[16] In the preceding discussion, the _mean_ is spoken of as if it were exactly the same thing with the _average_. But the mean for purposes of inductive inquiry, is not the average, or arithmetical mean, though in a familiar illustration of the theory the difference may be disregarded. If the deviations on one side of the average are much more numerous than those on the other (these last being fewer but greater), the effect due to the invariable cause, as distinct from the variable ones, will not coincide with the average, but will be either below or above the average, whichever be the side on which the greatest number of the instances are found. This follows from a truth, ascertained both inductively and deductively, that small deviations from the true central point are greatly more frequent than large ones. The mathematical law is, "that the most probable determination of one or more invariable elements from observation is that in which _the sum of the squares_ of the individual aberrations," or deviations, "_shall be the least possible_." See this principle stated, and its grounds popularly explained, by Sir John Herschel, in his review of Quetelet on Probabilities, _Essays_, pp. 395 _et seq._ [17] _Essai Philosophique sur les Probabilités_, fifth Paris Edition, p. 7. [18] It even appears to me that the calculation of chances, where there are no data grounded either on special experience or on special inference, must, in an immense majority of cases, break down, from sheer impossibility of assigning any principle by which to be guided in setting out the list of possibilities. In the case of the coloured balls we have no difficulty in making the enumeration, because we ourselves determine what the possibilities shall be. But suppose a case more analogous to those which occur in nature: instead of three colours, let there be in the box all possible colours: we being supposed ignorant of the comparative frequency with which different colours occur in nature, or in the productions of art. How is the list of cases to be made out? Is every distinct shade to count as a colour? If so, is the test to be a common eye, or an educated eye, a painter's for instance? On the answer to these questions would depend whether the chances against some particular colour would be estimated at ten, twenty, or perhaps five hundred to one. While if we knew from experience that the particular colour occurs on an average a certain number of times in every hundred or thousand, we should not require to know anything either of the frequency or of the number of the other possibilities. [19] _Prospective Review_ for February 1850.