Part III. The subdivisions of moral reasoning....III. Testimony.

diate conclusions from experience are general, and run thus: "This is the ordinary course of nature." "Such an event may reasonably be expected, when "all the attendant circumstances are similar." When we descend to particulars, the conclusion nécessarily becomes weaker, being more indirect. For though all the known circumstances be similar, all the actual circumstances may not be similar; nor is it possible in any case to be assured, that all the actual circumstances are known to us. Accordingly, experience is the foundation of philosophy; which consists in a collection of general truths, systematically digested. On the contrary, the direct conclusion from testimony is particular, and runs thus: " This is the fact in the "instance specified." Testimony, therefore, is the foundation of history, which is occupied about individuals. Hence we derive our acquaintance with past ages, as from experience we derive all that we can discover of the future. But the former is dignified with the name of knowledge, whereas the latter is regarded as matter of conjecture only. When experience is applied to the discovery of the truth in a particular incident, we call the evidence presumptive; ample testimony is accounted a positive proof of the fact. Nay, the strongest conviction built merely on the former is sometimes overturned by the slightest attack of the latter. Testimony is capable of giving us absolute certainty (Mr Hume himself being judge *),

Essay of Miracles, p. 2.

even of the most miraculous fact, or of what is contrary to uniform experience. For, perhaps, in no other instance can experince be applied to individual events, with so much certainty, as in what relates to the revolutions of the heavenly bodies. Yet, even this evidence, he admits, may not only be counterba lanced, but destroyed, by testimony.

BUT to return. Testimony is a serious intimation from another, of any fact or observation, as being what he remembers to have seen, or heard, or experienced. To this, when we have no positive reasons of mistrust or doubt, we are, by an original principle of our nature, (analogous to that which compels our faith in memory) led to give an unlimited assent. As on memory alone is founded the merely personal experience of the individual, so on testimony, in concurrence with memory, is founded the much more extensive experience, which is not originally our own, but derived from others *. By the first, I question not, a man might acquire all the knowledge necessary for mere animal support, in that rudest state of human nature, (if ever such a state existed) which was without speech, and without society; to the last, in conjunction with the other, we are indebted for every thing which distinguishes the man from the brute, for language, arts, and civilization. It hath been observed, that from experience we learn to confine our belief in human testimony, within the proper bounds. Hence we are

* Dissertation on Miracles, Part I. Sect. II.

Part III.

The subdivisions of moral reasoning....III. Testimony.

taught to consider many attendant circumstances, which serve either to corroborate or to invalidate its evidence. The reputation of the attester, his manner of address, the nature of the fact attested, the occasion of giving the testimony, the possible or probable design in giving it, the disposition of the hearers to whom it was given, and several other circumstances, have all considerable influence in fixing the degree of credibility. But of these I shall have occasion to take notice afterwards. It deserves likewise to be attended to on this subject, that in a number of concurrent testimonies, (in cases wherein there could have been no previous concert) there is a probability distinct from that which may be termed the sum of the probabilities resulting from the testimonies of the witnesses, a probability which would remain even though the witnesses were of such a character as to merit no faith at all. This probability ariseth purely from the concurrence itself. That such a concurrence should spring from chance, is as one to infinite; that is, in other words, morally impossible. If therefore concert be excluded, there remains no other cause but the reality of the fact.

Now to this species of evidence, testimony, we are first immediately indebted for all the branches of philology, such as history, civil, ecclesiastic, and literary; grammar, languages, jurisprudence, and criticism; to which I may add revealed religion, as far as it is to be considered as a subject of historical and critical inquiry, and so discoverable by natural means; and

secondly, to the same source we owe, as was hinted above, a great part of that light which is commonly known under the name of experience, but which is, in fact, not founded on our own personal observations, or the notices originally given by our own senses, but on the attested experiences and observations of others. So that, as hence we derive entirely our knowledge of the actions and productions of men, especially in other regions, and in former ages; hence also we derive, in a much greater measure than is commonly imagined, our acquaintance with Nature and her works.— Logic, rhetoric, ethics, œconomics, and politics, are properly branches of pneumatology, though very closely connected with the philological studies above enumerated.

IV....Calculations of Chances.

THE last kind of evidence I proposed to consider, was that resulting from calculations of chances. Chançe is not commonly understood either in philosophic or in vulgar language to imply the exclusion of a cause, but our ignorance of the cause. It is often employed to denote a bare possibility of an event, when nothing is known either to produce or to hinder it. But in this meaning it can never be made the subject of calculation. It then only affords scope to the calculator, when a cause is known for the production of an effect, and when that effect must necessarily be attended with this or that or the other circumstance; but no cause is known to determine us to regard one particular circumstance, in preference to the rest, as that

Part III. The subdivisions of moral reasoning....IV. Calculation of chances.

which shall accompany the supposed effect. The effect is then considered as necessary, but the circumstance as only casual or contingent. When a die is thrown out of the hand, we know that its gravity will make it fall; we also know, that this, together with its cubical figure, will make it lie so, when intercepted by the table, as to have one side facing upwards. Thus far we proceed on the certain principles of a uniform experience; but there is no principle which can lead me to conclude, that one side rather than another will be turned up. I know that this circumstance is not without a cause; but is, on the contrary, as really effected by the previous tossing which it receives in the hand or in the box, as its fall and the manner of its lying are by its gravity and figure. But the various turns or motions given it, in this manner, do inevitably escape my notice; and so are held for nothing. I say, therefore, that the chance is equal for every one of the six sides. Now, if five of these were marked with the same figure, suppose a dagger [+], and only one with an asterisk [*], I should, in that case, say, there were five chances that the die would turn up the dagger, for one that it would turn up the asterisk. For the turning up each of the six sides being equally possible, there are five cases in which the dagger, and only one in which the asterisk, would be uppermost

THIS differs from experience, inasmuch as I reckon the probability here, not from numbering and comparing the events, after repeated trials, but without