 So how is this knowledge of science and its history important for his work on the philosophy of science? Some commentators have claimed that Whewell developed an a priori philosophy of science and then shaped his History to conform to his own view (Stoll 1929; Strong 1955). It is true that he started out, from his undergraduate days, with the project of reforming the inductive philosophy of Bacon; indeed this early inductivism led him to the view that learning about scientific method must be inductive (i.e., that it requires the study of the history of science). Yet it is clear that he believed his study of the history of science and his own work in science were needed in order to flesh out the details of his inductive position. Thus, as in his epistemology, both a priori and empirical elements combined in the development of his scientific methodology. Ultimately, Whewell criticized Mill’s view of induction developed in the System of Logic not because Mill had not inferred it from a study of the history of science, but rather on the grounds that Mill had not been able to find a large number of appropriate examples illustrating the use of his “Methods of Experimental Inquiry.” As Whewell noted, Bacon too had been unable to show that his inductive method had been exemplified throughout the history of science. Thus it appears that what was important to Whewell was not whether a philosophy of science had been, in fact, inferred from a study of the history of science, but rather, whether a philosophy of science was inferable from it. That is, regardless of how a philosopher came to invent her theory, she must be able to show it to be exemplified in the actual scientific practice used throughout history. Whewell believed that he was able to do this for his discoverers’ induction.