THE Thames Advertiser Farour to none: fear of none: justice to all. MONDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1895.

Thames Advertiser, Volume XXVII, Issue 8258, 21 October 1895, Page 2

THE Thames Advertiser Farour to none: fear of none: justice to all. MONDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1895.

THE VALUE OF EVIDENCE

The conclusion of the Dean ease, if really it bo concluded, leads one to think of a vast question, which Ims been imperfectly occupying the attention of thinkers for tho last generation, and which will continue in different forms, to occupy it for years to conic. We refer to the question of the value of evidence. We arc accustomed to think that we are all more or less judges of the value of such evidence as is put before us; our jury system is built upon this assumption, and yet it seems oven more than doubtful whether tho majority of us are at all able to draw correct conclusions from data placed before us. We are loath to use the Dean case as an example on which to base our remarks, from a very natural fear lest we have not yet heard the last of this cause cckke. Tho motives that,led to confission on Dean's part are unexplained, and we still think thcro may be revelations awaiting us. But tho broad facts arc before us, that the jury in tho original trial camo with difficulty to the conclusion that the accused was guilty; a Royal Commission on fresh evidence acquitted him, n,nd he has sinceconfessed that tho verdict was correct. It is of course an instanco in which the lay mind, untrained to the study of evidence, went astray, but it also seems to us that there is more' j learn behind it.

It might seen: at first sight somewhat paradoxical to maintain that the average man is incapable of weighing evidence, but a little consideration of the history of the question will show us that there is much to be said . 011 that side of tho question. A few hundred years ago, amongst people who were far from being uncivilised, evidence was practically unknown. If a man were accused of a crime, he had to undergo somo such ordeal as walking barefoot over red hot coulters; if an old woman were accused of bewitching her neighbours cattlo, she was ducked in a pond, and her innocence could only be established by her drowning. If a knight or gentleman were accused he straightway fought his accuser, and the truth or otherwise of the accusation was considered to be settled by the issjie of tho fight. When even such an eminently judicial question arose as whether property should go to the widow, or to the children of a dead man, it was resolved by choosing an equal number of champions 011 each side, who fought out the matter, and it was settled accordingly, In those days such a tiling as evidence was unknown; no one protended to judge of it, for none had over heard of it. Endless relics of saints and martyrs abounded, and none questioned their reality or efficacy. Had evidence been wanted as to the wonders they worked, it could not have been had, and tho faith in them would have vanished. But for long centuries 110 0110 asked for evidence, Witchcraft, fairies, spoils, evil possession, wero all firmly believed in, and that by all classes. Our forefathers in fact were prepared to welcome, and cherish, the miraculous in any and overy form. The advent of the scientific spirit has of course altered this tendency. In the fifteenth century lawyers appeared,

and at least attempted to settle deputed matters by evidence. The R'i formation, which took its stand on private judgment, owed its r.-igin b the glimmering of the scientific spirit, and has done more than anything else to help it on. Medicine came gradually under its influence, and theology after some interval followed, But though wc talk of ourselves as enl' jhtencd, and emancipated, and fancy that we are reasonable beings, wo are all of us well aware of sundry little superstitions that our neighbours, at any rate, still cling to. Certain gems are unlucky, certain days are Iv.d for starting iin enterprise, certain numbers at table are likely to lead to ill fortune. These are all remnants of the old unreasonableness, which as we have seen characLu'isod our forefathers. They were totally ignorant of e\ 'dence; we, one and all, believe ourselves com-

petent judges thereof. The truth is probably, that only here and there is ( to be found a man, who with an s original aptitude, carefully trained, is t to be depended on to arrive at a just r conclusion. ' In Mrs Humphrey Ward's book * " Robert Elsmere," it will be remem- ' bered that the Squire was writing a great book on "The value of human J evidence." The question is too great ] for one book; in various forms, and on | all subjects of human interest, it will j continually come before us. And the more it is debated, the stronger will be the conclusion, that the relation which human testimony bears to the fact is' 1 one of "the most difficult questions which the intellect of man can attempt to solve. ■■ ■ - ... i