Experience, therefore, proves, that there is
an original principle of order in mind, not in matter. From
similar effects we infer similar causes. The adjustment of means
to ends is alike in the universe, as in a machine of human
contrivance. The causes, therefore, must be resembling.
I was from the beginning scandalised, I must own, with this
resemblance, which is asserted, between the Deity and human
creatures; and must conceive it to imply such a degradation of
the Supreme Being as no sound Theist could endure. With your
assistance, therefore, D/EMEA\, I shall endeavour to defend what
you justly call the adorable mysteriousness of the Divine Nature,
and shall refute this reasoning of C/LEANTHES\, provided he
allows that I have made a fair representation of it.
When C/LEANTHES\ had assented, P/HILO\, after a short pause,
proceeded in the following manner.
That all inferences, C/LEANTHES\, concerning fact, are
founded on experience; and that all experimental reasonings are
founded on the supposition that similar causes prove similar
effects, and similar effects similar causes; I shall not at
present much dispute with you. But observe, I entreat you, with
what extreme caution all just reasoners proceed in the
transferring of experiments to similar cases. Unless the cases be
exactly similar, they repose no perfect confidence in applying
their past observation to any particular phenomenon. Every
alteration of circumstances occasions a doubt concerning the
event; and it requires new experiments to prove certainly, that
the new circumstances are of no moment or importance.
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