68 A. F. RAVENSHEAE : mony aims at showing how to steer an even course between these two extremes. In a well-informed mind the modes of belief here seen in sharp contrast both enter in modified forms. Each is to be seen in almost every estimate of the truth or falsity of the statement of another. Every one believes himself to have some sort of justifica- tion, however obscurely apprehended, in accepting or re- jecting a statement resting on testimony or authority. The precise nature of this justification, when valid, is the object of our present inquiry. In so far as an investigation is first-hand, the conditions to which the evidence must con- form in order to constitute proof are those formulated in Logic. In so far as we depend upon acquaintance with the subject, grounds of disbelief are also discussed in Logic. But the questions now proposed relate to inquiries that for any reason are not first-hand ; to those inquiries in which either from necessity or convenience reliance is placed upon the work of others. To what conditions then must testi- mony or authority conform in order to be reliable ? What safeguards can be devised in order to lessen risk of error in judgments as to matters not within our own cognisance ? These are the questions that must be answered by a logic of testimony and authority ; and an attempt to give a sketch of the answer is made in the following pages : The Legal and the Mathematical treatment of the Subject. The nearest approach to a consistent body of principles regulative of the admission and indicative of the trustworthi- ness of testimony might be expected to be found in the Law of Evidence. The work on that subject by the late Mr. Justice Stephen l shows, however, that it is scarcely to be found in the existing law in this country. Many of the rules as they stand at present are designed merely to facilitate the business of the courts to regulate procedure and forms. Some are to limit the extent of inquiry, and some to safeguard the interests of strangers. Very few, strange to remark, aim directly and solely at securing reli- ability in the witnesses, or at setting up tests of trustworthi- ness these are matters left to cross-examiners and juries. The rules, indeed, have mainly been framed to deal with the exigencies of judicial inquiry; and accordingly are more often narrower in scope and more often based on considera- tions of convenience than a purely scientific treatment of the subject from the point of view of Logic would permit. 1 Digest of the Law of Evidence.
