Page:Philosophical Transactions - Volume 053.djvu/480

 drawn in a given time to the number of prizes drawn, is continually increaing as thee numbers increae; and that therefore, when they are coniderably large, this concluion may be looked upon as morally certain. By parity of reaon, it follows univerally, with repect to every event about which a great number of experiments has been made, that the caues of its happening bear the ame proportion to the caues of its failing, with the number of happenings to the number of failures; and that, if an event whoe caues are uppoed to be known, happens oftener or eldomer than is agreeable to this concluion, there will be reaon to believe that there are ome unknown caues which diturb the operations of the known ones. With repect, therefore, particularly to the coure of events in nature, it appears, that there is demontrative evidence to prove that they are derived from permanent caues, or laws originally etablihed in the contitution of nature in order to produce that order of events which we oberve, and not from any of the powers of chance. This is jut as evident as it would be, in the cae I have inited on, that the reaon of drawing 10 times more blanks than prizes in millions of trials, was, that there were in the wheel about o many more blanks than prizes.

But to proceed a little further in the demontration of this point.

We have een that uppoing a peron, ignorant of the whole cheme of a lottery, hould be led to conjecture, from hearing 100 blanks and 10 prizes drawn,