possible about the human type, its individual variations, and its
environment. Biologists have shown that large numbers of facts as to
individual variations within any type can be remembered if they are
arranged as continuous curves rather than as uniform rules or arbitrary
exceptions. On the other hand, any attempt to arrange the facts of
environment with the same approach to continuity as is possible with the
facts of human nature is likely to result in error. The study of history
cannot be assimilated to that of biology.


_(Chapter V.--The Method of Political Reasoning, page 138)_

The method of political reasoning has shared the traditional
over-simplification of its subject-matter.

In Economics, where both method and subject-matter were originally
still more completely simplified, 'quantitative' methods have since
Jevons's time tended to take the place of 'qualitative'. How far is a
similar change possible in politics?

Some political questions can obviously be argued quantitatively. Others
are less obviously quantitative. But even on the most complex political
issues experienced and responsible statesmen do in fact think
quantitatively, although the methods by which they reach their results
are often unconscious.

When, however, all politicians start with intellectualist assumptions,
though some half-consciously acquire quantitative habits of thought,
many desert politics altogether from disillusionment and disgust. What
is wanted in the training of a statesman is the fully conscious