Undoubtedly this principle is not yet extended, by the majority of minds, to all phenomena. This is shown clearly enough by their mode of reasoning in ethics and in politics. But it is, however, implied in their general conception of nature. It thus assumes a universal character, which has caused it to be regarded by many philosophers as an innate, or at least a primitive notion, in the human mind. According to Comte, this is erroneous. Like John Stuart Mill, whom he expressly quotes on this point,[52] he sees in this principle the result of a long, gradual induction, at the same time individual and collective. Except in the case of the most familiar phenomena, whose regularity is most striking, the human mind does not begin by believing in an invariable order. Even the mind’s conceptions, (theological and metaphysical), conceal the existence of laws, long after observation would have made it see them, were it freed from bias. It is true that the “first germs” of this principle exist as soon as human reason begins to be exercised, since the dominion of theological philosophy never could be absolute. But these germs are only developed very slowly, like the positive method and conceptions themselves. The induction upon which this principle is founded only began to acquire solidity when it was definitely verified for a whole order of important phenomena, that is to say when mathematical astronomy had been founded. Phenomena of the highest importance, from the theoretical as well as from the practical point of view, could then be predicted with perfect certainty. The invariability of their laws had been placed beyond doubt. From that moment, the principle must have been extended by analogy, to the more complex orders of phenomena, even before their own laws could be known. But according to Comte this “vague logical anticipation” remained valueless and fruitless. It is of no use to conceive, in the abstract that a certain order of phenomena _must_ be subject to laws. This empty conception cannot outweigh the theological and metaphysical beliefs, which have the force of habit in their favour. In order that the principle of laws should be really established in an order of phenomena, some laws must _in fact_ have been discovered and demonstrated in it.