1817 Nov 7

Not Paul

Ch Quasi Miracles &c

Least improbability Paul

But if the rule here contended for―the rule which prescribes that mode of accounting for occurrences presented as extraordinary prescribes that mode of accounting which is most probable―which is most conformable to the ordinary course of nature as presented to us by our own experience and observation―say in a word the rule of greatest probability be received―away at one stroke go the whole tribe of quasi miracles as exhibited in the Epistles of our Paul, and the history of his adherent the author of the Acts. Considered with a view to the history of those times, they are all reduced to a level with the same phrases of the same tenor or purport which in these our times are observable in such abundance in the discourses of Methodists and other sectaries.

Note (a)

Among Natural Philosophers under / by / the name of the rule or principle of the least action―more particularly among the French, under the name of principe du moindre action used to be designated a rule which was proposed for the purpose of accounting for certain phenomena belonging to the art and science of mechanics. Not more elliptical than that is the denomination here proposed for one of the / a / fundamental rules or principles belonging to that branch of the art and science of logic which might be termed Dicastics: or the art and science of judicature, taking the word judicature in the largest scales, and not as confined to law.