No man can speak of the future, pretending to any certain knowledge, but the Christian. Here the infidel's candle goes out, and except he obtains some oil from the lamp of revelation, he must continue in perpetual darkness. It was necessary, my friends, to introduce this brief analysis of the principal objections against the truth of the Christian miracles. You will easily perceive, that sentiments contained in my extract from Mr. Hume, are the reasons of Mr. Owen. Lord Bacon himself lays the foundation for correcting our reasonings upon this, as well upon other subjects.
Man is ignorant of everything antecedent to observation.
There is not a single department of inquiry in which a man does not err, the moment he abandons observation. The greater part of all human knowledge is derived from testimony, but testimony does no more than hand down to us the observations of others. This is especially true in the natural sciences of geography, geology, and chemistry. If Mr. Owen call me not to account for this, I hope some person more philosophic than he, may yet do it. I will make the principles of the inductive philosophy, too, my rule and guide in this investigation.