Page:The Limits of Evolution (1904).djvu/96

Rh ure, it is in the observations and experiments, or in the sifting and correcting of them by the methods of precision. The moment we are satisfied that our particulars are exactly settled, that moment the generalisation becomes irresistible, and we declare that a law of Nature is disclosed.

But now the crucial question is on us: What prompts and supports the generalisation? It cannot be just the facts; for, simply by themselves, they can mean nothing but themselves. What is it, then? The implication is not to be escaped: the ground of every generalisation is added in to the facts by the generalising mind, on the prompting of a conception organic in it. This organic conception is, that actual connexions between phenomena, supposing them to be exactly ascertained, are not simply actual, but are necessary. The logic of induction thus rests at last on the mind’s own declaration that between phenomena there are connexions which are real, not merely apparent, not simply phenomenal, but noumenal; that the reality of such connexions lies in their necessity, and that the processes of Nature are accordingly unchangeable. But the implication most significant of all in this tacit logic is the indispensable postulate of the whole process; namely, that this necessity in the connexion of phenomena issues from the organic action of the mind itself. The mind itself, then, if the processes