PRESENTED ]',Y mz Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 with funding from The Library of Congress http://www.archive.org/details/metaphysicsofsir01hami I THE METAPHYSICS ^^^ OF / SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON, COLLECTED, ARRANGED, AND ABRIDGIiD, FOR THE USE OF COLLEGES AND PRIVATE ISTLDENTS, BY FRANCIS BOWEN, ALFORD PROFESSOR OF MORAL PHIIOSOPHT IN I1ARV>RD COLLEQB. CAMBRIDGE: SEVER AND FRANCIS, 18 67. 1-4^^ .^ 73748 Entered according to Act of Congress in the ye»r 1861, by SEYER, AND FRANCIS, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of MaSvStachusetitg SEyE:NTII EDITION. PREFACE It is unfortunate that Sir William Hamilton did not undertake fully to digest his metaphysical opinions into system, and to publish them as one orderly and connected whole. He had a system, for he was eminently a method- ical and self-consistent thinker ; but it was built up piece- meal, and so given to the world, at various times, in succes- sive articles in the Edinburgh Review ; in copious notes, appendices, and other additions to these articles when they were republished as a volume of " Discussions," and again, when these "Discussions" passed to a second edition; in the Notes, and, still more at length, in the Supplementary Dissertations, to his ponderous edition of Reid ; and finally, in the memoranda prepared at different times and for vari- ous purposes, which his English editors gathered up and annexed to the posthumous publication of his " Lectures on Metaphysics." While neither of these works furnishes an outline of his system as a whole, each one of them con- tains a statement, more or less complete, of his principal doctrines and arguments, so that, taken together, they abound in repetitions. Even the '' Lectures," which afford the nearest approach to a full and systematic exposition of his opinions, besides laboring under the necessary disad- vantage of a posthumous publication, never finally revised by the author for the press, and probably not even intended by him to be printed, were first written by him in great haste at the time (1836) of his original appointment to a Professorship in the University of Edinburgh, and seem to have received but few subsequent alterations or additions, though his opinions certainly underwent afterwards con- siderable development and modification. As any course of instruction in the Philosophy of Mind (ui) iv PREFACE. at the present day must be very Imperfect whicli does not comprise a tolerably full view of Hamilton's Meta- physics, I have endeavored, in the present volume, to pre- pare a text-book which should contain, in his own language, the substance of all that he has written upon the subject. For this purpose, the '' Lectures on Metaphysics " have been taken as the basis of the work ; and I have freely abridged them by striking out the repetitions and redundancies in which they abound, and omitting also, in great part, the load of citations and references that they contain, as these are of inferior interest except to a student of the history of philosophy, or as marks of the stupendous erudition of the author. The space acquired by these abridgments has enabled me to interweave into the book, in their appro- priate place and connection, all those portions of the '' Dis- cussions," and of the Notes and Dissertations supplemen- tary to Reid, which seemed necessary either to elucidate and confirm the text, or to supplement it with the later and more fully expressed opinions of the author. These insertions, always distinguished by angular brackets [ ], and referred to the source whence they were drawn, are very numerous and considerable in amount ; sometimes they are several pages long, others do not exceed in length a single paragraph, or even a single sentence. The au- thor's language has invariably been preserved, and where- ever a word or two had to be altered or supplied, to pre- serve the connection, the inserted words have been enclosed in brackets. The divisions between the Lectures, necessa- rily arbitrary, as the limits of a discourse of fixed length could not coincide with the natural division of the subject, have not been preserved in this edition. A chapter here often begins in the middle of a Lecture, and sometimes comprises two or more Lectures. A very few notes, criti- cal or explanatory in character, are properly distinguished as supplied by the American Editor. It has been a laborious, but not a disagreeable task, to examine and collate three bulky octavos, with a view thus to condense their substance into a single volume of moder- ate dimensions. I cannot promise that the work has been thoroughly, but only that it has been carefully, done. ^ , CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PA6« Utility of the Study of Piiii.osopiiY .... 1 CHAPTER II. The Nature and Comprehension of PniLOSoniY . 27 CHAPTER III. The Causes of Philosophy, and the Dispositions WITH which it ought TO BE STUDIED .... 40 CHAPTER lY. . The Method of Philosophy 60 CHAPTER V. The Divisions of Philosophy . • . . . .71 CHAPTER YI. Definition of Psychology: Relativity of Human Knowledge : Explication of Terms .... 84 CHAPTER YII Explication of Terms continued . ... 99 (V) CONTENTS. CHAPTEE YIII. Distribution of Mental Ph^enomena : Special Con- ditions OF Consciousness . . . . . . 120 CHAPTER IX. Consciousness not a Special Faculty . . .135 CHAPTER X. Consciousness not a Special Faculty continued : its relation to Perception, Attention, and Reflec- tion ..... 148 CHAPTER XI. Consciousness, — its Evidence and Authority . .175 CHAPTER XII. Violations of the Authority of Consciousness in Various Theories of Perception . . .193 CHAPTER XIII. General Ph^enomena of Consciousness : Are we al- ways consciously active? . . . . . . 215 CHAPTER XIV. General Phenomena of Consciousness: Is the Mind ever unconsciously modified? . . . . . 235 CHAPTER XV. General Phenomena of Consciousness : Difficulties AND Facilities of Psychological Study: Classifi- cation OF the Cognitive Faculties .... 254 CONTENTS. vii CHAPTER XVI. The Presentative Faculty: Reid's Historical View OF THE Theories of Perception 27S CHAPTER XVII. The Presentative Faculty: Perception: Was Reid a Natural Realist ? 295 CHAPTER XVIII. The Presentative Faculty: The Distinction of Per- ception PROPER FROM SeNSATION PROPER: PRIMARY AND Secondary Qualities 313 CHAPTER XIX. The Presentative Faculty: Objections to the Doc- trine OF Natural Realism considered: the Rep- resentative Hypothesis refuted . . . . 342 CHAPTER XX. The Presentative Faculty: General Questions re- lating TO THE Senses: Perceptions by Sight and Touch • 863 CHAPTER XXI. The Presentative Faculty : Recapitulation : II. Self- Consciousness 389 CHAPTER XXII. The Conservative Faculty: Memory Proper . • 409 viii CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXIIT. The Heproductive Faculty: Laws ot Association: Suggestion and Reminiscence . ., • . .421 CHAPTER XXIV The Representative Faculty: Imagination . .44] CHAPTER XXV. The Elaborative Faculty : Classification : Abstrac- tion AND Generalization: Nominalism and Con- ceptualism 45G CHAPTER XXVI. The Elaborative Faculty : The Primum Cognitum : Judgment and Reasoning . . . . . . 480 CHAPTER XXVII. 'tiiE Regulative Faculty: The Philosophy of the Conditioned . .499 CHAPTER XXVIII. The Regulative Faculty: Law of the Conditioned IN ITS application TO THE DOCTRINE OF CaUSALITY e^Sl HAMILTON'S METAPHYSICS. CHAPTER I. UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. Some things are valuable, finally, or for themselves, — these are ends ; other things are valuable, not on their own account, but as conducive towards certain ulterior ends, — these are means. The value of ends is absolute, — the value of means is relative. Absolute value is properly called a good, — rela- tive value is properly called a utility. Of goods, or absolute ends, there are for man but two, — perfection and happiness. By perfection is meant the full and harmonious development of all our faculties, corporeal and mental, intellectual and moral ; by happiness, the complement of all the pleasures of which we are susceptible. Now, I may state, though I cannot at present attempt to prove, that human perfection and human happiness coincide, and thus constitute, in reality, but a single end. For as, on the one hand, the perfection or full development of a power is in proportion to its capacity of free, vigorous, and continued action, so on the other, all pleasure is the concomitant of activ- ity ; its degree being in proportion as that activity is sponta- neously intense, its prolongation in proportion as that activity is spontaneously continued ; whereas, pain arises either from a faculty being restrained in its spontaneous tendency to action, or from being urged to a degree, or to a continuance, of energy 1 a\ 2 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. beyond the limit to which it of itself freely tends. To pro- mote our perfection is thus to promote our happiness ; for to cultivate fully and harmoniously our various faculties, is simply to enable them, by exercise, to energize longer and stronger without painful effort ; that is, to afford us a larger amount of a higher quality of enjoyment. In considering the utility of a branch of knowledge, it be- hooves us, in the first place, to estimate its value as viewed simply in itself; and, in the second, its value as viewed in rela- tion to other branches. Considered in itself, a science is valua- ble in proportion as its cultivation is immediately conducive to the mental improvement of the cultivator. This may be called its Absolute utility. In relation to others, a science is valuable in proportion as its study is necessary for the prosecution of other branches of knowledge. This may be called its Relative utility. Absolute utility of two kinds — Subjective and Objective, — In the former point of view, that is, considered absolutely, or in itself, the philosophy of mind comprises two several utilities, according as it, 1°, Cultivates the mind or knowing subject, by calling its faculties into exercise ; and, 2°, Furnishes the mind with a certain complement of truths or objects of knowledge. The former of these constitutes its Subjective, the latter its Objective utility. These utiHties are not the same, nor do they even stand to each other in any necessary proportion. As an individual may possess an ample magazine of knowledge, and still be little better than an intellectual barbarian, so the utility of one science may be chiefly seen in affording a greater num- ber of higher and more indisputable truths, — the utility of another in determining the faculties to a higher energy, and consequently to a higher education. There are few, I behe^e, disposed to question the speculative dignity of mental science ; but its practical utility is not unfre- quently denied. To what, it is asked, is the science of mind conducive ? What are its uses ? What is Practical Utility? — I am not one of those who hink that the importance of a study is sufiiciently established ▼hen iV dignity is admitted ; for, holding that knowledge is UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PIIILOSOPIlr. 3 for the sake of man, and not man for the sake of knowledge, it is necessary, m order to vindicate its value, that every science should be able to show what are the advantages which it prom- ises to confer upon its student. I, therefore, profess myself a utilitarian ; and it is only on the special ground of its utility that I would claim for the philosophy of mind, what I regard as its peculiar and preeminent importance. But what is a utilitarian ? Simply one who prefers the Useful to the Useless — and who does not ? But what is the useful ? That which is prized, not on its own account, but as conducive to the acquisition of some- thing else, — the useful is, in short, only another word for a mean towards an end ; for every mean is useful, and whatever is useful is a mean. Now the value of a mean is always in proportion to the value of its end ; and the useful being a mean, it follows, that, of two utilities, the one which conduces to the more valuable end will be itself the more valuable utility. So far there is no difference of opinion. All agree that the useful is a mean towards an end ; and that, cceteris paribus^ a mean towards a higher end constitutes a higher utihty than a mean towards a lower. The only dispute that has arisen, or can possibly arise, in regard to the utility of. means (supposing always their relative efficiency), is founded on the various views that may be entertained in regard to the existence and compar- ative importance of ends. Two errors in the popular estimate of the comparative utility of human sciences, — Now the various opinions which prevail concerning the comparative utihty of human sciences and stud- ies, have all arisen from two errors. The first of these consists in viewing man, not as an end unto himself but merely as a mean organized for the sake of something out of himself ; and, under this partial view of human destination, those branches of knowledge obtain exclu- sively the name of useful, which tend to qualify a human being to act the lowly part of a dexterous instrument. It has been the tendency of different ages, of different countries, of different ranks and conditions of society, to measure the utility of studies rather by one of these standards, than by both. Thus it was 4 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. the bias of antiquity, when the moral and intellectual cultivation of the citizen was viewed as the great end of all politicai insti- tutions, to appreciate all knowledge principally by the nigher standard ; on the contrary, it is unfortunately the bias of our modern civilization, since the accumulation (and not too the distribution) of riches in a country, has become the grand prob- lem of the statesman, to appreciate it rather by the lower. The second, and the more dangerous, of these errors consists in regarding the cultivation of our faculties as subordinate to the acquisition of knowledge, mstead of regardmg the posses- sion of knowledge as subordinate to the cultivation of our fac- ulties ; and, in consequence of this error, those sciences which afford a greater number of more certain facts, have been deemed sr.perior in utility to those which bestow a higher cultivation on the higher faculties of the mind. Man an end unto himself. — As to the first of these errors, the fallacy is so palpable, that we may well wonder at its prev- alence. It is manifest, mdeed, that man, in so far as he is a mean for the glory of God, must be an end unto himself; for it is only in the accomplishment of his own perfection, that, as a creature, he can manifest the glory of his Creator. Though therefore man, by relation to God, be but a mean, for that very reason, in relation to all else is he an end. Wherefore, now speaking of him exclusively in his natural capacity and tempo- ral relations, I say it is manifest that mail is by nature necessa- rily an end to himself, — that his perfection and happiness constitute the goal of his activity, to which he tends, and ought to tend, when not diverted from this, his general and native destination, by peculiar and accidental circumstances. But it is equally evident, that, under the condition of society, individual men are, for the most part, to a greater or less degree, actually so diverted. To live, the individual must have the means of living; and these means (unless he already possess them) he must procure, — he must purchase. But purchase with what? With his services, i. e, — he must reduce himself to an instru- ment, — an instrument of utihty to others ; and the services of this instrument he must barter for those means of subsistence UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY.^ 5 of which he is in want. In other words, he must exercise some trade, calling, or profession. Thus, in the actualities of social life, each man, instead of being solely an end to himself, — instead of being able to make everj thing subordinate to that full and harmonious develop- ment of his individual faculties, in which his full perfection and his true happiness consist, — is, in general, compelled to degrade himself into the mean or instrument towards the accomplish- ment of some end external to himself, and for the benefit of others. Liberal and Professional Education, — Now the perfection of man as an end, and the perfection of man as a mean or in- strument, are not only not the same ; they are, in reality, gen- erally opposed. And as these two perfections are different, so the training requisite for their acquisition is not identical, and has, accordingly, been distinguished by different names. The one is styled Liberal, the other Professional education, — the branches of knowledge cultivated for these purposes be- ing called respectively liberal and professional, or liberal and lucrative, sciences. By the Germans, the latter are usually distinguished as the Brodwissenschaften^ which we may trans- late. The Bread and Butter Sciences. A few of the professions, indeed, as requiring a higher development of the higher faculties, and involving, therefore, a greater or less amount of liberal education, have obtained the name of liberal professions. We must, however, recollect that this is only an accidental and a very partial exception. But though the full and harmonious development of our faculties be the high and natural destination of all, while the cultivation of any professional dexterity is only a contingency, though a contingency incumbent upon most, it has, however, happened that the paramount and universal end of man, — of man absolutely, — has been often ignorantly lost sight of, and the term useful appropriated exclusively to those acquirements which have a value only to man considered in his relative, lower, and accidental character of an instrument. But, because some have thus been led to appropriate the name of useful to those studies and objects of knowledge, which are 1=^ 6 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. conducive to the inferior end, it assuredly does not follow that those conducive to the higher have not a far preferable title to the name thus curiously denied to them. Even admitting, therefore, that the study of mind is of no immediate advantage in preparing the student for many of the subordinate parts in the mechanism of society, its utility cannot, on that account, be called in question, unless it be asserted that man " liveth by bread alone," and has no higher destination than that of the calling by which he earns his subsistence. Knowledge and intellectual cultivation, — The second error to which I have adverted, reverses the relative subordination of knowledge and of intellectual cultivation. In refutation of this, I shall attempt briefly to show, firstly, that knowledge and intellectual cultivation are not identical; secondly j that knowl- edge is itself principally valuable as a mean of intellectual cul- tivation ; and, lastly, that intellectual cultivation is more directly and effectually accomplished by the study of mind than by any other of our rational pursuits.- But to prevent misapprehension, I may premise what I mean by knowledge, and what by intellectual cultivation. By knowl- edge is understood the mere possession of truths ; by intellectual cultivation, or intellectual development, the power, acquired through exercise by the higher faculties, of a more varied, vig- orous and protracted activity. In the first place, then, it will be requisite, I conceive, to say but little to show that knowledge and intellectual development are not only not the same, but stand in no necessary proportion to each other. This is manifest, if we consider the very dif- ferent conditions under which these two qualities are acquired. The one condition under which all powers, and consequently the intellectual faculties, are developed, is exercise. The more intense and continuous the exercise, the more vigorously de- veloped will be the power. But a certain quantity of knowledge, — in other words, a certain amount of possessed truths, — does not suppose, as its condition, a corresponding sum of intellectual exercise. One truth requires much, another truth requires little, effort in UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 7 acquisition ; and, while the original discovery of a truth evolves perhaps a maximum of the highest quality of energy, the sub- sequent learning of that truth elicits probably but a minimum of the very lowest. 7^ truth or mental exercise the superior end ? — But, as it is evident that the possession of truths, and the development of the mind in which they are deposited, are not identical, I pro- ceed, in the second place, to show that, considered as ends, and in relation to each other, the knowledge of truths is not su- preme, but subordinate to the cultivation of the knowing mind. The question - — Is Truth, or is the Mental Exercise in the pur- suit of truth, the superior end ? — this is perhaps the most curious theoretical, and certainly the most important practical, problem in the whole compass of philosophy. For, according to the solution at which we arrive, must we accord the higher or the lower rank to certain great departments of study ; and, what is of more importance, the character of its solution, as it determines the aim, regulates from first to last the method, which an enlightened science of education must adopt. But, however curious and important, this question has never, in so far as I am aware, been regularly discussed. Nay, what is still more remarkable, the erroneous alternative has been very generally assumed as true. The consequence of this has been, that sciences of far inferior, have been elevated above sciences of far superior, utility ; while education has been sys- tematically distorted, — though truth and nature have occa- sionally burst the shackles which a perverse theory had im- posed. The reason of this is sufficiently obvious. At first sight, it seems even absurd to doubt that truth is more valuable than its pursuit ; for is this not to say that the end is less im- portant than the mean? — and on this superficial view is the prevalent misapprehension founded. A slight consideration will, however, expose the fallacy. Practical and specidative Knowledge ; their ends. — Knowl- edge is either practical or speculative. In practical knowledge it is evident that truth is not the ultimate end ; for, in that case, knowledge is, ex hypothesis for the sake of application. The 8 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHT. knowledge of a moral, of a political, of a religious truth, is of value only as it affords the preliminary or condition of its exer- cise. In speculative knowledge, on the other hand, there may indeed, at first sight, seem greater difficulty ; but further re- flection will prove that speculative truth is only pursued, and is only held of value, for the sake of intellectual activity: " Sor- det cognita Veritas " is a shrewd aphorism of Seneca. A truth, once known, falls into comparative insignificance. It is now prized less on its own account, than as opening up new ways to new activity, new suspense, new hopes, new discoveries, new self-gratulation. Every votary of science is wilfully ignorant of a thousand estabhshed facts, — of a thousand which he might make his own more easily than he could attempt the disco\'ery of even one. But it is not knowledge, — it is not truth, — that he principally seeks ; he seeks the exercise of his faculties and feelings ; and, as in following after the one, he exerts a greatei amount of pleasurable energy than in taking formal possession of the thousand, he disdains the certainty of the many, and pre- fers the chances of the one. Accordingly, the sciences always studied with keenest interest are those in a state of progress and uncertainty ; absolute certainty and absolute completion would be the paralysis of any study ; and the last worst calam- ity that could befall man, as he is at present constituted, would be that full and final possession of speculative truth, which he now vainly anticipates as the consummation of his intellectual happiness. " Qusesivit coelo lucem, ingemuitque reperta/' I^ut what is true of science, is true, indeed, of all human ac- tivity. " In life," as the great Pascal observes, " we always believe that we are seeking repose, while, in reality, all that we ever seek is agitation." It is ever the contest that pleases us, and not the victory. Thus it is in play ; thus it is in hunting ; thus it is in the search of truth ; thus it is in life. The past does not interest, the present does not satisfy, the future alone is the object which engages us. UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 9 " (Nullo votorum fine beati) Victuras agimus semper, nee vivimus unquam." The question, I said, has never been regularly discussed, — probably because it lay in too narrow a compass ; but no philos- opher appears to have ever seriously proposed it to himself, who did not resolve it in contradiction to the ordinary opinion. A contradiction of this opinion is even involved in the very term Philosophy ; and the man who first declared that he was not a aocpog, or possessor, but a (filooocpog, or seeker of truth, at once enounced tile true end of human speculation, and embodied it in a significant name. Under the same conviction, Plato defines man " the hunter of truth," foV science is a chase, and in a chase, the pursuit is always of greater value than the game. " The intellect," says Aristotle, in one passage, " is perfected, not by knowledge, but by activity ; " and in another, " The arts and sciences are powers, but every power exists only for the sake of action ; the end of philosophy, therefore, is not knowl- edge, but the energy conversant about knowledge." The pro- foundest thinkers of modern times have emphatically testified to the same great principle. " If," says Malebranche, " I held truth captive in my hand, I should open my hand and let it fly, in order that I might again pursue and capture it." " Did the Almighty," says Lessing, " holding in his right hand Truth, and in his left Search after Truth, deign to tender me the one I might prefer, — in all humility, but without hesitation, I should request Search after Truths [We exist only as we energize ; pleasure is the reflex of unimpeded energy ; energy is the means by which our faculties are developed; and a higher energy the end which their development proposes. In action is thus contained the existence, happiness, improvement, and per- fection of our being ; and knowledge is only precious, as it may afford a stimulus to the exercise of our powers, and the condi- tion of their more complete activity. Speculative truth is, therefore, subordinate to speculation itself; and its value is directly measured by the quantity of energy which it occa- sions, — immediately m its discovery, — mediately through its consequences. Life' to Endymion was not preferable to death* IJ UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. aloof from practice, a waking error is better than a sbeping truth. — Neither, in point of fact, is there found any proportion between the possession of truths, and the developmemt of the mind in which they are deposited. Every learner in science is now famihar with more truths than Aristotle .or Plato ever dreamt of knowing ; yet, conipared with the Stagirite or the A^thenian, how few, even of our masters of modern science, rank higher than intellectual barbarians ! Ancient Greece and modern Europe prove, indeed, that " the march of intellect " is no inseparable concomitant of " the march of science, ; " — that the cultivation of the individual is not to be rashly confounded with the progress of the species.] - — Discussions, Philosophy best entitled to he called useful, — But if specula- tive truth itself be only valuable as a mean of intellectual activity, those studies which determine the faculties to a more vigorous exertion, will, in every Mberal sense, be better entitled, absolutely, to the name of useful, than those which, with a greater complement of more certain facts, awaken them to a less intense, and consequently to a less improving exercise. On this ground I would rest one of the preeminent utihties of mental philosophy. That it comprehends all the subhmest objects of our theoretical and moral interest ; — that every (natural) conclusion concerning God, the soul, the present worth and the future destiny of man, is exclusively deduced from the philosophy of mind, will be at once admitted. But I do not at present found the im|5ortance on the paramount dig- nity of the pursuit. It is as the best gymnastic of the mind, — as a mean, principally, and almost exclusively, conducive to the highest education of our noblest powers, that I would vindicate to these speculations the necessity which has too frequently been denied them. By no other intellectual application is the mind thus reflected on itself, and its faculties aroused to such independent, vigorous, unwonted, and continued energy ; — by none, therefore, are its best capacities so variously and intensely evolved. " By turning," says Burke, " the soul inward on itself, its forces are concentred, and are fitted for greater and stronger flights of science ; and in this pursuit, whether we UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 11 take or whether we lose our game, the chase is certamly of .service." These principles being established, it follows, that I must regard the main duty of a Professor to consist not simply in communicating information, but in doing this in such a manner, and with such an accompaniment of subsidiary means, that the information he conveys may be the occasion of awakening his pupils to a vigorous and varied exertion of their faculties. Self-activity is the indispensable condition of improvement ; and education is only education, — that is, accomplishes its pur- pose, only by affording objects and supplying incitements to this spontaneous exertion. Strictly speaking, every one must edu- cate himself. [All profitable study is a silent disputation — an intellectual gymnastic ; and the most improving books are pre- cisely those which most excite the reader, — to understand the author, to supply what he has omitted, and to canvass his facts and reasonings. To read passively, . to learn, — is, in reality, not to learn at all. In study, implicit faith, belief upon au- thority, is worse even than, for a time, erroneous speculation. To read profitably, we should read the authors, not most in unison with, but most adverse to, our opinions ; for w^hatever may be the case in the cure of bodies, enantiopathy, and not homceopathy^ is the true medicine of minds. Accordingly, such sciences and such authors as present only unquestionable truths, determining a minimum of self-activity in the student, are, in a rational education, subjectively naught. Those sciences and authors, on the contrary, who constrain the student to inde- pendent thought, are, whatever may be their objective cer- tainty, subjectively, educationally, best.] — Discussions. But though the common duty of all academical instructors be the cultivation of the student, through the awakened exercise of his faculties, this is more especially incumbent on those to whom is intrusted the department of liberal education ; for, in this department, the pupil is trained, not to any mere profes- sional knowledge, but to the command and employment of his faculties in general. But, moreover, the same obligation is specially imposed upon a professor of intellectual philosophy, 12 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. by the peculiar nature of his subject, and the conditions under which alone it can be taught. The phsenomena of the external world are so palpable and so easily described, that the expe- rience of one observer suffices to render the facts he has wit- nessed intelligible and probable to all. The phaenomena of the internal world, on the contrary, are not capable of being thus described : all that the prior observer can do, is to enable others to repeat his experience. • In the science of mind, we can neither understand nor be convinced of any thing at second hand. Here testimony can impose no behef ; and instruction is only instruction as it enables us to teach ourselves. A fact of consciousness, however accurately observed, however clearly described, and however great may be our confidence in the observer, is for us as zero, until we have observed and recog- nized it ourselves. Till that be done, we cannot reahze its pos- sibility, far less admit its truth. Thus it is that, in the philoso- phy of mind, instruction can do little more than point out the position in which the pupil ought to place himself, in order ta verify, by his own experience, the facts which his instructor proposes to him as true. The instructor, therefore, proclaims, ov qjiloGocpia, dlXa q)iXoooq}8ip ; he does not profess to tesich phi" losophy, but to philosophize. It is this condition imposed upon the student of doing every thing himself, that renders the study of the mental sciences the most improving exercise of intel- lect. Philosophy: its Objective utility, — I [have] endeavored to show that all knowledge is only for the sake of energy, and that even merely speculative truth is valuable only as it determines a greater quantity of higher power into activity. I [have] also endeavored to show that, on the standard of Subjective utility, philosophy is of all our studies the most useful ; inasmuch as more than any other it exercises, and consequently develops to a higher degree, and in a more varied manner, our noblest fac- ulties. I shall [now] confine myself to certain views of the importance of philosophy estimated by the standard of its Ob- jective utility. The human mind the noblest object of speculation, — Consid- UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF rHILOSOHlY. 13 ered in itself, a knowledge of the human mind, whether we regard its speculative or its practical importance, is confessedly of all studies the highest and the most interesting. " On earth," says an ancient philosopher, " there is nothing great but man ; in man^ there is nothing great but mind." No other study fills and satisfies the soul like the study of itself. No other science presents an object to be compared in dignity, in absolute or in relative value, to that which human consciousness furnishes to its own contemplation. What is of all things the best, asked Chilon of the Oracle. " To know thyself," was the response. This is, in fact, the only science in which all are always inter- ested ; for, while each individual may have his favorite occupa- tion, it still remains true of the species, that " the proper study of mankind is man." " For the world," says Sir Thomas Browne, " I count it not an inn, but an hospital ; and a place not to live, but to die in. The world that I regard is myself ; it is the microcosm of my own frame that I cast mine eye on ; for the other, I use it but like my globe, and turn it round some- times, for my recreation The earth is a point, not only in respect of the heavens above us, but of that heavejily and celestial part within us. That mass of flesh that circumscribes me, limits not my mind. That surface that tells the heavens it hath an end, cannot persuade me I have any Whilst I study to find how I am a microcosm, or little world, I find my- self something more than the great. There is surely a piece of divinity in us ; something that was before the elements, and owes no homage unto the sun. Nature tells me, I am the image of God, as well as Scripture. . He that understands not thus much hath not his introduction or first lesson, and is jet to begin the alphabet of man." Relation of Psychology to Theology, — But, though mind, considered in itself, be the noblest object of speculation which the created universe presents to the curiosity of man, it is under a certain relation that I would now attempt to illustrate its utility ; for mind rises to its highest dignity when viewed as the object through which, and through which alone, our unassisted reason can ascend to the knowledge of a God. The' Deity is 14 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. not an object of immediate contemplation ; as existing and in himself, he is beyond our reach ; we can know him only medi- ately through his works, and are only warranted in assuming his existence as a certain kind of cause necessary to account for a certain state of things, of whose reality our faculties are supposed to inform us. The affirmation of a God being thus a regressive inference, from the existence of a special class of etfects to the existence of a special character of cause, it is evi- dont, that the whole argument hinges on the fact, — Does a state of things really exist such as is only possible through the agency of a Divine Cause? For if it can be shown that such a state of things does not really exist, then our inference to the kind of cause requisite to account for it is necessarily nujl. Argument founded exclusively on the phcenomena of mind, — This being understood, I now proceed to show that the class of phaenomena which requires that kind of cause we denominate a Deity, is exclusively given in the^ phenomena of mind, — that the phsenomena of matter, taken by themselves (you will observe the qualification, ' taken by themselves '), so far from warranting any inference to the existence of a God, would, on the contrary, ground even an argument to his negation, — that the study of the external world taken with, and in subordination to, that of the internal, not only loses its atheistic tendency, but, under such subservience, may be rendered conducive to the great con- clusion, from which, if left to itself, it would dissuade us. We must, first of all, then, consider what kind of cause it is which constitutes a Deity, and what kind of efiects they are which allow us to infer that a Deity must be. The notion of a God — what, — The notion of a God is not contained in the notion of a mere First Cause ; for in the admission of a first cause, Atheist and Theist are at one. Neither is this notion completed by -adding to a first cause the attribute of Omnipotence ; for the atheist who holds matter or necessity to be the original principle of all that is, does not convert his blind force into a God, by merely affirming it to be all-powerful. It is not until the two great attributes of Intelli- gence and Virtue (and be it observed that virtue involves Lib- CTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 15 erty) — I say, it is not until the two attributes of intelligence and virtue or holiness are brought in, that the belief in a pri- mary and omnipotent cause becomes the belief in a veritable Divinity. But these latter attributes are not more essential to the divine nature than are the former. For as original and infinite power does not of itself constitute a God, neither is a God constituted by intelligence and virtue, unless intelligence and goodness be themselves conjoined with this original and infinite power. For even a Creator, intelhgent, and good, and powerful, would be no God, were he dependent for his intelH- gence and goodness and power on any higher principle. On this supposition, the perfections of the Creator are viewed as limited and derived. He is himself, therefore, only a depen- dency, — only a creature ; and if a God there be, he must be sought for in that higher principle, from which this subordinate principle derives its attributes. Now is this highest principle (ex hypothesi all-powerful) also intelligent and moral, then it is itself alone the veritable Deity ; on the other hand is it, though the author of intelligence and goodness in another, itself unin- telligent, — then is a blind Fate constituted the first and uni- versal cause, and atheism is asserted. Conditions of the proof of the existence of a God, — The peculiar attributes which distinguish a Deity from the original omnipotence or bhnd fate of the atheist, being thus those of intelligence and hohness of will, — - and the assertion of theism being only the assertion that the universe is created by intelli- gence, and governed not only by physical but by moral laws, we have next to consider how we are warranted in these two affirmations ; 1 ^, That intelligence stands first in the absolute order of existence, — in other words, that final preceded efficient causes ; and, 2°, That the universe is governed by moral laws. The proof of these two propositions is the proof of a God : and it establishes its foundation exclusively on the phaenomena of mind. I shall endeavor to show you this, in regard to both these propositions ; but, before considering how far the phse- nomena of mind and of matter do and do not allow us to infer 16 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. the one position or the other, I must solicit your attention to the characteristic contrasts which these two classes of phae- nomena in themselves exhibit. Contrasts of the phcenomena of matter and mind, — In the compass of our experience, we distinguish two series of facts, — the facts of the external or material world, and the facts of the internal world or world of intelligence. These concomitant series of phasnomena are not like streams which merely run parallel to each other ; they do not, hke the Alpheus and Are- thusa, flow on side by side without a comminghng of their waters. They cross, they combine, they are interlaced ; but notwithstanding their intimate connection, their mutual action and reaction, we are able to discriminate them without diffi- culty, because they are marked out by characteristic dif- ferences. The phaenomena of the material world are subjected to im- mutable laws, are produced and reproduced in the same inva- riable succession, and manifest only the blind force of a mechanical necessity. The phaenomena of man are, in part, subjected to the laws of the external universe. As dependent upon a bodily organi- zation, as actuated by sensual propensities and animal wants, he belongs to matter, and, in this respect, he is the slave of neces- sity. But what man holds of matter does not make up his personality. They are his, not he ; man is not an organism, — he is an intelligence served by organs. For in man there are tendencies, — there is a law, — which continually urge him to prove that he is more powerful than the nature by which he is surrounded and penetrated. He is conscious to himself of fac- ulties not comprised in the chain of physical necessity ; his intel- ligence reveals prescriptive principles of action, absolute and universal, in the Law of Duty, and a liberty capable of carrying that law into effect, in opposition to the solicitations, the im- pulsions, of his material nature. From the coexistence of these opposing, forces in man, there results a ceaseless struggle between physical necessity and moral liberty, — in the language of Revelation, between the Flesh and the Spirit ; and this UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 17 Struggle constitutes at once the distinctive character of human- ity, and the essential condition of human development and virtue. In the facts of intelligence, we thus become aware of an order of existence diametrically in contrast to that displayed to us in the facts of the material universe. There is made known to us an order of things, in which intelligence, by recognizing the unconditional law of duty and an absolute obligation to fulfil it, recognizes its own possession of a liberty incompatible with a dependence upon fate, and of a power capable of resisting and conquering the counteraction of our animal nature. Consciousness of freedom^ and of a law of duty, the condi- tions of Theology. — Now, it is only as man is a free intelli- gence, a moral power, that he is created after the image of God, and it is only as a spark of divinity glows as the life of our life in us, that we can rationally believe in an Intelligent Creator and Moral Governor of the universe. For, let us sup- pose, that in man intelligence is the product of organization, that our consciousness of moral liberty is itself only an illu- sion ; in short, that acts of volition are results of the same iron necessity which determines the phaenomena of matter ; — on this supposition, I say, the foundations of all religion, natural and revealed, are subverted. The truth of this will be best seen by applying the supposi- tion of the two positions of theism previously stated — namely, that the notion of God necessarily supposes, 1°, That in the absolute order of existence, intelligence should be first, that is, not itself the product of an unintelligent antecedent ; and, 2°, That the universe should be governed not only by physical, but by moral laws. Analogy between our experience and the absolute order of existence. — Now, in regard to the former, how can we attempt to prove that the universe is the creation of a free original intelligence, against the counter-position of the atheist, that lib- erty is an illusion, and intelligence, or the adaptation of means to ends, only the product of a blind fate ? As we know noth- ing of the absolute order of existence in itself, we can onlj 2* 18 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. attempt to infer its cliaracter from that of the particular order within the sphere of our experience ; and as we can affirm naught of mteUigence and its conditions, except what we may- discover from the observation of our own minds, it is evident that we can only analogically carry out into the order of the universe the relation in which we find intelligence to stand in the order of the human constitution. If in man intelligence be a free power, — in so far as its liberty extends, intelligence must be independent of necessity and matter ; and a powei independent of matter necessarily ijnplies the existence of an immaterial subject, — that is, a spirit. If, then, the original independence of intelligence on matter in the human constitu- tion, in other words, if the spirituality of mind in man, be sup- posed a datum of observation, in this datum is also given both the condition and the proof of a God. For we have only to infer, what analogy entitles us to do, that intelligence holds the same relative supremacy in the universe which it holds in us, and the first positive condition of a Deity is established, in the estabhshment of the absolute priority of a free creative intelli- gence. On the other hand, let us suppose the result of our study of man to be, that intelligence is only a product of mat- ter, only a reflex of organization, such a doctrine would not only afford no basis on which to rest arfy argument for a God, but, on the contrary, would positively warrant the atheist in denying his existence. For if, as the materialist maintains, the only intelligence of which we have any experience be a conse- quent of matter, — on this hypothesis, he not only caimot assume this order to be reversed in the relations of an intelli- gence beyond his observation, but, if he argue logically, he must positively conclude, that, as in man, so in the universe, the phaenomena of intelligence or design are only in their last analysis the products of a brute necessity. Psychological ma- terialism, if carried out fully and fairly to its conclusions, thus inevitably results in theological atheism ; as it has been well expressed by Dr. Henry More, nullus in microcosmo spiritus, nullus in macrocosmo Deus, I do not, of course, mean to assert that all matf^iialists deny, or actually disbelieve, a God. For, UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY.' VJ ill very many cases, this would be at once an unmerited compli- ment to their reasoning, and an unmerited reproach to their faith. Second condition of the proof of a Deity. — Such is the man- ifest dependence of our theology on our psychology in refer- ence to the first condition of a Deity, — the absolute priority of a free intelligence. But this is perhaps even more con- spicuous in relation to the second, that the universe is gov- erned not merely by physical but by moral laws ; for God is only God inasmuch as he is the Moral Governor of a Moral World. Our interest, also, in its establishment is incomparably greater ; for while a proof that the universe is the work of an omnipotent intelligence, gratifies only our speculative curiosity, — a proof that there is a holy legislator, by whom goodness and felicity will be ultimately brought into accordance, is necessary to satisfy both our intellect and our heart. A God is, indeed, to us, only of practical * interest, inasmuch as he is the condition of our immortality. Now, it is self-evident, in the first place, that, if there be no moral world, there can be no moral governor of such a world ; and, in the second, that we have, and can have, no ground on which to believe in the reality of a moral world, except in so far as we ourselves are moral agents. This being undeniable, it is further evident, that, should we ever be convinced that we are not moral agents, we should likewise be convinced that there exists no moral order in the universe, and no supreme intelli- gence by which that moral order is established, sustained, and regulated. Theology is thus again wholly dependent on Psychology ; for, with the proof of the moral nature of man, stands or falls the proof of the existence of a Deity.* ^ [It is chiefly, if not solely, to explain the one phenomenon of morality^ — oi freewill, that we are warranted in assuming a second and hyperphysi- cal substance, in an immaterial principle of thought ; for it is only on the supposition of a moral liberty in man, that we can attempt to vindicate, as truths, a moral order, and, consequently, a moral governor in the universe ; 20 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. Wherein the moral agency of man consists* — But in what does the character of man as a moral agent consist ? Man is a moral agent only as he is accountable for his actions, — in other words, as he is the object of praise or blame; and this he is, only inasmuch as he has prescribed to him a rule of duty, and as he is able to act, or not to act, in conformity with its precepts. The possibihty of morality thus depends on the possibility of liberty ; for, if man be not a free agent, he is not the author of his actions, and has^ therefore, no responsibility, — no moral personality at all. }^ How philosophy estaUishes human liberty. — Now the study of Philosophy, or mental science, operates in three ways to establish that assurance of human liberty, which is necessary for a rational belief in our own moral nature, in a moral world, and in a moral ruler of that world. In the first place, an atten- tive consideration of the phaenomena of mind is requisite in order to a luminous and distinct apprehension of hberty as a fact or datum of intelligence. For though, without philosophy, a natu- ral conviction of free agency lives and works in the recesses of every human mind, it requires a process of philosophical thought to bring this conviction to clear consciousness and scientific cer- tainty. In the second place, a profound philosophy is necessary and it is only on the hypothesis of a soul within us, that we can assert the reality of a God above us. In the hands of the materialist, or physical necessitarian, every argument for the existence of a Deity is either annulled or reversed into a demonstra- tion of atheism. In his hands, with the moral worth of man, the inference to a moral ruler of a moral universe is gone. In his hands, the argument from the adaptations of end and mean, everywhere apparent in existence, to the primary causality of intelligence and liberty, if applied, establishes, in fact, the primary causality of necessity and matter. For, as this argument IS only an extension to the universe of the analogy observed in man ; if in man, design, inteUigence, be only a phenomenon of matter, only a reflex of organization ; this consecution of first and second in us, extended to the universal order of things, reverses the absolute priority of intelligence to matter; that is, subverts the fundamental condition of a Deity. Tims it is, that our theology is necessarily founded on our psychology; that we must recognize a God in our own viinds, befoi'e we can detect a God in the universe of nature.] — Discussions. LTILLTY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 21 to obviate the difficulties which meet us v/hen we attempt to explain the possibility of this fact, and to prove that the datum of liberty is not a mere illusion. For though ah unconquerable feeling compels us to recognize ourselves as accountable, and therefore free, agents, still, when we attempt to realize in thought how the fact of our liberty can be, we soon find that this altogether transcends our understanding, and that every effort to bring the fact of liberty within the compass of our con- ceptions, only results in the substitution in its place of some more or less disguised form of necessity. For, — if I may be allowed to use expressions which many of you cannot be sup posed at present to understand, — we are only able to conceive a thing, inasmuch as we conceive it under conditions ; while the possibility of a free act supposes it to be an act which is not conditioned or determined. The tendency of a superficial phi- losophy is, therefore, to deny the fact of hberty, on the principle that what cannot be conceived is impossible. A deeper and more comprehensive study of the facts of mind overturns this conclusion, and disproves its foundation. It shows that, — so far from the principle being true, that what is inconceivable is impossible, — on the contrary, all that is conceivable is a mean between two contradictory extremes, both of which are incon- ceivable, but of which, as mutually repugnant, one or the other must be true. Thus philosophy, in demonstrating that the limits of thought are not to be assumed as the limits of possibil- ity, while it admits the weakness of our discursive intellect, reestablishes the authority of consciousness, and vindicates the veracity of our primitive convictions. It proves to us, from the very laws of mind, that while we can never understand how any original datum of intelligence is possible, we have no reason frona this inability to doubt that it is true. A learned ignorance is thus the end of philosophy, as it is the beginning of theology. In the third place, the study of mind is necessary to counter- balance and correct the influence of the study of matter ; and this utility of metaphysics rises in proportion to the progress of the natural sciences, and to the greater attention which they engross. 22 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. Twofold evil of exclusive physical study, — An exclusive de- votion to physical pursuits exerts an evil influence in two ways. Tn the first plac^, it diverts from all notice of the phaenomena of aoral liberty, which are revealed to us in the recesses of the human mind alone ; and it disqualifies from appreciating the import of these phaenomena, even if presented, by leaving un- cultivated the finer power of psychological reflection, in the exclusive exercise of the faculties employed in the easier and more amusing observation of the external world. In the second place, by exhibiting merely the phaenomena of matter and exten- sion, it habituates us only to the contemplation of an order in which every thing is determined by the laws of a blind or me- chanical necessity. Now, what is the inevitable tendency of this one-sided and exclusive study ? That the student becomes a materiahst, if he speculate at all. For, in the first place, he is familiar with the obtrusive facts of necessity, and is unaccus- tomed to develop into consciousness the more recondite facts of liberty ; he is, therefore, disposed to disbelieve in the existence of phaenomena whose reality he may deny, and whose possibility he cannot understand. At the same time, the love of unity, and the philosophical presumption against the multiplication of es- sences, determine him to reject the assumption of a second, and that an hypothetical, substance, — ignorant as he is of the rea- sons by which that assumption is legitimated. In the infancy of science, this tendency of physical study was not experienced. When men first turned their attention on the phaenomena of nature, every event was viewed as a miracle, for every effect was considered as the operation of an intelligence. God was not exiled from the universe^ of matter ; on the con- trary, he was multiplied in proportion to its phaenomena. As science advanced, the deities were gradually driven out; and long after the sublunary world had been disenchanted, they were left for a season in possession of the starry heavens. The movement of the celestial bodies, in which Kepler still saw the agency of a free intelligence, was at length by Newton resolved into a few mathematical principles ; and at last, even the irregu- larities which Newton was compelled to leave for the miraculous UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 23 correction of the Deity, have been proved to require no super- natural interposition ; for La Place has shown that all contin- gencies, past and future, in the heavens, fi];id their explanation in the one fundamental law of gravitation. But the very contemplation of an order and adaptation so astonishing, joined to the knowledge that this order and adapta- tion are the necessary results of a brute mechanism, — when acting upon minds which have not looked into themselves for the light of which the world without can only afford them the reflection, — far from elevating them more than any other aspect of external creation to that inscrutable Being who reigns beyond and above the universe of nature, tends, on the contrary, to im- press on them, with peculiar force, the conviction, that as the mechanism of nature can explain so much, the mechanism of nature can explaiu all. If all existence he hut mechanism^ pMlosopMcal interest extin- guished, — "Wonder," says Aristotle, "is the first cause of philosophy:" but in the discovery that all existence is but mechanism, the consummation of science would be an extinction of the very interest from which it originally sprang. " Even the gorgeous majesty of the heavens," says a religious philoso- pher, "the object of a kneeling adoration to an infant world, subdues no more the mind of him who comprehends the one mechanical law by which the planetary systems move, maintain their motion, and even originally form themselves. He no longer wonders at the object, infinite as it always is, but at the human intellect alone, which, in a Copernicus, Kepler, Gassendi, Newton, and La Place, was able to transcend the object, by science to terminate the miracle, to reave the heaven of its di- vinities, and to exorcise the universe. But even this, the only admiration of which our iutelligent faculties are now capable would vanish, were a future Hartley, Darwin, Condillac, oi Bonnet, to succeed in displaying to us a mechanical system of the human mind, as comprehensive, intelligible, and satisfactory as the Newtonian mechanism of the heavens." To this testimony I may add, that, should Physiology ever succeed in reducing the facts of intelligence to phaenomena of 24 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. matter, Philosophy would be subverted in the subversion of its three great objects, — God, Free- Will, and Immcrtalitj. True wisdom would then consist, not in speculation, but m repressing bought during our brief transit from nothingness to nothingness. For why ? Philosophy would have become a meditation, not merely of death, but of annihilation ; the precept, Kiioio thy- self^ would have been replaced by the terrific oracle to CEdipus — " May'st thou ne'er know the truth of what thou art ; " and the final recompense of our scientific curiosity would be wailing, deeper than Cassandra's, for the ignorance that saveO us from despair. Coincidence of these views with those of previous philoso- phers, — The views which I have now taken of the respective Influence of the sciences of mind and of matter in relation to our religious behef, are those which have been deliberately adopted by the profoundest thinkers, ancient and modern. Were I to quote to you the testimonies that crowd on my recol- lection, to the efiect that ignorance of Self is ignorance of God, I should make no end, for this is a truth proclauned by Jew and Gentile, Christian and Mohammedan. "The cause," says Plato, " of all impiety and irrehgion among men is, that, revers- ing in themselves the relative subordination of mind and body, they have, in like manner, in the universe, made that to be first which is second, and that to be second which is first ; for while, in the generation of all things, inteUigence and final causes pre- cede matter and efficient causes, they, on the contrary, have viewed matter and material things as absolutely prior, in the order of existence, to intelligence and design ; and thus, depart- ing from an original error in relation to themselves, they have ended in the subversion of the Godhead." The pious and profound Jacobi states the truth boldly and without disguise in regard to the relation of Physics and Meta- physics to Religion. " But is it unreasonable to confess, that we believe in God, not by reason of the nature * which con- ^ In the philosophy of Germany, Natur and its correlatives, whether of Greek or Latin derivation, are, in general, expressive of the world of Matter, in contrast to the world of Intelligence. UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. 25 ceals him, but by reason of the supernatural in man, which alone reveals and proves him to exist ? '' Nature conceals God : for through her whole domain. Nature reveals only fate, only an indissohible chain of mere efficient causes witJiout beginning and without end, excluding, with equal necessity, both providence and chance. An inde- pendent agency, a free original commencement within her sphere and proceeding from her powers, is absolutely impossi- ble. Workino; without will, she takes counsel neither of the good nor of the beautiful ; creating nothing, she casts up from her dark abyss only eternal transformations of herself, uncon- sciously and without an end ; furthering, with the same cease- less industry, decline and increase, death and life, — never pro- ducing what alone is of God and what supposes liberty, — the virtuous, the immortal. "- Man reveals God : for man, by his intelligence, rises above nature, and, in virtue of this intelligence, is conscious of himself as a power not only independent of, but opposed to, nature, and capable of resisting, conquering, and controlhng her. As man has a living faith in this power, superior to nature, which dwells in him ; so has he a belief in God, a feeling, an experience of his existence. As he does not believe in this power, so does he not beli®ve in God ; he sees, he experiences naught in exist- ence but nature, — necessity, — fate." These uses of Psychology not superseded hy the Christian revelation, — Such is the comparative importance of the sci- ences of mind and of matter in relation to the interests of religion. But it may be said, how great soever be the value of philosophy in this respect, were man left to rise to the divinity by the unaided exercise of his faculties, this value is superseded under the Christian dispensation, the Gospel now assuring us of all and more than all philosophy could ever warrant us in surmismg. It is true, indeed, that in Revelation there is con- tained a great complement of truths of which natural reason could afford us no knowledge or assurance ; but still the impor- tance of mental science to theology has not become superfluous in Christianity; for whereas, anterior to Revelation, religion 26 UTILITY OF THE STUDY OF PHILOSOPHY. rises out of psycliology as a result, subsequently to revelation, it supposes a genuine philosophy of mind as the condition of its truth. This is at once manifest. Revelation is a revelation to man and concerning man ; and man is only the object of revelation, inasmuch as he is a moral, a free, a responsible being. The Scriptures are replete with testimonies to our natural liberty ; and it is the doctrine of every Christian church, that man was originally created with a will capable equally of good as of evil, though this will, subsequently to the fall, has lost much of its primitive liberty. Christianity thus, by universal confession, supposes as a condition the moral nature of its object ; and if some individual theologians be found who have denied to man a higher liberty than a machine, this is only another example of the truth, that there is no opinion which has been unable to find not only its champions but its martyrs. The differences which divide the Christian churches on this question, regard only the Hberty of man in certain particular relations ; for fatalism, or a negation of human responsibility in general, is equally hostile to the tenets of the Calvinist and Arminian. In these circumstances, it is evident, that he who disbelieves the moral agency of man must, in consistency with that opinion, disbelieve Christianity. And therefore, inasmuch as Philoso- phy, — the Philosophy of Mind, — scientifically establishes the proof of human hberty, philosophy, in this, as in many other relations not now to be considered, is the true preparative and best aid of an enlightened Christian Theology. CHAPTER II. THE NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. You are about to commence a course of philosophical disci- pline ; — for Psychology is preeminently a philosophical science. It is therefore proper that you should obtain at least a notion of what philosophy is. But in affording you this information, it is evident that there lie considerable difficulties in the way. For the definition and the divisions of philosophy are the results of a lofty generalization from particulars, of which particulars you are, or must be presumed to be, still ignorant. You cannot, therefore, it is manifest, be made adequately to comprehend, in the commencement of your philosophical studies, notions which these studies themselves are intended to enable you to under- stand. But although you cannot at once obtain a full knowledge of the nature of philosophy, it is desirable that you should be enabled to form at least some vague conception of the road you are about to travel, and of the point to which it will conduct you. I mustj therefore, beg that you will, for the present, hypothetically believe, — believe upon authority, — what you may not now adequately understand ; but this only to the end that you may not hereafter be under the necessity of taking any conclusion upon trust. Nor is this temporary exaction of credit peculiar to philosophical education. In the order of nature, belief always precedes knowledge, — it is the condition of in- struction. The child (as observed by Aristotle) must believe, in order that he may learn ; and even the primary facts of intel- ligence, — the facts which precede, as they afford the conditions of, all knowledge, — would not be original, were they revealed to us under any other form than that of natural or necessary beliefs. (27i 28 NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. There are two question.s to be answered : — 1 st. What is the meaning of the name ? and 2d, What is the meaning of the thing f An answer to the former question is afforded in a nomi- nal definition of the term philosophy^ and in a history of its em- ployment and application. Philosophy — the name. — - In regard to the etymological sig- nification of the word. Philosophy is a term of Greek origin. It is a compound of qjiXog, a lover or friend, and Gocpia,^ wisdom — speculative wisdom. Philosophy is thus, literally, a love of wisdom. But if the grammatical meaning, of the word be un- ambiguous, the history of its application is, I think, involved in considerable doubt. According to the commonly received ac- count, the designation of philosopher (lover or suitor of wisdom) was first assumed and applied by Pythagoras ; whilst of the occasion and circumstances of its assumption, we have a story by Cicero, on the authority of Heraclides Ponticus. Pythagoras, once upon a time, says the Roman orator, having come to Phlius, a city of Peloponnesus, displayed, in a conversation which he had with Leon, who then governed that city, a range of knowl- edge so extensive, that the prince, admiring his eloquence and ability, inquired to what art he had principally devoted himself. Pythagoras answered, that he professed no art, and was simply a philosopher. Leon, struck by the novelty of the name, again inquired who were the philosophers, and in what they differed from other men. Pythagoras repHed, that human Kfe seemed to resemble the great fair, held on occasion of those solemn games which all Greece met to celebrate. For some, exercised in athletic contests, resorted thither in quest of glory and the crown of victory ; while a greater number flocked to them in order to buy and sell, attracted by the love of gain. There were a few, however, — and they were those distinguished by their liberality and mtelligence, — who came from no motive of glory or of gain, but simply to look about them, and to take note of what was done, and in what manner. So likewise, continued ^ 2o(pca in Greek, though sometimes used in a wide sense, like the term wise apphed to skill in handicraft, jet properly denoted speculative, not practical, wisdom or prudence. NATURE AND COMPKEIIENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. 29 Pythagoras, we men all make our entrance into this life on our departure from another. Some are here occupied in the pur- suit of honors, others in the search of riches ; a few there are wRo, indifferent to all else, devote themselves to an inquiry into the nature of things. These, then, are they whom I call stu- dents of wisdom, for such is meant by philosopher. The anecdote rests on very slender authority. It is proba- ble, I think, that Socrates was the first who adopted, or, at least, the first who familiarized, the expression. It was natural that he should be anxious to contradistinguish himself from the Sophists (ol ooq)ol, ol 6oq)ioral), literally, the wise men ; and no term could more appropriately ridicule the arrogance of these pretenders, or afford a happier contrast to their haughty desig- nation, than that of philosopher (^. e. the lover of wisdom) ; and, at the same time, it is certain that the substantives opikoaocfia and q)iX6(yoq.og first appear in the writings of the Socratic school. It is true, indeed, that the verb (ptloooqjslv is found in Herodotus, in the address by Croesus to Solon ; and that, too, in a participial form, to designate the latter as a man who had travelled abroad for the purpose of acquiring knowledge. It is, therefore, not impossible that, before the time of Socrates, those who devoted themselves to the pursuit of the higher branches of knowledge, were occasionally designated philoso- phers : but it is far more probable that Socrates and his school first appropriated the term as a distinctive appellation ; and that the word philosophy, in consequence of this appropriation, came to be employed for the complement of all higher knowl- edge, and, more especially, to denote the science conversant about the principles or causes of existence. The term philosophy/ , I may notice, which was originally assumed in modesty, soon lost its Socratic and etymological signification, and returned to the meaning of 6oq)ia, or wisdom. Quintilian calls it nomen inso- lentissimum ; Seneca, nomen invidiosum ; Epictetus counsels his scholars not to call themselves " Philosophers ; " and 'proud is one of the most ordinary epithets with which philosophy is now associated. Philosophy — the thing — its definitions, — So much for the 30 NATURE AND COMPKEHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. name signifying ; we proceed now to the thing signified. Were I to detail the various definitions of philosophy which philoso- phers have promulgated — far more, were I to explain the grounds on which the author of each maintains the exclusive adequacy of his peculiar definition — I should, in the present stage of your progress, only perplex and confuse you. All such definitions are (if not positively erroneous), either so vague that they afford no precise knowledge of their object ; or they are so partial, that they exclude what they ought to com- prehend ; or they are of such a nature that they supply no pre- liminary information, and are only to be understood (if ever), after a knowledge has been acquired of that which they profess to explain. It is, indeed, perhaps impossible adequately to define philosophy. For what is to be defined comprises what cannot be included in a single definition. For philosophy is not regarded from a single point of view ; — it is sometimes consid- ered as theoretical^ — that is, in relation to man as a thinking and cognitive intelligence ; sometimes as practical, — that is, in relation to man as a moral agent ; — and sometimes, as compre- hending both theory and practice. Again, philosophy may either be regarded objectively, that is, as a complement of truths known ; or subjectively, — that is, as a habit or quality of the mind knowing. In these circumstances, I shall not attempt a definition of philosophy, but shall endeavor to accomplish the end which every definition proposes, — make you understand, as precisely as the unprecise nature of the object-matter per- mits, what is meant by philosophy, and what are the sciences it properly comprehends within its sphere. Definitions in Greek antiquity. — As a matter of history, I may here, however, parenthetically mention, that in Greek antiquity, there were, in all, six definitions of philosophy which obtained celebrity. The first and second define philosophy from its object matter, — that which it is about ; the third aud fourth, from its end, — that for the sake of which it is ; the fifth, from its relative preeminence ; and the sixth, from ils ety- mology. The first of these definitions of philosophy is, — " the knowl NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. 31 edge of things existent as existent." The second is, — " the knowledge of things divine and human." These are both from the object-matter ; and both were referred to Pythagoras. The third and fourth, the two definitions of philosophy from its end, are, again, both taken from Plato. Of these, the third is, — " philosophy is a meditation of death ; " the fourth, — " philosophy is a resembling of the Deity in so far as that is competent to man." The fifth, that from its preeminence, was borrowed from Aristotle, and defined philosophy " the art of arts, and science , of sciences." Finally, the sixth, that from the etymology, was, hke the first and second, carried up to Pythagoras ; — it defined philosophy " the love of wisdom." To these a seventh and even an eighth were sometimes added ; — but the seventh was that by the physicians, who defined medicine the philosophy of bodies, and philosophy the medicine of souls. This was derided by the philosophers ; as, to speak with Homer, being an exchange of brass for gold, and of gold for brass, and as defining the more known by the less known. The eighth is from an expression of Plato, who, in the Thesetetus, calls philosophy " the greatest music," meaning thereby the harmony of the rational, irascible, and appetent parts of the soul. What Philosophy is, — But to return: All philosophy is knowledge, but all knowledge is not philosophy. Philosophy is, therefore, a kind of knowledge. Philosophical and empirical Icnowledge, — What, then, is philosophical knowledge, and how is it discriminated from knowledge in general ? We are endowed by our Creator with certain faculties of observation, which enable us to become aware of certain appearances or phaenomena. These faculties may be stated as two, — Sense, or External Perception, and Self-Consciousness, or Internal Perception ; and these faculties severally afford us the knowledge of a different series of phae- nomena. Through our senses, we apprehend what exists, or what o^.curs, in the external or material world ; by our self- 32 NATUKE AND COMPREHEISrSIOir 0>' PHILOSOPHY. consciousness, we apprehend what is, or what occurs, in the internal world, or world of thought. What is the extent, and what the certainty, of the knowledge acquired through sense and self-consciousness, we do not at present consider. It is now sufficient that the simple fact be admitted^ that we do actually thus know ; and that fact is so manifest, that it re- quires, I presume, at my hands, neither proof nor illustration. The information which we thus receive, — that certain phse- nomena are, or have been, is called Historical or Empirical knowledge. It is called historical, because, in this knowledge, we know only the fact, only that the phsenomenon is ; for his- tory is properly only the narration of a consecutive series of phaenomena in time, or the description of a coexistent series of phsenomena in space. Civil history is an example of the one ; natural history, of the other. It is called empirical or experien- tial^ if we might use that term, because it ib given us by expe- rience or observation, and not obtained as the result of infer- ence or reasoning. By-meaning of the term empirical. — I may notice, by paren- thesis, that you must discharge from your minds the by-meaning accidentally associated with the word empiric^ or empirical, in common Enghsh. This term is, with us, more familiarly used in reference to medicine, and from its fortuitous employment in that science, in a certain sense, the word empirical has unfortu- nately acquired, in our language, a one-sided and an unfavora- ble meaning. Of the origin of this meaning many of you may not be aware. You are aware, however, that £^7t£i{)ia is the Greek term for experience, and tiiTtsiQixog an epithet applied to one who uses experience. Now, among the Greek physicians, there arose a sect who, professing to employ experience alone, to the exclusion of generalization, analogy, and reasoning, de- nominated themselves distinctively ol tii7iaiQi>coi — the Empirics. The opposite extreme was adopted by another sect, who, reject- ing observation, founded their doctrine exclusively on reasoning and theory; — and these called themselves ol [Ae\}odixoi — or Methodists. A third school, of whom Galen was the head, opposed equally to the two extreme sects of the Empirics and NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. 33 of the Methodists, and, availing themselves both of experience and reasoning, were styled ol doyixanxot — the Dogmatists, or rational physicians. A keen controversy arose ; the Empirics were defeated ; they gradually died out ; and their doctrine, of which nothing is known to us, except through the writings of their adversaries, has probably been painted in blacker colors than it deserved. Be this, however, as it may, the word was first naturalized in EngHsh, at a time when the Galenic works were of paramount authority in medicine, as a term of medical import — of medical reproach; and the collateral meaning, which it had accidentally obtained in that science, was asso- ciated with an unfavorable signification, so that an Empiric, in common English, has been long a synonyme for a charlatan or quack-doctor, and, by a very natural extension, in general, for any ignorant pretender in science. In philosophical language, the term empirical means simply what belongs to, or is the pro- duct of, experience or observation, and, in contrast to another term afterwards to be explained, is now technically in general use through every other country of Europe. Were there any other word to be found of a corresponding signification in Eng- lish, it would perhaps, in consequence of the by-meaning attached to empirical, be expedient not to employ this latter. But there is not. Experiential is not in common use, and experimental only designates a certain kind of experience — namely, that in which the fact observed has been brought about by a certain intentional prearrangement of its coefficients. But this by the way. Empirical knowledge. — Returning, then, from our digression : Historical or empirical knowledge is simply the knowledge that something is. Were we to use the expression, the knowledge that, it would sound awkward and unusual in our modern lan- guages. In Greek, the most philosophical of all tongues, its parallel, however, was familiarly employed, more especially in the Aristotelic philosophy, in contrast to another knowledge of which we are about to speak. It was called the to ort, ri rvojcig on eariv. I should notice, that with us, the knowledge that, is commonly called the knowledge of the fact. As examples of 34 NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. empirical knowledge, take the facts, whether known on our own experience or on the testified experience of others, — that a stone falls, — that smoke ascends, — that the leaves bud in spring and fall in autumn, — that such a book contains such a passage, — that such a passage contains such an opinion, — that Caesar, that Charlemagne, that Napoleon, existed. [Empirical IS also used in contrast with Necessary knowledge; the former fiignifying the knowledge simply of what is, the latter of what must be.] Philosophical knowledge — what — But things do not exist, events do not occur, isolated, — apart — by themselves ; they exist, they occur, and are by us conceived, only in connection. Our observation affords us no example of a phsenomenon which is not an effect ; nay, our thought cannot even realize to itself the possibility of a phaenomenon without a cause. We do not at present inquire into the nature of the connection of effect and cause, — either in reality, or in thought. It is sufficient for our present purpose to observe that, while, by the constitution of our nature, we are unable to conceive any thing to begin to be, without referring it to some cause, — still the knowledge of its particular cause is not involved in the knowledge of any particular effect. By this necessity which we are under, of thinking some cause for every phaenomenon ; and by our origi- nal ignorance of what particular causes belong to what particular effects, — it is rendered impossible for us to acquiesce in the mere knowledge of the fact of a phaenomenon : on the contrary, we are determined, — we are necessitated, to regard each phae- nomenon as only partially known, until we discover the causes on which it depends for its existence. For example, we are struck with the appearance in the heavens called a rainbow. Think we cannot that this phaenomenon has no cause, though we may be wholly ignorant of what that cause is. Now, our knowledge of the phaenomenon as a mere fact, — as a mere isolated event, — does not content us ; we therefore set about an inquiry into the cause, — which the constitution of our mind compels us to suppose, — and at length, discover that the rain- bow is the effect of the refraction of the solar rays by the watery NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY. 35 particles of a cloud. Having ascertained the cause, but not till then, we are satisfied that we fully know the effect. Now, this knowledge of the cause of a phienomenon is differ- ent from, is something more than, the knowledge of that phae- nomenon simply as a fact ; and these two cognitions or knowl- edges have, accordingly, received different names. The latter, we have seen, is called historical or empirical knowledge ; the former is called philosophical^ or scientijic, or rational knowl- edge. Historical, is the knowledge that a thing is — philo- sophical, is the knowledge why or how it is. And as the Greek language, with peculiar felicity, expresses historical knowledge by the on. — the yvdjaig on eon : so, it well expresses philo- sophical knowledge by the dion — the yvcSoig dwn ean, though here its relative superiority is not the same. To recapitulate what has now been stated : — There are two kinds or degrees of knowledge. The first is a knowledge that a thing is — on XQW^^ ^'^'^'' ^^^^ ^^^^ > — ^^^ i^ ^^ called the knowledge of the fact, historical or empirical knowledge. The second is a knowl- edge why or how a thing is, bion XQiJiic^ sen, cur res sit ; — and is termed the knowledge of the cause, philosophical, scientific, rational knowledge. Philosophy implies a search after Jirst causes.-— Vhilo^o^hiddl knowledge, in the widest acceptation of the term, and as synony- mous with science, is thus the knowledge of effects as dependent on their causes. Now, what does this imply? In the first place, as every cause to which we can ascend is itself also an effect, — it follows that it is the scope, that is, the aim of phi- losophy, to trace up the series of effects and causes, until we arrive at causes which are not also themselves effects. These first causes do not indeed lie within the reach of philosophy, nor even within the sphere of our comprehension ; nor, consequently, on the actual reaching them does the existence of philosophy depend. But as pliilosophy is the knowledge of effects in their causes, the tendency of philosophy is ever upwards ; and phi- losophy can, in thought, in theory, only be viewed as accom- plished, — which in reality it never can be, — when the ultimate causes, — the causes on which all other causes depend, — have been attained and understood. 36 NATURE AND COxMPREHENSlON OF PHILOSOPHY. But, in the second place, as every effect is only produced by the concurrence of at least two causes (and by cause, be it ob- served, I mean every thing without which the effect could not he realized), and as these concurring or coefficient causes, in fact, constitute the effect, it follows, that the lower we descend in the series of causes, the more complex will be the product ; and that the higher we ascend, it will be the more simple. Let us take, for example, a neutral salt. This, as you probably know is the product, the combination, of an alkali and an acid. Now, considering the salt as an effect, what are the concurrent causes, — the co-efficients, — which constitute it what it is ? These are, Jirst, the acid, with its affinity to the alkali ; secondly, the alkali, with its affinity to the acid ; and thirdly, the trans- lating force (perhaps the human hand) which made their affin- ities available, by bringing the two bodies within the sphere of mutual attraction. Each of these three concurrents must be considered as a partial cause ; for, abstract any one, and the effect is not produced. Now, these three partial causes are each of them again effects ; but effects evidently less complex than the effect which they, by their concurrence, constituted. But each of these three constituents is an effect ; and therefore to be analyzed into its causes ; and these causes again into others, until the procedure is checked by our inability to resolve the last constituent into simpler elements. But, though thus unable to carry our analysis beyond a limited extent, we neither conceive, nor are we able to conceive, the constituent in which our analysis is arrested, as itself any thing but an effect. We therefore carry on the analysis in imagination ; and as each step in the procedure carries us from the more complex to the more simple, and, consequently, nearer to unity, we at last arrive at that unity itself, — at that ultimate cause which, as ultimate, cannot again be conceived as an effect.* =^ I may notice that an ultimate cause, and a first cause, are the same^ but viewed in different relations. What is called the ultimate cause in as- cending from effects to causes, — that is, in the regressive order, is called the first cause in descending from causes to ^effects, — that is, in the pro- gressive order. i- NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF PPIILOSOPHY. 37 Philosophy thus, as the knowledge of effects in their causes, necessarily tends, not towards a plurality of ultimate or first causes, but towards one alone. This first cause, — the Creator, — it can indeed never reach, as an object of immediate knowl- edge ; but, as the convergence towards unity in the ascending series is manifest, in so far as that series is within our view, and as it is even impossible for the mind to suppose the convergence not continuous and complete, it follows, — unless all analogy be rejected, — unless our intelligence be declared a lie, — that we must, philosophically, believe in that ultimate or primary unity which, in our present existence, we are not destined in itself to apprehend. Such is philosophical knowledge in its most extensive signifi- cation ; and, in this signification, all the sciences, occupied in the research of causes, may be viewed as so many branches of philosophy. There is, however, one section of these sciences which is denominated philosophical by preeminence ; — sci- ences which the term philosophy exclusively denotes, when employed in propriety and rigor. What these sciences are, and why the term philosophy has been specially limited to them, I shall now endeavor to make you understand. Alan's knowledge relative, — " Man," says Protagoras, " is the measure of the universe ; " and, in so far as the universe is an object of human knowledge, the paradox is a truth. Whatever we know, or endeavor to know, God or the world, — mind or matter, — the distant or the near, — we know, and can know, only in so far as we possess a faculty of knowing in general ; and we can only exercise that faculty under the laws which control and limit its operations. However great, and infinite, and various, therefore, may be the universe and its contents, — these are known to us, not as they exist, but as our mind is capable of knowing them. Hence the brocard — " Quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum recipientis." In the first place, therefore, as philosophy is a knowledge, and as all knowledge is only possible under the conditions to which our faculties are subjected, — the grand, the primary, problem of philosophy must be to investigate and determine 4 38 NATURE 4.ND COMPREHENSION OF PHILOSOPHY these conditions, as the necessary conditions of its own possi* bility. The study of mind the first ohject of philosophy, — In the second place, as philosophy is not merely a knowledge, but a knowledge of causes, and as the mind itself is the universal and principal concurrent cause in every act of knowledge ; phi- losophy is, consequently, bound to make the mind its first and paramount object of consideration. The study of mind is thus the philosophical study by preeminence. There is no branch of philosophy which does not suppose this as its prehminary, which does not borrow from this its light. A considerable number, indeed, are only the science of mind viewed in particu- lar aspects, or considered in certain special applications. Logicj for example, or the science of the laws of thought, is only a fragment of the general science of mind, and presupposes a certain knowledge of the operations which are regulated by these laws. Ethics is the science of the laws which govern our actions as moral agents ; and a knowledge of these laws is only possible through a knowledge of the moral agent himself. Political science, in like manner, supposes a knowledge of man in his natural constitution, in order to appreciate the modifica- tions which he receives, and of which he is susceptible, in social and civil life. The Fine Arts have all their foundation in the theory of the beautiful ; and this theory is afibrded by that part of the philosophy of mind, which is conversant Avith the phae- nomena of feehng. Religion, Theology, in fine, is not inde- pendent of the same philosophy. For as God only exists for us as we have faculties capable of apprehending his existence, and of fulfilling his behests, nay, as the phgenomena from which we are warranted to infer his being are wholly mental, the exam- ination of these faculties and of these phaenomena is, conse- quently, the primary condition of every sound theology. In short, the science of mind, whether considered in itself, or in relation to the other branches of our knowledge, constitutes the principal and most important object of philosophy, — consti- tutes in propriety, with its suit of dependent sciences, philoso- phy itself. NATURE AND COMPREHENSION OF rillLOSOriJY. 39 Misapplication of the term Philosoplty in England, — Tlie limitation of the term Philosophy to the sciences of mind, when not expressly extended to the other branches of science, has been always that generally prevalent ; — yet it must be confessed that, in this country, the word is applied to subjects with which, on the continent of Europe, it is rarely, if ever, associated. With us, the word philosophy, taken by itself, does not call up the precise and limited notion which it does to a German, a Hollander, a Dane, an Italian, or a Frenchman ; and we are obliged to say the philosophy of mind, if we do not wish it to be vaguely extended to the sciences conversant with the phasnomena of matter. We not only call Physics by the name of Natural Philosophy, but every mechanical process has with us its philosophy. We have books on the philosophy of Manufactures, the philosophy of Agriculture, the philosophy of Cookery, etc. In all this we are the ridicule of other nations. Socrates, it is said, brought down philosophy from the clouds, — the English have degraded her to the kitchen ; and this, our prostitution of the term, is, by foreigners, alleged as a sig- nificant indication of the low state of the mental sciences in Britain. From what has been said, you will, without a definition, be able to form at least a general notion of what is meant by phi- losophy. In its more extensive signification, it is equivalent to a ' knowledge of things hy their causes, — and this is, in fact, Aristotle's definition ; while, in its stricter meaning, it is con- fined to the sciences which constitute, or hold immediately of, the science of mind. CHAPTER III. THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY, AKD THE DISPOSITIONS WITH WHICH IT OUGHT TO BE STUDIED. The causes of philosophy, — Having thus endeavored to make you vaguely apprehend what cannot be precisely under- stood, — the Nature and Comprehension of Philosophy, — I now proceed to another question, — What are the Causes of Philosophy ? The causes of philosophy lie in the original ele- ments of our constitution. We are created with the faculty of knowledge, and, consequently, created with the tendency to exert it. Man philosophizes as he lives. He may philosophize well or ill, but philosophize he must. Philosophy can, indeed, only be assailed through philosophy itself. " If," says Aristotle, in a passage preserved to us by Olympiodorus, " we must phi- losopliize, we must philosophize ; if we must not philosophize, we must philosophize ; — in any case, therefore, we must phi- losophize." " Were philosophy," says Clement of Alexandria, " an evil, still philosophy is to be studied, in order that it may be scientifically contemned." And Averroes, — " Philosophi solum est spernere philosophiam." Of the causes of philoso- phy some are, therefore, contained in man's very capacity for knowledge ; these are essential and necessary. But there are others, again, which lie in certain feelings with which he is endowed ; these are complementary and assistant. Essential Causes of Philosophy, — Of the former class, — that is, of the essential causes, — there are in all two: the one is, the necessity we feel to connect Causes with Effects ; the other, to carry up our knowledge into Unity, These tendencies, however, if not identical in their origin, coincide in their result ; for, as I have previously explained to you, in ascending from (40) THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. 41 cause to cause, we necessai'ily (could we carry our analysis to its issue), arrive at absolute unity. Indeed, were it not a dis- cussion for which you are not as yet prepared, it might be shown, that both principles originate in the same condition ; — that both emanate, not from any original power, but from the same original powerlessness of mind. 1. The principle of Cause and Effect, — Of the former, — namely, the tendency, or rather the necessity, whi-ch we feel to connect the objects of our experience with others which afford the reasons of their existence, — it is needful to say but little. The nature of this tendency is not a matter on which we can at present enter ; and the fact of its existence is too notorious to require either proof or illustration. It is sufficient to say, or rather to repeat what we have already stated, that the mind is unable to realize in thought the possibility of any absolute commencement ; it cannot conceive that any thing which begins to be is any thing more than a new modification of preexistent elements ; it is unable to view any individual thing as other than a link in the mighty chain of being ; and every isolated object is viewed by it only as a fragment which, to be known, must be known in connection with the whole of which it constitutes a part.* It is thus that we are unable to rest satisfied with a ^ [The phenomenon is this : — When aware of a new appearance, we are unable to conceive that therein has originated any new existence, and are, therefore, constrained to think, that what now appears to us under a new form, had previously an existence under others, — others conceivable by us or not. These others (for they are always plural) are called its cause ; for a cause is simply every thing without which the effect would not result, and all such concurring, the effect cannot but result. We are utterly un- able to construe it in thought as possible, that the complement of existence has been either increased or diminished. We cannot conceive, either, on the one hand, nothing becoming something, or, on the other, something becoming nothing. When God is said to create the universe out of noth- ing, we think this, by supposing that he evolves the universe out of nothing but himself; and, in like manner, we conceive annihilation, only by con- ceiving the Creator to withdraw his creation, by withdrawing his creative energy from actuality into power The mind is thus compelled to recognize an absolute identity of existence in the effect and in the comf)le- ment of its causes, — between the causaium and the causce. We think the 4=^ 42 THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. mere historical knowledge of existence ; and that even our happiness is interested in discovering causes, hypothetical at least, if not real, for the various phagnomena of the existence of which our experience informs us. " Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas." 2. The love of Unity, — The second tendency of our nature, of which philosophy is the result, is the desire of Unity. Oiv this, which indeed involves the other, it is necessary to be some what more explicit. This tendency is one of the most promi- nent characteristics of the human mind. It, in part, originates in the imbecility of our faculties. We are lost in the multitude of the objects presented to our observation, and it is only by assorting them in classes that we can reduce the infinity of nature to the finitude of mind. The conscious Ego, the con- scious Self, by its nature one, seems also constrained to require that unity by which it is distinguished, in every thing which it receives, and in every thing which it produces. I regret that I can illustrate this only by examples which carlnot, I am aware, as yet be fully intelligible to all. We are conscious of a scene presented to our senses only by uniting its parts into a perceived whole. Perception is thus a unifying act. The Imagination cannot represent an object without uniting, in a single combina- tion, the various elements of which it is composed. Generali- zation is only the apprehension of the one in the many, and language little else than a registry of the factitious unities of thought. The Judgment cannot affirm or deny one notion of another, except by uniting the two in one indivisible act of com- parison. Syllogism is simply the union of two judgments in a third. Reason, Intellect, ^vovg, in fine, concatenating thoughts and objects into system, and tending always upwards from par- ticular facts to general laws, from general laws to universal principles, is never satisfied in its ascent till it comprehend causes to contain all that is contained in tlie effect ; the effect to contain nothing but what is contained in the causes. Each is the sum of the other. " Omnia mutantur. nLhil interit."] — Discussions. THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. 43 (what, however, it can never do) all laws in a single formula, and consummate all conditional knowledge in the unity of un- conditional existence. Nor is it only in science that the mind desiderates the one. We seek it equally in works of art. A work of art is only deserving of the name, inasmuch as an idea of the work has preceded its execution, and inasmuch as it is itself a realization of the ideal model in sensible forms. All languages express the mental operations by words which denote a reduction of the many to the one. ^^vvsaig, TieQiltjxpig, avvai- Ox^ijaig^ ovvemyfcjaig, etc. in Greek ; — in Latin, cogere, (co-agere), cogitare^ (co-agitare)^ concipere^ cognoscere^ comprehenderej con- scire^ with their derivatives, may serve for examples. Testimonies to the love of Unity, — The history of philoso- phy is only the history of this tendency ; and philosophers have amply testified to its reality. " The mind," says Anaxagoras, " only knows when it subdues its objects, when it reduces the many to the one." " All knowledge," say the Platonists, " is the gathering up into one, and the indivisible apprehension of this unity by the knowing mind." Leibnitz and Kant have, in like manner, defined knowledge by the representation of multi- tude in unity. " The end of philosophy," says Plato, " is the intuition of unity ; " and Plotmus, among many others, observes that our knowledge is perfect as it is one. The love of unity is by Aristotle apphed to solve a multitude of psychological phsenomena. St. Augustin even analyzes pain into a feeling of the frustration of unity. " Quid est enim aliud dolor, nisi quidam sensus divisionis vel corruptionis impatiens ? Unde luce clarius apparet, quam sit ilia anima in sui corporis universitate avida unitatis et tenax." Love of unity a guiding principle in philosophy. — This love of unity, this tendency of mind to generalize its knowledge, leads us to anticipate in nature a corresponding uniformity ; and as this anticipation is found in harmony with experience, it not only affords the efficient cause of philosophy, but the guiding principle to its discoveries. " Thus, for instance, when it is observed that solid bodies are compressible, we are inclined to expect that liquids will be found to be so likewise ; we sub- 44 THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. ject them, consequently, to a series of experiments ; nor do we rest satisfied until it be proved that this quality is common to both classes of substances. Compressibility is then proclaimed a physical law, — a law of nature in general ; and we experi- ence a vivid gratification in this recognition of unconditioned universality." Another example ; Kant, reflecting on the dif- ferences among the planets, or rather among the stars revolving round the sun, and having discovered that these difierences be- trayed a uniform progress and proportion, — a proportion which was no longer to be found between Saturn and the first of the comets, — the law of unity and the analogy of nature, led him to conjecture that, in the intervening space, there existed a star, the discovery of which would vindicate the universahty of the law.* This anticipation was verified. Uranus was discovered by Herschel, and our dissatisfaction at the anomaly appeased. Franklin, in hke manner, surmised that lightning and the electric spark were identical ; and when he succeeded in verifying this conjecture, our love of unity was gratified. From the moment an isolated fact is discovered, we endeavor to refer it to other facts which it resembles. Until this be accomplished, we do not view it as understood. This is the case, for example, with sulphur, which, in a certain degree of temperature melts like other bodies, but at a higher degree of .Jieat, instead of evapo- rating, again consohdates. When a fact is generalized, our discontent is quieted, and we consider the generality itself as tan- tamount to an explanation. Why does this apple fall to the ground? Because all bodies gravitate towards each other. Arrived at this general fact, we inquire no more, although igno- rant now as previously of the cause of gravitation ; for gravi- tation is nothing more than a name for a general fact, the why of which we know not. A mystery, if recognized as universal, would no longer appear mysterious. ^ Kant's conjecture was founded on a supposed progressive increase in the eccentricities of the planetary orbits. This progression, however, is only true of Venus, the Earth, Jupiter, and Saturn. The eccentricity di- minishes again in Uranus, and still more in Neptune. Subsequent discov- eries have thus rather weakened than confirmed the theory. — English Editors. THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. 45 The love of unity also a source of error, — " But this thirst of unity," as Garnier remarks, " this tendency of mind to gen- erahze its knowledge, and our concomitant belief in -the uni- formity of natural phoBnomena, is not only an effective mean of discovery, but likewise an abundant source of error. Hardly is there a similarity detected between two or three facts', than men hasten to extend it to all others ; and if, perchance, the similarity has been detected by ourselves, self-love closes our eyes to the contradictions which our theory may encounter from experience." " I have heard," says Condillac, " of a phi- losopher who had the happiness of thinking that he had dis- covered a principle which was to explain all the wonderful phgenomena of chemistry, and who, in the ardor of his self- gratulation, hastened to communicate his discovery to a skilful chemist. The chemist had the kindness to Hsten to him, and then calmly told him that there was but one unfortunate circum- stance for his discovery, — that the chemical facts were precisely the converse of what he had supposed them to be. ' Well, then,' said the philosopher, ' have the goodness to tell me what they are, that I may explain them on my system.' " We are naturally disposed to refer every thing we do not know to prin- ciples with which we are familiar. As Aristotle observes, the early Pythagoreans, who first studied arithmetic, were induced, by their scientific predilections, to explain the problem of the universe by the properties of number ; and he notices also that a certain musical philosopher was, in hke manner, led to suppose that the soul was but a kind of harmony. The musician sug- gests to my recollection a passage of Dr. Reid. " Mr. Locke," says he, " mentions an eminent musician who believed that God created the world in six days, and rested the seventh, because there are but seven notes in music. I myself," he continues, "knew one of that profession who thought there could be only three parts in harmony — to wit, bass, tenor, and treble ; be- cause there are but three persons in the Trinity." The alche- mists would see in. nature only a single metal, clothed with the different appearances which we denominate gold, silver, copper, iron, mercury, etc., and they confidently explained the mysteries, 46 THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. not only of nature, but of religion, by salt, sulphur, and mer- cury. Some of our modern zoologists recoil from the possibility .^f naturae working on two different plans, and rather than renounce the unity which delights them, they insist on recogniz- ing the wings of insects in the gills of fishes, and the sternum of quadrupeds in the antennge of butterflies ; — and all this that they may prove that man is only the evolution of a molluscum ! Descartes saw in the physical world only matter and motion ; and, more recently, it has been maintained that thought itself is only a movement of matter. Of all the faculties of the mind, Condiliac recognized only one, which transformed itself like the Protean metal of the alchemists ; and he maintains that our belief in the rising of to-morrow's sun is a sensation. It is this tendency, indeed, which has principally determined philosophers, as we shall hereafter see, to neglect or violate the original duality of consciousness ; in which, as an ultimate fact, — a self and not-self, — mind knowing and matter known, — are given in counterpoise and mutual opposition; and hence the three Unitarian schemes of Materialism, Idealism, and Absolute Identity. In fine, Pantheism, or the doctrine which identifies mind and matter, — the Creator and the creature, God and the universe, — how are we to explain the prevalence of this modi- fication of atheism in the most ancient and in the most recent times? Simply because it carries our love of unity to its high- est fruition. Influence of preconceived opinion reducible to love of unity, — To this love of unity — - to this desire of reducing the objects of our knowledge to harmony and system — a source of truth and discovery if subservient to observation, but of error and delusion if allowed to dictate to observation what phsenomena are to be perceived ; to this principle, I say, we may refer the influence which preconceived opinions exercise upon our perceptions and our judgments, by inducing us to see and require only what is in unison with them. What we wish, says Demosthenes, that we believe ; what we expect, says Aristotle, that we find ; — truths which have been reechoed by a thousand confessors, and confii-med by ten thousand examples. Opinions once adopted THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. 47 become part of the intellectual system of their holders. If op- posed to prevalent doctrines, self-love defends them as a point of honor, exaggerates whatever may confirm, overlooks or ex- tenuates whatever may contradict. Again, if accepted as a general doctrine, they are too often recognized, in consequence of their prevalence, as indisputable truths, and all counter ap- pearances peremptorily overruled as manifest illusions. Thus it is that men will not see in the pheenomena what alone is to be seen ; in their observations they interpolate and they expunge ; and this mutilated and adulterated product they call a fact. And why ? Because the real phoenomena, if admitted, would spoil the pleasant .music of their thoughts, and convert its facti- tious harmony into discord. " Quae volunt sapiunt, et nolunt sapere quae vera sunt." In consequence of this, many a system, professing to be reared exclusively on observation and fact, rests in reality mainly upon hypothesis and fiction. A pretended ex- perience is, indeed, the screen behind which every illusive doc- trine regularly retires. " There are more false facts," says Cullen, " current in the world, than false theories ; " — and the livery of Lord Bacon has been most ostentatiously paraded by many who were no members of his household. Fact, — obser- vation, — induction, have always been the watchwords of those who have dealt most extensively in fancy. It is now above three centuries since Agrippa, in his Vanity of the Sciences^ ob- served of Astrology, Physiognomy, and Metoposcopy (the Phrenology of those days), that experience was professedly their only foundation and their only defence : " Solent omnes illas divinationum prodigiosae artes non, nisi experientiae titulo, se defendere et se objectionum vinculis extricare." It was on this ground, too, that, at a later period, the great Kepler vindi- cated the first of these arts. Astrology. " For," said he, " how could the principle of a science be false, where experience showed that its predictions were uniformly fulfilled." Now, truth was with Kepler even as a passion ; and his, too, was one of the most powerful intellects that ever cultivated and promoted a science. To him, astronomy, indeed, owes perhaps even more than to Newton. And yet, even his great mind, preoccupied 48 THE CAUSES OF PHILOSOPHY. with a certain prevalent belief, could observe and judge only in conformity with that belief. This tendency to look at realities only through the spectacles of an hypothesis,* is perhaps seen most conspicuously in the fortunes of medicine. The history of that science is, in truth, little else than an incredible narrative of the substitution of fictions for facts ; the converts to an hy- pothesis (and every, the most contradictory, doctrine has had its day), regularly seeing and reporting only in conformity with its dictates. The same is also true of the philosophy of mind ; and the variations and alternations in this science, which are perhaps only surpassed by those in medicine, are to be traced to a refusal of the real phaenomenon revealed in consciousness, and to the substitution of another, more in unison with preconceived opinions of what it ought to be. Nor, in this commutation of fact with fiction, should we suspect that there is any mala fides. Prejudice, imagination, and passion sufficiently explain the illu- sion. " Fingunt simul creduntque." "When," says Kant, " we have once heard a bad report of this or that individual, we in- continently think that we read the rogue in his countenance ; fancy here mingles with observation, which is still further vitiated when affection or passion interferes." Auxiliary cause of jphilosophy — Wonder, — Such are the two intellectual necessities which afford the two principal sources of philosophy : — the intellectual necessity of refunding effects into their causes ; — and the intellectual necessity of carrying up our knowledge into unity or system. But, besides these intellectual necessities, which are involved in the very existence of our faculties of knowledge, there is another powerful subsidi- ary to the same effect, — in a certain affection of our capacities of feeling. This feeling, according to circumstances, is denomi- nated surprise^ astonishment^ admiration, wonder, and, when blended with the intellectual tendencies we have considered, it obtains the name of curiosity. This feeling, though it cannot, as some have held, be allowed to be the principal, far less the only, cause of philosophy, is, however, a powerful auxiliary to speculation ; and, though inadequate to account for the existence of philosophy absolutely, it adequately explains the preference THE CAUSES OF FHILOSOPDY. 49 with which certain parts of j)hilosophy have been cultivated, and the order in which philosophy in general has been devel- oped. We may err both in exaggerating, and in extenuating, its influence. Wonder ha>^ been conieni[)tuously called the daughter of ignorance ; true ! but wonder, we should add, is the mother of knowledge. Among others, Plato, Aiistotle, Plu- tarch, and Bacon liave all concurred in testifying to the influ- ence of this principle. " Admiration," says the Platonic Socrates in the Thecetetus, — " admiration is a highly philosophical aifec- tion ; indeed, there is no other principle of philosophy but this." — " That philosophy," says Aristotle, " was not originally studied for any practical end, is manifest from those who first began to philosophize. It was, in fact, wonder, which then, as now, determined men to philosophical researches. Among the phsenomena presented to them, their admiration was first di- rected to those more proximate and more on a level with their powers, and then, rising by degrees, they came at length to de- mand an explanation of the higher phsenomena, — as the dif- ferent states of the moon, sun, and stars, — and the origin of the universe. Now, to doubt and to be astonished is to recognize our ignorance. Hence it is, that the lover of wisdom is, in a certain sort, a lover of mythi, (cpiXoiivd^og TZoog) ; for the subject of mythi is the astonishing and marvellous. If, then, men phi- losophize to escape ignorance, it is clear that they pursue knowl- edge on its own account, and not for the sake of any foreign utility. This is proved by the fact ; for it was only after all that pertained to the wants, welfare, and conveniences of life had been discovered, that men commenced their philosophical researches. It is, therefore, manifest that we do not study philosophy for the sake of any thing ulterior; and, as we call him a free man who belongs to himself and not to another, so philosophy is, of all sciences, the only free or liberal study, for it alone is unto itself an end." — " It is the business of philosophy," says Plutarch, "to investigate,, to admire, and to doubt." Wonder explains the order in which objects are studied, — We have already remarked, that the principle of wonder 5 50 THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. affords an explanation of the order in which the different objects of philosophy engaged the attention of mankind. The aim of all philosophy is the discovery of principles, that is, of higher causes ; but, in the procedure to this end, men first endeavored to explain those phaenomena which attracted their sj.ttention by arousing their wonder. The child is wholly ab- sorbed in the observation of the world without; the world within first engages the contemplation of the man. As it is with the individual, so was it with the species. Philosophy, before attempting the problem of inteUigence, endeavored to resolve the problem of nature. The spectacle of the external universe was too imposing not first to soKcit curiosity, and to direct upon itself the prelusive efforts of philosophy. Thales and Pythagoras, in whom philosophy finds its earKest represent- atives, endeavored to explain the organization of the universe, and to substitute a scientific for a religious cosmogony. For a season, their successors toiled in the same course ; and it was only after philosophy had tried, and tired, its forces on external nature, that the human mind recoiled upon itself, and sought in the study of its own nature the object and end of philosophy. The mind now became to itself its point of departure, and its principal object ; and its progress, if less ambitious, was more secure. Socrates was he who first decided this new destination of philosophy. From his epoch, man sought in himself the so- lution of the great problem of existence; and the history of philosophy was henceforward only a development, more or less successful, more or less complete, of the inscription on the Del- phic temple — Fvcod^i aeavrov — Know thyself. Having informed you, — 1^, What Philosophy is, and 2*^, What are its Causes, I would now say a few words on the Dis- positions with which Philosophy ought to be studied ; for, with- out certain practical conditions, a speculative knowledge of the most perfect Method of procedure (our next following ques- tion), remains barren and unapplied. " To attain to a knowledge of ourselves," says Socrates, " we must banish prejudice, passion, and sloth ; " and no one who neglects this precept, can hope to make any progress in the phi- THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. 51 losopliy of the human mind, which is only another term for the knowledge of ourselves. First condition^ — renunciation of ^prejudice, — In the first place, then, all prejudices^ — that is, all opinions formed on irrational grounds, — ought to be removed. A preliminary doubt is thus the fundamental condition of philosophy ; and the necessity of such a doubt is no less apparent than is its diffi- culty. We do not approach the study of philosophy ignorant, but perverted. " There is no one," says Gatien-Arnoult, " who has not grown up under a load of beliefs — beliefs which he owes to the accidents of country and family, to the books he has read, to the society he has frequented, to the education he has received, and, in general, to the circumstances which have con- curred in the formation of his intellectual and moral habits. These beliefs may be true, or they may be false, or, what ia more probable, they may be a medley of truths and errors. It is, however, under their influence that he studies, and through them, as through a prism, that he views and judges the objects of knowledge. Every thing is therefore seen by him in false colors, and in distorted relations. And this is the reason why philosophy, as the science of truth, requires a renunciation of prejudices {prce-judicia^ opiniones prce-Judicatce), — that is, conclusions formed without a previous examination of their grounds." In this, Christianity and Philosophy are at one, — In this, if I may without irreverence compare things human with things divine, Christianity and Philosophy coincide, — for truth is equally the end of both. What is the primary condition which our Saviour requires of his disciples ? That they throw off their old prejudices, and come with hearts willing to receive knowledge, and understandings open to conviction. " Unless," He says, " ye become as little children, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven." Such is true rehgion ; such also is true philosophy. Philosophy requires an emancipation from the yoke of foreign authority, a renunciation of all bhnd adhesion to the opinions of our age and country, and a purification of the intellect from all assumptive beUefs. Unless we can cast off 52 THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. the prejudices of the man, and become as children, docile and unperverted, we need never hope to enter the temple of philos- ophy. It is the neglect of this primary condition, which has mainly occasioned men to wander from the miity of truth, and caused the endless variety of rehgious and philosophical sects. Men would not submit to approach the word of God in order to receive from that alone their doctrine and their faith ; but they came, in general, with preconceived opinions, and, accordingly, each found in revelation only what he was predetermined to find. So, in like manner, is it in philosophy. Consciousness is to the philosopher what the Bible is to the theologian. Both are revelations of the truth ; and both afford the truth to those who are content to receive it, as it ought to be received, with reverence and submission. But as it has, too frequently, fared with the one revelation, so has it with the other. Men turned, indeed, to consciousness, and professed to regard its authority as paramount ; but they were not content humbly to accept the facts which consciousness revealed, and to estabhsh these with- out retrenchment or distortion, as the only principles of their philosophy ; on the contrary, they came with opinions already formed, with systems already constructed ; and while they eagerly appealed to consciousness when its data supported their conclusions, they made no scruple to overlook, or to misinter- pret, its facts, when these were not in harmony with their spec- ulations. Thus, religion and philosophy, as they both terminate in the same end, so they both depart from the same fundamen- tal condition. But the influence of early prejudice is the more dangerous, inasmuch as this influence is unobtrusive. Few of us are, per- haps, fully aware of how little we owe to ourselves, — how much to the influence of others. Source of the power of custom. — Man is by nature a social animal. " He is more pohtical," says Aristotle, " than any bee or ant." But the existence of society, from a family to a state, supposes a certain harmony of sentiment among its members ; and nature has, accordingly, wisely implanted in us a tendency to assimilate, in opinions and habits of thought, to those with THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. 53 whom we live and act. There is thus, in every society, great or small, a certain gravitation of opinions towards a common centre. As in our natural body, every part has a necessary sympathy with every other, and all together form, by their har- monious conspiration, a healthy whole ; so, in the social body, there is always a strong predisposition, in each of its members, to act and think in unison with the rest. This universal sym- pathy, or fellow-feeling, of our social nature, is the principle of the different spirit dominant in different ages, countries, ranks, sexes, and periods of life. It is the cause why fashions, why political and religious enthusiasm, why moral example, either for good or evil, spread so rapidly, and exert so powerful an influence. As men are naturally prone to imitate others, they consequently regard, as important or insignificant, as honorable or disgraceful, as true or false, as good or bad, what those around them consider in the same light. They love and hate what they see others desire and eschew. This is not to be re- gretted ; it is natural, and, consequently, it is right. Lideed, were it otherwise, society could not subsist, for nothing can be more apparent than that mankind in general, destined as they are to occupations incompatible with intellectual cultivation, are wholly incapable of forming opinions for themselves on many of the most important objects of human consideration. If such, however, be the intentions of nature with respect to the unen- lightened classes, it is manifest that a heavier obhgation is thereby laid on those who enjoy the advantages of intellectual cultivation, to examine with diligence and impartiality the foun- dations of those opinions which have any connection with the welfare of mankind. If the multitude must be led, it is of con- sequence that it be led by enlightened conductors. That the great multitude of mankind are, by natural disposition, only what others are, is a fact at all times so obtrusive, that it could not escape observation from the moment a reflective eye was first turned upon man. " The whole conduct of Cambyses," says Herodotus, the father of history, " towards the Egyptian gods, sanctuaries, and priests, convinces me that this king was in the highest degree insane ; for otherwise, he would not have 5* 54 THE DISPOSITIONS PROPEK TO PHILOSOPHY. insulted the worship and holy things of the Egyptians. If any one should accord to all men the permission to make free choice of the best among all customs, undoubtedly each would choose his own. That this would certainly happen, can be shown hj many examples, and, among others, by the following. The King Darius once asked the Greeks who were resident in his court, at what price they could be induced to devour their dead parents. The Greeks answered, that to this no price could bribe them. Thereupon the king asked some Indians, who were in the habit of eating their dead parents, what they would take, not to eat, but to burn them ; and the Indians answered even as the Greeks had done." Herodotus concludes this narrative with the observation, that " Pindar had justly entitled Cus- tom — the Queen of the World." Sceptical inference from the influence of custom, — The ancient sceptics, from the conformity of men, in every country, in their habits of thinking, feeling, and acting, and from the diversity of different nations in these habits, inferred that noth- ing was by nature beautiful or deformed, true or false, good or bad, but that these distinctions originated solely in custom. The modern scepticism of Montaigne terminates in the same asser- tion ; and the sublime misanthropy of Pascal has almost carried him to a similar exaggeration. " In the just and the unjust," says he, " we find hardly any thing which does not change its character in changing its climate. Three degrees of an eleva- tion of the pole reverses the whole of jurisprudence. A meridian is decisive of truth, and a few years of possession. Fundamental laws change. Right has its epochs. A pleasant justice, which a river or a mountain limits ! Truth, on this side the Pyrenees, error on the other ! " This doctrine is exag- gerated, but it has a foundation in truth ; and the most zealous champions of the immutability of moral distinctions are unani- mous in acknowledging the powerful influence which the opin- ions, tastes, manners, affections, and actions of the society in which we live, exert upon all and each of its members. Influence of custom and example in revolutionary times, — Nor is this influence of man on man less unambiguous in times THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. 55 of social tranquillity, than in crises of social convulsion. Id seasons of political and religious revolution, there arises a strufrscle between the resistino; force of ancient habits and the contagious sympathy of new modes of feeling and thought. In one portion of society, the inveterate influence of custom prevails over the contagion of example ; in others, the conta- gion of example prevails over the conservative force of an- tiquity and habit. In either case, however, we think and act always in sympathy with others. " We remain,'' says an illus- trious philosopher, " submissive so long as the world continues to set the example. As we follow the herd in forming our con- ceptions of what is respectable, so we are ready to follow the multitude also, when such conceptions come to be questioned or rejected ; and are no less vehement reformers, when the cur- rent of opinion has turned against former establishments, than we were zealous abettors, while that current continued to set in a different direction." Relation of the individual to social crises. — Thus it is, that no revolution in public opinion is the work of an individual, of a single cause, or of a day. When the crisis has arrived, the catastrophe must ensue ; but the agents through whom it is ap- parently accomplished, though they may accelerate, cannot originate its occurrence. Who believes, that, but for Luther or Zwingli, the Reformation would not have been ? Their indi- vidual, their personal energy and zeal, perhaps, hastened by a year or two the event ; but had the public mind not been already ripe for their revolt, the fate of Luther and Zwingli, in the sixteenth century, would have been that of Huss and Je- rome of Prague, in the fifteenth. Woe to the revolutionist who is not himself a creature of the revolution ! If he anticipat(5, he is lost ; for it requires, what no individual can supply, a long and powerful counter-sympathy in a nation to untwine the ties of custom which bind a people to the established and the old. Testimonies to the power of received opinion, — I should have no end, were I to quote to you all that philosophers have said of the prevalence and evil influence of prejudice and opin- 56 THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. ion. " Opinion," says the great Pascal, " disposes of all things. It constitutes beauty, justice, happiness ; and those are the all in all of the world." "Almost every opinion we have," says the pious Charon, " we have but by authority ; we believe, judge, act, live, and die on trust, as common custom teaches us ; and rightly ! for we are too weak to decide and choose of ourselves. But the wise do not act thus." " Every opinion," says Montaigne, " is strong enough to have had its martyrs ; " and Sir W. Raleigh — " It is opinion, not truth, that travelleth the world without pass- port." Doubt the first step to philosophy. — Such being the recog- nized universality and evil effect of prejudice, philosophers have, consequently, been unanimous in making doubt the first step towards philosophy. Aristotle has a fine chapter in his Metaphysics on the utihty of doubt, and on the things which we ought first to doubt of; and he concludes by establishing that the success of philosophy depends on the art of doubting well. This is even enjoined on us by the Apostle. For in saying " Prove " (which may be more correctly translated test) — " Test all things," he implicitly commands us to doubt all things. " He," says Bacon, " who would become a philosopher, must commence by repudiating belief ; " and he concludes one of the most remarkable passages of his writings with the obser- vation, that, " were there a single man to be found with a firm- ness sufficient to efface from his mind the theories and notions vulgarly received, and to apply his intellect free and without prevention, the best hopes might be entertained of his success." " To philosophize," says Descartes, " seriously, and to good effect, it is necessary for a man to renounce all prejudices ; in other words, to apply the greatest care to doubt of all his pre- vious opinions, so long as these have not been subjected to a new examination, and been recognized as true." But it is needless to multiply authorities in support of so obvious a truth. The ancient philosophers refused to admit slaves to their in- struction. Prejudice makes men slaves ; it disqualifies them for the pursuit of truth ; and their emancipation from prejudice THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. 57 is what philosophy first inculcates on, what it first requires of, its disciples. Philosophical douht distinguished^ from scepticism. — Let us, [lowever, beware that we act not the part of revolted slaves ; that, in asserting our liberty, we do not run into license. Phil- osophical doubt is not an end, but a mean. We doubt in order that we may believe ; we begin, that we may not end with, doubt. We doubt once that we may believe always ; we re- nounce authority that we may follow reason ; we surrender opinion that we may obtain knowledge. We must be protes- tants, not infidels, in philosophy. " There is a great difierence," says Malebranche, " between doubting and doubting. — We may doubt through passion and brutality; through blindness and malice, and finally through fancy, and from the very wish to doubt ; but we doubt also from prudence and through distrust, from wisdom and through penetration of mind. The former doubt is a doubt of darkness, which never issues to the light, but leads us always further from it ; the latter is a doubt which is born of the light, and which aids in a certain sort, to produce light in its turn." Indeed, were the effect of philosophy the establishment of doubt, the remedy would be worse than the disease. Doubt, as a permanent state of mind, would be, in fact little better than an intellectual death. The mind lives as it believes, — it hves in the afiirmation of itself, of nature, and of God ; a doubt upon any one of these would be a diminution of its life ; — a doubt upon the three, were it possible, would be tantamount to a mental annihilation. It is well observed, by Mr. Stewart, " that it is. not merely in order to free the mind from the influence of error, that it is useful to examine the foundation of established opinions. It is such an examination alone, that, in an inquisitive age like the present, can secure a philosopher from the danger of unlimited scepticism. To this extreme, indeed, the complexion of the times is more likely to give him a tendency, than to implicit credulity. In the former ages of ignorance and superstition, the intimate association which had been formed in the prevail- ing systems of education, between truth and error had given to 58 THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. the latter an ascendant over the minds of men, which it could never have acquired if diVested of such an aUiance. The case has, of late years, been most remarkably reversed : the common sense of mankind, in consequence of the growth of a more lib- eral spirit of inquiry, has revolted against many of those ab- surdities which had so long held human reason in captivity ; and it was, perhaps, more than could have been reasonably expected, that, in the first moments of their emancipation, philosophers should have stopped short at the precise boundary which cooler reflection and more moderate views would have prescribed. The fact is, that they have passed far beyond it ; and that, in their zeal to destroy prejudices, they have attempted to tear up by the roots many of the best and happiest and. most essential principles of our nature In the midst of thefse contrary impulses of fashionable and vulgar prejudices, he alone evinces the superiority and the strength of his mind, who is able to disentangle truth from error ; and to oppose the clear conclu- sions of his own unbiased faculties to the united clamors of superstition and of false philosophy. Such are the men whom nature marks out to be the hghts of the world ; to &:s. the wa- vering opinions of the multitude, and to impress their own char- acters on that of their age." In a word, philosophy is, as Aristotle has justly expressed, not the art of doubting, but the art of doubting well. Subjugation of the passions. — In the second place, in obedi- ence to the precept of Socrates, the passions, under which we shall include sloth, ought to be subjugated. These ruffle the tranquillity of the mind, and consequently deprive it of the power of carefully considering all that the solution of a question re- quires should be examined. A man under the agitation of any lively emotion, is hardly aware of aught but what has immediate relation to the passion which agitates and engrosses him. Among the affections which influence the will, and induce it to adhere to scepticism oi error, there is none more dangerous than sloth. The greater proportion of mankind are inclined to spare them- selves the trouble of a long and laborious inquiry ; or they fancy that a superficial examination is enough ; and the shghtest THE DISPOSITIONS PROPER TO PHILOSOPHY. 59 agreement between a few objects, in a few petty points, they at once assume as evincing the correspondence of the whole throughout. Others apply themselves exclusively to the mat- ters which it is absolutely necessary for them to know, and take no account of any opinion but that which they have stumbled on, — for no other reason than that they have embraced it, and are unwilling to recommence the labor of learning. They re- ceive their opinion on the authority of those who have had suggested to them their own ; and they are always facile schol- ars, for the shghtest probability is, for them, all the evidence that they require. Pride is a powerful impediment to a progress in knowledge. Under the influence of this passion, men seek honor, but not truth. They do not cultivate what is most valuable in reahty, but what is most valuable in opinion. They disdain, perhaps, what can be easily accomplished, and apply themselves to the obscure and recondite ; but as the vulgar and easy is the foun- dation on which the rare and arduous is built, they fail even in attaining the object of their ambition, and remain with only a farrago of confused and ill-assorted notions. In all its phases, self-love is an enemy to philosophical progress ; and the history of philosophy is filled with the illusions of which it has been the source. On the one side, it has led men to close their eyes against the most evident truths which were not in harmony with their adopted opinions. It is said that there was not a physician in Europe, above the age of forty, who would admit Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the blood. On the other hand, it is finely observed by Bacon, that " the eye of human intellect is not dry, but receives a suffusion from the will and from the affections, so that it may almost be said to engender any science it pleases. For what a man wishes to be true, that he prefers believing." And, in another place, " if the human intellect hath once taken a liking to any doctrine, either because received and credited, or because otherwise pleasing, — it draws every thing else into harmony with that doctrine, and to its support ; and albeit there may be found a more powerful array of contra- dictory instances, these, however, it either does not observe, oi it contenms, or by distinction extenuates and rejects." CHAPTER IT. THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. There is only one possible method in philosophy ; and what have been called the different methods of different philosophers, vary from each other only as more or less perfect applications of this one Method to the objects of knowledge. What IS Method f — All method is a rational progress, — a progress towards an end ; and the method of philosophy is the procedure conducive to the end which philosophy proposes. The ends, — the final causes of philosophy, — as we have seen, are two ; first, the discovery of efficient causes ; secondly, the generalization of our knowledge into unity ; — two ends, however, which fall together into one, inasmuch as the higher we proceed in the discovery of causes, we necessarily approxi- mate more and more to unity. The detection of the one in the many might, therefore, be laid down as the end to which philos- ophy, though it can never reach it, tends continually to approx- imate. But, considering philosophy in relation to both these ends, I shall endeavor to show you that it has only one possible method. £ut one method in relation to the first end of Philosophy, — Considering philosophy, in the first place, in relation to its first end, — the discovery of causes, — we have seen that causes (taking that term as synonymous for all without which the effect would not be) are only the coefficients of the effect ; an effect being nothing more than the sum or complement of all the partial causes, the concurrence of which constitute its existence. This being the case, — and as it is only by experience that we discover what particular causes must conspire in order to pro- (60) THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. Gl duce such or such an effect, --— it follows, that nothing can be- come known to us as a cause except in and through its effect ; in other words, that we can only attain to the knowledge of a cause by extracting it out of its effect. To take the example, we formerly employed, of a neutral salt. This, as I observed, was made up by the conjunction of three proximate causes, — •namely, an acid, — an alkali, — and the force which brought the alkali and the acid into the requisite approximation. This last, as a transitory condition, and not always the same, we shall throw out of account. Now, though we might know the acid and the alkali in themselves as distinct phaenomena, we could never know them as the concurrent causes of the salt, unless we had known the salt as their effect. And though, in this ex- ample, it happens that we are able to compose the effect by the union of its causes, and to decompose it by their separa- tion, — this is only an accidental circumstance ; for the far greater number of the objects presented to our observation can only be decomposed, but not actually recomposed ; and in those which can be recomposed, this possibility is itself only the result of a knowledge of the causes previously obtained by an original decomposition of the effect. " This method is iy Analysis and Synthesis, — In so far, there- fore, as philosophy is the research of causes, the one necessary condition of its possibility is the decomposition of effects into their constituted causes. This is the fundamental procedure of philosophy, and is called by a Greek term Analysis. But though analysis be the fundamental procedure, it is still only a mean towards an end. We analyze only that we may compre- hend ; and we comprehend only, inasmuch as we are able to reconstruct, in thought, the complex effects which we have analyzed into their elements. This mental reconstruction is, therefore, the final, the consummative procedure of philosophy, and it is familiarly known by the Greek term Synthesis. Analy- sis and synthesis, though commonly treated as two different methods, are, if properly understood, only the two necessary parts of the same method. Each is the relative and the correl- ative of the other. Analysis, without a subsequent synthesis, is 6 62 THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. incomplete ; it is a mean cut off from its end. Synthesis, with- out a previous analysis, is baseless ; for synthesis receives from analysis the elements which it recomposes. And, as synthesis supposes analysis as the prerequisite of its possibility, — so it is also dependent on analysis for the qualities of its existence. The value of every synthesis depends upon the value of the foregoing analysis* If the precedent analysis afford false ele- ments, the subsequent synthesis of these elements will i ecessa- rily afford a false result. If the elements furnished by analysis are assumed, and not really discovered, — in other words, if they be hypothetical, the synthesis of these hypothetical ele- ments will constitute only a conjectural theory. The legiti- macy of every synthesis is thus necessarily dependent on the legitimacy of the analysis which it presupposes, and on which it founds. These two relative procedures are thus equally necessary to each other. On the one hand, analysis without synthesis affords only, a commenced, only an incomplete, knowledge. On the other, synthesis without analysis is a false knowledge, — that is, no knowledge at all. Both, therefore, are absolutely necessary to philosophy, and both are, in philosophy, as much parts of the same method as, in the animaj body, inspiration and expiration are of the same vital function. But though these operations are each requisite to the other, yet were we to distinguish and compare what ought only to be considered as conjoined, it is to analysis that the preference must be accorded. An analysis is always valuable ; for though now without a syn- thesis, this synthesis may at any time be added ; whereas a synthesis without a previous analysis is radically and ah initio DuU. So far, therefore, as regards the Jirst end of philosophy, or the discovery of causes, it appears that there is only one possi- ble method, — that method of which analysis is the foundation, synthesis the completion. In the second place, considering phi- losophy in relation to its second end, the carrying up our knowledge into unity, — the same is equally apparent. Only one method in relation to the second end of Philoso- THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. 63 phy. — Every, thing presented to our observation, whether external or internal, whether through sense or self-conseious- ness, is presented in complexity. Through sense, the objects crowd upon the mind in multitudes, and each separate indi- vidual of these multitudes is itself a congeries of many various qualities. The same is the case with the phsenomena of self- consciousness. Every modification of mind is a complex state ; and the different elements of each state manifest themselves only in and through each other. Thus, nothing but multiplicity is ever presented to our observation ; and yet our faculties are so limited that they are able to comprehend at once only the very simplest conjunctions. There seems, therefore, a singular disproportion between our powers of knowledge and the objects to be known. How is the equilibrium to be restored ? This is the great problem proposed by nature, and which analysis and synthesis, in combination, enable us to solve. For example, I perceive a tree, among other objects of an extensive landscape, and I wish to obtain a full and distinct conception of that tree. What ought I to do ? Divide et impera : I must attend to it by itself, that is, to the exclusion of the other constituents of the scene before me. I thus analyze that scene ; I separate a petty portion of it from the rest, in order to consider that portion apart. But this is not enough, the tree itself is not a unity, but, on the contrary, a complex assemblage of elements, far beyond what my powers can master at once. I must carry my analysis still further. Accordingly, I consider successively its height, its breadth, its shape ; I then proceed to its trunk, rise from that to its branches, and follow out its different ramifications ; I now fix my attention on the leaves, and severally examine their form, color, etc. It is only after having thus, by analysis, de- tached all these parts, in order to deal with them one by one, that I am able, by reversing the process, fully to comprehend them again in a series of synthetic acts. By synthesis, rising from the ultimate analysis, step by step, I view the parts in relation to each other, and, finally, to the whole of which they are thf -.onstituents ; I reconstruct them ; and it is only through these tw counter-processes of analysis and synthesis, that I am 64 THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY, able to convert the confused perception of the tree, which I obtained at first sight, into a clear, and distinct, and comprehen- sive knowledge. How a multitude is reduced to unity, — But if analysis and synthesis be required to afford us a perfect knowledge even of one individual object of sense, still more are they required to enable the mind to reduce an indefinite multitude of objects, — the infin- itude, we may say, of nature, — to the limits of its own finite com- prehension. To accomplish this, it is requisite to extract the one out of the many, and thus to recall multitude to unity, — confu- sion to order. And how is this performed ? The one in the many being that in which a plurality of objects agree, — or that in which they may be considered as the same ; and the agreement of objects in any common quality being discoverable only by an observation and comparison of the objects themseh^es, it fol- lows that a knowledge of the one can only be evolved out of a foregoing knovfledge of the many. But this evolution can only be accomplished by an analysis and a synthesis. By analysis, from the infinity of objects presented to our observation, we select some. These we consider apart, and, further, only in certain points of view, — and we compare these objects with others also considered in the same points of view. So far the procedure is analytic. Having discovered, however, by this observation and comparison, that certain objects agree in cer- tain respects, we generalize the quaHties in which they coincide, — that is, from a certain number of individual instances we infer a general law ; we perform what is called an act of In- duction. What is Induction ? — This induction is erroneously viewed as analytic ; it is purely a synthetic process. For example, from our experience, — and all experience, be it that of the individual or of mankind, is only finite, — from our limited ex- perience, I say, that bodies, as observed by us, attract each other, we infer by induction the unlimited conclusion that all bodies gravitate towards each other. Now, here the consequent contains much more than, was contained in the antecedent. Experience, the antecedent, only says, and only can say, this, THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. 05 that, and the other body gravitate (that is, some bodies gravi- tate) ; the consequent educed from that antecedent, says, — all bodies gravitate. The antecedent is limited, — the consequent unhmited. Something, therefore, has been added to the antecedent in order to legitimate the inference, if we are not to hold the consequent itself as absurd ; for, as you will hereafter learn, no conclusion must contain more than was contained in the prem- ises from which it is drawn. What then is the something^ If we consider the inductive process, this will be at once apparent. The affirmation, this, that, and the other body gravitate, is connected with the affirmation, all bodies gravitate, only by in serting between the two a third affirmation, by which the two other affirmations are connected into reason and consequent, — that is, into a logical cause and effect. What that is I shall explain. All scientific induction is founded on the presumption that nature is uniform in her operations. Of the ground and origin of this presumption, I am not now to speak. I shall only say, that, as it is a principle which we suppose in all our induc- tions, it cannot be itself a product of induction. It is, therefore, interpolated in the inductive reasoning by the mind itself. In our example the reasoning will, accordingly, run as follows : — This, that, and the other body (some bodies) are observed to gravitate ; But (as nature is uniform in her operations) this, that, and the other body (som6 bodies) represent all bodies ; Therefore,* all bodies gravitate. Now, in this and other examples of induction, it is the mind which binds up the separate substances observed and collected into a whole, and converts what is only the observation of many particulars into a universal law. This procedure is manifestly synthetic. Now, you will remark that analysis and synthesis are here absolutely dependent on each other. The previous observation and comparison, — the analytic foundation, — are only instituted for the sake of the subsequent induction, — the synthetic con- summation. What boots it to observe and to compare, if th€ uniformities we discover among objects are never generahzed 6* 6G THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. into laws ? We have obtained an historical, but not a philo- sophical knowledge. Here, therefore, analysis without synthesis is incomplete. On the other hand, an induction which does not proceed upon a competent enumeration of particulars, is either doubtful, improbable, or null ; for all synthesis is dependent on a foregone analysis for whatever degree of certainty it may pretend to. Thus, considering philosophy in relation to its second end, unity or system, it is manifest that the method by which it accomplishes that end, is a method involving both an analytic and a synthetic process. Now, as philosophy has only one possible method, so the his- tory of philosophy only manifests the conditions of this one method, more or less accurately fulfilled. There are aberra- tions in the method, — no aberrations from it. Earliest prohlem of philosophy, — " Philosophy," says Ge- ruzez, ^ commenced with the first act of reflection on the objects of sense or self-consciousness, for the purpose of explaining them. And with that first act of reflection, the method of phi- losophy began, in its application of an analysis, and in its appli- cation of a synthesis, to its object. The first philosophers naturally endeavored to explain the enigma of external nature. The magnificent spectacle of the material universe, and the marvellous demonstrations of power and wisdom which it every- where exhibited, were the objects which called forth the earliest eflbrts of speculation. Philosophy was thiis, at its commence- ment, physical, not psychological ; it was not the problem of the soul, but the problem of the world, which it first attempted to solve. " And what was the procedure of philosophy in its solution of this problem? Did it first decompose the whole into its parts, in order again to reconstruct them into a system ? This it could not accomplish ; but still it attempted this, and nothing else. A complete analysis was not to be expected from the first efforts of intelligence ; its decompositions were necessarily partial and imperfect ; a partial and imperfect analysis aflbrded only hypothetical elements ; and the synthesis of these elements issued, consequently, only in a one-sided or erroneous theory. THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. 67 Thales and the Ionic School. — " Tliales, the founder of the Ionian pliilosophy, devoted an especial study to the pha3nomena of the material universe ; and, struck with the appearances of power which water manifested in the formation of bodies, he analyzed all existences into this element, which he viewed as the universal principle, — the universal agent of creation. He proceeded by an incomplete analysis, and generalized, by hy- pothesis, the law which he drew by induction from the observa- tion of a small series of phsenomena. " The Ionic school continued in the same path. They limited themselves to the study of external nature, and sought in mat- ter the principle of existence. Anaximander of Miletus, the countryman and disciple of Thales, deemed that he had traced the primary cause of creation to an ethereal principle, which occupied space, and whose different combinations constituted the universe of matter. Anaximenes found the original element in air, from which, by rarefaction and condensation, he educed ex- istences. Anaxagoras carried his analysis further, and made a more discreet use of hypothesis ; he rose to the conception of an intelhgent first cause, distinct from the phaenomena of na- ture ; and his notion of the Deity was so far above the gross con- ceptions of his contemporaries, that he was accused of atheism. Pythagoras and the Italic School, — " Pythagoras, the founder of the Italic school, analyzed the properties of number ; and the relations which this analysis revealed, he elevated into principles of the mental and material universe. Mathematics were his only objects ; his analysis was partial, and his synthe- sis was consequently hypothetical. The Italic school developed the notions of Pythagoras, and, exclusively preoccupied with the relations and harmonies of existence, its disciples did not extend their speculation to the consideration either of substance or of cause. " Thus, these earlier schools, taking external nature for their point of departure, proceeded by an imperfect analysis, and a presumptuous synthesis, to the construction of exclusive sys- tems, --in which Idealism or Materiahsm preponderated, ac- cording to the kind of data on which they founded. G8 THE METHOD OF PHH^OSOPHY. " The Eleatic school^ which is distinguished into two branches, the one of Physical, the other of Metaphysical, speculation, ex- hibits the same character, the same point of departure, the same tendency, and the same errors. " These errors led to the scepticism of the Sophists, which was assailed by Socrates, — the sage who determined a new epoch in philosophy by directing observation on man himself; and henceforward the study of mind becomes the prime and cen- tral science of philosophy. " The point of departure was changed, but not the method. The observation or analysis of the human mind, though often profound, remained always, incomplete. Fortunately, the first disciples of Socrates, imitating the prudence of their master, and warned by the downfall of the systems of the Ionic, Italic, and Eleatic schools, made a sparing use of synthesis, and hardly a pretension to system. "Plato and Aristotle directed their observation on the phae- nomena of intelligence, and we cannot too highly admire the profundity of their analysis, and even the sobriety of their syn- thesis. Plato devoted himself more particularly to the higher faculties of intelligence ; and his disciples were led, by the love of generalizatiofi, to regard as the intellectual whole those por- tions of intelligence which their master had analyzed ; and this exclusive spirit gave birth to systems false, not in themselves, but as resting upon a too narrow basis. Aristotle, on the other hand, whose genius was of a more positive character, analyzed with admirable acuteness those operations of mind which stand in more immediate relation to the senses ; and this tendency, which among his followers became often exclusive and exag- gerated, naturally engendered systems which more or less tended to materialism." School of Alexandria. — The school of Alexandria, in which the systems resulting from those opposite tendencies were com- bined, endeavored to reconcile and to fuse them into a still more comprehensive system. Eclecticism, — conciliation, — union, were, in all things, the grand aim of the Alexandrian school. Geographically situated between Greece and Asia, it THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. 69 endeavored to ally Greek with Asiatic genius, religion with phi- losophy. Hence the JSTeoplatonic system, of which the last great representative is Proclus. This system is the result of the long labor of the Socratic schools. It is an edifice reared by synthesis out of the materials which analysis had col- lected, proved, and accumulated, from Socrates down to Plo- tinus. But a synthesis is of no greater value than its relative analy- sis ; and as the analysis of the earlier Greek philosophy was not complete, the synthesis of the Alexandrian school was necessarily imperfect. In the Scholastic philosophy, analysis and observation were too often neglected in some departments of philosophy, and too often carried rashly to excess in others. Bacon and Descartes, — After the revival of letters, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the labors of philosophy were principally occupied in restoring and illustrating the Greek systems ; and it was not until the seventeenth century, that a new epoch was determined by the genius of Bacon and Descartes. In Bacon and Descartes our modern philosophy may be said to originate, inasmuch as they were the first who made the doctrine of method a principal object of considera- tion. They both proclaimed, that, for the attainment of scien- tific knowledge, it is necessary to observe with care, — that is, to analyze ; to reject every element as hypothetical, which this analysis does not spontaneously afford ; to call in experiment in aid of observation; and to attempt no synthesis or generaliza- tion, until the relative analysis has been completely accom- pHshed. They showed that previous philosophers had erred, not by rejecting either analysis or synthesis, but by hurrying on to synthetic induction from a limited or specious analytic observa- tion. They propounded no new method of philosophy, they only expounded the conditions of the old. They showed that these conditions had rarely been fulfilled by philosophers in time past ; and exhorted them to their fulfilment in time to come. Thus they explained the petty progress of the past philosophy ; — and justly anticipated a gigantic advancement for 70 THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY. the 'future. Such was their precept, but such unfortunately was not their example. There are no philosophers who merit so much in the one respect, none, perhaps, who deserve less in €ie other. Of philosophy since Bacon and Descartes, we at present say nothing. Of that we shall hereafter have frequent occasion to speak. But to sum up what this historical sketch was intended to illustrate. There is but one possible method of philoso- phy, — a combination of analysis and synthesis ; and the purity and equiKbrium of these two elements constitute its perfection. The aberrations of philosophy have been all so many viola- tions of the laws of this one method. Philosophy has erred, because it built its systems upon incomplete or erroneous analy- sis, and it can only proceed in safety, if from accurate and unexclusive observation, it rise, by successive generalization, to a comprehensive system. CHAPTER V. THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. Expediency of a division of Philosophy, — As we cannot survey the universe at a glance, neither can we contemplate the whole of philosophy in one act of consciousness. We can only master it gradually and piecemeal ; and this is in fact the reason why philosophers have always distributed their science (constituting, ^though it does, one organic whole) into a plurality of sciences. The expediency, and even necessity, of a division of philosophy, in order that the mind may be enabled to em- brace in one general view its various parts, in their relation to each other, and to the whole which they constitute, is admitted by every philosopher. " Res utilis," continues Seneca, " et ad sapientiam properanti utique necessaria, dividi philosophiam, et ingens corpus ejus in membra disponi. Facihus enim pei partes in cognitionem totius adducimur." But, although philosophers agree in regard to the utility of such a distribution, Ihey are almost as little at one in regard to the parts, as they are in respect to the definition, of their sci- ence ; and, indeed, their differences in reference to the former, majnly arise from their discrepancies in reference to the latter. For they who vary in their comprehension of the whole, cannot agree in their division of the parts. Division into Theoretical and Practical, — The most ancient and universally recognized distinction of philosophy, is into Theoretical and Practical. These are discriminated by the different nature of their ends. Theoretical, called likewise speculative and contemplative, philosophy has for its highest end mere truth or knowledge. Practical philosophy, on the other hand, has truth or knowledge only as its proximate end, 72 THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. — this end being subordinate to the ulterior end of some prac- tical action. In theoretical philosophy, we know for the sake of knowing, scimus ut sciamus : in practical philosophy, we know for the sake of acting, scimus ut operemur, I may here notice the poverty of the English language, in the want of a word to express that practical activity which is contradistin- guished from mere intellectual or speculative energy, — what the Greeks express by TtQaoaeiVj the Germans by handeln. The want of such a word occasions frequent ambiguity ; for, to ex- press the species which has no appropriate word, we are com- pelled to employ the generic term active. Thus our philosophers divide the powers of the mind into Intellectual and Active. They do not, however, thereby mean to insinuate that the powers called intellectual are a whit less energetic than those specially denominated active. But, from the want of a better word, they are compelled to employ a term which denotes at once much more and much less than they are desirous of ex- pressing. I ought to observe, that the term practical has also obtained with us certain collateral significations, which render it in some respects unfit to supply the want. But to return. I'his distinction of Theoretical and Practical philosophy was first explicitly enounced by Aristotle ; and the attempts of the later Platonists to carry it up to Plato, and even to Pythagoras, are not worthy of statement, far less of refutation. Once pro- mulgated, the division was, how^ever, soon generally recognized. The Stoics borrowed it, as may be seen, from Seneca : — " Phi- los-ophia et contemplativa est et activa ; spectat, simulque agit." It was also adopted by the Epicureans ; and, in general, by those Greek and Roman philosophers who viewed their science as versant either in the contemplation of nature (^q)V6ix^), or in the regulation of human action (jid^i^irj) ; for by nature^ they did not denote the material universe alone, but their Physics in- cluded Metaphysics, and their Ethics embraced Politics and Economics. There was thus only a difference of nomenclature ; for Physical and Theoretical, — Ethical and Practical Pliilos- ophy, — were with them terms absolutely equivalent. This division unsound. — I regard the division of philosophy THE DIVISIONS OF nULOSOPHY. 73 into Theoretical and Practical as unsound, and this for two reasons. The first is, that philosophy, as philo?oj)hy, is only cognitive, — only theoretical ; whatever lies beyond the sphere of specu- lation or knowledge, transcends the sphere of philosophy ; consequently, to divide philosophy by any quality ulterior to speculation, is to divide it by a difference which does not be- long to it. Now, the distinction of practical philosophy from theoretical commits this error. For, while it is admitted that all philosophy, as cognitive, is theoretical, some philosophy is again taken out of this category, on the ground, that, beyond the mere theory, — the mere cognition, — it has an ulterior end in its application to practice. But, in the second place, this difference, even w^ere it admis- sible, would not divide philosophy ; for, in point of fact, all philosophy must be regarded as practical, inasmuch as mere knowledge, — that is, the mere possession of truth, — is not the highest end of any philosophy ; but on the contrary, all truth or knowledge is valuable only inasmuch as it determines the mind to its contemplation, — that is, to practical energy. Speculation, therefore, inasmuch as it is not a negation of thought, but on the contrary, the highest energy of intellect, is, in point of fact, preeminently practical. The practice of one branch of philos- ophy is, indeed, different from that of another ; but all are still practical; for in none is mere knowledge the ultimate, the highest, end. It is manifest that, in our sense of the term practical^ Logic, as an instrumental science, would be comprehended under the head of practical philosophy. The terms Art and Science, — I shall take this opportunity of explaining an anomaly which you will find explained in no work with which I am acquainted. Certain branches of philo- sophical knowledge are called Arts, — or Arts and Sciences indifferently ; others are exclusively denominated Sciences. Were this distinction coincident with the distinction of sciences speculative and sciences practical, — taking the term practical in its ordinary acceptation, — there would be no difficulty ;* for, 74 • THE DIVISIONS OF PHTLOSOPHY. as every practical science necessarily involves a theory, nothing could be more natural than to call the same branch of knowl- edge an art, when viewed as relative to its practical application, and a science when viewed in relation to the theory which that application supposes. But this is not the case. The specula- tive sciences, indeed, are never denominated arts ; we may, therefore, throw them aside. The difficulty is exclusively con- fined to the practical. Of these, some never receive the name of arts ; others are called arts and sciences indifferently. Thus the sciences of Ethics, Economics, Politics, Theology, etc., though all practical, are never denominated arts ; whereas this appellation is very usually applied to the practical sciences of Logic, Rhetoric, Grammar, etc. That the term art is with us not coextensive with practical science, is thus manifest; and yet these are frequently con- founded. Thus, for example. Dr. Wliately, in his definition of Logic, thinks that Logic is a science, in so far as it institutes an analysis of the process of the mind in reasoning, and an art, in so far as it affords practical rules to secure the mind from error in its deductions ; and he defines an art, the application of knowledge to practice. Now, if this view were correct, art and practical science would be convertible terms. But that they are not employed as synonymous expressions is, as we have seen, shown by the incongruity we feel in talking of the art of Ethics, the art of Religion, etc., though these are eminently practical sciences. The question, therefore, still remains. Is this restriction of the term art to certain of the practical sciences the result of some accidental and forgotten usage, or is it founded on any rational principle which we are able to trace ? The former alternative seems to be the common belief; for no one, in so far as I know, has endeavored to account for the apparently vague and capri- cious manner in which the terms art and science are applied. The latter alternative, however, is the true ; and I shall en- deavor to explain to you the reason of the application of the term art to certain practical sciences, and not to others. Historical origin of this usfi of language, — You are aware THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. 75 that tlie Aristotelic philosophy was, for many centuries, not only the prevalent, but during the middle ages, the one exclusive philosophy in Europe. This philosophy of the middle ages, or, as it is commonly called, the Scholastic Philosophy, has exerted the most extensive influence ^n the languages of modern Eu- rope ; and from this common source has been principally derived that community of expression which these languages exhibit. Now, the peculiar application of the term art was introduced into the vulgar tongues from the scholastic philosophy ; and was borrowed by that philosophy from Aristotle. This is only one of a thousand instances, which might be alleged, of the unfelt influence of a single powerful mind, on the associations and habits of thought of generations to the end of time ; and of Aristotle is preeminently true, what has been so beautifully said of the ancients in general : — " The great of old ! The dead but sceptred sovrans who still nile Our spirits from their urns." Now, then, the application of the term art in the modern languages being mediately governed by certain distinctions which the capacities of the Greek tongue allowed Aristotle to establish, these distinctions must be explained. In the Aristotelic philosophy, the terms nqa^ig and TTQaxTixog, — that is, practice and practical, were employed both in a ge- neric or looser, and in a special or stricter signification. In its generic meaning, itQa^ig, practice, was opposed to theory or speculation, and it comprehended under it practice in its special meaning, and another coordinate term to which practice, in this, its stricter signification, was opposed. This term was TtoiriGig, which we may inadequately translate by production. The dis tinction of TtQayaixog and TtoirjTixog consisted in this : the former denoted that action which terminated in action, — the latter, that action which resulted in some permanent product. For example, dancing and music are practical, as leaving no work after their performance ; whereas, painting and statuary are productive, as leaving some product over and above their en- ergy. 76' THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. Now Aristotle, in formally defining art, defines it as a habit productive, and not as a habit practical, ahg noirixvAri (j.eta Xoyov ; -—and, though he has not always himself adhered strictly to this limitation, his definition was adopted by his followers, and the term in its application to the practical sciences (the term prac- tical being here used in its generic meaning), came to be exclu- sively confined to those whose end did not result in mere action or energy. Accordingly, as Ethics, Politics,, etc., proposed hap piness as their end, — and as happiness was an energy, or at least the concomitant of energy, these sciences terminated in action, and were consequently practical, not productive. On the other hand. Logic, Khetoric, etc., did not terminate in a mere, — an evanescent action, but in a permanent, — an endur- ing product. For the end of Logic was the production of a reasoning, the end of Rhetoric the production of an oration, and so forth. This distinction is not perhaps beyond the reach of criticism, and I am not here to vindicate its correctness. My only aim is to make you aware of the grounds of the distinction, in order that you may comprehend the principle which origi- nally determined the application of the term art to some of the practical sciences and not to others, and without a knowledge of which principle, the various employment of the term must appear to you capricious and unintelligible. It is needless, per- haps, to notice that the rule applies only to the philosophical sciences, — to those which received their form and denomina- tions from the learned. The mechanical dexterities were be- neath their notice ; and these were accordingly left to receive their appellations from those who knew nothing of the Aristo- telic proprieties. Accordingly, the term art is in them applied, without distinction, to productive and unproductive operations. We speak of the art of rope-dancing, equally as of the art of rope-making. But to return. Universality of this division of Philosophy. — The division of philosophy into Theoretical and Practical is the most impor- tant that has been made ; and it is that which has entered into nearly all the distributions attempted by modern philosophers. Bacon was the first, after the revival of letters, who essayed a THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. 77 distribution of the sciences and of philosophy. He divided all human knowledge into History, Poetry, and Philosophy. Phi- losophy he distinguished into branches conversant about the Deity, about Nature, and about Man ; and each of these had their subordinate divisions, which, however, it is not necessary to particularize. Descartes distributed philosophy into theoretical and practi- cal, with various subdivisions ; but his followers adopted the division of Logic, Metaphysics, Physics, and Ethics. Gassendi recognized, like the ancients, three parts of philosophy. Logic, Physics, and Ethics, and this, along with many other of Gas- sendi's doctrines, was adopted by Locke. Kant distinguished philosophy into theoretical and practical, with various subdivis- ions ; and the distribution into theoretical and practical was also established by Fichte. I have now concluded the general Introduction to Philoso- phy, in which, frpm the general nature of the subjects, I have been compelled to anticipate conclusions, and to depend on your being able to supply a good deal of what it was impossible for me articulately to explain. I now enter upon the considera- tion of the matters which are hereafter to occupy our attention, with comparatively little apprehension, — for, in these, we shall be able to dwell more upon details, while, at the same time, the subject will open upon us by degrees, so that, every step that we proceed, we shall find the progress easier. But I have to warn you, that you will probably find the very commencement the m,ost arduous, and this not only because you will come less inured to difficulty, but because it will there be necessary to deal with principles, and these of a general and abstract na- ture ; whereas, having once mastered these, every subsequent step will be comparatively easy. Without entering upon details, I may now summarily state* the order which I propose to follow. This requires a prehm- inary exposition of the different departments of Philosophy, in order that you may obtain a comprehensive view of the proper objects of our consideration, and of the relations in which they stand to others. 7=* 78 THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY Distribution of the Sciences, — Science and pMlosopliy are conversant either about Mind or about Matter. The former of these is Philosophy, properly so called. With the latter we have nothing to do, except in so far as it may enable us to throw light upon the former ; for Metaphysics, in whatever lati- tude the term be taken, is a science, or complement of sciences, exclusively occupied with mind. Now the Philosophy of Mind, — Psychology or Metaphysics, in the widest signification of the terms, — is threefold ; for the object it immediately pro- poses for consideration may be either, 1°, Phenomena in general; or, 2°, Laws; or, 3°, Inferences, — Results. This I will endeavor to explain. The three grand questions of Philosophy, — The whole of philosophy is the answer to these three questions: 1°, What are the Facts or Phsenomena to be observed ? 2°, What are the Laws which regulate these facts, or under which these phse- nomena appear ? 3°, What are the real Results, not immedi- ately manifested, which these facts or phasnomena warrant us in drawing ? Phenomenology, — If we consider the mind merely with the view of observing and generalizing the various phasnomena it reveals, — that is, of analyzing them into capacities or facul- ties, — we have one mental science, or one department of men- tal science; and this we may call the Phenomenology of Mind. It is commonly called Psychology — Empirical Psychology, or the Inductive Philosophy of Mind ; we might call it Phenomenal Psychology. It is evident that the divisions of this science will be determined by the classes into which the phsenomena of mind are distributed. Nomology and its subdivisions, — If, again, we analyze the mental phsenomena with the view of discovering and consider- ing, not contingent appearances, but the necessary and universal facts, -— i. e, the laws by which our faculties are governed, to the end that we may obtain a criterion by which to judge or to explain their procedures and manifestations, — we have a sci- ence which we may call the Nomology of Mind, — nomo- LOGiCAL PSYCHOLOGY. Now, there will be as many distinct THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. 79 classes of Nomological Psychology, as there are distinct classes of mental phaenomena under the Phaenomenological division. I shall, hereafter, show you that there are Three great classes of these phaenomena, — namely, 1°, The phaenomena of our Cognitive faculties, or faculties of Knowledge ; 2°, The phae- nomena of our Feelings, or the phaenomena of Pleasure and Pain; and, 3°, The phaenomena of our Conative powers, — in other words, the phaenomena of Will and Desire. Each of these classes of phaenomena has, accordingly, a science which is conversant about its Laws. For, as each proposes a different end, and, in the accomplishment of that end, is regulated by peculiar laws, each must, consequently, have a different science conversant about these laws, — that is, a different Nomology. There is no one, no Nomological^ science of the Cognitive faculties^ in general ; though we have some older treatises which, though partial in their subject, afford a name not unsuitable for a nomology of the cognitions, — namely, Gnoseologia or Gnos- tologia. There is no independent science of the laws of Per- ception ; if there were, it might be called -Esthetic, which, however, as we shall see, would be ambiguous. Mnemonic, or the science of the laws of Memory, has been elaborated at least in numerous treatises ; but the name Anamnestic, the art of Recollection or Reminiscence, might be equally well apphed to it. The laws of the Representative faculty, — that is, the laws of Association, have not yet been elevated into a separate nomological science. Neither have the conditions of the Regu- lative or Legislative faculty, the faculty itself of Laws, been fully- analyzed, far less reduced to system ; though we have several deservedly forgotten treatises, of an older date, under the inviting name of Noologies. The only one of the cognitive faculties, whose laws constitute the object-matter of a separate science, is the Elaborative, — the Understanding Special, the faculty of relations, the faculty of Thought Proper. This nomology has obtained the name of Logic among other appel- lations, but not from Aristotle. The best name would have been Dianoetic. Logic is the science of the laws of thought, in relation to the end which our cognitive faculties propose, — 80 THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. L e. the True. To this head might be referred Grammar, — Universal Grammar, — Philosophical Grammar, or the sci- ence conversant with the laws of Language, as the instrument of thought. The Nomology of our Feelings^ or the science of the laws which govern our capacities of enjoyment, in relation to the end which they propose, — ^. e, the Pleasurable, — has ob- tained no precise name in our language. It has been called the Philosophy of Taste, and, on the Continent especially, it has been denominated Esthetic. Neither name is unobjectionable. The first is vague, metaphorical, and even delusive. In regard to the second, you are aware that aiad^r^oig in Greek means feeling in general, as well as sense in particular ; as our term feeling means either the sense of touch in particular, or senti- ment, — and the capacity of the pleasurable and painful in general. Both terms are, therefore, to a certain extent, ambig- uous ; but this objection can rarely be avoided, and Esthetic, if not the best expression to be found, has already been long and generally employed. It is now nearly a century since Baumgarten, a celebrated philosopher of the Leibnitzio-Wolfian school, first applied the term Esthetic to the doctrine which we vaguely and periphrastically denominate the Philosophy of Taste, the theory of the Fine Arts, the science of the Beauti- ful and Sublime, etc., — and this term is now in general accep- tance, not only in Germany, but throughout the other countries of Europe. The term Apolaustic would have been a more appropriate designation. Finally, the Nomology of our Conative powers is Practical Philosophy, properly so called ; for practical philosophy is sim- ply the science of the laws regulative of our Will and Desires, in relation to the end which our conative powers propose, — i, e, the Good. This, as it considers these laws in relation to man as an individual, or in relation to man as a member of society, will be divided into two branches, — Ethics and Poli- tics ; and these again admit of various subdivisions. So much for those parts of the Philosophy of Mind, which are conversant about Phsenomena, and about Laws. The THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. 81 Third great branch of this philosophy is that which is engaged in the deduction of Inferences or Resuhs. Ontology, or Metaphysics Proper, — In the First branch, — the Phasnomenologj of mind, — philosophy is properly limited to the facts afforded in consciousness, considered exclusively in themselves. But these facts may be such as not only to be ob- jects of knowledge in themselves, but likewise to furnish us with grounds of inference to something out of themselves. As effects, and effects of a certain character, they may enable us to infer the analogous character of their unknown causes ; as phsenomena, and phsenomena of peculiar qualities, they may warrant us in drawing many conclusions regarding the distinc- tive character of that unknown principle, of that unknown substance, of which they are the manifestations. Although, therefore, existence be only revealed to us in phaenomena, and though we can, therefore, have only a relative knowledge either of mind or of matter ; still, by inference and analogy, we may legitimately attempt to rise above the mere appearances which experience and observation afford. Thus, for example, the ex- istence of God and the Immortality of the Soul are not given us as phaenomena, as objects of immediate knowledge ; yet, if the phsenomena actually given do necessarily require, for their rational explanation, the hypotheses of immortality and of God, we are assuredly entitled, from the existence of the former, to infer the reality of the latter. Now, the science conversant about all such inferences of unknown being from its known manifestations, is called Ontology, or Metaphysics Proper. We might call it Inferential Psychology. The following is a tabular view of the distribution of Philos- ophy as here proposed : 1 ' Cognitions. i Facts, — Phsenomenology, Empirical ^ Feelings. OS Psychology. , Conative Powers (WiU and Desire). Uu 17-5 Cognitions, — Logic o Laws, — Nomology, Rational Psy- Feelings, — Esthetic. chology. Cocative Powers. {Mora^r.'pS^p\ Results, — Ontology, Inferential Psy- Being of God. i chology. ImmortaUty of the Soul, etc. 82 THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. Li this distribution of the philosophical sciences, you will observe that I take little account of the celebrated division of philosophy into Speculative and Practical, which I have already explained to you, for I call only one minor division of philosophy practical, — namely, the Nomology of the Conative powers, not because that science is not equally theoretical with any other, but simply because these powers are properly called j)]"actical, as tending to practice or overt action. Distribution of Philosophy in the Universities, — The subjects fissigned to the various chairs of the Philosophical Faculty, in the different" Universities of Europe, were not calculated upon any comprehensive view of the parts of philosophy, and of their natural connection. The universities were founded when the Aristotelic philosophy was the dominant, or rather the exclu- sive, system, and the parts distributed to the different classes, in the faculty of Arts or Philosophy, were regulated by the contents of certain of the Aristotelic books, and by the order in which they were studied. Of these, there were always Four great divisions. There was first. Logic, in relation to the Organon of Aristotle ; secondly. Metaphysics, relative to his books under that title ; thirdly. Moral Philosophy, relative to his Ethics, Politics, and Economics ; and, fourthly. Physics, relative to his Physics, and the collection of treatises styled in the schools the Parva Naturalia, But every university had not a full complement of classes, that is, did not devote a separate year to each of the four subjects of study ; and, accordingly, in those seats of learning where three years formed the curricu- lum of philosophy, two of these branches were combined. In the university of Edinburgh, Logic and Metaphysics were taught in the same year ; in others, Metaphysics and Moral Philosophy were conjoined ; and, when the old practice was abandoned of the several Pegents or Professors carrying on their students through every department, the two branches which had been taught in the same year were assigned to the same chair. What is most curious in the matter is this, — Aristotle's treatise On the Soul being (along with his lesser treatises on Memory and Reminiscence, on Sense and its Objects, THE DIVISIONS OF PHILOSOPHY. 83 etc.) included in the Parva Naturalia^ and, lie having declared that the consideration of the soul was part of* the philosophy of nature, the science of Mind was always treated along with Physics. The professors of Natural Philosophy have, however, long abandoned the philosophy of mind, and this branch has been, as more appropriate to their departments, taught both by the Professors of Moral Philosophy and by the Professors of Logic and Metaphysics ; — for you are not to suppose that meta- physics and psychology are, though vulgarly used as synony- mous expressions, by any means the same. In this work, we have nothing to do with Practical Philoso- phy, — that is. Ethics, Politics, Economics. But with this exception, there is no other branch of philosophy which does not fall naturally within our sphere. CHAPTER VI. DEFINITIOE^ OF PSYCHOLOGY; RELATIVITY OF HUMAIT KNOWLEDGE ; EXPLICATION OF TERMS. Psychology, or the Philosophy of the Human Mind, strictly so denominated, is the science conversant about the fhcenomena^ or modifications^ or states of the Mind^ or Con- scious-Subject^ or Soul^ or Spirit^ or Self^ or Ego, In this definition, you will observe that I have purposely accumulated a variety of expressions, in order that I might have the earliest opportunity of making you accurately ac- quainted with their meaning ; for they are terms of vital im- portance and frequent use in philosophy. — Before, therefore, proceeding further, I shall pause a moment in explanation of the terms in which this definition is expressed. Without re- stricting myself to the following order, I shall consider the word Psychology ; the correlative terms subject and substance , fhcenomenon^ modification^ state^ etc., and, at the same time, take occasion to explain another correlative, the expression object ; and, finally, the words mind, soul, spirit, self, and ego. Indeed, after considering these terms, it may not be im- proper to take up, in one series, the philosophical expressions of principal importance and most ordinary occurrence, in order to render less frequent the necessity of interrupting the course of our procedure, to afford the requisite verbal explanations. The use of the term Psychology vindicated, — The term Psy- chology, is a Greek compound, its elements \pvx% signifying soul or mind, and Xoyog, signifying discourse or doctrine. Psy- chology, therefore, is the discourse or doctrine treating of the human mind. But, though composed of Greek elements, it is, iike the greater number of the compounds of Xoyog, of modem (84) DEFINITION OF PSYCHOLOGY. 85 combination. I may be asked, — why use an exotic, a techni- cal name ? Why not be contented with the more-popular terms, Philosophy of Mind^ or 3fental Philosophy^ — Sciemce of Mind, or Mental Science ? — expressions by which this department of knowledge has been usually designated by those who, in Scotland, have cultivated it with the most distinguished success. To this there are several answers. In thcj^r^^ place, philosophy itself, and all, or almost all, its branches, have, in our language, received Greek technical denominations ; — why not also the most impor- tant of all, the science of mind ? In the second place, the term psychology is now, and has long been, the ordinary expression for the doctrine of mind in the philosophical language of every other European nation. Nay, in point of fact, it is now natu- ralized in English, psychology and psychological having of late years come into common use ; and their employment is war- ranted by the authority of the best English writers. But these are reasons in themselves of comparatively little moment : they tend merely to show that, if otherwise expedient, the nomen- clature is permissible ; and that it is expedient, the following reasons will prove. For, in the third place, it is always of con- sequence, for the sake of precision, to be able to use one word instead of a plurality of words, — especially where the frequent occurrence of a descriptive appellation might occasion tedium, distraction, and disgust ; and this must necessarily occur in the treatment of any science, if the science be able to possess no single name vicarious of its definition. In this respect, there- fore, Psychology is preferable to Philosophy of Mind, But, in the fourth place, even if the employment of the description for the name could, in this instance, be tolerated when used sub- stantively, what are we to do when we require (which we do unceasingly) to use the denomination of the science adjectively ? For example, I have occasion to say sl psychological fad, sl psy- chological law, 2i psychological curiosity, etc. How can we ex- press these by the descriptive appellation? A psychological fact may indeed be styled " a fact considered relatively to the philosophy of the human mind," — a psychological law may be called " a law by which the mental phsenomena are governed," — 8 86 DEFINITION OF PSYCHOLOGY. a psychological curiosity may be rendered — by what, I really do not know. ^ But how miserably weak, awkward, tedious, and affected, is the commutation when it can be made ; not only do the vivacity and precision of the original evaporate, the mean- ing itself is not even adequately conveyed. But this defect is still more manifestly shown, when we wish to place in contrast the matters proper to this science, with the matters proper to others. Thus, for example, to say, — this is ^psychological, not ^physiological doctrine — this is a psychological observation, not a logical inference. How is the contradistinction to be ex- pressed by a periphrasis ? It is impossible ; — for the intensity of the contrast consists, first, in the two opposite terms being single words, and second, in their being both even technical and precise Greek. This necessity has, accordingly, compelled the adoption of the terms psychology and psychological into the philosophical nomenclature of every nation, even where the same necessity did not vindicate the employment of a non-ver- nacular expression. Thus in Germany, though the native lan- guage affords a facility of composition only inferior to the Greek, and though it possesses a word {Seelenlehre) exactly correspond- ent to 'xpvyoloyia, yet because this substantive did not easily allow of an adjective flexion, the Greek terms, substantive and adjective, were both adopted, and have been long in as familiar use in the Empire, as the terms geography and geographical, — physiology and physiological, are with us. Other terms inappropriate. — What I have no^7 said may suffice to show that, to supply necessity, we must introduce these words into our philosophical vocabulary. But the pro- priety of this is still further shown by the inauspicious attempts that have been recently made on the name of the science. Dr. Blown, in the very title of the abridgment of his lectures on mental philosophy, has styled this philosophy, " The Physiology of the Human Mind ;'^ and I have also seen two English publi- cations of modern date, — one entitled the " Physics of the Sou^^ the other " Litellectual Physics J^ Now the term nature {q)V6ig, natura), though in common language of a more exten- sive meaning, has, in general, by philosophers, been applied DEFINITION OF PSYCHOLOGY. 87 appropriiitel}' to denote the laws which govern the appeai'anees of the material universe. A^d the words Physiology and Physics have been specially limited to denote sciences conver- sant about these laws as regulating the phaenomena of organic and inorganic bodies. The empire of nature is the empire of a mechanical necessity ; tlie necessity of nature, in philosophy, stands opposed to the liberty of intelligence. Those, accord- ingly, who do not allow that mind is matter, — who hold that there is in man a principle of action superior to the determina- tions of a physical necessity, a brute or blind fate, — must regard the application of the terms Physiology and Physics to the doctrine of the mind as either singularly inappropriate, or as significant of a false hypothesis in regard to the character of the thinking principle. Use and derivation of Spirit, Soul, — Mr. Stewart objects to the term Spirit, as seeming to imply an hypothesis concerning the nature and essence of the sentient or thinking principle, altogether unconnected with our conclusions in regard to its phainomena, and their general laws ; and, for the same reason, he is disposed to object to the words Pneumatology and Psy- chology, the former of which was introduced by the school- men. In regard to Spirit and Pneumatology/, Mr. Stewart's criticism is perfectly just. They are unnecessary ; and, besides the etymological metaphor, they are associated with a certain theological limitation, which spoils them as expressions of philo- sophical generality.* But this is not the case with Psychology, Yov though, in its etymology, it is, like almost all metaphysical terms, originally of physical application, still this had been long forgotten even by the Greeks.; and, if we were to reject philo- so])hical expressions on this account, we should be left without any terms for the mental phaenomena at all. The term soul ^ The terms Psychology and Pneum otology, or Pneumatic, are not equiva- lents. The latter word was used for the doctrine of spirit in general, wliicb was subdivided into three branches, as it treated of the three orders of spir itual substances, — God, — Angels and Devils, — and Man, Thus — ) 1. Theologia (Naturalis). Pneumatologia or Pneumatica, y 2. Angelographia, Dsemonologia. } 3. Psychologia. 88 RELATIVITY OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE. (and wiiat I say of the term soul is true of the term spirit)^ though in this country less employed than the term mind, may be regarded as another synonym for the unknown basis of the mental phjenomena. Like nearly all the words significant of the internal world, there is here a metaphor borrowed from the external ; and this is the case not merely in one, but, as far as we can trace the analogy, in all languages. You are aware that i/^f;^^, the Greek term for soul, comes from W/w, / breathe or hloio, — as itvEviia in Greek, and spiritus in Latin, from verbs of the same signification. In like manner, anima and animus are words which, though in Latin they have lost their primary signification, and are only known in their secondary or metaphorical, yet in their original physical meaning, are pre- served in the Greek avsfjtog, ivind or air. The English soul, and the German Seele, come from a Gothic root saivala, which signifies to storm. Ghost, the old Enghsh word for spirit in general, and so used in our English version of the Scriptures, is the same as the German Geist, and is derived from Gas, or Gescht, which signifies air. In like manner, the two words in Hebrew for soul or spirit, nephesh and ruach, are derivatives of a root which means to breathe ; and in Sanscrit, the word atmd (analogous to the Greek dt[i6g, vapor or air) signifies both mind and wind or air. Sapientia, in Latin, originally meant only the power of tasting ; as sagacitas only the faculty of scenting. In French, penser comes from the Latin pendere, through, pensare to weigh, and the terms, attentio, intentio (en- tendement), comprehensio, apprehensio, penetratio, understand- ing, etc., are just so many bodily actions transferred to the expression of mental energies. In the second place, I said that Psychology is conversant about the phcenomena of the thinking subject, etc. ; and I now proceed to expound the import of the- correlative terms phce- nomenon, subject, etc. Correlative terms illustrated by the relativity of human knowl- edge. — But the meaning of these terms will be best illustrated by now stating and explaining the great axiom, that all human knowledge, consequently that all human philosophy, is only of* RELATIVITY OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE. 80 tlie relative or phaenomenal. In this proposition, the term rela- tive is opposed to the term absolute ; and, therefore, in saying that we know only the relative, I virtually assert that we know nothing absolute, — nothing existing absolutely ; that is, in and for itself, and without relation to us and our faculties. I shall illustrate this by its application. Our knowledge is either of matter or of mind. Now, what is matter ? What do we know of matter ? Matter, or body, is to us the name either of some- thing known, or of something unknown. In so far as matter is a name for something known, it means that which appears to us under the forms of extension, solidity, divisibility, figure, mo- tion, roughness, smoothness, color, heat, cold, etc. ; in short, it is a common name for a certain series, or aggregate, or comple- ment of appearances or phgenomena manifested in coexistence. !6ut as the phsenomena appear only in conjunction, we are compelled by the constitution of our nature to think them con- joined in and by something ; and as they are phsenomena, we cannot think them the phsenomena of nothing, but must regard them as the properties or qualities of something that is extended, solid, figured, etc. But this something, absolutely and in 'tself, — ^. e, considered apart from its pheenomena, — is to us as zero. It is only in its qualities, only in its effects, in its relative or phgenomenal existence, that it is cognizable or conceivable ; and it is only by a law of thought, which compels us to think some- thing, absolute and unknown, as the basis or condition of the relative and known, that this something obtains a kind of in- comprehensible reality to us. Now, that which manifests its qualities, — in other words, that in which the appearing causes inhere, that to which they belong, is called their subject, or sub- stance, or substratum. To this subject of the phaenomena of extension, solidity, etc., the term matter or material substance is commonly given ; and, therefore, as contradistinguished from these qualities, it is the name of something unknown and in- conceivable. The same is true in regard to the term mind. In so far as mind is the common name for the states of knowing, willing, feeling, desiring, etc., of which I am conscious, it. is only the 8* DO EEI \TIYITY OF HUMA>i KNOWLEDGE. name for a certain series of connected phagnomena or qualities, and, consequently, expresses only what is known. But in so far as it denotes that subject or substance in which the phoenom- ena of knowing, willing, etc., inhere, — something behind or under these phsenomena, — it expresses what, in itself, or in its absolute existence, is unknown. Thus, mind and matter, as known or knowable, are only two different series of phaenomena or qualities ; mind and matter, as unknown and unknowable, are the two substances in which these two different series of phasnomena or quahties are sup- posed to inhere. The existence of an unknown substance is only an inference we are compelled to make, from the existence of known phsenomena ; and the distinction of two substances is only inferred from the seeming incompatibility of the two series of phsenomena to coinhere in one. Our whole knowledge of mind and matter is thus, as we have said, only relative ; of existence, absolutely and in itself, we know nothing; and we may say of man what Yirgil says of -^neas, contemplating in the prophetic sculpture of his shield the future glories of Rome — " Rerumque ignarus, imagine gaudet." Testimonies to the relativity of human knowledge, — This is, indeed, a truth, in the admission of which philosophers, in gen- eral, have been singularly harmonious ; and the praise that has been lavished on Dr. Reid for this observation, is wholly unmer- ited. In fact, I am hardly aware of the philosopher who has not proceeded on the supposition, and there are few who have not explicitly enounced the observation. It is only since Reid's deatli that certain speculators have arisen, who have obtained celebrity by their attempt to found philosophy on an immediate knowledge of the absolute or unconditioned. I shall quote to you a few examples of this general recognition, as they happen to occur to my recollection ; and, in order to manifest the better its universality, I purposely overlook the testimonies of a more modern philosophy. Aristotle, .among miny similar observations, remarks in re- KELATIVITY OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE. 91 gard to matter, that it is incognizable in itself ; while in regard to mind he says, " that the intellect does not know itself directly, but only indirectly, in knowing other things ; " and he defines the soul from its pha3nomena, " the principle by which we live, and move, and perceive, and understand." St Augustin, the most philosophical of the Christian fathers, admirably says of body, — " Materiam cognoscendo ignorari, et ignorando cog- nosci ; " [" By assuming that we know matter, we betray our ignorance of it ; and it is only by admitting this ignorance, that we can be said to know it ; "] and of mind, — " Mens se cognos- cit cognoscendo se vivere, se meminisse, se intelligere, se velle, cogitare, scire, judicare." ["The mind knows itself only by knowing that it lives, remembers, understands, wills, thinks, knows, and judges."] "Non incurrunt," says Melanchthon, " ipsae substantias in oculos, sed vestitas et ornatae accidentibus ; hoc est, non possumus, in hac vita, acie oculorum perspicere ipsas substantias : sed utcunque, ex accidentibus quas in sensus exteriores incurrunt, ratiocinamur, quomodo inter se differant substantive." ["The substances themselves are not exposed to sight, but only so far they are covered and adorned with their attributes ; that is, we are not able, in this life, to behold the substances themselves ; but from the phenomena which are manifest to our external senses, we somehow infer the distin- guishing peculiarities of the substances to which the phenomena belong."] All relative existence is not relative to us, — Thus, our knowl- edge is of partial and relative existence only, seeing that exist- ence in itself, or absolute existence,* is no object of knowledge. But it does not follow that all relative existence is relative to us ; that all that can be known, even by a limited intelligence, is actually cognizable by us. We must, therefore, more pre- cisely limit our sphere of knowledge, by adding, that all we know is known only under the special conditions of our facul- ties. This is a truth likewise generally acknowledged. " Man," says Protagoras, " is the measure of the universe," — a truth ^ Absolute in two senses: 1^, As opposed to partial; 2°, As opposed to rotative 92 RELATIVITY OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE. tvhich Bacon has well expressed : [" All perceptions, as well of the senses as of the mind, are conformed to the nature of the percipient individual, and not to the true nature of the uni- verse ; and the human understanding is like a false mirror, which distorts and discolors the nature of things, by mingling its own nature with it."] " In perception," says Kant, " every thing is known according to the constitution of our faculty of sense." This principle has two branches, — Now this principle, in which philosophers of the most opposite opinions equally con- cur, divides itself into two branches. In the Jirst place, it would be unphilosophical to conclude that the properties of existence necessarily are, m number^ only as the number of our faculties of apprehending them ; or, in the second^ that the properties known, are known in their native "purity^ and without addition or modification from our organs of sense, or our capaci ties of intelligence. I shall illustrate these in their order. In regard to the first assertion, it is evident that nothing exists for us, except in so far as it is known to us, and that nothing is known to us, except certain properties or modes of existence, which are relative or analogous to our faculties. Beyond these modes we know, and can assert, the reality of no existence. But if, on the one hand, we are not entitled to assert, as actually existent, except what we know ; neither, on the other, are we warranted in denying, as possibly existent, what we do not know. The universe may be conceived as a polygon of a thousand, or a hundred thousand, sides or facets, — and each of these sides or facets may be conceived as repre- senting one special mode of existence. Now, of these thousand sides or modes, all may be equally essential, but three or four only may be turned towards us, or be analogous to our organs. One side or facet of the universe, as holding a relation to the organ of sight, is the mode of luminous or visible existence ; another, as proportional to the organ of hearing, is the mode of sonorous or audible existence ; and so on. But if every eye to see, if every ear to hear, were annihilated, the mode of ex- istence to which these organs now stand in relation, — that KELATIVITY OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE. 93 i which could be seen, that which could be heard, would still remain ; and if the intelligences, reduced to the three senses of touch, smell, and taste, were then to assert the impossibility of any modes of being except those to which these three senses were analogous, the procedure would not be more unwarranted, than if we now ventured to deny the possible reality of other modes of material existence than those to the perception of which OUT five senses are accommodated. I will illustrate this by an hypothetical parallel. Let us suppose a block of marble, on which there are four different inscriptions, — in Greek, in Latin, in Persic, and in Hebrew; and that four travellers approach, each able to read only the inscription in his native tongue. The Greek is delighted with the information the mar- ble affords him of the siege of Troy. The Roman finds inter- esting matter regarding the expulsion of the kings. The Per- sian deciphers an oracle of Zoroaster. And the Jew is sur- prised by a commemoration of the Exodus. Here, as each inscription exists or is significant only to him who possesses the corresponding language ; so the several modes of existence are manifested only to those intelligences vfho possess the corre- sponding organs. And as each of the four readers would be rash, if he maintained that the marble could be significant only as significant to him, so should we be rash, were we to hold that the universe had no other phases of being than the few that are turned towards our faculties, and which our five senses enable us to perceive. Before leaving this subject, it is perhaps proper to observe, that had we faculties equal in number to all the possible modes of existence, whether of mind or matter, still would our knowl- edge of mind or matter be only relative. If material existence could exhibit ten thousand phssnomena, and if we possessed ten thousand senses to apprehend these ten thousand phenomena of material existence, — of existence absolutely and in itself, we should be then as ignorant as we are at present. The properties of existence not known in their native purity, — But the consideration that our actual faculties of knoAvledge are probably wholly inadequate in number to the possible, modes of d-L RELATIVITY OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE. being, is of comparatively less importance than the other con- sideration to which we now proceed, — that whatever we know is not known as it is, but only as it seems to us to he ; for it is rf less importance that our knowledge should be limited, than that our knowledge should be pure. It is, therefore, of the high- est moment that we should be aware, that what we know is not a simple relation apprehended between the object known and the subject knowing, — but that every knowledge is a sum made up of several elements, and that the great business of philosophy is to analyze and discriminate these elements, and to determine from whence these contributions have been derived. I shall explain whai I mean by an example. In the perception of an external object, the mind does not know it in immediate relation to itself, but mediately, in relation to the material organs of sense. If, therefore, we were to throw these organs out of consideration, and did not take into account what they contribute to, and how they modify our knowledge of that object, it is evident that our con- clusion in regard to the nature of external perception would be erroneous. Again, an object of perception may not even stand in immediate relation to the organ of sense, but may make its impression on that organ through an intervening medium. Now, if this medium be thrown out of account, and if it be not considered that the real external object is the sum of all that externally contributes to affect the sense, we shall, in like man- ner, run into error. For example, I see a book, — I see that book through an external medium (what that medium is, we do not now inquire), — and I see it through my organ of sight, the eye. Now, as the full object presented to the mind (observe that I say the mind), in perception, is an object compounded of (1.) the external object emitting or reflecting light, ^. e. modify- ing the external medium, of (2.) this external medium, and of (3.) the living organ of sense, in their mutual relation, — let us suppose, in the example I have taken, that the full or ade- quate object perceived is equal to twelve, and that this amount is made up of three several parts, — of four contributed by the book, — of four contributed by all that intervenes between the book and the organ, and of four contributed by the living organ itself. EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 95 I use this illustration to show, that the phgenomenon of the external object is not presented immediately to the mind, but is known bj it only as modified through certain intermediate agencies ; and to show that sense itself may be a source of error, if we do not analyze and distinguish what elements, in an act of perception, belong to the outward reality, what to the outward medium, and what to the action of sense itself. But this source of error is not limited to our perceptions ; and we are liable to be deceived, not merely by not distinguisliing in an act of knowledge what is contributed by sense, but by not dis- tinguishing what is contributed by the mind itself. This is the most difficult and important function of philosophy ; and the greater number of its higher problems arise in the attempt to determine the shares to which the knowing subject, and the object known, may pretend in the total act of cognition. For according as we attribute a larger or a smaller proportion to each, we either run into the extremes of Idealism and Materi- alism, or maintain an equilibrium between the two. In what sense human knowledge is relative, — From what has been said, you will be able, I hope, to understand what is meant by the proposition, that all our knowledge is only relative. It is relative, 1°, Because existence is not cognizable, absolutely and in itself, but only in special modes ; 2°, Because these modes can be known only if they stand in a certain relation to our faculties ; and 3°, Because the modes thus relative to our faculties are presented to, and known by, the mind only under modifications determined by these faculties themselves. l^wo series of expressions applied to human knowledge. — This general doctrine being premised, it will be proper now to take some special notice of the several terms significant of the relative nature of our knowledge. And here there are two opposite series of expressions, — 1*^, Those which denote the relative and the known ; 2°, Those which denote the absolute and the unknown. Of the former class, are the words phcenom- enon^ mode^ modification^ state^ — words which are employed in the definition of Psychology ; and to these may be added the analogous terms, — quality^ property^ attribute, accident. Of 96 EXPLICATION OF TEKMS. the la iter class, — that is, the absolute and the unknown, — is the word subject^ which we have to explain as an element of the definition, and its analogous expressions, substance and sub- stratum. These opposite classes cannot be explained apart ; for, as each is correlative of the other, each can be compre- hended only in and through its correlative. The term subject (subjectum, vTtoaxaaig, v7ZO}iei[xevov) is used to denote the unknown basis which lies under the various phas- nomena or properties of which we become aware, whether in our internal or external experience. In the more recent phi- losophy, especially in that of Germany, it has, however, been principally employed to denote the basis of the various mental phsenomena ; but of this special signification we are hereafter more particularly to speak. The word substance (substantia) may be employed in two, but two kindred, meanings. It may be used either to denote that which exists absolutely and of itself; in this sense, it may be viewed as derived from subsistendo, and as meaning ens per se subsistens ; or it may be viewed as the basis of attri- butes, in which sense it may be regarded as derived from sub- stando, and as meaning id quod substat accidentibus^ like the Greek vnoataaig^ vTtoxeiixevov. In either case, it will, however, signify the same thing viewed in a different aspect. In the former meaning, it is considered in contrast to, and independent of, its attributes ; in the latter, as conjoined with these, and as affording them the condition of existence. In different rela- tions, a thing may be at once considered as a substance, and as an attribute, quality, or mode. This paper is a substance, in relation to the attribute of white ; but it is itself a mode in relation to the substance, matter. Substance is thus a term foi fhe substratum we are obliged to think to all that we variously lenominate a mode, a state, a quality, an attribute, a property, an iccident, a phcenomenon, an appearance, etc. These, though expressions generically the same, are, however, used with spe- cific distinctions. The terms mode, state, quality, attribute, property, accident, are employed in reference to a substance, as existing ; the terms phcenomenon, appearance, etc. in reference EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 97 to it, as known. But each of these expressions has also its pe- culiar signification. A mode is the manner of the existence of a thing. Take, for example, a piece of wax. The wax may be round, or square, or of any other definite figure ; it may also be solid or fluid. Its existence in any of these modes is not essential ; it may change from one to the other without any substantial alteration. As the mode cannot exist without a substance, we can afford to it only a secondary or precarious existence in relation to the substance, to which we accord the privilege of existing by itself, 'per se existere ; but though the substance be not astricted to any particular mode of existence, we must not suppose that it can exist, or, at least, be conceived by us to exist, in none. All modes are, therefore, variable states; and though some mode is necessary for the existence of a thing, any individual mode is accidental. The word modifica- tion is properly the bringing a thing into a certain mode of existence, but it is very commonly employed for the mode of existence itself. State is a term nearly synonymous with mode^ but of a meaning more extensive, as not exclusively limited to the mutable and contingent. Quality is, likewise, a word of a wider signification, for there are essential and accidental qualities.* The essential qualities of a thing are those aptitudes, those manners of existence and action, which it cannot lose without ceasing to be. For exam- ple, in man, the faculties of sense and intelligence ; in body, the dimensions of length, breadth, and thickness ; in God, the attri- butes of eternity, omniscience, omnipotence, etc. By accidental qualities^ are meant those aptitudes and manners of existence and action, which substances have at one time and not at another ; or vfhich they have always, but may lose without ceasing to be. For example, of the transitory class are the whiteness of a wall, the health which we enjoy, the fineness of the weather, etc. Of the permanent class are the gravity of bodies, the periodical movement of the planets, etc. ^ The term quality should, in strictness, be confined to accidental attri- butes. 9 98 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. The term attribute is a word properly convertible with quaU ity, for every quahty is an attribute, and every attribute is a quality ; but, in our language, custom has introduced a certain distinction in their appHcation. Attribute is considered as a word of loftier significance, and is, therefore, conveniently limited to qualities of a higher application. Thus, for exam- ple, it would be felt as indecorous to speak of the qualities of God, and as ridiculous to talk of the attributes of matter. Property is correctly a synonym for peculiar quahty ; * but it is frequently used as coextensive with quality in general. Accident, on the contrary, is an abbreviated expression for acci- dental or contingent quality. Phcenomenon is the Greek word- for that which appears, and may, therefore, be translated by appearance. There is, how- ever, a distinction to be noticed. In the first place, the employ- ment of the Greek term shows that it is used in a strict and philosophical application. In the second place, the English name is associated with a certain secondary or implied mean- ing, which, in some degree, renders it inappropriate as a pre- cise and definite expression. For the term appearance is used to denote not only that which reveals itself to our observation, as existent, but also to signify that which only seems to be, in contrast to that which truly is. There is thus not merely a certain vagueness in the word, but it even involves a kind of contradiction to the sense in which it is used when employed for phcenomenon. In consequence of this, the term phcenome- non has been naturalized in our language, as a philosophical substitute for the term appearance. ^ In the older and Aristotelian sense of the term. By the later Logicians, the term property was less correctly used to denote a necessary quality, whether peculiar or not. — English Ed. CHAPTER VII. EXPLICATION OF TERMS CONTINUED. Recapitulation. — In the last chapter, I illustrated the prin- ciple, that all our knowledge of mind and matter is merely relative. We know, and can know, nothing absolutely and in itself; all that we know 'w,- existence in certain special forms or modeSj and these, likewise, only in so far as they may be analo- gous to our faculties. We may suppose existence to have a thousand modes ; — but these thousand modes are all to us as zero, unless we possess faculties accommodated to their appre- hension. But were the number of our faculties coextensive with the modes of being, — had we, for each of these thousand modes, a separate organ competent to make- it known to us, — still would our whole knowledge be, as it is at present, only of the relative. Of existence, absolutely and in itself, we should then be as ignorant as we are now. We should still apprehend existence only in certain special modes, — only in certain rela- tions to our faculties of knowledge. These relative modes, whether belonging to the world with- out, or to the world within, are, under different points of view, and different limitations, known under various names, as quali- ties, properties, essence, accidents, phcenomena, manifestations, appearances, and so forth ; — whereas the unknown something of which they are the modes, — the unknown ground, which affords them support, is usually termed their substance or sub- ject. Substance (substantia), I noticed, is considered either in contrast to its accidents, as res per se subsistens, or in connection with them, as id quod substat accidentibus. It, therefore, com- prehends both the Greek terms omia and vTtoaeiiAsvov, — ovoia being equivalent to substantia in the meaning of ens per se sub- 100 EXPLICATION OF TERMS- sistetis ; — v7TOKeL[A,svov to it, as id quod suhstat accidentibus. The term subject is used only for substance in its second mean- ing, and thus corresponds to vTto'Aeijievov ; its literal signification is, as its etymology expresses, that which lies, or is placed, under the phenomena. Three different errors regarding Substance, — I at present avoid entering into the metaphysics of substance and phae- nomenon. I shall only observe, in general, that philosophers have frequently fallen into one or other of three different errors. Some have denied the reality of any unknown ground of the known phsenomena ; and have maintained that mind and matter have no substantial existence, but are merely the two comple- ments of two series of associated qualities. This doctrine is, however, altogether futile. It belies the veracity of our pri- mary beliefs ; it leaves unsatisfied the strongest necessities of our intellectual nature ; it admits as a fact that the phsenomena are connected, but allows no cause explanatory of the fact of their connection. Others, again, have* fallen into an opposite error. They have endeavored to speculate concerning the nature of the unknown grounds of the phsenomena of mind and iaatter, apart from the phsenomena, and have, accordingly, transcended the legitimate sphere of philosophy. A third party have taken some one, or more, of the phgenomena themselves as the basis or substratum of the others. Thus Descartes, at least as understood and followed by Malebranche and others of his disciples, made thought or consciousness convertible with the substance of mind ; and Bishops Brown and Law, with Dr, Watts, constituted solidity and extension into the substance of body. This theory is, however, liable to all the objections which may be alleged against the first. I defined Psychology, the science conversant about the phce- nomena of the mind, or conscious-subjectj or self or ego. The former parts of the definition have been explained ; the terms mind, conscious-subject, self and ego, come now to be considered. These are all only expressions for the unknown basis of the mental phsenomena, viewed, however, in different relations. What we mean hy mind, — Of these the word mind is the EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 101 first. In regard to the etymology of this term, it is obscure and doubtful ; perhaps, indeed, none of the attempts to trace it to its origin are successful. It seems to hold an analogy with the Latin inens^ and both are probably derived from the same common root. This root, wliich is lost in the European lan- guages of Scytho-Indian origin, is probably preserved in the Sanscrit mena^ to know or understand. The Greek vov(;^ intel- ligence^ is, in like manner, derived from a verb of precisely the same meaning (vosoo). The word mind is of more limited sig- nification than the term soul. In the Greek philosophy, the term ipvx'^r soul, comprehends, besides the sensitive and rational principle in man, the principle of organic life, both in the ani- mal and vegetable kingdoms ; and, in Christian theology, it is likewise used, in contrast to uv^viia or spirit, in a vaguer and more extensive signification. Since Descartes limited Psychology to the domain of con- sciousness, the term mind has been rigidly employed for the self-knowing principle alone. Mind, therefore, is to be under- stood as the subject of the various internal phsenomena of which we are conscious, or that subject of which consciousness is the general phenomenon. Consciousness is, in fact, to the mind what extension is to matter or body. Though both are phae- nomena, yet both are essential qualities ; for we can neither conceive mind without consciousness, nor body without exten- sion. Mind can be defined only a posteriori, — that is, only from its manifestations. Wliat it is in itself, that is, apart from its manifestations, — we, philosophically, know nothing, and, accordingly, what we mean by mind is simply that which per- ceives, thinks, feels, wills, desires, etc. Mind, with us, is thus nearly coextensive with the Rational and Animal souls of Aris- totle ; for the faculty of voluntary motion, which is a function of the animal soul in the Peripatetic doctrine, ought not, as is generally done, to be excluded from the phasnomena of con- sciousness and mind. Conscious7iess and Conscious-suhject. — The next term to be considered is conscious-subject. And first, what is it to be con- scious ? Without anticipating the discussion relative to con- 6^ 102 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. sciousness, fxs the fundamental function of intelligence, I may, at present, simply indicate to you what an act of consciousness denotes. This act is of the most elementary character; it is the condition of all knowledge ; I cannot, therefore, define it to you ; but, as you are all familiar with the thing, it is easy to enable you to connect the thing with the word. I know, — 1 desire, — I feel. What is it that is common to all these? Knowing and desiring and feeling are not the same, and may be distinguished. But they all agree in one fundamental condi- tion. Can I know, without knowing that I know ? Can T desire, without knowing that I desire? Can I feel, without knowing that I feel ? This is impossible. Now this knowing that I know or desire or feel, — this common condition of self- knowledge, is precisely what is denominated Consciousness. [Consciousness is a knowledge solely of what is now and here f resent to the mind. . . . Again, Consciousness is a knowledge of all that is now and here present to the mind ; every imme- diate object of cognition is thus an object of consciousness, and every intuitive cognition itself is simply a special form of con- sciousness. Consciousness comprehends every cognitive act; in other words, whatever we are not conscious of, that we do not know. . . . The actual modifications — the 'present acts and affections of the Ego, are objects of immediate cognition, as themselves objects of Consciousness.] — Diss, s^ipp. to Reid, So much at present for the adjective of conscious ; now for the substantive, subject^ — conscious-subject. Though conscious- ness be the condition of all internal phasnomena, still it is itself only a phaenomenon ; and, therefore, supposes a subject in which it inheres; — that is, supposes something that is conscious, — something that manifests itself as conscious. And, since con- sciousness comprises within its sphere the whole phasnomena of mind, the expression conscious-subject is a brief, but comprehen- sive, definition of mind itself. I have already informed you of the general meaning of the word subject in its philosophical application, — namely, the unknown basis of phasnomenal or manifested existence. It is EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 103 thus, in its application, common equally to the external and to the internal worlds. But the philosophers of mind have, in a manner, usurped and appropriated this expression to themselves. Accordingly, in their hands, the phrases conscious or thinhing subject^ and subject simply, mean precisely the same thing ; and custom has prevailed " so far, that, in psychological discussions, the subject is a term now currently employed, throughout Eu- rope, for the mind or thinhing principle. Use of the term Subject vindicated, — The question here occurs, what is the reason of this employment ? If mind, and subject are only convertible terms, why multiply synonyms ? Why exchange a precise and proximate expression for a vague and abstract generality ? The question is pertinent, and merits a reply ; for unless it can be shown that the word is necessary, its introduction cannot possibly be vindicated. Now, the utility of this expression is founded on two circumstances. The first, that it affords an adjective; the second, that the terms subject and subjective have opposing relatives in the terms object and objective, so that the two pairs of words together enable us to designate the primary and most important analysis and antithe- sis of philosophy, in a more precise and emphatic manner than can be done by any other technical expressions. This will require some illustration. Terms Subjective and Objective, — Subject, we have seen, is a term for that in which the phasnomena revealed to our obser- vation inhere ; — what the schoolmen have designated the materia in qua. Limited to the mental phsenomena, subject, therefore, denotes the mind itself; and subjective, that which belongs to, or proceeds from, the thinking subject. Object, on the other hand, is a term for that about which the knowing sub- ject is conversant, what the schoolmen have styled the materia circa quam ; while objective means that which belongs to, or proceeds from, the object known, and not from the subject knowing ; and thus denotes what is real in opposition to what is ideal, — what exists in nature, in contrast to what exists merely in the thought of the individual. All knowledge is a relation — a relation between that which knows (in scholastic 104 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. language, the subject in which knowledge inheres), and thai which is known (in scholastic language, the object about which knowledge is conversant) ; and the contents of every act of knowledge are made up of elements, and regulated by laws, proceeding partly from its object and partly from its subject. Now philosophy proper is principally and primarily the science of knowledge ; its first and most important problem being to de- termine — What can we hnow"^ that is, what are the conditions of our knowing, whether these lie in the nature of the object, or in the nature of the subject, of knowledge ? [But Philosophy being the Science of knowledge ; and the science of knowledge supposing, in its most fundamental and thorough-going analysis, the distinction of the subject and object of knowledge ; it is evident, that, to philosophy^ the subject of knowledge would be, by preeminence. The Subject , and the object of knowledge^ by preeminence. The Object, It was, therefore, natural that the object and the objective^ the subject and the sub- jective^ should be employed by philosophers as simple terms, compendiously to denote the grand discrimination about which philosophy was constantly employed, and which no others could be found so precisely and promptly to express. In fact, had it not been for the special meaning given to objective in the Schools, their employment in this, their natural relation, would probably have been of a much earlier date ; not, however, that they are void of ambiguity, and have not been often abusively employed. This arises from the following circumstance : — The subject of knowledge is, exclusively, the Ego or conscious mind. Subject and subjective, considered in themselves, are therefore little liable to equivocation. But, on the other hand, the object of knowledge is not necessarily a phsenomenon of the Non-ego ; for the phaenomena of the Ego itself constitute as veritable, though not so various and prominent, objects of cog- nition, as the phsenomena of the Non-ego. Subjective and objective do not, therefore, thoroughly and ade- quately discriminate that which belongs to mind, and that which belongs to matter; they do not even competently distinguish what is dependent, from what is independent, on the conditiovs t EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 105 of the mental self. But in these significations they are and must be frequently employed. Without, therefore, discarding this nomenclature, which, so far as it goes, expresses, in general, a distinction of the highest importance, in the most apposite terms; these terms may, by qualification, easily be rendered adequate to those subordinate discriminations, which it is often requisite to signalize, but which they cannot si^nply and of them- selves denote. Subject and subjective^ without any qualifying attribute, 1 would therefore employ, as has hitherto been done, to mark out what inheres in, pertains to, or depends on, the knowing mind, whether of man in general, or of this or that individual man in particular ; and this in contrast to object and objective^ as ex- pressing what does not so inhere, pertain, and depend. Thus, for example, an art or science is said to be objective^ when considered simply as a system of speculative truths or practical rules, but without respect of any actual possessor ; subjective^ when considered as a habit of knowledge or dexterity, inherent in the mind, either vaguely of any, or precisely of this or that, possessor. But, as has been stated, an object of knowledge may be a mode of mind, or it may be something different from mind; and it is frequently of importance to indicate precisely under which of these classes that object comes. In this case, by an internal development of the nomenclature itself, we might employ, on the former alternative, the term subject-object ; on the latter, the term object-object. But the subject-object may be either a mode of mind, of which we are conscious as absolute and for itself alone, — as, for example, a pain or pleasure ; or a mode of mind, of which we are conscious, as relative to, and representative of something else, — as, for instance, the imagination of something past or possible. Of these we might distinguish, when necessary, the one, as the absolute or the real subject-object, the other, as the relative, or the ideal, or the representative, subject-object. Finally, it may be required to mark whether the object-object and the subject-object be immediately known as present, or only 106 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. as represented. In this case we must resort, on the former alternative, to the epithet presentative or intuitive ; on the lat- ter, to those of represented, mediate, remote, 'primary, princi- pal, etc,'] — Diss, siipp. to Reid, Now, the great problem of philosophy is, to analyze the con- tents of our acts of knowledge or cognitions, — to distinguish what elements are contributed by the knowing subject, what ele- ments by the object known. There must, therefore, be terms adequate to designate these correlative opposites, and to dis- criminate the share which each has in the total act of cognition. But, if we reject the terms subject and subjective, object and objective, there are no others competent to the purpose. At this stage of your progress, it is not easy to make you aware of the paramount necessity of such a distinction, and of such terms, — or to show you how, from the want of words ex- pressive of this primary antithesis, the mental philosophy of [Great Britain] has been checked in its development, and involved in the utmost perplexity and misconception. It is suffi- cient to remark at present, that to this defect in the language of his psychological analysis, is, in a great measure, to be attributed the confusion, not to say the errors, of Keid, in the very cardi- nal point of his philosophy, — a confusion so great that the whole tendency of his doctrine was misconceived by Brown, who, in adopting a modification of the hypothesis of a repre- sentative perception, seems not even to have suspected, that he, and Keid, and modern philosophers in general, were not in this at one. The terms subjective and objective denote the primary distinction in consciousness of self and not-self, and this dis- tinction involves the whole science of mind; for this science is nothing more than a determination of the subjective and objec- tive, in themselves and in their mutual relations. The distinc- tion is of paramount importance, and of infinite application, not only in Philosophy proper, but in Grammar, Rhetoric, Criti- cism, Ethics, Pohtics, Jurisprudence, Theology. I will give you ^an example, — a philological example. Suppose a lexi- cographer had to distinguish the two meanings of the word cer- tainty. Certainty expresses either the firm conviction which EXPLICATION OF TERMS. ]07 we have of the truth of a thing ; or the character of the proof on which its reahty rests. The former is the subjective mean- ing ; the latter the objective. By what other terms can they be distinguisiied and described ? History of the terms Subject and Object, — The distinction of ^subject and object, as marking out the fundamental and most thorough-going antithesis in philosophy, we owe, among many other important benefits, to the schoolmen, and from the school- men the terms passed, both in their substantive and adjective forms, into the scientific language of modern philosophers. Deprived of these terms, the Critical Philosophy, indeed the w^hole philosophy of Germany and France, would be a blank. In [Great Britain], though familiarly employed in scientific lan- guage, even subsequently to the time of Locke, the adjective forms seem at length to have dropt out of the English tongue. That these words w^axed obsolete, was, perhaps, caused by the ambiguity which had gradually crept into the signification of the substantives. Object^ besides its proper signification, came to be abusively applied to denote motive^ end,, final cause (a mean- ing, by the way, not recognized by Johnson). This innovation was probably borrowed from the French, in whose language the word had been similarly corrupted, after the commencement of the last century. Subject in English, as sujet in French, had not been rightly distinguished from object, taken in its proper meaning, and had thus returned to the original ambiguity of the corresponding term {ynoy.u\itvov) in Greek. It is probable that the logical appKcation of the word (subject of predication) facilitated or occasioned this confusion. In using the terms, therefore, we think that an explanation, but no apology, is re- quired. The distinction is expressed by no other terms ; and if these did not already enjoy a prescriptive right as denizens of the language, it cannot be denied, that, as strictly analogical, they are well entitled to sue out their naturalization. We shall have frequent occasion to recur to this distinction, — and it is eminently w^orthy of your attention. Self Ego — illustrated from Plato. ■ — The last parallel ex- pressions are the terms self and ego. These we shall take 108 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. together, as thej are absolutely convertible. As the best prepar- ative for the proper understanding of these terms, I shall trans- late to you a passage from the First Alcihiades of Plato. The interlocutors are Socrates and Alcibiades. " Socr, Plold, now, with whom do you at present converse ? Is it not with me ? — Alcih, Yes. , Socr, And I also with you ? — Alcih, Yes, Socr, It is Socrates then who speaks ? — Alcih, Assuredly. Socr, And Alcibiades who listens ? — Alcih, Yes. Socr, Is it not with language that Socrates speaks ? — Alcih, What now ? of course. Socr, To converse, and to use language, are not these then the same ? — Alcih. The very same. Socr, But he who uses a thing, and the thing used, — are these not different ? — Alcih, What do you mean ? Socr, A currier, — does he not use a cutting knife, and other instruments ? — Alcih, Yes. Socr, And the man who uses the cutting knife, is he differ- ent from the instrument he uses ? — Alcih, Most certainly. Socr, In like manner, the lyrist, is he not different from the lyre he plays on ? — Alcih, Undoubtedly. Socr, This, then, was what I asked you just now, — does not he who uses a thing seem to you always different from the thing used? — Alcih, Very different. Socr, But the currier, does he cut with his instruments alone, or also with his hands ? — Alcih, Also with his hands. Socr, He then uses his hands- ? — Alcih. Yes. Socr, And in his work he uses also his eyes ? — Alcih, Yes. Socr, We are agreed, then, that he who uses a thing, and the thing used, are different ? — Alcih, We are. Socr, The currier and lyrist are, therefore, different from the hands and eyes, with which they work ? — Alcih, So it seems. Socr, Now, then, does not a man use his whole body ? — ^ Alcih, Unquestionably. Socr, But we are agreed that he who uses, and that which is usee are different ? — Alcih, Yes. Socr, A man is, therefore, different from his body ? — Alcih, So I think EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 109 Soar, What then is the man ? — Alcib, I cannot say. Socr, You can at least say that the man is that which uses the body ? — Alcib, True. Socr, Now, does any thing use the body but the mind ? — Al'cib. Nothing. Socr, The mind is, therefore, the man ? — Alcih, The mind alone." To the same effect, Aristotle asserts that the mind contains the man, not the man the mind. " Thou art the soul," says Hierocles, " but the body is thine." The Self or Ego in relation to bodily organs^ and thoughts, — But let us come to a closer determination of the point ; let us appeal to our experience. " I turn my attention on my being " [says Gatien-Arnoult], " and find that I have organs, and that I have thoughts. My body is .the complement of my organs ; am I then my body, or any part of my body ? This I cannot be. The matter of my body, in all its points, is in a perpetual flux, in a perpetual process of renewal. I, — /do not pass away, I am not renewed. None probably of the molecules which constituted my organs some years ago, form any part of the material system which I now call mine. It has been made up anew ; but I am still what I was of old. These organs may be mutilated ; one, two, or any number of them may be re- moved ; but not the less do I continue to be what I was, one and entire. It is even not impossible to conceive me existing, deprived of every organ ; I, therefore, who have these organs, or this body, /am neither an organ nor a body. " Neither am I identical with my thoughts, for they are man- ifold and various. I, on the contrary, am one and the same. Each moment they change and succeed each other ; this change and succession takes place in me, but I neither change nor suc- ceed myself in myself. Each moment I am aware or am conscious of the existence and change of my thoughts : this change is sometimes determined by me, sometimes by some- thing different from me ; but I always can distinguish myself from them : I am a permanent being, an enduring subject, of whose existence these thoughts are only so many modes, ap- 10 110 EXPLICATION OF TEKMS. pearances, or phenomena ; — I who possess organs and thoughts am, therefore, neither these organs nor these thoughts. "I can conceive myself to exist apart from every organ. But if I try to conceive myself existent without a thought, — without some form of consciousness, — I am unable. This or that thought may not be perhaps necessary ; but of some thought it is necessary that I should be conscious, otherwise I can no longer conceive myself to be. A suspension of thought is thus a suspension of my intellectual existence ; I am, therefore, essentially a thinking, — a conscious being ; and my true character is that of an intelligence, — an intelligence served by organs." But this thought, this consciousness, is possible only in, and ihrough, the consciousness of Self. The Self, the I, is recog- lized in every act of intelligence, as the subject to which that act belongs. It is I that perceive, I that imagine, I that re- member, I that attend, I that compare, I that feel, I that desire, I that will, I that am conscious. The I, indeed, is only man- ifested in one or other of these special modes ; but it is mani- fested in them all ; they are all only the phaenomena of the I, and, therefore, the science conversant about the phaenomena of the mind is, most simply and unambiguously, said to be conver- sant about the phaenomena of the /or Ego, This Expression, as that which, in many relations, best marks and discriminates the conscious mind, has now become familiar in every country, with the exception of our own. Why it has not been naturalized with us is not unapparent. The French have two words for the Ego or I — Je and Moi. The former of these is less appropriate as an abstract term, being in sound ambiguous ; but le moi admirably expresses what the Germans denote, but less felicitously, by their Das Ich, In English, the /could not be tolerated ; because in sound it could not be dis- tinguished from the word significant of the organ of sight. We must, therefore, renounce the term, or resort to the Latin Ego ; and this is perhaps no disadvantage, for, as the word is only employed in a strictly philosophical relation, it is better that this should be distinctly marked, by its being used in that relation EXPLICATION OF TERMS. Ill alone. The term Self is more allowable ; yet still the expres- sions Ego and Non-Ego are felt to be less awkward than those of Self and Not- Self So much in explanation of the terms involved in the defini- tion which I gave of Psychology. I now j)roceed, as I pro- posed, to the consideration of a few other words of frequent occurrence in philosophy, and which it is expedient to explain at once, before entering upon discussions in which they will continually recur. I take them up without order, except in so far as they may be grouped together by their meaning ; and the first I shall consider, are the terms hypothesis and theory. Hypothesis. — When a phaenomenon is presented to us which can be explained by no cause within the sphere of our experi- ence, we feel dissatisfied and uneasy. A desire arises to escape from this unpleasing state ; and the consequence of this desire is an effort of the mind to recall the outstanding phaenomenon to unity, by assigning it, ad interim, to some cause, or class, to which we imagine that it may possibly belong, until w^e shall be able to refer it, permanently, to that cause, or class, to which we shall have proved it actually to appertain. The judgment by which the phenomenon is thus provisorily referred, is called an hypothesis, — a supposition. Hypotheses have thus no other end than to satisfy the desire of the mind to reduce the objects of its knowledge to unity and system ; and they do this in recalling them, ad interim, to some principle, through which the mind is enabled to comprehend them. From this view of their nature it is manifest how far they are permissible, and how far they are even useful and expedient, — throwing altogether out of account the possibility that what is at first assumed as hypothetical, may subsequently be proved true. Conditions of a legitimate hypothesis. — An hypothesis is allowable only under certain conditions. Of these ih^ first is, — that the phenomenon to be explained should be ascertained actually to exist. It would, for example, be absurd to propose an hypothesis to account for the possibility of apparitions, until 112 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. it be proved that ghosts do actually appear. This precept, to establish your fact before you attempt to conjecture its cause, may, perhaps, seem to you too elementary to be worth the statement. But a longer experience will convince you of the contrary. That the enunciation of the rule is not only not superfluous, but even highly requisite as an admonition, is shown by great and numerous examples of its violation in the history of science ; and, as Cullen has truly observed, there are more false facts current in the world than false hypotheses to explain them. There is, in truth, nothing which men seem to admit so lightly as an asserted fact. It would be easy to ad- duce extensive hypotheses, very generally accredited, even at the present hour, which are, however, nothing better than assumptions founded on, or explanatory of, phaenomena which do not really exist in nature. The second condition of a permissible hypothesis is, — that the phsenomenon cannot be explained otherwise than by an hypothesis. It would, for example, have been absurd, even before the discoveries of Franklin, to account for the phsenom- enon of lightning by the hypothesis of supernatural agency. These two conditions, of the reality of the phasnomenon, and the necessity of an hypothesis for its explanation, being fulfilled, an hypothesis is allowable. Criteria of the excellence of an hypothesis, — But the neces- sity of some hypothesis being conceded, how are we to dis- criminate between a good and a bad, — a probable and an improbable, hypothesis? The comparative excellence of an hypothesis requires, in the first place, that it involve nothing contradictory, either internally or externally, — that is, either between the parts of which it is composed, or between these and any established truths. Thus, the Ptolemaic hypothesis of the heavenly revolutions became worthless, from the moment that it was contradicted by the ascertained phaenomena of the planets Yenus and Mercury. Thus the Wernerian hypothesis in geology is improbable, inasmuch as it is obliged to maintain that water was originally able to hold in solution substances whi^h it is now incapable of dissolving. The Huttonian EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 113 hypothesis, on the contrary, is so far preferable, that it assumes no effect to have been produced by any agent, which that agent is not known to be capable of producing. In the seco7id i)\2ice, an hypothesis is probable in proportion as the phagnomenon in question can be by it more completely explained. Thus the Copernican hypothesis is more probable than the Tychonic and semi-Tychonic, inasmuch as it enables us to explain a greater number of phasnomena. In the third place, an hypothesis is probable in proportion as it is independent of all subsidiary hypotheses. In this respect, again, the Copernican hypothesis is more probable than the Tychonic. For, though both ^ave all the phaenomena, the Copernican does this by one principal assumption ; whereas the Tychonic is obliged to call in the aid of several subordinate suppositions, to render the principal assumption available. So much for hypothesis. Theory ; Practice, — I shall be more concise in treating of the cognate expression, ' — theory. This word is employed by English writers in a very loose and improper sense. It is with them usually convertible with hypothesis, and hypothesis is commonly used as another term for conjecture. Dr. Reid, indeed, expressly does this ; he identifies the two words, and explains them as philosophical conjectures, as you may see in his First Essay on the Intellectual Powers, This is, however, wrong ; wrong, in relation to the original employment of tlie terms by the ancient philosophers ; and wrong, in relation t(? their employment by the philosophers of the moderi^, nations. The terms theory and theoretical are properly used in opposi- tion to the terms practice and practical ; in this sense they were exclusively employed by the ancients ; and in this sense they are almost exclusively employed by the continental philos- ophers. Practice is the exercise of an art, or the application of a science, in hfe, which application is itself an art, for it is not every one who is able to apply all he knows ; there being re- quired, over and above knowledge, a certain dexterity and skill Theory, on thfe contrary, is mere knoAvledge or science. There IS a distinction, but no opposition, between theory and practice ; each to a certain extent supposes the other. On the one hand, 114 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. theory is dependent on practiee ; pi*actice must have preceded theory ; for theory being only a generahzation of the principles on which practice proceeds, these must originally have been taken out of, or abstracted from, practice. On the other hand, this' is true only to a certain extent; for there is no practice without a theory. The man of practice must have always known something, however little, of what he did, of what he intended to do, and of the means by which his intention was to be carried into effect. He was, therefore, not wholly ignorant of the principles of his procedure ; he was a limited, he was, in some degree, an unconscious, theorist. As he proceeded, however, in his practice, and reflected on his performance, his theory acquired greater clearness and extension, so that he became at last '^distinctly conscious of what he did, and could give, to himself and others, an account of his procedure. " Per varies usus artem experientia fecit, Exemplo monstrante viam." In this view, theory is, therefore, simply a knowledge of the principles by which practice accomplishes its end. The opposition of Theoretical and Practical philosophy is somewhat different ; for these do not stand simply related to each other as theory and practice. Practical philosophy in- volves likewise a theory, — a theory, however, subordinated to the practical application of its principles ; while theoretical phi- losophy has nothing to do with practice, but terminates in mere speculative or contemplative knowledge. The next group of associated words to which I would call your attention is composed of the terms, — power^ faculty^ ca- opacity y disposition^ habit, act, operation, energy, function, etc. Power, Reid's criticism of Locke. — Of these the first is power, and the explanation of this, in a manner, involves that of all the others. I have, in the first place, to correct an error of Dr. Reid, in relation to this term, in his criticism of Locke's statement of its import. — You will observe that I do not, at present, enter on the question, How do we acquire the notion of power ? and T EXPLICATION OF. TERMS. . 115 defend the following passage of Locke, only in regard to the meaning and comprehension of the term. " The mind," say? Locke, " being every day informed, by the senses, of the altera- tion of those simple ideas it observes in things without, and taking notice how one comes to an end," and ceases to be, and another begins to exist which was not before ; reflecting, also, on what passes within itself, and observing a constant change of its ideas, sometimes by the impression of outward objects on the senses, and sometimes by the determination of its own choice ; and concluding from what it has so constantly observed to have been, that the like changes will, for the future, be made in the same things, by hke agents, and by the like ways ; considers, in one thing, the possibility of having any of its simple ideas changed, and, in another, the possibility of making that change ; and so comes by that idea which we call power. Thus we say, fire has a power to melt gold, — that is, to destroy the consis- tency of its insensible parts, and, consequently, its hardness, and make it fluid, and gold has a power to be melted : that the sun has a power to blanch wax, and wax a power to be blanched by the sun, whereby the yellowness is destroyed, and whiteness made to exist in its room. In which, and the like cases, the power, we consider, is in reference to the change of perceivable ideas ; for we cannot observe any alteration to be made in, or operation upon,^any thing, but by the observable change of its sensible ideas ; nor conceive any alteration to be made, but by conceiving a change of some of its ideas. Power, thus considered, is twofold — namely, as able to make, or able to receive, any change : the one may be called active j and the other passive power." Active and Passive Power, — I have here only to call your attention to the distinction of power into two kinds, active and 'passive — the former meaning, id quod potest facere^ that which can effect or can do^ — the latter, id quod potest fieri ^ that which can he effected or can he done. In both cases, the general notion of power is expressed by the verb potest or can. Now, on this, Dr. Reid makes the following strictures : " Whereas Locke distinguishes power into active and passive, I conceive 116 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. passive power is no power at all. He means by it, the possi- bility of being changed. To call this, power, seems to be a misapplication of the word. I do not remember to have met with the phrase passive power in any other good author. Mr. Locke seems to have been unlucky in inventing it ; and it de- serves not to be retained in our language. Perhaps he was unwarily led into it, as an opposite to active power. But I con- ceive we call certain powers active, to distinguish them from other powers that are called speculative. As all mankind dis- tinguish action from speculation, it is very proper to distinguish the powers by which those different operations are performed into active and speculative. Mr. Locke, indeed, acknowledges that active power is more properly called power : but I see no propriety at all in passive power ; it is a powerless power, and a contradiction in terms." These observations of Dr. Reid are, I am sorry to say, erro- neous from first to last. The latter part, in which he attempts to find a reason for Locke being unwarily betrayed into making this distinction, is, supposing the distinction untenable, and Locke its author, wholly inadequate to account for his hallu- cination : for, surely, the powers by which we speculate are, in their operations, not more passive than those that have some- times been styled active, but which are properly denominated practical. But in the censure iteelf on Locke, Reid is alto gether mistaken. Li the first place, so far was Locke from being unlucky in inventing the distinction, it was invented some two thousand years before. In the second place, to call the possibility of heing changed a power, is no misapplication of the word. Li the third place, so far is the phrase passive power from not being employed by any good author, — there is hardly a metaphysician, previous to Locke, by whom it was not famil- iarly used. In fact, this was one of the most celebrated dis- tinctions in philosophy. It was first formally enounced by Aristotle, and from him was universally adopted. Active and passive power are in Greek styled dvvafug Troir^TiXT], and dvrafAig Tta&rjti'Ai] ; in Latin, potentia activa, and potentia passiva. Power, therefore, is a word wliich we may use both in an EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 117 Siciive, and in a passive, signification; and in psychology, wc may apply it botli to the actiye faculties, and to the passive capacities, of mind. Faculty, — This leads to the meaning of the terms faculties and capacities. Faculty (^facultas) is derived from the obsolete 'Lvdmfacul, the more ancient form of facilisy from which again facilltas is formed. It is properly limited to active power, and, therefore, is abusively applied to the mere passive affections of mind. Capacity (capacitas), on the other hand, is more properly limited to these. Its primary signification, which is literally room for^ as well as its employment, favors this ; although it cannot be denied, that there are examples of its usage in an active sense. Leibnitz, as far as I know, was the first who limited its psychological application to the passivities of mind. In liis famous Nouveaux Essais sur V Entendement Humain, a work written in refutation of Locke's Essay on the same sub- ject, he observes : " We may say that power, in general, is the possibility of change. Now the change, or the act of this possi- bility, being action in one subject and passion in another, there will be two powers, the one passive, the other active. The active may be called faculty, and perhaps the passive might be called capacity, or receptivity. It is true that the active power is sometimes taken in a higher sense, when, over and above the simple faculty, there is also a tendency, a nisus ; and it is thus that I have used it in my dynamical considerations. We might give it in this meaning the speciaf name oi force, '^ I may notice that Heid seems to have attributed no other meanino: to the term power than that of force. Power, then, is active and passive ; faculty is active power, — capacity is passive power. Disposition, Habit, — The two terms next in order, are dis- position, in Greek, diad^Eaig ; and liahit, in Greek f |^\ I take these together, as they are similar, yet not the same. Both are tendencies to action ; but they differ in this, that disposition properly denotes a natural tendency, habit an acquired ten- dency. Aristotle distinguishes them by another difference* 118 EXPLICATION OF TERMS. " Habit (f'Sfi?) is discriminated from disposition (^didd^saig) in this, that the latter is easily jnovable, the former of longer duration, and more difficult to be moved/' I may notice that iabit is formed by the frequent repetition of the same action or passion, and that this repetition is called consuetude, or custom. The latter terms, which properly signify the cause, are not un- frequently abusively employed for habit, their effect. I may likewise observe that the terms power, faculty, capac- ity, are more appropriately applied to natural, than to acquired, capabilities, and are thus inapplicable to mere habits. I say mere habits, for where habit is superinduced upon a natural capability, both terms may be used. Thus we can say both the faculty of abstraction, and the habit of abstraction, — the ca- pacity of suffering, and the habit of suffering; but still the meanings are not identical. The last series of cognate terms are act^ operation, energy. They are all mutually convertible, as all denoting the present exertion or exercise of a power, a faculty, or a habit. I must here explain to you the famous distinction of actual and poten- tial existence ; for, by this distinction, act, operation, energy, are contra-discriminated from power, faculty, capacity, disposition, and habit. This distinction, when divested of certain subordi- nate subtleties of no great consequence, is manifest and simple. Potential existence means merely that the thing may he at some time; actual existence, that it now is. Thus, the mathema- tician, when asleep or playing at cards, does not exercise his skill ; his geometrical knowledge is all latent, but he is still a mathematician — potentially. ** Hermogenes, says Horace, was a singer, even when silent ; how ? — a singer, not in actu, but in posse. So Alfenus was a cobbler, even when not at work; that is, he was a cobbler potential ; whereas, when busy in his booth, he was a cobbler actual. In like manner, my sense of sight potentially exists, though my eyelids are closed ; but when I open them, it exists actually. Now, power, faculty, capacity, disposition, habit, are all differ- ent expressions for potential or possible existence ; act, opera- EXPLICATION OF TERMS. 119 tton, energy, for actual or present existence. Thus the power of imagination expresses the unexerted capability of imagining ; the act of imagination denotes that power elicited into imme- diate — into present existence. The different synonyms for potential existence, are existence ev dvvdfxei, in potentta, in posse, in power ; for actual existence, existence Iv tveQyeia, or tv Ivrs- lt](^SLa, in actu, in esse, in act, in operation, iji energy. The term energy is precisely the Greek term for act of operation ; but it has vulgarly obtained the meaning of forcible activity. The word functio, in Latin, simply expresses performance or operation ; functio muneris is the exertion of an energy of some determinate kind. But with us, the word function has come to be employed in the sense of munus alone, and means not the exercise, but the specific character, of a power. Thus the function of a clergyman does, not mean with us the per- formance of his duties, but the peculiarity of those duties themselves. The function of nutrition does not mean the operation of that animal power, but its discrimin^ite character. CHAPTER VIII. DISTRIBUTION OF MENTAL PHiENOMENA :- SPECIAL CONDI- TIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. Consciousness compi^ehends all the mental ph(Enomena, — In taking a comprehensive survey of the mental phaenomena, these are all seen to comprise one essential element, or to be possible only under one necessary condition. This element or condition is Consciousness, or the knowledge that I, — that the Ego exists, in some determinate state. In this knowledge they appear, or are realized as phsenomena, and with this knowledge they likewise disappear, or have no longer a phaenomenal exist- ence ; so that consciousness may be compared to an internal light, by means of which, and which alone, what passes in the mind is rendered visible. Consciousness is simple, — is not composed of parts, either similar or dissimilar. It always resembles itself, differing only in the degrees of its intensity ; thus, there are not various kinds of consciousness, although there are various kinds of mental modes, or states, of which we are conscious. Whatever division, therefore, of the mental phsenomena may be adopted, all its members must be within consciousness itself, which must be viewed as comprehensive of the whole phsenomena to be divided ; far less should we reduce it, as a special phsenomenon, to a particular class. Let con- sciousness, therefore, remain one and indivisible, comprehend- ing all the modifications, — all the phsenomena, of the thinking subject. Three classes of mental phcenomena. — But taking, again, a survey of the mental modifications, or phsenomena, of which we are conscious, — these are seen to divide themselves into THBEE great classes. In the first place, there are the pha3- (120) DISTRIBUTION OF MENTAL PHENOMENA. 121 noniena of Knowledge ; in the second place, there are the phae- nomena of Feeling^ or the phgenomena of Pleasure and Pain ; and, in the tliird place, there are the j)hccnomena of Will and Desire, Let me illustrate this by an example. I see a picture. Now, first of all, — I am conscious of perceivmg a certain complement of colors and figures, — I recognize what the object is. This is the phsenomenon of Cognition or Knowl- edge. But this is not the only phsenomenon of which I may be here conscious. I may experience certain affections in the contemplation of this object. If the picture be a masterpiece, the gratification will be unalloyed ; but if it be an unequal pro- duction, I shall be conscious, perhaps, of enjoyment, but of enjoyment alloyed with dissatisfaction. This is the phaenome- non of Feeling, — or of Pleasure and Pain. But these two phsenomena do not yet exhaust all of which I may be conscious on the occasion. I may desire to see the picture long, — to see it often, — to make it my own, and, perhaps, I may will, resolve, or determine so to do. This is the complex phaenomenon of Will and Desire. Their nomenclature, — The English language, unfortunately, does not afford us terms competent to express and discriminate, with even tolerable clearness and precision, these classes of phasnomena. In regard to the Jirst, indeed, we have com- paratively little reason to complain ; the synonymous terms, knowledge and cognition^ suffice to distinguish the phaenomena of this class from those of the other two. In the second class, the defect of the language becomes more apparent. The word feeling is the only term under w^hich we can possibly collect the phaenomena of pleasure, and pain, and yet this word is ambiguous. For it is not only employed to denote what we are conscious of as ao-reeable or disaorreeable in our mental states, but it is likewise used as a synonym for the sense of touch. It is, however, principally in relation to the third class that the deficiency is manifested. In English, unfortunately, we have no term capable of adequately expressing what is common both to will and desire ; that is, the nisus or conatus, — 11 122 DISTKIBUTIOK OF MENTAL PHENOMENA. the tendency towards the realization of their end. By will is meant a free and deliberate, by desire a blind and fatal, ten- dency to act. Now, to express, I say, the tendency to overt action, — the quality in which desire and will are equally con- tained, — we possess no English term to which an exception of more or less cogency may not be taken. Were we to say the ohgenomena of tendency^ the phrase would be vague ; and the same is true of the phaenomena of doing. Again, the term phsgnomena of appetency is objectionable, because (to say noth- ing of the unfamiharity of the expression) appetency^ though perhaps etymologically unexceptionable, has, both in Latin and English, a meaning almost synonymous with desire. Like the Latin appetentiaj the Greek oqe^iq is equally ill-balanced ; for, though used by philosophers to comprehend both will and desire, it more familiarly suggests the latter, and we need not, therefore, be solicitous, with Mr. Harris and Lord Monboddo, to naturalize in English the term orectic. Again, the phrase phaenomena of activity would be even worse ; every possible objection can be made to the term active power Sj by which the philosophers of this country have designated the orectic facul- ties of the Aristotelians. For you will observe, that all facul- ties are equally active ; and it is not the overt performance, but the tendency towards it, for which we are in quest of an expression. The German is the only language I am acquainted with which is able to supply the term of which philosophy is in want. The expression Bestrehungs Vermogen, which is most nearly, though awkwardly and inadequately, translated by striv- ing facidtiesj — faculties of effort or endeavor, — is now gen- erally employed, in the philosophy of Germany, as the genus^ comprehending desire and will. Perhaps the phrase, phasnom- ena of exertion^ is, upon the whole, the best expression to denote the manifestations, and exertive faculties, the best expression to denote the faculties, of will and desire. Exero, in Latin, means hterally to put forth ; — and, with us, exertion and ex- ertive are the only endurable words that I can find which approximate, though distantly, to the strength and precision of the German expression. I shall, however, occasionally employ OISTKIBUTION OF MENTAL PHENOMENA. 123 likewise the term appetency^ in the rigorous signification I have mentioned, — as a genus comprehending under it both desires and voHtions.* This division of mind into the three great classes of the Cog- nitive faculties, — the Feelings, or capacities of Pleasure and Pain, — and the Exertive or Conative Powers, — I do not pro- pose as original. It was first promulgated by Kant ; and the felicity of the distribution was so apparent, that it has now been long all but universally adopted in Germany by the phi- losophers of every school. To English psychologists it is apparently wholly unknown. They still adhere to the old scholastic division into powers of the Understanding and pow- ers of the Will ; or, as it is otherwise expressed, into Intel- lectual and Active powers. Objection to the classification ohviated, — An objection to the arrangement may, perhaps, be taken on the ground that the three classes are not coordinate. It is evident that every men- tal phsenomenon is either an act of knowledge, or only possible through an act of knowledge, for consciousness is a knowl- edge, — a phasnomenon of cognition ; and, on this principle, many philosophers have been led to regard the knowing, or representative faculty, as they called it, — the faculty of cogni- tion, as the fundamental power of mind, from which all otherj" are derivative. . To this the answer is easy. These philoso- phers did not observe that, although pleasure and pain, — although desire and volition, are only as they are known to be yet, in these modifications, a quality, a phsenomenon of mind absolutely new, has been superadded, which was never involved in, and could, therefor^ never have been evolved out of, the mere faculty of knowledge. The faculty of knowledge is cer- tainly the first in order, inasmuch as it is the conditio sine qua non of the others ; and we are able to conceive a being pos- sessed of the power of recognizing existence, and yet wholly ^ The term Conative (from Conari) is employed by Cudworth in his Treatise on Free Will. The terms Conation and Conative are those finally adopted by the Author, as the most appropriate expressions for the class of phienomena in question. — English Ed. 124 DISTRIBUTION OF MENTAL PHENOMENA. void of all feeling of pain and pleasure, and of all powers of desire and volition. On the other hand, we are wholly unable to conceive a being possessed of feeling and desire, and, at the same time, without a knowledge of any object upon which his affections may be employed, and without a consciousness of these affections themselves^ We can further conceive a being possessed of knowledge and feeling alone — a being endowed with a power of recognizing objects, of enjoying the exercise, and of grieving at the restraint, of his activity, — and yet devoid of that faculty of voluntary agency — of that conation^ which is possessed by man. To such a being would belong feelings of pain and pleasure, but neither desire nor will properly so called. On the other hand, however, we cannot possibly conceive the exist- ence of a voluntary activity independently of all feeling; for voluntary conation is a faculty which can only be determined to energy through a pain or pleasure, — through an estimate of the relative worth of objects. In distinguishing the cognitions, feehngs, and conations, it is not, therefore, to be supposed that these phsenomena are possi- ble independently of each other. In our philosophical sys- tems, they may stand separated from each other in books and chapters ; — in nature, they are ever interwoven. In every, the simplest, modification of mind, knowledge, feeling, and desire or will go to constitute the mental state ; and it is only by a scientific abstraction that we are able to analyze the state into elements, which are never really existent but in mutual combination. These elements are found, indeed, in very vari- ous proportions in different states, — sometimes one prepon- derates, sometimes another ; but there is no state in which they are not all coexistent. Let the mental phaenomena, therefore, be distributed under the three heads of phaenomena of Cognition, or the faculties of Knowledge ; phaenomena of Feeling, or the capacities 'of Pleas- ure and Pain ; and phaenomena of Desiring or Willing, or the powers of Conation. The order of these is determined by their relative consecution. Feeling and appetency suppose knowl- CONDITIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. 125 edge. The cognitive faculties, therefore, stand first. But as will, and desire, and aversion suppose a knowledge of the pleasurable and painful, the feelings will stand second as inter- mediate between the other two. Consciousness cannot he defined, — Such is the highest or most general classification of the mental phsenomena, or of the phcenomena of which we are conscious. But as these primary classes are, as v/e have shown, all included under one universal ph^enomenon, — the phaenomenon of Consciousness, — it follows that Consciousness must form the first object of our considera- tion. Nothing has contributed more to spread obscurity over a very transparent matter, than the attempts of philosophers to define consciousness. Consciousness cannot be defined ; we may be ourselves fully aware what consciousness is, but we cannot, without confusion, convey to others a definition of what we ourselves clearly apprehend. The reason is plain. Conscious- ness lies at the root of all knowledge. Consciousness is itself the one highest source of all comprehensibility and illustration ; — how, then, can we find aught else by which consciousness may be illustrated or comprehended ? To accomplish this, it would be necessary to have a second consciousness, through which we might -be conscious of the mode in wliich the first consciousness was possible. Many philosophers, — and among others Dr. Brown, — have defined consciousness a feeling. But how do they define a feeling ? They define, and must define it, as something of which we are conscious ; for a feeling of which we are not conscious, is no feeling at all. Here, therefore, they are guilty of a logical see-saw or circle. They define consciousness by feeling, and feeling by consciousness, — that is, they explain the same by the same, and thus leave us in the end no wiser than we were in the beginning. Other philosophers say that consciousness is a hnowledgcj — and others again, that it is a belief or conviction of a knowledge. Here, again, we have the same violation of logical law. Is there any knowledge of which we are not conscious ? Is there any belief of which we are not conscious ? There is not, — there cannot 11* 126 CONDITIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. be ; tlierefore, consciousness is not contained under either knowledge or belief, but on the contrary, knowledge and be- lief are both contained under consciousness. In short, the notion of consciousness is so elementary, that it cannot possibly be resolved into others more simple. It cannot, therefore, be brought under any genus, — any more general conception ; and, consequently, it cannot be defined. But though consciousness cannot be logically defined, it may, however, be philosophically analyzed. This analysis is effected by observing and holding fast the phaenomena or facts of con- sciousness, comparing these, and, from this comparison, evolving the universal conditions under which alone an act of conscious- ness is possible. What the word consciousness denotes^ and what it involves, — But before proceeding to show in detail what the act of con- sciousness comprises, it may be proper, in the first place, to recall in general what kind of act the word is employed to denote. I know ^ If^^^^ I desire, etc. What is it that is neces- sarily involved in all these ? It requires only to be stated to be admitted, that when I know, I must know that I know, — when I feel, I must know that I feel, — when I desire, I must know that I desire. The knowledge, the feeling, the desire, are pos- sible only under the condition of being known, and being known by me. For if I did not know that I knew, I would not know, — if I did not know that I felt, I would not feel, — if I did not know that I desired, I would not desire. Now, this knowl- edge, which I, the subject, have of these modifications of my being, and through which knowledge alone these modifications are possible, is what we call consciousness. The expressions, I know that 1 know, — / know that I feel, — / knoiu that I de- sire, — are thus translated by, I am conscious that I know, — 2 am conscious that I feel, — lam conscious that T desire. Con- sciousness is thus, on the one hand, the recognition by the mhid or ego of its acts and affections ; — in other words, the self- affirmation, that certain modifications are known by me, and that these modifications are mine. But on the other hand, consciousness is not to be viewed as any thing different from CONDITIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. 127 these modifications themselves, but is, in fact, the general con- dition of their existence, or of their existence within the sphere of intelligence. Though the simplest act of mind, conscious- ness thus expresses a relation subsisting between two terms. These terms are, on the one hand, an I or Self, as the subject of a certain modification, — and, on the other, some modifica- tion, state, quality, affection, or operation belonging to the sub- ject. Consciousness, thus, in its simplicity, necessarily involves three things, — 1°, A recognizing or knowing subject ; 2°, A recognized or known modification ; and, 3°, A recognition or knowledge by the subject of the modification. Consciousness and knowledge involve each other, — From this it is apparent, that consciousness and knowledge each involve the other. An act of knowledge may be expressed by the formula, I know ; an act of consciousness by the formula, I know that I know : but as it is impossible for us to know without at the same time knowing that we know, so it is impossible to know that we know without our actually knowing. The one merely explicitly expresses what the other implicitly contains. Con- sciousness and knowledge are thus not opposed as really differ- ent. Why, then, it may be asked, employ two terms to express notions, which, as they severally infer each other, are really identical ? To this the answer is easy. Kealities may be in themselves inseparable, while, as objects of our knowledge, it may be necessary to consider them apart. Notions, likewise, nay severally imply each other, and be inseparable, even in bought ; yet, for the purposes of science, it may be requisite to distinguish them by different terms, and to consider them in 4ieir relations or correlations to each other. Take a geometri- cal example, — a triangle. This is a whole composed of cer- tain parts. Here the whole cannot be conceived as separate from its parts, and the parts cannot be conceived as separate from their whole. Yet it is scientifically necessary to liaA^e diff-erent names for each, and it is necessary now to consider the whole in relation to the parts, and now the parts in correla- tior to the whole. Again, the constituent parts of a triangle are ddes and angles. Here the sides suppose the angles. — 128 CONDITIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. the angles suppose the sides ; — and, in fact, the sides and angles are, in themselves, in reality, one and indivisible. But they are not the same to us, — to our knowledge. For though we cannot abstract in thought the sides from the angle, the angle from the sides, we may make one or other the principal object of attention. We may either consider the angles in relation to each other, and to the sides ; or the sides in relation to eac^ other, and to the angles. And to express all this, it is neces sary to distinguish, in thought and expression, what, in nature, is one and indivisible. As it is in geometry, so it is in the philosophy of mind. Wc require different words, not only to express objects and relations different in themselves, but to express the sam^ objects and re- lations under the different points of view in ifliich they are placed by the mind, when scientifically considering them. Thus, in the present instance, consciousness and knowledge are not distinguished by different words as different things, but only as the same thing considered in different aspects. The verbal dis- tinction is taken for the sake of brevity and pre rally allowed a reciprocal influence of these. By influence (in Latin, influxus)^ you are to understand the relation of a cause to its effect ; and the term, now adopted into every vulgar lan- guage of Europe, was brought into use principally by the au- thority of Suarez, a Spanish Jesuit, who flourished at the close of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries, and one of the most illustrious metaphysicians of modern times. By him a cause is defined, principium per se influens esse in aliud. This definition, however, and the use of the metaphysi- cal term influence, (for it is nothing more,) are not, as is sup-, posed, original with him. They are to be found in the pseudo- Aristotelic treatise, J)e Oausis, The second hypothesis in chronological order is that of the Plastic Medium. It is to be traced to Plato. That philosopher, in illustrating the relations of the two constituents of man, says that the soul is in the body like a sailor in a ship ; that the soul employs the body as its instrument ; but that the energy, or life and sense, of the body, is the manifestation of a different substance, — r of a substance which holds a kind of intermediate existence between mind and matter. This conjecture, which INTERCOURSE OF MIND AND BODY. 213 Plato onlj obscurely hinted at, was elaborated with peculiar partiality by his followers of the Alexandrian school ; and, in their psychology, the oxog, or vehicle of the soul, the medium through which it is united to the body, is a prominent element and distinctive principle. To this opinion St. Austin, among other Christian fathers, was inclined ; and, in modern times, it has been revived and modified by Gassendi, Cudworth, and Le Clerc. Descartes agrees with the Platonists, in opposition to the Aristotelians, that the soul is not the substantial form of the body, but is connected with it only at a single point in the brain, — namely, the pineal gland. The pineal gland, he supposes, is the central point at which the or*ganic movements of the body terminate, when conveying to the mind the determinations to voluntary motion. But Descartes did- not allow, like the Pla- tonists, any intermediate or connecting substance. The nature of the connection he himself does not very explicitly state ; — but his disciples have evolved the hypothesis, already explained, of Occasional Causes, in which God is the connecting principle, — an hypothesis at least implicitly contained in his philosophy. Finally, Leibnitz and Wolf agree with the Cartesians, that there is no real, but only an apparent, intercourse between mind and body. * To explain this apparent intercourse they do not, however, resort to the continual assistance or interposition of the Deity, but have recourse to the supposition of a harmony between mind and body, established before the creation of either. These hypotheses unphilosophical, — All these theories are unphilosophical, because they all attempt to establish something beyond the sphere of observation, and, consequently, beyond the sphere of genuine philosophy ; and because they are either, like the Cartesian and Leibnitzian theories, contradictions of the fact of consciousness ; or, like the two other hypotheses, at variance with the fact which they suppose. What St. Austin so admirably says of the substance, either of mind or of body, — "Materiam spiritumque cognoscendo ignorari, et ignorando cognosci," — T would exhort you to adopt as your opinion in re- 214 INTERCOURSE OF MIND AND BODY. gard to the union of these two existences. In short, in the words of Pascal, " Man is to himself the mightiest prodigy of nature ; for he is unable to conceive what is body, still less what fe mind, but least of all, is he able to conceive how a body can be united to a mind ; yet this is his proper being." A content- ed ignorance is, indeed, wiser than a presumptuous knowledge ; but this is a lesson which seems the last that philosophers are willing to learn. In the words of one of the acutest modern thinkers — " Magna, immo maxima, pars sapientiae est, quasdam asquo animo nescire velle." CHAPTER XIII. GENERAL PHJENOMENA OF CONSCIOUSNESS — ARE WE ALWAYS CONSCIOUSLY ACTIVE? The second General Fact of Consciousness which we shall consider, and out of which several questions of great interest arise, is the fact, or correlative facts, of the Activity and Passivity of Mind. Activity and Passivity always conjoined in mind, — There is no pure activity, no pure passivity in creation. All things in the universe of nature are reciprocally in a state of continual action and counter-action ; they are always active and passive at once. God alone must be thought of as being active with- out any mixture of passivity, as his activity is subjected to no limitation. But precisely because it is unlimited, is it for us wholly incomprehensible. Activity and passivity are not, therefore, in the manifesta- tions of mind, distinct and independent phsenomena. This is a great, though a common, error. They are always conjoined. There is no operation of mind which is purely active ; no affec- tion which is purely passive. In every mental modification, action and passion are the two necessary elements or factors of which it is composed. But though both are always present, each is not, however, always present in equal quantity. Some- times the one constituent preponderates, sometimes the other ; and it is from the preponderance of the active element in some modifications, of the passive element in others, that we distin- guish these modifications by different names, and consider them as activities or passivities according as they approximate to one or other of the two factors. Thus faculty^ operation, energy^ 216 GENERAL PHENOMENA OF CONSCIOUSNESS. are words that we employ to designate the manifestations in which activity is predominant. Faculty denotes an active power ; action, operation, energy, denote its present exertion. On the other hand, capacity expresses a passive power ; affec- tion, passion, express a present suifering. The terms, mode, modijication, state, may be used indifferently to signify both phsenomena; but it must be acknowledged that these, espe- cially the word state, £ire now closely associated with the pas- sivity of mind, which they, therefore, tend rather to suggest The passivity of mind is expressed by another term, receptivity ; for passivity is only the condition, the necessary antecedent of activity, only the property possessed by the mind of standing in relation to certain foreign causes, — of receiving from them impressions, determinations to act. 1^0 consciousness of passivity. — It is to be observed, that we are never directly conscious of passivity. Consciousness only commences with, is only cognizant of, the reaction consequent upon the foreign determination to act ; and this reaction is not itself passive. In so far, therefore, as we are conscious, we are active ; whether there be a mental activity of which we are not conscious, is another question. There are certain arduous problems connected with the activity of mind, which will be more appropriately considered [hereafter]. At present, I shall only treat of those questions which are conversant about the immediate phaenomena of activity. Of these, the first that I shall consider is one of con- siderable interest, and which, though variously determined by different philosophers, does not seem to lie beyond the sphere of observation. I allude to the question. Whether we are always consciously active ? Are we ahvays consciously active 'I — It is evident that this question is not convertible with the question, Have we always a memory of our consciousness ? — for the latter problem must be at once answered in the negative. It is also evident, that we must exclude the consideration of those states in which the mind is apparently without consciousness, but in regard to which, in reality, we can obtain no information from experi- THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 217 «• merit. Concerning these, we must be contented to remain in ignorance ; at least, only to extend to them the analogical con- clusions which our observations on those within the sphere of experiment warrant us inferring. Our question, as one of pos- sible solution, must,, therefore, be limited to the states of sleep and somnambulism, to the exclusion of those states of insensi- bility Avhicli we cannot terminate suddenly at will. It is hardly necessary to observe, that with the nature of sleep and som- nambulism, as psychological phasnomena, we have at present nothing to do ; our consideration is now strictly limited to the inquiry, Whether the mind, in as far as we can make it matter of observation, is always in a state of conscious activity. The general problem in regard to the ceaseless activity of the mind has been one agitated from very ancient times, but it has also been one on which philosophers have pronounced less on grounds of experience than of theory. Plato and the Platonists' were unanimous in maintaining the continual energy of intellect. The opinion of Aristotle appears doubtful, and passages may be quoted from his works in favor of either alternative. The Aristotelians, in general, were opposed, but a considerable num- ber were favorable, to the Platonic doctrine. The question, however, obtained its principal importance in the philosophy of Descartes. That philosopher made the essence, the very exist- ence, of the soul to consist in actual thought, under which he included even the desires and feelings ; and thought he defined all of which we are conscious. The assertion, therefore, of Descartes, that the mind always thinks, is, in his employment of language, tantamount to the assertion that the mind is always conscious. Locke's argument for the negative. — That the min 1 is always conscious, though a fundamental position of the Carte- sian doctrine, was rather assumed than proved by an appeal to fact and experience. All is theoretical in Descartes ; all is theoretical in his disciples. Even Malebranche assumes our consciousness in sleep, and explains our oblivion only by a mechanical hypothesis. It was, therefore, easy for Locke to deny the truth of the Cartesian opinion, and to give a strong Id 218 THE MIND NEVEU SLEEPS. semblance of probability to his own doctrine by its apparent conformity with the phaenomena. Omitting a good deal of what is either irrelevant to the general question, or what is now admitted to be false, as founded on his erroneous doctrine of personal identity, the following is the sum of Locke's argument upon the point. " We know certainly by experience," | he says,] " that we sometimes think, and thence draw this infallible consequence, that there is something in us that has a power to think : but whether that substance perpetually thinks or no, we can be no further assured than experience informs us. For to say that actually thinking is essential to the soul, and insepara- ble from it, is to beg what is in question, and not to prove it by reason ; which is necessary to be done, if it be not a self- evident proposition. But whether this, ' that the soul always thinks,' be a self-evident proposition, that everybody assents to at first hearing, I appeal to mankind. It is doubted whether I thought all last night or no ; the question being about a matter of fact, it is begging it to bring as a proof for it an hypothesis which is the very thing in dispute ; by which way one may prove any thing." .... "It will, perhaps, be said, that ' the soul thinks even in the soundest sleep, but the memory retains it not.' That the soul in a sleeping man should be this moment busy a-thinking, and the next moment in a waking man not remember nor be able to recollect one jot of all those thoughts, is very hard to be conceived, and would need some better proof than bare assertion to make it be believed. For who can^ without any more ado but being barely told so, imagine that the greatest part of men do, during all their lives, for several hours every day, think of something which, if they were asked even in- the middle of these thoughts, they could remember nothing at all of? Most men, I think, pass a great part of their sleep without dreaming. I once knew a man that was bred a scholar and had no bad memory, who told me he had never dreamed in his life, till he had that fever he was then newly recovered of, which was about the fiY^ or six and twentieth year of his age. I suppose the world affords more such instances ; at least every one's acquaintance will furnish him with examples enoug-h of THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 219 guch as pass most of their nights without dreaming." .... And again, "If thej say that a man is always conscious *o himself of thinking ; I ask how they know it ? ' Conscio'^^^ness is the perception of what passes in a man's own mind. 2an another man perceive that I am conscious of any thing, when I perceive it not myself? ' No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience. Wake a man out of a sound sleep, and ask him what he was that moment thinkino; on. If he liimself be conscious of nothing he then thought on, he must be a notable diviner of thoughts that can assure him that he was thinking : may he not with more reason assure him he was not asleep ? This is something beyond philosophy ; and it cannot be less than revelation that discovers to another thoughts in my mind when I can find none there myself; and they must needs have a penetrating sight who can certainly see what I think when I cannot perceive it myself, and when I declare that I do not. This some may think to be a step beyond the Rosicru- ci^ns, it being easier to make one's self invisible to others, than to make another's thoughts visible to one which are not visible to himself. But it is but defining the soul to be ' a substance that always thinks,' and the business is done." Locke's view opposed hy Leibnitz, — This decision of Locke was rejected by Leibnitz. He observes, in reply to the suppo- sition that continual consciousness is an attribute of Him " who neither slumbereth nor sleepeth," ' that this affords no inference that in sleep we are wholly without perception.' To the re- mark, " that it is difiicult to conceive, that a being can think and not be conscious of thought," he replies, ' that in this lies the whole knot and difiiculty of the matter. But this is not in- soluble.' " We must observe," he says, " that we think of a multitude of things at once, but take heed only of those thoughts that are the more prominent. Nor could it be otherwise. For were we to take heed of every thing, it would be necessary to attend to an infinity of matters at the same moment, all of which make an effectual impression on the senses. Nay, I assert that there remains always something of all our past thoughts, — that ^ none is ever entirely effaced. Now when we 220 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS « sleep without dreaming, and when stunned by a blow or other accident, there are formed in us an infinity of small confused perceptions." And again he remarks : " That even when we sleep without dreaming, there is always some feeble perception. The act of awakening, indeed, shows this : and the more easily we are roused, the clearer is the perception we have of what passes without, although this perception is not always strong enough to cause us to awake." Now, in all this it will be observed, that Leibnitz do(^ not precisely answer the question we have mooted. He maintains that the mind is never without perceptions, but, as he holds that perceptions exist without consciousness, he cannot, though he opposes Locke, be considered as affirming that the mind is never without consciousness during sleep, — in short, does al- ways dream. But if Leibnitz cannot be adduced as categorically asserting that there is no sleep without its dream, this cannot be said of Kant. That great thinker distinctly maintains that we always dream when asleep ; that to cease to dream would be to cease to live ; and that those who fancy they have not dreamt have only forgotten their dream. This is all that the manual of Anthropology, published by himself, contains upon the question ; but in a manuscript in my possession, which bears to be a work of Kant, but is probably only a compilation from notes taken at his lectures on Anthropology, it is further stated that we can dream more in a minute than we can act during a day, and that the great rapidity of the train of thought in sleep, is one of the principal causes why we do not always recollect what we dream. He elsewhere also observes, that the cessation of a force to act is tantamount to its cessation to be. The wakefulness of mind proved from somnambulism, — Though the determination of this question is one that seems not extremely difficult, we find it dealt with by philosophers, on the one side and the other, rather by hypothesis than by experi- ment; at least, we have, with one partial exception, which I am soon to quote to you, no observations sufficiently accurate and detailed to warrant us in establishing more than a very THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 221 doubtful conclusion. I have myself at different times turned my attention to the point, and, as far as my observations go, they certainly tend to prove that, during sleep, the mind is never either inactive or wholly unconscious of its activity. As to the objection of Locke and others, that, as we have often no recollection of dreaming, we have, therefore, never dreamt, it is sufficient to say that the assumption m this argument — that •consciousness, and the recollection of consciousness, are conver- tible — is disproved in the most emphatic manner by experience. You have all heard of the phaenomenon of somnambulism. In this remarkable state, the various mental faculties are usually in a higher degree of power than in the natural. The patient has recollections of what he has wholly forgotten. He speaks languages of which, when awake, he remembers not a word. If he use a vulgar dialect when out of this state, in it he em- ploys only a correct and elegant phraseology. The imagination, the sense of propriety, and the faculty of reasoning, are all in general exalted. The bodily powers are in high activity, and under the complete control of the will ; and, it is well known, persons in this state have frequently performed feats, of which, when out of it, they would not even have imagined the possibil- ity. And what is even more remarkable, the difference of the faculties in the two states seems not confined merely to a differ- ence in degree. For it happens, for example, that a person who has no ear for music when awake, shall, in his somnambulic crisis, sing with the utmost correctness and with full enjoyment of his performance. Under this affection persons sometimes live half their lifetime, alternating" between the normal and ab- normal states, and performing the ordinary functions of life indifferently in both, with this distinction, that if the patient be dull and doltish when he is said to be awake, he is comparatively alert and intelligent when nominally asleep. I am in possession of three works, written during the crisis by three different som- nambulists. Now it is evident that consciousness, and an ex- alted consciousness, must be allowed in somnambulism. This cannot possibly be denied ; — but mark what follows. It is the peculiarity of somnambulism, — it is the differential quality by 19* 222 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. which that state is contradistinguished from the state of dream- ing, — that we have no recollection, when we awake, of what has occurred during its continuance. Consciousness is thus cut in two; memory does not connect the train of consciousness in the one state with the train of consciousness in the other. When the patient again relapses into the state of somnambulism, he again remembers all that had occurred during every former alternative of that state ; but he not only remembers this, he recalls also the events of his normal existence ; so that, whereas the patient in his somnambulic crisis has a memory of his whole life, in his waking intervals he has a memory only of half his life. Dreaming possible without memory, — At the time of Locke, the phaenomena of somnambulism had been very little studied ; nay, so great is the ignorance that prevails in regard to its na- ture even now, that you will find this, its distinctive character, wholly unnoticed in the best works upon the subject. But this distinction, you observe, is incompetent always to discriminate the states of dreaming and somnambulism. It may be true that, if we recollect our visions during sleep, this recollection excludes somnambulism ; but the want of memory by no means proves that the visions we are known by others to have had, were not common dreams. The phaenomena, indeed, do not always enable us to discriminate the two states. Somnambu- lism may exist in many different degrees ; the sleep-walking from which it takes its name is only one of its higher phaenom- ena, and one comparatively rare. In general, the subject of this affection does not leave his bed, and it is then frequently impossible to say, whether the manifestations exhibited are the phaenomena of somnambulism or of dreaming. Talking during sleep, for example, may be a symptom of either ; and it is often only from our general knowledge of the habits and predisposi- tions of the sleeper, that we are warranted in referring this effect to the one and not to the other class of phaenomena. We* have, however, abundant evidence to prove that forgetfulness is not a decisive criterion of somnambulism. Persons whom there is no reason to suspect of this affection often manifest THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 223 during sleep the strongest indications of dreaming, and yet, when they awaken in the morning, retain no memory of what they may have done or said during the night. Locke's argu- ment, that because we do not always remember our conscious- ness during sleep, we have not, therefore, been always conscious, is thus, on the ground of fact and analogy, disproved. Results of personal experience, — But this is not all. We can not only show that the fact of the mind remaining conscious during sleep is possible, is even probable, we can also show, by an articulate experience, that this actually occurs. The follow- ing observations are the result of my personal experience, and similar experiments every one of you is competent to institute for himself. In the first place, when we compose ourselves to rest, we do not always fall at once asleep, but remain for a time in a state of incipient slumber, — in a state intermediate between sleep and waking. Now, if we are gently roused from this transition- state, we find ourselves conscious of being in the commencement of a dream ; we find ourselves occupied with a train of thought, and this train we are still able to follow out to a point when it connects itself with certain actual perceptions. We can still trace imagination to sense, and show how, departing from the last sensible impressions of real objects, the fancy proceeds in its work of distorting, falsifying, and perplexing these, in order to construct out of their ruins its own grotesque edifices. In the second place, I have always observed, that when sud- denly awakened during sleep, (and to ascertain the fact I have caused myself to be roused at different seasons of the night,) I have always been able to observe that I was in the middle of a dream. The recollection of this dream was not always equally vivid. On some occasions, I was able to trace it back until the train was gradually lost at a remote distance ; on others, I was hardly aware of more than one or two of the latter links of the chain ; and, sometimes, was scarcely certain of more than the fact, that I was not awakened from an unconscious state. Why we should not always be able to recollect our dreams, it is not difficult to explain. In our waking and our sleeping states, we 224 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. are placed in two worlds of thought, not only different but con- trasted, and contrasted both in the character and in the inten- sity of their representations. When snatched suddenly from the twilight of our sleeping imaginations, and placed in the meridian lustre of our waking perceptions, the necessary effect of the transition is at once to eclipse or obliterate the traces of our dreams. The act itself, also, of rousing us from sleep, by abruptly interrupting the current of our thoughts, throws us into confusion, disqualifies us for a time from recollection, and before we have recovered from our consternation, what we could at first have easily discerned is fled or flying. A sudden and violent is, however, in one respect, more favorable than a gradual and spontaneous, wakening to the observation of the pheenomena of sleep. For, in the former case, the images presented are fresh and prominent ; while in the latter, before our attention is applied, the objects of obser- vation have withdrawn darkling into the background of the soul. We may, therefore, I think, assert, in general, that whether we recollect our dreams or not, we always dream. Something similar, indeed, to the rapid oblivion of our sleeping consciousness, happens to us occasionally even when awake. When our mind is not intently occupied with any subject, or more frequently when fatigued, a thought suggests itself. We turn it lazily over and ^x our eyes in vacancy ; interrupted by the question what we are thinking of, we attempt to answer, but the thought is gone ; we cannot recall it, and say that we are thinking of nothing. General conclusion, — The observations I have hitherto made tend only to establish the fact, that the mind is never wholly inactive, and that we are never wholly unconscious of its activity. Of the degree and character of that activity, I at present say nothing. But in confirmation of the opinion I have now hazarded, and in proof of something more even than I have ventured to maintain, I have great pleasure in quot- ing the substance of a remarkable essay on "sleep by one of the most distinguished of the philosophers of France. I refer to M. Jouffroy, who, along with M. Royer Col la i- '., THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 225 was at the head of the pure school of Scottish Philosophy in France. The mind often awahe when the senses sleep, — "I have never well understood those who admit that in sleep the mind is dormant. When we dream, we are assuredly asleep, and assuredly also our mind is not asleep, because it thinks ; it is, therefore, manifest, that the mind frequently wakes when the senses are in slumber. But this does not prove tnat it never sleeps along with them. To sleep is for the mind not to dream ; and it is impossible to establish the fact, that there are in sleep moments in which the mind does not dream. To have no recollection of our dreams, does not prove that we have not dreamt ; for it can be often proved that we have dreamt, al- though the dream has left no trace on our memory. " The fact, then, that the mind sometimes wakes while the senses are asleep, is thus established ; whereas the fact, that it sometimes sleeps along with them is not ; the probability , there- fore, is, that it wakes always. It would require contradictory facts to destroy the force of this induction, which, on the con- trary, every fact seems to confirm. I shall proceed to analyze some of these which appear to me curious and striking. They manifestly imply this conclusion, that the mind, during sleep, is not in a peculiar state, but that its activity is carried on pre- cisely as when awake. Facts in support of this conclusion, — " When an inhabitant of the province comes to Paris, his sleep is at first disturbed, and continually broken, by the noise of the carriages passing under his window. He soon, however, becomes accustomed to the turmoil, and ends by sleeping at Paris as he slept in his village. " The noise, however, remains the same, and makes an equal impression on his senses ; how comes it that this noise at first hinders, and then, at length, does not hinder him, from sleeping ? " The state of waking presents analogous facts. Every one knows that it is difficult to fix our attention on a book, when surrounded by persons engaged in . conversation ; at lengthy 226 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. however, we acquire this faculty. A man unaccustomed to the tumult of the streets of Paris is unable to think consecutively while walking through them ; -*a Parisian finds no difficulty. He meditates as tranquilly in the midst of the crowd and bustle of men and carriages, as he could in the centre of the forest. The analogy between these facts taken from the state of waking, and the fact which I mentioned at the commencement, taken from the state of sleep, is so close, that the explanation of the former should throw some light upon the latter. We shall attempt this explanation. Analysis of Attention and Distraction, — " Attention is the voluntary application of the mind to an object. It is estab- lished, by experience, that we cannot give our attention to two different objects at the same time. Distraction is the removal of our attention from a matter with which we are engaged, and our bestowal of it on another which crosses us. In distraction, attention is only diverted because it is attracted by a new per- ception or idea soliciting it more strongly than that with which it is occupied ; and this diversion diminishes exactly in propor- tion as the solicitation is weaker on the part of the intrusive idea. All experience proves this. The more strongly atten- tion is applied to a subject, the less susceptible is it of distrac- tion ; thus it is, that a book which awakens a lively curiosity retains the attention captive ; a person occupied with a matter affecting his life, his reputation, or his fortune, is not easily dis- tracted ; he sees nothing, he understands nothing, of what passes around him ; we say that he is deeply preoccupied. In like manner, the greater our curiosity, or the more curious the things that are spoken of around us, the less able are we to rivet our attention on the book we read. In like manner, also, if we are waiting in expectation of any one, the^ slightest noises occasion distraction, as these noises may be the signal of the approach we anticipate. All these facts tend to prove, that distraction results only when the intrusive idea solicits us more strongly than that with which we are occupied. " Hence it is, that the stranger in Paris cannot think in the bustle of the streets. The Impressions which assail his eyef5 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 227 and ears on every side, being for him the signs of things new or little known, when they reach his mind, interest him more strongly than the matter even to which he would apply his thoughts. Each of these impressions announces a cause which may be beautiful, rare, curious, or terrific ; the intellect cannot refrain from turning out to verify the fact. It turns out, however, no longer when experience has made it familiar with all that can strike the senses on the streets of Paris ; it remains within, and no longer allows itself to be deranged. " The other admits of a similar explanation. To read with- out distraction, in the midst of an unknown company, would be impossible. Curiosity would be too strong. This would also be the case if the subject of conversation were very interest- ing. But in a familiar circle, whose ordinary topics of conver- sation are well known, the ideas of the book make an easy conquest of our thoughts. " The will, likewise, is of some avail in resisting distraction. Not that it is able to retain the attention when disquieted and curious ; but it can recall, and not indulge it in protracted ab- sences, and, by constantly remitting it to the object of its voli- tion, the interest of this object becomes at last predominant. Rational considerations, and the necessity of remaining atten- tive, likewise exert an influence ; they come in aid of the idea, and lend it, so to speak, a helping hand in concentrating on it the attention. Distraction and Non-distraction matters of intelligence, — " But, howsoever it may be with all these petty influences, it remains evident that distraction and n on -distraction are neither of them matters of sense, but both matters of intelligence. It is not the senses which become accustomed to hear the noises of the street and the sounds of conversation, and which end in being less affected by them ; if we are at first vehemently affected by the noises of the street or drawing-room, and then little or not at all, it is because at first attention occupies itself with these impressions, and afterwards neglects them ; when it neglects them, it is not diverted from its object, and distraction does not take place ; when, on the contrary, it accords them notice, it abandons its object, and is then distracted. 228 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. " We may observe, in support of tliis conclusion, that the habit of hearing the same sounds renders us sometimes highly sensible to them, as occurs in savages and in the blind ; some- times, again, almost insensible to them, as exemplified in the apathy of the Parisian for the noise of carriages. If the elTect were physical, — if it depended on the body and not on the mind, there would be a contradiction, for the habit of hearing the same sounds either blunts the organ or sharpens it ; it could not at once have two, and two contrary, effects ; — it could have only one. The fact is, it neither blunts nor sharpens ; the organ remains the same ; the same sensations are determined ; but when these sensations interest the mind, it applies itself to them, and becomes accustomed to their discrimination ; when they do not interest it, it becomes accustomed to neglect, and does not discriminate them. This is the whole mystery ; the phasnomenon is psychological, not physiological. The phcenomena of sleep, — " Let us now turn our attention to the state of sleep, and consider whether analogy does not demand a similar explanation of the fact which we stated at the commencement. What takes place when a noise hinders us from sleeping ? The body fatigued begins to slumber ; then, of a sudden, the senses are struck, and we awake; then fatigue regains the ascendant, we relapse into drowsiness, which is soon again interrupted ; and so on for a certain continuance. When, on the contrary, we are accustomed to noise, the impressions it makes no longer disturb our first sleep ; the drowsiness is pro- longed, and we fall asleep. That the senses are more torpid in sleep than in our waking state, is not a matter of doubt. But when I am once asleep, they are then equally torpid on the first night of my arrival in Paris as on the hundredth. The noise being the same, they receive the same impressions, which they transmit in equal vivacity to the mind. Whence comes it, then, that on the first night I am awakened, and not on the hundi'edth ? The physical facts are identical ; the difference can originate only in the mind, as in the case of distraction and of non-distraction in the waking state. Let us suppose that the Boul has fallen asleep along with the body ; on this hypothesis, THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 229 the slumber would be equally deep in botli cases, for the mind and for the senses ; and we should be unable to see why, in tiie one case, it was aroused more than in the other. It remains, therefore, certain that it does not sleep like the body ; and that, in the one case, disquieted by unusual impressions, it awakens the senses to inquire what is the matter ; whilst in the other, knowing by experience of what external fact these impressions are the sign, it remains tranquil, and does not disturb the senses to obtain a useless explanation. " For let us remark, that the mind has need of the senses to obtain a knowledge of external things. In sleep, the senses are some of them closed, as the eyes ; the others half torpid, as touch and hearing. If the soul be disquieted by the impressions which reach it, it requires the senses to ascertain the cause, and to relieve its inquietude. This is the cause why we find our- selves in a disquieted state, when aroused by an extraordinary noise ; and this could not have occurred had we not been occu- pied with this noise before we awoke. " This is also the cause why we sometimes feel, during sleep, the efforts we make to awaken our senses, when an unusual noise or any painful sensation disturbs our rest. If we are in a profound sleep, we are for a long time agitated before we have it in our power to awake ; — we say to ourselves, we must awake in order to get out of pain ; but the sleep of the senses resists, and it is only by little and little that we are able to rouse them from torpidity. Sometimes, when the noise ceases before the issue of the struggle, the awakening does not take place, and, in the morning, we have a confused recollection of having been disturbed during our sleep, — a recollection which becomes dis- tinct . only when we learn from others that such and such an occurrence has taken plape while we were asleep. Illustrated hy personal experience, — "I had given orders some time ago, that a parlor adjoining to my bedroom should be swept before I was called in the morning. For the first two days, the noise awoke me ; but, thereafter, I was not aware of it. Whence arose the difference? The noises are the same, and at the same hour I am in the same degree of slumber; 20 230 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. the same sensations, consequently, take place. Whence comes it that I awoke, and do no longer awake ? For this, it appears to me, there is but one explanation ; — namely, that my mind which awakes, and which is now aware of the cause of these sensations, is no longer disquieted, and no longer rouses my senses. It is true that I do not retain the recollection of this reasoning ; but this oblivion is not more extraordinary than that of so many others which cross our mind, both when awake and when asleep. " I add a single observation. The noise of the brush on the carpet of my parlor is as nothing compared with that of the heavy wagons, which pass under my windows at the same hour, and which do not trouble my repose in the least. I was, there- fore, awakened by a sensation much feebler than a crowd of others, which I received at the same time. Can that hypothesis aiford the reason, which supposes that the awakening is a neces- sary event ; that the sensations rouse the senses, and that the senses rouse the mind ? It is evident that my mind alone, and its activity, can explain why the fainter sensation awoke me ; as these alone can explain why, when I am reading in my study, the small noise of a mouse playing in a corner can distract my attention, while the thundering noise of a passing wagon does not affect me at all. " The explanation fully accounts for what occurs with those who sleep in attendance on the sick. All noises foreign to the patient have no effect on them ; but let the patient turn him on the bed, let him utter a groan or sigh, or let his breathing be- come painful or interrupted, forthwith the attendant wakes, however little inured to the vocation, or interested i]> the wel- fare of the patient. Whence comes this discrimination between the noises which deserve the attentiQn of the attendant, and those which do not, if, whilst the senses are asleep, the mind does not remain observant, — does not act the sentinel, does not consider the sensations which the senses convey, and does not awaken the senses as it finds these sensations disquieting or not ? It is by being strongly impressed, previous to going to sleep, with the duty of attending to the respiration, motions, complaints THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 231 d1 tlie sufferer, that we come to awaken ait all such noises, and at no others. The habitual repetition of such an impression gives this faculty to professional sick-nurses ; a lively interest in the health of the patient gives it equally to the members of his family. "It is in precisely the same manner that we waken at the appointed hour, when before going to sleep we have made a firm resolution of so doing. I have this power in perfection, but I notice that I lose it if I depend on any one calling me. In this latter case, my mind does not take the trouble of meas- uring the time or of listening to the clock. But in the former, it is necessary that it do so, otherwise the phasnomenon is inex- phcable. Every one has made, or can make, this experiment ; when it fails, it will be found, if I mistake not, either that we have not been sufficiently preoccupied with the intention, or were over-fatigued ; for when the senses are strongly benumbed, they convey to the mind, on the one hand, more obtuse sensations of the monitory sounds, and, on the other, they resist for a longer time the efforts the mind makes to awaken them, when these sounds have reached it. " After a night passed in this effort, we have, in general, the recollection, in the morning, of having been constantly occupied during sleep with this thought. The mind, therefore, watched, and, full of its resolution, awaited the moment. It is thus that when we go to bed much interested with any subject, we remem- ber, on awakening, that during sleep we have been continually haunted by it. On these occasions, the slumber is light, for, the mind being untranquil, its agitation is continually disturbing the torpor of the senses. When the mind is calm, it does not sleep more, but it is less restless. " It would be curious to ascertain, whether persons of a fee- ble memory, and of a volatile disposition, are not less capable than others of awakening at an appointed hour ; for these two circumstances ought to produce this effect, if the notion I have formed of the phoenomenon be correct. A volatile disposition is unable strongly to preoccupy itself with the thought, and to form a determined resolution ; and, on the other hand, it is the mem- 232 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. or J wliicli preserves a recollection of the resolution taken before falling: asleep. I have not had an opportunity of making the experiment. General conclusions. — "It appears to me, that, from the pre- vious observations, it inevitably follows : — 1°, That in sleep the senses are torpid, but that the mind wakes. 2°, That certain of our senses continue to transmit to the mind the imperfect sensations they receive. 3°, That the mind judges these sensations, and that it is in virtue of its judgments that it awakens, or does not awaken, the senses. 4°, That the reason why the mind awakens the senses is, that sometimes the sensation disquiets it, being unusual or pain- ful, and that sometimes the sensation warns it to rouse the senses, as being an indication of the moment when it ought to do so. 5°, That the mind possesses the power of awakening the sense;?, but that . it only accomplishes this by its own activity overcoming their torpor ; that this torpor is an obstacle, — an obstacle greater or less as it is more or less profound. "If these inferences are just, it follows that we can waken ourselves at will and at appointed signals ; that the instrument called an alarum does not act so much by the noise it makes, as by the associations we have established in going to bed between the noise and the thought of wakening ; that, therefore, an in- strument much less noisy, and emitting only a feeble sound, would probably produce the same effect. It follows, moreover, that we can inure ourselves to sleep profoundly in the midst of the loudest noises ; that to accomplish this, it is perhaps suf- ficient, on the first night, to impress it on our minds that these sounds do not deserve attention, and ought not to awaken us ; and that by this mean, any one may probably sleep as well in the mill as the miller himself. It follows, in fine, that the sleep of the strong and courageous ought to be less easily disturbed, all things equal, than the sleep of the weak and timid. Some historic? J facts may be quoted in proof of this last con(»Jusion," THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. 233 I may notice a rather curious case which occurs to my recol- lection, and which tends to corroborate the theory of the French psychologist. The object of observation was the postman be- tween Halle and a town, I forget which, some eight miles dis- tant. This distance the postman was in the habit of traversing daily. A considerable part of his way lay across a district of unenclosed champaign meadow-land, and in walking over this smooth surface, the postman was generally asleep. But at the termination of this part of his road, there was a narrow foot- bridge over a stream, and to reach this bridge, it was necessary to ascend some broken steps. Now, it was ascertained as com- pletely as any fact of the kind could be, — the observers were shrewd, and the object of observation was a man of undoubted probity, — I say, it was completely ascertained : — 1 °, That the postman was asleep in passing over this level course ; 2°, That he held on his way in this state without deflection towards the bridge ; and, 3°, That before arriving at the bridge, he awoke. But this case is not only deserving of all credit from the posi- tive testimony by which it is vouched ; it is also credible as only one of a class of analogous cases which it may be adduced as representing. This case, besides showing that the mind must be active though the body is asleep, shows also that certain bodily functions may be dormant, while others are alert. The locomotive faculty was here in exercise, while the senses were in slumber. This suggests to me another example of the same phenome- non. It is found in a story told by Erasmus in one of his letters, concerning his learned friend Oporinus, the celebrated professor and printer of Basle. Oporinus was on a journey with a bookseller ; and, on their road, they had fallen in with a manuscript. Tired with their day's travelling, — travelling was then almost exclusively performed on horseback, — they came at nightfall to their inn. They were, however, curious to ascer- tain the contents of their manuscript, and Oporinus undertook the task cf reading it aloud. This he continued for some time, when the bookseller found it necessary to put a question con- cerning a word which he had not rightly understood. It waft 20* 234 THE MIND NEVER SLEEPS. now discovered that Oporinus was asleep, and being awakened by bis companion, be found that be bad no recollection of wbat for a considerable time be bad been reading. Tbis is a case concurring witb a thousand others to prove, 1 °, That one bodily sense or function may be asleep while another is awake ; and, 2°, That the mind may be in a certain state of activity during sleep, and no memory of that activity remain after the sleep has ceased. The first is evident ; for Oporinus, while reading, must have had his eyes, and the muscles of his tongue and fauces awake ; though his ears and other senses were asleep ; and the second is no less so, for the act of reading supposed a very complex series of mental energies. I may notice, by the way, that physiologists have observed, that our bodily senses and powers do not fall asleep simultaneously, but in a certain succession. We all know that the first symptom of slumber is the relaxation of the eyelids ; whereas, hearing continues alert for a season after the power of vision has been dormant. In the case last alluded to, this order was, however, violated ; and the sight was forcibly kept awake while the hearing had lapsed into torpidity. In the case of sleep, therefore, so far is it from being proved that the mind h at any moment unconscious, that the result of observation \\oiild incline us to the opposite conclusion. CHAPTER XIV. GENERAL PHENOMENA OF CONSCIOUSNESS, — IS THE MIND EVER UNCONSCIOUSLY MODIFIED? I PASS now to a question in some respects of still more pro:^imate interest to the psychologist than that discussed in the preceding [chapter] ; for it is one which, according as it is decided, will determine the character of our explanation of many of the most important phasnomena in the philosophy of mind, and, in particular, the great phsenomena of Memory and Association. The question I refer to is, Whether the mind exerts energies^ and is the subject of modifications^ of neither of which it is conscious. This is the most general expression of a problem which has hardly been mentioned, far less mooted, in [Great Britain] ; and when it has attracted a passing notice, the supposition of an unconscious action or passion of the mind has been treated as something either unintelligible, or absurd. In Germany, on the contrary, it has not only been canvassed, but the alternative which the philosophers of this country have lightly considered as ridiculous, has been gravely established as a conclusion which the phaenomena not only war- rant, but enforce. The French philosophers, for a long time, viewed the question in the same light as the British. Condii- lac, indeed, set the latter the example ; but of late, a revolution is apparent, and two recent French psychologists have marvel- lously propounded the doctrine, long and generally established in Germany, as something new and unheard of before their own assertion of the paradox. Three degrees of mental latency, — This question is one not only of importance, but of difficulty ; I shall endeavor to make you understand its purport, by arguing it upon broader grounds (235) 236 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. than has hitlierto been done, and shall prepare you, by some preliminary information, for its discussion. I shall, first of all, adduce some proof of the fact, that the mind may, and does, contain far more latent furniture than consciousness informs us it possesses. To simplify the discussion, I shall distinguish three degrees of this mental latency. In the Jirst place, it is to be remembered that the riches, the possessions, of our mind are not to be measured by its present momentary activities, but by the amount of its acquired habits. I know a science, or language, not merely while I make a tem- porary use of it, but inasmuch as I can apply it when and how I will. Thus the infinitely greater part of our spiritual treas- ures lies beyond the sphere of consciousness, hid in the obscure recesses of the mind. This is the first degree of latency. In regard to this, there is no difiiculty or dispute ; and I only take it into account in order to obviate misconcep- tion, and because it affords a transition towards the other two degrees, which it conduces to illustrate. The second degree of latency exists when the mind contains certain systems of knowledge, or certain habits of action, which it is wholly unconscious of possessing in its ordinary state, but which are revealed to consciousness in certain extraordinary exaltations of its powers. The evidence on this point shows that the mind frequently contains whole systems of knowledge, which, though, in our normal state, they have faded into absolute oblivion, may, in certain abnormal states, as madness, febrile delirium, somnambulism, catalepsy, etc., flash out into luminous consciousness, and even throw into the shade of unconsciousness those other systems by which they had, for a long period, been eclipsed, and even extinguished. For example, there are cases in which the extinct memory of whole languages was suddenly restored, and, what is even still more remarkable, in which the faculty was exhibited of accurately repeating, in known or un- known tongues, passages which were never within the grasp of conscious mem^ory in the normal state. This degree, this phae- nomenon of latency, is one of the most marvellous in the whole compass of philosophy ; and the proof of its reality will prepare UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 237 US for an enlightened consideration of the third, of which the evidence, though not less certain, is not equally obtrusive. But, however remarkable and important, this plisenomenon has been almost wholly neglected by psychologists, and the cases which I adduce in illustration of its reality have never been previously collected and applied. That in madness, in fever, in somnam- bulism, and other abnormal states, the mind should betray ca- pacities and extensive systems of knowledge, of which it was at other times wholly unconscious, is a fact so remarkable that it may well demand the highest evidence to establish its truth. But of such a character is the evidence which I am now to give. It consists of cases reported by the most intelligent and trustworthy observers, — by observers wholly ignorant of each other's testimony; and the phaenomena observed were of so palpable and unambiguous a nature, that they could not possibly have been mistaken or misinterpreted. Evidence ffom cases of madness, — The first, and least inter- esting, evidence I shall adduce, is derived from cases of mad- ness ; it is given by a celebrated American physician, Dr. Rush. " The records of the wit and cunning of madmen," says the Doctor, " are numerous in every country. Talents for eloquence, poetry, music, and painting, and uncommon ingenuity in several of the mechanical arts, are often evolved in this state of mad- ness. A gentleman, whom I attended in an hospital in the year 1810, often delighted as well as astonished the patients and ofii- cers of our hospital by his displays of oratory, in preaching from a table in the hospital yard every Sunday. A female pa- tient of mine who became insane after parturition, in the year 1807, sang hymns and songs of her own composition during the latter stage of her illness, with a tone of voice so soft and pleas- ant that I hung upon it with delight every time I visited her. She had never discovered a talent for poetry or music in any previous part of her life. Two instances of a talent for draw- ing, evolved by madness, have occurred within my knowledge. And where is the hospital for mad people, in which elegant and completely rigged ships, and curious pieces of machinery, have 238 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. not been exhibited by persons who never discovered the least turn for a mechanical art, previous to their derangement ? Some- times we observe in mad people an unexpected resuscitation of knowledge ; hence we hear them describe past events, and speak in ancient or modern languages, or repeat long and interesting passages from books, none of which, we are sure, they were ca- pable of recollecting in the natural and healthy state of their mind." Fro7n cases of fever, — The second class of cases are those of fever ; and the first I shall adduce is given on the authority of the patient himself. This is Mr. Flint, a very intelligent American clergyman. I take it from his Recollections of the Valley of the Mississippi, He was travelling in the State of Illinois, and suffered the common lot of visitants from other climates, in being taken down with a bilious fever. "I am aware," he remarks, " that every sufferer in this way is apt to think his own case extraordinary. My physicians agreed with all who saw me that my case was so. As very few live to record the issue of a sickness like mine, and as you have re- *quested me, and as I have promised, to be particular, I will relate some of the circumstances of this disease. And it is in my view desirable, in the bitter agony of such diseases, that more of the symptoms, sensations, and sufferings should have been recorded than have been; that others, in similar pre- dicaments, may know that some before them have had sufferings like theirs, and have survived them. I had had a fever before, a^d had risen and been dressed every day. But in this, with the first day, I was prostrated to infantine weakness, and felt, with its first attack, that it was a thing very different from what I had yet experienced. Paroxysms of derangement occurred the third day, and this was to me a new state of mind. That state of disease in which partial derangement is mixed with a consciousness generally sound, and a sensibility preternaturally excited, I should suppose the most distressing of all its forms. At the same time that I was unable to recognize my friends, I was informed that my memory was more than ordinarily exact and retentive, and that I repeated whole passages in tlie different UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 239 languages which I knew, with entire accuracy. I recited, with- out losing or misplacing a word, a passage of poetry which I could not so repeat after I recovered my health." The following more curious case is given by Lord Monboddo, in his Ancient Metaphysics, '^ ' The Comtesse de Laval had been observed, by servants who sate up with her on account of some indisposition, to talk in her sleep a language that none of them understood ; nor were they sure, or, indeed, herself able to guess, upon the sounds being repeated to her, whether it was^*or was not gibberish. " ' Upon her lying in of one of her children, she was attended by a nurse, who was of the province of Brittany, and who im- mediately knew the meaning of what she said, it being in the idiom of the natives of that country ; but she herself, when awake, did not understand a single syllable of what she had uttered in her sleep, upon its being retold her. " ' She was born in that province, and had been nursed in a family where nothing but that language was spoken ; so that, in her first infancy, she had known it, and no other ; but when she returned to her parents, she had no opportunity of keeping up the use of it ; and, as I have before said, she did not under- stand a word of Breton when awake, though she spoke it in her sleep. " ' I need not say that the Comtesse de Laval never said or imagined that she used any words of the Breton idiom, more than were necessary to express those ideas that are within the compass of a child's knowledge of objects,' " etc. A highly interesting case is given by Mr. Coleridge in hi? Biographia Literaria, "It occurred," says Mr. Coleridge, "in a Roman Catholic town in Germany, a year or two before my arrival at Gottingen, and had not then ceased to be a frequent subject of conversa- tion. A young woman of four or five and twenty, who could neither read nor write, was seized with a nervous fever ; during which, according to the asseverations of all the priests and monks of the neighborhood, she became possessed, and, as it appeared, by a very learned devil. She continued incessantly talking 240 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, in very pompous tones, and with most distinct enunciation Siieets full of her ravings were taken down from her own mouth, and were found to con- sist of sentences, coherent and intelligible each for itself, but with little or no connection with each other. Of the Hebrew^, a small portion only could be traced to the Bible ; the remainder Bcemed to be in the Kabbinical dialect. All trick or conspiracy was out of the question. Not only had the young woman ever been a harmless, simple creature ; but she was evidently labor- ing under a nervous fever.* In the town, in which she had been resident for many years as servant in different families, no solu- tion presented itself. A young physician, however, determined to trace her past life step by step ; for the patient herself was incapable of returning a rational answer. He at length suc- ceeded in discovering the place where her parents had lived : travelled thither, found them dead, but an uncle surviving ; and from him learned that the patient had been charitably taken by an old Protestant pastor at nine years old, and had remained with him some years, even till the old man's death Anxious inquiries were then, of course, made concerning the pastor's habits ; and the solution of the phsenomenon was soon obtained. For it appeared that it had been the old man's cus- tom, for years, to walk up and down a passage of his house into which the kitchen-door opened, and to read to himself, with a loud voice, out of his favorite books. A considerable number of these were still in the niece's possession. She added, that he was a very learned man, and a great Hebraist. Among his books were found a collection of Rabbinical writings, together with several of the Greek and Latin fathers ; and the physician succeeded in identifying so many passages with those taken down at the young woman's bedside, that no doubt could remain in any rational mind concerning the true origin of the impres- sions made on her nervous system." These cases thus evince the general fact, that a mental modi- fication is not proved not to be, merely because consciousness affords us no evidence of its existence. This general fact being established, I now proceed to consider the question in relation UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. ' 241 to the third class or degree of latent modiiicaiions, — a class in relation to, and on the ground of wliich alone, it has ever hith- erto been argued by philosophers. The tiiird degree of latency. — The problem, then, in regard to this class is, — Are there, in ordinary, mental modijica' tio/fs, — I. e. mental activities and passivities^ of which we are unconscious, hut which manifest their existence by effects of which we are conscious ? In the question proposed, I am not only strongly inclined to the affirmative ; — nay, I do not hesitate to maintain, that what we are conscious of is constructed out of what we are not con- scious of, — that our whole knowledge, in fact, is made up of the unknown and the incognizable. This, at first sight, may appear not only paradoxical, but con- tradictory. It may be objected, 1°, How can we know that to exist which Hes beyond the one condition of all knowledge, — consciousness? And, 2°, How can knowledge arise out of ignorance, — consciousness out of unconsciousness, — the cog- nizable out of the incognizable, — that is, how can one opposite proceed out of the other? In answer to the first objection, — how can we know that of which we are unconscious, seeing that consciousness is the condi- tion of knowledge, — it is enough to allege, that there are many things which we neither know nor can know in themselves, — that is, in their direct and immediate relation to our faculties of knowledge, but which manifest their existence indirectly through the medium of their effects. This is the case with the mental modifications in question ; they are not in themselves revealed to consciousness, but as certain facts of consciousness necessarily suppose them to exist, and to exert an influence in the mental processes, we are thus constrained to admit, as modifications of mind, what are not in themselves phsenomena of consciousness. The truth of this will be apparent, if, before descending to any special illustration, we consider that con- sciousness cannot exist independently of some pecidiar modiftca- tion of mind; we are only conscious as we are conscious of a determinate state. To be conscious, we mijst be conscious of 21 242 ■ UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. some particular perception, or remembrance, or imagination, or feeling, etc. ; we have no general consciousness. But as con- sciousness supposes a special mental modification as its object, it must be remembered, that this modification or state supposes a change, — a transition from some other state or modification. But as the modification must be present, before we have a con- sciousness of the modification, it is evident, that we can have no consciousness of its rise or awakening; for its rise or awakening is also the rise or awakening of consciousness. But the illustration of this is contained in an answer to the second objection, which asks, — How can knowledge come out of ignorance, — consciousness out of unconsciousness, — the known out of the unknown, — how can one opposite be made up of the other? In the removal of this objection, the proof of the thesis which I support is involved. And without dealing in any gen- eral speculation, I shall at once descend to the special evi- dence, which appears to me not merely to warrant, but to^ necessitate the conclusion, that the sphere of our conscious modifications is only a small circle in the centre of a far wider sphere of action and passion, of which we are only conscious through its effects. I. External Perception, 1. The sense of Sight, — Let us take our first example from Perception, — the perception of external objects, and in that faculty, let us commence with the sense of sight. Now, you either already know, or can be at once informed, what it is that has obtained the name of Mini- mum Visihile, You are of course aware, in general, that visiop is the result of the rays of light reflected from the surface of objects to the eye ; a greater number of rays is reflected from a larger surface ; if the superficial extent of an object, and, con- sequently, the number of rays which it reflects, be diminished beyond a certain limit, the object becomes invisible ; and the minimum visihile is the smallest expanse which can be seen, — which can consciously affect us, — which we can be conscious of seeing. This being understood, it is plain that, if we divide this minimum visihile into two parts, neither half can, by itself. UNCONSCIOUS MLNTAL ACTION. 243 be an object of vision, or visual consciousness. Thej are, sev- erally and apart, to consciousness as zero. But it is evident, that each half must, by itself, have produced in us a certain modification, real though unperceived ; for as the perceived whole is nothing but the union of the unperceived halves, so the perception — the perceived affection itself of which we are conscious — is only the sum of two modifications, each of which severally eludes our consciousness. When we look at a distant forest, we perceive a certain expanse of green. Of this, as an affection of our organism, we are clearly and distinctly con- scious. Now, the expanse, of which we are conscious, is evi- dently made up of parts of which we are not conscious. No leaf, perhaps no tree, may be separately visible. But the greenness of the forest is made up of the greenness of the leaves ; that is, the total impression of which we are conscious, is made up of an infinitude of small impressions of which we are not conscious. 2. Sense of Hearing. — Take another example, from the sense of hearing. In this sense, there is, in like manner, a Minimum Audibile, that is, a sound the least which can come into perception and consciousness. But this minimum audibile is made up of parts which severally affect the sense, but of which affections, separately, we are not conscious, though of their joint result we are. We must, therefore, here likeAvise, admit the reality of modifications beyond the sphere of con- sciousness. To take a special example, ^^^len we hear the distant murmur of the sea, — what are the constituents of the total perception of which we are conscious ? This murmur is a sum made up of parts, and the sum would be as zero if the parts did not count as something. The noise of the sea is- the complement of the noise of its several waves ; — Ttovricjv rs xvfidrcov '^V7jQt{fiJiov yilaoiia ' and if the noise of each wave made no impression on our sense, the noise of the sea, as the result of these impressions, could not be realized. But the noise of each several wave, at the distance we suppose, is in- audible ; we must, however, admit that they produce a certain modification, beyond consciousness, on the percipient subject; 244 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. for this is necessarily involved in the reality of their result. The same is equally the case in the other senses ; the taste or smell of a dish, be it agreeable or disagreeable, is composed of a multitude of severally imperceptible effects, which the stimu- hiting particles of the viand cause on different points of the nervous expansion of the gustatory and olfactory organs ; and the pleasant or painful feeling of softness or roughness is the result of an infinity of unfelt modifications, which the body handled determines on the countless papillae of the nerves of touch. IL Association of Ideas, — Let us now take an example from another mental process. We have not yet spoken of what is called the Association of Ideas ; and it is enough for our present purpose that you should be aware, that one thought suggests another in conformity to certain determinate laws, — laws to which the successions of our whole mental states are subjected. Now it sometimes happens, that we find one thought rising immediately after another in consciousness, but whose consecution we can reduce to no law of association. Now in these cases we can generally discover, by an attentive observa- tion, that these two thoughts, though not themselves associated, are each associated with certain other thoughts ; so that the whole consecution would have been regular, had these inter- mediate thoughts come into consciousness, between the two which are not immediately associated. Suppose, for instance, that A, B, C, are three thoughts, — that A and C cannot im- niediately suggest each other, but that each is associated with B, so that A will naturally suggest B, and B naturally suggest C. Now it may happen, that we are conscious of A, and, immediately thereafter, of C. How is the anomaly to be ex- plained ? It can only be explained on the principle of latent modifications. A suggests C, not immediately, but through B ; but as B, like the half of the minimum visihile or minimum audihile^ does not rise into consciousness, we are apt to consider it as non-existent. You are probably aware of the following fact in mechanics. If a number of billiard balls be placed in a straight row and touching each other, and if a ball be made to UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 245 strike, in the line of the row, the bail at one end of the series, what will happen ? The motion of the impinging ball is not divided among the whole row ; this, which we might a priori have expected, does not happen ; but the impetus is transmitted through the intermediate balls, which remain each in its place, to the ball at the opposite end of the series, and this ball alone is impelled on. Something like this seems often to occur in the train of thought. One idea mediately suggests another into consciousness, — the suggestion passing through one or more ideas which do not themselves rise into consciousness. The awakening and awakened ideas here correspond to the ball striking and the ball struck off; while the intermediate ideas of which we are unconscious, but which carry on the suggestion, resemble the intermediate balls which remain moveless, but communicate the impulse. An instance of this occurs to me with which I was recently struck. Thinking of Ben Lomond, this thought was immediately followed by the thought of the Prussian system of education. Now, conceivable connection betwe,en these two ideas in themselves, there was none.* A little reflection, however, explained the anomaly. On my last visit to the mountain, I had met upon its summit a German gentleman, and though I had no consciousness of the interme- diate and unawakened links between Ben Lomond and the Prussian schools, they were undoubtedly these ; — the Ger- man, — Germany, — Prussia, — and, these media being admit- ted, the connection between the extremes was manifest. Stewards explanation of the phcenomenon, — I should perhaps reserve for a future occasion noticing Mr. Stewart's explanation of this phaenomenon. He admits that a perception or idea may pass through the mind without leaving any trace in the memory, and yet serve to introduce other ideas connected with it by the laws of association. Mr. Stewart can hardly be said to have contemplated the possibility of the existence and agency of mental modifications of which we are unconscious. He grants the necessity of interpolating certain intermediate ideas, in order to account for the connection of thought, which could otherwise be explained by no theory of association ; and he admits that 21* 246 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. these intermediate ideas are not known by memory to have actually intervened. So far, there is no difference in the two doctrines. But now comes the separation. Mr. Stewart sup- poses that the intermediate ideas are, for an instant, awakened into consciousness, but, in the same moment, utterly forgot; whereas the opinion I would prefer, holds that they are efficient without rising into consciousness. Mr. Stewart's doctrine on this point is exposed to all the difficulties, and has none of the proofs in its favQr which concur in establishing the other. Difficulties of Stewart's doctrine, — In the first place, to as- sume the existence of acts of consciousness of which there is no memory beyond the moment of existence, is at least as in- conceivable an hypothesis as the other. But, in the second place, it violates the whole analogy of consciousness, which the other does not. Consciousness supposes memory ; and we are only conscious as we are able to connect and contrast one in- stance of our intellectual existence with another. Whereas, to suppose the existence and efficiency of modifications beyond con*sciousness, is not at variance with its conditions ; for con- sciousness, though it assures us of the reahty of what is within its sphere, says nothing against the reality of what is without. In the third place, it is demonstrated, that, in perception, there are modifications, efficient, though severally imperceptible ; why, therefore, in the other faculties, should there not likewise be modifications, efficient, though unapparent ? In the fourth place, there must be some reason for the assumed fact, that there are perceptions or ideas of which we are conscious, but of which there is no memory. Now, the only reason that can possibly be assigned is, that the consciousness was too faint to afford the condition of memory. But of consciousness, however faint, there must be some memory, however short. But this is at variance with the phssnomenon ; for the ideas A and C may precede and follow each other without any perceptible interval, and without any, the feeblest, memory of B. If there be no memory, there could have been no consciousness ; and, there- fore, Mr. Stev/arfs hypothesis, if strictly interrogated, must, even at last, take refuge in our doctrine ; for it can easily be UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 247 shown, that the degree of memory is directly in proportion to the degree of consciousness, and, consequently, that an absolute negation of memory is an absolute negation of consciousness. III. Our Acquired Dexterities and Habits, — Let us now turn to another class of phasnomena, which in like manner are capable of an adequate explanation only on the theory I have advanced ; — I mean the operations resulting from our Acquired Dexterities and Habits. To explain these, three theories have been advanced. The jirst regards them a's merely mechanical or automatic, and thus denying to the mind all active or voluntary intervention, conse- quently removes them beyond the sphere of consciousness. The second^ again, allows to each several motion a separate act of conscious volition ; while the third^ which I would maintain, holds a medium between these, constitutes the mind the agent, accords to it a conscious volition over the series, but denies to it a consciousness and deliberate volition in regard to each sepa- rate movement in the series which it determines. The first or mechanical theory, — The first of these has been maintained, among others, by two philosophers who in other points are not frequently at one, — by Reid and Hartley. " Habit," says E.eid, " differs from instinct, not in its nature, but in its origin ; the last being natural, the first acquired. Both operate without will or intention, without thought, and therefore may be called mechanical principles." In another passage, he expresses himself thus : " I conceive it to be a part of our con- stitution, that what we have been accustomed to do, we acquire not only a facility but a proneness to do on like occasions ; so that it requires a particular will or effort to forbear it, but to do it requires very often no will at all." The same doctrine is laid down still more explicitly by Dr. Hartley. " Suppose," says he, " a person who has a perfectly voluntary command over his fingers, to begin to learn to play on the harpsichord. The first step is to move his fingers, from key to key, with a slow motion, looking- at the notes, and exert- ing an express act of volition in every motion. By degrees, the motions cling to one another, and to the impressions of the notes. 248 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. in the way of association^ so often mentioned ; tlie acts of voli- tion growing less and less express all the time, till, at last, they become evanescent and imperceptible. For an expert performer will play from notes, or ideas laid up in the memory, and, at the same time, carry on a quite different train of thoughts in his mind ; or even hold a conversation with another. Whence we conclude, that there is no intervention of the idea, or state of mind, called will." Cases of this sort Hartley calls " transitions of voluntary actions into automatic ones." The second theory hy Stewart, — The second theory is main- tained against the first by Mr. Stewart ; and I think his refuta- tion valid, though not his confirmation. " I cannot help thinking it," he says, " more philosophical to suppose, that those actions which are originally voluntary always continue so, although, in the case of operations which are become habitual in conse- quence of long practice, we may not be able to recollect every different volition. Thus, in the case of a performer on the harpsichord, I apprehend that there is an act of the will preced- ing every motion of every finger, although he may not be able to recollect these volitions afterwards, and although he may, during the time of his performance, be employed in carrying on a separate train of thought. For it must be remarked, that the most rapid performer can, when he pleases, play so slowly as to be able to attend to, and to recollect, every separate act of his will in the various movements of his fingers ; and he can grad- ually accelerate the rate of his execution, till he is unable to recollect these acts. Now, in this instance, one of two suppo- sitions must be made. The one is, that the operations in the two cases are carried on precisely in the same manner, and differ only in the degree of rapidity ; and that when this rapid- ity exceeds a certain rate, the acts of the will are too momentary to leave any impression on the memory. The other is, that when the rapidity exceeds a certain rate, the operation is taken entirely out of our hands, and is carried on by some unknown power, of the nature of which we are as ignorant as of the cause of the circulation of the blood, or of the motion of the intestines. The last supposition seems to me to be somewhat UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 249 similar to that of a man who should maintain, that although a body projected with a moderate velocity is seen to pass through all the intermediate spaces in moving from one place to another, yet we are not entitled to conclude that this happens when the body moves so quickly as to become invisible to the eye. The iormer supposition is supported by the analogy of many other facts in our constitution. Of some of these I have already taken notice, and it would be easy to add to the number. An exj)ert accountant, for example, can sum up, almost with a single glance of his eye, a long column of figures. He can tell the sum, with unerring certainty, while, at the same time, he is unable to re- collect any one of the figures of which that sum is composed ; and yet nobody doubts that each of these figures has passed through his mind, or supposes, that, when the rapidity of the process becomes so great that he is unable to recollect the vari- ous steps of it, he obtains the result by a sort of inspiration. This last supposition would be perfectly analogous to Dr. Hart- ley's doctrine concerning the nature of our habitual exertions. " The only plausible objection which, I think, can be offered to the principles I have endeavored to establish on this subject, is founded on the astonishing and almost incredible rapidity they necessarily suppose in our intellectual operations. When a per- son, for example, reads aloud, there must, according to this doc- trine, be a separate volition preceding the articulation of every letter ; and it has been found by actual trial, that it is possible to pronounce about two thousand letters in a minute. Is it rea- sonable to suppose that the mind is capable of so many different acts, in an interval of time so very inconsiderable ? " With respect to this objection, it may be observed, in the first place, that all arguments against the foregoing doctrine with respect to our habitual exertions, in so far as they are founded on the inconceivable rapidity which they suppose in our intel- lectual operations, apply equally to the common doctrine con- cerning our perception of distance by the eye. But this is not all. To what does the supposition amount which is considered as so incredible ? Only to this, that the mind is so formed as to be a])le to carry on certain intellectual processes in intervals of 250 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION, time too short to be estimated by our faculties ; a supposition which, so far from being extravagant, is supported by the anal- ogy of many of our most certain conclusions in natural philoso- phy. The discoveries made by the microscope have laid open to our senses a world of wonders, the existence of which hardly any man w^ould have admitted upon inferior evidence ; and have gradually prepared the way for those physical speculations, which explain some of thq most extraordinary phaenomena of nature by means of modifications of matter far too subtile for the examination of our organs. Why, then, should it be consid- ered as unphilosophical, after having demonstrated the existence of various intellectual processes wliich escape our attention in consequence of their rapidity, to carry the supposition a little further, in order to bring under the known laws of the human constitution a class of mental operations which must otherwise remain perfectly inexplicable? Surely, our ideas of time are merely relative, as well as our ideas of extension ; nor is there any good reason for doubting that, if our powers of attention and memory were more perfect than they are, so as to give us the same advantage in examining rapid events, which the micro- scope gives for examining minute portions of extension, they would enlarge our views with respect to the intellectual world, no less than that instrument has with respect to the material." Stewarfs theory shown to involve contradictions » — This doc- trine of Mr. Stewart, — that our acts of knowledge are made up of an infinite number of acts of attention, that is, of various acts of concentrated consciousness, there being required a sepa- rate act of attention for every minimum possible of knowledge, — I have already shown you, by various examples, to involve contradictions. In the present instance, its admission would constrain our assent to the most monstrous conclusions. Take ' the case of a person reading. Now, all of you must have ex- perienced, if ever under the necessity of reading aloud, that, if the matter be uninteresting, your thoughts, while you are going on in the performance of your task, are wholly abstracted from the book and its subject, and you are perhaps deeply occupied in a train of serious meditation. Here the process of reading UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 251 is performed without interruption, iind with the most punctual accuracy ; and, at the same time, the process of meditation is carried on without distraction or fatigue. Now this, on Mr. Stewart's doctrine, would seem impossible ; for what does his theory suppose ? It supposes that separate acts of concentrated consciousness or attention are bestowed on each least movement in either process. But be the velocity of the mental operations what it may, it is impossible to conceive how transitions between such contrary operations could be kept up for a continuance without fatigue and distraction, even if we throw out of ac- count the fact, that the acts of attention to be effectual must be simultaneous, which on Mr. Stewart's theory is not allowed. We could easily give examples of far more complex opera- tions ; but this, with what has been previously said, I deem suf- ficient to show, that we must either resort to the first theory, which, as nothing but the assumption of an occult and incom- prehensible principle, in fact explains nothing, or adopt the theory that there are acts of mind so rapid and minute as to elude the ken of consciousness. The doctrine of unconscious mental modifications, — I shall now say something of the history of this opinion. It is a curi- ous fact that Locke attributes this opinion to the Cartesians, and he thinks it was employed by them to support their doctrine of the ceaseless activity of mind. In this, as in many other points of the Cartesian philosophy, he is, however, wholly wrong. On the contrary, the Cartesians made consciousness the essence of thought; and their assertion that the mind always thinks is, in their language, precisely tantamount to the assertion that the mind is always conscious. But what was not maintained by the Cartesians, and even in opposition to their doctrine, was advanced by Leibnitz. To this great philosopher belongs the honor of having originated till? opinion, and of having supplied some of the strongest argu- ments in its support. He was, however, unfortunate in the terms which he employed to propound his doctrine. The latent modifications, — the unconscious activities of mind, he denom- inated obscure ideas, obscure representations, perceptions without 252 UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. apperception or consciousness, insensible perceptions, etc. In this he violated the universal usage of language. Y or percep- tion, and idea, and representation, all properly involve the notion of consciousness, — it being, in fact, contradictory to speak of a representation not really represented — a percep- tion not really perceived — an actual idea of whose presence we are not aware. The close affinity of mental modifications with perceptions, ideas, representations, and the consequent commutation of these terms, have been undoubtedly the reasons why the Leib- nitzian doctrine was not more generally adopted, and why, in France and in Britain, succeeding philosophers have almost admitted, as a self-evident truth, that there can be no modifica- tion of mind devoid of consciousness. As to any refutation of the Leibnitzian doctrine, I know of none. Condillac is, indeed, the only psychologist who can be said to have formally proposed the question. He, like Mr. Stewart, attempts to explain why it can be supposed, that the mind has modifications of which we are not conscious, by asserting that we are, in truth, conscious of the modification, but that it is immediately forgotten. In Germany, the doctrine of Leibnitz was almost universally adopted. I am not aware of a philosopher of the least note by whom it has been rejected. This doctrine explains the phenomena, — The third hypothe- sis, then, — that . which employs the single principle of latent agencies to account for so numerous a class of mental phsenom- ena, — how does it explain the phasnomenon under considera- tion? Nothing can be more simple and analogical than its solution. As, to take an example from vision, — in the exter- nal perception of a stationary object, a certain space, an ex- panse of surface, is necessary to the minimum visibile ; in other words, an object of sight cannot come into consciousness unless it be of a certain size ; in like manner, in the internal percep- tion of a series of mental operations, a certain time, a certain duration, is necessary for the smallest section of continuous energy to which consciousness is competent. Some minimum of time must be admitted as the condition of consciousness UNCONSCIOUS MENTAL ACTION. 253 and as time is divisible ad injinitum^ whatever minimum be taken, there must be admitted to be, beyond the cognizance of consciousness, intervals of time, in which, if mental agencies be performed, these will be latent to consciousness. If we suppose that the minimum of time, to which consciousness can descend, be an interval called six, and that six different movements be performed in this interval, tliese, it is evident, will appear to con- sciousness as a simple indivisible point of modified time ; pre- cisely as the minimum visihile appears as an indivisible point of modified space. And, as in the extended parts of the minimum visihile^ each must determine a certain modification on the per- cipient subject, seeing that the effect of the whole is only the conjoined effect of its parts, in like manner, the protended parts of each conscious instant, — of each distinguishable minunum of time, — though themselves beyond the ken of consciousness, must contribute to give the character to the whole mental state which that instant, that minimum, comprises. This being un- derstood, it is easy to see how we lose the consciousness of the several acts, in the rapid succession of many of our habits and dexterities. At first, and before the habit is acquired, every act is slow, and we are conscious of the effort of deliberation, choice, and volition ; by degrees, the mind proceeds with less vacillation and uncertainty ; at length, the acts become secure and precise : in proportion as this takes place, the velocity of the procedure is increased, and as this acceleration rises, the individual acts drop one by one from consciousness, as we lose the leaves in retiring further and further from the tree ; and, at last, we are only aware of the general state which results from these unconscious operations, as we can at last only perceive the greenness which results from the unperceived leaves. CHAPTER XV. GENE}*4L PH^JSrOMENA OF CONSCIOUSlSrESS. — DIFl^ICULTIES AND FACILITIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. — CLASSIFICA- TION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. Before terminating the consideration of the general phse- nomena of consciousness, there are Three Principal Facts, which it would be improper altogether to pass over without notice, but the full discussion of which I reserve for Meta- physics Proper, when we come to establish upon their founda- tion our conclusions in regard to the Immateriality and Immor- tality of Mind ; — I mean the fact of our Mental Existence or Substantiality, the fact of our Mental Unity or Individuality, and the fact of our Mental Identity or Personality. In regard to these three facts, I shall, at present, only attempt to give a very summary view of what place they naturally occupy in our psychological system. Sdf -Existence, — The first of these — the fact of our own Existence — I have already incidentally touched on, in giving a view of the various possible modes in which the fact of the Duality of Consciousness may be conditionally accepted. The various modifications of which the thinking subject. Ego, is conscious, are accompanied with the feeling, or intuition, or belief, — or by whatever name the conviction may be called, — that I, the thinking subject, exist. This feeling has been called by philosophers the apperception, or consciousness, of our own existence ; but, as it is a simple and ultimate fact of conscious- ness, though it be clearly given, it cannot be defined or described. And for the same reason that it cannot be defined, it cannot be deduced or demonstrated ; and the apparent enthy- (254) PHJENOMENA OF CONSCIOUSNESS. 255 meme of Descartes — Cogiio ergo sum, [I think, therefore I am,] — if really intended for an inference, — if really intended to be more than a simple enunciation of the proposition, that the fact of our existence is given in the fact of our conscious- ness, is either tautological or false. Tautological, because nothing is contained in the conclusion which was not explicitly given in the premise, — the premise, Cogito, I think, being only a grammatical equation of JEgo sum cogitans, I am, or exist, thinhing. False, inasmuch as there would, in the first place, be postulated the reality of thought as a quality or modification, and then, from the fact of this modification, inferred the fact of existence, and of the existence of a subject ; whereas it is self- evident, that in the very possibility of a quality or modification, js supposed the reality of existence, and of an existing subject. Philosophers in general, among whom may be particularly mentioned Locke and Leibnitz, have accordingly found the evi- dence in a clear and immediate belief in the simple datum of consciousness ; and that tliis was likewise the opinion of Des- cartes himself, it would not be difiicult to show. Mental Unity, — The second fact — our Mental Unity or In- dividuality — is given with equal evidence as the first. As 'jleaidy as I am conscious of existing, so clearly am I conscious it every moment of my existence, (and never more so than when the most heterogeneous mental modifications are in a state of rapid succession,) that the conscious Ego is not itself a mere modification, nor a series of modifications of any other subject, but that it is itself something dififerent from all its modifica- tions, and a self-subsistent entity. This feeling, belief, datum, or fact of our mental individuality or unity, is not more capable of explanation than the feeling or fact of our existence, wliich it indeed always involves. The fact of the deliverance of con- sciousness to our mental unity has, of course, never' been doubted ; but philosophers have been found to doubt its truth. According to Hume, our thinking Ego is nothing but a bundle of individual impressions and ideas, out of whose union in the imagination, the notion of a whole, as of a subject of that which is felt and thought is formed. According to Kant, it 256 PHiENOMENA OF CONSCIOUSNESS. cannot be properly determined whether we e:x^st as substance or as accident, because the datum of individuahtj is a condition of the possibility of our having "thoughts and feelings ; in other words, of the possibility of consciousness ; and, therefore, al- though consciousness gives — cannot but give — the phcenom- enon of individuality, it does not follow that this phienomenon may not be only a necessary illusion. An articulate refutation of these opinions I cannot attempt at present, but their refuta* tior. is, in fact, involved in their statement. In regard to Hume, his sceptical conclusion is only an inference from the premises of the dogmatical philosophers, who founded their systems on a violation or distortion of the facts of consciousness. His con- clusion is, therefore, refuted in the refutation of their premises, which is accomplished in the simple exposition that they at once found on, and deny, the veracity of consciousness. And by this objection the doctrine of Kant is overset. For if he attempts to philosophize, he must assert the possibility of philosophy. But the possibility of philosophy supposes the veracity of con- sciousness as to the contents of its testimony ; therefore, in dis- puting the testimony of consciousness to our mental unity and substantiality, Kant disputes the possibility of philosophy, and, consequently, reduces his own attempts at philosophizing to ab- surdity. Mental Identity, — The third datum under consideration is the Identity of Mind or Person. This consists in the assurance we have, from consciousness, that our thinking Ego, notwith- standing the ceaseless changes of state or modification, of which it is the subject, is essentially the same thing, — the same per- son, at every period of its existence. On this subject, laying out of account certain subordinate differences on the mode of stating the fact, philosophers, in general, are agreed. Locke, in the Essay on the Human Understanding ; Leibnitz, in the Nou- veaux Essais ; Butler and Reid are particularly worthy of attention. In regard to this deliverance of consciousness, the truth of which is of vital importance, affording, as it does, the basis of moral responsibility and hope of immortality, — it is, like the last, denied by Kant to afford a valid ground of scientific DIFFICULTIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. 257 certainty. He maintains that tliere is no cogent j)roof of the substantial permanence of our thinking self, because the feeling of identity is only the condition under which that thought ''is possible. Kant's doubt in regard to tlie present fact is refuted in the same manner as his doubt in regard to the preceding, and there are also a number of special grounds on which it can be shown to be untenable. But of these at another time. The peculiar di-fficulties of psychological investigation. — We have now terminated the consideration of Consciousness as the general faculty of thought, and as the only instrument and only source of Philosophy. But before proceeding to treat of the Special Faculties, it may be proper here to premise some obser- vations in relation to the peculiar Difficulties and peculiar Fa- cilities which we may expect in the application of consciousness to the study of its own phaenomena. I shall first speak of the difficulties. The Jirst difficulty in psychological observation arises from this, that the conscious mind is at once the observing subject and the object observed. What are the consequences of this ? In the first place, the mental energy, instead of being concentrated, is divided, and divided in two divergent directions. The state of mind observed, and the act of mind observing, are mutually in an inverse ratio ; each tends to annihilate the other. Is the state to be observed intense, all reflex observation is rendered impossible ; the mind cannot view as a spectator ; it is wholly occupied as an agent or patient. On the other hand, exactly in proportion as the mind concentrates its force in the act of re- flective observation, in the same proportion must the direct phsenomenon lose in vivacity, and, consequently, in the precision and individuality *of its character. This difficulty is manifestly insuperable in those states of mind, which, of their very nature, as suppressing consciousness, exclude all contemporaneous and voluntary observation, as in sleep and fainting. In states like dreaming, which allow at least of a mediate, but, therefore, only of an imperfect, observation, through recollection, it is not ahu- gether exclusive. In all states of strong mental emotion, thr 22* 258 DIFFICULTIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. passion is itself, to a certain extent, a negation of the tranquil- lity requisite for observation, so that we are thus impaled on the awkward dilemma, — either we possess the necessary tranquil- lity for observation, with little or nothing to observe, or there is something to observe, but we have not the necessary tran- quillity for observation. All this is completely opposite in our observation of the external world. There the objects he always ready for our inspection ; and we have only to open our eyes, and guard ourselves from the use of hypotheses and green spectacles, to carry our observations to an easy and successful termination. Want of mutual cooperation, — In the second place, in the study of external nature, several observers may associate them- selves in the pursuit ; and it is well known how cooperation and mutual sympathy preclude tedium and languor, and brace up the faculties to their highest vigor. Hence the old proverb, tmus homo, nullus homo, " As iron," says Solomon, " sharpen- eth iron, so a man sharpeneth the understanding of his friend." " In my opinion," says Plato, " it is well expressed by Homer, By mutual confidence and mutual aid, Great deeds are done, and great discoveries made;' for if we labor in company, we are always more prompt and capable for the investigation of any hidden matter. But if a man works out any thing by solitary meditation, he forthwith goes about to find some one with whom he may commune, no^* does he think his discovery assured until confirmed by the a quiescence of others." Aristotle, in like manner, referring to th^ same passage of Homer, gives the same solution. " Social oper- ation," he says, " renders us more energetic both in thought and action." Of this advantage the student of Mind is in a great measure deprived. He who would study the internal world must isolate himself in the solitude of his own thought ; a»d for man, who, as Aristotle observes, is more social by nature than any bee or ant, this isolation is not only ppJnful in itself, but, in place of strengthening his pov/ers, tends to rob them of what maintains their vigor and stimulates their exertion. DIFFICULTIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. 25^^ No fact of consciousness can he acc-epted at second hand, — Id the third place, " In the study of the material universe," [saji? Cardaillac,] ^' it is not necessary that each observer should him self make every observation. The phgenomena are here sc palpable and so easily described, that the experience ot one ob server suffices to make the facts which he has witnessed intelli- gible and credible to all. In point of fact, our knowledge of the external world is taken chiefly upon trust. The phcenomena of the internal world, on the contrary, are not thus capable of being described ; all that the first observer can do is to lead others to repeat his experience: in the science of mind, we can believe nothing upon authority, take nothing upon trust. In the physi- cal sciences, a fact viewed in different aspects and in different circumstances, by one or more observers of acknowledged sagacity and good faith, is not only comprehended as clearly by those who have not seen it for themselves, but is also admitted without hesitation, independently of all personal verification. Instruction thus suffices to make it understood, and the authority of the testimony carries with it a certainty which almost pre- cludes the possibility of doubt. " But this is not the case in the philosophy of mind. On the contrary, we can here neither understand nor believe at second hand. Testimony can impose nothing on its own authority ; and instruction is only instruction when it enables us to teach ourselves. A fact of consciousness, however well observed, however clearly expressed, and however great may be our con- fidence in its observer, is for us as nothing, until, by an expe- rience of our own, we have observed and recognized it our- selves. Till this be done, we cannot comprehend what it means, far less admit it to be true. Hence it follows that, in philoso- phy proper, instruction is limited to an indication of the position in which the pupil ought to place himself, in order, by his own observation, to verify for himself the facts which his instructor pronounces true." Phcenomena of consciousness only to he studied through mem- ory, — In i\\Q fourth place, the phsenomena of consciousness are not arrested during observation ; — they are in a ceaseless and 260 DIFFICULTIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. rapid How ; each state of mind is indivisible but for a moment, and there are not two states or two moments of whose precise identity we can be assured. Thus, before we can observe a modification, it is already altered ; nay, the very intention of observing it, suffices for the change. It hence results that the phaenomenon can only be studied through its reminiscence ; but memory reproduces it often very imperfectly, and always in lower vivacity and precision. The objects of the external world, on the other hand, remain either unaltered during our observation, or can be renewed without change ; and we can leave off at will, and recommence our investigation, without detriment to its result. Presented only in succession, — In the fifth place, " The phsenomena of the mental world," [says Biunde,] "are not, like those of the material, placed by the side of each other in space. They want that form by which external objects attract and fetter our attention ; they appear only in rows on the thread of time, occupying their fleeting moment, and then van- ishing into oblivion ; whereas, external objects stand before us steadfast, and distinct, and simultaneous, in all the life and emphasis of extension, figure, and color." Naturally hlend with each other, — In the sixth place, the perceptions of the different qualities of external objects are decisively discriminated by different corporeal organs, so that color, sound, sol-idity, odor, flavor, are, in the sensations them- selves, contrasted, without the possibility of confusion. In an individual sense, on the contrary, it is not always easy to draw the line of separation between its perceptions, as these are con- tinually running into each other. Thus red and yellow are, in their extreme points, easily distinguished, but the transition point from one to the other is not precisely determined. Now, in our internal observation, the mental phaenomena cannot be discriminated like the perceptions of one sense from the per- ceptions of another, but only like the perceptions of the same. Thus the phaenomenon of feeling, of pleasure or pain, and the phaenomenon of desire, are, when considered in their re m(»ter divergent aspects, manifestly marked out and cont^^adis- DIFFICULTIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. 261 tinguished as different original modifications ; whereas, when viewed on their approximating side, they are seen to vslide so insensibly into each other, that it becomes impossible to draw between them any accurate line of demarcation. Thus the various qualities of our internal life can be alone discriminated by a mental process called Abstraction ; and abstraction is ex- posed to many liabilities of error. Nay, the various mental operations do not present themselves distinct and separate ; they are all bound up in the same unity of action; and as they are only possible through each other, they cannot, even in thought, be dealt with as isolated and apart. In the perception of an external object, the qualities are, indeed, likewise pre- sented by the different senses in connection, as, for example, vinegar is at once seen as yellow, felt as liquid, tasted as sour, and so on ; nevertheless, the qualities easily allow themselves in abstraction to be viewed as really separable, because they are all the properties of an extended and divisible body ; whereas in the mind, thoughts, feelings, desires, do not stand separate, though in juxtaposition, but every mental act contains at once all these qualities, as the constituents of its indivisible simplicity. Self -observation costs painful effort, — In the seventh place, the act of reflection on our internal modifications is riot accom- panied with that frequent and varied sentiment of pleasure, which we experience from the impression of external things. Self-observation costs us a greater effort, and has less excite- ment than the contemplation of the material world ; and the higher and more refined gratification, which it supplies when its habit has been once formed, cannot be conceived by those who have not as yet been trained to its enjoyment. " The first part of our life," [says Cardaillac,] " is fled before we possess the capacity of reflective observation ; while the impressions which, from earliest infancy, we receive from material objects, the wants of our animal nature, and the prior development of our external senses, all contribute to concentrate, even from the first breath of life, our attention on the world without. The second passes without our caring to observe ourselves. The outer life is too agreeable to allow the soul to tear itself from 262 FACILITIES OF PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. its g atifications, and return frequently upon itself. And at the period when the material world has at length palled upon the senses, when the taste and the desire of reflection gradually feecome predominant, we then find ourselves, in a certain sort, already made up, and it is impossible for us to resume our life from its commencement, and to discover how we have become what we now are." " Hitherto," [says Ancillon,] " external objects have exclusively riveted our attention ; our organs have acquired the flexibility requisite for this peculiar kind of obser- vation ; we have learned the method, acquired the habit, and feel the pleasure which results from performing what we per- form with ease. But let us recoil upon oiirselves ; the scene changes ; the charm is gone ; difliculties accumulate ; all that is done, is done irksomely and with effort ; in a word, every thing within repels, every thing without attracts ; we reach the age of manhood without being taught another lesson than reading what takes place without and around us, whilst we possess neither the habit nor the method of studying the volume of our own thoughts." " For a long time, we are too absorbed in life to be able to detach ourselves from it in thought ; and when the desires and the feehngs are at length weakened or tranquil- lized, — when we are at length restored to ourselves, we can no longer judge of the preceding state, because we can no longer reproduce or replace it. Thus it is that our life, in a philo- sophical sense, runs like water through our fingers. We are carried along lost, whelmed in our life ; we live, but rarely see ourselves to live. " The reflective Ego, which distinguishes self from its transi- tory modifications, and which separates the spectator from the spectacle of life, which it is continually representing to itself, is never developed in the majority of mankind at all ; and even in the thoughtful and reflective few, it is formed only at a mature period, and is even then only in activity by starts and at inter- vals." The facilities of philosophical study. — But Philosophy has not only peculiar difliculties, it has also peculiar facilities. There is, indeed, only one external condition on which it is DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FaOULTIES. 263 dependent, and that is language ; and when, in the progress of civilization, a language is once formed of a copiousness and pli- ability capable of embodying its abstractions without figurative ambiguity, then a genuine philosophy may commence. With this one condition, all is given ; the Philosopher requires for his discoveries no preliminary preparations, — no apparatus of instruments and materials. He has no new events to seek, as the Historian ; no new combinations to form, as the Mathema- tician. The Botanist, the Zoologist, the Mineralogist, can accu- mulate only by care, and trouble, and expense, an inadequate assortment of the objects necessary for their labors and obser- vations. But that most important and interesting of all studies of which man himself is the object, has no need of any thing external ; it is only necessary that the observer enter into his inner self, in order to find there all he stands in need of, or rather it is only by doing this, that he can hope to find any thing at all. If he only effectively pursue the rgethod of ob- servation and analysis, he may even dispense with the study of philosophical systems. This is at best only useful as a mean towards a deeper and more varied study of himself, and is often only a tribute paid by philosophy to erudition. We have now concluded the consideration of Consciousness, viewed in its more general relations, and shall proceed to an- alyze its more particular modifications, that is, to consider the various Special Faculties of Knowledge. It is here proper to recall to your attention the division I gave of the Mental Phaenomena into three great classes, — namely, the phaenomena of Knowledge, the phaenomena of Feeling, and the phaenomena of Conation. ' But as these vari- ous phaenomena all suppose Consciousness as their condition, — those of the first class, the phaenomena of Knowledge, being, indeed, nothing but consciousness in various relations, — it was necessary, before descending to the consideration of the subor- dinate, first to exhaust the prmcipal ; and in doing this, the discussion has been protracted to a greater length than I antici- pated. I now proceed to the particular investigation of the first class 264 DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES- of the mental plisenomena, — those of Knowledge or CognitioHj — and shall commence by delineating to you the distribution of the cognitive faculties which I shall adopt ; — a distribution dif- ferent from any other with which I am acquainted. But I would first premise an observation in regard to psychological powers, and to psychological divisions. Mental powers not distinguishable from the thinking principhy nor from each other, — As to mental powers, — under which term are included mental faculties and capacities, — you are not to suppose entities really distinguishable from the thinking principle, or really different from each other. Mental powers are not like • bodily organs. It is the same simple substance which exerts every energy of every faculty, however various, and which is affected in every mode of every capacity, however opposite. This has frequently been wilfully or ignorantly mis- understood ; and, among others. Dr. Brown has made it a mat- ter of reproach to philosophers in general, that they regarded the faculties into which they analyzed the mind as so many dis- tinct and independent existences. No reproach, however, can be more unjust, no mistake more flagrant ; and it can easily be shown that this is perhaps the charge, of all others, to which the very smallest number of psychologists need plead guilty. On this point. Dr. Brown does not, however, stand alone as an ac- cuser ; and, both before and since his time, the same charge has been once and again preferred, and this, in particular, with sin- gular infelicity, against Reid and Stewart. To speak only of the latter, — he sufficiently declares his opinion on the subject in a foot-note of the Dissertation : — "I quote," he says, " the following passage ffom Addison, 7?o^ as a specimen of his meta- physical acumen, but as a proof of his good sense in divining and obviating a difficulty, which, I believe, most persons will acknowledge occurred to themselves when they first entered on metaphysical studies : — ' Although we divide the soul into sev- eral powers and faculties, there is no such division in the soul itself, since it is the whole soul that remembers, understands, wills, or imagines. Our manner of considering the memory, understanding, will, imagination, and the like faculties, is for the DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. 265 better enabling us to express ourselves in such abstracted sub- jects of speculations, not that there is any such division in the goul itself.' In another part of the same paper, Addison ob- serves, ' that what we call the faculties of the soul are only the different wavs or modes in which the soul can exert herself.' " What is a mental power ? — I shall first state to you what is intended by the terms mental power, faculty, or capacity/ ; and then show you that no other opinion has been generally held by philosophers. It is a fact too notorious to be denied, that the mind is capa- ble of different modifications, — that is, can exert different actions, and can be affected by different passions. This is admitted. But these actions and passions are not all dissimilar; every action and passion is not different from every other. On the contrary, they are like, and they are unlike. Those, therefore, that are like, we group or assort together in thought, and bestow on them a common name ; nor are these groups or assortments manifold, — they are in fact few and simple. Again, every action is an effect; every action and passion a modification. But every effect supposes a cause ; every modification supposes a subject. When we say that the mind exerts an energy, we virtually say that the mind is the cause of the energy ; when we say that the mind acts or suffers, we say in other words, that the mind is the subject of a modification. But the modifications, that is, the actions and passions, of the mind, as we stated, all fall into a few resembling groups, which we designate by a pe- culiar name; and as the mind is the common cause^ and subject of all these, we are surely entitled to say in general that the mind has the faculty of exerting such and such a class of ener- gies, or has the capacity of being modified by such and such an order of affections. We here excogitate no new, no occult principle. We only generalize certain effects, and then infer that common effects must have a common cause ; we only clas- sify certain modes, and conclude that similar modes indicate the same capacity of being modified. There is nothing in all this contrary to the most rigid rules of philosophizing ; nay, it is the purest specimen of the inductive philosophy. 23 2G6 DISTBIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. On this doctrine, a faculty is nolliing more than a general term for the causality the mind has of originating a certain class of energies ; a capacity, only a general term for the susceptibil- ity the mind has of being affected by a particular kind of emo- tions. All mental powers are thus, in short, nothing more than names determined by various orders of mental phaenomena. But as these phaenomena differ from, and resemble, each other in various respects, various modes of classification may, there- fore, be adopted, and consequently, various faculties and capaci- ties, in different views, may be the result. Value of Philosophical System, — And this is what we actu- ally see to be the case in the different systems of philosophy ; for each system of philosophy is a different view of the phae- nomena of mind. Now, here I would observe that we might fall into one or other of two errors, either by attributing too great or too small importance to a systematic arrangement of the mental phaenomena. It must be conceded to those who af- fect to undervalue psychological system, that system is neither the end first in the order of time, nor that paramount in the scale of importance. To attempt a definitive system or synthesis^ be- fore we have fully analyzed and accumulated the facts to be ar- ranged, would be preposterous, and necessarily futile ; and system is only valuable when it is not arbitrarily devised, but arises naturally out of an observation of the facts, and of the whole facts themselves ; trig TtoXXrjg TtsiQag xslevraTov Imytvvrnia, On the other hand, to despise system is to despise philosophy ; for the end of philosophy is the detection of unity. Even in the progress of a science, and long prior to its consummation, it is indeed better to assort the materials we have accumulated, even though the arrangement be only temporary, only provis- ional, than to leave them in confusion. For without such ar- rangement, we are unable to overlook our possessions ; and as experiment results from the experiment it supersedes, so system is destined to generate system in a progress never attaining, but ever approximating to, perfection. Having stated what a psychological power in propriety is, I may add that this, and not the other, opinion, has been the one DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. 267 prevalent in the various schools and ages of philosophy. I could adduce to you passages in which the doctrine that the faculties and capacities are more than mere possible modes, in which the simple indivisible principle of thought may act and exist, is explicitly denied by [many of] the fathers of the Church, by [many of] the Platonists, the Aristotelians, and by the whole host of recent philosophers. During the middle ages, the question was indeed one which divided the schools. St. Thomas, at the head of one party, held that the faculties were distinguished not only from each other, but from the essence of the mind ; and this, as they phrased it, really and not formally. Henry of Ghent, at the head of another party, maintained a modified opinion, — that the faculties were really distinguished from each other, but not from the essence of the soul. Scotus, again, followed by Occam and the whole sect of Nominalists, denied all real difference either between the several faculties, or between the faculties and the mind ; allowing between them only a formal or logical distinction. This last is the doctrine that has subsequently prevailed in the latter ages of philosophy ; and it is a proof of its universality, that few modern psycholo- gists have ever thought it necessary to make an exphcit profes- sion of their faith in what they silently assumed. No- accusation can, therefore, be more ungrounded than that which has been directed against philosophers, — that they have generally har- bored the opinion that faculties are, like organs in the body, distinct constituents of mind. The Aristotelic principle, that in relation to the body, " the soul is all in the whole and all in every part," — that it is the same indivisible mind that operates in sense, in imagination, in memory, in reasoning, etc., differ- ently indeed, but differently only because operating in different relations, — this opinion is the one dominant among psycholo- gists, and the one wdiich, though not always formally proclaimed, must, if not positively disclaimed, be in justice presumptively attributed to every philosopher of mind. Those who employed the old and familiar language of philosophy meant, in truth, exactly the same as those who would establish a new doctrine on a newfangled nomenclature. 268 DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIYE FACULTIES. What is Psychological Division ? — From what I have now said, you will be better prepared for what I am about to state in regard to the classification of the first great order of mental phsenomena, and the distribution of the faculties of Knowledge founded thereon. I formerly told you that the mental quali- ities — the mental phaenomena — are never presented to us separately ; they are always in conjunction, and it is only by an ideal analysis and abstraction that, for the purposes of science, they can be discriminated and considered apart. The prob- lem proposed in such an analysis is to find the primary threads which, in their composition, form the complex tissue of thought. In what ought to be accomplished by such an analysis, all phi- losophers are agreed, how^ever different may have been the result of their attempts. I shall not state and criticize the vari- ous classifications propounded of the cognitive faculties, as 1 did not state and criticize the classifications propounded of the mental phgenomena in general. The reasons are the same. You would be confused, not edified. I shall only delineate the distribution of the faculties of knowledge, which I have adopted, and endeavor to afford you some general insight into its principles. At 23resent, I limit my consideration to the phaenomena of Knowledge ; with the two other classes — the phaenomena of Feehng and the phaenomena of Conation — we have at present no concern. I again repeat that consciousness constitutes, or is coexten- sive with, all our faculties of knowledge, — these faculties being only special modifications under which consciousness is manifested. It being, therefore, understood that consciousness is not a special faculty of knowledge, but the general faculty out of which the special faculties of knowledge are evolved, I proceed to this evolution. I. The Presentativ^- Faculty, - — In the first place, as we are endowed with a faculty of Cognition, or Consciousness in gen- eral, and since it cannot be maintained that we have always possessed the knowledge which we now possess, it will be admitted, that we must have a faculty of acquiring knowdedge. But this acquisition of knowledge can only be accomplished by DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. 269 the immediate presentation of a new object to consciousness, in other words, by the reception of a new object within the sphere of our cognition. "We have thus a facuUj which may be called the Acquisitive, or the Presentative, or the Receptive. The term Presentative I use, as you will see, in contrast and correla- tion to a Representative Faculty, of which I am immediately to speak. Subdivided into Perception and Self-Consciousness. — Now, new or adventitious knowledge may be either of things exter- nal, or of things internal; in other words, either of the pha)- nomena of the Non-ego, or of the phsenomena of the Ego ; and this distinction of object will determine a subdivision of this, the Acquisitive Faculty. If the object of knowledge be ex- ternal, the faculty receptive or presentative of the qualities of such object will be a consciousness of the Non-ego. This has obtained the name of External Perception, or of Perception simply. If, on the other hand, the object be internal, the faculty receptive or presentative of the qualities of such sub- ject-object will be a consciousness of the Ego. This faculty obtains the name of Internal or Reflex Perception, or of Self- Consciousness. By the foreign psychologists, this faculty is termed also the Internal Sense. Under the general faculty of cognition is thus, in the first place, distinguished an Acquisitive, or Presentative, or Recep- tive Faculty ; and this acquisitive faculty is subdivided into the consciousness of the Non-ego, or External Perception simply, and into the consciousness of the Ego, or Self-Consciousness, or Internal Perception. This acquisitive faculty is the faculty of Experience. It affords us exclusively all the knowledge we possess a posteriori : that is, our whole contingent knowledge, — our whole knowl- edge of fact. External perception is the faculty of external, self-consciousness is the faculty of internal, experience. If we limit the term Reflection in conformity to its original employ- ment and proper signification, — an attention to the internal phaBuomena^ — reflection will be an expression for seF -con- sciousness concentrated. 270 DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE lACLLTlES. n. The Conservative Faculty^ — In the second place, mas- much as we are capable of knowledge, we must be endowed not only with a faculty of acquiring, but with a faculty of re- taining or conserving it when acquired. By this faculty, I mean merely, and in the most limited sense, the power of men- tal retention. If our knowledge of any object terminated when the object ceased to exist, or to exist within the sphere of consciousness, our knowledge would hardly deserve the name : for what we actually perceive by the faculties of external and of internal perception is but an infinitesimal part of the knowl- edge which we actually possess. We have thus, as a second necessary faculty, one that may be called the Conservative or Retentive. This is Memory strictly so denominated, — that is, the power of retaining knowledge in the mind, but out of con-' sciousness ; I say retaining knowledge in the mind, but out of consciousness, for to bring the retentum out of memory into consciousness is the function of a totally different faculty, of which we are immediately to speak. Under the general faculty of cognition is thus, in the second place, distinguished the Con- servative or Retentive Faculty, or Memory Proper. Whether there be subdivisions of this faculty, we shall not here inquire. III. The Reproductive Faculty, — But, in the third place, if we are capable of knowledge, it is not enough that we possess a faculty of acquiring, and a faculty of retaining it in the mind, but out of consciousness ; we must further be endowed with a faculty of recalling it out of UMConsciousness into consciousness, in short, a reproductive power. This Reproductive Faculty is governed by the laws which regulate the succession of our thoughts, — the laws, as they are called, of Mental Association. If these laws are allowed to operate without the intervention of the will, this faculty may be called Suggestion^ or Sponta- neous Suggestion ; whereas, if applied under the influence of the will, it will properly obtain the name of Reminiscence, or Recollection. By reproduction, it should be observed, that I strictly mean the process of recovering the absent thought from unconsciousness, and not its representation in consciousness. This reproductive faculty is commonly confounded with the DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIEa 271 conservative, under the name of Memory ; but most errone- ouslj. These quaUties of mind are totally unlike, and are pos- sessed by different individuals in the most different degrees. Some have a strong faculty of conservation, and a feeble fac- ulty of reproduction ; others, again, a prompt and active rem- iniscence, but an evanescent retention. Under the general faculty of cognition, there is thus discriminated, in the third place, the Reproductive Faculty. ly. The Representative Faculty, — In the fourth place, as capable of knowledge, we must not only be endowed with a presentative, a conservative, and a reproductive faculty ; there is required for their consummation — for the keystone of the arch — a faculty of representing in consciousness, and of keep- ing before the mind the knowledge presented, retained, and reproduced. We have thus a Representative Faculty ; and this obtains the name of Imagination or Phantasy. The word Fancy is an abbreviation of the latter ; but with its change of form, its meaning has been somewhat modified. Phantasy^ which latterly has been little used, was employed in the lan- guage of the older English philosophers, as, like its Greek original, strictly synonymous with Imagination. The element of imagination is not to be confounded with the element of reproduction, though this is frequently, nay com- monly, done ; and this either by comprehending these two qual- ities under imagination, or by conjoining them with the quality of retention under memory. The distinction I make is valid. For the two faculties are possessed by different individuals in very different degrees. It is not, indeed, easy to see how, with- out a representative act, an object can be reproduced. But the fact is certain, that the two powers have no necessary propor- tion to each other. The representative faculty has, by philoso- phers, been distinguished into the Productive or Creative, and the Reproductive, Imagination. I shall hereafter ^how you that this distinction is untenable. V. The Elahorative Faculty, — In the fifth place, all the fac- ulties we have considered are only subsidiary. They acquire, preserve, call out, and hold up the materials, for the use of a 272 DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. higher faculty which operates upon these materials, and which we ma/ call the Elaborative or Discursive Faculty. This fac- ulty has only one operation, it only compares ; — it is Compari^ son, — the faculty of Relations. It may startle you to hear that the highest function of mind is nothing higher than com- parison, but in the end, I am confident of convincing you of the paradox. Under Comparison, I include the conditions, and the results, of Comparison. In order to compare, the mind must divide or separate, and conjoin or compose. Analysis and syn- thesis are, therefore, the conditions of comparison. Again, the result of comparison is either the affirmation of one thing of another, or the negation of one thing of another. If the mind affirm one thing of another, it conjoins them, and is thus again synthesis. If it deny one thing of another, it disjoins them, and is thus again analysis. Generalization, which is the result of synthesis and analysis, is thus an act of comparison, and is properly denominated Conception. Judgment is only the com- parison of two terms or notions directly together ; Reasoning, only the comparison of two terms or notions with each other through a third. Conception or Generalization, Judgment and Reasoning, are thus only various applications of Comparison, and not even entitled to the distinction of separate faculties. Under the general cognitive faculty, there is thus discrim- inated a fifth special faculty in the Elaborative Faculty, or Comparison. This is Thought, strictly so called ; it corresponds to the /lidvoia of the Greek, to the Disciirsus of the Latin, to the Verstand of the German philosophy ; and its laws are the object of Logic. VI. The Regulative Faculty. — But, in the sixth and last place, the mind is not altogether indebted to experience for the whole apparatus of ^ its knowledge; — its knowledge is not all adventitious, not all a posteriori. What we know by expe- rience, without experience we should not have known; and as all our experience is contingent, all the knowledge derived from experience is contingent also. But there are cognitions in the mind which are not contingent, — wlilch are necespary, — which we cannot but think, — which thought supposes as its DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. 273 fundamental condition. These a priori cognitions are the laws or conditions of thought in general ; consequently, the laws and conditions under which our knowledge a posteriori is possible. These cognitions, therefore, are not mere generalizations from experience. But if not derived from experience, they must be native to the mind ; unless, on an alternative that we need not at present contemplate, we suppose with Plato, St. Austin, Cousin, and other philosophers, that Reason, or more properly Intellect, is impersonal, and that we are conscious of these nec- essary cognitions in the divine mind. These native, these necessary cognitions, are the laws by which the mind is gov- erned in its operations, and which afford the conditions of its capacity of knowledge. These necessary laws, or primary con- ditions, of intelligence, are phaenomena of a similar character ; and we must, therefore, generalize or collect them into a class ; and on the power possessed by the mind of manifesting these phaenomena, w^e may bestow the name of the Regulative Fac- ulty. This faculty corresponds in some measure to what, in the Aristotelic philosophy, was called Novg, — vovg (intellectus, mens), when strictly employed, being a term, in that philosophy, for the place of principles, — the locus principiorum. It is analogous, likewise, to the term Reason, as occasionally used by some of the older English philosophers, and to the Vernunft (reason) in the philosophy of Kant, Jacobi, and others of the recent German metaphysicians, and from them adopted into France and England. It is also nearly convertible with what I conceive to be Reid's, and certainly Stewart's, notion of Com- mon Sense. This, the last general faculty which I would dis- tinguish under the Cognitive Faculty, is thus what I would call the Regulative or Legislative, — its synonyms being Novg^ Intellect, or Common Sense. You will observe that the term faculty can be applied to the class of phaenomena here collected under one name, only in a very different signification from what it bears when applied to the preceding powers. For i^ovg, intelligence or common sense, meaning merely the complement of the fundamental principles or laws of thought, is not properly a faculty ; that is, it is not an 274 DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. active power at all. As it is, however, not a capacity, it is not easy to see by what other word it can be denoted. Knowledge a priori and a posteriori explained. — By the way, you will please to recollect these two relative expressions. As used in a psychological sense, a knowledge a posteriori is a syn- onym for knowledge empirical, or from experience ; and, con- sequently, is adventitious to the mind, as subsequent to, and in consequence of, the exercise of its faculties of observation. Knowledge a priori^ on the contrary, called likewise native, pure, or transcendental knowledge, embraces those principles which, as the conditions of the exercise of its faculties of obser- vation and thought, are, consequently, not the result of that exercise. True it is that, chronologically considered, our a pri- ori is not antecedent to our a posteriori knowledge ; for the internal conditions of experience can only operate when an object of experience has been presented. In the, order of time, our knowledge, therefore, may be said to commence with expe- rience, but to have its principle antecedently in the mind. Much as has been written on this matter by the greatest philosophers, this all-important doctrine has never been so well stated as in an unknown sentence of an old and now forgotten thinker: " Cognitio omnis a mente primam originem, a sensibus exordium habet primum " — [All knowledge has its primitive source in the mind, its beginning in the senses.] These few words are worth many a modern volume of philosophy. You will observe the felicity of the expression. The whole sentence has not a su- perfluous word, and yet is absolute and complete. Mens^ the Latin term for vovg, is the best^possible word to express the intellectual source of our a priori principles, and is well opposed to sensus. But the happiest contrast is in the terms origo and exordium ; the former denoting priority in the order of exist- ence, the latter priority in the order of time. The following is a tabular view of the distribution of the Special Faculties of Knowledge : DISTRIBUTION OF THE COGNITIVE FACULTIES. 275 > fcX) o Q I. Presentative 11. Conservative III. Reproductive IV. Kepresentative V. Elaborative VI. Resrulative i Externals Perception. Internal = Self-consciousness. = Memory. ( Without will = Suj2:_j^cstion. I With will = Reminiscence. = Imagination. = Comparison, — Faculty of Relations. = Reason, — Common Sense. Besides these faculties, there are, I conceive, no others ; and, in the sequel, I shall endeavor to show you, that while these are attributes of mind not to be confounded, — not to be analyzed into each other, — the other faculties which have been devised by philosophers are either factitious and imaginary, or easily reducible to these. CHAPTER XVI. THE PRESENTATIVE FACULTY. — REID'S HISTORICAL VIEW OP THE THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. Use of the term Cognition vindicated, — I may here notice, parenthetically, the reason why I frequently employ cognition as a synonym of knowledge. This is not done merely for the sake of varying the expression. In the first place, it is neces- sary to have a word of this signification, which we can use in the plural. Now the term knowledges has waxed obsolete, though I think it ought to be revived. It is frequently employed by Bacon. We must, therefore, have recourse to the term cogni- tion^ of which the plural is in common usage. But in the second place, we must likewise have a term for knowledge which we can employ adjectively. The word knowledge itself has no adjective, for the participle knowing is too vague and unemphatic to be employed, at least, alone. But the substantive cognition has the adjective cognitive. Thus, in consequence of having a plural and an adjective, cognition is a word we cannot possibly dispense with in psychological discussion. It would also be convenient, in the third place, for psychological precision and emphasis, to use the word to cognize in connection with its noun cognition^ as we use the decompound to recognize in con- nection with its noun recognition. But in this instance, the necessity is not strong enough to warrant our doing what cus- tom has not done. You will notice, such an innovation is always a question of circumstances ; and though ^ would not subject Philosophy to Rhetoric more than Gregory the Great would Theology to Grammar, still, without an adequate necessity, I should always recommend you, in your English compositions, t(? (276) THE PRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 277 prefer a word of Saxon, to a word of Greek or Latin derivation. It would be absurd to sacrifice meani-ng to its mode of utterance, — to make thought subordinate to its expression ; but still where no higher authority, no imperious necessity, dispenses with phil- ological precepts, these, as themselves the dictates of reason and philosophy, ought to be punctiliously obeyed. " It is not in language," says Leibnitz, " that we ought to play the puritan ; '* but it is not either for the philosopher or the theologian to throw off all deference to the laws of language, — to proclaim of their doctrines, " Hysteria tanta Turpe est gramraaticis submittere coUa capistris/^ The general right must certainly be asserted to the philosopher of usurping a peculiar language, if requisite to express his pe- culiar analyses ; but he ought to remember that the exercise of this right, as odious and suspected, is strictissimi juris, and that, to avoid the pains and penalties of grammatical recusancy, he must always be able to plead a manifest reason of philosophical necessity. But to return from this digression. Mental phcenomena distinguished only hy ahstraction, — The phgenomena of mind are never presented to us undecomposed and simple ; that is, we are never conscious of any modification of mind which is not made up of many elementary modes ; but these simple modes we are able to distinguish, by abstraction, as separate forms or qualities of our internal life, since, in differ- ent states of mind, they are given in different proportions and combinations. "We are thus able to distinguish as simple, by an ideal abstraction and analysis, what is never actually given ex- cept in composition ; precisely as we distinguish color from extension, though color is never presented to us apart, nay, can- not even be conceived as actually separable, from extension. The aim of the psychologist is thus to analyze,. by abstraction, the mental phsenomena into those ultimate or primary quahties, which, in their combination, constitute the concrete complexities of actual. thought. K the simple constituent phaenomenon be a mental activity, we give to the active powder thus possessed by 24 278 THE PRESENTATIVE FACULTY. the mind of eliciting such elementary energy the name of fac- ulty ; wher(ias, if the simple or constituent phsenomenon be a mental passivity, we give to the passive power thus possessed by the mind of receiving such an elementary affection, the name of capacity. Thus it is that there are just as many simple fac- ulties as there are ultimate activities of mind ; as many simple capacities as there are ultimate passivities of mind ; and it is consequently manifest that a system of the mental powers can never be final and complete, until Ave have accomplished a full and accurate analysis of the various fundamental phienomena of our internal life. And what does such an analysis suppose ? Manifestly three conditions : — 1°, That no phsenomenon be as- sumed as elementary which can be resolved into simpler princi- ples ; 2°, That no elementary phsenomenon be overlooked ; and 3°, That no imaginary element be interpolated. These are the rules which ought evidently to govern our psy- chological analyses. I could^ show, however, that these have been more or less violated in every attempt that has been made at a determination of the constituent elements of thought ; for philosophers have either stopped short of the primary phsenom- enon, or they have neglected it, or they have substituted another in its room. I declined, however, ^t present, an articulate criti- cism of the various systems of the human powers proposed by philosophers, and passed on to the summary distribution of the cognitive faculties given in the last chapter. It is evident that such a distribution, as the result of an analysis, cannot be appreci- ated until the analysis itself be understood ; and this can only be understood after the discussion of the several faculties and elementary phaenomena has been carried through. You are, therefore, at present to look upon this scheme as little more than a table of contents to the various chapters, under which the phaenomena of knowledge will be considered. I now only make a statement of what I shall subsequently attempt to prove. The principle of the distribution is, however, of such a nature that I flatter myself it can, in some measure, be comprehended even on its first enunciation : for the various elementary phce- nomena, and the relative faculties which it assumes, are of so THE PRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 279 notorioas and necessary a character, that they cannot possibly be refused ; and, at the same time, they are discriminated from each other both by obvious contrast, and by the fact that they are manifested in different individuals each in very various proportions to each other. The general faculty of knowledge is thus, according to this distribution, divided into six special faculties : first, the Acquis- itive, Presentative, or Receptive ; second, the Conservative ; third, the Reproductive ; fourth, the Representative ; fifth, the Elaborative ; and sixth, the Regulative. The first of these, the Acquisitive, is again subdivided into two faculties, — Perception and Self- Consciousness ; the third into Suggestion and Reminis- cence ; and the fifth may likewise admit of subdivisions, into Conception, Judgment, and Reasoning, which, however, as merely applications of the same act in different degrees, hardly warrant a distinction into separate faculties. I now proceed to consider these faculties in detail. The Presentative Faculty — Perception, — Perception, or the consciousness of external objects, is the first power in order. And, in treating of this faculty, — the faculty on which turns the whole question of Idealism and Realism, — it is perhaps proper, in the first place, to take an historical survey of the hy- potheses of philosophers in regard to Perception. In doing this, I shall particularly consider the views which Reid has given of these hypotheses : his authority on this the most im- portant part of his philosophy is entitled to high respect ; and it is requisite to point out to you, both in what respects he ha? misrepresented others, and in what been misrepresented him self. Before commencing this survey, it is proper to state, in a few words, the one, the principal, point in regard to which opinions vary. The grand distinction of philosophers is determined by the alternative they adopt on the question, — Is our perception, or our consciousness of external objects^ mediate or immediate f As we have seen, those who maintain our knowledge of ex- ternal objects to be immediate, accept implicitly the datum of consciousness, which gives as an ultimate fact^ in this act, an ego 280 THE PKESENTATIVE FACULTY. immediately known, and a non-ego immediately known. Those again who deny that an external object can be immediately known, do not aT^cept one-half of the fact of consciousness, but Bubsiitute some hypothesis in its place, — not, however, always the same. Consciousness declares that we have an immediate knowledge of a non-ego, and of an external non-ego. Two hypotheses of Mediate Perception. — Now, of the phi- losophers w^ho reject this fact, some admit our immediate knowl- edge of a non-ego, but not of an external non-ego. They do not limit the consciousness or immediate knowledge of the mind to its own modes, but conceiving it impossible for the external reality to be brought within the sphere of consciousness, they hold that it is represented by a vicarious image, numerically different from mind, but situated somewhere, either in the brain or mind, within the sphere of consciousness. Others, again, deny to the mind not only any consciousness of an extfernal non-ego, but of a non-ego at all, and hold that what the mind immediately perceives, and mistakes for an external object, is only the ego itself peculiarly modified. These two are the only generic varieties possible of the representative hypothesis. And they have each their respective advantages and disad- vantages. They both equally afford a basis for Idealism. On the former, Berkeley established his Theological, on the latter, Fichte his Anthropological, Idealism. Both violate the testi- mony of consciousness, the one the more complex and the clumsier, in denying that we are conscious of an external non- ego, though admitting that we are conscious of a non-ego within the sphere of consciousness, either in the mind or brain. The other, the simpler and more philosophical, outrages, how- ever, still more flagrantly, the veracity of consciousness, in denying not only that w^e are conscious of an external non-ego, but that we are conscious of a non-ego at all.'* ^ [Nothing is easier than to show that, so far from refuting Idealism, this doctrine affords it the best of all possible foundations An Egoisti- cal Idealism is established on the doctrine that all our knowledge is merely subjective, or of the mind itself; that the Ego has no immediate cognizance of a N'on-Ego as existing, but that the Non-Ego is only represented to us THE PRESENT ATI VE FACULTY. 2BI Each of these hypotheses of a representative perception admits of various subordinate hypotheses. Thus the former, which holds that the representative or immediate object is a tertium quid^ different both from the mind and from the exter- nal reality, is subdivided, according as the immediate object is viewed as material, as immaterial, or as neither, or as both, as something physical or as something hyperphysical, as propa- gated from the external object, as generated in the medium, or as fabricated in the soul itself; and this latter, either in the intelligent mind or in the animal life, as infused by God or by angels, or as identical with the divine substance, and so forth. In the latter, the representative modification has been regarded either as factitious, that is, a mere product of mind; or as innate, that is, as independent of any mental energy. Raid's error, — Reid, who, as I shall hereafter endeavor to show you, probably holds the doctrine of an Intuitive or Imme diate Perception, never generalized, never articulately under- stood, the distinction of the two forms of the Representative Hypothesis. This was the cause of the most important errors on his part. In the first place, it prevented him from drawing the obtrusive and vital distinction between Perception, to him a in a modification of the self-conscious Ego. This doctrine being admitted, the Idealist has only to show, that the supposition of a Non-Ego, or 'an external world really existent, is a groundless and unnecessary assump- tion ; for, while the Law of Parcimony prohil)its the multiplication of sub- stances or causes beyond what the phsenomena require, we have manifestly no right to postulate for the Non-Ego the dignity of an independent sub- Jtance beyond the Ego, seeing that this Non-Ego is, ex liypothesl, known to us, consequently exists for us, only as a phaenomenon of the Ego All our knowledge of the Non-Ego is thus merely ideal and mediate ; we have no knowledge of any really objective reality, except through a sub- jective representation or notion; in other words, we are only immediately cognizant of certain modes of our own minds, and, in and through them, mediately warned of the phgenomena of the material universe The common sense of mankind only assures us of the existence of an external and extended world, in assuring us that we are conscious, not merely of the phaenomena of mind in relation to matter, but of the ph^enomena of mat- ter in relation to mind ; — in other words, that we are immediately percipi- ent of extended things.] — Notes to Reid. Q4^ 282 VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION-. faculty immediately cognitive, or presentative of external ob- jects, and the faculties of Imagination and Memory, in which external objects can- only be known to the mind mediately, or in a representation. In the second place, this, as we shall see, causes him the greatest perplexity, and sometimes, leads him into errors in his history of the opinions of previous philoso- phers, in regard to which he has, independently of this, been guilty of various mistakes. Brown's error, — As to Brown, he holds the simple doctrine of a representative perception, — a doctrine which Reid does not seem to have understood ; and this opinion he not only holds himself, but attributes, with one or two exceptions, to all modern philosophers, nay, even to Keid himself, whose philoso- phy he thus maintains to be one great blunder, both in regard to the new truths it professes to establish, and to the old errors it professes to refute. It turns out, however, that Brown in relation to Reid is curiously wrong from first to last, — not one of Reid's numerous mistakes, historical and philosophical, does he touch, far less redargue ; whereas, in every point on which he assails Reid, he himself is historically or philosophically in error. Reid's historical review, — The Platonic theory, — This being premised, I now proceed to follow Reid through his historical view and scientific criticism of the various theories of Percep- tion ; and I accordingly commence with the Platonic. In this, however, he is unfortunate, for the simile of the cave, which is applied by Plato in the seventh book of the Republic, was n^ intended by him as an illustration of the mode of our sensibL perception at alL "Plato," says Reid, "illustrates our manner of perceiving the objects of sense in this manner. He sup- poses a dark subterraneous cave, in which men lie bound in such a manner that they can direct their eyes only to one part of the cave : far behind, there is a light, some rays of which come over a wall to that part of the cave which is before the eyes of our prisoners. A number of persons, variously em- ployed, pass between them and the light, whose shadows are seen by the prisoners, but not the persons themselves. In this VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. 283 manner, that philosopher conceived that, bj our senses, we per- ceive the shadows of things only, and not things themselves. He seems to have borrowed his notions on this subject from the Pythagoreans, and they very probably from Pythagoras him- self. If we make allowance for Plato's allegorical genius, his sentiments on this subject correspond very well with those of his scholar Aristotle, and of the Peripatetics. The shadows of Plato may very well represent the species and phantasms of the Peripatetic school, and the ideas and impressions of modern philosophers." Reid's account of the Platonic theory of perception is utterly wrong. Plato's simile of the cave he completely misappre- hends. By his cave, images, and shadows, this philosopher intended only to illustrate the great principle of his philoso- phy, that the sensible or ectypal world, — the world phsenome- nal, transitory, ever becoming but never being (del yiyvofxevov, u7jd87iors oV), stands to the noetic or archetypal world, — the world substantial, permanent (o^i^roog oV), in the same relation of comparative unreality, in which the shadows or the images of sensible existences themselves stand to the objects of which they are the dim and distant adumbrations. But not only is Peid wrong in regard to the meaning of the cave, he is curiously wrong in regard to Plato's doctrine, — at least, of vision. For so far was Plato from holding that we only perceive in consequence of the representations of objects being thrown upon the percipient mind, — he, on the contrary, maintained, in the Timceiis, that, in vision, a percipient power of the sensible soul sallies out towards the object, the images of which it carries back into the eye ; — an opinion, by the way, held likewise by Empedocles, Alexander of Aphrodisias, [and many others]. The Aristotelic doctrine, ■— The account which Peid gives of the Aristotelic doctrine is, likewise, very erroneous. " Aristotle seems to have thought that the soul consists of two parts, or rather, that we have two souls, — the animal and the rational ; or, as he calls them, the soul and the intellect. To th^jirsU be- long the senses, memory and imagination ; to the last^ judgment 284 VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION-. opinion, belief, and reasoning. The first we have in common with brute animals ; the last is peculiar to man. The animal soul he held to be a certain form of the body, which is insepar- able from it, and perishes at death. To this soul the senses belong ; and he defines a sense to be that which is capable of receiving the sensible forms or species of objects, without any of the matter of them ; as wax receives the form of the seal without any of the matter of it. The forms of sound, of color, of taste, and of other sensible qualities, are, in a manner, re- ceived by the senses. It seems to be a necessary consequence of Aristotle's doctrine, that bodies are constantly sending forth, in all directions, as many different kinds of forms without mat- ter as they have different sensible qualities ; for the forms of color must enter by the eye, the forms of sound by the ear, — and so of the other senses. This, accordingly, was main- tained by the followers of Aristotle, though not, as far as I know, expressly mentioned by himself. They disputed concern- ing the nature of those forms of species, whether they were real beings or nonentities ; and some held them to be of an in- termediate nature between the two. The whole doctrine of the Peripatetics and schoolmen concerning forms, substantial and accidental, and concerning the transmission of sensible species from objects of sense to the mind, if it be at all intelligible, is so far above my comprehension that I should perhaps do it injustice by entering into it more minutely." In regard to the statement of the Peripatetic doctrine of species, I must observe, that it is correct only as applied to the doctrine taught as the Aristotelic in the Schools of the middle ages ; and even in these Schools, there was a large party who not only themselves disavowed the whole doctrine of species, but maintained that it received no countenance from the authority of Aristotle. This opinion is correct ; and I could easily prove to you, had we time, that there is nothing in the metaphorical expressions of sidog and rvTtog, which, on one or two occasions, he cursorily uses, to warrant the attribution to him of the doc- trine of his disciples. This is even expressly maintained by several of his Greek commentators, — as the Aphrodisian, VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. 285 Michael Ephesius, and Philoponus. In fact, Aristotle appears to have held the same doctrine in regard to perception as Reid himself. lie was a Natural Kealist. Reid gives no account of the famous doctrine of Perception held by Epicurus, and which that philosopher had borrowed from Democritus, — namely, that the eidcola, djtooooiai, imag- ines, simulacra rerum, etc., are like pellicles continually flying off from objects ; and that these material likenesses, diffusing themselves everywhere in the air, are propagated to the per- ceptive organs. In the words of Lucretius, — " Qii93, quasi membranai, summo de cortice rerum DereptaB, volitant iiltro citroqae per auras." The Cartesian doctrine. — Reid's statement of the Cartesian doctrine of perception is not exempt from serious error. After giving a long, and not very accurate, account of the philosophy of Descartes in general, he proceeds : — " There are two points, in particular, wherein I cannot recon- cile him to himself: the first, regarding the place of the ideas or images of external objects, which are the immediate objects of perception ; the second, with regard to the veracity of our external senses. " As to the first, he sometimes places the ideas of material objects in the brain, not only when they are perceived, but when they are remembered or imagined ; and this has always been held to be the Cartesian doctrine ; yet he sometimes says, that we are not to conceive the images or traces in the brain to be perceived, as if there were eyes in the brain ; these traces are only occasions on which, by the laws of the union of soul and body, ideas are excited in the mind ; and, therefore, it is not necessary that there should be an exact resemblance between the traces and the things represented by them, any more than that words or signs should be exactly like the things signified by them. " These two opinions, I think, cannot be reconciled. For, if the images or traces in the brain are perceived, they must be the objects of perception, and not the occasions of it only. On 286 VARIOUS THEOKIES OF PERCEPTION. the other hand^ if they are only the occasions of our perceiving, they are not perceived at aU. Descartes seems to have hesi- tated between the two opinions, or to have passed from the one to the other." Reid's principal error consists in charging Descartes with vacillation and inconsistency, and in possibly attributing to him the opinion that the representative object, of which the mind is conscious ' in perception, is something material, — something in the brain. This arose from his ignorance of the fundamental principle of the Cartesian doctrine. By those not possessed of the key to the Cartesian theory, there are many passages in the writings of its author which, taken by themselves, might natu- rally be construed to import, that Descartes supposed the mind to be conscious of certain motions in the brain, to which, as well as to the modifications of the intellect itself, he applies the terms image and idea, Reid, who did not understand the Cartesian philosophy as a system, was puzzled by these superficial ambi- guities. Not aware that the cardinal point of that system is, that mind and body, as essentially opposed, are naturally to each other as zero ; and that their mutual intercourse can, therefore, only be supernaturally maintained by the concourse of the Deity, Reid was led into the error of attributing, by possibility, to Descartes, the opinion that the soul was immediately cogni- zant of material images in the brain. But in the Cartesian theory, mind is only conscious of itself; the affections of body may, by the law of union, be proximately the occasions, but can never constitute the immediate objects, of knowledge. Reid, however, supposing that nothing could obtain the name of image^ which did not represent a prototype, or the name of idea, which was not an object of thought, wholly misinterpreted Descartes, , who applies, abusively indeed, these terms to the occasion of perception, that is, the motion in the sensorium, unknown in itself and representing nothing ; as well as to the object of thought, that is, th^ representation of which we are conscious in the mind itself. In the Leibnitzo-Wolfian system, two ele- ments, both also denominated ideas, are in like manner accu- rately to be contradistinguished in the process of perception. VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. ^ 287 The idea in the brain, and the idea in the mind, are, to Des- cartes, precisely what the " material idea " and the " sensual idea " are to the Wolfians. In both philosophies, the two ideas are harmonic modifications, correlative and coexistent ; but in neither is the organic aiFection or sen-^orial idea an object of consciousness. It is merely the unknown and arbitrary condi- tion of the mental representation ; and in the hypothesis, both of Assistance and of Preestablished Harmony, the presence of the one idea implies the concomitance of the other, only by vir- tue of the hyperphysical determination. Reid confused in his account of Arnauld, — In treating of Arnauld's opinion, we see the confusion arising from Reid's not distinctly apprehending the two forms of the representative hy- pothesis. Arnauld held, and was the first of the philosophers noticed by E-eid or Brown who clearly held, the simpler of these forms. Now, in his statement of Arnauld's doctrine, Heid was perplexed, — was puzzled. As opposing the philosophers who maintained the more complex doctrine of representation, Ar- nauld seemed to Keid to coincide in opinion with himself; but yet, though he never rightly understood the simpler doctrine of representation, he still feels that Arnauld did not hold with him an intuitive perception. Dr. Brown is, therefore, wrong in as- serting that Reid admits Arnauld' s opinion on perception and his own to be identical. It cannot be maintained, that Reid admits a philosopher to hold an t)pinion convertible with his own, whom he states to "profess the doctrine, universally received, that we perceive not material things immediately, — that it is their ideas that are the immediate objects of our thoughts, — and that it is in the idea of every thing that we perceive its properties." This fun- damental contrast being established, we may safely allow that the original misconception, which caused Reid to overlook the difference of our intuitive and representative faculties, caused him, likewise, to believe that Arnauld had attempted to unite two contradictory theories of perception. Not aware that it wag possible to maintain a doctrine of perception in which the idea was not really distinguished from its cognition, and yet to hold 288 VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. that the mind had no immediate knowledo-e of external thinjrs*. Reid supposes, in the first place, that Arnauld, in rejecting the hypothesis of ideas, as representative existences really distinct from the contemplative act of perception, coincided with him in \^iewing the material reality as the immediate object of that act; and, in the second, that Arnauld again deserted this opinion, when, with the philosophers, he maintained that the idea, or act of the mind representing the external reality, and not the external reality itself, was the immediate object of per- ception. Arnauld's theory is one and indivisible ; and, as such, no part of it is identical with Reid's. Reid's confusion, here as elsewhere, is explained by the circumstance, that he had never speculatively conceived the possibility of the simplest modifica- tion of the representative hypothesis. He saw no medium between rejecting ideas as something different from thought, and his own doctrine of an immediate knowledge of the mate- rial object. Neither does Arnauld, as Reid supposes, ever assert against Malebranche, " that we perceive external things imme- diately," that is, in themselves : maintaining that all our per- ceptions are modifications essentially representative, he every- where avows, that he denies ideas only as existences distinct from the act itself of perception. Reid was, therefore, wrong, and did Arnauld less than jus- tice, in viewing his theory " as a weak attempt to reconcile two inconsistent doctrines : " he was wrong, and did Arnauld more than justice, in supposing that one of these doctrines was not incompatible with his own. The detection, however, of this error only tends to manifest more clearly, how just, even when under its influence, was Reid's appreciation of the contrast siib- Bisting between his own and Arnauld's opinion, considered as a whole ; and exposes more glaringly Brown's general misconcep- tion of Reid's philosophy, and his present gross misrepresenta- tion, in afiirming that the doctrines of the two philosophers were identical, and by Reid admitted to be the same. Reid on Locke, — Locke is the philosopher next in order, and it is principally against Reid's statement of the Lockian doc- trine of ideas, that the most vociferous clamor has been raised, VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION". 289 by those who deny that the cruder form of the representative hypothesis was the one prevalent among philosophers, after the decline of the Scholastic theor.y of species ; and who do not see that, though Reid's refutation, from the cause I have already noticed, was ostensibly directed only against that cruder form, it was virtually and in effect levelled against the doctrine of a representative perception altogether. Even supposing that Kcid was wrong in attributing this particular modification of the representative hypothesis to Locke, and the philosophers in general, — this would be a trivial error, provided it can be shown that he was opposed to every* doctrine of perception, except that founded on the fact of the duality of consciousness. But let us consider whether Reid be really in error when he attributes to Locke the opinion in question. Both Priestley and Brown strenuously contend against Reid's interpretation of the doctrine of Locke, who states it as that philosopher's opin- ion, "that images of external objects were conveyed to the brain ; but whether he thought with [Dr. Clarke] and New- ton, that the images in the brain are perceived by the mind, there present, or that they are imprinted on the mind itself, is not so evident." This, Brown, Priestley, and others pronounce a flagrant mis- representation. Not only does Brown maintain that Locke never conceived the idea to be substantially different from the mind, as a material image of the brain ; but that he never sup- posed it to have an existence apart from the mental energy of which it is the object. Locke, he asserts, like Arnauld, consid- ered the idea perceived and the percipient act to constitute the same indivisible modification of the conscious mind. This we shall consider. In his language, Locke is, of all philosophers, the most figura- tive, ambiguous, vacillating, various, and even contradictory ; as has been noticed by Reid and Stewart, and Brown himself, — indeed, we believe, by every philosopher who has had occasion to animadvert on Locke. The opinions of such a writer are not, therefore, to be assumed from isolated and casual expres- sions, which themselves require to be interpreted on the general 25 290 VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. analogy of the system ; and yet tliis is the only ground on which Dr. Brown attempts to establish his conclusions. Thus, on the matter under discussion, though really distinguishing, Locke verbally confounds, the objects of sense and of pure intellect, the operation and its object, the objects immediate and mediate, the object and its relations, the images of fancy and the notions of the understanding. Consciousness is converted with Per- ception ; Perception with Idea ; Idea wdth the object of Per- ception, and with Notion, Conception, Phantasm, Representation, Sense, Meaning, etc. Now, his language identifying ideas and perceptions, appears conformable to a disciple of Arnauld ; and now it proclaims him a follower of Democritus and Digby, — explaining ideas by mechanical impulse and the propagation of material particles from the external reality to the brain. In one passage, the idea would seem an organic affection, — the mere occasion of a spiritual representation ; in another, a rep- resentative image, in the brain itself. In employing thus indif- ferently the language of every hypothesis, may we not suspect that he was anxious to be made responsible for none ? One, however, he has formally rejected, and that is the very opinion attributed to him by -Dr. Brown, — that the idea, or object of consciousness » in perception, is only a modijfication of the mind itself. I do not deny that Locke occasionally employs expressions, which, in a wa*iter of more considerate language, would imply the identity of ideas with the act of knowledge ; and, under the circumstances, I should have considered suspense more rational than a dogmatic confidence in any conclusion, did not the follow- ing passage, which hats never, I believe, been noticed, afford a positive and explicit contradiction of Dr. Brown's interpreta- tion. It is from Locke's Examination of Malehranche's Opin- ion^ which, as subsequent to the publication of the Essay^ must be held decisive in relation to the doctrines of that work. At the same time, the statement is articulate and precise, and pos- sesses all the authority, of one cautiously emitted in the course of a polemical discussion. Malebranche coincided with Arnauld, Eleid, and recent philosophers in general, and consequently with VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. 2ljl Locke, as interpreted hj Brown, to the extent of supposing that sensation proper is nothing but a state or niodification of the mind itself; and Locke had thus the 0[)portunity of expressing^ in regard to this opinion, his agreement or dissent. An acqui- escence in the doctrine, that the secondary (qualities, of which we are conscious in sensation, are merely mental states, by no means involves an admission that the primary qualities, of which we are conscious in perception, are nothing more. Malebranche, for example, affirms the one and denies the other. But if Locke be found to ridicule, as he does, even the opinion which merely reduces the secondary qualities to mental states, a fortiori, and this on the principle of his own philosophy, he must be held to reject the doctrine, which would reduce not only the non -resem- bling sensations of the secondary, but even the resembling, and consequently extended, ideas of the primary, qualities of matter to modifications of the immaterial unextended mind. In these circumstances, the following passage is superfluously conclusive against Brown ; and equally so whether we coincide or not in all the doctrines it involves. " But to examine their doctrine of ynodijication a little further. — Different sentiments (sensations) are dilferent modifications of the mind. The mind, or soul, thai perceives, is one immaterial indivisible substance. Now I see the white and black on this paper ; I hear one singing in the next room ; I feel the w^armth of the fire I sit by ; and I taste an apple I am eating, and all this at the same time. Now, I ask, take modification for what you please, can the same unex- tended indivisible substance have different, nay, inconsistent and opposite (as these of white and black must be) modifications at the same time ? Or must we suppose distinct parts in an indi- visible substance, one for black, another for white, and another for red ideas, and so of the rest of those infinite sensations, which we have in sorts and degrees ; all which we can dis- tinctly perceive, and so are distinct ideas, some whereof are opposite, as heat and cold, which yet a man may fe^l at the same time ? I was ignorant before, how sensaf ion was per+brmed in us : this they call an explanation of it ! Must I say ni>AV I understand it better ? If this be to cure one^s ignorance, it is a 21/2 TAEIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTIOl^. very slight disease, and the charm of two or three insignificant words will at any time remove it ; prohatum est,^^ But if it be thus evident that Locke held neither the third form of representation, that lent to him by Brown, nor even the second ; it follows that Reid did him any thing but injustice, in supposing him to maintain that ideas are objects, either in the brain, or in the mind itself. Even the more material of these alternatives has been the one generally attributed to him by his critics, and the one adopted from him by his disciples. Nor is this to be deemed an opinion too monstrous to be entertained by so enlightened a philosopher. It was the common opinion of the age ; the opinion, in particular, held by the most illustrious I philosophers, his countrymen and contemporaries, — by Newton, Clarke, Willis, Hook, etc. Held and Brown on Hohhes, — To adduce Hobbes as an in- stance of Reid's misrepresentation of the " common doctrine of ideas," betrays, on the part of Brown, a total misapprehension of the conditions of the question ; or he forgets that Hobbes was a materialist. The doctrine of representation, under all its modifications, is properly subordinate to the doctrine of a spir- itual principle of thought ; and on the supposition, all but uni- versally admitted among philosophers, that the relation of knowledge implied the analogy of existence, it was mainly devised to explain the possibility of a knowledge by an imma- terial subject, of an existence so disproportioned to its nature, as the qualities of a material object. Contending, that an im- mediate cognition of the accidents of matter, infers an essential identity of matter and mind. Brown himself admits, that the hypothesis of representation belongs exclusively to the doctrine of dualism ; whilst Reid, assailing the hypothesis of ideas only as subverting the reality of matter, could hardly regard it as parcel of that scheme, which acknowledges the reality of noth- ing else. But though Hobbes cannot be adduced as a competent witness against Reid, he is, however, valid evidence against Brown. Hobbes, though a materialist, admitted no knowledge of an external world. Like his friend Sorbiere, he was a kind ctf Material Idealist. According to him, we know nothing of ARmtJ» THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. 2V3 the qualities or existence of any outward reality. All that we know is the " seeming," the " apparition," the " aspect," the " phaenomenon," the " phantasm," within ourselves ; and this subjective object, of which we are conscious, and which is con- sciousness itself, is nothing more than the " agitation " of our internal organism, determined by the unknown "motions," which are supposed, in like manner, to constitute the world v/ithout. Perception he reduces to Sensation. Memory and Imagination are faculties specifically identical with Sense, dif- fering from it simply in the degree of their vivacity ; and this difference of intensity, with Hobbes as with Hume, is the only discrimination between our dreaming and our waking thoughts. — A, doctrine of perception identical with Reid's ! Le Clerc and Crousaz, — Dr. Brown at length proceeds to consummate his victory, by "that most decisive evidence, found not in treatises read only by a few, but in the popular elemen- tary works of science of the time, the general text-books of schools and colleges." He quotes however, only two, — the Pneumatology of Le Clerc, and the Logic of Crousaz. " Le Clerc," says Dr. Brown, " in his chapter on the nature of ideas, gives the history of the opinions of philosophers on this subject, and states among them the very doctrine which is most forcibly and accurately opposed to the ideal system of percep- tion. [" Others suppose," says Le Clerc, " that an idea and the perception of an idea are the same thing, though they differ in their relations. The idea, as they think, is properly referred to the object which the mind considers, while the perception is re- ferred to the mind itself which perceives ; but this twofold rela- tion belongs to one and the same modification of mind. Tliere- fore, according to these philosophers, there are not, properly speaking, any ideas distinct from the mind."] What is it, I may ask, which Dr. Reid considers himself as having added to this very philosophical view of perception? and if he added nothing, it is surely too much to ascribe to him the merit of detecting errors, the counter-statement of which had long formed a part of the elementary works of the schools." In the first place, Dr. Reid certainly " added " nothing " to 25* 294 VARIOUS THEORIES OF PERCEPTION. this very philosophical view of perception," but he exploded it altogether. In the second, it is false either that this doc- trine of perception " had long formed part of the elementary works of the schools," or that Le Clerc affords any countenance, to this assertion. On the contrary, it is virtually stated by him to be the novel paradox of a single philosopher ; nay, it is already, as such a singular opinion, discussed and referred to its author by Reid himself. Had Dr. Brown proceeded from the tenth paragraph, which he quotes, to the fourteenth, which he could not have read, he would have found that the passage extracted, so far from containing the statement of an old and familiar dogma in the schools, was neither more nor less than a statement of the contemporary hypothesis of Antony Ar^auld, and of Antony Arnauld alone. In the third place, from the mode in which he cites Le Clerc, his silence to the contrary, and the general tenor of his statement, Dr. Brown would lead us to believe that Le Clerc himself coincides in " this very phi- losophical view of perception." So far, however, from coin- ciding with Arnauld, he pronounces his opinion to be false ; controverts it upon very solid grounds ; and in delivering his own doctrine touching ideas, though sufficiently cautious in tell- ing us what they are, he ha& no hesitation in assuring us, among other things which they cannot be, that they are noc modifications or essential states of mind. [" The idea," says Le Clerc, " is not a modification, nor is it the essence, of the mind ; for, besides the fact that there is a great difference be- tween the perception of an idea and a sensation, what is there in the mind which is like a mountain, or many other ideas of this sort?"] Such is the judgment of that authority to which Dr. Brown appealed as the most decisive. In Crousaz, Dr. Brown has actually succeeded in finding one example (he might have found twenty) of a philosopher, before Reid, holding the same theory of id(^,as with Arnauld and him- J^.lf. CHAPTER XVII. THE PRESENTATIVE FACULTY. — PERCEPTION. -- WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST ? In the last chapter, I concluded the review of Reid's Histori- cal Account of the previous Opinions on Perception. In enter- ing upon tliis review, I proposed the following ends. In the first place, to afford you, not certainly a complete, but a compe- tent insight into the various theories on this subject ; and this was sufficiently accomplished by limiting myself to the opinions touched upon by Reid. My aim, in the second place, was to correct some errors of Reid arising from, and illustrative of, those fundamental misconceptions which have infected his whole doctrine of the cognitive faculties with confusion and error ; and, in the third place, I had in view to vindicate Reid from the attack made on him by Brown. Perception, as mat- ter of psychological consideration, is of the very highest impor- tance in philosophy ; as the doctrine in regard to the object and operation of this faculty affords the immediate data for determining the great question touching the existence or non- existence of an external world ; and there is hardly a problem of any moment in the whole compass of philosophy, of which it does not mediately affect the solution. The doctrine of per- ception may thus be viewed as a cardinal point of philosophy It is also exclusively in relation to this faculty, that Reid must claim his great, his distinguishing glory, as a philosopher ; and of this no one was more conscious than himself. "The merit,'* he says, in a letter to Dr. James Gregory, " of what you are pleased to call my philosophy, lies, I think, chiefly in having called in question the common theory of ideas or images oi (295) 296 WAS EEID A NATURAL REALIST? things in the mind being the only objects of thought — a theory founded on natural prejudices, and so universally received, as to be interwoven with the structure of language." " I think/' he adds, " there is hardly any thing that can be called science in the philosophy of the mind, which does not follow with ease from the detection of this prejudice." To enable you provisionally to understand Reid's errors, I showed you how, holding himself the doctrine of an intuitive or immediate perception of external things, he did not see that the' counter doctrine of a mediate or representative perception ad- mitted of a subdivision into two forms, — a simpler and a more complex. The simpler, that the immediate or representative object is a mere modification of the percipient mind, — the more complex, that this representative object is something dif- ferent both from the reality and from the mind. His ignorance of these two forms has caused him great confusion, and intro- duced much subordinate error into his system, as he has often confounded the simpler form of the representative hypothesis with the doctrine of an intuitive perception ; but if he be allowed to have held the essential doctrine of an immediate perception, his errors in regard to the various forms of the rep- resentative hypothesis must be viewed as accidental, and com- paratively unimportant. Brown's errors, on the contrary, are vital. In the first place, he is fundamentally wrong in holding, in the teeth of conscious- ness, that the mind is incapable of an immediate knowledge of aught but its own modes. He adopts the simpler form of a representative perception. In the second place, he is wrong in reversing Reid's whole doctrine, by attributing to him the same opinion, on this point, which he himself maintains. In the third place, he is wrong in thinking that Reid only attacked the more complex, and not the more dangerous, form of the representa- tive hypothesis, and did not attack the hypothesis of representa- tion altogether. In the fourth place, he is wrong in supposing that modern philosophers, in general, held the simpler for^a of the representative hypothesis, and that Reid was, ther* Tore, mistaken in supposing them to maintain the'' more comph . , — WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? 297 mistaken, in fact, in supposing them to maintain a doctrine dif- ferent from his own. Was Reid himself a Natural Realist f — But a more impor- tant historical question remains, and one which even more affects the reputations of Reid and Brown. It is this : — Did Heid, as Brown supposes, hold, not the doctrine of Natural Kealism, but the finer hypothesis of a Representative Percep- tion? If Reid did hold this doctrine, I admit at once that Brown is right. Reid accomplished nothing; his philosophy is a blun- der, and his whole polemic against the philosophers, too insig- nificant for refutation or comment. The one form of repre- sentation may be somewhat simpler and more philosophical than the other ; but the substitution of the former for the latter is hardly deserving of notice ; and of all conceivable hallucina- tions, the very greatest would be that of Reid, in arrogating to himself the merit of thus subverting the foundation of •Idealism and Scepticism, and of philosophers at large in acknowledging the pretension. The idealist and sceptic can establish their conclusions indifferently on either form of a representative per- ception ; nay, the simpler form affords a securer, as the more philosophical, foundation. The idealism of Fichte is accord- ingly a system far more firmly founded than the idealism of Berkeley ; and as the simpler involves a contradiction of con- sciousness more extensive and direct, so it furnishes to the sceptic a longer and more powerful lever. 2^he distinction of Intuitive and Representative Knowledge. — Before, however, discussing this question, it may be proper here to consider more particularly a matter of which we have hitherto treated only by the way, — I mean the distinction of Immediate or Intuitive, in contrast to Mediate or Representar tive, Knowledge. This is a distmction of the most important kind, and it is one which has, however, been almost wholly- overlooked by philosophers. This oversight is less to be won- dered at in those who allowed no immediate knowledge to the mind, except of its proper modes ; in their systems the distinc- tion, tliough it still subsisted, had Httle relevancy or effect, as it 298 INTUITIVE AND KEPRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. did not discriminate the faculty by which we are aware of the presence of external objects, from that by which, when absent, these are imaged to the mind. In neither case, on this doc- trine, are we conscious or immediately cognizant of the external reality, but only of the mental mode through which it is repre- sented. But it is more astonishing that those who maintain that the mind is immediately percipient of external things, should not have signalized this distinction ; as on it is estab- lished the essential difference of Perception as a faculty of Intuitive, Imagination as a faculty of Representative, knowledge. But the marvel is still more enhanced when we find that Reid and Stewart — (if to them this opinion really belongs), so far from distinguishing Perception as an immediate and intuitive, from Imagination (and under Imagination, be it observed, I include both the Conception and the Memory of these philoso- phers) as a mediate or representative, faculty, — in language make tliem both equally immediate. You will recollect the refutation I formerly gave you of Reid's self-contradictory asser- tion, that in Memory we are immediately cognizant of that which, as past, is not now existent, and cannot, therefore, be known in itself; and that, in Imagination, we are immediately cognizant of that which is distant, or of that which is not, and probably never was, in being. Here the term immediate is either absurd, as contradictory ; or it is applied only, in a cer- tain special meaning, to designate the simpler form of repre- sentation, in which nothing is supposed to intervene between the mental cognition and the external reality ; in contrast to the more complex, in which the representative or vicarious image is supposed to be something different from both. Thus^ in con- sequence of this distinction not only not having been traced by Reid as the discriminative principle of his doctrine, but having been even overlaid, obscured, and perplexed, his whole philoso- phy has been involved in haze and confusion ; insomuch that a philosopher of Brown's acuteness could (as we have seen and shall see) actually so far misconceive, as even to reverse its import. The distinction is, therefore, one which, on every ac- count, merits your most sedulous attention ; but though of I^^TUrnVE AND REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. 299 primary importance, it is fortunately not of any considerable difficulty. This disUnction stated and illustrated. — As every cognitive act which, in one relation, is a mediate or representative, is, in another, an immediate or intuitive, knowledge, let us take a particular instance of such an act ; as hereby we shall at once obtai;! an example of the one kind of knowledge, and of the other, and these also in proximate contrast to each other. I call up an image of the High Church [a Cathedral edifice in Edinburgh], Now, in this act, what do I know immediately or intuitively ; what mediately or by representation ? It is mani- fest that I am conscious, or immediately cognizant, of all that is known as an act or modification of my mind, and, consequently, of the modification or act which constitutes the mental image of the Cathedral. But as, in this operation, it is evident, that I am conscious, or immediately cognizant, of the Cathedral as imaged in my mind ; so it is equally manifest, that I am not conscious or immediately cognizant of the Cathedral as existing. But still I am said to know it; it is even called the object of my thought. I can, however, only know it mediately^ — only through the mental image which represents it to consciousness ; and it can only be styled the object of thought, inasmuch as a reference to it is necessarily involved in the act of representa- tion. From this example is manifest, what in general is meant by immediate or intuitive, — what, by mediate or representative knowledge. All philosophers are at one in regard to the imme- diate knowledge of our jyresent mental modijications ; and all are equally agreed, if we remove some verbal ambiguities, that we are only mediately cognizant of all past thoughts, objects, and events, and of every external reality not at the moment within the sphere of sense. There is but one point on which thty are now at variance, — namely, whether the thinking sub- ject is competent to an intuitive knowledge of aught but the modifications of the mental self; in other words, whether we can have any immediate perception of external things. Waiv- ing, however, this question for the moment, let us articulately state what are the different conditions involved in the two kinds of knowledge. 300 INTUITIVE AND REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. In the Jirst place, considered as acts. — An act of immediate knowledge is simple ; there is nothing beyond the mere con- sciousness, by that which know^s, of that which is known. Here consciousness is simply contemplative. On the contrary, an act of mediate knowledge is complex ; for the mind is not only con- scious of the act as its own modification, but of this modification as an object representatiye of, or relative to, an object beyond the sphere of consciousness. In this act, consciousness is both representative and contemplative of the representation. In the second place, in relation to their objects, — In an im- mediate cognition, the object is single, and the term unequivocal. Here, the object in consciousness and the object in existence are the same ; in the language of the Schools, the esse intentionale or representativum coincides with the esse entitativum. In a mediate cognition, on the other hand, the object is twofold, and the term equivocal ; the object known and representing being different from the object unknown, except as represented. The immediate object, or object known in this act, should be called the subjective object, or subject-object, in contradistinction to the mediate or unknown object, which might be discriminated as the object-object. A slight acquaintance with philosophical writings will show you how necessary suck a distinction is ; the want of it has caused Reid to puzzle himself, and Kant to perplex his readers. In the third place, considered as judgments (for you will rec- ollect that every act of Consciousness involves an affirmation). — In an intuitive act, the object known is known as actually existing ; the cognition, therefore, is assertory, inasmuch as the reality of that, its object, is given unconditionally as a fact. In a representative act, on the contrary, the represented object is unknown as actually existing ; the cognition, therefore, is prob- lematical, the reality of the object represented being only given as a possibility, on the hypothesis of the object representing. In the fourth place, in relation to their sphere. — Representa- tive knowledge is exclusively subjective, for its immediate object is a mere mental modification, and its mediate object is unknown, except in .so far as that modification represents it. Int^ii!i>^« INTUITIVE AND REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. 301 knowledge, on the other hand, if consciousness is to be credited, is either subjective or objective, for its single object may be either a pliaenomenon of the ego or of the non-ego, — either mental or material. In \hejifth place, considered in reference to their perfection, — An intuitive cognition, as an act, is complete and absolute, as irrespective of aught beyond the dominion of consciousness ; whereas, a representative cognition, as an act, is incomplete, being relative to, and vicarious of, an existence beyond the sphere of' actual knowledge. The object likewise of the former is complete, being at once known and real; whereas, in the latter, the object known is ideal, the real object unknown. In their relations to each other, immediate knowledge is complete, as self-sufficient ; mediate knowledge, on the contrary, is incom- plete, as dependent on the other for its realization. [For the sake of distinctness, I shall state [over again and more fully] the different momenta of the distinction in separate Propositions ; and these for more convenient reference I shall number. 1. — A thing is known immediately or proximately, when we cognize it in itself; mediately or remotely, when we cognize it in or through something numerically different from itself Im- mediate cognition, thus the kno\vledge of a thing in itself, in- volves the fact of its existence ; mediate cognition, thus the knowledge of a thing in or through something not itself, involves only the possibility of its existence. 2. — An immediate cognition, inasmuch as the thing known is itself presented to observation, may be called a presentative ; and inasmuch as the thing presented is, as it were, viewed by the mind face to face, may be called an intuitive cognition. — A mediate cognition, inasmuch as the thing known is held up or mirrored to the mind in a vicarious representation, may be called a representative cognition. 3. — A thijig known is called an object of knowledge. 4. — In a presentative or immediate cognition there is one sole object ; the thing (immediately) known and the thing existin|; being one and tlie same. — In a representative or mediate co^ 26 302 INTUITIVE AND REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. iiiLion there may be discriminated two objects ; the thing (imme- diately) known and the thing existing being numerically dif- ferent. 5. — A thing known in itself is the (sole) presentative or intuitive object of knowledge, or the (sole) object of a 'presenta- tive or intuitive knowledge, — A thing known in and through something else is the primary^ mediate^ remote^ real, existent, or represented, object of (mediate) knowledge, objectum quod ; and a thing through which something else is known is the secondary, immediate, proximate, ideal, vicarious, or representafive, object of (mediate) knowledge, — objectum quo or per quod. The for- mer may likewise be styled objectum entitativum. 6. — If the representative object be supposed (according to one theory) a mode of the conscious mind or self, it may be distinguished as Egoistical ; if it be supposed (according to another) something numerically different from the conscious mind or self, it may be distinguished as Non-Egoistical, The former theory supposes two things numerically different: 1°, the object represented, — 2°, the representing and cognizant mind : — the latter, three ; 1°, the object represented, — 2°, the object representing, — 3°, the cognizant mind. Compared merely with each other, the former, as simpler, may, by contrast to the latter, be considered, but still inaccurately, as an imme- diate cognition. The latter of these, as limited in its application to certain faculties, and now in fact wholly exploded, may be thrown out of account. 7. — External Perception, or Perception simply, is the faculty presentative or intuitive of the phenomena of the Non-Ego or ^ The distinction of proximate and remote object is sometimes applied to perception in a different manner. Thus Color (the white of the wall for instance) is said to be i\\Q proximate object of vision, because it is seen im- mediately; the colored thing (the wall itself for instance) is said to be the remote object of vision, because it is seen only through the mediation of the color. This however is inaccurate. For the wall, that in which the color inheres, however mediately known, is never mediately seen. It is not indeed an object of perception at all ; it is only the subject of such an object, and is reached by a cognitive process, different from the merely perceptive. INTUITIVE AND REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLEDGE. 303 matter — if there be any intuitive apprehension allowed of* the Non-p]go at all. Internal Perception or Self-consciousness is the faculty presentative or intuitive of the phenomena of the Ego or mind. 8. — Imagination or Phantasy, in its most extensive meaning, is the faculty representative of the phenomena both of the ex- ternal and internal worlds. 9. — A representation considered as an object is logically, not really, different from a representation considered as an act Here, object and act are merely the same indivisible mode of mind viewed in two different relations. Considered by refer- ence to a (mediate) object represented, it is a representative object ; considered by reference to the mind representing and contemplating the representation, it is a representative act. A representative object being viewed as posterior in the order of nature, but not of time, to the representative act, is viewed as a product; and the representative act being viewed as prior in the order of nature, though not of time, to the representative object, is viewed as a producing process. The same may be said of Imao:e and Imao-ination. 10. — A thing to be known in itself must be known as act- ually existing, and it cannot be known as actually existing unless it be known as existing in its When and its Where, But the When and Where of an object are immediately cognizable by the subject, only if the When be now (i, e, at the same moment with the cognitive act), and the Where be here (^. e. within the sphere of the cognitive faculty) ; therefore a presentative or intuitive knowledge is only competent of an object present to the mind, both in time and in space. 1 1 . — E converso — whatever is known, but not as actually existing now and here, is known not in itself, as the presentative object of an intuitive, but only as the remote object of a repre- sentative, cognition. 12. — A representative object, considered irrespectively of what it represents, and simply as a mode of the conscious sub- ject, is an intuitive or presentative object. For it is known in itself, as a mental mode, actually existing now and here. J04 FN" TUITIVE A^TD REPRESENTATIVE KiN'OWLEDGE. 13. — The ac t^ual modl^csitions — the present acts and affections of the £lgo, are objects of immediate cognition, as themselves objects of consciousness. The past and possible modifications of the Ego are objects of mediate cognition, as represented tc consciousness in a present or actual modification. 14. — As not now present ih time^ an immediate knowledge of the past is impossible. The past is only immediately cogni- zable in and through a present modification relative to, and representative of, it as having been. To speak of an immediate knowledge of the past involves a contradiction in adjecto. For to know the past immediately, it must be known in itself ; — and to be known in itself, it must be known as now existing. But the past is just a negation of the now existent : its very notion, therefore, excludes the possibility of its being imme- diately known. So much for Memory, or Recollective Imagi- nation. 15.- — In like manner, supposing that a knowledge of the future were competent, this can only be conceived possible in and through a now present representation ; that is, only as a mediate cognition. For, as not yet existent, the future cannot be known in itself, or as actually existent. As not here present, an immediate knowledge of an object distant in space is like- wise impossible. For, as beyond the sphere of our organs and faculties, it cannot be known by them in itself; it can only, therefore, if known at all, be known through something diflferent from itself, — that is mediately, in a reproductive or a construc- tive act of imagination. 16. — A possible object — an ens rationis — is a mere fabri- cation of the mind itself; it exists only ideally in and through an act of imagination, and has only a logical existence, apart from that act with which it is really identical. It is therefore an intuitive object in itself; but in so far as, not involving a contradiction, it is conceived as prefiguring something which may possibly exist some-where and some-when — this something, too, being constructed out of elements which had been previ- ously given in Presentation — it is Representative.] — JDiss. iupp, to Held. WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? 305 Such are the two kinds of knowledge, which it is necessary to distinguish, and such are the principal contrasts they present. I said a little ago that this distinction, so far from being signal- ized, had been almost abolished by philosophers. I ought, how ever, to have excepted certain of the Schoolmen, by whom this discrimination was not only taken, but admirably applied ; and though I did not originally borrow it from them, I was happy tc find that what I had thought out for myself, was confirmed by the authority of these subtle spirits. The names given in the Schools to the immediate and mediate cognitions were intuitive and abstractive^ meaning by the latter term not merely what we, with them, call abstract knowledge, but also the representations of concrete objects in the imagination or memory. Order of the discussion. — Having now prepared you for the question concerning Reid, I shall proceed to its consideration ; and shall, in the first place, state the arguments that may be adduced in favor of the opinion, that Reid did not assert a doc- trine of Natural Realism, — did not accept the fact of the dual- ity of consciousness in its genuine integrity, but only deluded himself with the belief that he was originating a new or an impor- tant opinion, by the adoption of the simpler form of Represen- tation ; and, in the second place, state the arguments that may be alleged in support of the opposite conclusion, that his doctrine is in truth the simple doctrine of Natural Realism. Brown's interpretation of Reid^s doctrine refuted. — But be- fore proceeding to state the grounds on which alone I conceive any presumption can be founded, that Reid is not a Natural Realist, but, like Brown, a Cosmothetic Idealist, I shall state and refute the only attempt made by Brown to support this, his interpretation of Reid's fundamental doctrine. Brown's inter- pretation of Reid seems, in fact, not grounded on any thing which he found in Reid, but simply on his own assumption of what Reid's opinion must be. For, marvellous as it may sound, Brown hardly seems to have contemplated the possibility of an immediate knowledge of any thing beyond the sphere of self; ' and I should say, without qualification, that he had never at all imagined this possibility, were it not for the single attempt h^ 26* 306 WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? makes at a proof of the. impossibility of Reid holding such an opinion, when on one occasion Reid's language seems for a mo- ment to have actually suggested to him the question : Might that philosopher not perhaps regard the external object as iden- tical with the immediate object in perception? Now the sum and substance of [Brown's] reasoning is, as far as I can comprehend it, to the following effect : — To assert an immediate perception of material qualities, is to assert an identity of matter and mind; for that which is immediately known must be the same in nature as that which immediately knows. But Reid was not a materialist, was a sturdy spiritualist; therefore he could not really maintain an immediate perception of the qualities of matter. The whole validity of this argument consists in the truth of the major proposition (for the minor proposition, that Reid was not a materialist, is certain), — To assert an immediate percep- tion of material qualities, is to assert an identity of matter and mind ; for that which is immediately known must be the same in essence as that which immediately knows. Now, in support of the proposition which constitutes the foundation of his argument, Brown offers no proof. He as- sumes it as an axiom. But so far from his being entitled to do so, by its being too evident to fear denial, it is, on the contrary, not only not obtrusively true, but, when examined, precisely the reverse of truth. In the Ji7^st place, if we appeal to the only possible arbiter in the case, — the authority of consciousness, — we find that con- sciousness gives as an ultimate fact, in the unity of knowledge, the duality of existence ; that is, it assures us that, in the act of perception, the percipient subject is at once conscious of some- thing which it distinguishes as a modification of self, and of something which it distinguishes as a modification of not-self. Reid, therefore, as a dualist, and a dualist founding not on the hypotheses of philosophers, but on the data of consciousness, might safely maintain the fact of our immediate perception of external objects, without fear of involving himself in an asser- t?on of the identity of mind and matter. WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? 307 But, in the second place, if Reid did not maintain this imme- diacy of perception, and assert the veracity of consciousness, he would at once be forced to admit one or other of the unitarian conclusions of materialism or idealism. Our knowledge of mind and matter, as substances, is merely relative ; they are known to us only in their qualities ; and we can justify the pos- tulation of two different substances, exclusively on the supposi- tion of the incompatibility of the double series of ph^enomena to coinhere in one. Is this supposition disproved ? — The pre- sumption against dualism is again decisive. Entities are not to be multiplied without necessity ; a plurality of principles is not to be assumed, where the phaenomena can be explained by one. In Brown's theory of perception, he abolishes the incompati- bility of the two series ; and yet his argument, as a dualist, for an immaterial principle of thought, proceeds on the ground that this incompatibility subsists. This philosopher denies us an immediate knowledge of aught beyond the accidents of mind. The accidents which we refer to body, as known to us, are only states or modifications of the percipient subject itself; in other words, the qualities we call material^ are known by us to exist, only as they are known by us to inhere in the same substance as the qualities we denominate mental. There is an apparent antithesis, but a real identity. On this doctrine, the hypothesis of a double principle, losing its necessity, becomes philosophi- cally absurd ; on the law of parcimony, a psychological unita- rianism is established. To the argument, that the qualities of the object, are so repugnant to the qualities of the subject, of perception, that they cannot be supposed the accidents of the same substance, the unitarian — whether materialist, ideahst, or absolutist — has only to reply : — that so far from the attri- butes of the"bbject being exclusive of the attributes of the sub- ject, in this act, the hypothetical duahst himself estabhshes, as the fundamental axiom of his philosophy of mind, that the object known is universally identical with the subject knowing. The materialist may now derive the subject from the object, the idealist derive the object from the subject, the absolutist subli- mate both into indifference, nay, the nihilist subvert the sub- 308 WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? stantial reality of either ; — the hypothetical realist, so far from being able to resist the conclusion of any, in fact accords their assumptive premises to all. So far, therefore, is Brown's argument from inferring the con* elusion, that Reid could not have maintained our immediate perception of external objects, that not only is its inference ex- pressly denied by Reid, but if properly applied, it would prove the very converse of what Brown employs it to establish. Second reason for supposing that Reid was not a Natural Realist, — But there is a ground considerably stronger than that on which Brown has attempted to evince the identity of Reid's opinion on perception with his own. This ground is his equalizing Perception and Imagination, (Under Imagination, you will again observe that I include Reid's Conception and Memory.) Other philosophers brought perception into unison with imagination, by making perception a faculty of mediate knowledge. Reid, on the contrary, has brought imagination into unison wicli perception, by calling imagination a faculty of immediate knowledge. Now, as it is manifest that, in an act of imagination, the object-object is and can possibly be known only, mediately, through a representation, it follows that we must perforce adopt one of two alternatives ; — we may either suppose that Reid means by immediate knowledge only that simpler form of representation from which the idea or tertium quid^ intermediate between the external reahty and the con- scious mind, is thrown out, or that, in his extreme horror of the hypothesis of ideas, he has altogether overlooked the fundamen- tal distinction of mediate and immediate cognition, by which the faculties of perception and imagination are discriminated ; and that thus his very anxiety to separate more widely his own doctrine of intuition from the representative hypothesis of the philosophers, has, in fact, caused him almost inextricably .to confound the two opinions. Positive evidence that Reid held Natural Realism, — That this latter alternative is greatly the more probable, I shall now proceed to show you ; and in doing this, I beg you to keep in mind the necessary contrasts by which an immediate or intui- WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? 30f* tive is opposed to a mediate or representative cognition. The> question to be solved is, — Does Reid hold that in perception we immediately know the external reality, in its own qualities, as existing ; or only mediately know them, through a represen- tative modification of the mind itself ? In the following proof, I select only a few out of a great number of passages which might be adduced from the writings of Reid, in support of the same conclusions. I am, however, confident that they are suffi- cient ; and quotations longer or more numerous would tend rather to obscure than to illustrate. The conditions of Immediate Knowledge^ applied to Reid's statements, — In the first place, knowledge and existence are then only convertible when the reality is known in itself; for then only can we say, that it is known because it exists, and exists since it is known. And this constitutes an immediate or intuitive cognition, rigorously so called. Nor did Reid contem- plate any other. " It seems admitted," he says, " as a first principle, by the learned and the unlearned, that what is really perceived must exist, and that to perceive what does not exist is impossible. So far the unlearned man and the philosopher agree." In. the second place, philosophers agree, that the idea or rep- resentative object^ in their theory^ is, in the strictest sense, imme- diately perceived. And so Reid understands them. " I per- ceive not, says the Cartesian, the external object itself (so far he agrees with the Peripatetic, and differs from the unlearned man) ; but I perceive an image, or form, or idea, in my own mind, or in my brain. I am certain of the existence of the idea, because I immediately perceive it." In the third place, philosophers concur in acknowledging that mankind at large believe that the external reality itself con- stitutes the immediate and only object of perception. So also Reid : " On the same principle, the unlearned man says, I per- ceive the external object, and I perceive it to exist." — " The vulgar, undoubtedly, beUeve that it is the external object which we immediately perceive, and not a representative image of it only. It is for this reason that they look upon it as perfect 310 WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? lunacy to. call in question tlie existence of external objects." — • "The vulgar are firmly persuaded that the very identical objects which they perceive, continue to exist when they do not perceive them : and are no less firmly persuaded, that when ten men look at the sun or the moon they all see the same indi- vidual object." Speaking of Berkeley, — " The vulgar opinion he reduces to this, that the very things which we perceive by our senses do really exist. This he grants." — " It is, there- fore, acknowledged by this philosopher to be a natural instinct or prepossession, a universal and primary opinion of all men, that the objects which we immediately perceive by our senses are not images in our minds, but external objects, and that their existence is independent of us and our perception." In the fourth place, all philosophers agree that consciousness has an immediate knowledge^ and affords an absolute certainty of the reality^ of its object. Reid, as we have seen, limits the name of consciousness to self-consciousness, that is, to the im- mediate knowledge we possess of the modifications of self; whereas, he makes perception the faculty by which we are immediately cognizant of the qualities of the not-self. In these circumstances, if Keid either, 1°, Maintain, that his immediate perception of external things is convertible, with their reality ; or, 2°, Assert, that, in his doctrine of perception, the external reality stands to the percipient mind face to face, in the same immediacy of relation which the idea holds in the representative theory of the philosophers ; or, 3°, Declare the identity of his own opinion with the vulgar belief, as thus ex- pounded by himself and the philosophers ; or, 4°, Declare, that his Perception affords us equal evidence of the existence of external phaenomena, as his Consciousness affords us of the existence of internal ; — in all and each of these suppositions, he would unambiguously declare himself a Natural Realist, and evince that his doctrine of perception is one not of a mediate or representative, but of an immediate or intuitive knowledge. Ajid he does all four. The first and second, — " We have before examined the reasons given by philosophers to prove that ideas, and not ex- WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? 311 ternal objects, are the immediate objects of perception We shall only here observe, that if external objects be perceived immediately " [and he had just before asserted for the hun- dredth time that they were so perceived], " we have the same reason to believe their existence, as philosophers have to believe the existence of ideas, while they hold them to be the imme- diate objects of perception." 77i€ third, — Speaking of the perception of the external world, — " We have here a remarkable conflict between two contradictory opinions, wherein all mankind are engaged. On the one side, stand all the vulgar, who are unpractised in phil- osophical researches, and guided by the uncorrupted primary instincts of nature. On the other side, stand all the philoso- phers, ancient and modern ; every man, without exception, who reflects. In this division, to my great humiliation, I find my- self classed with the vulgar." The fourth, — " Philosophers sometimes say that we perceive ideas, — sometimes that we are conscious of them. I can have no doubt of the existence of any thing which I either perceive, or of which I am conscious ; but I cannot find that I either per- ceive ideas or am conscious of them." General conclusion and caution, — On these grounds, there- fore, I am confident that Reid's doctrine of Perception must be pronounced a doctrine of Intuition, and not of Kepresentation ; and though, as I have shown you, there are certainly some plausible arguments which might be alleged in support of the opposite conclusion; still, these are greatly overbalanced by stronger positive proofs, and by the general analogy of his phi- losophy. And here I would impress upon you an important lesson. That Keid, a distinguished philosopher, and even the founder of an illustrious school, could be so greatly miscon- ceived, as that an eminent disciple of that school itself should actually reverse the iundamental principle of his doctrine, — this may excite your wonder, but it ought not to move you to disparage either the talent of the philosopher misconceived, or of the philosopher misconceiving. It ought, however, to prove to you the permanent importance, not only in speculation, but •312 WAS REID A NATURAL REALIST? in practice, of precise thinking. You ought never to rest con- tent, so long as there is aught vague or indefinite in your rea- sonings, — so long as you have not analyzed every notion into its elements, and excluded the possibility of all lurking ambigu- ity in your expressions. One great, perhaps the one greatest advantage, resulting from the cultivation of Philosophy, is the habit it induces of vigorous thought ; that is, of allowing nothing to pass without a searching examination, either in your own speculations, or in those of others. We may never, perhaps, arrive at truth, but we can always avoid self-contradiction. CHAPTER XVIII. THE PRESENT ATIVE FACULTY. — THE DISTINCTION OF PER- CEPTION PROPER FROM SENSATION PROPER. — PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES. Of the doctrine of an intuitive perception of external ob- jects, — which, as a fact of consciousness, ought to be uncon- ditionally admitted, — Reid has the merit, in these latter times, of being the first champion. I have already noticed that, among the Scholastic philosophers, there were some who maintained the same doctrine, and with far greater clearness and comprehen- sion than Reid. These opinions are, however, even at this moment, I may. say, wholly unknown ; and it would be ridicu- lous to suppose that their speculations had exerted any influence, direct or indirect, upon a thinker so imperfectly acquainted with what had been done by previous philosophers, as Reid. Since the Revival of Letters, I have met with only two, anterior to Reid, whose doctrine on the present question -coincided with his. One of these [John Sergeant] may, indeed, be discounted ; for he has stated his opinions in so paradoxical a manner, that his authority is hardly worthy of notice. The other, [Peter Poire t,] who flourished about a century before Reid, has, on the con- trary, stated the doctrine of an intuitive, and refuted the coun- ter hypothesis of a representative, perception, with a brevity, perspicuity, and precision far superior to the Scottish philoso- pher. Both of these authors, I may say, are at present wholly unknown. Having concluded the argument by which I endeavored to satisfy you that Reid's doctrine is Natural Realism, I should now proceed to show that Natural Realism is a more philosoph- 27 (313) 814 PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. ical doctrine than Hypothetical Realism. Before, however, taking up the subject, I think it better to dispose of certain subordinate matters, with which ' it is proper to have some pre- paratory acquaintance. Of these the first is the distinction of Perception Proper from Sensation Proper. Use of the term Perception previously to Reid. — I have had occasion to mention, that the word Perception is, in the language of philosophers previous to R-eid, used in a very extensive sig nification. By Descartes, Malebranche, Locke, Leibnitz, and others, it is employed in a sense almost as unexclusive as Con- sciousness in its widest signification. By Reid, this word was limited to our faculty acquisitive of knowledge, and to that branch of this faculty whereby, through the senses, we obtain a knowledge of the external world. But his limitation did not stop here. In the act of external perception, he distinguished two elements, to which he gave the names of Perception and Sensation. He ought, perhaps, to have called these perception proper and sensation proper^ when employed in his special meaning ; for, in the language of other philosophers, sensation was a term which included his Perception, and perception a term comprehensive of what he called Sensation. Reid's account of Perception, — There is a great want of precision in Reid's account of Perception and Sensation. Of Perception he says : " If, therefore, we attend to that act of our mind, which we call the perception of an external object of sense, we shall find in it these three things. First. Some conception or notion of the object perceived. Secondly, A strong and irresistible conviction and belief of its present exist- ence ; and. Thirdly, That this conviction and belief are immedi- ate, and not the effect of reasoning. " First, it is impossible to perceive an object without having some notion or conception of what we perceive. We may in- deed conceive an object which we do not perceive ; but when we perceive the object, we must have some conception of it at the same time ; and we have commonly a more clear and steady notion of the object while we perceive it, than we have from PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. 315 memory or imagination, when it is not perceived. Yet, even in perception, the notion which our senses give of the object may be more or less clear, more or less distinct in all possible de- grees." Now here you will observe that the " having a notion or con- ception," by which he explains the act of perception, might at first lead us to conclude that he held, as Brown supposes, the doctrine of a representative perception ; for notion and concep- tion are generally used by philosophers for a representation or mediate knowledge of a thing. But though Reid cannot escape censure for ambiguity and vagueness, it appears, from the anal- ogy of his writings, that by notion or conception he meant nothing more than knowledge or cognition. Reid's account, of Sensation. — Sensation he thus describes : " Almost all our perceptions have corresponding sensations, which constantly accompany them, and, on that account, are very apt to be confounded with them. Neither ought we to expect that the sensation, and its corresponding perception, should be distinguished in common language, because the pur- poses of common life do not require it. Language is made to serve the purposes of ordinary conversation ; and we have no reason to expect that it should make distinctions that are not of common use. Hence it happens that a quality perceived, and the sensation corresponding to that perception, often go under the same name. "This makes the names of most of our sensations ambigu- ous, and this ambiguity hath very much perplexed the philoso- phers. It will be necessary to give some instances, to illustrate the distinction between our sensations and the objects of per- ception. " When I smell a rose, there is in this operation both sensa- tion and perception. The agreeable odor I feel, considered by itself, without relation to any external object, is merely a sensa- tion. It affects the mind in a certain way ; and this affection of the mind may be conceived, without a thought of the rose or any other object. This sensation can be nothing else than it is felt to be. Its very essence consists in being felt ; and when 316 PERCEPTION AND SENSATIOI^. it is not felt, it is not. There is no difference bet ween the sensation and the feeling of it; they are one and the same thing. It is for this reason, that we before observed, that in sensation, there is no object distinct from that act of mind by which it is felt ; and this holds true with regard to all sensations. " Let us next attend to the perception which we have in smelling a rose. Perception has always an external object; and the object of my perception, in this case, is that quality in the rose which I discern by the sense of smell. Observing that the agreeable sensation is raised when the rose is near, and ceases when it is removed, I am led, by my nature, to conclude some quality to be in the rose which is the cause of this sensa- tion. This quality in the rose is the object perceived ; and that act of the mind, by which I have the conviction and belief of this quality, is what in this case I call perception." By perception, Eeid, therefore, means the objective hiowledge we have of an external reality, through the senses ; by sensa- tion, the subjective feeling of pleasure or pain, with which the organic operation of sense is accompanied. This distinction of the objective from the subjective element in the act is impor- tant. Reid is not, however, the author of this distinction. He himself notices of Malebranche, that "he distinguished more accurately than any philosopher had done before, the objects which we perceive from the sensations in our own minds, which, by the laws of nature, always accompany the perception of the object. As in many things, so particularly in this, he has great merit ; for this, I apprehend, is a key that opens the way to a right understanding both of our external senses, and of other powers of the mind." I may notice that Malebranche's distinc- tion is into Idee, corresponding to Reid's Perception, and Senti- ment, corresponding to his Sensation ; and this distinction is as precisely marked in Malebranche as in Reid. Subsequently to Malebranche, the distinction became even common ; and th^re is no reason for Mr. Stewart being struck when he found it in Crousaz and Hutcheson. The nature of Perception and Sensation illustrated, — Before proceeding to state to you the great law which regulates the TERCEiPTION AND SENSATION. 817 mutual relation of these phaenomena, — a law which has been wholly overlooked by our psychologists, — it is proper to say a few words illustrative of the nature of the pha3nomena them- selves. The opposition of Perception and Sensation is true, but it is not a statement adequate to the generality of the contrast. Per- ception is only a special kind of Knowledge, and Sensation only a special kind of Feeling ; and Knowledge and Feeling, you will recollect, are two out of the three great classes, into which we primarily divided the phgenomena of mind. Conation was the third. Now, as Perception is only a special mode of Knowl- edge, and Sensation only a special mode of Feeling, so the contrast of Perception and Sensation is only the special mani- festation of a contrast, which universally divides the generic phsenomena themselves. It ought, therefore, in the first place, to have been noticed, that the generic phsenomena of Knowledge and Feeling are always found coexistent, and yet always dis- tinct; and the opposition of Perception and Sensation should have been stated as an obtrusive, but still only a particular example of the general law. But not only is the distinction of Perception and Sensation not generalized, — not referred to its category, by our psychologists ; it is not concisely and precisely stated. A Cognition is objective, that is, our consciousness is then relative to something different from the present state of the mind itself; a Feeling, on the contrary, is subjective, that is, our con- sciousness is exclusively limited to the pleasure or pain expe- rienced by the thinking subject. Cognition and feeling are always coexistent. The purest act of knowledge is always colored by some feeling of pleasure or pain ; for no energy is absolutely indifferent, and the grossest feeling exists only as it is known in consciousness. This being the case of cognition and feeling in general, the same is true of perception and sensation in particular. Perception proper is the consciousness, through the senses, of the qualities of an object known as different from self; Sensation proper is the consciousness of the subjective affection of pleasure or pain, which accompanies that act of knowledge. Perception is thus the objective element in the 27=* 318 PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. complex state, — the element of cognition; Sensation is the subjective element, — the element of feeling.* ^ [A word as to the various meanings of the terms here prominent — Perception, Sensation, Sense. i. — Perception (Perceptio, Wahrnehmung) has different significations; but under all and each of these, the term has a common ambiguity, denot- ing as it may, either 1^ the perceiving Faculty, or 2° the Perceiving Act, or 3° the Object perceived. Of these, the only ambiguity of importance is the last ; and to relieve it, I would propose the employment, in this rela- tion, of Percept, leaving Perception to designate both the Faculty and its Act; for these it is rarely necessary to distinguish, as what is applicable to the one is usually applicable to the other. But to the significations of the term, as applied to different faculties, acts, and objects ; of which there are in all four : — 1. Perception, in its primary philosophical signification, as in the mouths of Cicero and Quintilian, is vaguely equivalent to Comprehension, Notion, or Cognition in general. 2. From this first meaning it was easily deflected to a second, in which it corresponds to an apprehension, a becoming aware o/^ in a word, a conscious- ness. In this meaning, though long thus previously employed in the Schools, it was brought more prominently and distinctively forward in the writings of Descartes. Under this second meaning, it is proper to say a word in regard to a special employment of the term. The Leibnitzio-Wolfians distinguish three acts in the process of representative cognition: — 1° the act of repre- senting a (mediate) object to the mind; 2° the representation, or, to speak more properly, representamen, itself as an (immediate or vicarious) object exhibited to the mind ; 3° the act by which the mind is conscious, immediately of the representative object, and, through it, mediately of the remote object represented. They called the first Perception ; the last Apperception; the second Idea — sensual, to wit ; for what they styled the material Idea was only an organic motion propagated to the brain, which, on the doctrine of the Preestablished Harmony, is, in sensitive cognition, the arbitrary con- comitant of the former, and, of course, beyond the sphere of consciousness or apperception. 3. In its third signification. Perception is limited to the apprehensions of Sense alone. This limitation was first formally imposed upon the word by Reid, for no very cogent reason besides convenience; and thereafter by Kant. Kant, again, was not altogether consistent; for he employs ^Per- ception ' in the second meaning, for the consciousness of any mental presen- tation, and thus in a sense corresponding to the Apperception of the Leib- nitzians ; while its vernacular, synonym, ' Wahrnehmung ' he defines in conformity with the third, as the consciousness of an empirical intuition. PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. 319 Perception and Sensation in their reciprocal relation. — The most remarkable defect, however, in the present doctrine upon this point, is the ignorance of our psychologists in regard to the law by which the phaenomena of Cognition and Feeling, — of Perception and Sensation, are governed, in their reciprocal re- lation. This law is simple and universal ; and, once enounced. Imposed by such authorities, this is now the accredited signification of these terms, in the recent philosophies of Germany, Britain, France, &c. 4. But under this third meaning, it is again, since tlie time and through the authority of Keid, frequently employed in a still more restricted accep- tation, namely, as Perception (proper) in contrast to Sensation (proper). The import of these terms, as used by Reid and other philosophers on the one hand, and by myself on the other, is explained in the text. ii. — Sensation (Sensatio; Sentiment; Empfindung) has various significa- tions; and in all of these, like Perception, Conception, Imagination, and other analogous terms in the philosophy of mind, it is ambiguously ap- plied ;^1°, for a Faculty — 2°, for its Act — ,3°, for its Object. Here there is no available term, like Percept, Concept, etc., whereby to discrim- inate the last. There are two principal meanings in which this term has bieen em- ployed. 1. Like the Greek cesthesis, it was long and generally used to comprehend the process of sensitive apprehension, both in its subjective and its objective rela- tions. 2. As opposed to Idea, Perception, etc., it was limited, first in the Carte- sian school, and thereafter in that of Held, to the subjective phasis of our sensitive cognitions ; that is, to our consciousness of the affections of our ani- mated organism, — or on the Neo-Platonic, Cartesian, and Leibnitzian hy- potheses, to the affections of the mind corresponding to, but not caused by, the unknown mutations of the body. Under this restriction. Sensation may, both in French and English, be employed to designate our corporeal or lower feelings, in opposition to Sentiment, as a term for our higher, that is, our intellectual and moral, feelings, iii. — Sense (Sensus; Sens; Sinn) is employed in a looser and in a stricter application. Under the former head, it has two applications ; — 1°, a psychological, as a popular t>erm' for Intelligence : 2°, a logical, as a synonym for Meaning. Under the latter head, Sense is employed ambiguously; — 1*^, for the Faculty of sensitive apprehension ; 2°, for its Act ; 3°, for its Organ. In this relation. Sense has been distinguished into External and Inter- nal ; but under the second term, in so many vague and various meanings, that I cannot here either explain or enumerate them.] — Di'is. supp. to Reid. 320 PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. its proof is found in every mental manifestation. It is this : Knowledge and Feeling^ — Perception and Sensation^ though always coexistent, are always in the inverse ratio of each other. That these two elements are always found in coexistence, as it is an old and a notorious truth, it is not requisite for me to prove. But that these elements are always found to coexist in an inverse proportion, — in "support of this universal fact, it will be requisite to adduce proof and illustration. In doing this I shall, however, confine myself to the relation of Perception and Sensation. These afford the best examples of the generic relation of Knowledge and Feeling ; and we must not now turn aside from the special faculty with which we are engaged. The first proof I shall take from a comparison of the several senses ; and it will be found that, precisely as a sense has more of the one element, it has less of the other. Laying Touch aside for the moment, as this requires a special explanation, the other four Senses divide themselves into two classes, according as Perception, the objective element, or Sensation, the subjective element, predominates. The two in which the former element prevails, are Sight and Hearing ; the two in which the latter, are Taste and Smell. _^ Now, here, it will be at once admitted, that Sight, at the same instant, presents to us a greater number and a greater variety of objects and qualities, than any other of the senses. In thi^ Sense, therefore. Perception, — the objective element, is at its maximum. But Sensation, - — the subjective element, is here at its minimum ; for, in the eye, we experience less organic pleas- ure or pain from the impressions of its appropriate objects (colors), than we do in any other sense. Next to Sight, Hearing afibrds us, in the shortest interval, the greatest variety and multitude of cognitions ; and as sight divides space almost to infinity, through color, soliearing does the same to time, through sound. Hearing is, however, much less extensive in its sphere of Knowledge or Pea^eption than sight ; but in the same proportion is its capacity of Feeling or Sensation more intensive. We have greater pleasure and PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. 321 greater pain from single sounds than from single colors ; and, in like manner, concords and discords, in the one sense, affect us more agreeably oi* disagreeably, than any modifications of light in the other.^ In Taste and Smell, the degree of Sensation, that is, of pleas- ure or pain, is great in proportion as the Perception, that is, the information they afford, is small. In all these senses, therefore, — Sight, Hearing, Taste, Smell, it will be admitted that the principle holds good. The sense of Touch, or Feeling, strictly so called, I have reserved, as this requires a word of comment. Some philoso- phers include under this name all our sensitive perceptions, not obtained through some of the four special organs of sense, that is, sight, hearing, taste, smell ; others, again, divide the sense into several. To us, at present, this difference is of no interest : for it. is sufficient for us to know, that in those parts of the body where Sensation predominates. Perception is feeble ; and in those where Perception is lively. Sensation is obtuse. In the finger points, tactile perception is at its height ; but there is hardly another part of the body in which sensation is not more acute. Touch, or Feeling strictly so called, if viewed as a single sense, belongs, therefore, to both classes, — the objective and subjective. But it is more correct, as we shall see, to regard it as a plurality of senses, in which case Touch, properly so called, having a prin- cipal organ in the finger points, will belong to the first class, — the class of objective senses, — the perceptions, — that class in which Perception proper predominates. This law governs also the several impressions of the same sense, — The analogy, then, which we have thus seen to hold good in the several senses in relation to each other, prevails likewise among the several impressions of the same sense. Impressions =^ [In regard to the subjective and objective nature of the sensations of the several senses, or rather the perceptions we have through them, it may be observed, that what is more objective is more easily remembered; whereas, what is more subjective affords a much less distinct remembrance. Thus, what we perceive by the eye is better remembered than what we bear.] 822 PEKCEPTION AND SENSATION. in the same sense, differ both in degree and m quality or kind. By impression you will observe that I mean no explanation of the mode by which the external reality acts upofi the sense (the metaphor you must disregard) , but simply the fact of the agency itself; Taking, then, their difference in degree, and supposing that the degree of the impression determines the degree of the sensation, it cannot certainly be said, that the minimum of Sensation infers the maximum of Perception ; for Perception always supposes a certain quantum of Sensation : but this is un- deniable, that, above a certain limit. Perception declines, in pro- portion as Sensation rises. Thus, in the sense of sight, if the impression be strong we are dazzled, blinded, and consciousness is limited to the pain or pleasure of the Sensation, in the inten- sity of which. Perception has been lost. Take now the difference, in hind, of impressions in the same sense. Of the senses, take again that of Sight. Sight, as will hereafter be shown, is cognizant of color, and, through color, of figure. But though figure is known only through color, a very imperfect cognizance of color is necessary, as is shown in the case (and it is not a rare one) of those individuals who have not the faculty of discriminating colors. These persons, who probably perceive only a certain difference of light and shade, have as clear and distinct a cognizance of figure, as others who enjoy the sense of sight in absolute perfection. This being un- derstood, you will observe, that, in the vision of color, there is more of Sensation ; in that of figure, more of Perception. Color affords our faculties of knowledge a far smaller number of dif- ferences and relations than figure; but, at the same time, yields our capacity of feeling a far more sensual enjoyment. But if the pleasure we derive from color be more gross and vivid, that from figure is more refined and permanent. It is a law of our nature, that the more intense a pleasure, the shorter is its dura- tion. The pleasures of sense are grosser and more intense than those of intellect ; but, while the former alternate speedily with disgust, with the latter we are never satiated. The same ana- logy holds among the senses themselves. Those in which Sen- sation predominates, in which pleasure is most intense, soon ^ PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. 323 pall upon us ; whereas those in which Perception predominates, and which hold more immediately of intelligence, afford us a less exclusive but a more endurinoj o-ratification. How soon are we cloyed with the pleasures of the palate, compared with those of the eye ; and, among the objects of the former, the meats that please the most are soonest objects of disgust. This is too ijotorious in regard to taste to stand in need of proof. But it is no less certain in the case of vision. In painting, there is a pleasure derived from a vivid and harmonious coloring, and a pleasure from the drawing and grouping of the figures. The two pleasures are distinct, and even, to a certain extent, incom- patible. For if we attempt to combine them, the grosser and more obstrusive gratification, which we find in the coloring, dis- tracts us from the more refined and intellectual enjoyment we derived from the relation of figure ; while, at the same time, the disgust we soon experience from the one tends to render us in- sensible to the other. This is finely expressed by a modei^n Latin poet of high genius [Johannes Secundus] : — " Mensura rebus est sua dulcibus ; Ut quodque mentes suavius afficit, Fastidium sic triste secum Limite proximiore ducit." His learned commentator, Bosscha, has not, however, noticed that these are only paraphrases of a remarkable passage of Cicero. Cicero and Secundus have not, however, expressed the principle more explicitly than Shakspeare : " These violent delights have violent ends, And in their triumph die. The sweetest honey Is loathsome in its own deliciousness, And in the taste confounds the appetite. Therefore, love moderately ; long love doth so. To ^ swift arrives as tardy as too slow." The result of what I have now stated, therefore, is, in the first place, that, as philosophers have observed, there is a dis- tinction between Knowledge and Feeling, — Perception and Sensation, as between the objective and the subjective element ; 324 PERCEPTION AND SENSATION and, in tlie second, that this distinction is, moreover, governed bj the law, — That the two elements, though each necessarily supposes the other, are still always in a certain inverse propor- tion to each other. Why this distinction is important. — Before leaving this sub- ject, I may notice that the distinction of Perception proper and Sensation proper, though recognized as phaenomenal by philoso- phers who hold the doctrine of a representative perception, rises into reality and importance only in the doctrine of an intuitive perception. In the former doctrine. Perception is supposed to be only apparently objective ; being, in reality, no less subjec- tive than Sensation proper, — the subjective element itself. Both are nothing more than mere modes of the ego. The philosophers who hold the hypothesis of a representative per- ception, make the difference of the two to consist only in this ; — that in Perception proper, there is reference to an unknown object, different from me ; in Sensation, there is no reference to aught beyond myself. Brown, on the supposition that Reid held that doctrine in common with himself and philosophers at large, states Sensation, as understood by Reid, to be " the simple feeling that immediately follows the action of an external body on any of our organs of sense, considered merely as a feeling of the mind ; the corresponding Perception being the reference of this feeling to the external body as its cause." The distinc- tion he allows to be a convenient one, if the nature of the com- plex process which it expresses be rightly understood. " The only question," he says, " that seems, philosophically, of impor- tance, with respect to it, is whether the Perception in this sense, — the reference of the Sensation to its external corporeal cause, - — implies, as Dr. Reid contends, a peculiar mental power, co- extensive with Sensation, to be distinguished by a peculiar name in the catalogue of our faculties ; or be not merely one of tlie results of a more general power, which is afterwards to be con- sidered by us, — the power of Association, — by wdiich one feel- ing suggests, or induces, other feelings that have formerly coexisted with it." If Brown be correct in his interpretation of Reid's general PERCEPTION AND SENSATION. 325 doctrine of perception, his criticism is not only true but trite. In the hands of a Cosmothetic Idealist, the distinction is only superficial, and manifestly of no import ; and the very fact, that Reid laid so great stress on it, would tend to prove, independ- ently of what we have already alleged, that Brown's interpre- tation of his doctrine is erroneous. You will remark, likewise, that Brown (and Brown only speaks the language of all phi- losophers who do not allow the mind a consciousness of aught beyond its own states) misstates the phsenomenon, when he as- serts that, in perception, there is a reference from the internal to the external, from the known to the unknown. That this is not the fact, an observation of this phaenomenon will at once convince you. In an act of perception, I am conscious of something as self, and of something as not-self: — this is the simple fact. The philosophers, on the contrary, who will not accept this fact, misstate it. They say that we are there con- scious of nothing but a certain modification of mind ; but this modification involves a reference to, — in other words, a repre- sentation of, — something external, as its object. Now this is untrue. We are conscious of no reference, — of no represen- tation ; we believe that the object of which we are conscious is the object which exists. Nor could there possibly be such reference or representation ; for reference or representation supposes a knowledge already possessed of the object referred to or represented ; but perception is the faculty by which our first knowledge is acquired, and, therefore, cannot suppose a previous knowledge as its condition. But this I notice only by the way ; this matter will be regularly considered in the sequel. Perception a primary^ not a compound and derivative faculty, — I may here notice the false analysis, which has endeavored to take perception out of the list of our faculties, as being only a compound and derivative power. Perception, say Brown and others, supposes memory and comparison and judgment ; there- fore, it is not a primary faculty of mind. Nothing can be more erroneous than this reasoning. In the first place, I have for- merly shown you that consciousness supposes memory, and discrimination, and judgment ; and, as perception does not pre- 28 32 G PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES. tend to be simpler than consciousness, but in fact only a modifi- cation of consciousness, that, therefore, the objection does not apply. But, in the second place, the objection is founded on a misapprehension of what a faculty properly is. It may be very true, that an act of perception cannot be realized simply and alone. I have often told you that the mental phaenomena are never simple, and that, as tissues are woven out of many threads, so a mental phgenomenon is made up of many acts and affec- tions, which we can only consider separately by abstraction, but can never even conceive as separately existing. In mathemat- ics, we consider a triangle or a square, the sides and the angles apart from each other, though we are unable to conceive them existing independently of each other. But because the angles and sides exist only through each other, would it be correct to deny their reality as distinct mathematical elements ? As in geometry, so is it in psychology. We admit that no faculty can exist itself alone ; and that it is only by viewing- the actual manifestations of mind in their different relations, that we are able by abstraction to analyze them into elements, which we refer to different faculties. Thus, for example, every judgment, every comparison, supposes two terms to be compared, and, therefore, supposes an act of representative, or an act of acquis- itive, cognition. But go back to one or other of these acts, and you will find that each of them supposes a judgment and a memory. If I represent in imagination the terms of compari- son, there is involved a judgment ; for the fact of their repre- sentation supposes the afiirmation or judgment that they are called up, that they now ideally exist; and this judgment is only possible, as a result of a comparison of the present con- sciousness of their existence with a past consciousness of their non-existence, which comparison, again, is only possible through an act of memory. The Primary and Secondary Qualities of matter, — Con- nected with the preceding distinction of Perception and Sensa- tion, is the distinction of the Primary and Secondary Quahties of matter. It would only confuse you wer^ T to attempt to determine PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES. 327 how far this distinction was known to the Atomic physiologists, prior to Aristotle, and how far Aristotle himself was aware of the principle on which it proceeds. — It is enough to notice, as the most remarkable opinion of antiquity, that of Democritus, who, except the common qualities of body which are known by Touch, denied that the senses afforded us any information con- cerning the real properties of matter. Among modern philoso- phers, Descartes was the first who recalled attention to the dis- tinction. According to him, the Primary qualities differ from the Secondary in this, — that our knowledge of the former is more clear and distinct than of the latter. " The qualities of external objects," says Locke, " are of two sorts y first, Original or Primary ; such are solidity, extension, Inotion or rest, number, and figure. These are inseparable from body, and such as it constantly keeps in all its changes and alterations. Thus, take a grain of wheat, divide it into two parts ; each part has still solidity, extension, figure, mobility ; divide it again, and it still retains the same qualities ; and will do so still, though you divide it on till the parts become insen- sible. " Secondly, Secondary qualities, such as colors, smells, tastes, sounds, etc., which, whatever reaHty we by mistake may attrib- ute to them, are, in truth, nothing in the objects themselves, but powers to produce various sensations in us ; and depend on the qualities before mentioned. " The ideas of Primary qualities of bodies are resemblances of them ; and their patterns really exist in bodies themselves : but the ideas produced in us by Secondary qualities have no resemblance of them at all: and what is sweet, blue, or warm in the idea, is but the certain bulk, figure, and motion of the insensible parts in the bodies themselves, which we call so." Keid adopted the distinction of Descartes : he holds that our knowledge of the Primary qualities is clear and distinct, whereas our knovf ledge of the Secondary qualities is obscure. " Every man," he says, " capable of reflection, may easily sat- isfy himself, that he has a perfectly clear and distinct notion of extension, divisibility, figure, and motion. The solidity of a 328 PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES.. body means no more, but that it excludes other bodies from oc- cupying the same place at the same time. Hardness, softness, and fluidity are different degrees of cohesion in the parts of a body. It is fluid, when it has no sensible cohesion ; soft, when the cohesion is weak ; and hard, when it is strong : of the cause of this cohesion we are ignorant, but the thing itself we under- stand perfectly, being immediately informed of it by the sense of touch. It is evident, therefore, that of the Primary qualities we have a clear and distinct notion ; we know what they are, though we may be ignorant of the causes." But he did more ; he endeavored to show that this difference arises from the cir- cumstance, that the perception, in the case of the Primary qualities, is direct; in the case of the Secondary, only relative. This he explains : " I observe, further, that the notion we have of Primary qualities is direct, and not relative only. A rela- tive notion of a thing is, strictly speaking, no notion of the thing at all, but only of some relation which it bears to something- else. "Thus, gravity sometimes signifies the tendency of bodies towards the earth ; sometimes, it signifies the cause of that ten- dency ; when it means the first, I have a direct and distinct notion of gravity ; I see it, and feel it, and know perfectly what it is ; but this tendency must have a cause ; we give the same name to the cause; and that cause has been an object of thought and of speculation. Now, what notion have we of this cause, when we think and reason about it ? It is evident we think of it as an unknown cause of a known effect. This is a relative notion, and it must be obscure, because it gives us no conception of what the thing is, but of what relation it bears to something else. Every relation which a thing unknown bears to something that is known, may give a relative notion of it ; and there are many objects of thought, and of discourse, of which our faculties can give no better than a relative noticn. " Having premised these things to explain what is meant by a relative notion, it is evident, that our notion of Primary Qualities is not of this kind ; we know what they are, and not barely what relation they bear to something else. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES. 329 "It is otherwise with Secondary Qualities. If you ask me, what is that quahty or modification in a rose which I call its smell, I am at a loss what to answer directly. Upon reflection, I find, that I have a distinct notion of the sensation which it produces in my mind. But there can be nothing like to this sensation in the rose, because it is insentient. The quality in the rose is something which occasions the sensation in me ; but what that something is, I know not. My senses give me no information upon this point. The only notion, therefore, my senses give is this, that smell in the rose is an unknown quality or modification^ which is the cause or occasion of a sensation^ which I know well. The relation which this unknown quality bears to the sensation with which nature hath connected it, is all I learn from the sense of smelling ; but this is evidently a relative notion. The same reasoning will apply to every Sec- ondary quality." [The Primary Qualities of Matter or Body, noio and here^ — that is, in proximate relation to our organs, — are objects of immediate cognition to the Natural Realists, of mediate^ to the Cosmothetic Idealists ; the former, on the testimony of con- sciousness, asserting to mind the capability of intuitively per- ceiving what is not itself; the latter denying this capability, but asserting to the mind the power of representing, and truly rep- resenting, what it does not know. — To the Absolute Idealists, matter has no existence as an object of cognition, either imme- diate or mediate. The Secondary Qualities of Body, now and here, — as only present affections of the conscious subject, determined by an unknown external cause, — are, on every theory, now allowed to be objects of immediate cognition.] — Diss, siipp, to Reid, You will observe that the lists of the primary qualities given by Locke and Reid do not coincide. According to Locke, these are Solidity, Extension, Motion, Hardness, Softness, Roughness, Smoothness, and Fluidity. Stewards classification of qualities. — Mr. Stewart proposes another line of demarcation. " I distinguish," he says, " Exten- sion and Figure by the title of the Mathematical Affections of 28=* 330 PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES. matter ; restricting the phrase, Primary Qualities, to Hardness and Softness, Roughness and Smoothness, and other properties of the same description. The hne which I would draw between Primary and Secondary Qualities is this, that the former neces- sarily involve the notion of PJxtension, and consequently of externality or outness ; whereas the latter are only conceived as the unknown causes of known sensations ; and when first appre- hended hy the mind, do not imply the existence of any thing locally distinct from the subjects of its consciousness." The Primary Qualities reducible to two. - — All these Primary Qualities, including Mr. Stewart's Mathematical Affections of matter, may easily be reduced to two, — Extension and Solid- ity, Thus : Figure is a mere limitation of extension ; Hard- ness, Softness, Fluidity, are only Solidity variously modified, — only its different degrees ; while Roughness and Smoothness denote only the sensations connected with certain perceptions of Solidity.* On the other hand, in regard to Divisibility, (which ^ [The term Solidity {to arepeov, solidum), as denoting an attribute of body, is a word of various significations ; and the non-determination and non-distinction of these have given rise to manifold error and confusion. First Meaning. — In its most unexclusive signification, the SoHd is that which Jills or occupies space. In this meaning, it is simply convertible vi^ith Body; and is opposed, 1°, to the unextended in all or in any of the three dimensions of space; and 2°, to mere extension or empty space itself. This we may cail Solidity simply. The occupation of space supposes two necessary conditions; — and each of these has obtained the common name of Solidity, thus constituting a second and a third meaning. Second Meaning. — What is conceived as occupying space, is necessarily conceived as extended in the three dimensions of space. This is the phasis of Solidity which the Geometer exclusively contemplates. Trinal extension has, accordingly, by mathematicians, been emphatically called the Solid ; and this first partial Solidity we may therefore distinguish as the Mathe- matical, or rather the Geometrical. Third Meaning. — On the other hand, what is conceived as occupying space, is necessarily conceived as wliat cannot he eliminated from space. But this supposes a power of resisting such elimination. This is the phasis of Solidity considered exclusively from the physical point of view. Accord- ingly, by the men of natural science, tlie impossibility of compressing a body from an extended to an unextended has been emphatically styled PRIMARY AND SECONDARY QUALITIES. 331 is proper to Reid,) and to Motion, — these can hardly be mere data of sense. Divisibility supposes division, and a body Solidity ; and this second partial solidity we may therefore distinguish as the Physical. The resisting force here involved has been called the Impen- etrahilily of matter; but most improperly and most ambiguously. It might more appropriately be termed its Ultimate or Absolute Incompressi- hility. In a psychological point of view — and this is that of Locke and meta- physicians in general — no attribute of body is Pnmary which is not neces- sary in thought ; that is, which is not necessarily evolved out of, as neces- sarily implied in, the very notion of body. And such is Solidity, in the one total and the two partial significations heretofore enumerated. But in its physical application, this term is not always limited to denote the ultimate incompressibility of matter. Besides that necessary attribute, it is extended, in common language, to express other powers of resistance in bodies, of a character merely contingent in reference to thought. These may be re- duced to the five following . Fourth Meaning. — The term Solid is very commonly employed to denote not merely the absolutely, but also the relatively, incompressible, the Dense, in contrast to the relatively compressible, the Kare, or Hollow. (In Latin, moreover, aSo//c//cular feeling, that the perception of Externality is realized. All this, however, might be con- fusedly involved in the Touch of the philosophers in question. 17. [They hold that] real (or absolute) magnitude is an ob- ject of perception (proper) through Touchy but through Touch only. On the contrary, I hold, that the magnitude perceived through touch is as purely relative as that perceived through vision or any other sense ; for the same magnitude does not appear the same to touch at one part of the body and to touch at another. 18. [They hold that] Color ^ though a Secondary quality, is an object, not of Sensation (proper), but of Perception (proper) ; in other words, we perceive Color, not as an affection of our own minds, but as a quality of external things. On the contrary, I hold, that Color, in itself, as apprehended or immediately known by us, is a mere affection of the sentient organism ; and therefore, like the other Secondary qualities, an object not of Perception, but of Sensation, proper. The only distinguishing peculiarity in this case lies in the three following circumstances : — a) That the organic affection of Color, though not altogether indifferent, still, being accompanied by compara- tively little pleasure, comparatively httle pain, the apprehension of this affection, qua affection, i. e. its Sensation pi'oper, is, con- sequently, always at a minimum. — b) That the passion of Color first rising into consciousness, not from the amount of the inten- sive quantity of the affection, but from the amount of the exten- sive quantity of the organism affected, is necessarily apprehended INTERN^AL PERCEPTIOlSr ; SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 395 under the condition of extension. — c) That tlie isolation, tenu- ity, and delicacy of the ultimate filaments of the optic nerve afford us sensations minutely and precisely distinguished, sensa- tions realized in consciousness only as we are conscious of them AS out of each other in space. — These circumstances show, that while, in vision, Perception proper is at its maximum, and Sen- sation proper at its minimum, the sensation of Color cannot be realized apart from the perception of extension : but they do not warrant the assertions, that Color is not, hke the other Sec- ondary qualities, apprehended by us as a mere sensorial affection, and, therefore, an object, not of Sensation proper, but of Percep- tion proper.] — Diss. svpp. to Reid, Sensation and Perception do not always coexist in the same degree of intensity, but they are equally original ; and it is only by an act not of the easiest abstraction,, that we are able to dis- criminate them scientifically from each other. So much for the first of the two faculties by which we acquire knowledge, — the faculty of External Perception. The faculty of Self consciousness, — The second of these fac- ulties is Self-consciousness, which has likewise received, among others, the name of Internal or Reflex Perception. This facul- ty will not occupy us long, as the principal questions regarding its nature and operation have been already considered, in treat- ing of Consciousness in general. I formerly showed that it is impossible to distinguish Percep- tion, or the other Special Faculties, from Consciousness, — in other words, to reduce Consciousness itself to a special faculty ; and that the attempt to do so by the Scottish philosophers is self-contradictory. T stated, however, that though it be incom- petent to establish a faculty for the immediate knowledge of the external world, and a faculty for the immediate knowledge of the internal, as two ultimate powers, exclusive of each other, ano not merely subordinate forms of a higher immediate knowl- edge, under which they are comprehended or carried up into one, — I stated, I say, that though the immediate knowledges of matter and of mind are still only modifications of Consciousness, yet that their discrimination, as subaltern faculties, is both al- 896 INTERNAL PERCEPTION; SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. lowable and convenient. Accordingly, in tlie scheme which I gave you of the distribution of Consciousness into its special modes, — I distinguished a facuhy of External, and a faculty of Internal, Apprehension, constituting together a more general modification of Consciousness, which I called the Acquisitive, or Presentative, or Receptive Faculty. In regard to Self-consciousness, — the faculty of Internal Experience, — philosophers have been far more harmonious than in regard to External Perception. In fact, their differ- ences touching this faculty originate rather in the ambiguities of language, and the different meanings attached to the same form of expression, than in any fundamental opposition of opinion in regard to its reality and nature. It is admitted equally by all to exist, and to exist as a source of knowledge ; and the supposed differences of philosophers in this respect are, as I shall show you, mere errors in the historical statement of their opinions. Self-consciousness contrasted with Perception, — The sphere and character of this faculty of acquisition will be best illus- trated by contrasting it with the other. Perception is the power by which we are made aware of the phaenomena of the Exter- nal world ; Self-consciousness, the power by w^hich we apprehend the phaenomena of the Internal. The objects of the former are all presented to us in Space and Time ; space and time are thus the two conditions, — the two fundamental forms, of External Perception.^ The objects of the latter are all apprehended by * [Kant, first, made our actual world one merely of illusion. Time and Space, under which we must perceive and think, he reduced to mere sub- jective spectral forms, which have no real archetype in the noumenal or real universe. We can infer nothing from this, [the actual, world,] to that, [the noumenal or real universe. The law of] Cause and Effect governs thing and thought in the world of Space and Time ; [this law does] nor subsist where Time and Space have no reality. Kant, secondly, made Reason, Intelligence, contradict itself in its legitimate exercise. Antinomy [contradiction] is part and parcel of its nature. Thus, scepticism — the conviction that we live in a world of unreality and illusion, and that our very faculty of knowledge is only given us to mislead, is the result of [Kant's philosophy]. On the contrary, my doctrine holds, first, that Space and Time, as given, INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 397 US in Time and in Self; time and self are thus the two condi- tions, — the two fundamental forms, of Internal Perception ox Self-consciousness. Time is thus a form or condition common to both faculties ; while Space is a form peculiar to the one, Self a form peculiar to the other. What I mean by the ybrm or con- dition of a faculty, is that frame, — that setting (if I may so speak), out of which no object can be known. Thus, we only know, through Self-consciousness, the phaenomena of the Internal world, as modifications of the indivisible Ego or conscious unit ; are real forms of thought and conditions of things ; and, secondly, that In- telligence, Reason, within its legitimate limits, is legitimate ; within this sphere, it nevei deceives ; and it is only when transcending this sphere, when founding on its illegitimate as on its legitimate exercise, that it affords a contradictory result. Kant holds the subjectivity of Space (and Time), and, if he does not deny, will not affirm the existence of a real space, external to our minds ; because it is a mere form of our perceptive faculty. He holds that we have no knowledge of any external thing as really existing, and that all our perceptions are merely appearances, i. e, subjective representations, — sub- jective modifications, — which the mind is determined to exhibit, as an ap- parently objective opposition to itself, — its pure and real subjective modi- fications. Yet, while he gives up the external existence of space, as beyond the sphere of consciousness, he holds the reality of external material ex- istences (things in themselves), which are equally beyond the sphere of consciousness. It was incumbent on him to render a reason for this seem- ing inconsistency, and to explain how his system was not, in its legitimate conclusions, an universal Idealism ; and he has accordingly attempted to establish, by necessary inference, what his philosophy could not accept as an immediate fact of consciousness. Kant endeavored to evince that pure Reason, that Intelligence, is natu- rally, is necessarily, repugnant with itself, and that speculation ends in a series of insoluble antilogies. In its highest potcnce, in its ver^' essence, thought is thus infected with contradiction ; and the worst and most pervad- ing scepticism is the melancholy result. If I have done any thing meritori- ous in philosophy, it is in the attempt to explain the phsenomena of these contradictions ; in showing that they arise only when intelligence transcends the limits to which its legitimate exercise is restricted ; and that, within these bounds (the Conditioned), natural thought is neither fallible nor men- dacious — "Neque decipitur, nee decipit umquam." If this view be cor- rect, Kant's antinomies, with their consequent scepticism, are solved ; and the human mind, however weak, is shown not to be the work of a treacher- ous Creator.] — Appendix, 34 3 "8 INTKUNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. we only know, through Perception, the phasnomena of the Exter- nal world, under Space, or as modifications of the extended and divisible Non-ego or known plurality. That the forms are na- tive, not adventitious, to the mind, is involved in their necessity. What I cannot but think, must be a prion, or original to thought ; it cannot be engendered by experience upon custom. But this is not a subject the discussion of which concerns us at present. It may be asked, if self, or Ego, be the form of Self-conscious- ness, why is the not-self, the Non-ego, not in hke manner called the form of Perception ? To this I reply, that the not-self is only a negation, and, though it discriminates the objects of the external cognition from those of the internal, it does not afford to the former any positive bond of union among themselves. This, on the contrary, is supplied to them by the form of Space, out of which they can neither be perceived, nor imagined by the mind ; — Space, therefore, as the positive condition under which the Non-ego is necessarily known and imagined, and through which it receives its unity in consciousness, is properly said to afford the condition, or form, of External Perception. The mind itself is not extended, — But a more important question may be started. If Space,- — if extension, be a neces- sary form of thought, this, it may be argued, proves that the mind itself is extended. The reasoning here proceeds upon the assumption, that the qualities of the subject knowing must be similar to the qualities of the object known. This, as I have already stated, is a mere philosophical crotchet, — an assumption without a shadow even of probability in its favor. That the mind has the power of perceiving extended objects, is no ground for holding that it is itself extended. Still less can it be main- tained, that because it has ideally a native or necessary concep- tion of space, it must really occupy space. Nothing can be more absurd. On this doctrine, to exist as extended is supposed necessary in order to think extension. But if this analogy hold good, the sphere of ideal space, which the mind can imagine, ought to be limited to the sphere, of real space which the mind actually fills. This is not, however, the case ; for though the IISfTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS 399 mind be not absolutely unlimited in its power of conceiving space, still the compass of thought may be viewed as infinite in this respect, as contrasted with the petty point of extension, which the advocates of the doctrine in question allow it to oc- cupy in its corporeal domicil. Two modes of treating the fhcenomena of Self-consciousness. — The faculty of self-consciousness affords us a knowledge of the phaenomena of our minds. It is the source of internal ex- perience. You will, therefore, observe, that, like External Per- ception, it only furnishes us with facts ; and that the use we make of these facts, — that is, what we find in them, what we deduce from them, — belongs to a different process of intelli- gence. Self-consciousness affords the materials equally to all systems of philosophy ; all equally admit it, and all elaborate the materials which this faculty supplies, according to their fashion. And here I may merely notice, by the way, what, in treating of the Regulative Faculty, will fall to be regularly dis- cussed, that these facts, these materials, may be considered in two ways. We may employ either Induction alone^ or also Analysis. If we merely consider the phaenomena which Self-con- sciousness reveals, in relation to each other, — merely compare them together, and generalize the qualities which they display in common, and thus arrange them into cla^^ses or groups gov- erned by the same laws, we perform the process of Induction. By this process, we obtain what is general, hut not what is neces- sary. For example, having observed that external objects pre- sented in perception are extended, we generalize the notion of extension or space. We have thus explained the possibility of a conception of space, but only of space as a general and contin- gent notion ; for if we hold that this notion exists in the mind only as the result of such a process, we must hold it to be a pos- teriori or adventitious, and, therefore, contingent. Such is the process of Induction, or of Simple Observation. The other process, that of Analysis or Criticism, does not rest satisfied with this comparison and generalization, which it, however, supposes. It proposes, not merely to find what is general in the phasnomena, but what is necessary and universal. It, accordingly, 400 INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS takes mental phsenomena, and, by abstraction, throws aside all that it is able to detach, without annihilating the phsenomena altogether ; — in short, it analyzes thought into its essential or necessary, and its accidental or contingent, elements. All necessity to us is subjective, — Thus, from Observation and Induction, we discover what experience affords as its general result ; from Analysis and Criticism, we discover what experi- ence supposes as its necessary condition. You will notice, that the critical analysis of which I now speak, is limited to the objects of our internal observation ; for in the phaenomena of mind alone can we be conscious of absolute necessity. All ne- cessity is, in fact, to us subjective ; for a thing is conceived impossible, only as we are unable to construe it in thought. Whatever does not violate the laws of thought is, therefore, not to us impossible, however firmly we may believe that it will not occur. For example, we hold it absolutely impossible, that a thing can begin to be without a cause. Why ? Simply because the mind cannot realize to itself the conception of absolute com- mencement. That a stone should ascend into the air, we firmly believe will never happen ; but we find no difficulty in conceiv- ing it possible. Why ? Merely because gravitation is only a fact generalized by induction and observation ; and its negation, therefore, violates no law of thought. When we talk, therefore, of the necessity of any external phasnomenon, the expression is improper, if the necessity be only an inference of induction, and not involved in any canon of intelligence. For Induction proves to us onli/ what is, ngt what must he, — the actual, not the nec- essary. Use of the Inductive and Critical Methods in philosophy, — The two processes of Induction or Observation, and of Analysis or Criticism, have been variously employed by different philos- ophers. Locke, for instance, limited himself to the former, overlooking altogether the latter. He, accordingly, discovered nothing necessary, or a priori^ in the phaenomena of our inter- nal experience. To him, all axioms are only generalizations of experience. In this respect, he was greatly excelled by Descar- tes and Leibnitz. The latter, indeed, was the philosopher who INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 401 clearly enunciated the principle, that the pha3nomenon of neces- sity, in our cognitions, could not be explained on the ground of experience. " All the examples," he says, " which confirm a gen- eral truth, how numerous soever, would not suffice to establish the universal necessity of this same truth ; for it does not follow, that what has hitherto occurred will always occur in future/' " If Locke," he adds, " had sufficiently considered the difference be- tween truths which are necessary or demonstrative, and those which we infer from induction alone, he would have perceived that necessary truths could only be proved from principles Avhich command our assent by their intuitive evidence ; inasmuch as our senses can inform us only of what is, not of what must necessarily be." Leibnitz, however, was not himself fully aware of the import of the principle ; — at least, he failed in carrying it out to its most important applications ; and though he triumphantly demonstrated, in opposition to Locke, the a priori character of many of those cognitions which Locke had derived from experience, yet he left to Kant the honor of having been the first who fully applied the Critical analysis in the phi- losophy of mind. Has Locke been ynisrepresented by his French disciples^ — The faculty of Self-consciousness corresponds with the Reflec- tion of Locke. Now, there is an interesting question concern- ing this faculty ; — whether the philosophy of Locke has been misapprehended and misrepresented by Condlllac, and other of his French disciples, as Mr. Stewart maintains ; or, whether Mr. Stewart has not himself attempted to vindicate the tendency of Locke's philosophy on grounds which wall not bear out his conclusions. Mr. Stewart has canvassed this point at consider- able length, [and by him] the point at issue is thus briefly stated : " the objections to which Locke's doctrine concerning the origin of our ideas, or, in other words, concerning the sources of our knowledge, are, in my judgment, liable, I have stated so fully in a former work, that I shall not touch on them here. It is quite sufficient, on the present occasion, to reraai'k. how very unjustly this doctrine (imperfect, on the most favor- able construction, as it undoubtedly is) has been confound '^d 34 >^ 402 INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. with those of Gassendi, of Coiidillac, of Diderot, and of Home Tooke. The substance of all that is common in the conclusions of these last writers, cannot be better expressed than in the words of their master, Gassendi. ' All our knowledge,' he ob- serves in a letter to Descartes, ' appears plainly to derive its origin from the senses ; and although you deny the maxim, " Quicquid est intellectu praeesse debere in sensu," [Whatever is in the intellect must have previously been in the faculty of sense,] yet this maxim appears, nevertheless, to be true ; since our knowledge is all ultimately obtained by an influx or incur^ sion from things external ; which knowledge afterwards under- goes various modifications, by means of analogy, composition, division, amplification, extenuation, and other similar processes, which it is unnecessary to enumerate.' This doctrine of Gassen- di's coincides exactly with that ascribed to Locke by Diderot and by Home Tooke ; and it differs only verbally from the more concise statement of Condillac, that ' our ideas are nothing more than transformed sensations' ' Every idea,' says the first of these writers, 'must necessarily, when brought to its state of ultimate decomposition, resolve itself into a sensible representa- tion or picture ; and since every thing in our understanding has been introduced there by the channel of sensation, whatever proceeds out of the understanding is either chimerical, or must be able, in returning by the same road, to reattach itself to its sensible archetype. Hence an important rule in philosophy, — that every expression which cannot find an external and a sen- sible object, to which it can thus establish its affinity, is destitute of signification.' Such is the exposition given by Diderot, of what is regarded in France as Locke's great and capital discov- ery ; and precisely to the same purpose we are told by Condor- cet, that ' Locke was the first who proved that all our ideas are compounded of sensations.' If this were to be admitted as a fair account of Locke's opinion, it would follow that he has not advanced a single step beyond Gassendi and Hobbes ; both of whom have repeatedly expressed themselves in nearly the same words with Diderot and Condorcet. But although it must be granted, in favor of their interpretation of his language, that INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. AOo various detached passages may be quoted from his work, whicli seem, on a superficial view, to justify theh^ comments ; yet of what weight, it may be asked, are these passages, when com- pared with the stress laid by the author on Reflection, as an original source of our ideas, altogether different from Sensation ? * The other fountain,' says Locke, ' from which experience fur- nisheth the understanding with ideas, is the perception of the operations of our own minds within us, as it is employed about the ideas it has got ; which operations, when the soul comes to reflect on and consider, do furnish the understanding with an- other set of ideas, which could not be had from things without ; and such are Perception, Thinking, Doubting, Believing, Rea- soning, Knowing, Willing, and all the different actings of our own minds, which, we being conscious of, and observing in our- selves, do from these receive into our understandings ideas as distinct as we do from bodies affecting our senses. This source of ideas every man has wholly in himself; and though it be not sense, as having nothing to do with external objects, yet it is very like it, and might properly enough be called Internal Sense. But as I call the other Sensation, so I call this Reflection ; the ideas it affords being such only as the mind gets by reflecting on its own operations within itself? Again, ' The understanding seems to me not to have the least glimmering of any ideas which it does not receive from one of these two. External objects furnish the mind with the ideas of sensible qualities ; and the mind furnishes the understanding with ideas of its own operations.' " Stewart's vindication unsatisfactory. — On these observations I must remark, that they do not at all satisfy me ; and I cannot but regard Locke and Gassendi as exactly upon a par, and both as deriving all our knowledge from experience.^ The French philosophers are, therefore, in my opinion, fully justified in their interpretation of Locke's philosophy ; and Condillac must, I think, be viewed as having simplified the doctrine of his master, without doing the smallest violence to its spirit. In the first place, =* [True ; but from experience by way both of sensation and reflection ; and not from experience by way of sensation alone.] — Am. Ed. 404 INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. I cannot concur with Mr. Stewart in allowing any weight to Locke's distinction of Reflection, or Self-consciousness, as a second source of our knowledge. Such a source of experience no sensualist ever denied, because no sensualist ever denied that sense was cognizant of itself. It makes no difference that Locke distinguished Reflection from Sense, " as having nothing to do with external objects," admitting, however, that " thej are ver j like," and that Reflection " might properlj enough be called In- ternal Sense," while Condillac makes it only a modification of sense. It is a matter of no importance that we do not call Self-consciousness by the name of Sense, if we allow that it is only conversant about the contingent. Now, no interpretation of Locke can ever pretend to find in his Reflection a revelation to him of aught native or necessary to the mind, beyond the capability to act and suffer in certain manners, — a capability which no philosophy ever dreamt of denying. And if this be the case, it follows, that the formal reduction, by Condillac, of Reflection to Sensation, is only a consequent following out of the principles of the doctrine itself. The philosophy of Gassendi, — Of how little import is the distinction of Reflection from Sensation, in the philosophy of Locke, is equally shown in the philosophy of Gassendi ; in regard to which I must correct a fundamental error of Mr. Stewart. I had formerly occasion to point out to you the unaccountable mistake of this very learned philosopher, in relation to Locke's use of the term Reflection, which, both in his Essays and his Dissertation^ he states was a word first employed by Locke in its psychological signification. Nothing, I stated, could be more incorrect. When adopted by Locke, it was a word of universal currency, in a similar sense, in every contemporary system of philosophy, and had been so employed for at least a thousand years previously. This being understood, Mr. Stewart's mistake in regard to Gassendi is less surprising. " The word Reflections^ says Mr. Stewart, " expresses the peculiar and characteristical doctrine, by which Locke's system is distinguished from that of the Gassendists and Hobbists. All this, however, serves only to prove still more clearly, how widely remote his real opinion 017 INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 40o this subject was from that commonlj ascribed to him by the French and German commentators. For my own part, I do not think, notwithstanding some casual expressions which may seem to favor the contrary supposition, that Locke would have hesitated foi' a moment to admit, with Cudworth and Price, that the Understanding is itself a source of new ideas. That it is by Reflection^ (which, according to its own definition, means merely the exercise of the Understanding on the internal phe- nomena,) that we get our ideas of Memory, Imagination, Reasoning, and of all other intellectual powers, Mr. Locke has again and again told us ; and from this principle it is so obvious an inference, that all the simple ideas, which are necessarily implied in our intellectual operations, are ultimately to be referred to the same source, that we cannot reasonably suppose a philosopher of Locke's sagacity to admit the former propo- sition, and to withhold his assent to the latter." The inference which, in the latter part of this quotation, Mr. Stewart speaks of, is not so obvious as he supposes, seeing that it was not till Leibnitz that the character of necessity was enounced, and clearly enounced, as the criterion by which to discriminate the native from the adventitious cognitions of the mind. This is, indeed, shown by the example of Gassendi himself, who is justly represented by Mr. Stewart as a Sen- sationalist of the purest water ; but wholly misrepresented by him, as distinguished from Locke by his negation of any faculty corresponding to Locke's Reflection. So far is this from being correct, — Gassendi not only allowed a faculty of Self-conscious- ness analogous to the Reflection of Locke, he actually held such a faculty, and even attributed to it far higher functions than did the English philosopher ; nay, what is more, held it under the very name of Reflection. In fact, from the French philosopher Locke borrowed this, as he did the principal part of his whole philosophy ; and it is saying but little either for the patriotism or intelligence of their countrymen, that the works of Gassendi and Descartes should have been so long eclipsed in France by those of Locke, who was in truth only a follower of the one, and a mistaken refuter of the other. In respect to Gassendi, 406 INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. tliere are reasons that explain this neglect apart from any want of merit in himself; for he is a thinker fully equal to Locke in independence and vigor of intellect, and, with the exception of Leibnitz, he is, of all the great philosophers of modern times, the most varied and profound in learning. Gassendi's division of the phcenomena of mind, — Now, in regard to the point at issue, so far is Gassendi from assimilating Reflection to Sense, as Locke virtually, if not expressly, does, and for which assimilation he has been principally lauded by those of his followers who analyzed every mental process into Sensation, — so far, I say, is Gassendi from doing this, that he places Sense and Reflection at the opposite mental poles, making the former a mental function wholly dependent upon the bodily organism ; the latter, an energy of intellect wholly inorganic and abstract from matter. The cognitive phsenomena of mind Gas- sendi reduces to three general classes of faculties: — 1°. Sense, 2°. Phantasy (or Lnagination), and 3°. Intellect. The two former are, however, virtually one, inasmuch as Phantasy, on his doctrine, is only cognizant about the forms which it receives from Sense, and is, equally with Sense, dependent on a corporeal organ. Intellect, on the contrary, he holds, is not so dependent, and that its functions are, therefore, of a kind superior to those of an organic faculty. These functions or faculties of Intellect he reduces to three. "The first," he says, "is Intellectual Apprehension, — that is, the apprehension of things which are beyond the reach of Sense, and which, consequently, leaving no trace in the brain, are also beyond the ken of Imagination. Such, especially, is spiritual or incorporeal nature, as, for example, the Deity. For although in speaking of God, we say that He is incorporeal, yet in attempting to realize Him to Phantasy, we only imagine something with the attributes of body. It must not, however, be supposed that this is all ; for, besides and above the corporeal form which we thus imagine, there is, at the same time, another conception, which that form contributes, as it were, to veil and obscure. This conception is not confined to the narrow limits of Phantasy ; it is proper to Intellect ; and, therefore, such an apprehension ought not, to be INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 407 called an imagination^ but an intelligence or intellection,^^ In his doctrine of Intellect, Gassendi takes, indeed, far higher ground than Locke ; and it is a total reversal of his doctrine, when it is stated, that he allowed to the mind no different, no higher, appre- hensions than the derivative images of Sense. He says, indeed, and he says truly, that if we attempt to figure out the Deity in imagination, we cannot depict Him in that faculty, except under sensible forms — as, for example, under the form of a venerable old man. But does he not condemn this attempt as derogatory ? and does he not allow us an intellectual conception of the Divinity, superior to the grovelling conditions of Phantasy ? The Cartesians, however, were too well disposed to overlook the limits under which Gassendi had advanced his doctrine, — that the senses are the source of all our knowledge ; and Mr. Stewart has adopted, from the Port Royal Logic, a statement of Gassendi's opinion, which is, to say the least of it, partial and incomplete. The second function which Gassendi assigns to Intellect is Reflection, and the third is Reasoning. It is with the former of these that we are at present concerned. Mr. Stewart, you have seen, distinguishes the philosophy of Locke from that of his predecessor in this, — that the former introduced Reflection or Self-consciousness as a source of knowledge, which was over- looked or disallowed by the latter. Mr. Stewart is thus wrong in the fact of Gassendi's rejection of any source of knowledge of the name and nature of Locke's Reflection. So far is this from being the case, that Gassendi attributes far more to this faculty than Locke ; for he not only makes it an original source of knowledge, but founds upon the nature of its action a proof of the immateriality of mind. " To the second operation," he says, " belongs the Attention or Reflection of the intellect upon its proper acts, — an operation by which it understands that it understands, and thinks that it thinks (qua se intelligere intelligit, cogitatve se cogitare). " We have formerly," he adds, " shown that it is above the power of Phantasy to imagine that it imag- ines, because, being of a corporeal nature, it cannot act upon itself; in fact, it is as absurd to say that I imagine myself to 408 INTERNAL PERCEPTION: SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. imagine, as that I see myself to see." He then goes on to show, that the knowledge we obtain of all our mental operations and affections is by this reflection of Intellect ; that it is necessarily of an inorganic or purely spiritual character ; that it is peculiar to man, and distinguishes him from the brutes ; and that it aids us in the recognition of disembodied substances, in the confession of a God, and in according to Him the veneration which we owe Him. From what I have now said, you will see, that the mere admission of a faculty of Self-consciousness, as a source of knowledge, is of no import in determining the rational, the anti-sensual, character of a philosophy ; and that even those philosophers who discriminated it the most strongly from Sense might still maintain that experience is not only the occasion, but the source, of all our knowledge. Such philosophers were Gas- Bendi and Locke. CHAPTER XXII. THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. — MEMORY PROPER. Through the powers of External and Internal Perception we are enabled to acquire information, — experience : but this acquisition is not of itself independent and complete ; it sup- poses that we are also able to retain knowledge acquired, for we cannot be said to get what we are Unable to keep. The faculty of Acquisition is, therefore, only realized through an- other faculty, — the faculty of Retention or Conservation. Here we have another example of what I have already frequently had occasion to suggest to your observation ; — we have two faculties, two elementary phsenomena, evidently distinct, and yet each depending on the other for its realization. Without a power of Acquisition, a power of Conservation could not be ex- erted ; and without the latter, the former would be frustrated, for we should lose as fast as we acquired. But as the faculty of Ac- quisition would be useless without the faculty of Retention, so the faculty of Retention would be useless without the faculties of Reproduction and Representation. That the mind retained, beyond the sphere of consciousness, a treasury of knowledge, would be of no avail, did it not possess the power of bringing out, and of displaying, — in other words, of reproducing, and rep- resenting, this knowledge in consciousness. But because the faculty of Conservation would be fruitless without the ulterior faculties of Reproduction and Representation, we are not to confound these faculties, or to view the act of mind, which is their joint result, as a simple and elementary phsenomenon. Though mutually dependent on each other, the faculties of Conservation, Reproduction, and Representation are governed 35 (409) 410 THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. bj different laws, and, in different individuals, are found greatly varying in their comparative vigor. Use of the terms Memory and Recollection, — The intimate connection of these three faculties, or elementary activities, is the cause, however, why they have not been distinguished in the analysis of philosophers ; and why their distmction is not pre- cisely marked in ordinary language. In ordinary language, we have, indeed, words which, without excluding the other faculties, denote one of these more emphatically. Thus, in the term Mem- ory^ the Conservative Faculty, the phaenomenon of Retention, is the central notion, with which, however, those of Reproduc- tion and Representation are associated. In the term Recollec- tion ^ again, the phsenomenon of Reproduction is the principal notion, accompanied, however, by those of Retention and Rep- resentation as its subordinates. This being the case, it is evi- dent what must be our course in regard to the employment of common language. We must either abandon it altogether, or take the term that more proximately expresses our analysis, and, by definition, limit and specify its signification. Thus, in the Conservative Faculty, we may either content ourselves with the scientific terms of Conservation and Retention alone, or we may moreover use as a synonym the vulgar term Memory^ deterniin- ing its application, in our mouths, by a preliminary definition. And that the word Memory principally and properly denotes the power the mind possesses of retaining hold of the knowledge it Jias acquired, is generally admitted by philologists, and is not de- nied by philosophers. Of the latter, some have expressly avowed this. Of these, I* shall quote to you only two or three, which happen to occur the first to my recollection. Plato considers Memory simply as the faculty of Conservation. Aristotle dis- tinguishes Memory {iivrniri), as the faculty of Conservation, finm Reminiscence (dvaiivrjoig), the faculty of Reproduction. St. Augustin, who is not only the most illustrious of the Christian fathers, but one of the profoundest thinkers of antiquity, fin*:5ly contrasts Memory with Recollection or Reminiscence, in one of the most eloquent and philosophical chapters of his Oon/js- sions, Joseph Scaliger, also, speaking of himself, is mad^ to THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. 411 say : " I have not a good memory, but a good reminiscence ; proper names do not easily recur to me, hut when I think on them, I find them out." It is sufficient for our purpose that the distinction is here taken between the Retentive Power, — Mem- ory, and the Reproductive Power, — Reminiscence. Scahger's memory could hardly be called bad, though his reminiscence might be better ; and these elements in conjunction go to con- stitute a good memory, in the comprehensive sense of the ex- pression. I say the retentive faculty of that man is surely not to be despised, who was able to commit to memory Homer in twenty-one days, and the whole Greek poets in three months, and who, taking him all in all, was the most learned man the world has ever seen. I might adduce many other authorities to the same effect ; but this, I think, is sufficient to warrant me in using the term Memory exclusively to denote the faculty pos- sessed by the mind of preserving what has once been present to consciousness, so that it may again be recalled and represented in consciousness. So much for the verbal consideration. What is Memory f — By Memory or Retention, you will see, is only meant the condition of Reproduction ; and it is, there- fore, evident that it is only by an extension of the term that it can be called a faculty, that is, an active power. It is more a passive resistance th^,n an energy, and ought, therefore, perhaps to receive rather the appellation of a capacity. But the nature of this capacity or faculty we must now proceed to consider. In the first place, then, I presume that the fact of retention is admitted. We are conscious of certain cognitions as acquired, and we are conscious of these cognitions as resuscitated. That, in the interval, when out of consciousness, these cognitions do continue to subsist in the mind, is certainly an hypothesis, be- cause whatever is out of consciousness can only be assumed ; but it is an hypothesis which we are not only warranted, but neces- sitated, by the phenomena, to establish. I recollect, indeed, that one philosopher has proposed another hypothesis. Avicen- na, the celebrated Arabian philosopher and physician, denies to the human mind the conservation of its acquired knowledge ; and he explains the process of recollection by an irradiation of 412 THE CONSERYATIYE FACULTY. divine liglit, through which the recovered cognition is infused into the intellect. Assuming, however, that the knowledge we have acquired is retained in and by the human mind, we must, of course, attribute to the mind a power of thus retaining it. The fact of memory is thus established. Retention admits of explanation. — But if it cannot be denied that the knowledge we have acquired by Perception and Self- consciousness does actually continue, though out of conscious- ness, to endure ; can we, in the second place, find any ground on which to explain the possibility of this endurance ? I think we can, and shall adduce such an explanation, founded on tiie general analogies of our mental nature. Before, however, com- mencing this, I may notice some of the similitudes which have been suggested by philosophers, as illustrative of this faculty. It has been compared to a storehouse, — Cicero calls it " thesaurus omnium rerum^'' — provided with cells or pigeon-holes, in which its furniture is laid up and arranged. It has been likened to a tablet, on which characters were written or impressed. But of all these sensible resemblances, none is so ingenious as that of Gas- sendi, to the folds in a piece of paper or cloth ; though I do not recollect to have seen it ever noticed. A sheet of paper, or cloth, is capable of receiving innumerable folds, and the folds in which it has been oftenest laid, it takes afterwards of itself. All these resemblances, if intended as more than metaphors, are unphilosophical. We do not even obtain any insight into the nature of Memory from any of the physiological hypotheses which have been stated ; indeed, all of them are too contempti- ble even for serious criticism. "The mind," [says Schmid,] "affords us, however, in itself, the very explanation which we vainly seek in any collateral influences. The phaenomenon of retention is, indeed, so natural, on the ground of the self-energy of mind, that we have no need to suppose any special faculty for memory ; the conservation of the action of the mind being involved in the very conception of its power of self-activity. The real difficulty of the problem, — " Let us consider how knowledge is acquired by the mind. Knowledge is not acquired by a mere passive affection, but through the exertion of sponta- THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. 413 neous activity on the part of the knowing subject ; for though this activity be not exerted without some external excitation, still this excitation is only the occasion on vv^hich the mind de- velops its self-energy. But this energy being once determined, it is natural that it should persist, until again annihilated by other causes. This would, in fact, be the case, were the mind merely passive in the impression it receives ; for it is a univer- sal law of nature, that every effect endures as long as it is not modified or opposed by any other effect. But the mental activ- ity, the act of knowledge, of which I now speak, is more than this ; it is an energy of the self-active power of a subject one and indivisible : consequently, a part of the Ego must be detached or annihilated, if a cognition once existent be again extinguished. Hence it is, that the problem most difficult of solution is noty how a mental activity endures^ hut how it ever vanishes. For as we must here maintain, not merely the possible continuance of certain energies, but the impossibility of the non-continuance of any one, we, consequently, stand in apparent contradiction to what experience shows us ; showing us, as it does, our internal activities in a ceaseless vicissitude of manifestation and disap- pearance. This apparent contradiction, therefore, demands solution. If it be impossible that an energy of mind which has once been should be abolished, without a laceration of the vital unity of the mind as a subject one and indivisible ; — on this supposition, the question arises. How can the facts of our self- consciousness be brought to harmonize with this statement, see- ing that consciousness proves to us, that cognitions once clear and vivid are forgotten ; that feelings, wishes, desires, in a word, every act or modification, of which we are at one time aware, are at another vanished ; and that our internal existence seems daily to assume a new and different aspect. ^ The distribution of the mental force explains forgetfulness. — " The solution of this problem is to be sought for in the theory of obscure or latent modifications, [that is, mental activities, real, but beyond the sphere of consciousness, which I formerly ex- plained.] The disappearance of internal energies from the view of internal perception does not warrant the conclusion, 35* 414 THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. that tliej no longer exist ; for we are not always conscious of all the mental energies whose existence cannot be disallowed. Onlj the more vivid changes sufficiently affect our consciousness to become objects of its apprehension : we, consequently, are only conscious of the more prominent series of changes in our internal state ; the others remain for the most part latent. Thus we take note of our memory only in its influence on our con- sciousness ; and, in general, do not consider that the immenr e proportion of our intellectual possessions consists of our delites- cent cognitions. All the cognitions which we possess, or have possessed, still remain to us, — the whole complement of all our knowledge still lies in our memory ; but as new acquisitions are continually pressing in upon the old, and continually taking place along with them among the modifications of the Ego, the old cognitions, unless from time to time refreshed and brought forward, are driven back, and become gradually fainter and more obscure. This obscuration is not, however, to be conceived as an obliteration, or as a total annihilation. The obscuration, the delitescence of mental activities, is explained by the weak- ening of the degree in which they affect our self-consciousness or internal sense. An activity becomes obscure, because it is no longer able adequately to affect this. To explain, therefore, the disappearance of our mental activities, it is only requisite to explain their weakening or enfeeblement, — which may be at- tempted in the following way: — Every mental activity belongs to the one vital activity of mind in general ; it is, therefore, indivisibly bound up with it, and can neither be torn from, nor abolished in, it. But the mind is only capable, at any one mo- ment, of exerting a certain quantity or degree of force. This quantity must, therefore, be divided among the different activi- ties, S3 that each has only a part; and the sum of force belong- mg to all the several activities taken together, is equal to the quantity or degree of force belonging to the vital activity of mind in general. Thus, in proportion to the greater number of activities in the mind, the less will be the proportion of force which will accrue to each ; .the feebler, therefore, each will be, and the fainter the vivacity with which it can affect self-con- THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. 415 sciousness. This weakening of vivacity can, in consequence of the indefinite increase in the number of our mental activities, caused by the ceaseless excitation of the mind to new knowl- edge, be carried to an indefinite tenuity, without the activities, therefore, ceasing altogether to be. Thus it is quite natural, that the great proportion of our mental cognitions should have waxed too feeble to affect our internal perception with the competent intensity ; it is quite natural that they should have become ob- scure or delitescent. In these circumstances, it is to be supposed, that every new cognition, every newly-excited activity, should be in the greatest vivacity, and should draw to itself the great- est amount of force : this force will, in the same proportion, be withdrawn from the other earlier cognitions ; and it is they, con- sequently, which must undergo the fate of obscuration. Thus is explained the phsenomenon of Forgetfulness or Oblivion. And here, by the way, it should perhaps be noticed, that forget- fulness is not to be limited merely to our cognitions : it applies equally to the feelings and desires. "The same principle illustrates, and is illustrated by, the phaenomenon of Distraction and Attention, If a great number of activities are equally excited at once, the disposable amount of mental force is equally distributed among this multitude, so that each activity only attains a low degree of vivacity; the state of mind which results from this is Distraction. Attention is the state the converse of this ; that is, the state in which the vital activity of mind is, voluntarily or involuntarily, concen- trated, say, in a single activity ; in consequence of which con- centration, this activity waxes stronger, and, therefore, clearer. On this theory, the proposition with which I started, — that all mental activities, all acts of knowledge, which have been once excited, persist, — becomes intelligible ; we never wholly lose them, but they become obscure. This obscuration can be con- ceived in every infinite degree, between incipient latescence and iiTCCoverable latency. The obscure cognition may exist simply out of consciousness, so that it can be recalled by a common act of reminiscence. Again, it may be impossible to recover it by an act of voluntary recollection ; but some association may re- 416 THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. vivify it, enough to make it flash after a long oblivion into con- sciousness. Further, it may be obscured so far that it can only be resuscitated by some morbid affection of the system ; or, finally, it may be absolutely lost for us in this life, and destined only for our reminiscence in the life to come. Conservation of all the mental phcEnomena, — " That this doctrine admits of an immediate application to the faculty of detention, or Memory Proper, has been already signified. And in further explanation of this faculty, I would annex two obser- vations, which arise out of the preceding theory. The first is, that retention, that memory, does not belong alone to the cogni- tive faculties, but that the same law extends, in like manner, over all the three primary classes of the mental phaenomena. It is not ideas, notions, cognitions only, but feelings and cona- tions, which are held fast, and which can, therefore, be again awakened. This fact, of the conservation of our practical mod- ifications, is not indeed denied ; but psychologists usually so represent the matter, as if, when feelings or conations are re- tained in the mind, that this takes place only through the medium of the memory ; meaning by this, that we must, first of all, have had notions of these affections, which notions being preserved, they, when recalled to mind, do again awaken the modification they represent. From the theory I have detailed to you, it must be seen, that there is no need of this intermediation of notions, but that we immediately retain feelings, volitions, and desires, no less than notions and cognitions ; inasmuch as all the three classes of fundamental phaenomena arise equally out of the vital manifestations of the same one and indivisible subject. Memory dependent on corporeal conditions. — " The second result of this theory is, that the various attempts to explain memory by physiological hypotheses are as unnecessary as they are untenable. This is not the place to discuss the general problem touching the relation of mind and body. But in prox- imate reference to memory, it may be satisfactory to show, that this faculty does not stand in need of such crude modes of explanation. It must be allowed, that no faculty affords a more tempting subject for materialistic conjecture^ No othei' menral THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. 417 power betrays a greater dependence on corporeal conditions than memory. Not only, in general, does its vigorous or feeble activity essentially depend on the health and indisposition of the body, more especially of the nervous systems ; but there is manifested a connection between certain functions of memory and certain parts of the cerebral apparatus." This connection, however, is such as affords no countenance to any particular hypotheses at present in vogue. For example, after certain diseases, or certain affections of the brain, some partial loss of memory takes place. Perhaps the patient loses the whole of his stock of knowledge previous to the disease, the faculty of acquiring and retaining new information remaining entire. Perhaps he loses the memory of words, and preserves that of things. Perhaps he may retain the memory of nouns, and lose that of verbs, or vice versa; nay, what is still more marvellous, though it is not a very unfrequent occurrence, one language may be taken neatly out of his retention, without affecting his memory of others. " By such observations, the older psycholo- gists were led .to the various physiological hypotheses by which they hoped to account for the phaenomena of retention, — as, for example, the hypothesis of permanent material impressions on the brain, — or of permanent dispositions in the nervous fibres to repeat the same oscillatory movements, — of particular organs for the different functions of memory, — of particular parts of the brain as the repositories of the various classes of ideas, — or even of a particular fibre, as the instrument of every se^ eral notion. But all these hypotheses betray only an ignorance of the proper object of philosophy, and of the true nature of the thinking principle. They are at best but useless ; for if the unity and self-activity of mind be not denied, it is manifest, that the mental activities, which have been once determined, must persist, and these corporeal explanations are superfluous. Nor can it be argued, that the limitations to which the Retentive, or rather the Hep reductive. Faculty is subjected in its energies, in consequence of its bodily relations, prove the absolute depend- ence of memory on organization, and legitimate the explanation * of this faculty by corporeal agencies ; for the incompetency of 418 THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. this inference can be shown from^ the contradiction in which it stands to the general laws of mind, which, howbeit conditioned by bodily relations, still ever preserves its self-activity and inde- pendence." Two qualities requisite to a good memory, — There is perhaps no mental power in which such extreme differences appear, in different individuals, as in memory. To a good memory there are certahily two qualities requisite, — 1 °, The capacity of Re- tention, and 2°, The faculty of Reproduction. But the former quality appears to be that by which these marvellous contrasts are principally determined. I should only fatigue you, were I to enumerate the prodigious feats of retention, which are proved to have been actually performed. Of these, I shall only select the one which, upon the whole, appears to me the most extra- ordinary. The sum of the statement is, that at Padua there dwelt, [near Muretus,] a young man, a Corsican by birth, and of a good family in that island, who had come thither for the culti- vation of Civil law, in which he was a diligent and distinguished student. He was a frequent visitor at the house and gardens of Muretus, who, having heard that he possessed a remarkable art, or faculty of memory, took occasion, though incredulous in regard to reports, of requesting from him a specimen of his power. He at once agreed ; and having adjourned wdth a considerable party of distinguished auditors into a saloon, Mu- retus began to dictate words, Latin, Greek, barbarous, significant and non-significant, disjointed and connected, until he wearied himself, the young man who wrote them down, and the audience who w^ere present; — "we were all," he says, "marvellously tired." The Corsican alone was the one of the whole company alert and fresh, and continually desired Muretus for more words ; who declared he would be more than satisfied, if he could repeat the half of what had been taken down, and at length he ceased. The young man, with his gaze fixed upon the ground, stood silent for a brief season, and then, says Muretus, " vidi facinus mirificissimum." Having begun to speak, he absolutely repeated \k\^ whole words, in the same order in which they had THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. 419 been delivered, witliout the HlIgllte^;t hesitation ; then, com- meneing from the last, he repeated them backwards till he came to the first. Then again, so that he spoke the first, the third, the fifth, and so on ; did this in any order that was asked, and all without the smallest error. Having subsequently become familiarly acquainted with him, I have had other and frequent experience of his power. He assured me (and he had nothing of the boaster in him) that he could recite, in the manner I have mentioned, to the amount of thirty-six thousand words. And what is more wonderful, they all so adhered to the mind that, after a year's interval, he could repeat them without trouble. I know, from having tried him, he could do so after a consider- able time. Before passing from the faculty of Memory, considered simply as the power of conservation, I may notice tw^o opposite doc- trines, that have been maintained, in regard to the relation of this faculty to the higher powers of mind. One of these doc- trines holds, that a great development of memory is incompatible with a high degree of intelligence ; the other, that a high degree of intelhgence supposes such a development of memory as its condition. Great memory and sound judgment not incompatible. — The former of these opinions is one very extensively prevalent, not only among philosophers, but among mankind in general ; and the w^ords — beati memoria, expectantes judicium — have been applied to express the supposed incompatibility of great memory and sound judgment. There seems, however, no valid ground for this belief. If an extraordinary power of retention is fre- quently not accompanied with a corresponding power of intelli- gence, it is a natural, but not a very logical procedure, to jump to the conclusion, that a great memory is inconsistent with a sound judgment. The opinion is refuted by the slightest induction ; for we immediately find, that many of the individ- uals who towered above their fellows in intellectual superiority, werti almost equally distinguished for the capacity of their memory. I recently quoted to you a passage, in which Joseph Scahger is made to say that he had not a good memory, but a 420 THE CONSERVATIVE FACULTY. good reminiscence ; and he immediately adds, " never, or rarely, are judgment and a great memory found in conjunction." Of this opinion Scaliger himself affords the most illustrious refu- tation. During his lifetime, he was hailed as the Dictator of the Republic of Letters, and posterity has ratified the decision of his contemporaries, in crowning him as the prince of philol- ogers and critics. But to elevate a man to such an eminence, it is evident, that the most consummate genius and ability wen conditions. For intellectual power of the highest order, none were dis- tinguished above Grotius and Pascal ; and Grotius and Pascal forgot nothing they had ever read or thought. Leibnitz and Euler were not less celebrated for their intelligence than for their memory, and both could repeat the whole of the ^neid. Donellus knew the Corpus Juris by heart, and yet he was one of the profoundest and most original speculators in jurisprudence. Muratori, though not a genius of the very highest order, was still a man of great ability and judgment ; and so powerful was his retention, that in making quotations, he had only to read his passages, put the books in their place, and then to write out from memory the words. But if there be no ground for the vulgar opinion, that a strong faculty of retention is incompatible with intellectual capacity in general, the converse opinion is not better founded, which has been maintained, among others, by Hoffbauer. This doctrine does not, however, deserve an articulate refutation ; for the common experience of every one sufficiently proves, that intelligence and memory hold no necessary proportion to each oiher. CHAPTER XXIII, THE REPRODUCTIVE FACULTY. — LAWS OF ASSOCIATION.— SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. I NOW pass to the next faculty in order, — the faculty which I have called the Reproductive. I am not satisfied with this name ; for it does not precisely, of itself, mark what I wish to be expressed, — namely, the process by which what is lying dor- mant in memory is awakened, as contradistinguished from the representation in consciousness of it as awakened. The two processes certainly suppose each other ; for we cannot awaken a cognition without its being represented, — the representation being, in fact, only its state of waking ; nor can a latent thought or alfection be represented, unless certain conditions be fulfilled, by which it is called out of obscurity into the light of conscious- ness. The two processes are relative and correlative, but not more identical than hill and valley. I am not satisfied, I say, with the term reproduction for the process by which the dormant thought or affection is aroused ; for it does not clearly denote what it is intended to express. Perhaps the Resuscitative Fac- ulty would have been better ; and the term reproduction might have been employed to comprehend the whole process, made up of the correlative acts of Retention, Resuscitation, and Represen- tation. Be this, however, as it may, I shall at present continue to employ the term, in the limited meaning I have already assigned. The phaenomenon of Reproduction is one of the most won- derful in the whole compass of psychology ; and it is one in the explanation of which philosophy has been more successful than in almost any other. The Scholastic psychologists seem to have regarded the succession in the train of thought, or, as they called 36 (421) 422 THE REPRODUCTIVE FACUl TY. it, the excitation of the species, with peculiar wonder, as one of the most inscrutable mysteries of nature ; and yet, what is curious, Aristotle has left almost as complete an analysis of the laws by which this phaenomenon is regulated, as has yet been accomplished. It required, however, a considerable progress in the inductive philosophy of mind, before this analysis of Aris- totle could be appreciated at its proper value ; and in fact, it was only after modern philosophers had rediscovered the prin- cipal laws of Association, that it was found that these laws had been more completely given two thousand years before. The faculty of Reproduction is governed by the laws which regulate the Association of the mental train ; or, to speak more correctly, Reproduction is nothing but the result of these laws. Every one is conscious of a ceaseless succession or train of thoughts, one thought suggesting another, which again is the cause of exciting a third, and so on. In what manner, it may be asked, does the presence of any thought determine the introduction of another ? Is the train subject to laws, and if so, by what laws is it regulated ? The train of thought subject to laws. — That the elements of the mental train are not isolated, but that each thought forms a link of a continuous and uninterrupted chain, is well illustrated by Hobbes. " In a company," he says, " in which the conver- sation turned upon the late civil war, what could be conceived more impertinent than for a person to ask abruptly, what was the value of a Roman denarius ? On a little reflection, how- ever, I was easily able to trace the train of thought which suggested the question ; for the original subject of discourse naturally introduced the history of the king, and of the treach- ery of those who surrendered his person t ) his enemies ; this again introduced the treachery of Judas Iscariot, and the sum of money which he received for his reward." But if thoughts, and feelings, and conations (for you must observe, that the train is not limited to the phaenomena of cognition only), do not arise of themselves, but only in casual connection with preceding and subsequent modifications of mind, it remains to be asked and answered, — Do the links of this THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 4:3 chain follow each other under any other condition than that of simple connection ? — in other words, mai/ any thought^ feeling, or desire be connected with any other '^ Or^ is the succession regulated by other and special laws, according to which certain kinds of modification exclusively precede, and exclusively fol- low, each other ? The slightest observation of the phgenomenon shows, that the latter alternative is the case ; and on this all philosophers are agreed. Nor do philosophers differ in regard to what kind of thoughts are associated together. They differ almost exclusively in regard to the subordinate question, of how these thoughts ought to be classified, and carried up into system. This, therefore, is the question to which I shall address myself. The laws of Association — how classified, — I have explained to you how thoughts, once experienced, remain, though out of consciousness, still in possession of the mind ; and I have now to show, how these thoughts retained in memory may, without any excitation from without, be again retrieved by an excitation or awakening from other thoughts within. Philosophers having observed, that one thought determined another to arise, and that this deter n^inati on only took place between thoughts which stood in certain relations to each other, set themselves to ascertain and classify the kinds of correlation under which this occurred, in order to generalize the laws by which the phaenomenon of Re- production was governed. Accordingly it has been established, that thoughts are associated, that is, are able to excite each other; — 1°, If coexistent, or immediately successive, in time; 2°, If their objects are conterminous or adjoining in space ; 3°, If they hold the dependence to each other of cause and effect, or of mean and end, or of whole and part ; 4°, If they stand in \ relation either of contrast or of similarity ; 5°, If they are the operations of the same power, or of different powers conversant ibout the same object; 6*^, If their objects are the sign and the signified; or, 7°j Even if their objects are accidentally denoted by l^e same sound. T\^.ese, as far as I recollect, are all the classes to which phi- losophers have attempted to reduce the principles of Mental 4j^ociation. Aristotle recalled the laws of this connection to 424 THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. four, or rather to three, — Contiguity in time and space^ Resem- blance, and Contrariety. He even seems to have thought they might all be carried up into the one law of Coexistence. St. Augustin explicitly reduces association to a single canon, — namely. Thoughts that have once coexisted in the mind are af- terwards associated. This law, which I would call the law of Redintegration, was afterwards enounced by Malebranche, Wolf, and Bilfinger ; but without any reference to St. Austin. Hume, who thinks himself the first philosopher who had ever attempted to generalize the laws of association, makes them three, — Re- semblance, Contiguity in time and place, and Cause and Effect. Stewart, after disclaiming any attempt at a complete enumera- tion, mentions two classes of circumstances as useful to be observed. " The relations," he says, " upon which some of them are founded, are perfectly obvious to the mind ; those which are the foundation of others, are discovered only in consequence of particular efforts of attention. Of the former kind are the rela- tions of Resemblance and Analogy, of Contrariety, of Vicinity in time and place, and those which arise from accidental coinci- dences in the sound of different words. These, in general, con- nect our thoughts together, when they are suffered to take their natural course, and when we are conscious of little or no active exertion. Of the latter kind are the relations of Cause and Effect, of Means and End, of Premises and Conclusion ; and those others which regulate the train of thought in the mind of the philosopher, when he is engaged in a particular investi- gation." Brown divides the circumstances affecting association into primary and secondary. Under the primary laws of Suggestion, he includes Resemblance, Contrast, Contiguity in time and place, — a classification identical with Aristotle's. By the secondary, he means the vivacity, the recentness, and the frequent repeti- tion of our thoughts ; circumstances which, though they exert an influence on the recurrence of our thoughts, belong to a different order of causes from those we are at present consider- ing. These laws reduced to two^ and even to one. — Now all the rrlE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 425 laws which I have hitherto enumerated may be easily reduced to two, — the law of the Simidtanelty^ and the law of the Resem-' hlance or Affinity^ of Thought. Under Simultaneity I include Immediate Consecution in time ; to the other category of Affin- ity every other circumstance may be reduced. I shall take the several cases 1 have above enumerated, and having exemplified their influence as associating principles, I shall show how they are all only special modifications of the two laws of Simulta- neity and Affinity ; which two lavs^s, I shall finally prove to you, are themselves only modifications of one supreme law, — the law of Redintegration, The law of Simultaneity. — The first law, — that of Simul- taneity, or of Coexistence and Immediate Succession in time, — is too evident to require any illustration. " In passing along a road," as Mr. Stewart observes, " which we have formerly trav- elled in the company of a friend, the particulars of the conver- sation in vrhich v/e were then engaged, are frequently suggested to us by the objects we meet with. In such a scene, we recol- lect that a particular subject was started ; and in passing the different houses, and plantations, and rivers, the arguments we were discussing when we last saw them recur spontaneously to the memory. The connection which is formed in the mind be- tween the words of a language and the ideas they denote; the connection which is formed between the different words of a discourse we have committed to memory ; the connection be- tween the different notes of a piece of music in the mind of the musician, are all obvious instances of the same general law of our nature." The law of Affinity, — The second law, — that of the Affinity of thoughts, — will be best illustrated by the cases of which it is the more general expression. In the first place, in the case of resembling^ or analogous^ or partially identical objects, it will not be denied that these virtually suggest each other. The im- agination of Alexander carries me to the imagination of Caesar, Caesar to Charlemagne, Charlemagne to Napoleon. The vision of a portrait suggests the image of the person portrayed. In a company one anecdote suggests another analogous. That re- 36* ' 426 THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. sembling, analogous, or partially identical objects stand in recip- rocal Affinity, is apparent ; they are its strongest exemplifications. So far there is no difficulty. In the second place, thoughts standing to each other in the relation of contrariety or contrast are mutually suggestive. Thus the thought of vice suggests the thought of virtue ; and, in the mental world, the prince and the peasant, kings and beg- gars, are inseparable concomitants. On this principle are de- pendent those associations which constitute the charms of antithesis and wit. Thus the whole pathos of Milton's apos- trophe to light lies in the contrast of his own darkness to the resplendent object he addresses. And in what else does the beauty of the following line consist, but m the contrast and connection of life and death ; life being represented as but a wayfaring from grave to grave ? T/f ^Ioq; — e/c TVfLfjOLO d-opdv, em tv{i(3ov dSevo). Who can think of Mariu.^ sitting amid the ruins of Carthage, without thinking of the resemblance of the consul and the city, - — without thinking of the difference between their past and present fortunes ? And in the incomparable epigram of Molsa on the great Pompey, the effect is produced by the contrast of the life and death of the hero, and in the conversion of the very fact of his posthumous dishonor into a theme of the noblest panegyric. " Dux, Pharia quamvis jaceas inhumatus arena, Noil ideo fati est ssevior ira tui : Indignum fuerat tellus tibi victa sepulcrum ; Non decuit ccelo, te, nisi, Magne, tegi." Thus that objects, though contrasted, are still akin, — still stand to each other in a relation of Affinity, depends on their logical analogy. The axiom, that the knowledge of contraries is one, proves that the thought of the one involves the thought of the other. In the thi7^d place, objects contiguous in place are associated. Tou recollect the famous passage of Cicero in the first chapter THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 427* of the fifth book De Finihus^ of which the following is the con- clusion : — " Tanta vis admonitionis est in locis, ut, non sine causa, ex his memoriae deducta sit discipllna Id quidem infinitum in hac urbe ; quocumque enim ingredimur, in aliquam historiam vestigium ponimus." But how do objects adjacent in place stand in Afiinity to each other ? Simply because local contiguity binds up objects, otherwise unconnected, into a single object of perceptive thought. In the fourth place, thoughts of the whole and the parts, of the thing and its properties, of the sign and the thing signified, — of these it is superfluous to illustrate either the reality of the influence, or to show that they are only so many forms of Affin- ity ; both are equally manifest. But in this case Affinity is not the only principle of association ; here Simultaneity also occurs. One observation I may make to show, that what Mr. Stewart promulgates as a distinct principle of association, is only a sub- ordinate modification of the two great laws I have laid down ; — I mean his association of objects arising from accidental coinci- dences in the sound of the words by which they are denoted. Here the association between the objects or ideas is not immedi- ate. One object or idea signified suggests its term signifying. But a complete or partial identity in sound suggests another word, and 'that word suggests the thing or thought it signifies. The two things or thoughts are thus associated, only mediately, through the association of their signs, and the several immedi- ate associations are very simple examples of the general laws. In the fifth place, thoughts of causes and efifects reciprocally suggest each other. Thus the falling snow excites the imag- ination of an inundation ; a shower of hail, a thought of the destruction of the fruit ; the sight of wine carries us back to the grapes, or the sight of the grapes carries us forward to the wine ; and so forth. But cause and effect not only naturally, but necessarily, suggest each other ; they stand in the closest Affinity ; and, therefore, whatever phsenomena are subsumed under this relation, as indeed under all relations, are, conse- quently, also in Affinity. One grand law of Redintegration. — I have now, I think, 428 THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION". gone through all the circumstances which philosophers liave constituted into separate laws of Association ; and shown that they easily resolve themselves into the two laws of Simultaneity and Affinity. I now proceed to show you, that these two laws themselves are reducible to that one law, which I would call the law of Redintegration or Totality, which, as I already stated, I have found incidentally expressed by St. Augustin. This law may be thus enounced, — Those thoughts suggest each other which had 'previously constituted parts of the same entire or total act of cognition, Now to the same entire or total act belong, as integral or constituent parts, in the first place, those thoughts which arose at the same time, or in immediate consecution ; and in the second, those thoughts which are bound up into one by their mutual affinity. Thus, therefore, the two laws of Simul- taneity and Affinity are carried up into unity, in the higher law of Redintegration or Totality ; and by this one law the whole phenomena of Association may be easily explained. The law of Redintegration explained, — But this law being established by induction and generalization, and affi3rding an explanation of the various phsenomena of Association, it may be asked, How is this law itself explained ? On what principle of our intellectual nature is it founded ? To this no answer can be legitimately demanded. It is enough for the natural philos- opher, to reduce the special laws of the attraction of distant bodies to the one principle of gravitation ; and his theory is not invalidated, because he can give no account of how gravitation is itself determined. In all our explanations of the phsenomena of mind and matter, we must always arrive at an ultimate fact or law, of which we are wholly unable to affiord an ulterior ex- planation. We are, therefore, entitled to decline attempting any illustration of the ground on which the supreme fact or law of Association reposes ; and if we do attempt such illustration, and fail in the endeavor, no presumption is, therefore, justly to be raised against the truth of the fact or principle itself. But an illustration of this great law is involved in the princi- ple of the unity of the mental e4.ergies, as the activities of the subject one and indivisible, to which I have had occasion to THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 429, refer. " The various acts of mind," [says Schmid,] " must not be viewed as single, — as isolated, manifestations ; they all belong to the one activity of the Ego : and, consequently, if our s'arious mental energies are only partial modifications of the same general activity, they must all be associated among themselves. Every mental energy, — every thought, feeling, desire that is excited, excites at the same time all other previously existent activities, in a certain degree ; it spreads its excitation over the whole activities of the mind, as the agitation of one place of a sheet of water expands itself, in wider and wider circles, over the whole surface of the fluid, although, in proportion to its eccen- tricity, it is always becoming fainter, until it is at last not to be perceived. The force of everj internal activity exists only in a certain limited degree ; consequently, the excitation it deter- mines has only likewise a certain limited power of expansion, and is continually losing in vigor in proportion to its eccentricity. Thus there are formed particular centres, particular spheres, of internal unity, within which the activities stand to each other in a closer relation of action and reaction ; and this, in proportion as they more or less belong already to a single energy, — hi proportion as they gravitate more or less proximately to the same centre of action. A plurality, a comj^lement, of several activities forms, in a stricter sense, one whole activity for itself; an invigoration of any of its several 'activities is, therefore, an invigoration of the part of a whole activity ; and as a part cannot be active for itself alone, there, consequently, results an invigoration of the whole, that is, of all the other parts of which it is composed. Thus the supreme law of association, — that activities excite each other in proportion as they have previously belonged, as parts, to one whole activity, — is explained from the still more universal principle of the unity of all our mental energies in general. '' " But on the same principle, we can also explain the two subal- tern laws of Simultaneity and Affinity. The phsenomena of mind are manifested under a twofold condition or form ; for they are only revealed, 1°, As occurrences in time ; and, 2°, As the energies or modifications of the Eo:o. as their cause and subject. 430 THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. Time and Self are thus the two forms of the internal world. By these two forms, therefore, every particular, every limited, unity of operation, must be controlled ; — on them it must depend. And it is precisely these two forms that lie at the root of the two laws of Simultaneity and Affinity. Thus acts which are exerted at the same time belong, by that very circumstance, to the same particular unity, — to the same definite sphere of mental energy ; in other words, constitute through their simul- taneity a single activity. Thus energies, however heterogeneous in themselves, if developed at once, belong to the same activity, — constitute a particular unity ; and they will operate with a greater suggestive influence on each other, in proportion as they are more closely connected by the bond of time. On the other hand, the affinity of mental acts or modifications will be deter- mined by their particular relations to the Ego, as their cause or subject. As all the activities of mind obtain a unity in being all the energies of the same soul or active principle in general, so they are bound up into particular unities, inasmuch as they belong to some particular faculty, — resemble each other in the common ground of their manifestation. Thus cognitions, feel- ings, and volitions severally awaken cognitions, feelings, and volitions ; for they severally belong to the same faculty, and, through that identity, are themselves constituted into distinct unities : or again, a thought of the cause suggests a thought of the effect, a thought of the mean suggests a thought of the end, a thought of the part suggests a thought of the whole ; for cause and effect, end and mean, whole and parts, have subjectively an indissoluble affinity, as they are all so many forms or organi- zations of thought. In hke manner, the notions of all resembling objects suggest each other, for they possess some common quality, through which they are in thought bound up in a single act of thought. Even the notions of opposite and contrasted objects mutually excite each other upon the same principle ; for these are logically associated, inasmuch as, by the laws of thought, the notion of one opposite necessarily involves the notions of the other ; and it is also a psychological law, that contrasted objects relieve ^.ach other. Opposita, juxta posita, se invicem colliistranL THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 431 Wlien the operations of different faculties are mutually sug- gestive, they are, likewise, internally connected by the nature of their action ; for they are either conversant with the same object, and have thus been originally determined by the same affection from without, or they have originally been associated through some form of the mind itself; thus moral cognitions, moral feelings, and moral volitions, may suggest each other, through the common bond of morality ; the moral principle in this case uniting the operations of the three fundamental powers into one general activity." How thoughts apparently unassociated succeed each other, — It sometimes happens, that thoughts seem to follow each other immediately, between which it is impossible to detect any bond of association. If this anomaly be insoluble, the whole theory of association is overthrown. Philosophers have accordingly set themselves to account for this phosnomenon. To deny the fact of the phaenomenon is impossible ; it must, therefore, be explained on the hypothesis of association. Now, in their at- tempts at such an explanation, all philosophers agree in regard to the first step of the solution, but they differ in regard to the second. They agree in this, — that, admitting the apparent, the phasnomenal, immediacy of the consecution of the two unasso- ciated thoughts, they deny its reality. They all affirm, that there have actually intervened one or more thoughts, through the mediation of which, the suggestion in question has been affected, and on the assumption of which intermediation, the theory of association remains intact. For example, let us sup- pose that A and C are thoughts, not on any law of association suggestive of each other, and that A and C appear to our con- sciousness as following each other immediately. In this case, I say, philosophers agree in supposing, that a thought B, associ- ated with A and with C, and which consequently could be awakened by A, and could awaken C, has intervened. So far they are at one. But now comes their separation. It is asked, how can a thought be supposed to intervene, of which conscious- ness gives us no indication ? In reply to this, two answers have been made. By one set of philosophers, among whom I may 432 THE LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. particularly specify Mr. Stewart, it is said, that the immediate thought B, having been awakened by A, did rise into conscious- ness, suggested C, and was instantly forgotten. This solution is apparently that exclusively known in Britain. Other philos- ophers, following the indication of Leibnitz^ by whom the theory of obscure or latent activities was first explicitly promulgated, maintain that the intermediate thought never did rise into con- sciousness. They hold that A excited B, but that the excite- ment was not strong enough to rouse B from its state of latency, though strong enough to enable it obscurely to excite C, whose latency was less, and to afford it vivacity* sufficient to rise into consciousness. Explained through the latent modifications of mind, — Of these opinions, I have no hesitation in declaring for the latter. I formerly showed you an analysis of some of the most palpable and familiar phsenomena of mind, which made the supposition of mental modifications latent, but not inert, one of absolute necessity. In particular, I proved this in regard to the phasnom- ena of Perception. But the fact of such latencies being estab- lished in one faculty, they afford an easy and philosophical explanation of the phasnomena in all. In the present instance, if we admit, as admit we must, that activities can endure, and consequently can operate, out of consciousness, the question is at once solved. On this doctrine, the whole theory of associa- tion obtains an easy and natural completion ; as no definite line can be drawn between clear and obscure activities, which melt insensibly into each ; and both, being of the same nature, must be supposed to operate under the same laws. In illustration of the mediatory agency of latent thoughts in the process of sug- gestion, I formerly alluded to an analogous phaenomenon under the laws of physical motion, which I may again call to your remembrance. If a series of elastic balls, say of ivory, are placed in a straight line, and in mutual contact, and if the^ first be sharply struck, what happens ? The intermediate balls re- main at rest ; the last alone is moved. The other doctrine, which proceeds upon the hypothesis that we can be conscious of a thought and that thought be instantly SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. 433 forgotten, has every thing against it, and nothing in its fa^or. In the first place, it does not, like the counter hypothesis of la- tent agencies, only apply a principle which is already proved to exist ; it, on the contrary, lays its foundation in a fact which is not shown to be real. But in the second place, this fact is not only not shown to be real : it is iniprobable, — nay, impossible ; for it contradicts the whole analogy of the intellectual phaenomena. The memory or retention of a thought is in proportion to its vivacity in consciousness ; but that all trace of its existence so, completely perished with its presence, that reproduction be- came impossible, even the instant after, — this assumption vio- lates every probability, in gratuitously disallowing the established law of the proportion between consciousness and memory. But on this subject, having formerly spoken, it is needless now agam to dwell. So much for the Laws of Association, — the laws to which the faculty of Reproduction is subjected. Spontaneous Suggestion and Reminiscence, — This faculty, I formerly mentioned, might be considered as operating, either spontaneously, without any interference of the will, or as modi- fied in its action by the intervention of volition. In the one case, as in the .other, the Reproductive Faculty acts in subservi- ence to its own laws. In the former case, one thought is allowed to suggest another according to the greater general connection subsisting between them ; in the latter, the act of volition, by concentrating attention upon a certain determinate class of as- sociating circumstances, bestows on these circumstances an ex- traordinary vivacity, and, consequently, enables them to obtain the preponderance, and exclusively to determine the succession of the intellectual train. The former of these cases, where the Reproductive Faculty is left wholly to itself, may not improperly be called Spontaneous Suggestion, or Suggestion simply ; the latter ought to obtain the name of Reminiscence or Recollection, (in Greek dvdfJLVTjaig), The employment of these terms in these significations corresponds with the meaning they obtam in common usage. Philosophers have not, however, always so applied them. But as I have not entered on a criticism of the a? 434 SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. analyses attempted by philosophers of the faculties, so I shall say nothing in illustration of their perversion of the terms by which they have denoted them. Recollection or Reminiscence supposes two things. " First, it is necessary that the mind recognize the ijentity of two repre- sentations, and then, it is necessary that the mind be conscious of something different from the first impression, in consequence of which it affirms to itself that it had formerly experienced this modification. It is passing marvellous, this conviction that we have of the identity of two representations ; for they ar^ only similar, not the same. Were they the same, it would be impossible to discriminate the thought reproduced from the thought originally experienced." This circumstance justly ex- cited the admiration of St. Augustin, and he asks how, if we had actually forgotten a thing, we could so categorically affirm, — it is not that, when some one named to us another ; or, it is that, when it is itself presented. The question was worthy of his subtlety, and the answer does honor to his penetration. His principle is, that we cannot seek in our own memory for that of which we have no sort of recollection. We do not seek what hai been our first reflective thought in infancy, the first reasoning we have performed, the first free act which raised us above the rank of automata. We are conscious that the attempt would be fruitless ; and even if modifications thus lost should chance to recur to our mind, we should not be able to say with truth that we had recollected them, for we should have no criterion by which to recognize them. And what is the consequence he de- duces ? It is worthy of your attention. From the moment, then, that we seek aught in our memory, we declare, by that very act, that we have not altogether for gotten it ; we still hold of it, as it were, a part, and by this part, which we hold, we seek that which we do not hold. And what is the secret motive which determines us to this research ? It is that our memory feels, that it does not see together all that it was accustomed to see together. It feels with regret that it still only discovers a part of itself, and hence its disquietude to seek out what is missing, in order to reannex it to the whole ; like to SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE, 435 those reptiles, if the comparison may be permitted, whose mem- bers, 'when cut asunder, seek again to reunite. But when this detached portion of our memory at length presents itself, — the name, for example, of a person, which had escaped us, — how shall we proceed to reannex it to the other ? We have only to allow nature to do her work. For if the name, being pro- nounced, goes of itself to reunite itself to the thought of the person, and to place itself, so to speak, upon his face, as upon its ordinary seat, we will say, without hesitation, — there it is. And if, on the contrary, it obstinately refuses to go there to place itself, in order to rejoin the thought to which we had else attached it, we will say peremptorily and at once, — no, it does not suit. But when it suits, where do we discover this luminous accordance which consummates our research ? And where can we discover it, except in our memory itself, — in some back chamber, I mean, of that labyrinth where what we considered as lost had only gone astray. And the proof of this is manifest. When the name presents itself to our mind, it appears neither novel nor strange, but old and familiar, like an ancient property of which we have recovered the title-deeds. Such is the doctrine of one of the profoundest thinkers of antiquity, and whose philosophical opinions, were they collected, arranged, and illustrated, would raise him to as high a rank among metaphysicians, as he already holds among theologians. The consecutive order of association not the only one, — " Among psychologists," [says Cardaillac,] " those who have written on Memory and Reproduction with the greatest detail and precision, have still failed in giving more than a meagre outline of these operations. They have taken account only of the notions which suggest each other with a distinct and palpa- ble notoriety. They have viewed the associations only in the order in which language is competent to express them ; and as language, which renders them still more palpable and distinct, can only express them in a consecutive order, — can only express them one after another, they have been led to suppose that thoughts only awaken in succession. Thus, a series of ideas mutually associated resembles, on the doctrine of philosophers, 436 SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. a chain, in which every link draws up that which folio w-s ; and it is by" means of these links that intelligence labors through, in the act of reminiscence, to the end which it proposes to attain. " There are some, indeed, among them, who are ready to ac- knowledge, that every actual circumstance is associated to sev- eral fundamental notions, and, consequently, to several chains, be- tween which the mind may choose ; they admit even, that every link is attached to several others, so that the whole forms a hind of trellis^ — a kind of net-work^ which the mind may traverse in every direction^ but still always in a single direction at once, — always in a succession similar to that of speech. This manner of explaining reminiscence is founded solely on this, ^ — that, content to have observed all that is distinctly manifest in the phsenomenon, they have paid no attention to the under play of the latescent activities, — paid no attention to all that custom conceals, and conceals the more effectually in proportion as it is more completely blended with the natural agencies of mind. ; The movement of thought from one order of subjects to another. ^ "b — " Thus their theory, true in itself, and departing from a well- K " established principle, the Association of Ideas, explains in a satisfactory manner a portion of the phssnomena of Reminis- cence ; but it is incomplete, for it is unable to account for the prompt, easy, and varied -operation of this faculty, or for all the marvels it performs. On the doctrine of the philosophers, we can explain how a scholar repeats, without hesitation, a lesson he has learned, for all the words are associated in his mind according to the order in which he has studied them ; how he demonstrates a geometrical theorem, the parts of which are connected together in the same manner ; these and similar reminiscences of simple successions present no difficulties which the common doctrine cannot resolve. But it is impossible, on this doctrine, to explain the rapid and certain movement of thought, which, with a marvellous facility, passes from one. order of subjects to another, only to return again to the first ; which advances, retrogrades, deviates, and reverts, sometimes marking all the points on its route, again clearing, as if in play, immense intervals ; which runs over, now in a manifest order, now in a SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. 437 seeming irregularity, all the notions relative to an object, often relative to several, between which no connection could be sus- pected ; and this without hesitation, without uncertainty, without error, as the hand of a skilful musician expatiates over the keys of the most complex organ. All this is inexplicable on the meagre and contracted theory on which the phasnomena of Re- production have been thought explained. Two conditions of Reminiscence, — " To form a correct notion of the phasnomena of Reminiscence, it is requisite, that we consider under what conditions it is determined to exertion. In the first place, it is to be noted that, at every crisis of our exist- ence, momentary circumstances are the causes which awaken our activity, and set our recollection at work to supply the nec- essaries of thought. In the second place, it is as constituting a want (and by want^ I mean the result either of an act of desire or of volition), that the determining circumstance tends princi- pally to awaken the thoughts with which it is associated. This being the case, we should expect that each circumstance which constitutes a want should suggest, likewise, the notion of an object, or objects, proper to satisfy it ; and this is what actually happens. It is, however, further to be observed, that it is not enough that the want suggests the idea of the object ; for if that idea were alone, it would remain without effect, since it could not guide me in the procedure I should follow. It is necessary, at the same time, that, to the idea of this object there should be associated tl^e notion of the relation of this object to the want, of the place where I may find it, of the means by which I may procure it, and turn it to account, etc. For instance, I wish to make a quotation : — this want awakens in me the idea of the author in whom the passage is to be found, which I am desirous of citing ; but this idea would be fruitless, unless there were conjoined, at the same time, the representation of the volume, of the place where I may obtain it', of the means I must eji- ploy, etc. Accessory notions awakened, — " Hence I infer, in the first place, that a want does not awaken an idea of its object alone, but that it awakens it accompanied with a number, more or less 37=* 438 SUGGESTION AND EEMINISCENCE. considerable, of accessory notions, which form, as it were, its train or attendance. This train may vary according to the nature of the want which suggests the notion of an object ; but the train can never fall wholly off, and it becomes more indissolubly attached to the object, in proportion as it has been more fre- quently called up in attendance. "I infer, in the second place, that this accompaniment of accessory notions, simultaneously suggested with the principal idea, is far from being as vividly and distinctly represented in consciousness as that idea itself; and when these accessories have once been completely blended with the habits of the mind, and its reproductive agency, they at length finally disappear, becoming fused, as it were, in the consciousness of the idea to which they are attached. Experience proves this double effect of the habits of Reminiscence. If we observe our operations relative to the gratification of a want, we shall perceive that we are far from having a clear consciousness of the accessory notions ; the consciousness of them is, as it were, obscured, and yet we cannot doubt that they are present to the mind, for it is they that direct our procedure in all its details. These accessory notions unknown to consciousness, — "We must, therefore, I think, admit that the thought of an object immediately suggested by a desire, is always accompanied by an escort, more or less numerous, of accessory thoughts, equally present to the mind, though, in general, unknown in themselves to consciousness ; that these accessories are not without their influence in guiding the operations elicited by the principal notion ; and, it may even be added, that they are so much the more calculated to exert an effect in the conduct of our proced- ure, in proportion as, having become more part and parcel of our habits of Reproduction, the influences they exert are further withdrawn, in ordinary, from the ken of consciousness." The same thing may be illustrated by what happens to us in the case of reading. Originally, each word, each letter, was a separate object of consciousness. At length, the knowledge of letters and words and hues being, as it were, fused into our habits, we no longer have any distinct consciousness of them, as severally SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. 439 concurring to the result, of which alone we are conscious. But that each word and letter has its effect, — an effect which can, at any moment, become an object of consciousness, is shown by the following experiment. If we look over a book for the occurrence of a particular name or word, we glance our eye over a page from top to bottom, and ascertain, almost in a moment, that it is or is not to be found therein. Here the mind is hardly con- scious of a single word, but that of which it is in quest ; but yet it is evident, that each other word and letter must have pro- duced an obscure effect, and which effect the mind was ready to discriminate and strengthen, so as to call it into clear con- sciousness, whenever the effect was found to be that which the letters of the word sought for could determine. But, if the mind be not unaffected by the multitude of letters and words which it surveys, if it be able to ascertain whether the combi- nation of letters constituting the word it seeks, be or be not actually among them, and all this without any distinct conscious- ness of all it tries and finds defective, — why may we not sup- pose, — why are we not bound to suppose, that the mind may, in like manner, overlook its book of memory, and search among its magazines of latescent cognitions for the notions of w^hich it is in want, awakening these into consciousness, and allowing the others to remain in their obscurity ? £^ach accessory thought calls up other thoughts. — "A more attentive consideration of the subject," [et>ntinues Cardaillac,] " will show, that we have not yet divined the faculty of Remin- iscence in its whole extent. Let us make a single reflection. Continually struck by relations of every kind, continually as* sailed by a crowd of perceptions and sensations of every variety, and, at the same time, occupied with a complement of thoughts \ we experience at once, and we are more or less distinctly con^ scious of, a considerable number of wants, — wants sometimeg real, sometimes factitious or imaginary, — phgenomena, however, all stamped with the same characters, and all stimulating us to act with more or less of energy. And as we choose among tho different wants which we would satisfy, as well as among the different means of satisfying that want which we determine to 440 SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. prefer ; and as the motives of tliis preference are taken either from among the principal ideas relative to each of these several wants, or from among the accessory ideas which habit has estab- lished into their necessary escorts; — in all these case?, it is re-^ quisite that all the circumstances should at once, and from the moment they have taken the character of wants, produce an effect correspondent to that which, we have seen, is caused by each in particular. Hence we are compelled to conclude, tli^t the complement of the circumstances by which we are thus affected, has the effect of rendering always present to us, and, consequently, of placing at our disposal, an immense number of thoughts; some of .which certainly are distinctly recognized, being accompanied by a vivid consciousness, but the greater number of which, although remaining latent, are not the less effective in continually exercising their peculiar influence on our modes of judging and acting. " We might say, that each of these momentary circumstances, is a kind of electric shock which is communicated to a certain portion, — to a certain limited sphere, of intelligence ; and the sum of all these circumstances is equal to so many shocks, which, given at once at so many different points, produce a general agitation. We may form some rude conception of this phaenom- enon by an analogy. We may compare it, in the former case, to those concentric circles which are presented to our observa- tion on a smooth sheet of water, when its surface is agitated by throwing in a pebble ; and, in the latter case, to the same sur- face when agitated by a number of pebbles thrown simultan- eously at different points. " To obtain a clearer notion of this phsenomenon, I may add some observations on the relations of our thoughts among them- selves^ and with the determining circumstances of the moment. " 1°, Among the thoughts, notions, or ideas which belong to the different groups, attached to the principal representations simultaneously awakened, there are some reciprocally connected by relations proper to themselves ; so that, in this whole com- plement of coexistent activities, these tend to excite each other to higher vigor, and, consequently, to obtain for themselves a SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. 441 kind of preeminence in the group or particular circle of activity to which they belong. " 2^, There are thoughts associated, whether as principals or accessories, to a greater number of determining circumstances, or to circumstances which recur more frequently. Hence they present themselves oftener than the others, they enter more completely into our habits, and take, in a more absolute manner, the character of customary or habitual notions. It hence results, that they are less obtrusive, though more energetic, in their in- fllience, enacting, as they do, a principal part in almost all our deliberations ; and exercising a stronger influence on our deter- minations. "3^, Among this great crowd of thoughts, simultaneously excited, those which are connected with circumstances which more vividly affect us, assume not only the ascendant over others of the same description with themselves, but likewise predomi- nate over all those which are dependent on circumstances of a feebler determining influence. " From these three considerations, we ought, therefore, to infer, that the thoughts connected with circumstances on which our attention is more specially concentrated, are those which prevail over the others ; for the effect of attention is to render dominant and exclusive the object on which it is directed, and during the moment of attention, it is the circumstance to which we attend t^>at necessarily obtains the ascendant. " Thus if we appreciate correctly the phgenomena of Repro- duction or Reminiscence, we shall recognize, as an incontestable fact, that our thoughts suggest each other, not one by one suc- cessively, as the order to which language is astricted mighl lead* us to infer; but that the complement of circumstance? under which we at every moment exist, awakens simultaneouslj a great number of thoughts ; these it calls into the presence oi the mind, either to place them at our disposal, if we find it re quisite to employ them, or to make them cooperate in our de- liberations, by giving them, according to their nature and our habits, an influence, more or less active, on our judgments and consequent acts. , 442 SUGGESTION AND REMINISCENCE. " It is also to be observed, that in this great crowd of thoughtv*^ always present to the mind,, there is only a small number of which we are distinctly conscious : and that in this small num- ber, we ought to distinguish those which, being clothed in lan- guage oral or mental, become the objects of a more fixed atten- tion ; those which hold a closer relation to circumstances more impressive than others ; or which receive a predominant char- acter by the more vigorous attention we bestow on them. As to the others, although not the objects of clear consciousness, they are nevertheless present to the mind, there to perform, a very important part as motive principles of determination ; and the influence which they exert in this capacity is even the more powerful in pr< portion as it is less apparent, being more dis- guised by habit CHAPTER XXIV. THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. — IMAGINATION. Having terminated the separate consideration of the two drst of the three correlative processes of Retention, Reproduc- tion, and Representation, I proceed to^the special discussion of the last, — the Representative Faculty. By the faculty of Representation, as I formerly mentioned, I mean strictly the power the mind has of holding up vividly before itself the thoughts which, by the act of Reproduction, it has recalled* into consciousness. Though the processes of Rep- resentation and Reproduction cannot exist independently of each other, they are nevertheless not more to be confounded into one than those of Reproduction and Conservation. They are, indeed, discriminated by differences sufficiently decisive. Reproduction, as we have seen, operates, in part at least, out of consciousness. Representation, on the contrary, is only realized as it is realized in consciousness ; the degree or vivacity of the representation being always in proportion to the degree or vivacity of our consciousness of its reality. Nor are the energies of Representation and Reproduction al- ways exerted by the same individual in equal intensity, any more than the energies of Reproduction and Retention. Some minds are distinguished for a higher power of manifesting one of these phaenomena ; others, for manifesting another ; and as it is not always the person who forgets nothing, who can most promptly recall what he retains, so neither is it always the per- son who recollects most easily and correctly, who can exhibit what he remembers in *the most vivid colors. It is to be recol- lected, however, that Retention, Reproduction, and Representa* -(443 J 444 THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. tion, though not in different per^;ons of the same relative vigor, are, however, in the same individuals, all strong or weak in reference to the same classes of objects. For example, if a man's memory be more peculiarly retentive of words, his verbal reminiscence and imagination will, in like manner, be more par- ticularly energetic. In common language, it is not of course to be expected that there should be found terms to express the result of an analysis, which had not even been performed by philosophers ; and, ac- cordingly, the term Imagination^ or Phantasy, which denotes most nearly the Representative process, does this, however, not without an admixture of other processes, which it is of conse- quence for scientific precision that we should consider apart. Improper division of * Imagination. — Philosophers have di- vided Imagination into two, — what they call the Reproductive and the Productive. By the former, they mean Imagination considered as simply reexhibiting, representing, the objects pre- sented by perception, that is, exhibiting them without addition or retrenchment, or any change in the relations which they reciprocally held when first made known to us through sense. This operation Mr. Stewart has discriminated as a separate fac- ulty, and bestowed on it the name of Conception. This dis- crimination and nomenclature I think unfortunate. The dis- crimination is unfortunate, because it is unphilosophical to distinguish, as a separate faculty, what is evidently only a special application of a common power. The nomenclature is unfortunate, for the term Conception^ which means a taking up in bundles, or grasping into unity, — this term, I say, ought to have been left to denote, what it previously was, and only prop- perly could be, applied to express, — the notions we have of classes of objects, in other words, what have been called our general ideas. Be this, however, as it may, it is evident, that the Reproductive Imagination (or Conception, in the abusive language of the Scottish philosophers) is not a simple faculty. It comprises two processes : — first^ an act of representation strictly so called ; and, secondly, an act of reproduction arbi- trarily limited by certain contingent circumstances ; and it is THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 445 from the arbitrary limitation of this second constituent, that the faculty obtains the only title it can exhibit to an independent 5xistence. Nor can the Productive Imagination establish a better claim to the distinction of a separate faculty than the Reproductive. The Productive or Creative Imagination is that which is usually signified by the term Imagination or Fancy^ in ordinary language. Now, in the first place, it is to be observed, that the terms productive or creative are very im- properly applied to Imagination, or the Representative Faculty t)f mind. It is admitted on all hands, that Imagination creates nothing, that is, produces nothing new ; and the terms in ques- tion are, therefore, by the acknowledgment of those who em- ploy thejn, only abusively applied to denote the operations of Fancy, in the new arrangement it makes of the old objects fur- nished to it by the senses. We have now, therefore, only to consider, whether, in this corrected meaning, Imagination, as a plastic energy, be a simple or a complex operation. And that it is a complex operation, I do not think it will be at all difficult to prove. What is Representation'^ — In the view I take of the funda- mental processes, the act of Representation is merely the energy of the mind in holding up to its own contemplation what it is determined to represent. I distinguish, as essentially different, the Representation, and the determination to represent. I ex- clude from the Faculty of Representation all power of prefer- ence among the objects it holds up to view. This is the func- tion of faculties wholly different from that of Representation, which, though active in representing, is wholly passive as to what it represents. Two conditions of Representation. — What, then, it may be asked, are the powers by which the Representative Faculty is determined to represent, and to represent this particular object, or this particular complement of objects, and not any other? These are two. The Jirst of these is the Reproductive Fac- ulty. This faculty is the great immediate source, from which the Representative receives both the materials and the deterr mination to represent; and the laws by which the Reproductive 446 THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY Faculty is goYerned, govern also the Representative. Accord- ingly, if there were no other laws in the arrangement and com- bination of thought than those of association, the Representative Faculty would be determined in its manifestations, and in the character of its manifestations, by the Reproductive Faculty alone ; and, on this supposition. Representation could no more be distinguished from Reproduction than Reproduction from Association. The Faculty of Relations* — But there is another elementary process which we have not yet considered, — Comparison, or the Faculty of relations, to which the representative act is likewise subject, and which plays a conspicuous part in deter- mining in what combinations objects are represented.. By the process of Comparison, the complex objects, — the congeries of phaenomena called up by the Reproductive Faculty, undergo various operations. They are separated into parts, they are analyzed into elements ; and these parts and elements are again compounded in every various fashion. In all this the Repre- sentative Faculty cooperates. It, first of all, exhibits the phae- nomena so called up by the laws of ordinary association. In this it acts as handmaid to the Reproductive Faculty. It then exhibits the phaenomena as variously elaborated by the analysis and synthesis of the Comparative Faculty, to which, in like manner, it performs the part of a subsidiary. Imagination a complex process, — This being understood, you will easily perceive, that the Imagination of common language, — the Productive Imagination of philosophers, — is nothing but the Representative process, plus the process to which I would give the name of the Comparative. In this compound opera- tion, it is true that the representative act is the most conspicu- ous, perhaps the most essential, element. For, in th.e first place, it is a condition of the possibility of the act of comparison, — of the act of analytic synthesis, that the material on which it operates (that is, the objects reproduced in their natural connec- tions) should be held up to its observation in a clear light, in order that it may take note of their various circumstances of relation ; and, in the second^ that the result of its own elabora- THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 447 tion, that is, tlie new arrangements which it proposes, should be realized in a vivid act of Representation. Thus it is, that, in the view both of the vulgar and of philosophers, the more ob- trusive, though really the more subordinate, element in this compound process has been elevated into the principal constitu- ent; whereas, the act of Comparison, — the act of separation and reconstruction, has been regarded as identical with the act of Representation. Thus Imagination, in the common acceptation of the term, is not a simple but a compound faculty, — a faculty, however, in which Representation, — the vivid exhibition of an object, — forms the principal constituent. If, therefore, we were obliged to find a common word for every elementary process of our Sinsilj&is, —- Imagination would be the term, which, with the least violence to its meaningj could be accommodated to express the Representative Faculty. Imagination not limited to objects of sense, — By Imagina- tion, thus limited, you are not to suppose that the faculty of representing mere objects of sense alone is meant. On the contrary, a vigorous power of Representation is as indispensable a condition of success in the abstract sciences, as in the poetical and plastic arts ; and it may, acTcordingly, be reasonably doubted whether Aristotle or Homer were possessed of the more power- ful Imagination. " We may, indeed, affirm, that there are as many different kinds of imagination as there are different kinds of intellectual activity. There is the imagination of abstrac- tion, which represents to us certain phases of an object to the exclusion of others, and, at the same time, the sign by which the phases are united ; the imagination of wit, which represents differences and contrasts, and the resemblances by which these are again combined ; the imagination of judgment, which repre- sents the various qualities of an object, and binds them together under the relations of substance, of attribute, of mode ; the imagination of reason, which represents a principle in connec- tion with its consequences, the effect in dependence on its cause ; the imagination of feehng, which represents the accessory im- ages, kindred to some particular, and which therefore confer on 448 THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. it greater compass, depth, and intensity ; the imagination of vo- lition, which represents all the circumstances which concur to persu-ade or dissuade from a certain act of will ; the imagination of the passions, which, according to the nature of the affection, represents all that is homogeneous or analogous; finally, the imagination of the poet, which represents whatever is new, or beautiful, or sublime, — whatever, in a word, it is determined to represent by any interest of art." ^ The term Imagination^ however, is less generally applied to the representations of the Comparative Faculty considered in the abstract, than to the representations of sensible objects concretely modified by com- parison. The two kinds of imagination are, in fact, not fre- quently combined. Accordingly, using the term in this its ordinary extent, that is, in its limitation to objects of sense, it is finely said by Mr. Hume : " Nothing is more dangerous to reason than the flights of imagination, and nothing has been the occasion of more mistakes among philosophers. Men of bright fancies may, in this respect, be compared to those angels whom the Scriptures represent as covering their eyes with their wings." Considering the Representative Faculty in subordination to its two determinants, the faculty of Reproduction and the fac- ulty of Comparison or Elaboration, we may distinguish three principal orders in which Imagination represents ideas : — " 1°, The Natural order ; 2°, The Logical order ; 3°, The Poetical order. The Natural order is that in which we receive the im- pression of external objects, or the order according to which our thoughts spontaneously group themselves. The Logical order consists in presenting what is universal, prior to what is contained under it as particular, or in presenting the particulars first, and then ascending to the universal which they constitute. The former is the order of Deduction, the latter that of Liduc- tion. These two orders have this in common, that they deliver to us notions in the dependence in which the antecedent ex- plains the subsequent. The Poetical order consists in seizing ^ [Translated by Hamilton, together with the other citations in this chapter, unless otherwise credited, from Ancillon's Essais Philosophiqites.} THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. , 449 individual circumstances, and in grouping them in such a man- ner that the Imagination shall represent them so as they might be offered by the sense. The Natural order is involuntary ; it is established independently of our concurrence. The Logical order is a child of art, it is the result of our will ; but it is con- formed to the laws of intelligence, which tend always to recall the particular to the general, or the general to the particular. The Poetical order is exclusively calculated on effect, Pindar would not be a lyric poet, if his thoughts and images followed each other in the common order, or in the logical order. The state of mind in which thought and feeling clothe themselves in lyric forms, is a state in which thoughts and feelings are associated in an extraordinary manner, — in which they have, in fact, no other relation than that which groups and moves them around the dominant thought or feeling which forms the subject of the ode." Imagination as affected hy different trains of association. — " Thoughts which follow each other only in the natural order, or as they are associated in the minds of men in general, form tedious conversations and tiresome books. Thoughts, on the other hand, whose connection is singular, capricious, extraordi- nary, are unpleasing ; whether it be that they strike us as im- probable, or that the effort which has been required to produce, supposes a corresponding effort to comprehend. Thoughts whose association is at once simple and new, and which, though not previously witnessed in conjunction, are yet approximated without a violent exertion, — such thoughts please universally, by affording the mind the pleasures of novelty and exercise at once." " A peculiar kind of Imagination, determined by a peculiar order of association, is usually found in every period of life, in every sex, in every country, in every religion. A knowledge of men principally consists in a knowledge of the principles by which their thoughts are linked and represented. The study of this is of importance to the instructor, in order to direct the character and intellect of his pupils ; to the statesman, that he may exert his influence on the public opinion and manners of 38* . 450 THE REPRESENTAiIVE FACULTY. a people ; to the poet, that he may give truth and reality to his dramatic situations ; to the orator, in order to convince and per- suade ; to the man of the world, if he would give interest to his conversation. , " Authors who have made a successful study of this subject skim over a multitude of circumstances under which an occur- rence has taken place, because they are aware that it is proper to reject what is only accessory to the object which they would present in prominence. A vulgar mind forgets and spares nothing ; he is ignorant that conversation is always but a selection ; that every story is subject to the laws of dra- matic poetry, — festinat ad eventum ; and that all which does not concur to the effect, destroys or weakens it. The invol- untary associations of their thoughts are imperative on minds of this description ; they are held in thraldom to the order and cir- cumstances in which their perceptions were originally obtained." This has not, of course, escaped the notice of the greatest ob- server of human nature. Mrs. Quickly, in reniinding Falstaff of his promise of marriage, supplies a good example of this peculiarity. ' Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt gob- let, sitting in my Dolphin chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal fire, upon Wednesday in Whitsun week, when the prince broke thy head for likening his father to a singing man of Windsor,' — and so forth. " Dreaming, Somnambulism, Reverie, are so many effects of imagination determined by association, — at least, states of mind in which these have a decisive influence. If an impression on the sense often commences a dream, it is by imagination and suggestion that it is developed and accomplished. Dreams have frequently a degree of vivacity which enables them to compete with the reahty ; and if the events which they repre- sent to us were in accordance with the circumstances of time and place in which we stand, it would be almost impossible to distinguish a vivid dream from a sensible perception." " If," says Pascal, " we* dreamt every night the same thing, it would perhaps affect us as powerfully as the objects which we perceive every day. And if an artisan were certain of dreaming every THE KEPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 451 night for twelve hours that he was king, I am convinced that he would be almost as happy as a king, who dreamt for twelve hours that he was an artisan. If we dreamt every night that we were pursued by enemies and harassed by horrible phan- toms, we should suffer almost as much as if that were true, and we should stand in as great dread of sleep, as we should of wak- ing, had we real cause to apprehend these misfortunes It is only because dreams are different and inconsistent, that we can say, when we awake, that we have dreamt ; for life is a dream a little less inconstant." Now the case which Pascal here hypothetically supposes, has actually happened. In a very curious German work, by Abel, I find the following case, which I abridge : — A young man had a cataleptic attack, in consequence of which a singular effect was operated in his men- tal constitution. Some six minutes after falling asleep, he began to speak distinctly, and almost always of the same objects and concatenated events, so that he carried on from night to night the same history, or rather continued to play the same part. On wakening, he had no reminiscence whatever of his ^reaming thoughts, — a circumstance, by the way, which distin- guishes this as rather a case of somnambulism than of j3ommon dreaming. Be this, however, as it may, he played a double part in his existence. By day, he was the poor apprentice of a merchant ; by night, he was a married man, the father of a family, a senator, and in affluent circumstances. If, during his vision, any thing was said in regard to his waking state, he de- clared it unreal and a dream. This case, which is established on the best evidence, is, as far as I am aware, unique. The influence of dreams upon our character is not without its interest. A particular tendency may be strengthened in a man solely by the repeated action of dreams. Dreams do not, however, as is commonly supposed, afford any appreciable indi- cation of the character of individuals. It is not always the subjects that occupy us most, when awake, that form the matter of our dreams; and it is curious that the persons the dearest to us are precisely those about whom we dream most rarely. SomnambuHsm is a phaenomenon still more astonishing. In 452 THE REPRESENT ATIVE FACULTY. this singular state, a person performs a regular series of rational actions, and those frequently of the most difficult and delicate nature, and what is still more marvellous, with a talent to which he could make no pretension when awake. His memory and reminiscence supply him with recollections of words and things, which perhaps were never at his disposal in the ordinary state ; he speaks more fluently a more refined language ; and, if we are to credit what the evidence on which it rests hardly alloAVS us to disbelieve, he has not only perceptions through other channels than the common organs of sense, but the sphere of his cognitions is amplified to an extent far beyond the limits to which sensible perception is confined. This subject is one of •the most perplexing in the whole compass of philosophy ; for, on the one hand, the phasnomena are so marvellous that they cannot be believed, and yet, on the other, they are of so unam- biguous and palpable a character, and the witnesses to their reality are so numerous, so intelligent, and so high above every suspicion of deceit, that it is equally impossible to deny credit to what is attested by such ample and unexceptionable evidence. " The third state, that of Reverie or Castle-building, is a kind of waking dream, and does not differ from dreaming, ex- cept by the consciousness which accompanies it. In this state, the mind abandons itself without a choice of subject, without control over the mental train, to the involuntary associations of imagination. The mind is thus occupied without being prop- erly active ; it is active, at least, without effort. Young per- sons, women, the old, the unemployed, and the idle, are all dis- posed to reverie. There is a pleasure attached to its illusions, which render it as seductive as it is dangerous. The mind, by indulgence in this dissipation, becomes enervated ; it acquires the habit of a pleasing idleness, loses its activity, and at length even the power and the desire of action." Influence of imagination on human life, — " The happiness and misery of every individual of mankind depends almost ex- clusively on the particular character of his habitual associations, and the relative kind and intensity of his imagination. It is much less what we actually are, and what we actually possess, THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 453 than what we imagine ourselves to be and have, that is decisive of our existence and fortune." Apicius committed suicide to avoid starvation, when his fortune was reduced to somewhere, in English money, about £100,000. The Roman epicure im- agined that he could not subsist on what, to men in general, would seem more than affluence. " Imagination, by the attractive or repulsive pictures with which, according to our habits and associations, it fills the frame of our life, lends to reality a magical charm, or despoils it of all its pleasantness. The imaginary happy and the imaginary miserable are common in the world, but tlieir happiness and misery are not the less real ; every thing depends on the mode in which they feel and estimate their condition. Fear, hope, the recollection of past pleasures, the torments of absence and of desire, the secret and almost resistless tendency of the mind towards certain objects, are the effects of association and imagi- nation. At a distanqp, things seem to us radiant with a celes- tial beauty, or in the lurid aspect of deformity. Of a truth, in either case, we are equally wrong. When the event which we dread, or which we desire, takes place, when we obtain, or when there is forced upon us, an object environed with a thou- sand hopes, or with a thousand fears, we soon discover that we have expected too much or too little ; we thought it by antici- pation infinite in good or evil, and we find it in reality not only finite, but contracted. 'With the exception,' says Rousseau, ' of the self-existent Being, there is nothing beautiful, but that which is not.' In the crisis, whether of enjoyment or suffering, happiness is not so much happiness, nor misery so much misery, as we had anticipated. In the past,- thanks to a beneficent Creator, our joys reappear as purer and more brilliant than they had been actually experienced ; and sorrow loses not only its bitterness, but is changed even into a source of pleasing rec- ollection. In early youth, the present and the future are dis- played in a factitious magnificence ; for at this period of life, imagination is in its spring and freshness, and a cruel experience has not yet exorcised its brilliant enchantments. Hence the fair picture of a golden age, which all nations concur in placing 454 THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. in the past ; it is the dream of the youth of mankind." In old age, again, where the future is dark and sliort, imagination carries us back to the reenjoyment of a past existence. " The young," says Aristotle, " live forwards in hope, the old live backwards in memory." From all this, however, it appears, that the present is the only time in which we never actually live; we live either in the future, or in the past. So long as we have a future to antici- pate, we contemn the present ; and when we can no longer look forward to a future, we revert and spend our existence in the past. Organs of Imagination, — I shall terminate the consideration of Imagination Proper by a speculation concerning the organ which it employs in the representations of sensible objects. The organ which it thus employs seems to be no other than the organs themselves of Sense, on which the original impressions were made, and through which they were jDriginally perceived. Experience has shown, that Imagination depends on no one part of the cerebral apparatus exclusively. There is no portion of the brain which has not been destroyed by mollification, or induration, or external lesion, without the general faculty of Representation being injured. But experience equally proves, that the intracranial portion of any external organ of sense can- not be destroyed, without a certain partial abolition of the Imag- ination Proper. For example, there are many cases recorded by medical observers, of persons losing their sight, who have also lost the faculty of representing the images of visible objects. They no longer call up such objects by reminiscence, they no longer dream of them. Now in these cases, it is found that not merely the external instrument of sight, ■ — the eye, — has been disorganized, but that the disorganization has extended to those parts of the brain which constitute the internal instrument of this sense, that is, the optic nerves and thalami. If the latter, — the real organ of vision, — remain sound, the eye alone being destroyed, the imagination of colors and forms remains as vigorous as when vision was entire. Similar cases are re- corded in regard to the deaf. These facts, added to the observa- THE REPRESENTATIVE FACULTY. 455 tion of the internal pliaenomena which take place during our acts of representation, make it, I think, more than probable that there are as many organs of Imagination as there are organs of Sense. Thus I have a distinct conscious- ness, that, in the internal representation of visible objects, the same organs are at work which operate in the external percep- tion of these ; and the same holds good in an imagination of the objects of Hearing, Touch, Taste, and Smell. But not only sensible perceptions, voluntary motions likewise, are imitated in and by the imagination. I can, in imagination, represent the action of speech, the play of the muscles of the countenance, the movement of the limbs ; and when I do this, I feel clearly that I awaken a kind of tension in the same nerves through which, by an act of will, I can determine an overt and voluntary motion of the muscles ; nay, when the play of imagi- nation is very lively, this external movement is actually deter- mined. Thus we frequently see the countenances of persons under the influence of imagination undergo various changes ; they gesticulate w^ith their hands, they talk to themselves, and all this is in consequence only of the imagined activity going out into real activity. I should, therefore, be disposed to conclude, that, as in Perception the living organs of sense are from with- out determined to energy, so in Imagination they are determined to a similar energy by an influence from within. CHAPTER XXV. THE ELABORATIYE FACULTY. — CLASSIFICATION. ~ ABSTRAC- TION AND GENERALIZATION. — NOMINALISM AND CONCEP- TUALISM. The faculties with which we have been hitherto engaged may be regarded as subsidiary to that which we are now about to consider. This, to which I gave the name of the Elabora- tive Faculty, — the Faculty of Relations, — or Comparison, — constitutes what is properly denominated Thought. It supposes always at least two terms, and its act results in a judgment, that is, an affirmation or negation of one of these terms of the other. You will recollect that, when treating of Consciousness in general, I stated to you, that consciousness necessarily invohes a judgment ; and as every act of mind .is an act of conscious- ness, every act of mind, consequently , invohes a judgment. A consciousness is necessarily the consciousness of a determinate something ; and we cannot be conscious of any thing without virtually affirming its existence, that is, judging it to be. ^Cbn- sciousness is thus primarily a judgment or affirmation of exist- ence. Again, consciousness is not merely the affirmation of naked existence, but the affirmation of a certain qualified or determinate existence. We are conscious that we exist, only in and through our consciousness that we exist in this or that particular state, — that we are so or so affected, — so or so active ; and we are only conscious of this or that particular state of existence, inas- much as we discriminate it as diffiirent from some other state of existence, of which we have been previously (conscious and are now reminiscent ; but such a discrimination supposes, in con- sciousness, the affirmation of the existence of one state of a (456) THE ELABORATIVE FACULTY. 457 specific character, and the negation of another. On this ground it was that I maintained, that consciousness necessarily involves, besides recollection, or rather a certain continuity of represen- tation, also judgment or comparison ; and, consequently, that, so far from comparison or judgment being a process always subse- quent to the acquisition of knowledge, through perception and self-consciousness, it is involved as a condition of the acquisitive process itself. In point of fact, the various processes of Acqui- sition (Apprehension), Representation, and Comparison, are all mutually dependent. Comparison cannot judge without some- thing to compare ; we cannot originally acquire, — - apprehend, we cannot subsequently represent our knowledge, witliout in either act attributing existence, and a certain kind of existence, both to the object known and to the subject knowing, — that is, without enouncing certain judgments and performing certain acts of comparison ; I say, without performing certain acts of comparison, for taking the mere affirmation that a thing is, — this is tantamount to a negation that it is not, and necessarily supposes a comparison, — a collation, between existence and non-existence. Comparison supposed, in every act of Thoiiglit, — What I have now said may perhaps contribute to prepare you for what I am hereafter to say of the faculty or elementary process of Comparison, — a faculty which, in the analysis of philosophers, is exhibited only in part ; and even that part is not preserved in its integrity. They take into account only a fragment of the process, and that fragment they again break down into a plural- ity of faculties. In opposition to the views hitherto promul- gated in regard to Comparison, I will show, that this faculty is at work in every, the simplest, act of mind ; and that, from the primary affirmation of existence in an original act of conscious- ness, to the judgment contained in the conclusion of an act of reasoning, every operation is only an evolution of the same ele- mentary process, — that there is a difference in 'the complexity, none in the nature, of the act ; in short, that the various pro- ducts of Analysis and Synthesis, of Abstraction and General- ization, are all merely the results of Comparison, and that the 39 458 THE ELABORATIVE FACULTY. operations of Conception or Simple Apprehension, of Judg- ment, and of Reasoning, are all only acts of Comparison in various applications and degrees. What I have, therefore, to prove is, in the first place, tliat Comparison is supposed in every, the simplest^ act of knowl- edge ; in the second^ that our factitiously simple, our factitiously complex, our abstract, and our generalized notions are all merely so many products of Comparison; in the thirds that Judgment, and, in the fourth^ that Reasoning, is identical with Comparison. In doing this, I shall not formally distribute the discussion into these heads, but shall include the proof of what I have now advanced, while tracing Comparison from its sim- plest to its most complex operations. Primary acts of Comparison, — The first or most elementary act of Comparison, or of that mental process in which the relation of two terms is recognized and affirmed, is the judg- ment virtually pronounced, in an act of Perception, of the Non-ego, or, in an act of Self-consciousness, of the Ego. This is the primary affirmation of existence. The notion of exist- ence is one native to the mind. It is the primary condition of thought. The first act of experience awoke it, and the first act of consciousness was a subsumption of that of which we were conscious under this notion ; in other words, the first act of consciousness was an affirmation of the existence of something. The first or simplest act of Comparison is thus the discrimina- tion of existence from non-existence ; and the first or simplest judgment is the affirmation of existence, in other words, the denial of non-existence. .But the something of which we are conscious, and of which we predicate existence, in the primary judgment, is twofold, — the Ego and the Non-ego. We are conscious of both, and affirm existence of both. But we do more ; we do not merely affirm the existence of each out of relation to the other, but, in affirm- ing their existence, we affirm their existence in duality, in dif- ference, in mutual contrast ; that is, we not only affirm the Ego to exist, but deny it existing as the Non-ego ; we not only affirm the Non-ego to exist, but deny it existing as the Ego. The sec- CLASSIFICATION AND ABSTRACTION. 459 ond act of Comparison is thus the discrimination of the Ego and the Non-ego ; and the second judgment is the affirmation, that each is not the other. The third gradation in the act of Comparison, is in the recog- nition of the multiplicity of the coexistent or successive phag- nomena, presented either to Perception or Self-consciousness, and the judgment in regard to their resemblance or dissimi- larity. The fourth is the Comparison of the phaenomena with the native notion of Substance, and the judgment is the grouping of these phaenomena into different bundles, as the attributes of different subjects. In the external world, this relation consti- tutes the distinction of things ; in the internal, the distinction of powers. The fifth act of Comparison is the collation of successive phaenomena under the native notion of Causality, and the affirmation or negation of their mutual relation as cause and effect. Classification an act of Comparison, — So far, the pjrocess of Comparison is determined merely by objective conditions hitherto, it has followed only in the footsteps of nature. In those, again, we are now to consider, the procedure is, in a cer- tain sort, artificial, and determined by the necessities of the thinking subject itself. The mind is finite in its powers of com- prehension ; the objects, on the contrary, which are presented to it, are, in proportion to its limited capacities, infinite in num- ber. How then is this disproportion to be equahzed ? How can the infinity of nature be brought down to the finitude of man ? This is done by means of Classification. Objects, though infinite in number, are not infinite in variety ; they are all, in a certain sort, repetitions of the same common qualities, and the mind, though lost in the multitude of particulars, — in- dividuals, — can easily grasp the classes into which their resem- bling attributes enable us to assort these. This whole process of Classification is a mere act of Comparison, as the following deduction will show. In tlie first place, this may be shown in regard to the forma- 460 CLASSIFICATION AND ABSTRACTION. tion of Complex notions, with which, as the simplest species of classification, we may commence. By Complex or Collective notions, I mean merely the notion of a class formed by the rep- etition of the same constituent notion. Such are the notions of an army^ a forest^ a town, a number. These are names of classes, formed by the repetition of the notion of a soldier^ of a tree, of a house, of a unit. You are not to confound, as has sometimes been done, the notion of an army, a forest, a toivn, a number, with the notions of army, forest, town, and number ; the former, as I have said, are complex or collective, the latter are general or universal notions. It is evident that a Collective notion is the result of Compari- son. The repetition of the same constituent notion supposes that these notions were compared, their identity or absolute similarity affirmed. How language aids Classification. — In the whole process of classification, the mind is in a great measure dependent upon language for its success ; and in this, the simplest of the acts of classification, it may be proper to show how language affords to mind the assistance it requires. Our complex notions being formed by the repetition of the same notion, it is evident that the difficulty we can experience in forming an adequate concep- tion of a class of identical constituents, will be determined by the difficulty we have in conceiving a multitude. " But the comprehension of the mind," [says Degerando,] " is feeble and limited ; it can embrace at once but a small number of objects. It would thus seem that an obstacle is raised to the extension of our complex ideas at the very outset of our combinations. But here language interposes, and supplies the mind with the force of which it is naturally destitute." We have formerly seen that the mind cannot, in one act, embrace more than ^Ye or six, at the utmost seven, several units. How then does it pro- ceed ? " When, by a first combination, we have obtained a complement of notions as complex as the mind can embrace, we give this complement a name. This being done, we regard the assemblage of units thus bound up undet a collective name as itself a unit, and proceed, by a second combination^ to aot»u- CLASSIFICATION AND ABSTRACTION. ' 461 mulate these into a new complement of the same extent. To this new complement we give another name ; and then again proceed to perform, on this more complex unit, the same opera- tion we had performed on the first ; and so we may go on rising from complement to complement to an indefinite extent. Thus, a merchant, having received a large unknown sum of money in crowns, counts out the pieces by fives, and having done this till he has reached twenty, he lays them together in a heap ; around these, he assembles similar piles of coin, till they amount, let us say, to twenty ; and he then puts the whole four hundred into a bag. In this manner he proceeds, until he fills a number of bags, and placing the whole in his coffers, he will have a complex or collective notion of the quantity of crowns which he has received." It is on this principle that arithmetic pro- ceeds, — tens, hundreds, thousands, myriads, hundreds of thou- sands, millions, etc., are all so many factitious units, which ena- ble us to form notions, vague indeed, of what otherwise we could have obtained no conception at all. So much for com- plex or collective notions, formed without decomposition, — a process which I now go on to consider. Two modes of decomposing thought. — Our thought, — that is, the sum total of the perceptions and representations which occupy us at any given moment, is always, as I have frequently observed, compound. The composite objects of thoughts may be decomposed in two ways, and for the sake of two different interests. In the first place, we may decompose in order that we may recombine, influenced by the mere pleasure which this plastic operation affords us. This is poetical analysis and syn- thesis. On this process it is needless to dwell.* It is evidently the work of comparison. For example, the minotaur, or chi- moera, or centaur, or gryphon (hippogryph), or any other poet- ical combination of different animals, could only have been effected by an act in which the representations of these animals were compared, and in which certain parts of one were affirmed, compatible with certain parts of another. How, again, is the imagination of all ideal beauty or perfection formed ? Simply by comparing the various beauties or excellences of which we 39* 462 CLASSIFICATION AND ABSTRACTION. have had actual experience, and thus being enabled to pro- nounce in regard to their common and essential quality. In the second place, we may decompose in the interest of science ; and as the poetical decomposition was principally ac- complished by a separation of integral parts, so this is princi- pally accomplished by an abstraction of constituent qualities. On this process it is necessary to be more particular. Abstraction through the senses. — Suppose an unknown body is presented to my senses, and that it is capable of affecting each of these in a certain manner. " As furnished with flve different organs," [says Laromiguiere,] " each of which serves to intro- duce a certain class of perceptions and representations into the mind, we naturally distribute all sensible objects into five species of qualities. The human body, if we may so speak, is thus itself a kind of abstractive machine. The senses cannot but abstract. If the eye did not abstract colors, it would see them confounded with odors and with tastes, and odors and tastes would necessa- rily become objects of sight." " The abstraction of the senses is thus an operation the most natural ; it is even impossible for us not to perform it. Let us now see whether abstraction by the mind be more arduous than that of the senses." We have formerly found that the compre- hension of the mind is extremely limited ; that it can only take cognizance of one object at a time, if that be known with full intensity ; and that it can accord a simultaneous attention to a very small plurality of objects, and even that imperfectly. Thus it is that attention fixed on one object is tantamount to a with- drawal, - — to an abstraction, of consciousness from every other. Abstraction is thus not a, positive act of mind^ as it is often erroneously described in philosophical treatises ; — it is merely a negation to one or more objects, in consequence of its concen- tration on another. This being the case. Abstraction is not only an easy and natural, but a necessary result. " In studying an object," [con- tinues Laromiguiere,] " we neither exert all our faculties at once, nor at once apply them to ajl the qualities of an object. We know from experience, that the effect of such a mode of CLASSIFICATION AND ABSTRACTION. * 463 procedure is confusion. On the contrary, we converge our at- tention on one alone of its qualities, — nay, contemplate this quality only in a single point of view, and retain it in that aspect until we have obtained a full and accurate conception of it. The human mind proceeds from the confused and complex to the distinct and constituent, always separating, always dividing, always simplifying ; and this is the only mode in which, from the weakness of our faculties, we are able to apprehend and to represent with correctness." " It is true, indeed, that after having decomposed every thing, we must, as it were, return on our steps by recomposing evury thing anew ; for unless we do so, our knowledge would not be conformable to the reality and relations of nature. The simple qualities of body have not each a proper and independent exist- ence ; the ultimate faculties of mind are not so many distinct and independent existences. On either side, there is a being one and the same ; on that side, at once extended, solid, colored, etc. ; on this, at once capable of thought, feeling, desire, etc." " But although all, or the greater number of, our cognitions comprehend different fasciculi of notions, it is necessary to com- mence by the acquisition of these notions one by one, through a successive application of our attention to the different attri- butes of objects. The abstraction of the intellect is thus as natural as that of the senses. It is even imposed upon us by the very constitution of our mind." " I am aware that the expression, abstraction of the senses, is incorrect ; for it is the mind always which acts, be it through the medium of the senses. The impropriety of the expression is not, however, one which is in danger of leading into error ; and it serves to point out the important fact, that Abstraction is not always performed in the same manner. In Perception, — in the presence of physical objects, the intellect abstracts colors by the eyes, sounds by the ear, etc. In Representation, and when the external object is absent, the mind operates on its reproduced cognitions, and looks at them successively in their different points of view." " However abstraction be performed, the result is notions 464 ABSTRACTION AND GENERALIZATION. which are simple, or which approximate to simplicity ; and if we apply it with consistency and order to the different qualities of objects, we shall attain at length to a knowledge of these qualities and of their mutual dependencies ; that is, to a knowl- edge of objects as they really are. In this case, abstraction be- comes analysis, which is the method to which we owe all our cognitions." The process of abstraction is familiar to the most uncultivated mmds ; and its uses are shown equally in the mechanical arts as in the philosophical sciences. "A carpenter," says Kames, speaking of the great utility of abstraction, " considers a log of wood with regard to hardness, firmness, color, and texture ; a philosopher, neglecting these properties, makes the log undergo a chemical analysis, and examines its taste, its smell, and com- ponent principles ; the geometrician confines his reasoning to the figure, the length, breadth, and thickness ; in general, every artist, abstracting from all other properties, confines his observa- tions to those which have a more immediate connection with his profession." But is Abstraction, or rather, is Exclusive attention, the work of Comparison ? This is evident. The application of attention to a particular object, or quality of an object, supposes an act of will, — a choice or preference, and this again supposes Com- parison and Judgment. But this may be made more manifest from a view of the act of Generalization, on which we are about to enter. Generalization. Abstract individual ideas, -r- The notion of the figure of the desk before me is an abstract idea, — an idea that makes part of the total notion of that body, and on which I have concentrated my attention, in order to consider it exclu- sively. This idea is abstract, but it is at the same time individ- ual ; it represents the figure of this particular desk, and not the figure of any other body. But had we only individual abstract notions, what would be our knowledcje ? We should be coo^- nizant only of qualities viewed apart from their subjects (and of separate phasnomena there exists none in nature) ; aisd as these qualities are also separate from each oiJiei-, we sboukj ABSTRACTION AND GENERALIZATION. 465 have no knowledge of their mutual relations. We should also be overwhelmed with their number. Abstract General notions. — It is necessary, therefore, that we should form Abstract General notions. This is done when, companng a number of objects, we seize on their resemblances ; when we concentrate our attention on these points of similarity, thus abstracting the mind from a con- sideration of their differences; and when we give a name to our notion of that circumstance in which they all agree. The General Notion is thus one which makes us know a quality, property, power, action, relation ; in short, any point of view, under which we recognize a plurality of objects as a unity. It makes us aware of a quality, a point of view, common to many things. It is a notion of resemblance ; hence the reason why general names or terms, the signs of general notions, have been called terms of resemblance (termini similitu- di7iis). In this process of generalization, we do not stop short at a first generalization. By a first generalization, we have obtained a number of classes of resembling indi\ iduals. But these classes we can compare together, observe their similarities, abstract from their differences, and bestow on their common cir- cumstance a common name. On these second classes we can again perform the same operation, and thus ascending the scale of general notions, throwing out of view always a greater num- ber of differences, and seizing always on fewer similarities in the formation of our classes, we arrive at length at the limit of our ascent in the notion of being or existence. Thus placed on the summit of the scale of classes, we descend by a process the reverse of that by which we have ascended ; we divide and subdivide the classes^ by introducing always more and more characters, and laying always fewer differences aside ; the notions become more and more composite, until we at length arrive at the individual. Twofold quantity in notions. — I may here notice, that there is a twofold kind of quantity to be considered in notions. It is evident, that, in proportion as the class is high, it will, in the first place, contain under it a greater number of classes, and, in the second, will include the smallest complement of attributes- 466 ABSTRACTION AND GENERALIZATION. Thus, heing or existence contains under it every class ; and yet, when we say that a thing exists, we say the very lea^t of it that is possible. On the other hand, an individual, though it contain nothing but itself, involves the largest amount of predi- cation. For example, when I say, — this is Richard, I not only affirm of the subject every class from existence down to, man, but likewise a number of circumstances proper to Richard as an individual. Now, the former of these quantities, the external, is called the Extension of a notion ; the latter, the internal quantity, is called its Comprehension or* Intension. The extension of a notion is, likewise, styled its circuit, region^ domain, or sphere, also its breadth. On the other hand, the comprehension of a notion is likewise called its depth. These names we owe to the Greek logicians. The internal and ex- ternal quantities are in the inverse ratio of each other. The greater the Extension, the less the Comprehension; the greater the Comprehension, the less the Extension. I have noticed the improper use of the term abstraction by many philosophers, in applying it to that on which attention is converged. This we may indeed be said to prescind, but not to abstract. Thus, let A, B, C, be three qualities of an object. We prescind A, in abstracting it from B and C ; but we cannot, without impropriety, simply say that we abstract A. Thus, by attending to one object to the abstraction from all others, we, in a certain sort, decompose or analyze the complex materials pre- sented to us by Perception and Self-consciousness. This analy- sis or decomposition is of two kinds. In the first place, by concentrating attention on one integrant part of an object-, we, as it were, withdraw or abstract it from the others. For exam- ple, we can consider the head of an animal to the exclusion of the other members. This may be called Partial or Concrete Abstraction. The process here noticed has, however, been . overlooked by philosophers, insomuch that they have opposed the terms concrete and abstract as exclusive contraries. In the second place, we can rivet our attention on some particular mode of a thing, as its smell, its color, its figure, its motion, its size, etc., and abstract it from the others. This may be called Modal Abstraction. ABSTRACTION AND GENERALIZATION. 467 The Abstraction we have been now spcaldng of is performed &n individual objects, and is consequently particular. There is nothing necessarily connected with Generalization in Abstrac- tion. Generalization is indeed dependent on Abstraction, wliich it supposes ; but Abstraction does not involve Generalization. I remark this, because you will frequently find the terms abstract and general applied to notions, used as convertible. Nothing, however, can be more incorrect. " A person," says Mr. Stewart, " who had never seen but one rose, might yet have been able to consider its color apart from its other qualities ; and, therefore, there may be such a thing as an idea which is at once abstract and particular. After having perceived this quality as belong- ing to a variety of individuals, we can consider it without refer- ence to any of them, and thus form the notion of redness or whiteness in general, which may be called a general abstract idea. The words abstract and general, therefore, when applied to ideas, are as completely distinct from each other as any two words to be found in the language." Generalization is the process through which we obtain what are called general or universal notions. A general notion is nothing but the abstract notion of a circumstance in which a number of individual objects are found to agree, that is, to resemble each other. In so far as two objects resemble each other, the notion we have of them is identical, and, therefore, to us the objects may be considered as the same. Accordingly, having discovered the circumstance in which objects agree, we arrange them by this common circumstance inio classes, to which we also usually give a comnion name. I have explained how, in the prosecution of this operation, commencing with individual objects, we generalized these into a lowest class. Having found a number of such lowest classes, we then compare these again together, as we had originally compared individuals ; we abstract their points of resemblance, and by these points generalize them into a higher class. The same process we perform upon these higher classes ; and thus proceed, generalizing class from classes, until we are at last arrested in the one highest class, that of being. Thus w^e find 468 NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. Peter, Paul, Timothy, etc., all agree in certain common attri- butes, which distinguish them from other animated beings. We accordingly collect them into a class, which we call man. In like manner, out of the other animated beings which we ex- clude from mauj we form the classes, horse^ dog^ ox^ etc. These and man form so many lowest classes or species. But these species, though differing in certain respects, all agree in others. Abstracting from their diversities, we attend only to their resemblances ; and as all manifest hfe, sense, feeling, etc., — this resemblance gives us a class, on which we bestow the name animal. Animal, or living sentient existences, we then com- pare with lifeless existences, and thus going on abstracting from dilTerences, and attending to resemblances, we arrive at naked or undifferenced existence. Having reached the pinnacle of generalization, we may redescend the ladder ; and this is done by reversing the process through which we ascended. Instead of attending to the similarities, and abstracting from the differ- ences, we now attend to the differences, and abstract from the similarities. And as the ascending process is called Generali- zation, this is called Division or Determination ; — Division, be- cause the higher or wider classes are cut down into lower or narrower ;— Determination, because every quality added on to a class limits or determines its extent, that is, approximates it more to some individual, real, or determinate existence. Question between the Nominalists and the Conceptualists. — Having given you this necessary information in regard to the na- ture of Generalization, I proceed to consider one of the most sim- ple, and, at the same time, one of the most perplexed, problems in philosophy, — in regard to the object of the mind, — the object of consciousness, when we employ a general term. In the ex- planation of the process of generalization, all philosophers are at one ; the only differences that arise among them relate to the point, — whether we can form an adequate idea of that which is denoted by an abstract, or abstract and general term. In the discussion of this question, I shall pursue the following order : jirst of all, I shall state the arguments of the Nominalist^ , — of those who hold, that we are unable to form an idea corre- NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. 469 spending to the abstract and general term ; in the second place, I shall state the arguments of the Conceptualists, — of those who maintain that we are so competent; and, in the last, I shall show that the opposing parties are really at one, and that the whole controversy has originated in the imperfection and ambiguity of our philosophical nomenclature. In this discus- sion, I avoid all mention of the ancient doctrine of Realism. This is curious only in an historical point of view ; and is wholly irrelevant to the question at issue among modern philos- ophers. This controversy has been principally agitated in [Great Britain] and in France, for a reason that I shall hereafter ex- plain ; and, to limit ourselves to Great Britain, the doctrine of Nominalism has, among others, been embraced by Hobbes, Berkeley, Hume, Principal Campbell, and Mr. Stewart; while Conceptualism has found favor with .Locke, Reid, and Brown. Throwing out of view the antiquities of the question, (and this question is perhaps more memorable than any other in the history of philosophy), — laying, I say, out of account opinions which have been long exploded, there are two which still divide philosopliers. Some maintain, that every act and every object of mind is necessarily singular, and that the name is that alone which can pretend to generality. Others again hold, that the mind is capable of forming notions, representations, correspond- ent in universality to the classes contained under, or expressed hy, the general term. Nominalism, — The former of these opinions, — the doctrine^ as it is called, of Nominalism, — maintains that every notion, considered in itself, is singular, but becomes, as it were, general, through the intention of the mind to make it represent every resembling notion, or notion of the same class. Take, for ex- ample, the term man. Here we can call up no notion, no idea, corresponding to the universahty of the class or term. This is manifestly impossible. For as man involves contradictory attri- butes, and as contradictions cannot coexist in one representation, an idea or notion adequate to man cannot be realized in thought. The class man includes individuals, male and female, white and 40 470 NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. black and copper-colored, tall and short, fat and thin, straight and crooked, whole and mutilated, etc., etc. ; and the notion of the class must, therefore, at once represent all and none of these. It is, therefore, evident, though the abslirdity was maintained by Locke, that we cannot accomplish this ; and, this being im- possible, we cannot represent to ourselves the class man by any equivalent notion or idea. All that we can do is to call up some individual image, and consider it as representing:, though madequately representing, the generality. This we easily do, for as we can call into imagination any individual, so we can make that individual image stand for any or for every other which it resembles in those essential points which constitute the identity of the class. This opinion, which, after Hobbes, has been maintained, among others, by Berkeley, Hume, Adam Smith, Campbell, and Stewart, appears to me not only true, but self-evident. No one has stated the case of the Nominalists more clearly than Bishop Berkeley, and his whole argument is, as far as it goes, irrefragable. " It is agreed," [he says,] " on all hands,* that the qualities or modes of things do never really exist each of them apart by itself, and separated from all others, but are mixed, as it were, and blended together, several in the same object. But we are told, the mind, being able to consider each quality singly, or abstracted from those other qualities with which it is united, does by that means frame to itself abstract ideas. For example, there is perceived by sight an object ex- tended, colored, and moved : this mixed or compound idea the mind resolving into its simple, constituent parts, and viewing each by itself, exclusive of the rest, does frame the abstract ideas of extension, color, and motion. Not that it is possible for color or motion to exist without extension ; but only that the mind can frame to itself, by abstraction, the idea of color exclusive of extension, and of motion exclusive of both color and extension. " Again, the mind having observed that, in the particular ex- tensions perceived by sense, there is something common and alike in all, and some other things peculiar, as this or that figure or magnitude, which distinguish them one from another ; it con NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUAUSM. 471 siders apart or singles out by itself that which is common, mak- ing thereof a most abstract idea of extension, which is neither line, surface, nor solid, nor has any figure or magnitude, but is an idea entirely prescinded from all these. So, likewise, the mind, by leaving out of the particular colors perceived by sense that which distinguishes them one from another, and retaining that only which is common to all, makes an idea of color in abstract which is neither red, nor blue, nor white, nor any other determinate color. And in like manner, by considering motion abstractedly not only from the body moved, but likewise from the figure it describes, and all particular directions and veloci- ties, the abstract idea of motion is framed ; which equally cor- responds to all particular motions whatsoever that may be per- ceived by sense. " Whether others have this wonderful faculty of abstracting their ideas, they best can tell : for myself I find, indeed, I have a faculty of imagining, or representing to myself the ideas of those particular things I have perceived, and of variously com- pounding and dividing them. I can imagine a man with two heads, or the upper parts of a man joined to the body of a horse. I can consider the hand, the eye, the nose, each by itself ab- stracted or separated from the rest of the body. But then whatever hand or eye I imagine, it must have some particular shape and color. Likewise, the idea of man that I frame to myself must be either of a white, or a black, or a tawny, a straight or a crooked, a tall or a low, or a middle-sized man. I cannot by any effort of thought conceive the abstract idea above described. And it is equally impossible for me to form the abstract idea of motion distinct from the body moving, and which is neither swift nor slow, curvilinear nor rectilinear ; and the like may be said of all other abstract general ideas what- soever. To be plain, I own myself able to abstract in one sense, as when I consider some particular parts or quahties sep- arated from others, with which, though they are united in some object, yet it is possible they may really exist without them. But I deny that I can abstract one from another, or conceive separately, those qualities which it is impossible should exist so 472 NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. iseparated : or that I can frame a general notion by abstracting from particulars in the manner aforesaid. Which two last are the proper acceptations of abstraction. And there are grounds to think most men will acknowledge themselves to be in my case. The generality of men, which are simple and illiterate, never pretend to abstract notions. It is said they are difficult, and not to be attained without pains and study. We may there- fore reasonably conclude, that, if such there be, they are confined only to the learned." Such is the doctrine of Nominalism, as asserted by Berkeley, and as subsequently acquiesced in by the principal philosophers of [Great Britain]. Reid himself is, indeed, hardly an excep- tion, for his opinion on this point is, to say the least of it, ex- tremely vague. Conceptualism. — The counter-opinion, that of Conceptual- ism, as it is called, has, however, been supported by several philosophers of distinguished ability. Locke maintains the doctrine in its most revolting absurdity, boldly admitting that the general notion must be realized, in spite of the principle of Contradiction. " Does it not require," he says, " some pains and skill to form the general idea of a triangle (which is yet none of the most abstract, comprehensive, and difficult), for it must be neither oblique or rectangle, neither equilateral, equi- crural, nor scalenon ; but all and none of these at once. In effect, it is something imperfect, that cannot exist; an idea wherein some parts of several different and inconsistent ideas are put together." This doctrine was, however, too palpably absurd to obtain any advocates ; and Conceptualism, could it not find a firmer basis, behoved to be abandoned. Passing over Dr. Reid's speculations on the question, which are, as I have said, wavering and ambiguous, I solicit your attention to the principal state- ment and defence of Conceptualism by Dr. Brown, in w^hom the doctrine has obtained a strenuous advocate. The following is the seventh, out of nine recapitulations, he has given us of it in his Lectures. " If then the generalizing process be, first, the percepi ion or conception of two or more objects ; secondly, the NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. 473 relative feeling of their resemblance in certain respects ; thirdly, the designation of these circumstances of resemblance by an appropriate name, the doctrine of the Nominalists, which in- cludes only two of these stages, — the perception of particular objects, and the invention of general terms,. — must be false, as excluding that relative suggestion of resemblance in certain re- spects, which is the second and most important step of the pro- cess ; since it is this intermediate feeling alone that leads to the use of the term, which, otherwise, it would be impossible to limit to any set of objects." This contains, in fact, both the whole of his own doctrine, and the whole ground of his rejection of that of the Nominalists. Now, upon this, I would, first of all, say, in general, that what in it is true is not new. But I hold it idle to prove, that his doctrine is old and common, and to trace it to authors with whom Brown has shown his acquaintance, by repeatedly quot- ino; them in his Lectures ; it is enousrh to show that it is erroneous. The first point I shall consider is his confutation of the Nomi- nalists. In the passage I have just adduced, and in ten others, he charges the Nominalists with excluding " the relative sug- gestion of resemblance in certain respects, which is the second and most important step in the process." This, I admit, is a weighty accusation, and I admit at once that if it do not prove that his own doctrine is right, it would at least demonstrate theirs to be sublimely wrong. But is the charge well founded ? Let us see whether the Ncuninalists, as he assures us, do really exclude the apprehension of resemblance in certain respects, as one step in their doctrine of generalization. I turn first to Hobbes as the real father of this opinion, — to him, as Leibnitz ti'uly says, " nomiiialibus ipsis nominalioremr The classical place of this philosopher on the subject is the fourth chapter of the Leviathan ; and there we have the following passage — " One universal name is imposed on many things for their simil- itude in some quality or other accident ; and whereas a proper name bringeth to mind one thing only, universals I'ecall a7ty one of those many." There are other passages to the same effect m Hobbes, but I look no further. 40* 474 NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. The second great Nominalist is Berkeley ; [from whom,] out of many similar passages, I select the two following. In both, he is stating his own doctrine of Nominalism. In the Introduc- tion, sect. 22 : "To discern the agreements or disagreements that are between my ideas, tj see what ideas are included in any compound idea, etc." In the Minute Philosopher^ sect. 7 : " But may not words become general by being made to stand indis- criminately for all particular ideas, which, from a mutual resem- blance^ belong to the same kind, without the intervention of any abstract general idea ? " I next take down Hume. In glancing over [his] exposition of the doctrine, I see the following : — " When we have found a resemblance among several objects, we apply the same name to all of them," etc. Again : — "As individuals are collected together and placed under a general term, with a view to that resemblance which they bear to each other," etc. In the last page and a half of the section, it is stated, no less than four times, that perceived resemblance is the foundation of classifica- tion. Adam Smith's doctrine is to the same effect as his predeces- sor's. [He says], " It is this application of the name of an in- dividual to a great number of objects, whose resemblance natu- rally recalls the idea of that individual, and of the name which expresses it, that seems originally to have given occasion to the formation of these classes and assortments, which in the Schools are called genera and species, and of which the ingenious and eloquent Rousseau finds himself so much at a loss to account for the origin. What constitutes a species is merely a number of objects bearing a certain degree of resemblance to one another, and on that account denominated by a single appellation, which may be applied to express any one of them." From the evidence I have already quoted, you will see how marvellously wrong is Brown's assertion. I assure you, that not only no Nominalist ever overlooked, ever excluded, the manifested resemblance of objects to each other, but that every Nominalist explicitly founded his doctrine of classification od lliis resemblance, and on this resemblance alone. No Nominalist NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. 475 ever dreamt of disallowing the notion of relativity, — the con- ception of similarity between things ; — this they maintain not less strenuously than the Conceptionalist ; they only deny that this could ever constitute a general notion. Brown is wrong in holding that the notion of similitude is general, and constitutes the general notion. But perhaps it may be admitted, that Brown is wrong in asserting that the Nomi- nalist excludes resemblance as an element of generalization, and yet maintained, that he is right in holding, against the Nominal- ists, that the notion, or, as he has it, the feeling, of the simihtude of objects in certain respects, is general, and constitutes what is called the general notion. I am afraid, however, that the mis- conception in regard to this point will be found not inferior to that in regard to the other. Resemblance is often an individual, not a general, relation. — In the frst place, then, resemblance is a relation ; and a rela- tion necessarily supposes certain objects as related terms. There can thus be no relation of resemblance conceived, apart from certain resembling objects. This is so manifest, that a formal enumeration of the principle seems almost puerile. Let it, however, be laid down as a first axiom, that the notion of simi- larity supposes the notion of certain similar objects. In the second place, objects cannot be similar without being similar in some particular mode or accident, — say in color, in figure, in size, in weight, in smell, in fluidity, in life, etc., etc. This is equally evident, and this I lay down as a second axiom. In the third place, I assume, as a third axiom, that a resem blance is not necessarily and of itself universal. On the con- trary, a resemblance between two individual objects, in a deter- minate quality, is as individual and determinate as the objects and their resembling qualities themselves. Who, for example, will maintain that my actual notion of the likeness of a particu- lar snowball and a particular egg, is more general than the representations of the several objects and their resembling accidents of color? Now let us try Dr. Brown's theory on these grounds. In reference to the first, he does not pretend that what he calls the 476 NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM. general feeling of resemblance can exist except between indi- vidual objects and individual representations. The universal- ity, which he arrogates to this feeling, cannot accrue to it from any universality in the relative or resembling ideas. This nei- ther he nor any other philosopher ever did or could pretend. They are supposed, ex hypothesis to be individual, — singular. Neither, in reference to the second axiom, does he pretend to derive the universality which he asserts to his feeling of resem- blance from the universality of the notion of the common qual- ity, in which this resemblance is realized. He does not, with Locke and others, maintain this ; on the contrary, it is on the admitted absurdity of such a foundation that he attempts to establish the doctrine of Conceptualism on another ground. But if the universality, assumed by Dr. Brown for his " feel- ing of resemblance," be found neither in the resembling objects, nor in the qualities through which they are similar, we must look for it in the feeling of resemblance itself, apart from its actual realization ; and this, in opposition to the third axiom which we laid down as self-evident. In these circumstances, we have cer- tainly a right to expect that Dr. Brown should have brought cogent proof for an assertion so contrary to all apparent evi- dence, that although this be the question which perhaps has been more ably, keenly, and universally agitated than any other, still no philosopher before himself was found even to imagine such a possibility. But in proof of this new paradox, Dr. Brown has not only brought no evidence ; he does not even attempt to bring any. He assumes and he asserts, but he haz- ards no argument. In this state of matters, it is perhaps super- fluous to do more than to rebut assertion by assertion ; and as Dr. Brown is not in possessorio^ and as his opinion is even opposed to the universal consent of philosophers, the counter assertion, if not overturned by reasoning, must prevail. But let us endeavor to conceive on what grounds it could pos- sibly be supposed by Dr. Brown, that the feeling of resemblance between certain objects, through certain resembling qualities, has in it any thing of universal, or can, as he says, constitute the general notion. This to me is, indeed, not easy ; and kiwevj hy- NOMINALISM AND CONCEPT-UALISM. 477 potliesis I can make is so absurd, that it appears almost a libel to attribute it, even by conjecture, to so ingenious and acute a thinker. In the first place, can it be supposed that Dr. Brown believed that a feeling of resemblance between objects in a certain qual- ity or respect was general, because it was a relation ? Then must every notion of a relation be a general notion ; which neither he nor any other philosopher ever asserts. In the second place, does he suppose that there is any thing in the feeling or notion of the particular relation called similar' ity^ which is more general than the feeling or notion of any other relation ? This can hardly be conceived. What is a feeling or notion of resemblance ? Merely this ; two objects aftect us in a certain manner, and we are conscious they affect us in the same way that a single object does, when presented at different times to our perception. In either case, we judge that the affections of which we are conscious are similar or the same. There is nothing general in this consciousness, or in this judg- ment. At all events, the relation recognized between the con- sciousness of similarity produced on us by two different eggs, is not more general than the feeling of similarity produced on us by two successive presentations of the same egg. If the one is to be called general, so is the other. Again, if the feeling or notion of resemblance be made general, so must the feeling or notion of difference. They are absolutely the same notion, only in different applications. You know the logical axiom, — the science of contraries is one. We know the like only as we know the unlike. Every affirmation of similarity is virtually an affirmation that difference does not exist ; every affirmation of difference is virtually an affirmation that similarity is not to be found. But neither Brown nor any other philosopher has pretended, that the apprehension of difference is either general, or a ground of generalization. On the contrary, the apprehen- sion of difference is the negation of generalization, and a descent from the universal to the particular. But if the notion or feel- ing of the dissimilarity is not general, neither is the feeling or notion of the similarity. 478 NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISAI. In the third place, can it be that Dr. Brown supposes the particular feeling or consciousness of similarity between certain objects in certain respects to be general, because we have, in general, a capacity of feeling or being conscious of similarity ? This conjecture is equally improbable. On this ground, every act of every power would be general ; and we should not be obliged to leave Imagination, in order to seek for the universal- ity, which we cannot discover in the light or definitude of tha faculty, in the obscurity and vagueness of another. Conceptions distinguished from imaginations^ or concepts from images, — In the fourth place, only one other supposition remains ; and this may perhaps enable us to explain the possi- bility of Dr. Brown's hallucination. A relation cannot be represented in Imagination. The two terms, the two relative objects, can be severally imaged in the sensible phantasy, but not the relation itself. This is the object of the Comparative Faculty, or of Intelligence Proper. To objects so different as the images of sense and the unpicturable notions of intelligence, different names ought to be given ; and, accordingly, this has been done wherever a philosophical nomenclature of the slight- est pretensions to perfection has been formed. In the German language, which is now the richest in metaphysical expressions of any living tongue, the two kinds of objects are carefully dis- tinguished. In our language, on the contrary, the idea, concep- tion, notion, are used almost as convertible for either ; and the vagueness and confusion which is thus produced, even within the narrow sphere of speculation to which the want of the dis- tinction also confines us, can be best appreciated by those who are conversant with the philosophy of the different countries. Dr. Brown seems to have had some faint perception of the difference between intellectual notions and sensible representa- tions ; and if he had endeavored to signalize their contrast by a distinction of terms, he would have deserved well of English philosophy. But he mistook the nature of the intellectual no- tion, which connects two particular qualities by the bond of similarity, and imagined that there lurked under this intangible relation the universality which, he clearly saw, could not bo NOMINALISM AND CONCEPTUALISM, 479 found in a representation of the related objects, or of their re- sembhng qualities. At least, if this do not assist us in account- ing for his misconception, I do not know in what way we other- wise can. What I have now said is, I think, sufficient in regard to the nature of Generalization. It is notoriously a mere act of Com- parison. We compare objects ; we find them similar in certain respects, — that is, in certain respects they affect us in the same manner ; we consider the qualities in them, that thus affect us in the same manner, as the same ; and to this common quahty we give a name ; and as we can predicate this name of all and each of the resembling objects, it constitutes them into a class. Aristotle has truly said that general names are only abbreviated definitions, and definitions, you know, are judgments. For ex- ample, animal is only a compendious expression for organized and animated body ; man^ only a summary of ratioiial animal^ etc CHAPTER XXVI. mE ELABORATIVE FACULTY. — THE PRIMUM COGmTUM. ~ JUDGMENT AND REASONING. What does Language originate in'^ — I proceed now to a very curious question, which has likewise divided philosophers. It is this, — Does Language originate in General AppeUatives, or hy Proper Names f Did mankind in the formation of lan- guage, and do children in their first applications of.it, commence with the one kind of words or with the other ? The deter- mination of this question, — the question of the Primum Cog- nitum^ as it was called in the Schools, is not involved in the doctrine of Nominalism. Many illustrious philosophers have maintained that all terms, as at first employed, are expressive of individual objects, and that these only subsequently obtain a general acceptation. 1. That our first ideas and names are of particulars, — This opinion I find maintained by Yives, Locke, E-ousseau, Condillac, Adam Smith, and others. " The order of learning " (I trans- late from Yives) " is from the senses to the imagination, and from this to the intellect ; — such is the order of life and of nature. We thus proceed from the simple to the complex, from the singular to the universal. This is to be observed in chil- dren, who first of all express the several parts of different things, and then conjoin them. Things general they call by a singular name ; for instance, they call all smiths by the name of that in- dividual smith whom they have first known, and all meats, heef or porlc, as they have happened to have heard the one or the other first, when they begin to sj^eak. Thereafter the mind col- lects universals from particulars, and then again reverts to partic- r480j THE PRIMUM COGNITUM, 481 alars from universals."^ The same doctrine, without probably any knowledge of Yives, is maintained by Locke. " There is nothing more evident," he says, " than that the ideas of the persons children converse with, (to instance in them alone), are, like the persons themselves, only particular. The ideas of the nurse' and the mother are well framed in their minds ; and, like pictures of them there, represent only those individuals. The names they first gave to them are confined to these indi- viduals ; and the names of nurse and mamma, the child uses, determine themselves to those persons. Afterwards, when time and a larger acquaintance have made them observe that there are a great many other things in the world, that, in some com- mon agreements of shape, and several other qualities, resem- ble their father and mother, and those persons they have been used to, they frame an idea which they find those many par- ticulars do partake in ; and to that they give, with others, the name man, for example. And thus they come to have a general name, and a general idea." Adam Smith has, however, the merit of having applied this theory to the formation of language ; and his doctrine is too important not to be fully stated, and in his own powerful lan- guage. " The assignation," says Smith, " of particular names, to denote particular objects, — that is, the institution of nouns substantive, would probably be one of the first steps towards the formation of language. Two savages, who had never been taught to speak, but had been bred up remote from the societies of men, would naturally begin to form that language by which they would endeavor to make their mutual wants -intelligible to each other, by uttering certain sounds whenever they meant to denote certain objects. Those objects only which were most familiar to them, and which they had most frequent occasion to mention, would have particular names assigned to them. The particular cave whose covering sheltered them from the weather, the particular tree whose fruit relieved their hunger, the par- ticular fountain whose water allayed their thirst, would first be denominated by the words, cave, tree, fountain, or by whatever appellations they might think proper, in that primitive jargon, 41 482 THE PRIMUM COGNITUM to mark them. Afterwards, when the more enlarged expe- rience of these savages had led them to observe, and their nec- essary occasions obliged them to make mention of other caves, and other trees, and other fountains, they would naturally be- stow upon each of those new objects the same name by which they had been accustomed to express the similar object they were first acquainted with. The new objects had none of them any name of its own, but each of them exactly resem- bled another object, which had such an appellation. It was impossible that those savages could behold the new objects, without recollecting the old ones, and the name of the old ones, to which the new bore so close a resemblance. When they had occasion, therefore, to mention or to point out to each other any of the new objects, they would naturally utter the name of the correspondent old one, of which the idea could not fail, at that instant, to present itself to their memory in the strongest and liveliest manner. And thus those words, which were originally the proper names of individuals, would each of them insensibly become the common name of a multitude. A child that is just learning to speak, calls every person who comes to the house its papa, or its mamma ; and thus bestows upon the whole species those names which it had been taught to apply to two individuals. I have known a clown who did not know the proper name of the river which ran by his own door. It was the river^ he said, and he never heard any other name for it. His experience, it seems, had not led him to observe any other river. The general word river^ therefore, was, it is evident, in his acceptance of it, a proper name signify- ing an individual object. If this person had been carried to another river, would he not readily have called it a river? Could we suppose a person living on the banks of the Thames so ignorant as not to know the general word river^ but to be acquainted only with the particular word Thames^ if he was brought to any other river, would he not readily call it a Thames ? This, in reality, is no more than what they who are well acquairted with the general word are very apt to do. An Englishman, describing any great river which he may bave^ THE PRIMUM COGNITUM. 483 seen in some fo reign country, naturally says, that it is another Thames. The Spaniards, when they first arrived upon the coast of Mexico, and observed the wealth, populousness, and habitations of that fine country, so much superior to the savage nations which they had been visiting for some time before, cried out that it was another Spain. Hence it was called New Spain ; and this name has stuck to that unfortunate country ever since. We say, in the same manner, of a hero, that he is an Alexander ; of an orator, that he is a Cicero ; of a philosopher that he is a Newton. This way of speaking, which the gram- marians call an Antonomasia, and which is still extremely common, though now not at all necessary, demonstrates how much mankind are naturally disposed to give to one object the name of any other which nearly resembles it ; and thus, to de- nominate a multitude by what originally was intended to express an individual. " It is this application of the name of an individual to a great multitude of objects, whose resemblance naturally recalls the idea of that individual, and of the name which expresses it, that seems originally to have given occasion to the formation of those classes and assortments which, in the Schools, are called genera and species. ^^ 2. That we first use general fer7ns. — On the other hand, an opposite doctrine is maintained by many profound philosophers. A large section of the Schoolmen embraced it ; and, among more modern thinkers, it is adopted by Leibnitz,. who says, that "gen- eral terms serve not only for the perfection of languages, but are even necessary for their essential constitution. For if by particulars be understood things individual, it would be impos- sible to speak, if there were only proper names, and no appel- latives, that is to say, if there were only names for things indi- vidual, since, at every moment, we are met by new ones, when we treat of persons, of accidents, and especially of actions, which are those that we describe the most ; but if by particulars be meant the lowest species (species infimas), besides that it is frequently very difficult to determine them, it is manifest that these are already universals, founded on similarity. Now, as 484 THE PRIMUM COGNITUM. the only difference of species and genera lies in a similarity of greater or less extent, it is natural to note every kind of simi- larity or agreement, and, consequently, to employ general terms of every degree ; nay, the most general being less complex with regard to the essences which they comprehend, although more extensive in relation to the things individual to which they apply, are frequently the easiest to form, and are the most use- ful. It is likewise seen that children, and those who know but little of the language which they attempt to speak, or little of the subject on which they would employ it, make use of general terms, as thing, plant, animal, instead of using proper names, of which they are destitute. And it is certain that all proper or individual names have been originally appellative or general." In illustration of this latter most important doctrine, he, in a subsequent part of the work, says : " I would add, in conformity to what I have previously observed, that proper names have been originally appellative, that is to say, general in their origin, as Brutus, Csesar, Augustus, Capito, Lentulus, Piso, Cicero, Elbe, Rhine, Rhur, Leine, Ocker, Bucephalus, Alps, Pyrenees, etc.," and, after illustrating this in detail, he concludes : — " Thus I would make bold to affirm that almost all words have been originally general terms, because it would happen very rarely that men would invent a name, expressly and without a reason, to denote this or that individual. We may, therefore, assert that the names of individual things were names of species, which were given par excellence, or otherwise, to some individual, as ihe name Great Head to him of the whole town who had the largest, or who was the man of most consideration, of the Great Heads known. It is thus, likewise, that men give the names of genera to species, that is to say, that they content themselves with a term more general or vague to denote more particular classes, when they do not care about the differences. As, for example, we content ourselves with the general name ahsirithium (wormwood), although there are so many species of the plant that one of the Bauhins has filled a whole book with them." That this was likewise the opinion of the great Turgot, we learn from his biographer. "M. Turgot," says Condorcet, THE PRIMUM COGNITUM. 485 *' believed that the opinion was wrong, which held that, in gen- eral, the mind only acquired general or abstract ideas by the comparison of more particular ideas. On the contrary, our first ideas are very general ; for, seeing at first only a small num- ber of qualities, our idea irpcludes all the existences to which these qualities are common. As we acquire knowledge, our ideas become ♦more particular, without ever reaching the last limit ; and, what might have deceived the metaphysicians, it is precisely by this process that we learn that these ideas are more g(meral than we had at first supposed." Here are two opposite opinions, each having nearly equal authority in its favor, maintained on both sides with equal abil- ity and apparent evidence. Either doctrine would be held established were we unacquainted with the arguments in favor of the other. 8. That our first ideas and terms are only vague and confused. — But I have now to state to you a third opinion, intermediate between these, which conciliates both, and seems, moreover, to carry a superior probability in its statement. This opinion maintains, that as our knowledge proceeds from the confused to the distinct, — from the vague to the determinate, — so, in the mouths of children, language at first expresses neither the precisely general nor the deter minately individual^ hut the vague and confused ; and that, out of this, the universal is elaborated by generification, the particular and singular by specification and individualization. I formerly explained why I view the doctrine held by Mr. Stewart and others in regard to perception in general and vision in particular, as erroneous ; inasmuch as they conceive that our sensible cognitions are formed by the addition of an almost in- finite number of separate and consecutive acts of attentive per- ception, each act being cognizant of a certain minimum sensibile. On the contrary, I showed that, instead of commencing with minima, perception commences with masses ; that, though our capacity of attention be very limited in regard to the number of objects on which a faculty can be simultaneously directed, yet these objects may be large or small. We may make, for 41* 486 /THE PEIMUM COGNITUM. example, a single object of attention either of a whole man, or of his face, or of his eje, or of the pupil of his eye, or of a speck upon the pupil. To each of these objects there can only be a certain amount of attentive perception applied, and we can concentrate it all on any one. * In proportion as the object is larger and more complex, our attention can of course be less applied to a»y part of it, and consequently, our knowledge of it in detail will be vaguer and more imperfect. But having first acquired a comprehensive knowledge of it as a whole, we can descend to its several parts, consider these both in themselves, and in relation to each other, and to the whole of which they are constituents, and thus attain to a complete and articulate knowledge of the object. We decompose, and then we recom- pose. The mind 'proceeds hy analysis, from the whole to the parts, — But in this we always proceed first by decomposition or analysis. All analysis indeed supposes a foregone composition or synthesis, because we cannot decompose what is not already composite. But in our acquisition of knowledge, the objects are presented to us compounded ; and they obtain a unity only in the unity of our consciousness. The unity of consciousness is, as it were, the frame in which objects are seen. I say, then, that the first procedure of mind in the elaboration of its knowledge is always analytical. It descends from the whole to the parts, — from the vague to the definite. Definitude, that is, a knowledge of minute differences, is not, as the opposite theory supposes, the firsj;, but 'the last, term of our cognitions. Between two sheep an ordinary spectator can probably apprehend no difference, and if they were twice presented to him, he would be unable to discriminate the one from the other. But a shepherd can distinguish every individual sheep ; and why ? Because he has descended from the vague knowledge which we all have of sheep, - — from the vague knowledge which makes every sheep, as it were, only a repetition of the same undifferenced unit, — to a definite knowledge of qualities by which each is contrasted from its neighbor. Now, in this example, we apprehend the sheep by marks not less individual than those by which the THE PIUMUM COGNITUM. 487 shepherd discriminates them ; but the whole of each sheep be- ing made an object, the marks by which we know it are the same in each and all, and cannot, therefore, afford the principle by which we can discriminate them from each other. Now this is what appears to me to take place with children. They first know, — they first cognize, the things and persons presented to them as wholes. But wholes of the same kind, if we do not descend to their parts, afford us no difference, — no mark by which we can discriminate the one from the other. Children, thus, originally perceiving similar objects, — persons, for exam- ple, — only as wholes, do at first hardly distinguish them. They apprehend first the more obtrusive marks that separate species from species and, in consequence of the notorious contrast of dress, men from women ; but they do not as yet recognize the finer traits that discriminate individual from individual. But, though thus apprehending individuals only by what we now call their specific or their generic qualities, it is not to be supposed that children know them by any abstract general attributes, that is, by attributes formed by comparison and attention. On the other hand, because their knowledge is not general, it is not to be supposed to be particular or individual, if by particular be meant a separation of species from species, and by individual, the separation of individual from individual ; for cliildren are at first apt to confound individuals together, not only in name but in reality. " A cliild " [says Degerando] " who has been taught to say papa^ in pointing to his father, will give at first, as Locke [and Aristotle before him] had remarked, the name of papa to all the men whom he sees. As he only at first seizes on the more striking appearances of objects, they would appear to him all similar, and he denotes them by the same names. But when it has been pointed out to him that he is mistaken, or when he has discovered this by the consequences of his lan- guage, he studies to discriminate the objects which he had con- founded, and he takes hold of their differences. The child commences, like the savage, by employing only isolated words in place of phrases ; he commences by taking verbs and nouns only in their absolute state. But as these imperfect attempts at 488 THE PRIMUM COGNITUM. speech express at once many and very different things, and pro- duce, in consequence, manifold ambiguities, he soon discovers the necessity of determining them with greater exactitude ; he endeavors to make it understood in what respects the thing which he wishes to denote, is distinguished from those with which it is confounded; and, to succeed in this endeavor, he tries to distinguish them himself. Thus when, at this age, the child seems to us as yet unoccupied, he is in reality very busy ; he is devoted to a study which differs not in its nature from* that to which the philosopher applies himself; the child, like the philosopher, observes, compares, and analyses." In support of this doctrine I can appeal to high authority ; it is that maintained by Aristotle. Speaking of the order of pro- cedure in physical science, he says, " We ought to proceed from the better known to the less knoAvn, and from what is clearer to us to that which is clearer in nature. But those things are first known and clearer, which are more complex and confused ; for it is only by subsequent analysis that we attain to a knowledge of the parts and elements of which they are composed. We ought, therefore, to proceed from universals to singulars ; for the whole is better known to sense than its parts ; and the universal is a kind of w^hole, as the universal comprehends many things as its parts. Thus it is that names are at first better known to us than definitions ; for the name denotes a whole, and that in- determinately ; whereas the definition divides and explicates its parts. Children, likewise, at first call all men fathers and all women mothers ; but thereafter they learn to discriminate each individual from another." I have terminated the consideration of the faculty of Com- parison in its process of Generalization. I am now to consider it in those of its operations, which have obtained the special names of Judgment and Reasoning. In these processes, the act of Comparison is a judgment of something more than a mere afifirmation of the existence of a phaenomenon, — something more than a mere discrimination of one phaenomenon from another ; and, accordingly, while it has happened, that the intervention of judgment in every, even the JUDGMENT AND REASONING. 489 simplest, act of primary cognition, as monotonous and rapid, has been overlooked, the name has been exclusively limited to the more varied and elaborate comparison of one notion with another, and the enouncement of their agreement or disagree- ment. It is in the discharge of this, its more obtrusive, func- tion, that we are now about to consider the Elaborative Faculty, Why Judgment and Reasoning are necessary. — Considering the Elaborative Faculty as a mean of discovering truth, by a comparison of the notions we have obtained from the Acquisi- tive Powers, it is evident that, though this faculty be the attri- bute by which a man is distinguished as a creation higher than the animals, it is equally the quality which marks his inferiority to superior intelligences. Judgment and Reasoning are ren- dered necessary by the imperfection of our nature. Were we capable of a knowledge of things and their relations at a single view, by an intuitive glance, discursive thought would be a su- perfluous act. It is by such an intuition that we must suppose that the Supreme Intelligence knows all things at onc\^. I have already noticed that our knowledge does not com- mence with the individual and the most particular objects of knowledge, — that we do not rise in any regular progress from the less to the more general, first considering the qualities which characterize individuals, then those which belong to species and genera, in regular ascent. On the contrary, our knowledge commences with the vague and confused, in the way which Aristotle has so well illustrated. This I may further explain by another analogy. We perceive an object approaching from a distance. At first, we do not know whether it be a hving or an inanimate thing. By degrees, we become aware that it is an animal ; but of what kind, — whether man or beast, — we are not as yet able to determine. It continues to advance, we dis- cover it to be a quadruped, but of what species we cannot yet say. At length, we perceive that it is a horse, and again, after a season, we find that it is Bucephalus. Thus, as I formerly observed, children, first of all, take note of the generic differ- ences, and they can distinguish species long before they are able to discriminate individuals. In all this, however, I must again 490 JUDGMENT AND REASONING. remark, that our knovf ledge does not properly commence with the general, but with the vague and confused. Oat of this the general and the individual are both equally evolved. What is an act ofjiidgment, — " In consequence of this gene- alogy of our knowledge," [says Crousaz,] ",we usually com- mence by bestowing a name upon a whole object, or congeries of objects, of which, however, we possess only a partial and indeiinite conception. In the sequel, this vague notion becomes somewhat more determinate ; the partial idea which we Lad, becomes enlarged by new accessions ; by degrees, our concep- tion waxes fuller, and represents a greater number of attributes. With this conception, thus amplified and improved, we compare the last notion which has been acquired, that is to say, we com- pare a part with its whole, or with the other parts of this whole, and finding that it is harmonious, — that it dovetails and nat- urally assorts with other parts, we acquiesce in this union ; and this we denominate an act of judgment, "Li learning arithmetic, I form the notion of the number six^ as surpassing J^^;e by a single unit, and as surpassed in the same proportion by seven. Then I find that it can be divided into two equal halves, of which each contains three units. By this procedure, the notion of the number six becomes more complex ; the notion of an even number is one of its parts. Comparing this new notion with that of the number, six becomes fuller by its addition. I recognize that the two notions suit, — in other words I judge that six is an even number. " I have the conception of a triangle, and this conception is composed in my mind of several others. Among these partial notions, I select that of two sides greater than the third, and this notion, which I had at first, as it wei'e, taken apart, I reu- nite with the others from which it had been separated, saying' the triangle contains always two sides, which together are greater than the third. " When I say, body is divisible among the notions which concur in forming my conception of body, I particularly attend to that of divisible, and finding that it really agrees with the otliers, I judge accordingly that body is divisible. • ^\p ' JUDGMENT AND REASONING. 491 Subject. Predicate. Copula. — ^ " Every time we judge, we compare a total conception with a partial, and we recognize that the latter really constitutes a part of the foa-mer. One of these (•onceptions has received the name of subject, the other, that of attribute or predicate.'^ The verb which connects these two parts is called the copida. The quadrangle is a double triangle ; nine is an odd number ; body is divisible. Here quadrangle, nine, body, are subjects ; a double triangle, an o^d number, divis- ible, are predicates. The whole mental judgment, formed by the subject, predicate, and copula, is called, when enounced in words, 'proposition. " In discourse, the parts of a proposition are not always found placed in logical order ; but to discover and discriminate them, it is only requisite to ask, — What is the thing of which something else is affirmed or denied'^ The answer to this question will point out the subject ; and we shall find the predicate if we inquire, — What is affirmed or denied of the matter of which we speak ? "A proposition is sometimes so enounced that each of its terms may be considered as subject and as predicate. Tims, when we say, — Death is the wages of sin ; we may regard sin as the subject of which we predicate death, as one of its conse- quences, and we may likewise view death as the subject of which we predicate sin, as the origin. In these cases, we must consider the general tenor of the discourse, and determine from 'the context what is the matter of which it principally treats." " In fine, when we judge, we must have, in the first place, at least two notions ; in the second place, we compare these ; in the third, we recognize that one contains or excludes the other ; and, in the fourth, we acquiesce in this recognition." Reasoning is complex and mediate judgment. — Simple Com- parison or Judgment is conversant with two notions, the one of which is contained in the other. But it often happens, that one notion is contained in another not immediately, but mediately, and we may be able to recognize the relation of these to each other only through a third, which, as it immediately contains the one, is immediately contained in the other. Take the 492 JUDGMENT AND REASONING. notions, A, B, C. — A contains B ; B contains C ; — A, there fore, also contains C. But as, ex hypothesi, we do not at once and directly know G as contained in A, we cannot immediately compare them together, and judge of their relation. We, there- fore, perform a double or complex process of comparison ; we compare B with A, and C with B, and then C with A, through B. We say B is a part of A ; C is a part of B ; therefore, C is a part of A. •This double act of comparison has obtained the name of -Reasoning ; the term Judgment being left to express the simple act of comparison, or rather its result. If this distinction between Judgment and Reasoning were merely a verbal difference, to discriminate the simpler and more complex act of comparison, no objection could be raised to it on the score of propriety, and its convenience would fully warrant its establishment. But this distinction has not always been meant to express nothing more. It has, in fact, been generally supposed to mark out two distinct faculties. Two hinds of Reasoning. — Reasoning is either from the " whole to its parts; or from all the. parts, discretively, to the whole they constitute, collectively. The former of these is De- ductive, the latter is Inductive, Reasoning. The statement you will find, in all logical books, of reasonings from certain parts to the whole, or from certain parts to certain parts, is erroneous. I shall first speak of the reasoning from the whole to its parts, — or of the Deductive Inference. Axiom of Deductive Reasoning, — 1°, It is self-evident, that whatever is the part of a part, is a part of the whole. This one axiom is the foundation of all reasoning from the whole to the parts. There are, however, two kinds of whole and parts ; and these constitute two varieties, or rather two phases, of deductive reasoning. This distinction, which is of the most important kind, has nevertheless been wholly overlooked by logicians, in consequence of which the utmost perplexity and confusion have been introduced into the science. I have formerly stated that a proposition consists of two terms, — the one called subject, the other predicate, the subject being that of which some attribute is said, the predicate being JUDGMENT AND REASONING. 493 the attribute so said. Now, in^ different relations, we may re- gard the subject as the whole, and the predicate as its part, or the predicate as the whole and the su})ject as its part. Let us take the proposition, — milk is wJdte, Now, here we may either consider the predicate white as one of a number of attributes, the whole complement of which constitutes the sub- ject milk. In this point of view, the predicate is a part of the subject. Or, again, we may consider the predicate white as the name of a class of objects, of which the subject is one. In this point of view, the subject is a part of the predicate. Comprehension and Extension applied to Reasoning, — You will remember the distinction, which I formerly stated, of the twofold quantity of notions or terms. The Breadth or Exten- sion of a notion or term corresponds to the greater number of subjects contained under a predicate ; the Depth, Intension, or Comprehension of a notion or term, to the greater number of predicates contained in a subject. These quantities or wholes are always in the inverse ratio of each other. Now, it is sin- gular, that logicians should have taken this distinction between notions, and yet not have thought of applying it to reasoning. But so it is, and this is not the only oversight they have com- mitted in the application of the very primary principles of their science. The great distinction we have established between the subject and predicate considered severally, as, in different rela- tions, whole and as part, constitutes the primary and principal division of Syllogisms, both Deductive and Inductive ; and its introduction wipes off a complex mass of rules and qualifications, which the want of it rendered necessary. I can, of course, at present, only explain in general the nature of this distinction ; its details belong to the science of the Laws of Thought, or Logic, of which we are not here to treat. Essential and Integral wholes, — I shall first consider the process of that Deductive Inference in which the subject is viewed as the whole, the predicate as the part. In this reason- ing, the whole is determined by the Comprehension, and is, again, either a Physical or Essential whole, or an Integral or Mathematical whole. A Physical or Essential whole is that 42 494 JUDGMENT AND REASONING. which consists of not really separable parts, of or pertaining tc its substance. Thus, man is made up of two substantial parts, -— a mind and a body ; and each of these has again various quali- ties, v/hich, though separable only by mental abstraction, are considered as so many parts of an essential whole. Thus, the attributes of respiration, of digestion, of locomotion, of color, are so many parts of the whole notion we have of the human body ; cognition, feeling, desire, virtue, vice, etc., so many parts of the whole notion we have of man. A Mathematical, or Integral, or Quantitative whole is that which has part out of part, and which, therefore, can be really partitioned. The Integral or, as it ought to be called. Integrate whole, is composed of inte- grant parts which are either homogeneous or heterogeneous. An example of the former is given in the division of a square into two triangles ; of the latter, of the animal body into head, trunk, extremities, etc. These wholes (and there are others of less importance which I omit), are varieties of that whole which we may call a Comprehensive, or Metaphysical ; it might be called a Natural, whole. Reasoning in the whole of Comprehension, — This being un- derstood, let us consider how we proceed when we reason from the relation between a Comprehensive whole and its parts. Here, as I have said, the subject is the whole, the predicate its part; in other words, the predicate belongs to the subject. Now here it is evident, that all the parts of the predicate must also be parts of the subject ; in other terms, all that belongs to the predicate must also belong to the subject. In the words of the scholastic adage, — Nota notce est nota rei ipsius ; Predi- catam predicati est predicatum subjecti. An example of this reasorting : Europe contains England ; England contains Middlesex ; Therefore, Europe contains Middlesex. In other words, England is an integrant part of Europe ; Middlesex is an integrant part of England ; therefore, Middle- sex is an integrant part of Europe. This is an example from a mathematical whole and parts. Again : JUDGMENT AND REASONING. 495 Socrates is just (that is, Socrates contains justice as a qual- ity) ; ^ ^ ^ . ^ Justice is a virtue (that is, justice contains virtue as a con- stituent part) ; Therefore, Socrates is virtuous. In other words ; — justice is an attribute or essential part of Socrates ; virtue is an attribute or essential part of justice ; therefore, virtue is an attribute or essential part of Socrates. This is an example from a physical or essential whole and parts. What I have now said will be enough to show, in general, what I mean by a deductive reasoning, in which the subject is the whole, the predicate the part. Reasoning in the whole of Extension, — I proceed, in the sec- ond place, to the other kind of Deductive Reasoning, — that in which the subject is the part, the predicate is the whole. This reasoning proceeds under that species of whole which has been called the Logical, or Potential, or Universal. This whole is determined by the Extension of a notion ; the genera having species, and the species individuals, as their parts. Thus, ani- mal is a universal whole, of which hird and beast are immedi- ate, eagle and sparrow^ dog and horse, mediate, parts ; while man, which, in relation to animal, is a part, is a whole in rela- tion to Peter, Paul, Socrates, etc. The parts of a logical or universal whole, I^hould notice, are called the subject parts. From what you now know of the nature of generalization, you are aware, that general terms are terms expressive of attri- butes which may be predicated of many different objects ; and inasmuch as these objects resemble each other in the common attribute, they are considered by us as constituting a class. Thus, when I say, that a horse is a quadruped ; Bucephalus is a horse; therefore, Bucephalus is a quadruped; — I virtually say, — horse, the subject, is a part of the predicate quadruped ; Bucephalus^ the subject, is part of the predicate horse ; there- fore, Bucephalus, the subject, is part of the predicate quadruped. In the reasoning under this whole, you will observe that the same word, as it is whole or part, changes from predicate to 496 -^ JUDGMENT AND REASONING. subject ; horse ^ when viewed as a part of qiiadrwped^ J)eing the subject of the proposition ; whereas when viewed as a whole, containing Bucephalus^ it becomes the predicate. Axiom of Inductive Reasoning. — Such is a general view of the process of Deductive Reasoning under the two great varie- ties determined by the two different kinds of whole and parts. I now proceed to the counter process, — that of Inductive Reasoning. The Deductive is founded on the axiom, that what is part of the part, is also part of the containing whole ; the In- ductive on the principle, that what is true of every constituent part belongs, or does not belong, to the constituted whole. Induction proceeds in the two wholes, — Induction, like Deduc- tion, may be divided into two kinds, according as the whole and parts about which it is conversant, are a Comprehensive or Physical or Natural, or an Extensive or Logical whole. Thus, in the former : Gold is a metal, yellow, ductile, fusible in aqua regia^ of a certain specific gravity, and so on ; These qualities constitute this body (are all its parts) ; Therefore this body is gold. In the latter ; — Ox, horse, dog, etc., are animals, — that is, are contained under the class animal ; Ox, horse, dbg, etc., constitute (are all the constituents of) the class quadruped ; Therefore, quadruped is contained under animal. Both in the Deductive and Inductive processes^ the inference must be of an absolute necessity^ in so far as the mental illation is concerned ; that is, every consequent proposition must be evolved out of every antecedent proposition with intuitive evi- dence. I do not mean by this, that the antecedent should be necessarily true, or that the consequent be really contained in it ; it is sufficient that the antecedent be assumed as true, and that the consequent be, in conformity to the laws of thought, evolved out of it as its part or its equation. This last is called Logical or Formal or Subjective t]:uth ; and an inference may be subjectively or formally true, which is objectively or really false. JUDGMENT AND REASONING. 497 The account given of Induction in all works of Logic is ut- terly erroneous. Sometimes we find tliis inference described as a precarious, not a necessary reasoning. It is called an illa- tion from some to all. But here the some^ as it neither contains nor constitutes the all, determines no necessary movement, and a conclusion drawn under these circumstances is logically vicious. Others again describe the Inductive process thus : What belongs to some objects of a class belongs to the whole class ; This property belongs to some objects of the class ; Therefore, it belongs to the whole class. This account of Induction, which is the one you will find in all the English works on Logic, is not an inductive reasoning at all. It is, logically considered, a deductive syllogism ; and, log- ically considered, a syllogism radically vicious. It is logically vicious to say, that, because, some individuals of a class have certain common qualities apart from that property which c(;nsti- tutes the class itself, therefore the whole individuals of the class should partake in these qualities. For this there is no logical reason, — no necessity of thought. The probability of this in- ference, and it is only probable, is founded pn the observation of the analogy of nature, and, therefore, not upon the laAVS of thought by which alone reasoning, considered as a logical pro- cess, is exclusively governed. To become a formally legitimate induction, the objective probability must be clothed with a sub- jective necessity, and the some must be translated into the all which it is supposed to represent. In the deductive syllogism we proceed by analysis, — that is, by decomposing a whole into its parts ; hut as the two ivholes with which reasoning is conversant are in the inverse ratio of each other^ so our analysis in the one will correspond to our syn- thesis in the other. For example, when I divide a whole of ex- tension into its parts, — when I divide a genus into the species, a species into the individuals it contains, — I do so by adding new differences, and thus go on accumulating in the parts a complement of qualities which did not belong to the wholes. This, therefore, which, in point of extension, is an analysis, is* 498 JUDGMENT AND REASONING. in point of comprehf nsion, a synthesis. In like manner, when 1 decompose a whole of comprehension, that is, decompose a complex predicate into its constituent attributes, I obtain by this process a simpler and more general quality, and thus this, which, in relation to a comprehensive whole, is an analysis, is, in relation to an extensive whole, a synthesis. As the deduc- ti^ e inference is Analytic, the inductive is Synthetic. But as induction, equally as deduction, is conversant with both wholes, so the Synthesis of induction on the comprehensive whole is a reversed process to its synthesis on the extensive whole. From what I have now stated, you will, therefore, be aware, that the terms analysis and synthesisj when used without quali- fication, may be employed at cross purposes, to denote opera- tions precisely the converse of each other. And so it has happened. Analysis, in the mouth of one set of philosophers, means precisely what synthesis denotes in the mouth of an- other ; nay, what is even still more frequent, these words are perpetually converted with each other by the same philosopher. I may notice, what has rarely, if ever, been remarked, that syn- thesis in the writings of the Greek logicians is equivalent to the analysis of modern philosophers : the former, regarding the ex- tensive whole as the principal, applied' analysis, y^at t^o^^rjv, to its division ; the latter, viewing the comprehensive whole as the principal, in general limit analysis to its decomposition. This, however, has been overlooked, and a confusion the most inextri- cable prevails in regard to the use of these words, if the thread to the labyrinth is not obtained. CHAPTER XXVII. THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. — THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. I NOW enter upon the last of the Cognitive Faculties, — tht faculty which I denominated the Regulative. Here the term faculty^ you will observe, is employed in a somewhat peculiar signification, for it is employed not to denote the proximate cause of any definite energy, but the power the mind has of being the native source of certain necessary or a priori cogni- tions ; which cognitions, as they are the conditions, the forms, under which our knowledge in general is possible, constitute so many fundamental laws of intellectual nature. It is in this sense that I call the power which the mind possesses of modify- ing the knowledge it receives, in conformity to its proper nature, its Regulative Faculty. The Regulative Faculty is, however, in fact, nothing more than the complement of such laws ; — it is the locus principiorum. It thus corresponds to what was known in the Greek philosophy under the name of vovg, when that term was rigorously used. To this faculty has been latterly applied the name Reason ; but this term is so vague and am- biguous, that it is almost unfitted to convey any definite mean- ing. Proper use of the term Common Sense, — The term Common Sense has likewise been aj^plied to designate the place of prin- ciples. This word is also ambiguous. In the Jirst place, it was the expression used in the Aristotelic philosophy to denote the Central or Common Sensory, in which the differeiit external senses met and were united. In tlie second place, it was em- ployed to signify a sounci understanding applied to vulgar ob^ (499) 500 THE ARGUMENT FROM COMMON SENSE. jects^ in contrast to a scientijic or speculative intelligence ; and it is in this signification that it has been taken by those who have derided the principle on which the philosophy, which has been distinctively denominated the Scottish, professes to be estab^ lished. This is not, however, the meaning which has always, or even principally, been attached to it ; and an incomparably stronger case might be made out in defence of this expression than has been done by Reid, or even by Mr. Stewart. It is, in fact, a term of high antiquity and very general acceptation. We find it in Cicero, in several passages not hitherto observed. It is found in the meaning in question in Phsedrus, and not in the signification of community of sentiment, which it expresses in Horace and Juvenal. And in the same meaning the term Sensus Communis is employed by St. Augustin. In modern times, it is to be found in the philosophical writings of every country of Europe. In fact, so far as use and wont may be allowed to weigh, there is perhaps no philosophical expression in support of which a more numerous array of authorities may be alleged. The expression, however, is certainly exceptiona- ble, and it can only claim toleration in the absence of a better. I may notice that Pascal and Hemsterhuis have applied Intu- ition and Sentiment in this sense ; and Jacobi originally em- ployed Belief or Faith in the same way, though he latterly superseded this expression by that of Reason, [Our cognitions, it is evident, are not all at second hand. Consequents cannot, by an infinite regress, be evolved out of an- tecedents, which are themselves only consequents. Demonstra- tion, if proof be possible, behooves us to repose at last on proposi- tions, which, carrying their own evidence, necessitate their own admission ; and which being, as primary, inexplicable, as inex- plicable, incomprehensible, must consequently manifest them- selves less in the character of cognitions than o^ facts ^ of which consciousness assures us under the simple form o^ feeling or belief Without at present attempting to determine the character, number, and relations — waiving, in short, all attempt at an articulate analysis and classification, of •the primar}' elements of THE ARGUIVIENT FROM COMMON Si:>>8E. 501 cognition, as canying us into a discussion beyond our iimlL^", and not of indispensable importance for the end we have in view ; it is sufficient to have it conceded, in general, tJtat such elements there are ; and this concession of their existence being supposed, I shall proceed to hazard some observations, principally in re- gai'd to their authority as warrants and criteria of truth. Nor can this assumption, of the existence of some original basis of knowledge in the mind itself, be refused by any. For even tho u [;liilosophers who profess to derive all our knowdedge from experience, and who admit no universal truths of intelligence but such as are generalized from individual truths of fact — • even these philosophers are forced virtually to acknowledge, at the root of the several acts of observation from which their rren- eralization starts, some law or principle to w^hich they can appeal as guaranteeing the procedure, should the validity of these primordial acts themselves be called in question. This acknowledgment is, among others, made even by Locke ; and on such fundamental guarantee of induction he even bestows the name of Common Sense. Limiting, therefore, our consideration to the question of au- thority; how, it is asked, do these primary propositions — these cognitions at first hand — these fundamental facts, feelings, be- liefs, certify us of their own veracity? To this the only possible answer is — that as elements of our mental constitution — as the essential conditions of our knowledge — they must by us be accepted as true. To suppose their falsehood, is to suppose that we are created capable of intelligence, in order to be made tho victims of delusion ; that God is a deceiver, and the root of our nature a lie. But such a supposition, if gratuitous, is manifestly illegitimate. For, on the contrary, the data of our original con- sciousness must, it is evident, in the first instance^ be presumed true. It is only, if proved false, that their authority can, in consequence of that proof ^ be, in i\\Q second instance, disallowed. Speaking, therefore, generally, to argue from Common Sense is simply to show^ that the denial of a given proposition 'would involve the dt-nial of some original datum of consciousness ; hut as every original datum of consciousness is to be presumed true^ 502 THE ARGUMENT FROM COMMON SENSE. that the proposition in question^ as dependent on such a principle^ must be admitted, Though the argument from Common Sense be an appeal to the natural convictions of mankind, it is not an appeal from philosophy to blind feeling. It is only an appeal, from the heretical conclusions of particular philosophies, to the catholic principles of all philosophy. The prejudice which, on this sup- position, -has sometimes been excited against the argument, is groundless. Nor is it true, that the argument from Common Sense denies the decision to the judgment of philosophers, and accords it to the verdict of the vulojar. Nothinoj can be more erroneous. We admit — nay we maintain, as D'Alembert well expresses it, "that the truth in metaphysic, like the truth in matters of taste, is a truth of which all minds have the germ within them- selves ; to which, indeed, the greater number pay no attention, but which they recognize the moment it is pointed out to them. . . . But if, in this sort, all are able to understand, all are not able to instruct. The merit of conveying easily to others true and simple notions, is much greater than is commonly supposed ; for experience proves how rarely this is to be met with. Sound metaphysical ideas are common truths, which every one appre- hends, but which few have the talent to develop. So difficult is it on any subject to make our own what belongs to every one." Or, to employ the words of the ingenious Lichtenberg, " Philoso- phy, twist the matter as we may, is always a sort of chemistry. The peasant employs all the principles of abstract philosophy, only inveloped^ latent, engaged, as the men of physical science express it ; the Philosopher exhibits the pure principle." The first problem of Philosophy — and it is one of no easy accomplishment — being thus to seek out, purify, and establish, by intellectual analysis and criticism, the elementary feelings or beliefs, in which are given the elementary truths of which all are in possession ; and the argument from Common Sense being the allegation of these feelings or beliefs as explicated and ascertained, in proof of the relative truths and their neces- sary consequences ; — this argument is manifestly dependent on THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. 503 philosophy, as an art, as an acquired dexterity, and cannot, not- withstanding the errors which they have so frequently com- mitted, be taken out of the hands of the philosophers. Common Sense is like Common Law. Each may be laid down as the general rule of decision ; but in the one ca?e, it must be left to the jurist, in the other, to the philosopher, to ascertain what are the contents of the rule ; and though, in both instances, the com- mon man may be cited as a witness for the custom or the fact, in neither can he be allowed to officiate as advocate or as judge. It must be recollected, also, that in appealing to the conscious- ness of mankind in general, we only appeal to the consciousness of those not disqualified to pronounce a decision. " In saying," (to use the words of Aristotle), " simply and without qualifica- tion, that this or that is a known truth, we do not mean that it is in fact recognized by all, but only by such as are of sound understanding ; just as in saying absolutely that a thing is wholesome, we must be held to mean, to such as are of a hale constitution." We may, in short, say of the true philosopher what Erasmus, in an epistle to Hutten, said of Sir Thomas More : — " Nemo minus ducitur viilgijudicio ; sed rursus nemo minus abest a sensu communiJ^~\ — Diss, supp, to Reid, : Nomenclature of the Regulative Faculty. — Were it allowed in metaphysical philosophy, as in physical, to discriminate sci- entific differences by scientific terms, I would employ the word noetic, as derived from vovg, to express all those cognitions that originate in the mind itself, dianoetic to denote the opera- tions of the Discursive, Elaborative, or Comparative Faculty. So much for the nomenclature of the faculty itself. On the other hand, the cognitions themselves, of which it is the source, have obtained various appellations. They have been denominated j^rs^ ^rmczp/es,"^ common anticipations, prin- ^ [Without entering on the various meanings of the term Principle, which Aristotle defines, in general, that from whence any thing exists, is produced, or is known, it is sufficient to say that it is always used for that on which some- thing else depends ; and thus both for an original law and for an original element. In the former case it is regulative^ in the latter a constitutive, prin- ciple ; and in either signification, it may be very properly applied to our crig'nal cognitions.] — Diss. supp. to Reid. 504 THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. ciples of common sense, self-evident or intuitive '^ truths, primitive notions, native notions, innate cognitions, natural knowledges {cognitions), fundamental reasons, metaphysical or transcendental truths, idtirnate or elemental laws of thought, primary or funda- mental laws of human belief ov primary laws of human reason,'\ ^ [The terra Intuition is not unambiguous. Besides its original and proper meaning (as a visual perception), it has been employed to denote a kind of apprehension and a kind o^ judgment. Under the former head, Intuition, or intuitive knowledge, has been used in the following significations : a. — To denote a perception of the actual and present, in opposition to the '^ abstractive ^^ knowledge which we have of the possible in imagination, and of the past in memory. b. — To denote an immediate apprehension of a thing in itself, in contrast to a representative, vicarious, or mediate, apprehension of it, in or through something else. c. — To denote the knowledge which we can adequately represent in im- agination, in contradistinction to the " symbolical '^ knowledge which we cannot image, but only think or conceive, through and under a sign or word. Under the latter head, it has only a single signification; namely: To denote the immediate affirmation by the intellect, that the predicate does or does not pertain to the subject, in what are called self-evident prop- ositions. All these meanings, however, have this in common, that they express the condition of an immediate, in opposition to a mediate knowledge.] — Diss, snpp. to Reid. t [Reason is a very vague, vacillating, and equivocal word. Throwing aside various accidental significations which it has obtained in particular languages, as in Greek denoting not only the ratio, but the oratio, of the Latins ; throwing aside its employment, in most languages, for cause, mo- tive, argument, principle of probation, or middle term of a syllogism, and con- sidering it only as a philosophical word denoting a faculty or comple- ment of faculties ; in this relation, it is found employed in the following meaning . It has, both in ancient and modern times, been very commonly employed, VikQ understanding 2iXidi intellect, to diQnotQ our intelligent nature in general; and this usually as distinguished from the lower cognitive faculties, as Sense, Imagination, Memory — but always, and emphatically, as in con- trast to the Feelings and Desires. In this signification, to follow the Aris- totelic division, it comprehends — 1°, Conception or Simple Apprehension ; 2^, the Compositive and Divisive process, Affirmation and Negation, Judgment; THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. * 505 pure or transcendental^ or a priori cognitions^ categories of thought^ natural beliefs,' rational instincts, \ etc. t3^, Reasoning or the Discursive faculty ; 4°, Intellect or Intelligence proper, either as the intuition, or as the phice, of principles or self-evident truths. In modern times, though we frequently meet with Reason, as a general faculty, distinguished from Reasoning, as a particular; yet until Kant, I am not aware that Reason (Vernunft) was ever exclusively, or even em- phatically, used in a signification corresponding to the noetic faculty, in its strict and special meaning, and opposed to understanding ( Verstand), viewed as comprehending the other functions of thought. Though Common Sense be not therefore opposed to Reason, still the term Reason is of so general and ambiguous an import, that its employment in so determinate a meaning as a synonym of Common Sense ought to be avoided. It is only, we have seen, as an expression for the noetic faculty, or Intellect proper, that Reason can be substituted for Common Sense.] — Diss. supp. to Reid. ^ [In the Schools, ti anscendentalis and transcendens were convertible ex- pressions, employed to mark a term or notion which transcended, that is, which rose above, and thus contained under it, the Categories, or summa genera, of Aristotle. Such, for example, is Being, of which the ten cate- gories are only subdivisions. Kant, according to his wonr, twisted the^e old terms into a new signification. First of all, he distinguished them from each other. Transcendent he employed to denote what is wholly beyond experience, being given neither as an a posteriori nor a priori el^jment of cognition — what therefore transcends every category of thought. Tran scendental he applied to signify the a priori or necessary cognitions which, though manifested in, as affording the conditions of, experience, transcend the sphere of that contingent or adventitious knowledge which we acquire by experience. Transcendental is not therefore what transcends, but what in fact constitutes, a category of thought.] — Diss. supp. to Reid. t [Instincts, rational or intellectual. These terms are intended to express not so much the light, as the dark, side which the elementary facts of consciousness exhibit. They therefore stand opposed to the conceivable, the understood, the known. As to the impropriety, though, like most other psychological terms, these are not unexceptionable, they are however less so than many, nay than most, others. An Instinct is an agent which performs blindly and igno- rantly a work of intelligence and knowledge. The terms, Instinctive be- lief — judgment — cognition are therefore expressions not ill adapted to char- acterize a belief, judgment, cognition, which, as the result of no anterior consciousness, is, like tte products of animal instinct, the intelligent effect of (as far as we are concerned) an unknowing cause. In like manner, we can hardly find more suitable expressions to indicate those incomprehensi- 43 SOO^ THE REGULATIVE FACULTt. Criterion for distinguishing Native from Adventitious Knowl" edge, — The history of opinions touching the acceptation, or rejection, of such native notions, is, in a manner, the history of philosophy : for as the one alternative, or the other, is adopted in this question, the character of a system is determined. At present, I content myself with stating, that, though from the earliest period of philosophy, the doctrine was always common, if not always predominant, that our knowledge originated, in part at least, in the mind, yet it was only at a very recent date that the criterion was explicitly enounced, by which the native may be discriminated from the adventitious elements of knowl- edge. Without touching on some ambiguous expressions in more ancient philosophers, it is sufficient to say, that the char- acter of universality and necessity, as the quality by which the two classes of knowledge are distinguished, was first explicitly proclaimed by Leibnitz. I have already frequently had occasion incidentally to notice, that we should carefully distinguish be- tween those notions or cognitions which are primitive facts, and those notions or cognitions which are generalized or derivative facts. The former are given us ; they are not, indeed, obtru- sive, — they are not even cognizable of themselves. They lie hid in the profundities of the mind, until drawn from their obscurity by the mental activity itself employed upon the mate- rials of experience. Hence it is, that our knowledge has its commencement in sense, external or internal, but its origin in intellect. The latter, the derivative cognitions, are of our own fabrication ; we form them after certain rules ; they are the tardy result of Perception and Memory, of Attention, Reflection, Abstraction. The primitive cognitions, on the contrary, seem to leap ready armed from the womb of reason, like Pallas from the head of Jupiter ; sometimes the mind places them at the com- mencement of its operations, in order to have a point of support ble spontaneities themselves, of which the primary facts of consciousness are the manifestations, than rational or intellectual Instincts. In fact, if Keason can justly be called a developed Feeling, it may with no less pro- priety be called an illuminated Instinct.] — ■ Diss. supp. to Reid. Et quod nunc Ratio, Impetus ante fuit. THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. • 507 and a fixed basis, without which the operations would be impos" sible ; sometimes they form, in a certain sort, the crowning, the consummation of all the intellectual operations. The derivative or generalized notions are an artifice of intellect, — an ingenious mean of giving order and compactness to the materials of our knowledge. The primitive and general notions are the root of all principles, — the foundation of the whole edifice of human science. But how different soever be the two classes of our cog- nitions, and however distinctly separated they may be by the cir- cumstance, — that we cannot but think the one, and can easily annihilate the other in thought, — this discriminative quality was not explicitly signalized till done by Leibnitz. The older philosophers are at best undeveloped. Descartes made the first step towards a more perspicuous discrimination. He frequently enounces that our primitive notions (besides being clear and dis- tinct) are universal. But this universality is only a derived circumstance ; — a notion is universal (meaning thereby that a notion is common to all mankind), because it is necessary to the thinking mind, — because the mind cannot but think it. The enouncement of this criterion was, in fact, a great dis- covery in the science of mind ; and the fact that a truth so manifest, when once proclaimed, could have lain so long unno- ticed by philosophers, may warrant us in hoping that other dis- coveries of equal importance may still be awaiting the advent of another Leibnitz. Leibnitz has, in several parts of his works, laid down the distinction in question; and, what is curi- ous, almost always in relation to Locke. " In Locke," [he says,] " there are some particulars not ill expounded, but upon the whole he has wandered far from the gate, nor has he under- stood the nature of the intellect. Had he sufficiently consid- ered the difference between necessary truths or those appre- hended by demonstration, and those which become known to us by induction alone, — he would have seen, that those which are necessary could only be approved to us by principles native to the mind ; seeing that the senses indeed inform us what may take place, but not what necessarily takes place. Locke has not observed, that the notions of being, of substance, of one and 508 THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. the same, of the true, of the good, and many others, are innate to our mind, because our mind is innate to itself, and finds all these in its own furniture. It is true, indeed, that there is nothing in the intellect which was not previously in the sense, — except the intellect itself." In [another] place he says, ^ — " Hence arises another question, namely : Are all truths de- pendent on experience, that is to say, on induction and exam- ples ? Or are there some which have another foundation ? For if some events Can be foreseen before all trial has been made, it is manifest that we contribute something 'on our part. The senses, although necessary for all our actual cognitions, are not, however,, competent to afford us all that cognitions involve ; for the senses never give us more than examples, that is to say, particular or individual truths. Now all the examples, which confirm a general truth, how numerous soever they may be, are insufficient to establish the universal necessity of this same truth ; for it does not follow, that what has happened will hap- pen always in like manner. For example : the Greeks and Romans and other nations have always observed, that, during the course of twenty-four hours, day is changed into night, and night into day. But we should be wrong, were we to believe that the same rule holds everywhere, as the contrary has been observed during a residence in Nova Zembla. And he again would deceive himself, who should believe that, in our latitudes at least, this was a truth necessary and eternal ; for we ought to consider, that the earth and the sun themselves have no nec- essary existence, and that there will perhaps a time arrive when this fair star will, with its whole system, have no longer -a place in creation, — - at least under its present form. Hence it appears, that the necessary truths, such as we find them in Pure Mathematics, and particularly in Arithmetic and Geome- try, behoove to have principles the proof of which does not depend upon examples, and, consequently, not on the evidence of ?ense ; howbeit, that without the senses, we should never have found occasion to call them into consciousness. This is what it is necessary to distinguish accurately, and it is what Euclid has so well understood, in demonstrate i^ or bv reason whal: THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. 509 is sufficiently apparent by experience and sensible images. Logic, likewise, with Metaphyics and Morals, the one of which constitutes Natural Theology, the other Natural Jurisprudence, are full of such truths ; and, consequently, their proof can only be derived from internal principles, which we call innate. It is true, that we ought not to imagine that we can read in the soul these eternal laws of reason ad aperturam lihri^ as we can read the edict of the Praetor, without troable or research ; but it is enough, that we can discover them in ourselves by dint of atten- tion, when the occasions are presented to us by the senses. The success of the observation serves to confirm reason, in the same way as proofs serve in Arithmetic to obviate erroneous calculations, when the computation is long. It is hereby, also, that the cognitions of men differ from thost; of beasts. The beasts are purely empirical, and only regulate themselves by examples ; for as far as we can judge, they never attain to the formation of necessary judgments, whereas, men are capable of demonstrative sciences, and herein the faculty which brutes pos- sess of drawing inferences is inferior to the reason which is in men." And, after some other observations, he proceeds : '^ In illustration of this, let me make use hkewise of the simile of a block of marble which has veins, rather than of a block of marble wholly uniform, or of blank tablets, that is to say, what is called a tabula rasa by philosophers ; for if the mind resem- bled these blank tablets, truths would be in us, as the figure of Hercules is in a piece of marble, when the marble is altogether indifferent to the reception of this figure or of any other. But if we suppose that there are veins in the stone which v/ould mark out the figure of Hercules by preference to other figures, this stone would be more determined there nnto, and Hercules would exist there, innately in a certain sort ; although it would require labor to discover the veins, and to clear them by polish- ing and the removal of all that prevents their manifestation. It is thus that ideas and truths are innate in us ; like our incli nations, dispositions, natural habitudes or virtualities, and not as actions ; although these virtualities be always accompanied by Bome corresponding actions, frequently however unperceived." 43^ 510 THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. And in another remarkable passage, Leibnitz says, "The mind is not only capable of knowing pure and necessary truths, but likewise of discovering them in itself; and if it possessed only the simple capacity of receiving cognitions, or the passive power of knowledge, as indetermined as that of the wax to re- ceive figures, or a blank tablet to receive letters, it would not be the source of necessary truths, as I am about to demonstrate that it is : for it is incontestable, that the senses could not suffice to make their necessity apparent, and that the intellect has, therefore, a disposition, as well active as passive, to draw thein from its own bosom, although the senses be requisite to furnish the occasion, and the attention to determine it upon some in preference to others. You see, therefore, these very able phi- losophers, who are of a different opinion, have not sufficiently reflected on the consequence of the difference that subsists be- tween necessary or eternal truths and the truths of experience, as I have already observed, and as all our contestation shows. The original proof of necessary truths comes from the intellect alone, while other truths are derived from experience or the observations of sense. Our mind is competent to both kinds of knowledge, but it is itself the source of the former ; and how great soever may be the number of particular experiences in support of a universal truth, we should never be able to assure ourselves forever of its universality by induction, unless we knew its necessity by reason. The senses may register, justify, and confirm these truths, but not demonstrate their infallibility and eternal certainty." ^ And in speaking of the faculty of such truths, he says : " It is not a naked faculty, which consists in the mere possibility of understanding them ; it is a disposition, an aptitude, a preforma- tion, which determines our mind to elicit, and which causes that they can be elicited ; precisely as there is a difference between the figures which are bestowed indifferently on stone or marble, and those which veins mark out or are disposed to mark out, if the sculptor avail himself of the indications." Reid made the same discrimination, — We have thus seen that* Leibnitz was the first philosopher who explicitly established THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. 511 the quality of necessity as the criterion of distinction between empirical and a priori cognitions. I may, however, remark, what is creditable to Dr. Reid's sagacity, that he founded the same discrimination on the same difference : and I am disposed to think that he did this without being aware of his coincidence with Leibnitz ; for he does not seem to have studied the system of that philosopher in his own works ; and it was not till Kant had shown the importance of the criterion, by its application in his hands, that the attention of the learned was called to the scattered notices of it in the writings of Leibnitz. In spealdng of the principle of causality, Dr. Reid says : " We are next to consider whether we may not learn this truth from experience, — That effects which have all the marks and tokens of design, must proceed from a designing cause." " I apprehend that we cannot learn this truth from experi- ence, for two reasons. ''First, Because it is a necessary truth, not a contmgent one. It agrees with the experience of mankind since the beginning of the world, that the area of a triangle is equal to half the rectangle under its base and perpendicular. It agrees no less with experience, that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. So far as experience goes, these truths are upon an equal footing. But every man perceives this distinction be- tween them, — that the first is a necessary truth, and that it is impossible that it should not be true ; but the last is not neces- sary, but contingent, depending upon the will of Him who made the world. As we cannot learn from experience that twice three must necessarily make six, so neither can we learn from experience that certain effects must proceed from a designing and intelligent cause. Experience informs us only of what haf; been, but never of what must be." And in speaking of our belief in the principle that an effec* manifesting design must have had an intelligent cause, he says, — " It has been thought, that, although this principle does not admit of proof from abstract reasoning, it may be proved from experience, and may be justly drawn by induction from in- stances that fall within our observation. 512 THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. " I conceive this metliod of proof will leave us in great un- certainty, for these three reasons : " 1st, Because the proposition to be proved is not a contingent but a necessary/ proposition. It is not that things which begin to exist commonly have a cause, or even that they always in fact have a cause ; but that they must have a cause, and cannot begin to exist without a cause. " Propositions of this kind, from their nature, are incapable of proof by induction. Experience informs us only of what is or has been, not of what must he ; and the conclusion must be of the same nature with the premises. " For this reason, no mathematical proposition can be proved by induction. Though it should be found by experience in a thousand cases, that the area of a plain triangle is equal to the rectangle under the altitude and half the base, this would not prove that it must be so in all cases, and cannot be otherwise ; which is what the mathematician affirms. " In like manner, though we had the most ample experimen- tal proof, that things which had begun to exist had a cause, this would not prove that they must have a cause. Experience may show us what is the established course of nature, but can never show what connection of things are in their nature neces- sary. " 2dly. General maxims, grounded on experience, have only a degree of probability proportioned to the extent of our experi- ejice ; and ought always to be understood so as to leave room for exceptions, if future experience should discover any such. " The law of gravitation has as full proof from experience and induction as any principle can be supposed to have. Yet, if any philosopher should, by clear experiment, show that there is a kind of matter in some bodies which does not gravitate, the law of gravitation ought to be limited by that exception. '^ Now it is evident that men have never considered the prin- ciple of the necessity of causes as a truth of this kind, which may admit of limitation or exception ; and therefore it has not been received upon this kind of evidence. " ^dly, I do not see that experience could satisfy us that ev- ery change in nature actually has a cause. THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. 513 " In the far greatest part of the changes in nature that fall within our observation, the causes are unknown ; and, therefore, from experience, we cannot know whether they have causes or not. " Causation is not an object of sense. The only experience we can have of it, is in the consciousness we have of exerting some power in ordering our thoughts and actions. But tliis ex- perience is surely too narrow a foundation for a general conclu- sion, that all things that have had or shall have a beginning, must have a cause." How many cognitions should he ranlced as ultimate, — But though it be now generally acknowledged, by the profoundest thinkers, that it is impossible to analyze all our knowledge into the produce of experience, external or internal, and that a cer- tain complement of cognitions must be allowed as having their origin in the nature of the thinking principle itself; they are not at one in regard to those which ought to be recognized as ultimate and elemental, and those which ought to be regarded as modifications or combinations of these. Reid and Stewart, (the former in particular), have been considered as too easy in their admission of primary laws ; and it must be allowed that the censure, in some instances, is not altogether unmerited. But it ought to be recollected, that those who thus agree in reprehension are not in unison in regard to the grounds of cen- sure ; and they wholly forget that our Scottish philosophers made no pretension to a final analysis of the primary laws of human reason, — that they thought it enough to classify a cer- tain number of cognitions as native to the mind, leaving it to their successors to resolve these into simpler elements. " The labyrinth," [says Dr. Reid,] " may be too intricate, and the thread too fine, to be traced through all its windings ; but, if we stop where we can trace it no further, and secure the ground we have gained, there is no harm done ; a quicker eye may in time trace it further." The same view has been likewise well stated by Mr. Stew^art. " In all the other sciences, the progress of discovery has been gradual, from the less general to the more general laws of nature ; and it would be singular indeed, if, in 514 THE REGULATIVE FACULTY. this science, wliicli but a few years ago was confessedly in its infancy, and which certainly labors under many disadvantages peculiar to itself, a step should all at once be made to a single principle, comprehending all tlie particular phenomena which we know. As the ordei* established in the intellectual world seems to be regulated by laws analogous to those which we trace among the phenomena of the material system ; and as in all our philosophical inquiries (to whatever subject they may relate), the progress of the mind is liable to be affected by the same tendency to a premature generalization, the following extract from an eminent chemical writer may contribute to illustrate the scope and to confirm the justness of some of the foregoing reflections. ' Within the last fifteen or twenty years, several new metals and new earths have been made known to the world. The names that support these discoveries are respecta- ble, and the experiments decisive. If we do not give our assent to them, no single proposition in chemistry can for a moment stand. But whether all these are really simple substances, or compounds not yet resolved into their elements, is what the authors themselves cannot possibly assert ; nor would it, in the least, diminish the merit of their observations, if future experi- ments should prove them to have been mistaken, as to the sim- plicity of these substances. This remark should not be confined to later discoveries ; it may as justly be applied to those earths and metals with which we have been long acquainted.' ' In the dark ages of chemistry, the object was to rival Nature ; and the substance which the adepts of those days were busied to create, was universally allowed to be simple. In a more enlightened period, we have extended our inquiries and multiplied the num- ber of the elements. The last task will be to simplify ; and by a closer observation of Nature, to learn from what a small store of primitive materials, all that we behold and wonder at was created.' " That the list of the primary elements of human reason, which our two philosophers have given, has no pretence to order; and that the principles which it contains are not systematically deduced by any ambitious process of metaphysical ingenuity, is THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. 515 no valid ground of disparagement. In fact, which of the vaunted classifications of these primitive truths can stand the test of criti- cism ? The most celebrated, and by far the most ingenious, of these, — the scheme of Kant, — though the truth of its details may be admitted, is no longer regarded as affording either a necessary deduction or a natural arrangement of our native cog- nitions; and the reduction of these to system still remains a problem to be resolved. Distinction between Positive and Negative Necessity, — In point of fact, philosophers have not yet purified the antecedent conditions of the problem, — have not yet established the prin- ciples on which its solution ought to be undertaken. And here I would solicit your attention to a circurjistance, which shows how far philosophers are still removed from the prospect of an ultimate decision. It is agreed, that the quality of necessity is that which discriminates a native from an adventitious element of knowledge. When we find, therefore, a cognition which con- tains this discriminative quality, we are entitled to lay it down as one which could not have been obtained as a generalization from experience. This I admit. But when philosophers lay it down not only as native to the mind, but as a positive and immediate datum of an intellectual power, I demur. It is evident that the quality of necessity in a cognition may depend on two different and opposite principles, inasmuch as it may either he the result of a power^ or of a powerlessness of the think- tny principle. In the one case, it will be a Positive, in the other a Negative, necessity. Let us take examples of these opposite cases. In an act of perceptive consciousness, I think, and cannot but think, that I and that something different from me exist, — in other words, that my perception, as a modification of the Ego, exists, and that the object of my perception, as a modification of the Non-ego, exists. In these circumstances, I pronounce Existence to be a native cognition, because I find that I cannot think except under the condition of thinking all that I am conscious of to exist. Existence is thus a form, a cat- egory, of thought. But here, though I cannot but think exist- ence, I am conscious of this thought as an act of power, — an 516 THE PHILOSOFHY OF THE COKDITIONED. act of intellectual force. It is the result of strength, and not of weakness. In like manner, when I think 2X^ = 4, the thought, though inevitable, is not felt as an imbecility ; we know it as true, and, in the perception of the truth, though the act be necessary, the mind is conscious that the necessity does not arise from impo- tence. On the contrary, we attribute the same necessity to God. Here, therefore, there is a class of natural cognitions, which we may properly view as so many positive exertions of the mental vigor, and the cognitions of this class we consider as Positive. To this class will belong the notion of Existence and its modifi- cations, the principles of Identity, and Contradiction, and Ex- cluded Middle, the intuitions of Space and Time, etc. The Negative sort of Necessity illustrated, — But besides these, there are other necessary forms of thought, which, by all philos- ophers, have been regarded as standing precisely on the same footing, which to me seem to be of a totally different kind. In place of being the result of a power, the necessity- which belongs to them is merely a consequence of the impotence of our facul- ties. But if this be the case, nothing could be more unphilo- sophical than to arrogate to these negative inabilities the dignity of positive energies. Every rule of philosophizing would be violated. The law of Parcimony prescribes, that principles are not to be multiplied without necessity, and that an hypothetical force be not postulated to explain a phaenomenon which can be better accounted for by an admitted impotence. The phaenom- enon of a heavy body rising from the earth, may warrant us in the assumption of a special power ; but it would surely be absurd to devise a special power (that is, a power besides gravitation) to explain the phoenomenon of its descent. Now, that the imbecility of the human mind constitutes a great negative; principle, to which sundry of the most important phgenomena of intelligence may be referred, appears to me 'in- contestable ; and though the discussion is one somewhat abstract, - I shall endeavor to give you an insight into the nature and ap- plication of this principle. I begin by the statement of certain principles, to which it is necPF-sarv in th'^ s^q^iel to refer. THE PHILOSoriir OF THE CONDITIONED. 517 The highest of all logical laws, in other words the supreme law of thought, is what is called the principle of Contradiction, or more correctly the priuQciple of Non-Contradiction.* It is ^ [The doctrines of Contradiction, or of Contradictories, that Affirmation or Negation is a necessity of thought, whilst Affirmation and Negation aro incompatible, is developed into three sides or phases, each of which implies both the others, — phases which may obtain, and actually have received, severally, the name of Law, Principle, or Axiom. Neglecting the historical order in which these were scientifically named and articulately developed, they are : 1°, The Law, Principle, or Axiom, of Identity, Avhich, in regard to the same thing, immediately or directly enjoins the affirmation of it with itself, and mediately or indirectly prohibits its negation : {A is A). 2°, The Law, etc., of Contradiction (proipGrly Non-contradiction) , which, in regard to contradictories, explicitly enjoining their reciprocal negation, im- plicitly prohibits their reciprocal affirmation: {A is not Not-A) . In other words, contradictories are thought as existences incompatible at the same time, — as at once mutually exclusive. 3°, The Law, etc., of Excluded Middle or Third, which declares that, whilst contradictories are only two, every thing, if explicitly thought, must be thought as of these either the one or the other : (A is either B or Not-B). In different terms : — Affirmation and negation of the same thing, in tlu same respect, have no conceivable medium ; whilst any thing actually may and virtually must, be either affirmed or denied of any thing. In othei words : — Every predicate is true or false of every subject; or, contradicto- ries are thought as incompossible, but, at the same time, the one or the other as necessary. The argument from Contradiction is omnipotent within its sphere, but that sphere is narrow. It has the following limitations : 1", It is negative, not positive; it may refute, but it is incompetent to establish. It may show what is not, but never of itself what is. It is exclusively Logical or Formal, not Metaphysical or Keal ; it proceeds on a necessity of thought, but never issues in an Ontology or knowledge of existence. 2°, It is dependent ; to act it presupposes a counter-proposition to act from. 3°, It is explicative, not ampliative; it analyzes what is given, but does not originate information, or add any thing, through itself, to our stock of knowledge. 4°, But, what is its principal defect, it is partial, not thorough-going. It leaves many of the most important problems of our knowledge out of its determination ; and is, therefore, all too narrow in its application as a uni- versal criterion or instrument of judgment. For were we left, in our rea^ 518 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. this: A thing cannot be and not be at the same time, — Alpha est, Alpha non est, are propositions which cannot both be true at once. A second fundamental law of thought, or rather the principle of Contradiction viewed in a certain aspect, is called the principle of Excluded Middle, or, more fully, the principle of Excluded Middle between two Contradictories. A thing either is or is not, — Aut est Alpha, aut non est ; there is no me- dium ; one must be true, both cannot. These principles require, indeed admit of, no proof. They prove every thing, but are proved by nothing. When I therefore have occasion to speak of these laws by name, you will know to what principle I refer. Hamilton's one grand law of thought illustrated, > — Now, then, I lay it down as a law, which, though not generalized by philoso- phers, can be easily proved to be true by its application to the phaenomena : That all that is conceivable in thought, lies between two extremes, which, as co7itradictory of each other, cannot both be true, but of which, as mutual contradictories, one must. For example, we conceive Space, — we cannot but conceive Space. I admit, therefore, that Space indefinitely is a positive and nec- essary form of thought. But when philosophers convert the fact, that we cannot but think space, or, to express it differently, that we are unable to imagine any thing out of space, — when philosophers, I say, convert this fact with the assertion, that we have a notion, — a positive notion, of absolute or of infinite • space, they assume, not only what is not contained in the phae- nomenon, nay, they assume what is the very reverse of what the phaenomenon manifests. It is plain, that space must either be bounded or not bounded. These are contradictory alterna- sonings, to a dependence on the principle of Contradiction, we should be unable competently to attempt any argument with regard to some of the most interesting and important questions. For there are many problems in the philosophy of mind where the solution necessarily lies between wha are, to us, the one or the other of two counter, and, therefore, incompatible alternatives, neither of which are we able to conceive as possible, but of which, by the very conditions of thought, we are compelled to acknowledge that the one or the other cannot but be ; and it is as supplying this defi- ciency, that what has been called the argument from Common Sense becomes principally useful.] — Appendix, THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. 519 tives ; on the principle of Contradiction, they cannot both be true ; and, on the principle of Excluded Middle, one must be true. This cannot be denied, without denying the primary laws of intelligence. But though space must be admitted to be neces- sarily either Jinite or infinite^ we are able to conceive the possi- bility neither of its jinitude nor of its infinity. We are altogether unable to perceive space as bounded, — as finite ; that is, as a whole beyond which there is no further space. Every one is conscious that this is impossible. It con- tradicts also the supposition of space as a necessary notion ; for if we could imagine space as a terminated sphere, and that sphere not itself enclosed in a surrounding space, we should not be obliged to think every thing in space ; and, on the contrary, if we did imagine this terminated sphere as itself in space, in that case, we should not have actually conceived all space as a bounded whole. The one contradictory is thus found incon- ceivable; we cannot conceive space as positively limited. This law applied to space as a maximum, — On the other hand, we are equally powerless to realize in thought the4)ossi- bility of the opposite contradictory ; we cannot conceive space as infinite, as without limits. You may launch out in thought beyond the solar walk, you may transcend in fancy even the universe of matter, and rise from sphere to sphere in the region of empty space, until imagination sinks exhausted ; — with all this, what have you done ? You have never gone beyond the finite, you have attained at best only to the indefinite, and the indefinite, however expanded, is still always the finite. As Pascal energetically says, " Inflate our conceptions as we may, with all the finite possible, we cannot make one atom of the infinite." " The infinite is infinitely incomprehensible." Now, then, both contradictories are equally inconceivable ; and could we limit our attention to one alone, we should deem it at once impossible and absurd, and suppose its unknown opposite as necessarily true. But as we not only can, but are constrained to consider both, we find that both are equally incomprehensible ; and yet, though unable to view either as possible, we are forced by a higher law to admit that one, but one only, is necessary. 520 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. Space as a minimum also inconceivable, — That the conceiv- able lies also between two inconceivable extremes, is illustrated by every other relation of thought. \¥e have found the maxi- mum of space incomprehensible ; can we comprehend its mini- mum ? This is equally impossible. Here, likewise, we recoil from one inconceivable contradictory only to infringe upon an- other. Let us take a portion of space, however small ; we can never conceive it as the smallest. It is necessarily extended, and may, consequently, be divided into a half or quarters, and each of these halves or quarters may again be divided into other halves or quarters, and this ad infinitum. But if we are unable to construe to our mind the possibility of an absolute minimum qf space, we can as little present to ourselves the possibility of an infinite divisibility of any extended entity. Time also inconceivable, either as a maximum or a minimum, — In like manner, Time ; — this is a notion even more universal than space, for while we exempt from occupying space the energies of mind, we are unable to conceive these as not occupying time. Thus, we think every thing, mental and material, as in time, and out of time we can think nothing. But, if we attempt to compre- hend time, either in whole or in part, we find that thought is hedged in between two incomprehensibles. Let us try the whole. And here let us look back, — let us consider time a parte ante. And here, we may surely flatter ourselves, that we shall be able to conceive time as a whole, for here we have the past period bounded by the present ; the past cannot, therefore, be infinite or eternal, for a bounded infinite is a contradiction. But we shall deceive ourselves. We are altogether unable to conceive time as commencing ; we can easily represent to ourselves time under any relative limitation of commencement and termination ; but we are conscious to ourselves of nothing more clearly, than that it would be equally possible to think without thought, as to construe to the mind an absolute commencement, or an absolute termination, of time ; that is, a beginning and an end beyond which time is conceived as non-existent. Goad imagination to the utmost, it still sinks paralyzed within the bounds of time, and time survives as the condition of the thought itself in wliich THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIOXED. 521 we annihilate the universe. On the other hand, the concept of past time as without hmit, — without commencement, is equally impossible. We cannot conceive the infinite regress of time ; for such a notion could only be realized by the infinite addition in thought of finite times, and such an addition would itself require an eternity for its accomj^lishment. If we dream of effecting this, we only deceive ourselves by substituting the indefinite for the infinite, than which no two notions can be more opposed. The negation of a commencement of time involves, likewise, the affirmation, that an infinite time has, at every moment, already run ; that is, it implies the contradiction, that an infinite has been completed. For the same reasons, we are unable to conceive an infinite progress of time ; while the in- finite regress and the mfinite progress, taken together, involve the triple contradiction of an infinite concluded, of an infinite commencing, and of two infinities, not exclusive of each other. Now take the parts of time, — a moment, for instance ; this we must conceive, as either divisible to infinity, or that it is made up of certain absolutely smallest parts. One or the other of these contradictories must be the case. But each is, to us, equally inconceivable. Time is a protensive quantity, and, con- sequently, any part of it, however small, cannot, without a con- tradiction, be imagined as not divisible into parts, and these parts into others ad infinitum. But the opposite alternative is equally impossible ; we cannot think this infinite division. One is necessarily true ; but neither can be conceived possible. It is on the inability of the mind to conceive either the ultimate indivisibility, or the infinite divisibility of space and time,, that the arguments of the Eleatic Zeno against the possibility of motion are founded, — arguments which at least show, that mo- tion, however certain as a fact, cannot be conceived possible, as it involves a contradiction."^ ^ [Contradictions proving the Psychological Theory of the Conditioned. 1. Finite cannot comprehend, contain the Infinite. — Yet an inch or min- ute, say, are finites, and are divisible ad infinitum, that is, their terminated division incogitable. 44* 522 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. This grand principle called the Law of the Conditioned. — The same principle could be shown in various other relations, but what I have now said is, I presume, sufficient to make you understand its import. Now, the law of mind, that the con- ceivahle is in every relation hounded by the inconceivabUj I call 2. Infinite cannot be terminated or begun. — Yet eternity ah ante ends now ; and eternity a post begins now. — So apply to Space. 3. Tli«re cannot be two infinite maxima. — Yet eternity ab ante and a post are two infinite maxima of time. 4. If an infinite maximum be cut into two, the halves cannot be each in- finite, for nothing can be greater than infinite, and thus they could not be parts ; nor finite, for thus two finite halves would make an infinite whole. 5. What contains infinite extensions, protensions, intensions, [three modes of quantity,] cannot* be passed through, — come to an end. An inch, a minute, a degree contains these ; ergo, etc. Take a minute. This contains an infinitude of protended quantities, which must follow one after another-; but an infinite series of successive protensions can, ex termino, never be ended ; ergo, etc. 6. An infinite maximum cannot but be all inclusive. Time ab ante and a post [are] infinite and exclusive of each other ; ergo. 7. An infinite number of quantities must make up either an infinite or a finite whole. I. The former. — But an inch, a minute, a degree, contain each an infinite number of quantities ; therefore, an inch, a minute, a de- gree, are each infinite wholes ; which is absurd. II. The latter. — An in- finite number of quantities would thus make up a finite quantity ; which is equally absurd. 8. If we take a finite quantity (as an inch, a minute, a degree), it would appear equally that there are, and that there are not, an equal number of quantities between these and a greatest, and between these and a least. 9. An absolutely quickest motion is that which passes from one point to another in space in a minimum of time. But a quickest motion from one point to another, say a mile distance, and from one to another, say a mil- lion million of miles, is thought the same ; which is abs'urd. 10. Awheel turned with, quickest motion; if a spoke be prolonged, it will therefore be moved by a motion quicker than the quickest. The same may be shown using the rim and the nave. 1 1 . Contradictory are Boscovich Points, which occupy space, and are in- extended. Dynamism, therefore, inconceivable. E contra, 12. Atomism also inconceivable; for this supposes atoms, — minima extended but indivisible. 13. A quantity, say a foot, has an infinity of parts. Any part of this quantity, say an inch, has also an infinity. But one infinity is not larger than another. Therefore, an inch is equal to a foot.] — Appendix. THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. 523 the Law of tlie Conditioned. You will find many philosoplierg who hold an opinion the reverse of thi's, — maintaining that '' the Absolute " is a native or necessary notion ot intelligence. This, T conceive, is an opinion founded on vagueness and confusion. They tell us we have a notion of absolute or infinite space, of absolute or infinite time. But they do not tell us in which of the opposite contradictories this notion is realized. Though these are exclusive of each other, and though bT)th are only ne- gations of the conceivable on its opposite poles, they confound together these exclusive inconceivables into a single notion ; suppose it positive, and baptize it with the name of Absolute. The sum, therefore, of what I have now stated is, that the Con- ditioned is that which is alone conceivable or Cogitable ; the Un- conditioned^ that 'which is inconceivable or incogitable. The Conditioned or the thinkable lies between two extremes or poles ; and these extremes or poles are each of them Uncondi- tioned, each of them inconceivable, each of them exclusive or contradictory of the other. Of these two repugnant opposites, the one is that of Unconditional or Absolute Limitation ; the other, that of Unconditional or Lifinite Illimitation. The one we may, therefore, in general call the Absolutely Unconditioned, the other the Infinitely Unconditioned ; or, more simply, the Absolute and the Infinite ; the term Absolute expressing that which is finished or complete, the term Infinite, that which cannot be terminated or concluded. These terms, which, like the Absolute and Infinite themselves, philosophers have con- founded, ought not only to be distinguished, but opposed as con- tradictory. The notion of either unconditioned is negative : — the Absolute and the Infinite can each only be conceived as a negation of the thinkable. In other words, of the Absolute and Infinite we have no conception at all. [To recapitulate : — In our opinion, the mind can conceive, and, consequently, can know, only the limited, and the conditionally limited. The unconditionally unlimited, or the Infinite, — the unconditionally limited, or the Absolute, — cannot positively be construed to the mind ; they can be conceived, only by a think- ing away from, or abstraction of, those very conditions under 521 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. which thought itself is realized ; consequently, the notion of the Unconditioned is only negative — negative of the conceivable itself. For example, on the one hand we can positively con- ceive, neither an absolute whole, that is, a whole so great, that we cannot also conceive it as a relative part of a still greater whole ; nor an absolute part, that is, a part so small, that we cannot also conceive it as a relative whole, divisible into smaller parts. On the other hand, we cannot positively represent, or realize, or construe to the mind (as here Understanding and Imagination coincide),"^ an infinite whole ; for this could only be done by the infinite synthesis in thought of finite wholes, which M^ould itself require an infinite time for its accomplishment ; nor, for the same reason, can we follow out in thought aii infinite di- visibility of parts. The result is the same, whether we apply the process to limitation in space^ in time^ or in degree. The un- conditional negation, and the unconditional affirmation of limita- tion, — in other words, the Infinite and the Absolute, — properly so calledjf are thus inconceivable to us. =^ [The Understanding, thought proper, notion, concept, etc., may coin- cide or not with Imagination, representation proper, image, etc. The two faculties do not coincide in a general notion ; for we cannot represent Man or Horse in an actual image without individualizing the universal ; and thus contradiction emerges. But in the individual, say Socrates or Bu- cephalus, they do coincide ; for I see no valid ground why we should not think, in the strict sense of the word, or conceive, the individuals which we represent. In like manner, there is no mutual contradiction between the image and the concept, of the Infinite or Absolute, if these be otherwise possible ; for there is not necessarily involved the incompatibility of the one act of cognition with the oUier.j t [The terms Infinite, and Absolute, and Unconditioned, ought not to be confounded. The Unconditioned, in our use of language, denotes the ge- nus of which the Infinite and Absolute are the species. The term Absolute is of twofold (if not threefold) ambiguity, corre- sponding to the double (or treble) signification of tlie word in Latin. 1. Ahsolidum means what i^ freed or loosed; in which sense, the Absolute will be what is aloof from relation, comparison, limitation, condition, de- pendence, etc., and thus is tantamount to to airolvrov of the lower Greeks. In this meaning, the Absolute is not opposed to the Infinite. 2. Ahsoluiam m.Qa,ns finished, perfected, completed; in which sense, the Ab- solute will be what is out of relation, etc., a-s finished, perfect, complete, THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. 525 As the conditionally limited (which we may briefly call the Conditioned) is thus the only possible object of knowledge and of positive thought — -thought necessarily sup[)Oses conditions. To think is to condition ; and conditional limitation is the fun- damental law of the possibility of thought. For, as the grey- hound cannot outstrip his shadow, nor (by a more appropriate simile) the eagle outsoar the atmosphere in which he floats, and by which alone he is supported ; so the mmd cannot transcend that sphere of limitation, within and through which exclusively the possibility of thought is realized. Thought is only of the Conditioned ; because, as we have said, to think is simply to condition. The Absolute is conceived merely by a negation of conceivability ; and all that w^e know, is only known as "won from the void and formless Infinite.'^ How, indeed, it could ever be doubted that thought is only of the Conditioned, may well be deemed a matter of the profound- est admiration. Thought cannot transcend consciousness ; con- sciousness is only possible under the antithesis of a subject and object of thought, known only in correlation, and mutually lim- iting each other ; while, independently of all this, all that we know either of subject or object, either of mind or matter, is total, and thus corresponds to rb o\ov and to teTiclov of Aristotle. In this acceptation — and it is that in which for myself I exclusively use it — the Absolute is diametrically opposed to, is contradictory of, the Infinite. Besides these two meanings, there is to be noticed the use of the word, Vor the most part in its adverbial form; — absolutely (absolute) in the sense of simply, simpliciter (dTzXcog), that is, considered in and for itself — consid- ered not in relation. This holds a similar analogy to the two former meanings of absolute, which the Indefinite [to doptoTov) does to the Infi- nite (to d-KELpov). It is subjective as they are objective; it is in our thought as they are in their own existence. This application is to be dis- counted, as here irrelevant.] [Tho Infinite and Absolute are only the names of two counter imbecili- ties of the human mind, transmuted into properties of the nature of things — of two subjective negations, converted into objective affirmations. We tire ourselves, either in adding to, or in taking from. Some, more reasona- bly, call the thing unfinishable — infinite; others, less rationally, call it fin- ished — absolute. But in both cases, the metastasis is in itself irrational. 1 526 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. onlj a knowledge in each of the particular, of the plural, of the different, of the modified, of the phsenomenah We admit that the consequence of this doctrine is — that philosophy, if viewed as more than a science of the Conditioned, — is impossible. De- parting from the particular, we admit that we can never, in our highest generalizations, rise above the Finite ; that our knowl- edge, whether of mind or matter, can be nothing more than a knowledge of the relative manifestations of an existence, which, in itself, it is our highest wisdom to recognize as beyond the reach of philosophy ; — in the language of St. Austin — " cog- noscendb ignorari^ et ignorando cognoscir The Conditioned is the mean between two extremes — two inconditionates, exclusive of each other, neither of which can he conceived as possible, but of which, on the principles of Contra- diction and Excluded Middle, one must be admitted as necessary. On this opinion, therefore, our faculties are shown to be weak, but not deceitful. The mind is not represented as conceiving two propositions subversive of each other, as equally possible ; but only, as unable to understand as possible either of two ex- tremes ; one of which, however, on the ground of their mutual repugnance, it is compelled to recognize as true. We are thus taught the salutary lesson, that the capacity of thought is not to be constituted into the measure of existence ; and are warned from recognizing the domain of our knowledge as necessarily co- extensive with the horizon of our faith. And by a wonderful revelation, we are thus, in the very consciousness of our inabil- ity to conceive aught above the relative and finite, inspired with a belief in the existence of something unconditioned beyond the sphere of all comprehensible reality.^] — Discussions* =^ [True, therefore, are the declarations of a pious philosophy: "A God understood would be no God at all ; " — "To think that God is, as we can think him to be, is blasphemy." — The Divinity, in a certain sense, is re- vealed; in a certain sense, is concealed: He is at once known and un- known. But the last and highest consecration of all true religion must be an altar — 'Ayv^crrcj 9ec5 — "To the unknown and unknowable God/' In this consummation, nature and revelation, paganism and Christianity, are at one : and from either source the testimonies are so numerous that I must /*jfrain from quoting any.] THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. 527 [In his criticism of Cousin's philosophy, Hamilton argues further :] [Our author maintains that the idea of the infinite, or absolute, and the idea of the finite or relative, are equally real, because the notion of the one necessarily suggests the notion of the other. Correlatives certainly suggest each other, but correlatives iiiay, or may not, be equally real and positive. In thought, contradictories necessarily imply each other, for the knowledge of contradictories is one. But the reality of one contradictory, so far from guaranteeing the reality of the other, is nothing else than its negation. Thus every positive notion (the concept of a thing by what it is) suggests a negative notion (the con- cept of a thing by what it is not) ; and the highest positive notion, the notion of the conceivable, is not without its corre- sponding negative • in the notion of the inconceivable. But though these mutually suggest each other, the positive alone is real; the negative is only an abstraction of the other, and in the highest generality, even an abstraction of thought itself.] [The philosophy of the Conditioned, even from the preceding outline, is, it will be seen, the express converse of the philoso- phy of the Absolute — at least, as this system has been latterly evolved in Germany. For this asserts to man a knowledge of the Unconditioned — of the Absolute and Infinite ; while that denies to him a knowledge of either, and maintains, all which we immediately know, or can know, to be only the Conditioned, the Relative, the Ph^enomenal, the Finite. The one, supposing knowledge to be only of existence in itself, and existence in it- self to be apprehended, and even understood, proclaims — "Understand that you may believe," ("Intellige ut*credas") ; the other, supposing that existence, in itself, is unknown, that apprehension is only of phasnomena, and that these are received only upon trust, as incomprehensibly revealed facts, proclaims with the Prophet — " Believe that ye may understand,*' " Crede ut intelligas."] —^ Discussions. This is the only orthodox inference, — I shall only add in con- clusion, that, as this is the one 'true, it is the only orthodox, inference. We must believe in the infinity of God ; but the 528 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIOJSED. infinite God cannot by us, in the present limitation of our facul- ties, be comprehended or conceived. A Deity understood, would be no Deity at all ; and it is blasphemy to say that God only is as we are able to think Him to be. We know God according to the finitude of our faculties ; but we believe much that we are incompetent properly to know. The Infinite, the infinite God, is what, to use the words of Pascal, is infinitely inconceivable. Faith, — Belief, — is the organ by which we apprehend what is beyond our knowledge. In this all Divines and Philosophers, worthy of the name, are found to coincide ; and the few who assert to man a knowledge of the infinite, do this on the daring, the extravagant, the paradoxical supposition, either that Human Reason is identical with the Divine, or that Man and the Absolute are one. The assertion has, however, sometimes been hazarded, through a mere mistake of the object of knowledge or conception : as if that could be an object of knowledge, which was not known ; as if that could be an object of conception, which was not conceived. It has been held, that the Infinite is known or conceived, though only a part of it (and every part, be it observed, is ivso facto finite) can be apprehended ; and Aristotle's definition of the infinite has been adopted by those who disregard his declara- tion, that the infinite, qua infinite, is beyond the reach of human understanding. To say that the infinite can he thought^ hut only inadequately thought^ is a contradiction in adjecto ; it is the same as* saying, that the infinite can be known, but only known as finite. The Scriptures ' explicitly declare that the infinite is for us now incognizable ; — they declare that the finite, and the finite alone, is within our reach. It is said (to cite one text out of many), that " now I know in part " (^. e. the finite) ; " but the7i " (^. e. in the life to come) " shall I know even as I am known " (^. e, without limitation) ."^ ^ [In a private letter, Hamilton replied as follows to some objections which Mr. H. Calderwood had made to his doctrine of " The Infinite."] [The Infinite which I contemplate is considered only as in thought; the THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. 529 Infinite beyond thought being, it may be, an object of belief, but not of knowledge. This consideration obviates many of your objections. The sphere of our belief is much more extensive than the sphere of our knowledge ; and, therefore, when I deny that the Infinite can by us be known, I am far from denying that by us it is, must, and ought to be, be- lieved. This I have indeed anxiously evinced, botli by reasoning and authority. When, therefore, you maintain, that in denying to man any positive cognizance of the Infinite, I virtually extenuate his belief in the in- finitude of Deity, I must hold you to be wholly wrong, in respect both of my opinion, and of the theological dogma itself. Assuredly, I maintain that an infinite God cannot be by us (positively) comprehended. But the Scriptures, and all theologians worthy of the name, assert tlie same. Some indeed of the latter, and among them some of the most illustrious Fathers, go the length of asserting, that ^' an understood God is no God at all," and that, " if we maintain God to be as we think he is, we blaspheme." Hence the assertion of Augustine : " Deum potius ig- norantia quam scientia attingi." There is a fundamental diff'erence between ITie Infinite (to "Y^v kol Hav), and a relation to which we may apply the term infinite. Thus, Time and Space must be excluded from the supposed notion of The Infinite ; for The Infinite, if positively thought it could be, must be thought as under neither Space nor Time. You maintain (passim) that thought, conception, knowledge, is and must be finite, whilst the object of thought, etc., may be infinite. This appears to me to be erroneous, and even contradictory. An existence can only be an object of thought, conception, knowledge, inasmuch as it is an object thought, conceived, known ; as such only does it form a constituent of the circle of thought, conception, knowledge. A thing may be partly known, conceived, thought, — partly unknown, etc. But that part of it only which is thought, can be an object of thought, etc. ; whereas the part of it not thought, etc., is, as far as thought, etc., is concerned, only tantamount to zero. The infinite, therefore, in this point of view, can be no object of thought, etc. ; for nothing can be more self-repugnant than the assertion, that we know the infinite through a finite notion, or have a finite knowledge of an infinite object of knowledge. But you assert (passim) that we have a knowledge, a notion, of the in- finite ; at the same time, asserting (passim) that this knowledge or notion is *' inadequate," — ^'partial," — "imperfect," — "limited," — "not in all its extent," — " incomplete," — "only to some extent," — " in a certain sense," — "indistinct," etc., etc. Now, in the first place, this assertion is in contradiction of what you also maintain, that " the infinite is one and indivisible ; " that is, that having no pans, it cannot be partially known. But, in the second place, this also sub- verts the possibility of conceiving, of knowing, the Infinite ; for as partial, 45 530 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDITIONED. inadequate, not in all its extent, etc., our conception includes some part only of the object supposed infinite, and does not include the rest. Our knowK edge is, therefore, by your own account, limited and finite ; consequently, you implicitly admit that we have no knowledge, at least no positive knowl- edge, of the infinite. Again, as stated, you describe the infinite to be "one and indivisible." But to conceive as inseparable into parts an entity which, not excluding, 'm fact includes, the worlds of mind and matter, is for the human intellect utterly improbable. And does not the infinite contain the finite? If it does, then it contains what has parts, and is divisible ; if it does not, then it is exclusive : the finite is out of the infinite : and the infinite is condi- tioned, limited, restricted, — finite. You controvert my assertion, that, to conceive a thing in relation is, ipso facto, to conceive it as finite ; and you maintain that the relative is not incompatible with infinity, unless it be also restrictive. But restrictive, I hold the relative always to be, and therefore, incompatible with The Infinite in the more proper signification of the term, though infinity, in a looser sig- nification, may be applied ^o it. My reasons for this are the following : A relation is always a particular point of view ; consequently, the things thought as relative and correlative are always thought restrictively, in so far as the thought of the one discriminates and excludes the other, and like- wise all things not conceived in the same special or relative point of view. Thus, if we think of Socrates and Xanthippe under the matrimonial rela- tion, not only do the thoughts of Socrates and Xanthippe exclude each other as separate existences, and, pro tanto, therefore are restrictive ; but thinking of Socrates as husband, this excludes our conception of him as citizen, etc., etc. Or, to take an example from higher relatives : what is thought, as the object, excludes what is viewed as the subject, of thought ; and hence the necessity which compelled Schelling and other absolutists to place 27ie Absolute in the indifference of subject and object, of knowledge and existence. Again : we conceive God in the relation of Creator, and in so far as we merely conceive Him as Creator, we do not conceive him as un- conditioned, as infinite ; for there are many other relations of the Deity under which we may conceive Him, but which are not included in the relation of Creator. In so far, therefore, as we conceive God only in this relation, our conception of Him is manifestly restrictive. Further, the created universe is, and you assert it to be, finite. The creation is, therefore, an act, of however great, of finite power ; and the Creator is thus thought only in a finite capacity. God, in his own nature, is infinite ; but we do not positively think Him as infinite, in thinking Him under the relation of the Creator of a finite creation. Finally, let us suppose the created uni- . verse (which you do not) to be infinite ; in that case, we should be reduced to the dilemma of asserting two infinities, which is contradictory, or of asserting the supernal absurdity, that God the Creator is finite, and the universe created ^^ Him is infinite.] — Appendix, CHAPTER XXVIIl. Tim REGULATIVE FACULTY. — LAW OF THE CONDITIOJNED IN ITS APPLICATION TO THE DOCTRINE OF CAUSALITY. 1 HAVE been desirous to explain the principle of the Condi- tioned, as out of it we* are able not only to explain the hallucina- tion of the Absolute, but to solve some of the most momentous, and hitherto most puzzling, problems of mind. In particular, this principle affords us, I think, a solution of the two great intellectual principles of Cause and Effect, and of Substance and Phaenomenon or Accident. Both are only applications of the principle of the Conditioned, in different relations. Of all questions in the history of Philosophy, that concernuig the nature and genealogy of the notion of Causality, is, perhaps, the most 'famous ; and I shall endeavor to give a comprehensive, though necessarily a very summary, view of the problem, and of the attempts which have been made at its solution. What is the phenomenon of Causality, — But before proceed ing to consider the different attempts to explain the phaenom- enon, it is proper to state and to determine what the phsenom- enon to be explained really is. Nor is this superfluous, for ive shall find that some philosophers, instead of accommodating their solutions to the problem, have accommodated the problem to their solutions. When we are aware of something which begins to be, we are, by the necessity of our intelligence, constrained to believe that it has a Cause. But what does the expression, that it has a cause, signify ? If we analyze our thought, we shall find that it simply means, that as we cannot conceive any new existence to commence, therefore, all tha^ is now seen to arise under a new *► (531) 532 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. appearance had previously an existence under a prior form. [We are constrained to think that what now appears to us under a new form, had previously an existence under others — others conceivable by us or not. These others (for they are always plural) are called its cause; and a cause, or more properly causes, we cannot but suppose ; for a cause is simply every thing without which the effect would not result, and all such concurring, the effect cannot but result.] — Discussions, We are utterly unable to realize in thought the possibility of the complement of existence being either increased or diminished. We are unable, on the one hand, to conceive nothing becoming something, — or, on the other, something becoming nothing. When God is said to create out of nothing, we construe this to thought by supposing that He evolves existence out of himself ; we view the Creator as the cause of the universe. " Ex nihilo nihil, in nihilum nil posse reverti " expresses, in its purest form, the whole intellectual phsenomenon of causality. There is thus conceived an absolute tautology between the effect and its causes. We think the causes to contain all that is contained in the effect ; the effect to contain nothing which was not contained in the causes. Take an example. A neutral salt is an effect of the conjunction of an acid and alkali. Here we do not, and here we cannot, conceive that, in effect, any new existence has been added, nor can we conceive that any has been taken away. But another example : — Gunpowder is the effect of a mixture of sulphur, charcoal, and nitre, and these three substances are again the effect, — result, of simpler con- stituents, and these constituents again of simpler elements, either known or conceived to exist. Now, in all this series of com- positions, we cannot conceive that aught begins to exist. The gunpowder, the last compound, we are compelled to think, con- tains precisely the same quantum of existence that its ultimate elements contained, prior to their combination. Well ; we ex- plode the powder. Can we conceive that existence has been diminished by the annihilation of a single element previously in being, or increased by the addition of a single element which was not heretofore in nature ? " Omnia mutantur ; nihil interit/' — THE PRINCIPLE OE CAUSALITY. 533 is what we think, what we must think. This, then, is the mental phaenomenon of causality, — that we necessarily deny in thought that the object which appears to begin to be, really so begins ; and that we necessarily identify its present with its past exist- ence. Here it is not requisite that we should know under what form, under what combinations, this existence was previously realized ; in other words, it is not requisite that we should know what are the particular causes of the particular effect. The dis- covery of the connection of determinate causes and determinate effects is merely contingent and individual, — merely the datum of experience; but the principle that every event should have itb causes, is necessary and universal, and is imposed on us as a condition of our human intelligence itself. This necessity of so thinking is the only phcenomenon to he explained. [The question of philosophy is not concerning the cause, but concerning a cause.] Nor are philosophers, in general, really at variance in their statement of the problem. However divergent in their mode of explanation, they are at one in regard to the matter to be explained. But there is one exception. Dr. Brown has given a vpiy different account of the phsenomenon in question. To a statement of it, I solicit your attention ; for as his theory is solely accommodated to his view of the phsenomenon, so his the- ory is refuted by showing that his view of the phaenomenon is erroneous. Now, in explaining to you the doctrine of Dr. Brown, 1 am happy to avail myself of the assistance of [Prof. John Wilson] Dr. Brown^s successor, whose metaphysical acuteness was not the least remarkable of his many brilliant qualities. Wilson's confutation of Brown's doctrine, — " The distinct and full purport of Dr. Brown's doctrine, it will be observed, is this, — that when we apply in this way the words cause and power, we attach no other meaning to the terms than what he has explained. By the word cause, we mean no more than that, in this instance, the spark falling is the event immediately prior to the explosion : including the belief that in all cases hitherto, when a spark has fallen on gunpowder (of course, supposing 45* 534 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. other circumstances the same), the gunpowder has kindled ; and that whenever a spark shall again so fall, the grains will again take fire. The present immediate priority, and the past and future invariable sequence of the one event upon the other, are all the ideas that the mind can have in view in speaking of the event in that instance as a cause ; and in speaking of the power in the spark to produce this effect, we mean merely to express the invariableness with which this has happened and will happen. " This is the doctrine ; and the author submits it to this test : — ' Let any one,' he says, ' ask himself what it is which he means by the term " power," ' and without contenting himself with a few phrases that signify nothing, reflect before he give his answer, — and he will find that he means nothing more than in that, all similar circumstances, the explosion of gunpowder will be the immediate and uniform consequence of the applica- tion of a spark. " This test, indeed, is the only one to which the question can be brought. For the question does not regard causes them- selves, but solely the ideas of cause, in the human mind. If, therefore, every one to whom this analysis of the idea, that is in his mind when he speaks of a cause, is proposed, finds, on com- paring it with what passed in his mind, that this is a complete and full account of his conception, there is nothing more to be said, and the point is made good. By that sole possible test the analysis is, in such a case, established. If, on the contrary, when this analysis is proposed, as containing all the ideas which we annex to the words cause and power, the minds of most men cannot satisfy themselves, that it is complete, but are still pos- sessed with a strong suspicion that there is something more which is not here accounted for, — then the analysis is not yet established, and it becomes necessary to inquire by additional examination of the subject, what that more may be. " Let us then apply the test by which Dr. Brown proposes that the truth of his views shall be tried. Let us ask ourselves what we mean when we say, that the spark has power to kindle the gunpowder, — that the powder is susceptible of being kin- THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 535 died by the spark. Do we mean only that whenever they come together this will happen ? Do we merely predict this simple and certain futurity ? " We do not fear to say, that when we speak of a power in one substance to produce a change in another, and of a suscep- tibility of such change in that other, we express more than our belief that the change has taken and will take place. There is more in our mind than a conviction of the past and a foresight of the future. There is, besides this, the conception included of a fixed constitution of their nature, which determines the event, — a constitution, which, while it lasts, makes he event a necessary consequence of the situation in which the objects are placed. We should say then, that there are included in these terms, 'power,' and * susceptibility of change,' two ideas which are not expressed in Dr, Brown's ancdysis^ — one of ne^essity^ and the other of a constitution of things, in which that necessity is established. That these two ideas are not expressed in the terms of Dr. Brown's analysis, is seen by quoting again his words : — ' He will find that he means nothing more than that, in all similar circumstances, the explosion of gunpowder will be the immediate and uniform consequence of the application of a spark.' " It is certain, from the whole tenor of his work, that Dr. Brown has designed to exclude the idea of necessity from his analysis." Now this admirably expresses what I have always felt is the grand and fundamental defect in Dr. Brown's theory, — a de- fect which renders that theory ah initio worthless. Brown pro- fesses to explain the phaenomenon of causality, but, previously to explanation, he evacuates the phaenomenon of all that deside- rates explanation. What remains in the phaenomenon, after the quality of necessity is thrown, or rather silently allowed to drop out, is only accidental, — only a consequence of the essential circumstance. Classification of opinions respecting the Principle of Cans- ality, — The opinions in regard to the nature and origin of th^ principle of Causality, in so far as that principle is viewed as a 586 THE PEINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. subjective phsenomenon, — as a judgment of the human mind, — fall into two great categories. The first category (A) com- prehends those theories which consider this principle as Empir- ical, or a posteriori^ that is, as derived from experience ; the other (B) comprehends those which view it as Pure, or a priori^ that is, as a condition of intelligence itself These two primary genera are, however, severally subdivided into various subordi- nate classes. The former category (A), under which this principle is re- garded as the residt of experience, contains two classes, inasmuch as the causal judgment may be supposed founded either (a) on an Original, or (b) on a Derivative, cognition. Each of these again is divided into two, according as the principle is supposed to have an objective, or a subjective, origin. In the former case, that is, where the cognition is supposed to be original and unde- rived, it is Objective, or rather Objectivo-Objective, when held to consist in an immediate perception of the power or efficacy of causes in the external and internal worlds (1) ; and Subjective, or rather Objectivo- Subjective, when viewed as given in a self consciousness alone of the power or efficacy of our own volitions (2). In the latter case, that is, where the cognition is supposed to be derivative, if. objective, it is viewed as a product of Indue- tion and Generalization (3) ; if subjective, of Association and Custom (4). In like manner, the latter category (B), under which the causal principle is considered not as a result, but as a condition, of experience, is variously divided and subdivided. In the first place, the opinions under this category fall into two classes, inas- much as some regard the causal judgment (c) as an Ultimate or Primary law of mind, while others regard it (d) as a Second- ary or Derived. Those who hold the former doctrine, in view- ing it as a simple original principle, hold likewise that it is a positive act, — an affirmative datum of intelligence. This class is finally subdivided into two opinions. For some hold that the causal judgment, as necessary, is given in what they call " the principle of Causality, ^^ that is, the principle which declares that every thing which begins to be, must have its cause (5) ; THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 537 • A TABULAR VIEW • OF THE THEOEIES IN EEGARD TO THE CAUSALITY. PEINCIPLE OP y a. Original or Objectivo-objective and Objectivo- subjective, — Perception of Causal Efficiency, external and internal. A Posteriori. Primitive. 2. Objectivo-subjective, — Perception of Causal Efficiency, internal. b. Obj ective, — Induction, Generaliza- ' Derivative tion. Judgment of or > \ Secondary. 4. Subj ective, — Association, Custom, Habit. Causality \ ^5. as B. < A Priori. f c. Original or Primitive. Necessary: A Special Principle ot Intelligence. Contingent : Expectation of the Con- , stancy of Nature. d. Derivative "7. From the Law of Contradiction {i. e. Non-Contradiction) .* or ^ Secondary. 8. From the Law of the Conditioned. 538 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. whilst at least one philosopher, without explicitly denying that the causal judgment is necessary, would identify it with the principle of our " Expectation of the Constancy of nature^' (6). Those who hold that it can be analyzed into a higher princi- ple, also hold that it is not of a positive, but of a negative, char- acter. These, however, are divided into two classes. By some it has been maintained, that the principle of Causality can he resolved into the principle of Contradiction (7), which, as I formerly stated to you, ought in propriety to be called the prin- ciple of Non- Contradiction. On the other hand, it may be (though it never has been) argued, that the judgment of Caus- ality can be analyzed into what I ccdled the principle of the Conditioned, — the principle of relativity (8). To one or the other of these eight heads, all the doctrines that have been ac- tually maintained in regard to the origin of the principle in question, may be referred; and the classification is the better worthy of your attention, as in no work will you find any attempt at even an enumeration of the various theories, actual and possible, on this subject. An adequate discussion of these several heads, and a special consideration of the differences of the individual opinions which they comprehend, would far exceed our limits. I shall, there- fore, confine myself to a few observations on the value of these eight doctrines in general, without descending to the particular modifications under which they have been maintained by partic- ular philosophers. 1 . External Perception of causal efficiency, — Of these, the first, — that which asserts that we have a perception of the causal agency, as we have a perception of the existence of ex- ternal objects, — this opinion has been always held in combina- tion with the second, — that which maintains that we are self- conscious of efiiciency ; though the second has been frequently held by philosophers who have abandoned the first as untena- ble. Considering them together, that is, as forming the opinion that we directly and immediately apprehend the efiiciency of causes both external and internal, — this opinion is refuted by two objections. THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 539 The first is, that we have no such apprehension, — no such knowledge ; the second, that if we had, this being merely em- pirical, — merely conversant with individual instances, could never account for the quality of necessity and universality which accompanies the judgment of causality. In regard to the first of these objections, it is now universally admitted^ that we have no perception of the connection of cause and effect in the external world. For example ; when one billiard-ball is seen to strike another, we perceive only that the impulse of the one is followed by the motion of the other, but have no perception of any force or efficiency in the first, by which it is connected with the second, in the relation of causality. Hume was the philoso- pher who decided the opinion of the world on this point. He was not, however, the first who stated the fact, or even the reasoner who stated it most clearly. He, however, believed himself, or would induce us to beheve, that in this he was orig- inaL Speaking of this point, " I am sensible," he says, " that of all the paradoxes, which I have had, or shall hereafter have, occasion to advance, in the course of this treatise, the present one is the most violent, and that it is merely by dint of solid proof and reasoning I can ever hope it will have admission, and overcome the inveterate prejudices of mankind. Before we are reconciled to this doctrine, how often must we repeat to ourselves, that the simple view of any two objects or actions, however related, can never give us any idea of power, or of a connection betwixt them ; that this idea arises from the repetition of their union ; that the repetition neither discovers nor causes any thing in the objects, but has an influence only on the mind, by that customary transition it produces ; that this customary transition is, therefore, the same with the power and necessity ; which are consequently . qualities of perceptions, not of objects, and are internally felt by the soul, and not perceived externally in bodies?" I could adduce to you a whole army of philosophers previous to Hume, who had announced and illustrated the fact. As far as I have been able to trace it, this doctrine was first promul- gated towards the commencement of the twelfth century, at 540 THE PRINCIPLE OF CALj^ALHT. Bagdad, by Algazel, a pious Mohammedan philosopher, who not undeservedly obtained the title of Imaum of the World. Algazel did not deny the reality of causation, but he maintained that God was the only efficient cause in nature ; and that second causes were not properly causes, but only occasions, of the effect. That we have no perception of any real agency of one body on another, is a truth which has not more clearly been stated or illustrated by any subsequent philosopher than by him who first proclaimed it. The doctrine of Algazel was adopted by that great sect among the Mussulman doctors, who were styled those speaking in the law^ that is, the law of Mohammed. From the Eastern Schools, the opinion passed to those of the West ; and we find it a problem which divided the Scholastic philosophers, whether God were the only efficient, or whether causation could be attributed to created existences. After the Revival of Let- ters, the opinion of Algazel was maintained by many individual thinkers, though it no longer retained the same prominence in the Schools. It was held, for example, by Malebranche, and his illustration from the collision of two billiard-balls is likewise that of Hume, who probably borrowed from Malebranche both the opinion and the example. 2. Internal perception of causal efficiency, — But there are many philosophers who surrender the external perception, and maintain our internal consciousness, of causation or power. This opinion was, in one chapter of his Essay ^ advanced by Locke, and, at a very recent date, it has been amplified and enforced with distinguished ability by the late M. Maine de Biran, — one of the acutest metaphysicians of France. On this doctrine, the notion of cause is not given to us by the observations of external phsenomena, which, as considered only by the senses, manifest no causal efficiency, and appear to us only as succes- sive ; it is given to us within, in reflection, in the consciousness of our operations and of the power which exerts them, — - namely, the will. I make an effort to move my arm, and I move it. When we analyze attentively the phasnomenon of effort, which M. de Biran considers as the type of the phaenomena of vohtion, the following are the results : — 1°, The consciousness of an act THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 541 of will ; 2°, The consciousness of a motion produced ; 3^, A relation of the motion to the volition. And what is this relation ? Not a simple relation of succession. The will is not for us a pure act without efficiency, — it is a productive energy ; so that, in a volition there is given to us the notion of cause ; and this notion we subsequently transport, — project out from our in- ternal activities, into the changes of the external world. This doctrine shown to he untenable, — This reasoning, in so far as regards the mere empirical fact of our consciousness of causality, in the relation of our will as moving, and of our limbs as moved, is refuted by the consideration, that between the overt fact of corporeal movement of which we are cognizant, and the internal act of mental determination of which we are also cognizant, there intervenes a numerous series of intermedi- ate agencies of which we have no knowledge ; and, consequently, that we can have no consciousness of any causal connection between the extreme links of this chain, — the volition to move and the limb moving, as this hypothesis asserts. No one is immediately conscious, for example, of moving his arm through his volition. Previously to this ultimate movement, muscles, nerves, a multitude of solid and fluid parts, must be set in motion by the will ; but of this motion we know, from consciousness, absolutely nothing. A person struck with paralysis is conscious of no inability in his limb to fulfil the determinations of his will ; and it is only after having willed, and finding that his limbs do not obey his volition, that he learns by his experience, that the external movement does not follow the internal act. But as the paralytic learns after the volition, that his limbs do not obey his mind ; so it is only after volition that the man in health learns, that his limbs do obey the mandates of his will.^ * [Elsewhere, in the Dissertations supplementary to Reid, this argument is stated by Hamilton as follows .] " Volition to move a limb, and the actual moving of it, are the first and last vx a series of more than two successive events; and cannot, therefore, stand to each other, immediately, in the relation of cause and effect. They may, however, stand to each other in the relation of cause and eflfect, mediately. But, then, if they can be known in consciousne?s 46 542 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. But, independently of all this, the second objection above mentioned i^ fatal to the theory which would found the judgment as thus mediately related, it is a necessary condition of such knowledge, that the intervening series of causes and elfects, through which the final movenent of the limb is supposed to be mediately dependent on the pri- mary volition to move, should be known to consciousness immediately imder that relation. But this intermediate, this connecting series is, con- fessedly, unknown to consciousness at all, far less as a series of causes and effects. It follows, therefore, a fortiori, that the dependency of the last on the first of these events, as of an effect upon its cause, must be to con- sciousness unknown. In other words, — having no consciousness that the volition to move is the efficacious force (power) by which even the event immediately consequent on it (say the transmission of the nervous influence from brain to muscle) is produced, such event being in fact itself to con- sciousness occult; multo minus can we have a consciousness of that volition being the efficacious force by which the ultimate movement of the limb is mediately determined." [In the same Dissertation, Hamilton gives the following analysis of the action of the will in determining motion.] " We have here to distinguish three things : — " 1°. The still immanent or purely mental act of will : what, for distinc- tion's sake, I would call the hyperorganic volition to move ; — the actio elicita of the Schools. Of this volition we are conscious, even though it do not go out into overt action. " 2°. If this volition become transeunt, be carried into effect, it passes mto the mental effort or nisus to move. This I would call the enorganic volition, or, by an extension of the' Scholastic language, the actio imperans. Of this we are immediately conscious. For we are conscious of it, though, hy a narcosis or stupor of the sensitive nerves, we lose all feeling of the movement of the limb ; — though by a paralysis of the motive nerves, no movement in the limb follows the mental effort to move; — though by an abnormal stimulus of the muscular fibres, a contraction in them is caused even in opposition to our will. "3°. Determined by the enorg*anic volition, the cerebral influence is transmitted by the motive nerves; the muscles contract, or endeavor to contract, so that the limb moves or endeavors to move. This motion or effort to move I would call the organic movement, the organic nisus ; by a limitation of the scholastic term, it might be denominated the actio im- perata." [It is in this third element — the organic nisus and the organic movement — that Sir AVilliara seeks for evidence of the efficiency of the will, and rightly declares that it cannot be found. We agree with him. " Between the ex- treme links of this chain, — that is, between the volition to move, and the THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 543 of causality on any empirical cognition, whether of the pliaiiioin- ena of mind or of the phsenomena of matter. Admitting that causation were cognizable, and that perception and self-con- sciousness were competent to its apprehension, still as these faculties could only take note of individual causations, we should be wholly unable, out of such empirical acts, to evolve the quality of necessity and universality, by which this notion is arm moving/' he says, "there intervenes a scries of intermediate agencieSj of which we are wholly unaware." How mind operates upon matter, — even upon the matter of our own bodies, with which we are so intimately connected, — we do not know. How the action of the will is communicated to the muscles, — whether by one, two, or three intermediate steps, — we do not know. But we find proof of the efficiency of volition in the second of our author's three elements, where his language, which we have italicized, is so explicit that it seems strange the conclusion* could have escaped him. By the " enorganic volition" we understand neither " the still immanent or purely mental act," nor yet the organic nisus or movement which is wholly exterior to the mind, but the transeunt act from one to the other, the command^ whether it is obe3^ed or not; — and of this enorganic movement, "we are immediately conscious," though the limb may be paralyzed. It is action , of which we are here conscious ; otherwise, the " purely mental act of will " could not have " become transeunt." We are conscious of an effort in this act — conscious o^ putting forth power — conscious oi attempting to move the muscles, whether they obey or not. The laborer is not more clearly con- scious that he has tried to raise the rock. It is certain, also, that power in action is necessarily causative ; it forms our only idea of causation. It must produce an effect, though perhaps not the whole effect which we desire. The pressure is not lost, though the rock does not move. We have, then, the direct evidence of consciousness, — of that faculty not one of whose dic- tates can be impeached, — that the will is a true cause — an efficient cause, not a mere antecedent — alijnited cause, indeed, but supreme within its proper domain — not always s^//ficient for the end proposed, but always e/'ficient, or expending force, which is real, though often inadequate. We have here all the marks or tests, by which efficient causation is distinguished from mere antecedence. In the case of material phasnomena, the result can be ascertained only by experience ; we learn only by trial, that one substance is soluble, and another not, — that iron expands, and clay contracts, in the fire. But in the case of mental exertion, the result to be accomplished is ^reconsidered, or meditated, and is therefore known a priori, or before expe- rience ; the volition succeeds, which is a true effort, or power in action ; and this is necessarily followed by an effect, partial or complete.] — Am. Ed 544 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITi. distinguished. Admitting that we had really observed tht; agency of any number of causes, still this would not explain to us, how we . are unable to think a manifestation of existence without thinking it as an effect. Our internal experience, especially in the relation of our volitions to their effects, may be useful in giving us a clearer notion of causality ; but it is alto- gether incompetent to account for what in it there is of the quality of necessity. So much for the two theories at the head of the Table. As the first and second opinions have been usually associated, so also have the third and fourth ; — that is, the doctrine that our notion of causality is the offspring of the objective principle of Induction or Generalization, and the doctrine that it is the off- spring of the subjective principle of Association or Custom. 3. Judgment of Causality obtained from Induction and Gen- eralization, — In regard to the former, — the third, it is plain that the observation, that certain phsenomena are found to suc- ceed certain other phaenomena, and the generalization conse- quent thereon, that these are reciprocally causes and effects, could never of itself have engendered, not only the strong, but the irresistible belief, that every event must have its cause. Each of these observations is contingent; and any number of observed contingencies will never impose upon us the feeling of necessity, — of our inability to think the opposite. Nay more, this theory evolves the absolute notion of causality out of the observation of a certain number of uniform consecutions among phgenoiiiena ; [that is, it would collect that all must he, because some are,'] But we find no difficulty whatever in conceiving the reverse of all or any of the consecutions we have observed ; and yet the general notion of causality, which, ex hypothesis is their result, we cannot possibly think as possibly unreal. We have always seen a stone fall to the ground, when thrown into the air ; but we find no difficulty in representing to ourselves the possibility of one or all stones gravitating from the earth ; only we cannot conceive the possibility of this, or any other event, happening without a cause. 4. From Association and Custom, — Nor does the latter,— THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 54N the fourth theory, — that of Custom or AsRoeiation, — afford a better solution. The necessity of so thinking cannot be derived from a custom of so thinking. Allow the force of custom to be great as may be, still it is always limited to the customary ; and the customary has nothing whatever in it of the necessary. But we have here to account not for a strong, hut for an absolutely irresistible belief. On this theory, also, the causal judgment, when association is recent, should be weak, and sliould only gradually acquire its full force in proportion as custom becomes inveterate. But do we find that the causal judgment is weaker in the young, stronger in the old ? There is no difference. In either case, there is no less and no more ; the necessity in both is absolute. Mr. Hume patronized the opinion, that the notion of causality is the offspring of experience engendered upon cus* tom. But those have a sorry insight into the philosophy of that great thinker, who suppose that this was a dogmatic theory of his own. On the contrary, in his hands, it was a mere reduction of dogmatism to absurdity, by showing the inconsistency of its results. To the Lockian sensualism, Hume proposed the prob- lem, — to account for the phceiiomenoii of necessity in our notion of the causal nexus. That philosophy afforded no other princi- ple through which even the attempt at a solution could be made ; — and the principle of custom, Hume shows, could not furnish a real necessity. The alternative was plain. Either the doctrine of sensualism is false, or our nature is a delusion. Shallow thinkers adopted the latter alternative, and vf ere lost ; profound thinkers, on the contrary, were determined to lay a deeper foundation of philosophy than that of the superficial edifice of Locke ; and thus it is that Hume became the cause, or the occasion, of all that is of principal value in our more recent metaphysics. Hume is the parent of the philosophy of Kant, and, through Kant, of the whole philosophy of Germany ; he is the parent of the philosophy of Reid and Stewart in Scot- land, and of all that is of preeminent note in the metaphysics of France and Italy. — But to return. 5. Causality a special principle of intelligence. — I now come to the second category (B), and to the first of the four particu- 46^ 546 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. lar heads which it likewise contains, — the opinion, namely, that the judgment, that every thing that begins to be must have a cause, is a simple primaiy datum, a positive revelation of intel- ligence. To this head are to be referred the theories on causal- ity of Descartes, Leibnitz, Reid, Stewart, Kant, Fichte, Cousin, and the majority of recent philosophers. This is the fifth theory in order. Now it is manifest, that, against the assumption of a special principle, which this doctrine makes, there exists a primary pre- sumption of philosophy. This is the law of Parcimony, which forbids, without necessity, the multiplication of entities, powers, principles, or causes ; above all, the postulation of an unknown foTce^ where a known impotence can account for the effect. We are, therefore, entitled to apply Occam's razor* to this theory of causality, unless it be proved impossible to explain the causal judgment at a cheaper rate, by deriving it from a higher, and that a negative, origin. On a doctrine like the pres- ent is thrown the onus of vindicating its necessity, by showing that, unless a special and positive principle be assumed, there exists no competent mode to save the phsenomena. It can only, therefore, be admitted provisorily ; and it falls of course, if the phsenomenon it would explain can be explained on less onerous conditions. Leaving, therefore, the theory to stand or fall according as the two remaining opinions are or are not found insufficient, I proceed to the consideration of these. 6. Expectation of the constancy of nature, — Dr. Brown has promulgated a doctrine of Causality, which may be numbered as the sixth ; though perhaps it is hardly deserving of distinct enumeration. He actually identifies the causal judgment, which to us is necessary^ with the principle by which we are =^ [The dictum, entia non multiplicanda sunt prceter necessitatem, first ex- plicitly applied by Occam as a summary means of refuting arbitrary and unnecessary hypotheses, has been called " Occam's razor." Hamilton usu- ally calls it the ** Law of Parcimony,^' and elsewhere says that " it has never perhaps been adequately enounced. It should be thus expressed: — Neither' more, nor more onerous, causes are to be assumed than are nec^- mry to account for the phcenomena."] — Am. Ed. THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY. 547 merely inclined to believe in the uniformity of nature's opera- tions. [But apart from all subordinate objections, it is sufficient to saj, that the phaenomenon to be explained is the necessity of thinking — the absolute impossibility of not thinking — a cause ; whilst all that the latter principle pretends to, is, to incline us to expect that like antecedents will be followed by tike consequents. This necessity to suppose a cause for every phaenomenon. Dr. Brown, if he does not expressly deny, keeps cautiously out of view, — virtually, in fact, eliminating all that requires explana- tion in the problem.] — Discussions, 7. The Judgment of Causality demonstrable by abstract rea- soning^ — i. e. by the Principle of Contradiction, — The sev- enth is a doctrine that has long been exploded. It attempts to establish the principle of Causality upon the principle of Con- tradiction. Leibnitz was too acute a metaphysician to attempt to prove the principle of Sufficient Reason or Causality, which is an ampliative or synthetic principle, by the principle of Con- tradiction, which is merely explicative or analytic. But his fol- lowers were not so wise. Wolf, Baumgarten, and many other Leibnitzians, paraded rTemonstrations of the law of the Suffi- cient Reason, on the ground of the law of Contradiction ; but the reasoning always proceeds on the covert assumption of the very point in question. The same argument is, however, at an earlier date, to be found in Locke, and modifications of it in Hobbes and Clarke. Hume, who was only aware of the argu- ment as in the hands of the English metaphysicians, has given it a refutation, which has earned the approbation of Reid ; and by foreign philosophers, its emptiness in the hands of the Wolf- ian metaphysicians has frequently been exposed. Listen to the pretended demonstration : — Whatever is produced without a cause, is produced by nothing, — in other ivords, has nothing for its cause. Bat nothing can no more be a cause, than it can be something. The same intuition that makes us aware, that noth- ing is not something, shows us that every thing must have a real cause of its existence. To this it is sufficient to say, that the existence of causes being the point in question, the existence of causes must not be taken for granted in the very reasoning 548 THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSALITY which attempts to prove their reality. In exchiding causes, we exchide all causes ; and consequently exclude " nothing " con- sidered as a cause ; it is not, therefore, allowable, contrary to that exclusion, to suppose " nothing " as a cause, and then from the absurdity of that supposition to infer the absurdity of the exclusion itself* If every thing must have a cause, it follows that, upon the exclusion of other causes, we must accept of nothing as a cause. But it is the very point at issue, whether every thing must have a cause or not ; and, therefore, it violates the first principles of reasoning to take this quaesitura itself as granted. This opinion is now universally abandoned. 8. A result of the Law of the Conditioned, — The eighth and last opinion is that which regards the judgment of causality as derived ; and derives it not from a power, but from an impo- tence, of mind ; in a w^ord, from the principle of the Conditioned. I do not think it possible, without a detailed exposition of the various categories of thought, to make you fully understand the grounds and bearings of this opinion. In attempting to explain, you must, therefore, allow me to take for granted certain laws of thought, to which I have only been* able incidentally to al- lude. Those, however, which I postulate, are such as are now generally admitted by all philosophers who allow the mind itself to be a source of cognitions ; and the only one which has not been recognized by them, but which, as I endeavored briefly to prove, must likewise be taken into account, is the Law of the Conditioned, — the law that the conceivable has always two opposite extremes, and that the extremes are equally incon- ceivable. That the Conditioned is to be viewed, not as a power, but as a powerlessness of mind, is evinced by this, — that the two extremes are contradictories, and, as contradictories, though neither alternative can he conceived, — thought as possible, one or other must be admitted to be necessary. Causality deduced from this law through the three Ccctegories of thought. — Philosophers who allow a native principle to the mind at all, allow that Existence is such a principle. I shall, therefore, take for granted Existence as the highest category or condition of thought. As I noticed in the last chapter, no THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. 549 thought 18 possible except under this category. All that we perceive or imagine as different from us, we perceive or imag- ine as objectively existent. All that we are conscious of as an act or modification of self, we are conscious of only as subjec- tively existent. All thought^ therefore, implies the thought- of existence ; and this is the veritable exposition of the enthymeme of Descartes, — Gogito ergo sum. I cannot think that I think, without thinking that I exist, — I cannot be conscious, without being conscious that I am. Let existence, then, be laid down as a necessary form of thought. As a second category or subjec- tive condition of thought, I postulate that of Time. This, like- wise, cannot be denied me. It is the necessary condition of every conscious act ; thought is only realized to us as in succes- sion, and succession is only conceived by us under the concept of time. Existence and Existence in Time is thus an elemen- tary form of our intelligence. But we do not conceive existence in time absolutely or infinitely, — we conceive it only as condi- tioned in time ; and Existence Conditioned in Time expresses, at once and in relation, the three categories of thought which afford us in combination the principle of Causality. This re- quires some explanation. When we perceive or imagine an object, we perceive or im- agine it — 1°, As existent, and, 2°, As in Time ; Existence and Time being categories of all thought. But what is meant by saying, I perceive, or imagine, or, in general, think an object only as I perceive, or imagine, or, in general, think it to exist ? Simply this ; — that, as thinking it, I cannot but think it to ex- ist, in other words, that / cannot annihilate it in thought. I may think away from it, I may turn to other things ; and I can thus exclude it from my consciousness ; but, actually thinking it, I cannot think it as non-existent, for as it is thought, so it is thought existent. But a thing is thought to exist, only as it is thought to exist in time. Time is present, past, and future. We cannot think an object of thought as non-existent de presently — as actually an object of thought. But can we think that quantum of exist- ence of which an object, real or ideal, is the complement, as 550 THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. non-existent, either in time past, or in time future ? Make th*3 experiment. Try to think the object of your thought as non- existent in the moment before the present. — You cannot. Try it in the moment before that. — You cannot. Nor can you annihilate it by carrying it back to any moment, however distant in the past. You may conceive the parts of which this complement of existence is composed, as separated ; if a mate- rial object, you can think it as shivered to atoms, sublimated into aether ; but not one iota of existence can you conceive as anni- hilated, which subsequently you thought to exist. In like manner, try the future, — try to conceive the prospective anni- hilation of any present object, — of any atom of any present object. — You cannot. All this may be possible, but of it we cannot think the possibility. But if you can thus conceive nei- ther the absolute commencement nor the absolute termination of any thing that is once thought to exist, try, on the other hand, if you can conceive the opposite alternative of infinite non-commencement, of infinite non-termination. To this you are equally impotent. This is the category of the Conditioned, as applied to the category of Existence under the category of Time. But in this application is the principle of Causality not given ? Why, what is the law of Causality ? Simply this, — that when an object is presented phaenomenally as commencing, we cannot but suppose that the complement of existence, which it now contains, has previously been ; in other words, that all that we at present come to know as an effect must previously have existed in its causes ; though what these causes are we may perhaps be altogether unable even to surmise. The law of the Conditioned, — This theory, which has not hitherto been proposed, is recommended by its extreme sim- plicity. It postulates no new, no special, no positive principle. It only supposes that the mind is limited ; and the law of limita- tion, the law of the Conditioned, in one of its applications, constitutes the law of Causality. The mind is necessitated to think certain forms ; and, under these forms, thought is only pos- sible in the interval between two contradictory extremes^ both of THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. 551 which are absolutely inconceivahle, hut one of wJiich^ on the prin-- ciple of Excluded Middle^ is necessarily true. In reference to the present subject, it is only requisite to specify two of these forms, — Existence and Time. I showed you that thought is only possible under the native conceptions, — the a priori forms, — of existence and time ; in other woi'ds, the notions of existence and time are essential elements of every act of intelli- gence. But while the niind is thus astricted to certain necessary modes or forms of thought, in these forms it can only think under certain conditions. Thus, while obliged to think under the thought of time, it cannot conceive, on the one hand, the absolute commencement of time, and it cannot conceive, on the other, the infinite non-commencement of time ; in like manner, on the one hand, it cannot conceive an absolute minimum of time, nor yet, on the other, can it conceive the infinite divisi- bility of time. Yet these form two pairs of contradictories, that is, of counter-propositions, which, if our intelligence be not all a lie, cannot both be true, but of which, on the same authority, one necessarily must be true. This proves : 1°, That it is not competent to argue^ that what cannot he comprehended as possible hy us, is impossible in reality ; and 2°, That the necessities of thought are not always positive powers of cognition, hut often negative inabilities to know. The law of mind, that all that is positively conceivable, lies in the interval between two incon- ceivable extremes, and which, however palpable when stated, has never been generalized, as far as I know, by any philoso- pher, I call the Law or Principle of the Conditioned. This law in its application affords the phcenomenon of Caus- ality, — Thus, the whole phsenomenon of causality seems to me to be nothing more than the law of the Conditioned, in its application to a thing thought under the form or mental cate- gory of Existence, and under the form or mental category of Time. We cannot know, we cannot thmk a thing, except as existing, that is, under the category of existence ; and we cannot know or tliink of a thing as existing, except in time. Now the application of the law of the conditioned to any object, tliought as existent, and thought as in time, will give us at once the 552 THE LAW OF THE COKDITIONED. j I aenomenon of causalitj. And thus: — An object is given us, either by sense or suggestion, — unagination. As known, we cannot but think it existent, and in time. But to say that we cannot but think it to exist, is to say, that we are unable to think it non-existent; that is, that we are unable to annihilate it in thought. And this we cannot do. We may turn aside from it ; we may occupy our attention with other objects ; and we may thus exclude it from our thoughts. This is certain : we need not think it ; but it is equally certain, that thinking it, we cannot think it not to exist. This will be at once admitted of the present; but it may possibly be denied of the past and future. But if we make the experiment, we shall find the mental annihilation of an object equally impossible under time past, present, or future. Annihilation and Creation^ — as conceived by us, — To obvi- ate misapprehension, however, I must make a very simple observation. When I say that it is impossible to annihilate an object in thought — in other words, to conceive it as non-exist- ent, — it is of course not meant that it is impossible to imagine the object wholly changed in form. We can j&gure to ourselves the elements of which it is composed, distributed and arranged and modified in ten thousand forms, — we can imagine any thing of it, short of annihilation. But the complement, the cmantum, of existence, which is reaUzed in any object, — that we can [not] represent to ourselves, either as increased, without abstraction from other bodies, or as diminished, without addition to them. In short, we are unable to construe it in thought, that there can be an atom absolutely added to, or an atom absolutely taken away from, existence in general. Make the experiment. Form tc yourselves a notion of the universe ; now can you conceive that the quantity of existence, of which the universe is the sum, is either amplified or diminished ? You can conceive the creation of a world as lightly as you conceive the creation of an atom. But what is a creation ? It is not the springing of nothing into something. Far from it : — it is conceived, and is by us con- ceivable, merely as the evolution of a new form of existence, by the fiat of the Deity. Let us suppose the very crisis of creation. THE LAW OF rilli: COlSDITIONED. 558 Call we realke it to ourselves, in thought, that, the moment after the universe came into manifested being, there was a larger complement of existence in the universe and its Author together, than there was the moment before, in the Deity him- self alone ? This we cannot imagine. Wliat P have now said of our conceptions of creation, holds true of our conceptions of annihilation. We can conceive no real annihilation, — no abso- lute sinking of something into notliing. But, as creation is cogitable by us only as an exertion of divine power, so annihila- tion is only to be conceived by us as a withdrawal of the divine support. All that there is now actually of existence in the universe, we conceive as having virtually existed, prior to crea- tion, in the Creator ; and in imagining the universe to be anni- hilated by its Author, we can only imagine this, as the retracta- tion of. an outward energy into power. All this shows how impossible it is for the human mind to think aught that it thinks, as non-existent either in time past or in time future. [Our mability to think what we have once conceived existent in Time, as ill time becoming non-existent, corresponds with our inability to think, what we have conceived existent in Space, as in space becoming non-existent. We cannot realize it to thought, that a thing should be extruded, either from the one quantity or the other. Hence, und^r extension, the law of Ultimate Incompressibility • under pretension, the law of Cause and Effect.] — Discussions, Infinite regress, or non-commencement, equally inconceiva* hie, — We have been hitherto speaking only of one inconceiva- ble extreme of the conditioned, in its application to the category of existence in the category of time, — the extreme of absolute commencement ; the other is equally incomprehensible, that is, the extreme of infinite regress or non-commencement. With this latter we have, however, at present nothing to do. [Indeed, as not obtrusive, the Infinite figures far less in the theatre of mind, and exerts a far inferior influence in the modification of thought, than the Absolute. It is, in fact, both distant and delitescent ; and in place of meeting us at every turn, it requires some exertion on our part to seek it out.] It is the former 47 554 THE LAW OF THE CONDITIOiSIED alone, — it is the iiiabilltv we experience of annihilating in thought an existence in time past, in other words, onr utter impotence of conceiving its absolute commencement, that consti- tutes and explains the whole phasnomenon of causality. An object is presented to our observation which has phsenomenally begun to be. Well, we cannot realize it in thought that the object, that is, this determinate complement of existence, had really no being at any past moment ; because this supposes that, once thinking it as existent, we could again think it as non- existent, which is for us impossible. "What, then, can we do? That the phaenomenon presented to us began, as a phsenomenon, to be, — this we know by experience ; but that the elements of its 'existence only began, when the phgenomenon they constitute came into being, — this we are wholly unable to represent in thought. In these circumstances, how do we proceed ? — How must we proceed ? There is only one possible mode. We are compelled to believe that the object (that is, a certain quale and quantum of being) whose phaenomenal rise into existence we have witnessed, did really exist, prior to this rise^ under other forms ; [and by form^ be it observed, I mean any mode of existence, conceivable by us or not]. But to say that a thing previously existed under different forms, is only in other words to say, that a thing had cafases. I have already noticed to you the error of philosophers in supposing, that any thing can have a single cause. Of course, I speak only of Second Causes. Of the causation of the Deity we can form no possible conception. Of Second Causes, I say, there must almost always be at least a concurrence of two to constitute an effect. Take the example of vapor. Here, to say that heat is the cause of evaporation, is a very inaccurate, — at least a very inadequate, expression. Water is as much the cause of evaporation as heat. But heat- and water together are the causes of the phsenomenon. Nay, there is a third concause which we have forgot, — the atmos- phere. Now, a cloud is the result of these three concurrent causes or constituents ; and, knowing this, we find no difficulty in carrying back the complement of existence, which it contains prior to its appearance. But on the hypothesis, that we are not THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. 555 aware what are the real constituents or 'causes of the cloud, the human mind must still perforce suppose some unknown, some hypothetical, antecedents, into which it mentally refunds all the existence which the cloud is thought to contain."* Uniform succession not a necessary prerequisite for the causal * [My doctrine of Causality is accused of neglecting the phaenomenon of change, and of ignoring the attribute of power. This objection precisely reverses the fact. Causation is by me proclaimed to be identical with change, — change of power into act ("omnia mutantur"); change, how- ever, only of appearance, — we being unable to realize in thought either existence (substance) apart from phenomena, or existence absolutely com- mencing, or absolutely terminating. And specially as to power ; power is the property of an existent something (for it is thought only as the essential attribute of what is so or so to exist) ; power is, consequently, the correla- tive of existence, and a necessary supposition, in this theory, of causation. Here the cause, or rather the complement of "causes, is nothing but powers capable of producing the effect ; and the effect is only that now existing actually, which previously existed potentially, or in the causes. We must, in truth, define — a cause, the power of effectuating a change; and an etiect, a change actually caused. Mutation, Causation, Effectuation, are only the same thought in difi*er- ent respects ; they may, therefore, be regarded as virtually terms converti- ble. Eveiy change is an effect ; every effect is a change. An effect is, in truth, just a change of power into act ; every effect being an actualization of the potential. But what is now considered as the cause may at another time be viewed as the effect ; and vice versa. Thus, we can extract the acid or the alkali^ as effect, out of the salt, as principal concause ; and the square which, as effect, is made up of two triangles in conjunction, may be viewed as cause when cut into these figures. In opposite views. Addition and Multiplica- tion, Subtraction and Division, may be regarded as causes, or as effects. Power is an attribute or property of existence, but not coextensive with it; ' for we may suppose (negatively think) things to exist which have no capac- ity of change, no capacity of appearing. Creation is the existing subsequently in act of what previously existed in power; annihilation, on the contrary, is the subsequent QxistencQ in power of what previously existed in act. Except the first and last causal agencies (and these, as Divine opel-ations, are by us incomprehensible), every other is conceived also as an effect; therefore, every event is, in different relations, a pov/er and an act. Con- sidered as a cause, it is a power, — a power to cooperate an effect. Consid- ered as an effect, it is an act, — an act cooperated by causes. 1 — Appendix. 556 THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. judgment — Nothing can be a greater error in itself, or a more fertile cause of delusion, than the common doctrine, that the causal judgment is elicited only when we apprehend objects in consecution, and uniform consecution. Of course, the observa- tion of such succession prompts and enables us to assign partic- ular causes to particular effects. But this consideration ought to be carefully distinguished from the law of Causality, abso- lutely, which consists not in the empirical attribution of this phaenomenon, as cause, to that phsenomenon as effect, but in the universal necessity, of which we are conscious, to think causes for every event, whether that event stand isolated by itself, and be by us referable to no other, or whether it be one in a series of successive phaenomena, which, as it were, spontaneously ar- range themselves under the relation of effect and cause. [Of no phaenomenon, as observed, need we think the cause ; but of every phaenomenon^ must we think a cause. The former we may learn through a process of induction and generalization ; the latter we must always and at once admit, constrained by the condition of E-elativity. 3n this, not sunken rock, Dr. Brown and others have been shipwrecked.] — Discussions, Reasons for preferring this, doctrine, — In the first place, to explain the phaenomenon of the Causal Judgment, it postulates no new^ no extraordinary^ no express principle. It does not even found upon a positive power ; for, while it shows that the phaenomenon in question is only one of a class, it assigns, as their common cause, only a negative impotence. In this, it stands advantageously contrasted with the one other theory which saves the phaenomenon, but which saves it only by the hypothesis of a special principle, expressly devised to account for this phaenomenon alone. Nature never works by more, and more complex, instruments than are necessary; — iiridh 7t8Qit- Twg ; and to assume a particular force, to perform what can be better explained by a general imbecility, is contrary to every rule of philosophizing. It averts scepticism. — But, in the second place, if there be postulated an express and positive affirmation of intelligence to account for the fact, that existence cannot absolutely commence, THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED, 557 we must equally postulate a counter affirmation of intelligence, positive and express, to explain the counter fact, that existence cannot infinitely not-commence. The one necessity of mind is equally strong as the other ; and if the one be a positive ioc- trine, an express testimony of intolligence, so also must be the other. But they are contradictories ; and, as contradictories, they cannot both be true. On this theory, therefore, the root of our nature is a lie ! By the doctrine, on the contrary, which I propose, these contradictory phaenomena are carried up into the common principle of a limitation of our faculties. Intelligence is shown to be feeble, but not false ; our nature is, thus, not a lie, nor the Author of our nature a deceiver. It avoids fatalism or inconsisteiicy, — In the third place, this simpler and easier doctrine avoids a serious inconvenience, which attaches to the more difficult and" complex. It is this : — To suppose a positive and special principle of causality, is to suppose, that there is expressly revealed to us, through intelli- gence, the fact that there is no free causation, — that is, that there is no cause which is not itself merely an effect ; existence being only a series of determined antecedents and determined conse- quents. But this is an assertion of Fatalism. Such, however, most of the patrons of that doctrine will not admit. The as- sertion of absolute necessity, they are aware, is virtually the negation of a moral universe, consequently of the Moral Gov- ernor of a moral universe ; in a word. Atheism. Fatalism and Atheism are, indeed, convertible terms. The only valid argu- ments for the existence of a God, and for the immortality of the soul, rest on the ground of man's moral nature ; conse- quently, if that moral nature be annihilated, which in any scheme of necessity it is, every conclusion established on such a nature, is anniliilated also. Aware of this, some of those who make the judgment of causality a special principle, — a positive dictate of intelligence, — find themselves compelled, in order to escape from the consequences of their doctrine, to deny that this dictate, though universal in its deliverance, should be al- lowed to hold universally true; and, accordingly, they would exempt from it the facts of volition. Will, they hold to be a 47* 558 THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. free cause, that is, a cause which is not an effect; in other words, they attribute to will the power of absolute origination.* But here their own principle of causality is too strong for them. They say, that it is unconditionally given, as a special and positive law of intelligence;, that every origination is only an apparent, not a real, commencement. Now to exempt certain phaenomena from this law, for the sake of our moral conscious- ness, cannot be validly done. For, in the first place, this would be to admit that the mind is a complement of contradictory rev- elations. If mendacity be admitted of some of our mental dic- tates, we cannot vindicate veracity to any. " Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus." Absolute scepticism is hence the legiti- mate conclusion. But, in the second place, waiving this con- clusion, what right have we, on this doctrine, to subordinate the positive afiirmation of causality to our consciousness of moral liberty, — what right have we, for the interest of the latter, to derogate from the universality of the former ? We have none. If both are equally positive, v/e have no right to sacrifice to the other the alternative, which our wishes prompt us to abandon. But the doctrine which I propose is not exposed to these dif- ficulties. It does not suppose that the judgment of Causality is founded on a power of the mind to recognize as necessary in thought what is necessary in the universe of existence ; it, on the contrary, founds this judgment merely on the impotence of the mind to conceive either of two contradictories, and, as one or the other of two contradictories must be true, though both cannot, it shows that there is no ground for inferring from the inability of the mind to conceive an alternative as possible, that such alternative is really impossible. At the same time, if the causal judgment be not an afiirmation of mind, but merely an Incapacity of positively thinking the contrary, it follows that such a negative judgment cannot stand in opposition to the posi- tive consciousness, — the affirmative deliverance, that we are truly the authors, — the responsible originators, of our actions, ^ [To conceive a free act, is to conceive an act, which, being a causp, is not itself a?i effect; in other words, to conceive an absolute conim en cement But is such by us conceivable ?] — Notes to Reid THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. 559 and not merely links in the adamantine series of effects and causes. It appears to me tliat it is only on this doctrine that we can philosophically vindicate the liberty of the will, — that we can rationally assert to a man "fatis avolsa voluntas." How the will can possibly be free must remain to us, under the present limitation of our faculties, wholly incomprehensible. We cannot conceive absolute commencement ; we cannot, there- fore, conceive a free volition. But as little can we conceive the alternative on which hberty is denied, on which necessity is af- firmed. And in favor of our moral nature, tTie fact that we are free, is given us in the consciousness of an uncompromising law of Duty, in the consciousness of our moral accountability ; and this fact of liberty cannot be redargued on the ground, that it is incomprehensible ; for the doctrine of the Conditioned proves, against the necessitarian, that something may, nay must, be true, of which the mind is wholly unable to construe to itself the possibihty ; whilst it shows that the objection of incomprehen- sibility applies no less to the doctrine of fatalism than to the doctrine of moral freedom. If the deduction, therefore, of the Causal Judgment, which I have attempted, should speculatively prove correct, it will, I think, afford a securer and more satis- factory foundation for our practical interests, than any other which has ever yet been promulgated. [The question of Liberty and Necessity may be dealt with in two ways. I. The opposing parties may endeavor to show each that his thesis is distinct, intelligible, and consistent, whereas that the anti-thesis of his opponent is indistinct, unintelligible, and con- tradictory. II. An opposing party may endeavor to show that the thesis of either side is unthinkable, and thus abolish logically the whole problem, as, on both alternatives, beyond the limits of human thought ; it being, however, open to him to argue that, though unthinkable, his thesis is not annihilated, there being contradictory opposites, one of which must consequently be held as true, though we be unable to think the possibility of either opposite ; whilst he mav be able to appeal to a direct or indi 560 THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. reel uecIai'aLion of our conscious nature in favor of the alterna* tive wliicli he maintains.] — Appendix, Eeid sajs that, according to one meaning of the word Liberty, " it is opposed to confinement of the body bj superior force ; so we say a prisoner is set at Hberty, when his fetters are knocked off and he is discharged from confinement ;" and he grants that " this hbertj extends not to the wilL" [This is called the lib- erty from Coaction or Violence — the liberty of Spontaneity — Spontaneity. In the present question, this species of liberty ought to be thrown altogether out of account ; it is admitted by all parties ; it is common equally to brutes and men ; is not a peculiar quality of the will ; and is, in fact, essential to it, for the will cannot possibly be forced. The greatest spontaneity is, in fact, the greatest necessity. Thus, a hungry horse, who turns of necessity to food, is said, on this definition of liberty, to do so with freedom, because he does so spontaneously ; and, in gene- ral, the desire of happiness, which is the most necessary ten- dency, will, on this application of the term, be the most free. Again, " liberty is opposed to obligation by law, or lawful authority." With this description of hberty, also, the present question has no concern. Moral liberty does not merely consist in the power of doing what we will, but in the power of willing what we will. This is variously denominated the Liberty from N^ecessity — Moral Liberty — Philosophical Liberty — LJssential Liberty — Liberty from Lndifference, etc. A Power over the determinations of our Will supposes an act of Will that our Will should deter- mine so and so ; for we can only freely exert power through a rational determination or Volition. This definition of Liber^ is right. But then question upon question remains — and this ad infinitum. Have we a power (a will) over such anterior will ? And until this question be definitively answered, which it never can", we mu^t be unable to conceive the possibility of the fact of Liberty, But though inconceivable, this fact is not therefore false. For there are many contradictories (and of contradictories, one must and one only can, be true), of which we are equally unable to conceive the possibility of either. THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. 5G1 The philosophy, therefore, which I profess, annihilates the theo- retical problem — How is the scheme of Liberty, or the scheme of Necessity, to be rendered comprehensible? — by showing that* both schemes are equally inconceivable ; but it establishes Liberty practically as a fact, by showing that it is either itself an immediate datum^ or is involved in an immediate datum^ of consciousness. Held has done nothing to render the scheme of Liberty conceivable. But if our intellectual nature be not a lie, if our consciousness and conscience do not deceive us in the immediate datum of an Absolute Law of Duty^ we are free, as we are moral j agents ; for Morality involves Liberty as its es- sential condition, its ratio essendi. Is the person an original undetermined cause of the determi- nation of his will ? If he be not, then he is not a free agent, and the scheme of Necessity is admitted. If he be, in the first place, it is impossible to conceive the possibility of this ; and, in the second, if the fact, though inconceivable, be allowed, it is impossible to see how a cause undetermined by any motive * can be a rational^ jnoral, and accountable cause. There is no con- ceivable medium between Fatalism and Casuism ; and the con- tradictory schemes of Liberty and Necessity themselves are inconceivable. For, as we cannot compass in thought an unde- termined cause — an absolute commencement — the fundamental hypothesis of the one ; so we can as little think an infinite series of determined causes — of relative commencements — the fundamental hypothesis of the other. The champions of the ^ [A motive, abstractly considered, is called an end (>x final cause. It is well denominated in the Greek philosophy, to eveaa ov — that for the sake of which. A motive, however, in its concrete reality, is nothing apart from the mind, — only a mental tendency. If motives ^^ influence to action," as Reid says, they must cooperate in producing a certain effect upon the agent ; and the determination to act, and to act in a certain manner, is that effect. They are thus, on Reid's ov/n view, in. this relation, causes, and efficient causes. It is of no consequence in the argument whether motives be said to determine a man to act, or to in- fluence (that is, to determine) him to determine himself to act. It does not, therefore, seem consistent to say that motives are not causes, and tliat they do not Gct.\ — Not^s to Reid. 562 THE LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. opposite doctrines are thus at once resistless in assault, and im- potent in defence. Each is hewn down and appears to die under the home-thrusts of his adversary ; but each again recov- ers life from the very death of his antagonist, and, to borrow a simile, both are hke the heroes in Valhalla, re^dy in a moment to amuse themselves anew in the same bloodless and intermina- ble conflict. The doctrine of Moral Liberty cannot be made conceivable, for we can only conceive the determined and the relative. As already stated, all that can be done is to show, 1° That, for the -fact of Liberty, we have, immediately or medi- ately, the evidence of consciousness ; and, 2°, That there are, among the phoenomena of mind, many facts which we must ad- mit as actual, but of whose possibility we are wholly unable to form any notion. I may merely observe that the fact of Motion can be shown to .be impossible, on grounds not less strong than those on which it is attempted to disprove the fact of Liberty ; to say nothing of many contradictories, neither of which can be thought^ but one of which must, on the laws of Contradiction and Excluded Middle, necessarily he. It is proper to notice, that, as to live is to act^ and as man is not free to live or not to live, so neither, absolutely speaking, is he free to act or not to act. As he lives, he is necessarily de- termined to act or energize — to think and will; and all the liberty to which he can pretend, is to choose between this mode of action and .that. In Scholastic language, man cannot have the liberty of freedom^ though he may have the liberty of sped- Jication, The root of his freedom is thus necessity. Nay, we cannot conceive otherwise even of the Deity. As we must think Him as necessarily existent, and necessarily living, so we must think him as necessarily active. Such are the conditions of human thought. When Dr. Clarke says, ''The true defini- tion of Liberty is the Power to Act^^ he should have recollected that this power is, on his own hypothesis, absolutely fatal if it cannot but act,"] — Notes to Reid, [Substance and Quality are, manifestly, only thought as mu- tual relatives. Yf e cannot think a Quality existing absolutely, in or of itself. We are constrained to think it as inhering in TII£ LAW OF THE CONDITIONED. 563 some basisj substratum, hypostasis, or Substance ; but this Sub- stance cannot be conceived by us except negatively, that is, as the unapparent — the inconceivable, correlative of certain ap- pearing Qualities. If we attempt to think it positively, we can think it only by transforming it into a Quality or bundle of Qual- ities, which, again, we are compelled to refer to an unknown substance, now supposed for their incogi table basis. Every thing, in fact, may be conceived as the Quality, or as the Sub- stance of something else. But Absolute Substance and Absolute Quality, these are both inconceivable, as more than negations of the conceivable. It is hardly requisite to observe, that the term Substance is vulgarly applied, in the abusive signification, to a congeries of qualities, denoting those especially which are more permanent, in contrast to those which are more transitory. What has now been said, applies equally to Mind and Matter. Space applies, proximately, to things considered as Substance ; for the qualities of substances, though they are in, may not oc- cupy, space. In fact, it is by a merely modern abuse of the term, that the affections of Extension have been styled Quali- ties. It is extremely difficult for the human mind to admit the possibility of unextended Substance. Extension, being a con- dition of positive thinking, clings to all our conceptions ; and it is one merit of the philosophy of the Conditioned, that it proves space to be only a law of Thought, and not a law of Things.] — Discussions. THE END standard College Text-Books. The Metaphysics of Sir William Hamilton. Collected, Arranged, and Abridged for the Use of Colleges and Private Students. By Francis Bowen, Alford Professor of Moral Philosophy in Harvard University. 12mo. Cloth $2.00 A Treatise on Logic ; or, The Laws of Pure Thought. Comprising both the Aristotelic and the Hamiltonian Analyses of Logi- cal Forms. By Francis Bowen, Alford Professor of Moral Philosophy in Harvard University. 12mo. Cloth . . " 2.00 Chemical Tables. By S. P. Sharples. 12mo. Cloth . 2.25 Constitutional Documents of England and America, from Magna Charta to the Federal Constitution of 1789. Compiled and Revised, with Notes, by Francis Bowen, Alford Professor of Moral Philosopy in Harvard University. 8vo. Cloth 1.00 Selections from the Greek Historians. Arranged in the Order of Events. With Notes, by Cornelius C Felton, LL. D., late President of Harvard University. 12m o. Half morocco . . .2.00 Selections from Modern Greek "Writers, in Prose and Poetry. With Notes, by Cornelius C. Felton, LL. D., late President of Harvard University. 12mo. Cloth . 1,25 The Panegyricus of Isocrates. Erom the Textof Beemi. With English Notes, by Cornelius C. Felton, LL. D., late President of Harvard University. A Revised Edition. 12mo. Cloth. . . .1.00 The Clouds of Aristophanes. With Notes, hy Cornelius C. Felton, LL.D., late President of Harvard University. 12mo. Cloth 1.50 The Birds of Aristophanes. With Notes, and a Metrical Table, by Cornelius C. Felton, LL. D., late President of Harvard University. 12mo. Cloth 1.50 Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb. By W. W. Goodwin, Ph. D., Eliot Professor of Greek Literature in Harvard University. Revised Edition. 12mo. Cloth .... 1.75 Horace. With English Notes, by Rev. A. J. Macleane, M. A. Revised and Edited by R. H. Chase, A. M. 12mo. Cloth . . . 1.76 1 Standard College Text-Books. Cicero's Tusculan Disputations. Book First: The Dream of Scipio 5 and Extracts from the Dialogues on Old Age and Friend- ship. With English Notes, by Thomas Chase, A. M. 16mo. Cloth . 1.25 M. Tullii Ciceronis pro A. Cluentio Habito Oratio and Judices. With English Notes, by Austin Sticknet, A. M., Pro- fessor of Latin in Trinity College, Hartford, Conn. 12mo. Cloth . . 1.00 A German Reader for Beginners. Compiled by Bernard RoELKER, A. M., Instructor in Harvard University. Second Revised and Improved Edition. 12mo. Cloth 1.50 Elegant Standard Books. -♦- THE GOLDEN TREASURY SERIES, The Golden Treasury of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language. Selected and arranged, with Notes, by Francis Turner Palgrave, Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford. 16mo. Green vellum 1.7S The Children's Garland. From the best Poets. Selected and Arranged by Coventry Patmore. 16rao. Red vellum . . . 1.75 The Book of Praise. From the best English Hymn- Writers. Selected and Arranged by Roundell Palmer. 16mo. Ma- roon vellum 1.75 The Pilgrim's Progress. From this World to that which is to come. By John Buntan. With Illustrations by Stothard. 16mo. Vellum cloth • 1.75 A Book of Golden Deeds of all Times and all Lands. Gathered and Narrated by the Author of "The Heir of Redely fife." 16mo. Green vellum 1.75 The Jest-Book. The choicest Anecdotes and Sayings. Se- lected and Arranged by Mark Lemon. 16mo. Green vellum . .1.75 The Ballad Book. A Selection of the choicest British Bal- lads. Edited by William Allingham. 16rao. Vellum . . . 1.75 The Sunday Book of Poetry. Selected and Arranged by C. F. Alexander. 16mo. Vellum 1.75 2 Elegant Standard Books. THE GOLDEN TREASURY JUVENILE, Dream Children. By the Author of " Seven Little People and their Friends." Full-page Illustrations, after Designs by White, with Ornamental Initials illustrating each Story. 16mo. Yellum cloth 1.26 The Poems of Thomas Gray. Illustrated. A new and elegant Edition. Small 4to. Morocco Cloth ... . . 2.25 Democracy in America. By Alexis de Tocqueville. Translated by Henry Reeve, Esq. Edited, with Notes, the Translation revised, and in great part rewritten, and the Additions made to the recent Paris Editions now first translated, by Francis Bowen, Alford Professor of Moral Philosophy in Harvard University. Elegantly printed on linen paper at the University Press. Boxmd in maroon vellum. 2 vols. PostSvo. 6.00 Scientific Books. — ♦— — Icones Muscorum ; or, Figures and Descriptions of most of those Mosses peculiar to Eastern North America which have not been heretofore figured. By William S. Sullivant, LL. D. With 129 copper- plates. Royal 8vo. Cloth 15.00 First Outlines of a Dictionary of the Solubilities of Chemical Substances. By Frank H. Storer. 1 vol. in 3 Parts. 8vo. Paper covers, per Part 2.00 Whole work, cloth 7.50 Chemical Tables. By S. P. Sharples, S. B. 12mo. . Cloth 2.25 Illustrated Catalogue of the Museum of Comparative Zoology of Harvard College. Published by Order of the Legislature of Massachusetts. The American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac. The Annals of the Observatory of Harvard College. The Proceedings of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The Mathematical Monthly. 1859 to 1862. 3 vols. 4to. 3 Miscellaneous Books. Harvard Memorial Biographies. Edited by T. W. Hig- GiNSON. 2 vols. 8vo. On the Cam. Lectures on the University of Cambridge in England. By William Everett, A. M. 12mo. Cloth . . $ 1.75 Classical and Scientific Studies, and the Great Schools of England. A Lecture read before the Society of Arts of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, April 6, 1865 By W. P. Atkinson. With Additions and an Appendix. Bvo. Pamphlet 76 Dynamic and Mechanic Teaching. A Lecture read be- fore the American Institute of Instruction at the Annual Meeting in New Haven, Conn., August 9, 1865. By W. P. Atkinson. ' 16mo. Pamphlet .25 Vanity Fair. A Novel without a Hero. By William Makepeace Thackeray. With Illustrations by the Author. 3 vols. Crown 8vo. Brown cloth 7.50 Does the Bible sanction American Slavery? By GoLDWiN Smith. 12mo. Paper covers . .35 Catalogue of Postage Stamps, American and Foreign, and United States Revenue Stamps. 16mo. Boards . . . . . .50 Hellas : Her Monuments and Scenery. By Thomas Chase, M. A. 12mo. Cloth . . 1-00 Versions and Verses. By Charles Dexter. 12mo. Green vellum 1«75 "^^ Any of the above hooks sent hy mail, post-paid, on receipt of price. - 1 SEVER AND FRANCIS, Publishers, Cambridge, Mass. Deacidified using the Bookkeeper procej Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide Treatment Date: August 2004 PreservationTechnologie A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATIC 1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive Cranberry Township, PA 16066 (724)779-2111 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 012 826 467 A