derives this knowledge from experience. Every man will be ready to tell you, that he needs no other witneffes than his eyes, to fatisfy him that objects are not in contact with his body, but are at different diftances from him as well as from one another. So paffive is the mind in this matter, and fo rapid are the tranfitions which, by this ideal attraction, the is impelled to make, that the is, in a manner, unconscious of her own operations. There is fore ground to think, from the exact analogy which their organs bear to ours, that the difcovery of diftance from the eye, is attained by brutes in the fame manner as by us. As to this, however, I will not be pofitive. But though, in this way, the mind' acquires an early perception of the most obvious and neceffary truths, without which the bodily organs would be of little ufe; in matters lefs important, her procedure is much flower, and more the refult of voluntary application; and as the exertion is more deliberate, the is more confcious of her own activity, or at least remembers it longer. It is then only that in common ftyle we honour her operation with the name of rea foning; though there is no effential difference between the two cafes. It is true, indeed, that the conclufions in the firft way, by which also

in infancy we learn language, are commonly more to be regarded as infallible, than those effected in the second..

PART II. The fubdivifions of Moral Reafoning,

BUT to return to the propofed diftribution of moral evidence. Under it I include these three tribes; experience, analogy, and teftimony. To thefe I fhall fubjoin the confideration of a fourth, totally diftinct from them all, but which appears to be a mixture of the demonftrative and the moral; or rather, a particular application of the former, for ascertaining the precife force of the latter. The evidence I mean, is that refulting from calculations concerning chances.

THE firft of these I have named peculiarly the evidence of experience, not with philosophical propriety, but in compliance with common language, and for diftinction's fake. Analogical reasoning is furely reafoning from a more indirect experience. Now, as to this first kind, our experience is either uniform or various. In the one cafe, provided the facts on which it is founded be fufficiently numerous, the conclufion

is faid to be morally certain. In the other, the
conclufion built on the greater number of in-
ftances, is faid to be probable, and more or lefs
fo, according to the proportion which the in-
ftances on that fide bear to thofe on the oppofite.
Thus we are perfectly affured, that iron thrown
into the river will fink, that deal will float; be-
cause these conclufions are built on a full and
uniform experience. That, in the last week of
December next, it will fnow in any part of Bri-
tain fpecified, is perhaps probable; that is, if,
on inquiry or recollection, we are fatisfied that
this hath more frequently happened than the
contrary that fome time in that month it will
fnow, is more probable, but not certain; be-
caufe, though this conclufion be founded on ex-
perience, that experience is not uniform: laftly,
that it will fnow fome time during winter, will,
I believe, on the fame principles, be pronounced
certain.

Ir was affirmed, that experience, or the tendency of the mind to affociate ideas under the notion of caufes, effects, or adjuncts, is never contracted by one example only. This affertion, may be thought, is contradicted by the principle on which phyfiologifts commonly proceed,

it

who

who confider one accurate experiment in fupport of a particular doctrine as fufficient evidence. The better to explain this phænomenon, and the farther to illuftrate the nature of experience, I fhall make the following obfervations. First, whereas fenfe and memory are converfant only about individuals, our earliest experiences imply, or perhaps generate, the notion of a fpecies,. including all thofe individuals, which have the moft obvious and univerfal refemblance. From Charles, Thomas, William, we afcend to the idea of man; from Britain, France, Spain, to the idea of kingdom. As our acquaintance with nature enlarges, we difcover refemblances of a ftriking and important nature, between one species and another, which naturally begets the notion of a genus. From comparing men with beafts, birds, fishes, and reptiles, we perceive, that they are all alike poffeffed of life, or a principle of fenfation and action, and of an organifed body, and hence acquire the idea of animal; in like manner from comparing kingdoms with republics and ariftocracies, we obtain the idea of nation, and thence again rife in the fame track to ideas ftill more comprehenfive. Further, let it be remembered, that by experience we not only decide concerning the future from the

paft,

paft, but concerning things uncommon from things familiar, which resemble them.

Now to apply this obfervation; a botanist in traversing the fields, lights on a particular plant, which appears to be of a fpecies he is not acquainted with. The flower he observes is monopetalous, and the number of flowers it carries is feven. Here are two facts that occur to his obfervation, let us confider in what way he will be disposed to argue from them. From the firft he

does not hesitate to conclude,

not only as pro

bable, but as certain, that this individual, and all of the fame fpecies, invariably produce monopetalous flowers. From the fecond, he by no means concludes, as either certain or even probable, that the flowers which either this plant, or others of the fame fpecies, carry at once, will always be seven. This difference, to a fuperficial inquirer, might feem capricious, fince there appears to be one example, and but one in either cafe, on which the conclufion can be founded. The truth is, that it is not from this example only that he deduces these inferences. Had he never heretofore taken the fmalleft notice of any. plant, he could not have reafoned at all from thefe remarks. The mind recurs inftantly, from

the