1692 – 1752

Joseph Butler

Worth knowing

Bishop of Durham from 1750, and one of the ablest English defenders of the faith.
His Analogy of Religion (1736) answered the deists. It argues that the difficulties they found in the Bible are the same kind of difficulties found in nature, which they accepted as God's work.
He wrote there that "probability is the very guide of life": we act on good evidence short of proof all the time.

In Scholar’s Dream, Joseph Butler has one book

The Analogy of ReligionJoseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature (1736)Natural TheologyRationality

Joseph Butler’s quotes in the game

Every quotation from Joseph Butler that a player meets in Scholar’s Dream, attached to the move that says it. Or see them as a plain list →

In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other, and each thing a book can do in a debate is called a move. Every quote below is spoken by one of those moves. Open “How it works in the game” under a quote to see the move, which books learn it, and which arguments it answers best.

“We see no more reason why the frame and course of nature should be such a scheme, than why Christianity should... Christianity would be liable to the like objections, as the frame of nature.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Part II, Ch. IV, public domain.public domain

How it works in the game: the move The Same Objections, Answered The Same Way

Natural TheologyArgument · power 100 · 95% accurate

In the gameButler answered Tindal without making revelation look tidier than nature. The gaps, delays and roundabout ways that trouble people in revealed religion show up in nature too, and Tindal never doubted nature.

Learned byThe Analogy of Religion (Lv 44)

Strong against

×4Christianity as Old as the Creationan argument · why?

Butler never denies the difficulties. He asks why nature gets a pass from the exact same standard Tindal is using to convict revelation.

×4Émilea book · why?

The Vicar calls revelation superfluous because it carries difficulties nature does not. Butler shows nature carries the very same difficulties, and the Vicar has never once doubted the sunrise over it.

×4The Savoyard Vicaran argument · why?

“Nothing which is the possible object of knowledge... can be probable to an infinite intelligence... But to us, probability is the very guide of life.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Introduction, public domain.public domain

How it works in the game: the move Probability, The Guide of Life

Natural TheologyArgument · power 82 · 100% accurate

In the gameButler starts by admitting that only an infinite mind has certainty. A prince raised in the tropics could reason from a lifetime of evidence that ice cannot exist, and still be wrong. Finite creatures must act on the best evidence they have.

Learned byThe Analogy of Religion (Lv 46)

Strong against

×2Christianity as Old as the Creationan argument · why?

Butler admits that we reason by probability, not certainty, in everything we do. On that same footing, a revelation that adds to natural religion is no less reasonable than nature itself.

×2Émilea book · why?

Butler admits that we live by probability, not certainty. By that same standard, the Vicar cannot rule out that God has said more than nature says.

×2The Savoyard Vicaran argument · why?

Butler admits that we live by probability, not certainty. By that same standard, the Vicar cannot rule out that God has said more than nature says.

“There is a presumption of millions to one, against the story of Cæsar, or of any other man. For suppose a number of common facts so and so circumstanced, of which we had no kind of proof, should happen to come into one’s thoughts; every one would, without any possible doubt, conclude them to be false.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Part II, Ch. II, public domain.public domain

How it works in the game: the move A Presumption of Millions to One

RationalityArgument · power 88 · 100% accurate

In the gameBefore you hear the evidence, every particular fact is wildly unlikely — Caesar included. Butler grants that freely and then asks the only question that was ever in dispute: how much MORE unlikely a miracle is than any other unheard-of event, and whether the proof offered is enough to carry it.

Learned byThe Analogy of Religion (Lv 50)

Strong against

×2.5Miracles Are Impossiblean argument · why?

Spinoza rules the miracle out before any witness speaks, because it would contradict the order God decreed. Butler grants the presumption and asks for its size: every particular fact is improbable to millions to one before its proof, and proof is what overcomes it.

“The proof of revelation is not some direct and express things only, but a great variety of circumstantial things also; and that though each of these direct and circumstantial things is indeed to be considered separately, yet they are afterwards to be joined together; for that the proper force of the evidence consists in the result of those several things, considered in their respects to each other, and united into one view.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Part II, Ch. VII, public domain — opening capital ours; the clause runs on from the sentence before it.public domain

How it works in the game: the move Considered Separately, Joined Together

Natural TheologyArgument · power 90 · 100% accurate

In the gameButler asks for both halves of the work. Examine each claim on its own, then put them back together, because the strength of the case is in how they fit, which no single piece can show.

Learned byThe Analogy of Religion (Lv 58)

Strong against

×2.5Grammar of Assenta book · why?

Newman quotes Butler on this point in the Grammar of Assent: the truth of religion, like the truth of common matters, is judged by the whole evidence taken together.

×2.5The Life of Jesus Examinedan argument · why?

Strauss takes the Gospels a paragraph at a time, and paragraph by paragraph each one can be explained away. Butler asks for the second half of the work: examine them separately, then put them back, because the force of the case is in how they stand to one another.

“For it is easy to show, in a short and lively manner, that such and such things are liable to objection, that this and another thing is of little weight in itself; but impossible to show, in like manner, the united force of the whole argument in one view.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Part II, Ch. VIII, public domain.public domain

How it works in the game: the move The United Force of the Whole

RationalityArgument · power 92 · 100% accurate

In the gameButler names the advantage the other side has in any short exchange, and it is not an advantage in truth. An objection fits in a sentence. The thing it is an objection to does not.

Learned byThe Analogy of Religion (Lv 66)

Strong against

×2.5The Documentary Hypothesisan argument · why?

Every seam in the Pentateuch fits in a sentence and the book it is a seam in does not. Butler named the advantage that gives in any short exchange, and it is an advantage in convenience rather than in truth.

×2Grammar of Assenta book · why?

Newman calls Butler the great master of this kind of reasoning, where many small probabilities add up.

Passages you can read in the game

Longer excerpts the Scriptorium holds on screen for a player to sit and read, word for word.

“Nothing which is the possible object of knowledge... can be probable to an infinite intelligence... But to us, probability is the very guide of life.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Introduction, public domain.

from The Analogy of Religion

“We see no more reason why the frame and course of nature should be such a scheme, than why Christianity should... Christianity would be liable to the like objections, as the frame of nature.”
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1736), Part II, Ch. IV, public domain.

from The Analogy of Religion

Words Joseph Butler’s books borrow from others

Moves these books can learn whose quotation comes from somebody else. The citation on each one names who actually said it.

“For in him we live, and move, and have our being. As some of your own poets have said.”
Acts 17:28 (WEB) — Paul at the Areopagus, quoting the Athenians’ own poets back to them.

How it works in the game: the move Affirm

Status

In the gamePick the part of the opponent’s case that is true and affirm it. That point can no longer be used against you, and the opponent’s Defend falls sharply. It deals no damage. Affirm something false and you have only agreed with an error.

Learned byThe Analogy of Religion (Lv 41)

Who else was alive

Joseph Butler against everyone else in the game.

A.D. 450A.D. 700A.D. 950A.D. 1200A.D. 1450A.D. 1700A.D. 1950

Boethius Boniface John of Damascus Daniel of Winchester Timothy I Alcuin of York Pope Leo III Eulogius of Córdoba Paul Alvaro of Córdoba Rimbert Humbert of Silva Candida Michael Cerularius Peter III of Antioch Anselm of Canterbury Ari Thorgilsson Ebo and Herbord Thomas Aquinas John Wyclif Lorenzo Valla Girolamo Savonarola Pope Paul III Martin Luther Miles Coverdale William Tyndale Emperor Charles V John Calvin Teresa of Ávila John Jewel The Council of Trent The English exiles at Geneva Hugo Grotius René Descartes John Owen Blaise Pascal John Bunyan Louis XIV of France Pierre Bayle Joseph Butler Jonathan Edwards Thomas Reid George Campbell William Paley John Henry Newman J. C. Ryle Friedrich Nietzsche James Orr B. B. Warfield Herman Bavinck W. R. Sorley James Denney J. Gresham Machen

Solid bar = firm dates · faded = approximate51 authors sit outside this window