Almond's analysis is known as structural-functionalismi The yard stic with which political systems are measured consists of the functions performed by the political system and the units which are being compared ar the various structures which compose individual political systems. Once the functions of a political system are defined operationally and the structures categorised with precision, it will become, Almond asserts, possible to write equation of each political system which will show how much of function fulfilled by a particular structure. This Almond describes as the"probabilistic theory of the polity Whatever be the merits of structural functionalism and the possibilities of major advances likely to emerge from this analysis, there is no denying the act that the study of comparative government has grown during recent years md has, indeed, become a major branch of study with scholars working on detailed problems and theorists attempting grand syntheses. It may not achieve great deal"but this should not be allowed to obscure its potentiality The student may find it one of the most rewarding and stimulating parts of,,69 Political Science' The Method of Analogy. Prof. Gilchrist suggests one more inductive method, that of analogy. This method has been made use of by Herbert Spencer. He says that both the State and an organism possess the sustaining distributary and the regulating systems and both exhibit the same process of development. From this analogy, he concludes that the State is an organisin The method of analogy is, no doubt, good and it serves a useful purpose. But analogy is not proof. What analogy leads to is merely a hypothesis. It gives probability and not certainty and the farther the analogy is carried the more misleading it becomes. The difficulty of its application in Political Science is all the more marked because of the vast number of circumstances surrounding any given instance The Statistical or the Quantitative Method. Another method which has recently become increasingly important and is being widely used in the study of political phenomena is the Statistical or Quantitative inethod. It attempts to describe and measure in quantitative terms and is especially applied o the study of political parties and public opinion. The statistical technique has also been extended to the study of comparative government and interna tional relations. David Thomson is of the opinion that until some such statistical and sociological technique is applied to international relations, the science of studying international relations will make little further progress in 70 method The analysis of public opinion is as old as Plato, but as a field of scientific investigation with the aid of statistical tools it is only a generation old. In the mmediate background are such writ as Tonnies,Tarde, Le Bon, Wallasand Bryce. But two books, Lawrence Lowell's Public Opinion an opular Government, and Walter Lipmann's Public opinion"did much to delineate