of cold, without being previously acquainted with the operation of these
qualities.


PART II.


28. But we have not yet attained any tolerable satisfaction with regard
to the question first proposed. Each solution still gives rise to a new
question as difficult as the foregoing, and leads us on to farther
enquiries. When it is asked, _What is the nature of all our reasonings
concerning matter of fact?_ the proper answer seems to be, that they are
founded on the relation of cause and effect. When again it is asked,
_What is the foundation of all our reasonings and conclusions concerning
that relation?_ it may be replied in one word, Experience. But if we
still carry on our sifting humour, and ask, _What is the foundation of
all conclusions from experience?_ this implies a new question, which may
be of more difficult solution and explication. Philosophers, that give
themselves airs of superior wisdom and sufficiency, have a hard task
when they encounter persons of inquisitive dispositions, who push them
from every corner to which they retreat, and who are sure at last to
bring them to some dangerous dilemma. The best expedient to prevent this
confusion, is to be modest in our pretensions; and even to discover the
difficulty ourselves before it is objected to us. By this means, we may
make a kind of merit of our very ignorance.

I shall content myself, in this section, with an easy task, and shall
pretend only to give a negative answer to the question here proposed. I
say then, that, even after we have experience of the operations of cause
and effect, our conclusions from that experience are _not_ founded on