Probabilities | Page 2

how this bears on our coming
argument? Such a deposit was very unlikely to be found there in the
eyes of the unenlightened: but very likely to the wise man's ken. The
real probabilities were in favour of a strange fact, though the seeming
probabilities were against it.
Take another. We are all now convinced of the existence of America;
and so, some three or four hundred years back, was Christopher
Columbus--but nobody else. Alone, he proved that mighty continent so
probable, from geometrical measurements, and the balance of the world,
and tides, and trade-winds, and casual floatsams driven from some land
beneath the setting sun, that he was antecedently convinced of the fact:
and it would have been a shock to his reason, as well as to his faith, had
he found himself able to sail due west from Lisbon to China, without
having struck against his huge probability. I purposely abstain from
applying every illustration, or showing its specific difference regarding
our theme. It is better to lead a mind to think for itself than to
endeavour to forestall every notion.
Another. A Kissoor merchant in Timbuctoo is told of the existence of
water hard and cold as marble. All the experience of his nation is
against it. He disbelieves. However, after no long time, the testimony
of two native princes who have been _fêted_ in England, and have seen
ice, shakes his once not unreasonable incredulity: and the additional
idea brought soon to his remembrance, that, as lead cools down from
hot fluidity to a solid lump, so, in the absence of solar heat, in all
probability would water--corroborates and makes acceptable by
analogous likelihood the doctrine simultaneously evidenced by credible

witnesses.
Yet one more illustration for the last. Few things in nature appear more
unlikely to the illiterate, than that a living toad should be found
prisoned in a block of limestone; nevertheless, evidence goes to prove
that such cases are not uncommon. Now, if, instead of limestone, which
is a water-product, the creature had been found embedded in granite,
which is a fire-product; although the fact might have been from
eye-sight equally unimpeachable, how much more unlikely such a
circumstance would have appeared in the judgment of science. To the
rustic, the limestone case is as stout a puzzle as the granite one; but _à
priori_, the philosopher--taking into account the aqueous fluidity of
such a matrix at a period when reptiles were abundant, the torpid
qualities of the toad itself, and the fact that time is scarcely an element
in the absence of air--arrives at an antecedent probability, which
comforts his acceptance of the fact. The granite would have staggered
his reason, even though his own experience or the testimony of others
were sufficient, nay, imperative, to assure his faith: but in the case of
limestone, Reason even helps Faith; nay, anticipates and leads it in, by
suggesting the wonder to be previously probable. How truly, and how
strongly this bears upon our theme, let any such philosophizing mind
consider.
But enough of illustrations: although these, multipliable to any amount,
might bring, each in its own case, some specific tendency to throw light
upon the path we mean to tread: it is wiser perhaps, as implying more
confidence in the reader's intellectual powers, to leave other analogous
cases to the suggestion of his own mind; also, not to vex him in every
instance with the intrusive finger of an obvious application. Meanwhile,
it is a just opportunity to clear the way at once of some obstructions, by
disposing of a few matters personal to the writer; and by touching upon
sundry other preliminary considerations.
1. The line of thought proposed is intended to show it probable that any
thing which has been or is, might, viewed antecedently to its existence,
by an exercise of pure reason, have by possibility been guessed: and on
the hypothesis of sufficient keenness and experience, that this idea may

be carried even to the future. Any thing, meaning every thing, is a word
not used unadvisedly; for this is merely a suggestive treatise, starting a
rule capable of infinite application: and, notwithstanding that we have
here and now confined its elucidation to some matters of religious
moment only, as occupying a priority of importance, and at all times
deserving the lead; still, if knowledge availed, and time and space
permitted, I scarcely doubt that a vigorous and illuminated intellect
might so far enlarge on the idea, as to show the antecedent probability
of every event which has happened in the kingdoms of nature,
providence, and grace: nay, of directing his guess at coming matters
with no uncertain aim into the realms of the immediate future. The
perception of cause in operation enables him to calculate the
consequence, even perhaps better than