With the
second you never know where you are--you never know when the
consequences are over. And it requires your closest observation to know
what _are_ the consequences of what--for the consequent by no means
follows immediately upon the antecedent--and coarse observation is
utterly at fault.
[Sidenote: Superstition the fruit of bad observation.]
Almost all superstitions are owing to bad observation, to the _post hoc,
ergo propter hoc_; and bad observers are almost all superstitious.
Farmers used to attribute disease among cattle to witchcraft; weddings
have been attributed to seeing one magpie, deaths to seeing three; and I
have heard the most highly educated now-a-days draw consequences for the
sick closely resembling these.
[Sidenote: Physiognomy of disease little shown by the face.]
Another remark: although there is unquestionably a physiognomy of
disease as well as of health; of all parts of the body, the face is
perhaps the one which tells the least to the common observer or the
casual visitor. Because, of all parts of the body, it is the one most
exposed to other influences, besides health.
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