and arranging phenomena;' and furthermore, 'that Aristotle,
and other ancient philosophers, not only asserted in the most pointed
manner that all our knowledge must begin from experience, but also
stated, in language much resembling the habitual phraseology of the most
modern schools of philosophizing, that particular facts must be
_collected_; that from these, general principles must be obtained by
induction; and that these principles, when of the most general kind, are
_axioms_.'

The confusion of thought which has existed and, to a considerable
extent, still exists, even among Scientific men, in relation to the
nature of this Method, arises from the want of an understanding of its
twofold mode of operation, as just explained. The assertion of those
who ascribe the failure of this Method to its neglect of Facts, is true;
the averment of Professor Whewell that it was neither from a lack of
Facts nor Ideas, but because the Ideas were not distinct and appropriate
to the Facts, is not less so. But the former statement applies to that
phase of the Method which assumed unverified Laws or Principles, or
fanciful hypotheses, as the starting points of reasoning without
reference to Facts; while the latter refers to the process, which, while
it collected Facts and derived Laws therefrom, did not stop at the
inferences which were warranted by the Facts. This last was the mode of
applying the Method most in vogue with Aristotle and the Greek
Scientists; while the first was preeminently, almost exclusively, the
process of the Greek Philosophers and the mediaeval Schoolmen.

But while the endeavor to arrive at certain knowledge by the Deductive
Method, by attempting to reason from Principles to Facts, from Generals
to Particulars, failed so completely as far as the Anticipative or
Hypothetical branch, of the Method was concerned, the same mode of
procedure was productive of the most satisfactory results when applied
to Mathematics, and furnished a rapid and easy means of arriving at the
ulterior Facts of this department of the universe with precision and
certainty. We have thus the curious exhibition of the same process
leading into utter confusion when applied to one set of phenomena, and
into exactitude and surety when applied to another; and behold the
Scientific world condemning as utterly useless for other departments of
investigation, and throwing aside, a Method which is still retained in
the only Science that is called _ex