_e.g._, in the case in point, to have said simply where the men were.
How then does the probabilist contrive to extract certainty out of a
case of insoluble doubt? By aid of what is called a _reflex_
principle. A _reflex_ is opposed to a _direct_ principle. A direct
principle lays down an obligation, as it would bind one who had a
perfect discernment of the law and of the facts of the case, and of
the application of the one to the other, and who was perfectly able to
keep the law. By a _reflex_ principle, a man judges of his own act,
taking account of the imperfection of his knowledge and the
limitations of his power. Probabilism steps in, only where a case is
practically insoluble to an agent upon direct principles. The
probabilist thereupon leaves the direct speculative doubt unsolved. He
relinquishes the attempt of determining what a man should do in the
case in question, who had a thorough insight into the lie of the law.
He leaves that aside, and considers what is his duty, or not his duty,
in the deficiency of his knowledge. Then he strikes upon the
principle, which is the root of Probabilism, _that a doubtful law has
no binding power_. It will be observed that this is a _reflex_
principle. For objectively nothing is doubtful, but everything is or
is not in point of fact. To a mind that had a full grasp of the
objective order of things, there would be no doubtful law: such a mind
would discern the law in every case as holding or not holding. But no
human mind is so perfect. Every man has to take account of his own
limitations of vision in judging of his duty. The question for me is,
not the law absolutely, but the law as far as I can make it out. Our
proposition, then, states that when an individual, using such moral
diligence of enquiry as the gravity of the matter calls for, still
remains in a state of honest doubt as to whether the law binds, in
that mental condition it does not bind _him_.