A Treatise of Human Nature

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BOOK I PART III


SECTIONXIII. OFUNPHILOSOPHICAL


PROBABILITY


All these kinds of probability are received
by philosophers, and allowed to be reasonable
foundations of belief and opinion. But there are
others, that are derived from the same princi-
ples, though they have not had the good for-
tune to obtain the same sanction. The first
probability of this kind may be accounted for
thus. The diminution of the union, and of the
resemblance, as above explained, diminishes
the facility of the transition, and by that means
weakens the evidence; and we may farther ob-
serve, that the same diminution of the evidence
will follow from a diminution of the impres-
sion, and from the shading of those colours, un-
der which it appears to the memory or senses.
The argument, which we found on any mat-

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