Beacon Lights of History, Volume 06: Renaissance and ReformationLord, John
History
Beacon Lights of History, Volume 06: Renaissance and Reformation
Lord, John
History
gravitation from the fall of an apple; when Leverrier sought for a new
planet from the perturbations of the heavenly bodies in their
orbits,--we feel that deduction is as much a legitimate process as
induction itself.
But deductive logic is the creation of Aristotle; and it was the
authority of Aristotle that Bacon sought to subvert. The inductive
process is also old, of which Bacon is called the father. How are these
things to be reconciled and explained? Wherein and how did Bacon adapt
his method to the discovery of truth, which was his principal aim,--that
method which is the great cause of modern progress in science, the way
to it being indicated by him pre-eminently?
The whole thing consists in this, that Bacon pointed out the right road
to truth,--as a board where two roads meet or diverge indicates the one
which is to be followed. He did not make a system, like Descartes or
Spinoza or Newton: he showed the way to make it on sound principles. "He
laid down a systematic analysis and arrangement of inductive evidence."
The syllogism, the great instrument used by Aristotle and the
School-men, "is, from its very nature, incompetent to prove the ultimate
premises from which it proceeds; and when the truth of these remains
doubtful, we can place no confidence in the conclusions drawn from
them." Hence, the first step in the reform of science is to review its
ultimate principles; and the first condition of a scientific method is
that it shall be competent to conduct such an inquiry; and this method
is applicable, not to physical science merely, but to the whole realm of
knowledge. This, of course, includes poetry, art, intellectual
philosophy, and theology, as well as geology and chemistry.
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