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there was a coincidence of person and tranfaction in point of time, but not of place.

And, both of these Facts will be transmitted, as they deserve, to future ages, and embraced by them with almost the fame degree of certainty, on the authority of found and well authenticated TESTIMONY: in which cafe all coincidence of person and transaction, time and place, may be removed.

All Historical Facts derive their existence as truths from Narration and Teftimony, which are, therefore, to be regarded as their Principles, agreeing in one, which is the main, point of confideration-that they are both founded on the information and autho. rity of others: And, as the short space of man's life, to which Narration has a reference, bears so small a proportion to the extent of time within the reach of human tradition and record, TESTIMONY may be ufed, as it often is, to exprefs the whole, as the GENERAL PRINCIPLE of all Hiftorical truth,

SECT.

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SECT. II.

Of Hiftorical REASONING.

S in all parts of knowledge in which General Principles are concerned, Hiftorical REASONING is, firft to the Principle, and then from the Principle.

How, then, is the credit and authority of TESTIMONY, on which all History depends, established and confirmed?

Historical Facts are all particular and individual in their exiftence; and, by their nature, removed from the Evidence of the External Senfes: And, as all general Principles are formed by an Induction of particulars, there must be fome other native Evidence as a first Principle, by which a number of these particular Facts are estimated and their truth confirmed, fufficient to ensure the authoriry, and to warrant the general truth, of the Secondary Principle of Teftimony.

The

The Senfes are, indeed, the first informers, but MEMORY is the regifter and storehoufe, of the mind, in which all the facts which they have witneffed, and all the truths which are otherwise obtained, are lodged and recorded with as much fidelity, as is confiftent with the condition of imperfect creatures : and, fo far as relates to its retention, communication and tradition, it is recognized and acknowledged as a First Principle of truth.

The Memory of fallible men is not, in

deed, infallible. It is fubject to fimilar infirmities and defects with thofe of the External Senses; and capable of being regulated and adjusted, by an act of Reafon, in a fimilar manner. After comparing it with itself exerted at different times and in different inftances, and after examining whether, in the inftance under confideration, it is uniform and confiftent with its other acts, Reafon confirms its fidelity fo far established, and enfures it ftill farther, by comparing it with other Memories acting collaterally with it in the fame inftance.

But

But MEMORY, however faithful it may be found, is not fufficient of itself to eftablish and erect Teftimony into a general Prin ple of reasoning, fince what it records is liable to be betrayed, difguifed, or falfified in the act of utterance; was it not fufficiently guarded and fecured by another native and powerful dictate of the mind The Love of truth, which, as a collateral Principle, comes in to the aid and fupport of Memory.

Convinced of the existence of both these Principles from our own confciousness and internal feeling, prefuming that all men are formed of the fame materials caft in the fame mould, and obferving them to operate in the minds of all, to whom that observation can extend, we conclude, by a ftrong Analogy and Induction, that they are Univerfal. And we are convinced from an experience that does honour to human nature, that whenever intereft, or any other evil and finifter motive, influences an individual or combination of men to counteract these native dictates, to reject the truth and to espouse and propagate

propagate a lye, the lye is detefted and contradicted as foon as found, and the truth is juftified, vindicated and avenged, by the public voice which truth, in oppofition to the lye, ftrengthened and fupported by a felf-approbation and native sense of right in its afferter, will be fure to prevail at last.

Upon the ground of these two First Principles, the one a native faculty, and the other a fublime affection, of the mind, operating in conjunction, the credit of all History is originally founded. From the particular inftances which are innumerable, and inceffantly occur, in which they are observed to act together in ftrict and faithful union, we derive, by a familiar and almost insensible INDUCTION, the authority and truth of TESTIMONY; which, as it is not only the general vehicle or channel of all Historical facts of whatever kind, but the univerfal fountain from which they flow, has a right to be claffed among the SECONDARY PRINCIPLES of truth. Testimony is, indeed, of fuch great variety and extent, and of fuch frequent occurrence and vaft importance in

all

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