Abstract
Hume 's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion is a work widely admired for the clarity of its thought, the importance of its theme, and the felicity of its literary expression. However, the logic of its argumentation often is not adequately appreciated, for readers frequently fail to recognize how centrally the work relies upon reasoning by analogy, and this of two different types. To try to characterize the role of reasoning by analogy in Hume's Dialogues is a worthwhile undertaking in logical interpretation, and success in this can advance our understanding of Hume's thought. Moreover, if we can satisfactorily characterize this reasoning of Hume's, a pedagogical application will emerge: one valuable way for us to teach students about the logic of analogy will be to have them study Hume's Dialogues, attending both to the specific reasonings it contains and to their bearing on more general issues about logical reasoning.
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