9 Sept 1804

Evidence

Circumstantial

Ch General

§. Modifications

By the above /all these several/ marks, evidence by deportment, though it be personal evidence as well as from a personal source, will be clearly understood to be - in no case direct - in every case circumstantial evidence. Its connection with the principal fact in question will be required to be made out and its probative force will be understood /seen/ to be reduced /reducible/ by the same connections /cause/ in this case as in the case of real evidence from a personal source. When subsequent to the principal fact in question - it being a punishable act it may operate as evidence of intention with reference to the commission of the act: a sort of information that may not so frequently be conveyed by purely real evidence. But when subsequent to that same act, it will most commonly be indicative of fear and nothing more - fear - the same sort of psychological evidence, as, at that period, will most frequently be the psychological fact indicated by real evidence.