5. Syllogism helps little in demonstration, less in probability.
But however it be in knowledge, I think I may truly
say, it is of far less, or no use at all in probabilities. For the assent there being to be determined by the
preponderancy, after due weighing of all the proofs, with all circumstances on both sides, nothing is so unfit to
assist the mind in that as syllogism; which running away with one assumed probability, or one topical argument,
pursues that till it has led the mind quite out of sight of the thing under consideration; and, forcing it upon some
remote difficulty, holds it fast there; entangled perhaps, and, as it were, manacled, in the chain of syllogisms,
without allowing it the liberty, much less affording it the helps, requisite to show on which side, all things
considered, is the greater probability.
