Imp. of W. Hastings

“Much industry and art have been used, among the illiterate and unexperienced, to throw imputations on this prosecution, and its conduct, because so great a proportion of the evidence offered on the trial (especially on the latter charges) has been circumstantial. Against the prejudices of the ignorant your committee opposes the judgment of the learned. It is known to them, that, when this proof is in its greatest perfection, that is, when it is most abundant in circumstances, it is much superior to positive proof; and for this we have the authority of the learned judge who presided at the trial of Captain Donellan: “On the part of the prosecution a great deal of evidence has been laid before you. It is all circumstantial evidence, and in its nature it must be so: for, in cases of this sort, no man is weak enough to commit the act in the presence of other persons, or to suffer them to see what he does at the time; and therefore it can only be made out by circumstances, either before the committing of the act, at the time when it was committed, or subsequent to it. And a presumption which necessarily arises from circumstances is very often more convincing and more satisfactory than any other kind of evidence; because it is not within the reach and compass of human abilities to invent a train of circumstances which shall be so connected together as to amount to a proof of guilt, without affording opportunities of contradicting a great part, if not all, of these circumstances. But if the circumstances are such as, when laid together, bring conviction to your minds, it is then fully equal, if not, as I told you before, more convincing than positive evidence.”

Edmund Burke: Imp. of W. Hastings: Report on the Lords’ Journals, 1794.

Author: international

Author: international

Arms Control, Disarmament, Nonproliferation

Administrative Law