On the Method of Zadig: Essay #1 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" — Page 11

历史，就其通常含义而言，是建立在对文献证据的解读之上的；而文献之所以具有证据价值，是因为历史学家有理由相信：这些文献的产生，是由与我们现有经验中产生文献的原因相类似的因素所导致的。

History, in the ordinary acceptation of the word, is based upon the interpretation of documentary evidence; and documents would have no evidential value unless historians were justified in their assumption that they have come into existence by the operation of causes similar to those of which documents are, in our present experience, the effects.

如果一部书写的历史可以不经由人力而产生，或者如果写下某份文献的人是受到非常人动机的驱使，那么这些文献就如同一堆花纹装饰，毫无证据价值可言。

If a written history can be produced otherwise than by human agency, or if the man who wrote a given document was actuated by other than ordinary human motives, such documents are of no more evidential value than so many arabesques.

考古学在文献证据无法企及之处接续了历史的脉络，它之所以能够存在，是因为我们有充分理由相信：纪念碑以及艺术或人工制品，从未由与其现今起源本质不同的原因所产生。

Archaeology, which takes up the thread of history beyond the point at which documentary evidence fails us, could have no existence, except for our well grounded confidence that monuments and works of art or artifice, have never been produced by causes different in kind from those to which they now owe their origin.

地质学将历史的进程追溯至考古学界限之外，它之所以能够告诉我们任何信息，依赖的是这样一个假设：数百万年前，水、热、重力、摩擦、动植物生命所产生的效果，与它们如今所产生的效果属于同一类型。

And geology, which traces back the course of history beyond the limits of archaeology, could tell us nothing except for the assumption that, millions of years ago, water, heat, gravitation, friction, animal and vegetable life, caused effects of the same kind as they now cause.

不仅如此，就连物理天文学，就其将我们带回古生物学所能触及的最遥远时间节点而言，也建立在同样的假设之上。

Nay, even physical astronomy, in so far as it takes us back to the uttermost point of time which palaetiological science can reach, is founded upon the same assumption.

如果在那个时期，万有引力定律哪怕有一丝一毫的失效，天文学家的计算便将失去其适用性。

If the law of gravitation ever failed to be true, even to a small extent, for that period, the calculations of the astronomer have no application.