An introductory text-book of logic - Mellone, Sydney - Rare Books at ...

256 THE GENERAL NATURE OF INDUCTION.
ation to obtain between every fact in Nature and some
other fact which has preceded it ; ... the invariable
antecedent is termed the cause, the invariable con
sequent the effect. And the universality of the law
of Causation consists in this, that every consequent
is connected in this manner with some particular an
tecedent or set of antecedents" (III. v.
2). (b) He
then points out that the
"
"
invariable antecedent is not
usually one particular circumstance, but a group of con
ditions, as when a person eats of a particular dish and
dies in consequence "that is, would not have died if
"
he had not eaten of it ;
not only the food, but the tak
ing of it in combination with a particular constitution,
state of health, climate, &c.,
these constitute the group
of conditions which is the "invariable antecedent" (III.
v. 3). Among these conditions we choose one, some
what arbitrarily, and call it the Cause, (c) He then
shows that invariable sequence is not an adequate defini
tion, unless the sequence is also regarded as "uncon
ditional."
"This," says Mill, "is what writers mean
when they say that the notion of Cause involves the idea
of necessity ; that which is necessary, that which must
be, means that which will be, whatever supposition we
may make with regard to other things" (III. v. 6).
We will comment on each of the three steps in Mill s
development of the idea of Cause. By laying stress, in
his first statement (a), on the antecedence, or priority in
time, of the Cause, Mill raises the question, What is the
relation of time sequence to causation? Now we can
only have a time sequence i.e., a relation of before and
after, when we have two distinct events. Can cause
and effect be regarded as two distinct events? Some
cases of causation may seem to lend support to such a
conception e.g., we have (a) the cause, the introduction