Note 13 — Chapter IV · OF LAWS OF NATURE.

Dr. Whewell (Phil. of Discov. p. 246) will not allow these and similar erroneous judgments to be called inductions; inasmuch as such superstitious fancies "were not collected from the facts by seeking a law of their occurrence, but were suggested by an imagination of the anger of superior powers, shown by such deviations from the ordinary course of nature." I conceive the question to be, not in what manner these notions were at first suggested, but by what evidence they have, from time to time, been supposed to be substantiated. If the believers in these erroneous opinions had been put on their defence, they would have referred to experience: to the comet which preceded the assassination of Julius Cæsar, or to oracles and other prophecies known to have been fulfilled. It is by such appeals to facts that all analogous superstitions, even in our day, attempt to justify themselves; the supposed evidence of experience is necessary to their hold on the mind. I quite admit that the influence of such coincidences would not be what it is, if strength were not lent to it by an antecedent presumption; but this is not peculiar to such cases; preconceived notions of probability form part of the explanation of many other cases of belief on insufficient evidence. The à priori prejudice does not prevent the erroneous opinion from being sincerely regarded as a legitimate conclusion from experience; though it improperly predisposes the mind to that interpretation of experience.

Thus much in defence of the sort of examples objected to. But it would be easy to produce instances, equally adapted to the purpose, and in which no antecedent prejudice is at all concerned. "For many ages," says Archbishop Whately, "all farmers and gardeners were firmly convinced—and convinced of their knowing it by experience—that the crops would never turn out good unless the seed were sown during the increase of the moon." This was induction, but bad induction: just as a vicious syllogism is reasoning, but bad reasoning.