ii. 12.)

Anal.

"What does it signify whether I say-every simple being is indestructible by nature; now my soul is a simple being, therefore, &c.; or whether I say directly-My soul is simple, therefore it is indestructible. In either case it is the syllogism which is virtually in the induction, as it is in the enthymem."

Now it is quite true that every induction may be thrown into the form of a syllogism by supplying the major premiss; and it is this which led Archbishop Whately to conclude that induction itself is but a peculiar case of ratiocination, and that the universal type of all reasoning is the syllogism. We cannot but agree with John Mill in holding precisely the reverse opinion, and believing

*Philos. of Mind,' vol. ii. chap. iv. sect. 2. The reader will do well to consult the whole chapter. It contains a triumphant refutation of the notion we are examining.

that ratiocination itself is resolvable into Induction.* Be this as it may, M. de Maistre has afforded us an illustration of the difference between Aristotle and Bacon in the very passage quoted.

If every induction can be thrown into the form of a syllogism by supplying the major premiss, it is in the way this major premiss is established that we must seek the real difference between the Syllogistic and Inductive Methods: and that difference is the difference between à priori and à posteriori. Every one who has read Bacon knows that his scorn for the Syllogism is not scorn for it as a form of ratiocination, but as a means of investigation. He objects to proceeding to deduce from an axiom not accurately and inductively obtained, consequences which may very well be contained in the axiom, but yet have no relation to the truth of things. "The axioms in use being derived from slender experience and a few obvious particulars, are generally applied in a corresponding manner; no wonder they lead not to new particulars." Again: "Syllogism consists of propositions, propositions of words, and words are the signs of notions; therefore, if our notions, the basis of all, are confused, and over-hastily taken from things, nothing that is built upon them can be firm; whence our only hope rests upon genuine Induction."+

Nothing can be more explicit. Bacon very well knew the difference between his Method and that of the Aristotelians; and he very well expressed this difference. To turn round upon him and say *See System of Logic: Inductive and Ratiocinative, vol. i. pp. 372, 3. Ib., Aph. 14.

Nov. Org.,' Aph. 25.

all Induction is itself but Syllogism, is mere sophistry. He was not giving a logical analysis of the mind; he was warning men against long-standing errors, and pointing out to them the path of

truth.

Mr. Macaulay's arguments are of a different stamp. To us they seem only ingenious and plausible; and so ingenious and so plausible as to gain many followers. They are mostly true as far as they go, but do not appear to us to go to the real point. We shall select the main parts of his opposition:

"The inductive method has been practised ever since the beginning of the world by every human being. It is constantly practised by the most ignorant clown; who by this method is led to the conclusion, that if he sows barley he shall not reap wheat. A plain man finds his stomach out of order. He never heard of Lord Bacon's name. But he proceeds in the strictest conformity with the rules laid down in the second book of the Novum Organum,' and satisfies himself that mince pies have done the mischief. I ate mince pies on Monday and Wednesday, and was kept awake by indigestion all night.' This is the comparentia ad intellectum instantiarum convenientium. 'I did not eat any on Tuesday and Friday, and I was quite well.❜ This is the comparentia instantiarum in proximo quæ natura data privantur. 'I ate very sparingly of them on Sunday, and was very slightly indisposed in the evening. But on Christmas Day I almost dined on them, and was so ill that I was in some danger.' This is the comparentia instantiarum secundum magis et minus. It cannot be the brandy which I took with them; for I have drunk