26. In previous writings, I have not only stated this view generally, but I have followed it into detail, exemplifying it in the greater part of the History of the principal Inductive Sciences in succession. I have pointed out what are the Conceptions which have been introduced in every prominent discovery in those sciences; and have noted to which of the above Ideas, or of the like Ideas, each belongs. The performance of this task is the office of the greater part of my _Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences_. For that work is, in reality, no less historical than the _History_ which preceded it. The _History of the Inductive Sciences_ is the history of the discoveries, mainly so far as concerns the _Facts_ which were brought together to form sciences. The _Philosophy_ is, in the first ten Books, the history of the _Ideas_ and _Conceptions_, by means of which the facts were connected, so as to give rise to scientific truths. It would be easy for me to give a long list of the Ideas and Conceptions thus brought into view, but I may refer any reader who wishes to see such a list, to the Tables of Contents of the _History_, and of the first ten Books of the _Philosophy_. 27. That these Ideas and Conceptions are really distinct elements of the scientific truths thus obtained, I conceive to be proved beyond doubt, not only by considering that the discoveries never were made, nor could be made, till the right Conception was obtained, and by seeing how difficult it often was to obtain this element; but also, by seeing that the Idea and the Conception itself, as distinct from the Facts, was, in almost every science, the subject of long and obstinate controversies;--controversies which turned upon the possible relations of Ideas, much more than upon the actual relations of Facts. The first ten Books of the _Philosophy_ to which I have referred, contain the history of a great number of these controversies. These controversies make up a large portion of the history of each science; a portion quite as important as the study of the facts; and a portion, at every stage of the science, quite as essential to the progress of truth. Men, in seeking and obtaining scientific knowledge, have always shown that they found the formation of right conceptions in their own minds to be an essential part of the process.