tyle="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> In still further answer to the objection, it may be added that—even when the test has been applied, and the sufficiency of the evidence recognized—if it is sufficient to support the general proposition, it is sufficient also to support an inference from particulars to particulars without passing through the general proposition. The inquirer who has logically satisfied himself that the conditions of legitimate induction were realized in the cases A, B, C, would be as much justified in concluding directly to the Duke of Wellington as in concluding to all men. The general conclusion is never legitimate, unless the particular one would be so too; and in no sense, intelligible to me, can the particular conclusion be said to be drawn from the general one. Whenever there is ground for drawing any conclusion at all from particular instances, there is ground for a general conclusion; but that this general conclusion should be actually drawn, however useful, can not be an indispensable condition of the validity of the inference in the particular case. A man gives away sixpence by the same power by which he disposes of his whole fortune; but it is not necessary to the legality of the smaller act, that he should make a formal assertion of his right to the greater one.

Some additional remarks, in reply to minor objections, are appended.65

[pg 156]

§ 9. The preceding considerations enable us to understand the true nature of what is termed, by recent writers, Formal Logic, and the re