William Whewell - The philosophy of the inductive sciences (1840)

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The hypothesis is like the captain, and the observations like the soldiers of an army: while he appears to command them, and in this way to work his own will, he does in fact derive all his power of conquest from their obedience, and becomes helpless and useless if they mutiny.

William Whewell
At every step, [man] must try the value of the advances he has made in thought, by applying his thoughts to things. The Explication of Conceptions must be carried on with a perpetual reference to the Colligation of Facts.

William Whewell
No scientific discovery can, with anyjustice, be considered due to accident. In whatever manner facts may be presented to the notice of a discoverer, they can never become the materials of exact knowledge, except they find his mind already provided with precise and suitable conceptions by which they may be analyzed and connected.

William Whewell
Hypotheses may often be of service to science, when they involve a certain portion of incompleteness, and even of errour.

William Whewell
To predict what has not been observed, is to attempt ourselves to use the legislative phrases of nature; and when she responds plainly and precisely to that which we thus utter, we cannot but suppose that we have in a great measure made ourselves masters of the meaning and structure of her language.

William Whewell
When the hypothesis, of itself and without adjustment for the purpose, gives us the rule and reason of a class of facts not contemplated in its construction, we have a criterion of its reality, which has never yet been produced in favour of falsehood.

William Whewell
Metaphysical discussions are not to be put in opposition to the study of facts; but are to be stimulated, nourished and directed by a constant recourse to experiment and observation.

William Whewell
As we cannot use physician for a cultivator of physics, I have called him a physicist. We need very much a name to describe a cultivator of science in general. I should incline to call him a Scientist. Thus we might say, that as an Artist is a Musician, Painter or Poet, a Scientist is a Mathematician, Physicist, or Naturalist.

William Whewell