LECTURE III.

OF THE LOGICAL MEthod of pPOLITICAL

ECONOMY.

§ 1. IN adverting, in the opening of this course, to the differences of opinion now existing respecting many fundamental principles in Political Economy, I stated that these discrepancies appeared to me to be chiefly traceable to the more loose and popular method of treating economic questions which has of late years come into fashion; and I further stated that this change in the character of economic discussions was, as I conceived, mainly attributable to the practical success of economic principles in the experiment of free trade a success which, while it attracted a new class of adherents to the cause of Political Economy, furnished its advocates also with a new description of arguments.

The method which we pursue in any inquiry must be determined by the nature and objects of that inquiry. I was thus led in my opening lectures to consider the nature and objects of Political Economy. In the present and following lectures I proceed to

discuss the method which, having regard to what Political Economy proposes to accomplish, it is proper to pursue in its investigations.

I

Let me recall briefly the description I have given of the nature and objects of Political Economy. You will remember I defined Political Economy as the science which investigates the laws of the production and distribution of wealth, which result from the principles of human nature as they operate under the actual circumstances of the external world. also stated that those mental principles and physical conditions are taken by the political economist as ultimate facts, as the premisses of his reasonings, beyond which he is not concerned to trace the causes of the phenomena of wealth. I next considered the nature of those ultimate facts, physical and mental, and found that, although so numerous as to defy distinct specification, there are yet some, the existence and character of which are easily ascertainable, of such paramount importance in relation to the production and distribution of wealth, as to afford a sound and stable basis for deducing the laws of those phenomena. The principal of these I stated to be, first, the desire for physical wellbeing implanted in man, and for wealth as the means of obtaining it, and, as a consequence of this in conjunction with other mental attributes, the desire to obtain wealth at the least possible sacrifice; secondly, the principles of population as derived from the physiological character of man and his mental propensities; and thirdly, the physical

qualities of the natural agents, more especially land, on which human industry is exercised. I also showed you that the most important of the subordinate principles and facts affecting the production and distribution of wealth, which come in to modify and sometimes to reverse the operation of the more cardinal principles, are also capable of being ascertained and appreciated, with sufficient accuracy at least to be taken account of in our reasonings, if not to be constituted as premisses of the science; and of these also I gave several examples.

This, then, being the character of Political Economy, we have to consider by what means the end which it proposes the discovery of the laws of the production and distribution of wealth-may be most effectually promoted. To the question here indicated, the answer most commonly given by those who take an interest in economic speculation is :—by the inductive method of inquiry; but this, without more explanation than is usually given, affords us little practical help. For what are we to understand by the inductive method? What are the logical processes intended to be included under this form of words? That is a question to which not many of those who talk of studying Political Economy inductively' have troubled themselves to find an answer. The truth is, the expression 'inductive method' is one used with much latitude of meaning even by writers on inductive logic-latitude of meaning which it will be very necessary, before determining whether in

duction be applicable or inapplicable to economic investigation, to clear up. In its more restricted, and, as I conceive, its proper sense, induction is thus defined by Mr. Mill:-"That operation of the mind by which we infer that what we know to be true in a particular case or cases will be true in all cases which resemble the former in certain assignable respects. In other words, induction is the process by which we conclude that what is true of certain individuals of a class is true of the whole class, or that what is true at certain times will be true in similar circumstances at all times." The characteristic of induction, as thus defined, is that it involves an ascent from particulars to generals, from individual facts to laws. But the word is frequently used, and by writers of authority, in a sense much wider than this. For example, in his History of the Inductive Sciences, Dr. Whewell invariably speaks of laws of nature, both ultimate and secondary, as being established by induction, and as being inductions;' though from his own account of their discovery it is evident that this has frequently been accomplished quite as much by reasoning downwards from general principles, as by reasoning upwards from particular facts. Sir John Herschel, too, not unfrequently uses the term with the same extended meaning, as embracing all the logical processes of whatever kind by which the truths of physical science are established.2 And Mr. Mill, in speaking of the inductive logic,

1 'System of Logic,' book iii. chap. ii. § 1.

2 Preliminary Discourse on Natural Philosophy.'

describes it as comprising not merely the questionhow to ascertain the laws of nature,' but also'how, after having ascertained them, to follow them to their results.' Such being the large sense in which induction' has been employed by authoritative writers, it is obvious that, as thus understood, the inductive method cannot properly be contrasted with the 'deductive,' since it includes amongst its processes this latter mode of reasoning. The proper antithesis to induction, in this wider meaning of the word, would be, not deduction, but rather that method of speculation which is known as the 'metaphysical,' in obedience to which the inquirer, disdaining to be guided by experience, aims at reaching nature by transcending phenomena through the aid of the intuitions, real or supposed, of the human mind. If this latter mode of reasoning has ever been followed in economic speculation, it has, at least, been long laid aside by all writers of any mark (with the possible exception of Mr. Ruskin); and therefore the question really at issue, as regards the logical method proper to Political Economy, is not as to the suitability for economic investigation of the inductive method as understood by such writers as Herschel and Whewell- this we may take as generally agreed upon-but the more specific problem as to the suitability, for the purpose in hand, of the several processes included under that comprehensive sense of the phrase; in other words, to ascertain the place, order, and importance which induction (in the narrower meaning of the term), deduction,