Page:An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding - Hume (1748).djvu/241

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Practical Consequences of Natural Religion.
229

be comprehended under any known Species; I do not see, that we could form any Conjecture or Inference at all concerning its Cause. If Experience and Observation and Analogy be, indeed, the only Guides we can reasonably follow in Inferences of this Nature; both the Effect and Cause must bear a Similarity and Resemblance to other Effects and Causes, which we know, and which we have found, in many Instances, to be conjoin'd with each other. I leave it to your own Reflections to prosecute the Consequences of this Principle. I shall just observe, that as the Antagonists of Epicurus always suppose the Universe, an Effect quite singular and unparallel'd, to be the Proof of a Deity, a Cause no less singular and unparallel'd; your Reasonings, upon that Supposition, seem, at least, to merit our Attention. There is, I own, some Difficulty, how we can ever return from the Cause to the Effect, and reasoning from our Ideas of the former, infer any Alteration on, or Addition to, the latter.ESSAY