Elements of the philosophy of the human mind. By Dugald Stewart. Rev. and abridged, with critical and explanatory notes, for the use of colleges and schools. By Francis Bowen ...

13)0 ABSTRA CTION.
for us to a.commodate our conduct to the established course of
nature; and, accordingly, we find that it is a principle coeval
with our very existence, and, in some measure, common to man
with the lower animals.
It is an obvious consequence of this doctrine, that, although
philosophers be accustomed to state what are commonly called
the laws of nature in the form of general propositions, it is by
no means necessary for the practical purposes of life, that we
should express them in this manner, or even that we should express them in words at all. The philosopher, for example, may
state it as a law of nature, that " fire scorches;" or that " heavy
bodies, when unsupported, fall downwards;" but long before
the use of artificial signs, and even before the dawn of reason,
a child learns to act upon both of these suppositions. In doing
so, it is influenced merely by the instinctive principle which has
now been mentioned, directed in its operation (as is the case
with many other instincts) by the experience of the individual.
If man, therefore, had been destined for no other purposes than
to acquire such an acquaintance with the course of nature as is
necessary for the preservation of his animal existence, he
might have fulfilled all the ends of his being without the use of
language.
As we are enabled, by our instinctive anticipation of physical
events, to accommodate our conduct to what we foresee is to
happen, so we are enabled, in many cases, to increase our power, by employing physical causes as instruments for the accomplishment.of our purposes; nay, we can employ a series of such
causes, so as to accomplish very remote effects. We can employ the agency of air, to increase the heat of a furnace; the
furnace, to render iron malleable; and the iron, to all the various
purposes of the mechanical arts. Now it appears to me, that
all this may be conceived and done without the aid of language;
and yet, assuredly, to discover a series of means subservient to
a particular end, or, in other words, an effort of mechanical invention, implies, according to the common doctrines of philosophers, the exercise of our reasoning powers. In this sense,
therefore, of the word reasoning, I am inclined to think, that it