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A UTHOR : COURTNEY, TITLE: THE ETAPHYSICS OF JOHN STUART MILL PLACE: LONDON DA TE : 1879 Master Negative # COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES PRESERVATION DEPARTMENT -.%-loM-_l Restrictions on Use: BIBLIOGRAPHIC MICROFORM TARGET Original Material as Filmed - Existing Bibliographic Record /X921i59 DC ■ I — II I n ^PiP*PP^W»-iWi ^mr^mmmmm "" '":^ " : ';""'"rr'i'""'"'^-iL »^: •i Courtney, William Leonard, 1850-1928. The metaphysics of John Stuart Mill. By W L Court ,' ney ... London, C. K Paul & co, 1879. ^^ ^- ^- ^°°'^*- 1 vi. i2), 156 p. 19J~. | D10CMC 9- - ^"rr ''" r-T^Vi T j iT n - a i-j u f Phil ooopliy , — ig29. 1^1, John Stuart, 1806-1873. 2. Metaphysics. Title from Univ. of Chicago B1608.M6C8 Printed by L. C A 14-2476 TECHNICAL MICROFORM DATA IIB REDUCTION RATIO: JJj^, FILM SIZE: 3S t^VVy IMAGE PLACEMENT: lA/^Q) JB __ DATE FILMED: ^/^l^ /? / INITIALS__Z'Aej2. FILMED BY: RESEARCH PUBLICATIONS. INC WOODBRIDGE. CT 7y O FIID *> If f3| to H% I J^ "^ 4^oi/^ ciy /- M 57 Mfci II ■!■!* m niiiwi ■' ■ mil li* iiiiiit iiiiiM ..Jk..V.XdC BIBLIOGRAPHIC IIUIEGULARITIES MAIN ENTRY! C/yuQ-fkiP.^ ^ U). L. Bibliogiaphic Irregularities in the Original Document List volumes and pages affected; include name of institution if filming borrowed text. Page(s) missing/ not available: VolumesCs) missing /not available:. .Illegible and /or damaged page(s):. ^ ^Page(s) or volumes(s) misnumbered:. Bound out of sequence:. V Page(s) or illustration(s) filmed from copy borrowed from: U/wiV^?Ks;-kA _ af Other: FILMED IN OR PART F FROM UNIVERSITY OF IOWA ^emj^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^MM^^^^^^^^^d c Association for Information and image iManagement 1100 Wayne Avenue. Suite 1100 Silver Spring. Maryland 20910 301/587-8202 Centimeter I JEp iJI 'Mp %||P iiiimiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiuliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiii 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 mm iiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiiliiiili II iiiiliiii iiiiliiii n I Inches Mil 1 T Ml Mill 1.0 Ul ]2.8 i£ IM m Hi m It H ■BUH. 1.4 2.5 22 I.I 2.0 1.8 1.6 1.25 TTT TTT 1 «p / MfiNUFflCTURED TO OHM STflNDORDS BY fiPPLIED IMRGE. INC. C^ ■^;a "ts, ' O <^ % r .IT 5, fa \h LIBRARY Ph.D. Crown 8vo, cloth, pnce 6*. ^*, n«TJt? TWT?nRY OF LOGIC : An Essay. - -'SSL'S! "ZJSSilS:-^.^^ PHYSIOLOGICAL /ESTHETICS. By Geaht PHYSlOLUUi^n ^^ g^^^ ce 9*. ALLBN, 15.A. •'^'r^ ^08t untried fleld.''- "A fresli ami vigoroua effort m « »ub«» Sofimlay iZevi«w. . Won: C.KEOAK Pxu.fc Co..l,Patemorter SquTC y U*1 . • . 1 TBE METAPRYSIGS OF m-i 1 ■ IS 4 . JOHN STUART MILL. %:. ) .•; • _ t • •••••• .• • • , . • •• , ♦ • • « « • • * • • • • • «• • •• • » t . * * • ■ 3 1 i > ► • • • • • • » * • > > • > • ■> • • • ».• « » * • •» >• • ' • • " • ' • • • t •• • BY % • • • W.^^'^^il COURTNEY, M.A., FELLOW or NEW OOLLEOE, OXFOHO. Lokbon: a Kegan Paul & Co., 1, Patebj^oster Square. 1879. 'ill.- . .- iiiiiii :. iliit-l It 1 : I I > { THE METAPHYSICS OF JOHN STUART MILL. . f U. is } \ I"' ^ i ■- ~i i P 1 PREFACE. 2,^ - 7-3 C // ) / » • • J • •"• • * «• ' • ■■ • * t ... ... • « • • • • • • • • • a*^ ^« • » • « • [r/i^ ri^Jih ojttriinsMfm «'-*^ oj[Ji'2f(^Mito}iiare reserved.] This book is an attempt to deal in somewhat cursory fashion with large metaphysical pro- blems. Questions of Philosophy almost neces- sarily involve an abstruse mode of treatment, intricate details, and a technical phraseology, which make them difficult and repellent to the majority of the reading public ; while the attempt to treat them in a simple and broad manner, without the use of a peculiar nomenclature, seems fore-doomed to ignore their complexity and arduousness. Whether it is possible to steer clear of either misfortune is, perhaps, doubtful : all that I have tried to do in the following pages is to avoid prolixity, and to set as clearly as I could before the reader the main issue between rival systems. Originality I cannot and do not claim. • •# • •«•• • • • • •• • I • •• • ••• • • > • • Yl PEEFACE. That Mr. Mill's logical and psychological spe- culations distinctly raise metaphysical questions is in itself a proof of the reality of Metaphysics. Every system must of necessity rest on the basis of some theory of " Consciousness," and, " Conscious- ness " brings inevitably in its train metaphysical problems. Even a physiologist like Mr. George Henry Lewes finds, in his '' Problems of Life and Mind," that the Positive Philosophy must seek to lay, as best it can, the Metaphysical ghost, which is ever starting up with awkward persistence to confront experimental psychology and demonstrated materialism. It only remains for me to acknowledge assist- ance received from one or two friends, especially Mr. F. H. Bradley, Fellow of Merton CoUeo-e, Oxford. Most of aU, however, I am indebted to Professor Green's Introduction to the Philosophy of Hume,---a work to which many of these pages owe any value they may contain. Oxfoi©, Nomnher, 1878. ? iff III I I CONTENTS. f PACE CHAP. I.— IXTEODUCTORY 1 „ II.— THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. HUME . . . 16 ,, III. — THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL {continued) . . 27 ,, IV.— CONSCIOUSNESS 44 ^^ Y. — BODY AND MIND 63 ,, VL— THE PRIMARY QUALITIES OF MATTER .' . . 81 „ VIL— CAUSATION, AND THE UNIFORMITY OF NATURE . 9S ,, VIIL — MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS AND NECESSARY TRUTHS . 116 ,, IX. — GENERAL IDEAS 134 ,, X — EPILOGUE 148 1^ ~4 THE METAPHYSICS OF JOHN STUAET MILL. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTOEY. The future of metaphysical speculation is tlie question which is more and more agitating the modem philosophic mind. Is it doomed to yield to the conquering inroads of *' Science," is it, in Mr. Lewes' language " to be crushed into dust beneath the chariot wheels of modern thought ? " Or is there yet a region into which Science has never come, into which it cannot come, because Scientific methods cannot be applied to the source and fountain-head of all method whatsoever ? Such a question can only be approached when it has become clear with what sort of problems metaphysics deals : it cannot be sum- marily despatched by the assertion that every such problem, when " rationally stated," is capable of B 2 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. solution by "the inductions and deductions from experience." T he c^^ ^-^ ntion of ^^^ "f[ ii i ' i i f - i lif rn rtfiphpin is that it js totally unprogress ive. Here again the whole question turns upon the nature of the progress to be demanded, the character of those hindmarks by which advance, retrogression, and lateral oscillation are severally to be estimated. Especially in the judgment to be passed upon a particular philosophical writer, like John Stuart Mill, is it necessary to begin with a preliminary view of intellectual movements in the higher questions of philosophy, if we are in any way to determine the position he is to occupy, and the value to be attributed to his labours. And it is only possible adequately to do this, after a general survey of the lines on which Modern Philosophy has moved for two centuries from Descartes to Hegel. The period, commencing in the sixteenth century and ending in the eighteenth, exhibits three great movements. At the outset there is the vast do^miatic system of Scholasticism. At the close there is another dogmatic system, rising into prominence, a dogmatism which attempts to construct an ontology out of thought, tlie system of Hegel. And midway be- tween the two,— in the interspace between the two dogmatisms,— there is a period wherein thought in its newly-found emancipation is running riot in different lines, touching the problems on every side, enquiring ' h 1 INTEODUCTOEY. 3 critical, tentative, everything but dogmatic, going a few steps in one direction, and then, dissatisfied, turn- ing back on its footsteps and essaying another path, building up only to destroy— a great transitional period, paving the way for a great constructive epoch in the future. Is there any one description which will suit this period? is there any one aspect which will embrace its various movements? Perhaps only this: a de- termined assertion of the rights of the individual as against all authority. Authoritative assertion it will have none of: whether it be the authority of the Church, or the authority of Thought in its universal relations, or the authority of a great Matter outside which forces knowledge into conformity with itself. If ever any of these assertions of Authority are made, in however tenter live a form, they are immediately destroyed. Scholasti- cism made the assertion of the Church's Authority : and Bacon and Descartes threw it off. Locke tended to assert the Authority of Matter, and Berkeley threw it off. Berkeley tended to assert the Authority of Spirit or Universal Thought, and Hume threw it off. The right of the individual to construct his own world of Knowledge and Thought and Life,— this is perhaps the /le dominant feature of the whole period. When, after such a general prospect, we look closer into these systems, the action and reaction, the con- struction and the destruction, the synthesis and the B 2 > Ill .f ■III H^- ' it- I 4 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. analysis strike us more clearly. PMlosophy means Invention, says Bacon : Philosophy means the assertion of myself as a thinking subject, says Descartes. Then follow Materialism in Hobbes, Pantheism in Spinoza, Sensationalism in Locke, Idealism in Berkeley, Scepti- cism in Hume, Monadism or Individualistic Idealism in Leibnitz, endless analysis in Wolflf. The mere terms of description are so antagonistic that the whole period looks like cliaos. But this makes still clearer the business of the historian, to disentangle the permanent elements from the transitory, to discover the progres- sive tendencies, and dissever tliem from the retrogres- sive, to let the various systems fall into their proper places of superiority and subordination, to discover which for us are the most important and which most helpful to Thought and Philosophy viewed as a Progress, and not as a chaos of conflicting opinions. There are two points which are chiefly interesting in studying any period. The first is to see tJie limita- twm of TlmigM — to see how Thought, as expressed in the various systems, is limited to one issue rather than another, to the one-sided affirmation of one tendency and the undue depreciation of anotlier tendency. And U.e second U to see M. Deteloi»ne,U, of Tlumgk- to deny which is indeed the dcatliblow of Philosophy, tlie cud of all fruitful relation between Philosophy and iiile. ) i 1$ \ n .r t ■!?■'• .•» \}^!. INTRODUCTOEY. 6 Let us look at the first of these. Thought, we say, is limited in its expression in any one system. Limited by what ? By three things— ! by the particular character of the knowledge around ' it, by nationality, by the particular moment at which . the system is born. In Bacon, for instance, there is the enormous and rapid development of physical research going on around him : tbere is " the moment " wherein the individual thinker was casting off the restraints of autliority, wliether of Church or of Aristotle : and as to the problem which ho assigned to Pliilosopliy, the problem of Invention, or Human Mastery over Nature's secrets,— who can doubt that such a problem essentially suited the cliaracter of a grave, practical, active people like the English, with their spirit of enterprise as exhibited in travel, and their intolerance for metaphysics and word-splitting ? These, in the sphere of literature, we call «* predis- posing causes," because in literature the diversity and partiality are recognised elements ; but we call them " limitations " in the case of Thought, limita- tions of that pure, distinctionless spirit, the inmost nature of which must be to be above party or creed or nation. Or if, leaving Bacon, we look at the course of philo- sophy as it expressed itself in Locke, and was then . extended by Berkeley and Hume, similar results are obtained. We see in Locke the incarnation of the ' 1 :- I'! THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. Englisli pliilosopliic temper, the massive common- sense, the semi-materialism, the practical way of ** sending a man back to his senses." But after Locke, tendencies a little alien to the English mind come in,— Berkeley, the too vivacious and spiritual Irish- man, attempting to prove that Locke's philosophy led to Idealism, and Hume, the too logical and hard- headed Scotchman, shocking English respectability, by showing that Locke led straight to Scepticism. I have tiken the British philosopliers, because it is more easy fur us to see in their case these liniitiitions in the expression of Thought; but the same thing would of course be true, among others, of Spinoza and Wolff. Spinoza, the Jew, filled full with the Jewish idea of God's unity and omnipotence, naturally turned his thought into a system of Pantheism ; and Wolff, the German, with his patient analysis, with his spider-like proi>ensity of evolving thought out of him- self, with his method, his completeness, his dulness — are not these characteristics of hk nationality ? All these considerations add, I think, to the fresh- ness of interest in studying the History of Philosophy, but they might lead us to serious error. The effect is to make one believe too much in individualities and too little in Thought. Philosophy is too sacred and too impersonal a thing to be resolved into mere con- ditions and limitations of epochs or nationalities or individual tempers. Let us then try to correct this 11 % 4 « /i I INTBODUCTOEY. 7 by turning to the other point of interest, the Develop- ment of Thought. In the vast and multiform move- ment of thought during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, what elements of permanent acquisition in Philosophy were being brought to light?- What threads may we disentangle from the complex web to give the clue to the new pattern ? The iirst I will instance is the meaning and proper content of the word " Individual." That looks an in- significant result assuredly. But it is not so really ; it carries with it far weightier consequences than would appear at first sight. What, in the first place, is an Individual object? We apprehend many such every day of our lives, and without analysis wo should say that an individual object of perception was the effect or result of a single unrelated moment of conscious- ness, taking in or grasping a single unrelated thing. That is, in truth, the way it strikes Locke ; he is, as a philosopher, exactly in the same position as we are in our unanalytic common-sense moods. But then it is from these objects, successively apprehended, that our whole body of knowledge, in some way, grows ; and again it is of these objects, single and unrelated, that in some way the world, as a whole, is composed. Now, if we put a number of leaden bullets together, they certainly do not mass themselves into one large leaden l»ullet by themselves. That is only possible if they are fused together by melting. And a number of a THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. INTRODUCTORY. single, unrelated objects will never form an articulated world, or a complex body of knowledge, unless they too are in some way fused together. How are they to be fused ? The obvious reply is, that the mind invents some links or relations between them. Are these links, then, formed by the mind, purely fictitious, mere inventions ? Yes, answer Locke and Hume, they are not found in the constitution of things. Then the world, as a totality, and not as a mere heap of objects, is a delusion ? Yes. And knowledge, as a synthesis, and as a unity, and not as a succession of single modes of consciousness, is a delusion also? Yes. itere then we have the complete scepticism of Hume. But Philosophy and Knowledge refuse to commit suicide in tliis way. And so, as the whole conclusion seems to come from the way in which the individual was regarded, Philosopliy looks at this "individual" again, to see if it can be defined differently. Tliere are three words : particular, indi- vidual, universal, which seem to come in a definite order. Of these, it is ** particular " which should properly be applied to the single, unrelated impression, just as it is "universal," which is obviously applied to the synthesis of objects in a world, or a synthesis of perception in knowledge. What then is indi- vidual? It is the meeting-point of particular and universal. In an individual object, how much, if we carefully analyse, is involved ? This much,~there is the particular impression on the sentient organs, and there is tlie action of the mind, which grasps this im- pression, and retains it, by relating it to other im- pressions : and so the object becomes definite and individual, distinguished from everything else, and yet related to everything else. Another result, too, follows. If the universal element, i.e., the super- induction of relations, really makes a world, and not a mere heap of unrelated objects, it must be due to Thought, that we get a real world at all ; or, in other words, Reality is the work of Thought, to be found in thought, and not in a supposed Matter, still less in a series of sensations. Let us, before leaving this word, " universal," look at it in another way. Take an individual man, a finite individual. Is there such a creature ? Spinoza says. No. He is only an unreal fraction of the Universal. Hume would say Yes, the universal, on the contrary, being a mere fiction of the finite individual. Here are the two extremes, and here is the difiiculty. An indi- vidual man is finite and separate, on the one hand, and yet on the other he can arrive at universal notions and have an idea of Universality whether exhibited in a Perfect God, or a Cosmic Unity. How is this pos- sible ? Only, as it seems, in one way : The individual is a junction of the Universal and the Particular, limited as being " a part of this partial world " * — of * Green's "Hume," p. 131. 10 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. matter, as we rooglily call it ; but transcending his limitations, as being self-conscious,— because Thought is univei'sal. Such are the momentous issues of a proper appre- ciation of this word, so simple as it seems,—" Indi- vidual." Again, we can trace the same progress in the proper understanding of such words as Sensation, Percei)tion, Thought. Sensation and Perception are treated as identical, not distinguished, both by Locke and Hume : we cannot say exactly the same of Berkeley, hecause he seemed to recognise in the second edition of his " Principles," that he would have to distinguish his " idea," or passive sensation, from an active something, which he called " notion." % reality it ap pears^ Bensation. Perceptinn^ ^'^„^L?^<^"o^i* ^^e Jfel^rrel ates of the words, Par- ^^^^„..L is^^^i!?^' Unive rsal We do not appre- Een d an I ndividual by Sensation, as Locke thought. All we can be aware of by Sensation is a single moment of sentience— a momentary modification of our sensibility, which is what we call " Parti- cular." An individual object, however, is perceived: a perception, in other words, is the superinduction on the particular element of sensation, of the uni- versal element of Thought-relations. To constitute an individual object, the momentary sensation has to be arrested, fixed, made definite, crystallized, by INTEODTJCTOEY. 11 the putting on of relations, which serve to dis- tinguish it from, and relate it to, everything else. Tliis is Perception — the fusion, as it were, of the uni- versal element of Thought and the particular elements of Sensation. The inquiry naturally comes after all this, — is not this mere elaborate word-splitting? Does it, after all, make much dilfereuce what particular meaning we assign to words of this sort ? It makes no difference, it may at once be admitted, to the practical, common- sense man, who wishes to carve out his fortune in his own practical way — any more than it makes any dilLrcnce to the Scientific man, who wipes away all these mental cobwebs, and applies himself to experi- ment and the acquisition of knowledge of Nature. The only thing to be remembered is, that underlying all these experiments and all this practical acquaintance with the world, there is the further question, which some minds are compelled to ask. How is Nature, — How is the world, known at all? And then the result comes out, that, despite all this seemingly immediate perception of Nature and the world, the underlying fact is *' consciousness," and the appa- rently external thing is found by an inexorable logic, to be after all a mode of consciousness. Something of course there is of external, sometliing which is, as it were, given to the mind and not manufactured by the mind, but the whole envisagement of the thing, 12 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. the wliole * entmirag'e/tis it were, wliicli makes it for us a tiling at all, is the creation of consciousness. All this preliminary consideration, tlie wliole of tliese fundamental conditions, may be taken for granted, but cannot be denied. And the interest for the meta- physical philoso}>her is just this preliminary considera- tion, these fundamental conditions, the satisfactory explanation of which means for him progress, and their systematic neglect, or confused treatment, means for him tlie demolition of all rffison iVetre whatsoever. And so all these straiuLs of inquiry and speculation, some of which we have been considering, are reduced at length to the one great decisive problem — What is the relation of the Self to the Not- Self, of the Ego to the Non-Ego? To deny the Self, means scepticism and despair of knowledge as a reasoned system, as it did with Hume. To deny the Not-Self, means end- less analysis and sterile revolution of thought upon itself, as it did with Wolff. Progressive advance of knowledge, and knowledge as a reasoned system, alike imperatively demand the acknowledgment of both factors, and some necessary relation between the two. What, then, is the relation ? All the speculation of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries seems to tend to one result, which may thus be summed. The Not- Self is the manifold, the unformed, the airctpor, as it successively conies in upon our sentient organs. A sensation is this I INTEODUCTORY. 13 momentary stirring of the sensory organs : a Percep- tion is the individualising, the making-definite of the manifold of sensation by the relations imposed by Thought. Thought is two-fold : in relation to Percep- tion, it is the superinduction of forms, of categories : in relation to itself, it is the universal, which makes these forms, these categories, the creator of a Real World, as a totality or synthesis of Phenomena, the creator of Knowledge, as a synthesis or totality of Per- ception, a perfect and complete Self-Consciousness— limited, indeed, in the case of men, by their being finite parts of this finite order, while in God, it is just this Divine Self-Consciousness, apart from and above all such limitations. Not- Self, Self, God — to aneLpov, t6 ircTTcpaa-fjievov, TO TTcpas : these are the successive moments of Meta- physics, and it is in progress to and in realisation of these, that it finds its scope, its justification, and its life. Wliat tlie position of Mill is, with regard to this vast intellectual movement, we have now to attempt to discover. For Hie present, we may just indicate the conditions under which his philosophy is attempted. He is a Sensationalist,— that is, he belongs to that line of English philosophy which commenced with 14 THE METAPHYSICS OP MILL. INTEODUCTOEY. 15 Hobbes, was continued by Locke and Berkeley, and culminated in Hume. But, if our review of the f period be at all correct, Hume represented the high- I water mark of this sort of speculation. Therefore Mill must combine with Hume some newer elements. Above all, living in a great scientific age, he must make his peace with Science, which Hume, to say the least, somewhat gravely affronted. And Science, for most thinkers, has only one metaphysical foundation, viz., that of Realism. Therefore Mill has in some way to combine Sensationalism and Realism. He is a Sensationalist in his *' Examination of Sir W. Hamil- ton," and a Realist in his " Logic." Or let us look at him from a different aspect. He is an Empiricist, — one link in that chain of empirical research which was formulated in the eighteenth cen- tuiy and vastly developed in the nineteenth. But empiricism in the hands of Locke and Hume is indi- vidualistic; empiricism in the hands of Herbert Spencer and George Henry Lewes is universal is tic. To which of the two species of empiricism does Mill belong? Curiously enough, the *' experience" which plays so large a part in his philosophy, belongs to the age which preceded him, not to that of his contempo- raries. In otlier words, not in an age of individualism, he founds his philosophy on the experience of the individual, like Hume, not on that of the race, like Herbert Spencer. Living in the nineteenth century, in the age when conceptions like "evolution" and " development of the race " are in the air, he still turns back to the time when " the historic sense " was hardly born. / THE ANTECEDENTS OP MILL. HUME. 17 TT \^ JL JLi JLJk Mini JL .JLJ JLIi JL JL, m THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. HUME. The spiritual progenitor of Mill is undoubtedly Hume. Without Hume, Mill would not have been possible, just as without Locke and Berkeley, Hume would not have been possible. Yet the relation of Mill and his predecessor is by no means the same as that of Hume and his predecessors. There are times when thought enters — almost without warning — upon II brilliant and rapidly-developing course, when every step forward presents a clearly-defined and continuous progress, " churning life out of a dead level of habit and custom," striking out glints and gleams of meteoric brilliance, till the whole intellectual horizon is glowing with their fires. Such was tlie brief life of drama in England, or the sudden glory of Athenian art : such too, with more sombre and subdued radiance, was the development of Sensationalism in England from Locke to Hume. In these times, the lineal successor is also the more perfect mouthpiece of the thought ; each step brings out the system into sharper and bolder relief. But in other times, when the animating impulse has subsided, and the Spirit has spent its force, lineal succession becomes mere repetition with variations, dying away into hollower, artificial, capricious echoes. And then the thinker who takes up the mantle that has dropped from his predecessor's shoulders, is merely sewing pieces of new cloth into the old raiment, whereby the rents are made worse. The peculiar merit of Hume, as a philosopher, con- sists in his superior consistency. With him, the doc- trines of Sensationalism which he inherited, are cleared of their inconsistencies and presented in clear and startling nakedness. In many respects, his is an almost ideal character for a philosopher. There is his absolute freedom from Theological prepossession, which enabled him to discuss, without any anxiety about the issue, the successive difiiculties of Philosophy, and accept with composure the sceptical conclusion. There is the literary vanity— the last infirmity of philosophic minds — which led him to suppress his earlier work, and suggested brilliant paradox and intolerant posturing against Dogmatists and Mystics; and there is the literary strategy and skill which taught him how to arrange his arguments to win his reader's ears. Perhaps, too, must be added the characteristic frankness with which he confessed that his doubts left him, as soon as he left his study*— the unconscious testimony to the dis- \ * (( Treatise," Bk. IV., sec. rii. 18 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. HUME. 19 satisfaction which is the natural issue of such a system, and to the obdurate refusal of knowledge to commit such suicide, as Hume recommended. These merits enabled Mm to see more clearly than ever was seen before the real problem which he had to solve. The problem- forced upon him by preceding thought— was this : given the mind as " a tabula rasa," a passive receptacle of ex- perience, to explain the progress of knowledge. Locke was inclined to fall back on an exterior matter, to be the cause of our sensations and the progressive source of experience. But if all that we can be sure of is sensation, abstract unperceivable Matter is of course an impossible conception. Berkeley was inclined to fall back on Spirit and God, as the fountain-head of knowledge ; but the same line of argument, which dis- posed of Matter apart from a series of sensations, was equally fatal to Mind, or God, apart from a series of sensations. And so the cherished illusions of his pre- decessors—whether Locke's real primary qualities of a real Matter, or Berkeley's " Spirits " and " God," are dissolved in the glowing crucible of Hume's logic. The conclusion stands forth in naked clearness— that all we can be sure of in consciousness, is just the sen- sations experienced, and the copies of them in so-called ideas. Such is the '' pars destruens " of Hume's work, lict us now remind ourselves, constructively, of the main positions of his system. 1 . All knowledge is resolved into sensuous impres- /-' sions and ideas — the ideas being the copies of the / impressions. If then we wish to find the reality of ' ^ any idea that we have in our minds, we must find the j \^ sensuous impression of which it is the copy. In this Hume shows himself a true disciple of the school of Locke. A^ojaHeJimitation of knowledge is thusjntroduced. In the first place, knbw ledi ^e cann ot be, in anvjxuje se nse, obje ctive : for as to the ori^^inal of the sensuous i mpression we can sa y noth ing. We cannot speaFof a Matter, or a Material World, impressing our sense- organs, for this is to travel beyond our rec ord. We are stricW Hmitedto our own perceptions and feelings. In the second place, knowledge cannot be, in any true sense, subjective , that is, we cannot put any faith in the constructive power of the mind. For an idea is only so fi\y \-flHfl n.s jj— JR^jJTft^njw of a sensuous impression. Thus the mind is strictly receptive — working up, with moTe~of less advantage, the materials of sense-im- pression, in accordance with certain associative prin- ciples. So ruthlessly does Hume sweep away Physics and Metaphysics. 2. What are these associative principles ? They are three in number: Resemblance, Contiguity in Time and Place, and Causation. The mind is inclined to class together ideas or impressions, which resemble each other, or which occur in close juxtaposition, or c 2 V iiiill 20 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. wliich follow eacli other so as to lead us to infer that one is the cause of the other. It is the last of these of which we obviously make most use in constructing our knowledge of the world in which we live : it is the principle of Causality, there- fore, which seems to be most objectively real, and it is to this that Hume's attention is most directed. 3. Knowledge, in the opinion of Hume, may be either analytic or synthetic : in other words, we may either get to a clearer comprehension of our own ideas, or attain to fresh additions to our knowledge. Geo- metrical axioms are instances of analytical knowledge. When we say that two straight lines cannot inclose a space, we are merely analysing what we mean by a straight line, the predicate of the proposition affirming explicitly what was implicit in the subject. Moreover, here we get to a connection which is a necessary one, because we are only moving amongst our own ideas. The contradictory of an analytic proposition (such as the principle that " everything is either A or not A," or the equality of the three angles of a triangle to two right angles), is impossible and absurd. Here then is a " necessity," but merely because we are concerned with the agreement or disagreement of our ideas. The question is whether synthetic propositions, (pro- positions which add something to our knowledge,) can ever be necessary. Now reasoning on matters of fact depends principally on the relation of Cause andEfiect. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. HUME. 21 Have we here a necessary connection or not ? If it is a necessary connection, the contradictory of an assertion of such relation is absurd and unintelligible. But the assertion that day is not followed by night is certainly not unintelligible. Further, if it is a connection which we attain to a jmori^ we ought, by a mere analysis of the cause, to be able to arrive at the effect. Let us analyse, then, '' fire." Can we, by mere analysis, arrive at the knowledge that it gives light ? Or, by the analysis of one billiard-ball, can we arrive at the conclusion that, if propelled against another, it will make that other move ? 4. The principle of Causality, then, is not a necessary connection, nor is it an a 2mori law of our minds. Of what, then, is it a product? Simply of experience. Experience tells us that one thing is followed by another. Further than this we may not go. 5. But by what right, then, do we, as a matter of fact, on the occurrence of one sense-impression, infer that it will be followed by another ? We evidently do this, as our every-day experience testifies. What is the justification of this inference ? Habit, Custom, answers Hume. We have had many experiences ; many ex- periences produce a certain feeling of expectancy : this is the product of Custom. Hence, on the occurrence of one thino-, we infer that it will be followed by another, because we are accustomed or habituated to their con- junction. The notion of a hidden tie, linking together cause and effect, or the idea of Power, is explained as 22 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL, being nothing else but an expectation grounded on custom. " Power " could only be a valid idea, if we could find its original, 2>., the sensuous impression of which it is a copy. Can we find such a sensuous impression ? We cannot, either in the world outside us— for all that we there get is *' sequence "—or in the world within us— for all that we are conscious of within us is a flux of sensations and ideas : and neither in the so-called power of the soul over the body, or the power of the Will, is there anything like it. So the "hidden tie," between cause and effect, and the "power" of the Cause to produce the Effect, are only mental hallucinations. So-called necessary connec- tion," is merely habitual or customary association. We need not pursue Hume's philosophy any further. We have seen that it rests on the characteristic grounds of empirical Philosophy— grounds which allow of no active or originative power to the mind, and which trace back all human knowledge to sense-im- pressions. Thus to Hume, the only possible sources of mental possession are "impressions of sense" and " impressions of reflection," or, in other words, sensa- tions and emotions. From these arise in a fainter form ideas,— ideas, which may be on the one hand, the direct heritage of decaying sensations, or, on the other, the product of emotional states, such as " desire," or "aversion." THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. HUME. 23 AVith this groundwork Hume makes short work of Locke's external matter, and Berkeley's objective and subjective Spirit. In examining his philosophy, we are therefore freed from all necessity of showing how little the world, as a totality of phenomena, or Self-Con- sciousness, as a totality of feelings and ideas, or God, as the Absolute and Divine Self-Consciousness, can be constructed on such a narrow foundation. We have already seen that Hume, pushing Locke to his logical conclusions, did away with the Primary Qualities of Matter, and Cause, as an objective relation, and per- forming the same service to Berkeley, showed the non-existence of a Self, and a God. ^^ What difficult problems then remain, which Hume's philosophy of negation or scepticism has to solve? What of the higher questions of Logic and Meta- physics urgently require to be dealt with and cleared up, if the sensationalist or empirical foundation of philosophy is to be accepted ? Sensationalism, not being absolute Pyrrhonism, (or absolute denial of the possibility of knowledge,) has at least to find room for the exact sciences, and the physical sciences. Now Mathematics, broadly speak- ing, depend on certain ultimate ideas \-— Number^ Qmn- titify Space^ Time ; and Physics depend, in their turn, on certain ultimate ideas, such as the Uniformity of Nature^ the conception of Cause and Effect. Further, the possibility of these ultimate ideas is found itself to 24 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. HUME. 25 L L depend on prior mental conditions, e.g., The Faculty ofAhtradion (the formation of general ideas), and the power of Association of IckaSy whicli, in their ultimate expression, amount to the power of forming Mental Relationsy distinct from and above the changing im- pressions of sense. It may easily be gathered that Hume's treatment of these problems was not wholly satisfactory, and that the burden he left to posterity was the re-consideration and re-construction of our notions on these points. Of this Mill himself is not unconscious, though his relation to these questions is peculiar. Mathematics and Physics— these must be saved at all hazards ; these must be placed on a foundation, safe from the critical scepticism of Hume. And so it is exactly on these points— on the question of the foundations of Mathematics, and the question of Causation and Natural Uniformity — that ]\Iill differs from his predecessor. But the groundwork is left by Mill un- disturbed. Sensationalism and Empiricism are still the dogmatic foundations of his creed. He saw that Hume's treatment of Science and Mathematics was not eminently satisfactory, and so, as we shall here- aUter see, he tried to re-mould it. He did not see that that treatment followed with rigid consistency from the essential groundwork of the Empirical and Sensational structure, which would itself retaliate on his " re-construction." The character of Mathe- matical Necessity, and the definition of Cause are very differently stated in Mill and Hume : but the real dependence of these on the prior condition of Mental relations, and the impossibility of any recon- struction of them, unless the notion of Mental action was first re-constructed— to this Mill is characteristi- cally blind. This is just that lateral oscillation of which any system is capable in the hands of a disciple. Widen the edifice, but leave the foundation as it is— this is the procedure of Mill, a procedure which is not and cannot be an improvement, but far more probably the cause of future disaster and downfall. Hume describes himself as " a moderate sceptic." * He is right. For there is one thing which he assumes and takes for granted, as an ultimate fact, the validity of which is left to depend on itself. This is " Experience." For if experience be explained by causality, and causality be explained by custom, and custom be explained by experience, Ve move in a vicious circle, and do not advance one jot in our explanation. Experience is presupposed in the ac- count of experience : experience is explained by expe- rience. So Hume is not a true sceptic, or rather let us say that he is not a true critical philosopher. For a critical philosophy must not take experience for granted, but must seek to explain it. This Kant saw. The line of development of Philosophic Thought runs * '• Enquiry," xii., 3. 26 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. through Locke and Berkeley and Hume, but Mill is not the successor thereof. The real inheritor of Hume's philosophy, the real disciple, the next great '' moment" in the Intellectual advance is not Mill, but Kant. Uxlixir IxLIa/ ill. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL — {continued). Eighty or ninety years elapsed between Hume's capital work and Mill's. Hume died in 1776. The years of Mill's life fall between 1806—1873. The question, then, naturally suggests itself, what phases of philosophic thought successively appeared in the interval ? What systems arose, which presenting and enforcing new points of view, could not help leaving their traces on any thinker of the latter half of the nineteenth century ? Such is our present problem. It was natural that Hume's sceptical tenets should produce an immediate reaction. It was equally natural that the reaction should take two forms, one of which should be the normal rebound against an extreme tension of thought, the other the truer development and expansion by means of ciiticism and a sounder analysis. The first was to be found in Hume's native country, the second in Germany. The form which the English reaction took in the hands of Reid, Dugald Stewart and Brown, in reality showed a want of 28 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. philosopliic grasp and insiglit. For, instead of boldly attacliing tliemselves to the analysis of experience (of whicli Hume made such capital), instead of attempting to see what elements were involved in the phenomena of sensation, perception, and the formation of conceptions, and so arriving at a truer interpretation of the meaning of "experience," the immediate antagonists of Hume fell back upon the verdict of Common Sense, and the somewhat crude notions of what is called " Realism." A beneficial result, which was perhaps a fortuitous consequence of the " Common Sense " stand-point, was the beginning of an inde- pendent investigation of psychology, destined to bear greater fruit, when it came into the hands of James Mill and those whom he influenced. According to the view^s of this reactionary Scotch school, we are imme- diateh conscious of external objects and an external world. Tlie Scotch school were not unfruitful in the History of Philosophy. In France, a school that mingled, in about equal proportions, fragments of Cartesian thought, a nebulous spiritualism and an nnedifying eclecticism, carried on the crusade against the spirit of the age, which had been taught to Royer-Collard by Reid. As the Common-Sense School had a horror of iHume, so the French Eclectics had a horror of Con- \ (dillac and Diderot. Just as Reid and Brown re- volted from critical scepticism and atheism, so, under THE ANTECEDENTS OE MILL. 29 the feverish rhetoric of Victor Cousin, lurked a nervous dread of the Revolutionary spirit. So far, then, we find a reaction against Hume and Sensationalism, animated, indeed, by the best of motives, but deficient in such metaphysical ability and insight, as are necessary to meet the acute specu- lations of men like Hume and the Encyclopaedists. If the results of philosophical analysis were such a melancholy reversal of current notions and ordinary beliefs, it were better, in the opinion of the reactionists, to give up analysis, and fiill back on the broad uncritical methods of the common consciousness. If ordinary men of the world found, notwithstanding the scepticism of Hume, that their wonted views of the world outside them, and the soul inside them, were satisfactory, the fault must lie with the philosopher, and not with their views. Perish philosophical analysis, if its result be scepticism ! Such a reaction as this is not singular in the History of Thought, but it has had, and can have but one issue. Analysis can only be conquered by a more perfect analysis : philosophy can only succumb to a truer philosophy. Uncritical oratory only dis- guises the wounds, which it cannot heal. Rhetoric i's oftener the privilege of weakness, than the conscious overflow of power. The true development of Hume's thoughts came from Germany. Woke from " dogmatic slumber " by Hume, Kant, and after him Fichte, Schelling, and mhhmii 30 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. SI He^el, have not only materially altered the conditions of all pliilosopliic thought and inquiry, hut have perhaps made more positive contrihutions to Meta- physical Science than have heen made in any one period since the time of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. It is impossible to characterise the work of Kant by a single expression. Coming after Hume and the English school with its two characteristics of Indi- vidualism and Sensationalism, Kant saw that the whole ground-work of Human Knowledge must be gone over anew. Nothing short of a revolution in mode and method, it was his claim to have inaugurated. <* Critical " is the title given to his philosophy, and critical is throughout its cliaracter. For it set itself to analyse the antecedent conditions of experience, the conditions which render that very experience, which was clung to with such fervour by the English scliool, pos- sible at all. And so Kant's positive result is the discovery that in the whole process of knowledge, from the earliest beginnings of Sensation, there is an interaction of two factors, one of which is supplied by the mind in the so- called "forms," the other supplied by an external element, of which all we can say is, that it is not mental. Critical again the Kantian philosophy is, in the affirmation that we can only deal with phenomena, not with noiimena, that what Mind and Spirit are in themselves we cannot say, any more than we can say what Matter is in itself. We are limited to phenomena. t the component result of two factors, one objective, the other subjective. Idealism in one form or other is the character of the philosophy that succeeded Kant: but it is idealism in different phases, and conceived in dif- ferent ways. Fichte's philosophy, if summed up in a word, is Subjective Idealism, Schelling's is Objective Idealism, Hegel's is Absolute Idealism. Tliis is all the development and carrying out of that one side of the Kantian philosophy which showed itself in the mental forms, a priori conceptions, and categories. Another school of German thought attempted to develope the objective side, but with them we are not concerned. Two other phases of thought appeared in the in- terval between Hume and Mill, which we must briefly notice. The first of these was inaugurated by Comte and Positivism. Positivism is at once a system of thought, and a system of life, and has contributed alike to logical and social science. With the form of^ socialism, which is connected with Positivism, we have ) V, o-ot nothing to do. But the chief features of Posi- tivism, as a philosophy, are the suppression of all researches beyond phenomena, the affirmation of a o-reat historic law of Pro^^ress, and a classification of the Sciences. Lastly, we must notice an English Psychological School (generally connected with Utilitarianism in - 32 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILIi. Morals) wliicli immediately preceded and was con- temporary with Mill It commenced with Hartley, was taken up by James Mill, and carried on by Stimrfc Mill, Alexander Bain, and Herbert Spencer. Tlie chief characteristic of this Psychological School is the stress it lays upon the principle of Association of Ideas, which is its key to the explanation of all mental phenomena. Here then we have five schools — the Common Sense School, the French Eclectics, tho German Metaphy- sicians, tlie Positivists, and tho English Psychologists, wlios© infiuenco on Mill we have now to attempt to discover. It will be better, at whatever penalty of methodical dulness, to take each of these in order. One of them we may at once begin by dismissing. The tendencies of the French Eclectics are utterly alien to that scientific spirit, which is the best element of MiO. They emphasized just those features in their predecessors, which are least connected with the scientific spirit. For the French school of Eoyer- Collard and others is animated by two principles. Eclecticism and Spiritualism, and Mill is as far from the first as he is from the last. The influence, however, of tho Common Sense School upon Mill is real, though, being indirect, it is by no means easy to define. That system whicli regards Nature as the exhibition of laws, which THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. 33 B T 4 *i.t« are invariable, and which combine to form what we call tho " Uniformity of Nature," — which holds, further, that these laws and uniformities are .attainable by the human intellect, while yet it strenuously denies that they are realities, because formed by thouglit and because in and through them Consciousness is intel- ligibly constructing the impressions given by the senses — that system, I say, depends for its meta- physical foundation on the doctrines of Itcalism. And so far as Mill adopts these uniformities of Nature without regarding them as the product of Thought, and conceives that in perception and knowledge we are immediately in contact with a world outside us, (whence it results that Induction and the four Ex- perimental Methods are valid and trustworthy,) so far Mill is at one with that spirit of Realism, which is the animating impulse of the Common Sense School. But, fortunately or unfortunately. Mill's metaphysical foundationp, when he discloses them, are not those of Realism. He would call them "Psychological;" we may perhaps be allowed to call them "Idealistic." The so-called Psychological Theory of Matter insists, in the strongest manner, upon the Relativity of our knowledge of the External World; in other words, that Consciousness cannot transcend itself, and that we are and can be only conscious of our own subjective inter- pretation of things, and not conscious of things in themselves. The conclusion follows with Mill that we D It*. I' ■ I ^; 34 THE METAPHYSICS OF MIIiL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. 35 I I cannot apprehend Matter and Objective Reality imme- diately, but mediately. And fiirtlier, we cannot appre- hend Spirit and Subjective Reality immediately but mediately. In these conclusions, then, Mill is in antagonism to tho School of Common Sense. That school would say that the World outside us and the Soul inside us are matters of direct presentation. Mill holds that they are matters of indirect pre- sentation. And so, while allowing, or at least seeming to allow, the scientific conclusions of the Realistic spirit of the CoinnK»n Sense School, he denies their meta- physical foundation. The influence, in fact, of this school upon Mill is filtered through channels of Brown and Hamilton, and while Brown is, in many respects, by Mill admired and imitated, Hamilton, as the compound of Kant and the Common Sense School, is ruthlessly attacked. The next school alluded to was formed by the metaphysical systems of Germany. In relation to these it is one of the singular characteristics of Mill that he knows or cares very little about them. He is fur ever under the impression that the wliole German world is groaning and travailing in the chains of a false metaphysical method : while it is plain to every modern historian of philosophy that Germany is at present leading the whole world even in cmpiriciil research. More than this. He makes a startling remai-k about Kant The only part, he thinks, of Hume's doctrine about Causality, which "his great adversary Kant" contested, was that Cause meant " the invariable antecedent." Now surely, as a matter of fact, the result of Hume's analysis of Cause was to show that, as it rested upon mere custom, it was variable, or at all events, not objectively invariable : while the result of Kant's analysis was above all this — that Causation was necessary and invariable as being dependent on a mental Category, which made it real (for Reality was the work of Thought) and objectively valid.* The truth is that Mill, in Idealism, never got beyond such Idealism as is to be found in Berkeley, which is not in reality Idealism at all, or, at most, is subjective Idealism. More accurately, it would be called Sensa- tionalism, qualified by foregone Theological conclu- sions. It is SensationaUsm, so far as the human Consciousness is considered as a merely sentient con- sciousness, and not a thinking one. It is Idealism, so far as, the .analysis being imperfect. Thought, Spirit, Soul, God are instinctively, though not logically, retained. But Idealism, such as Berkeley's, would never lead Mill to the understanding of Kant, much less of Hegel. He is quite indignant with the German meta- physicians on this ground — that they made mere con- • Cf . Dr. Stirling, * Supplementary Notes ' to Schwcgler's History of riiiloBopby, p. 4u5. D 2 ;I6 THE METAPHYSICS OF MttL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. 37 t ccptioos of mind take the place of things. He is in such a horrj to establish this, that he never stops to think whether his own doctrines (as exhibited, e.y., in the Psychological Theories of Matter and Mind) would permit him to consider " things " as anything more than the construction of mind. Assumptions of noumena he cannot away witli ; yet he too, when pressed, has to admit that things in themselves may exist, though we do not know exactly what they are, because we only know them through their sensations — the very doctrine of Kant. We shall perliaps better understand tlie position of . .^lili when we understand his great obligations and his coose€|uent adherence to the English Psychological School, which immediately preceded him. That school really began with Hartley. The characterisrie doctrine of Hartley was his theory of " vibrations *' — the doc- trine, namely, that all nervous actions, as well as the phenomena of light, heat, and electricity, consist of vibrations, an hypothesis by which he further explained the processes of sensation. But tlie doctrine which most influenced his successors, was that insistence on the Law of Mental Association, which made Mill call him "the First Father of Association." It was in this that his influence upon Mill was most decided. James Mill carried out and elaborated the doctrine of Association which he had derived from Hartley, and which has been coniijleted not only by Mill, but much more by Bai:i and Herbert Spencer. The im- perfections of Mr. James Mill have been so well stated by his son in his Preface to the " Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind,"* that I may repro- duce two of them here. " First, the imperfection of physiological science at the time at which his book was written. Secondly, a certain impatience of detail and a consequent love of simplification which cannot always be trusted." For instance, the laws of Association of Ideas are reduced to the one principle of contiguity in .space and time, (whereas even Hume allowed, as we liave seen, of three,) a simplification which Stuart Mill says is " perhaps the least successful in the work." t The tendency towards physiology and the stress laid on Mental Association, as the source and origin of all Mental Ideas, are the two elements which Mill prin- cipally derived from his father and from Hartley, and both will explain his expressed abhorrence of meta- physics. With regard to the first, however, there is this much to be said, that the early disciples of the Association School — James Mill and, to a large extent, Stuart Mill — did not connect their speculations with biology in the same explicit way in which the later advocates of the doctrine do. The dependence of our moral and spiritual nature on our physical nature is the result of the later English psychologists. Bain, Spencer, and George Henry Lewes. ♦ Vol. i. p. XV. to p. XX. t Ibid, note 35. o8 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. THE ANTiilCEDENTS OF MILL. 39 We turn fimllj to the Positive Scliool and Comte, aiKl we liave to ask how far Mill is indebted to that system whicli Comte inatigura ted. The relation of Mill to Positivism is hy no means so easy to discuss as tlie relations we have already examined, nor is it easy to give very decided opinions on tlie point. A good many of the o])ponents of Mill liave a tendency to merge liim lu tlie wider doctrines of Positivism : on the other haiidj i^Iill liimseif seems inclined to repu- diate the connection, and in his hook "Auguste Comte and Positivism " delivers some trenchant criticisms on til is particular School The Positive Sj'stem is the product we find at once of the positive sciences, and of Saint-Simonism, a com- bination of empiricism and socialism. The latter element we have a.greed to droj) out of the considera- tion ; and, indeed, sotne of tlie speculations of M. Comte on this point have been repudiated by his best modern followers — M. Littre and others. Further, there are two sides to Positivism. There is tlie destructive side, wherein we find the search for final j causes and first causes is distinctly abandoned. With the beginning and end of things we have nothing to do, we are only concerned with what lies between these two extremes. Tlius all forms of theology, all forms of metaphysics, are practically discarded. Now, so far as this point is concerned, it is un- doubtedly true that much the same truly positive standpoint must be ascribed to Mill. He_ too is_jj . phenomenalist, an empiricist : one who relies on ex- \ perience to hnd Mws of co-existen Ce, and d oes not busy himsetfl^itlThiore thari"the middle levels of knowledge, j eliminating all transcendental researches. On the other hand, it is none the less true that this aspect of things is by no means confined to Positivism ; nor can Comte claim to have been its author or expounder. As Mill himself says in *^ Comte and Positivism," "The Philosopliy called Positivism is not a recent invention of M. Comte, but a simple adherence to the traditions of all the great scientific minds whose discoveries have made the human race what it is." That is to say. Positivism is only a particular form of the modern scientific spirit— that spirit which had its rise in Descartes and Newton, and animated all the men of science. But though Mill thus agrees with the range o f subjects fiJoi'^SseTlorjiK^^ lil^'G-.- Comte, abandonme taphysical speculation alt ogether—witness niany'of his chapters in " An Examniation of Hamil- ton." Moreover, with regard to the fundamental questions of knowledge— the whence and the whither— Mill is not so truculent as Comte ; he says, that " it is a mistake on the part of M. Comte to leave no open questions." He says again, that " tliejositive rnoik^ of thinkingLi&-n£it»nece»sa«^^ natur al" T his is an important qualification of Mill's agreement with the destructive side of Positivism. r^e. ' 40 THE METxlPHYSICS OF MILL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. 41 Beside tbe destructive side, however, there is a con- stmctive side to Positivism which shows itself in two main positions. (i.) The historic conception — the "loi des trois etats" — that the human mind necessarily passes through three stages, the theological, the metaphysical, and the Dositive. ■JL (ii.) The co-ordination of the Sciences — a hierarchy of arrangement, — in which each later or more complex science depends on the one above it, and each ad- ditional complexity has to be met by new devices in experimental inquiry. And tlie order is. Mathematics, Astronomy, Pliysics, Chemistry, Biology, and Sociology. Now, with regard to the first of these, Mill appears in the main to accept it.* With regard to the second, how- ever, there is more antagonism on the part of jMill. He notices omissions from the Scheme — Logic, for instance, and Political Economy. But the gravest omission is Psychology. Comte expressly repudiates Psychology, and for him the only way to arrive at the results at which Psychology aims, is to pursue Physiology, or some improved kind of Phrenology. Here Mill, as the true descendant of a Psychological School, is up in arms. He points out in answer to Comte's criticisms that the mind can attend to a great number of im- pressions at once ; that tlie mind can study some of its own phenomena by the aid of memory ; and that • ** Coiiitc and rositivism," p. 33. Psychology is much further advanced than that portion of physiology which corresponds to it.* We find, in fact, that Comte's attack on Psychology is not supported by Comtists, e.g.^ Littre and Lewes. It had, however, its effect in leading to the substitu- tion of a study of minds in history, in the place of an exclusively individual introspection — to a larger inter- pretation of experience tlian the merely individual ex- perience which formed the staple of Psychology before. But now it is not doubted that Psychology is a science ; the only question is wliether it should be considered a part of Biology, or hold an independent place after Biology and before Ethology, as with Mill.t Lastly, with regard to Sociology itself, Mill refuses to allow that the merit of its acknowledgment as a science belongs to Comte. t '* He has not created Sociology." The reason of this, in Mill's eyes, is that Sociology depends on Ethology, and Ethology on Psychology, and Comte did not do justice either to Ethology or Psychology. But MilFs assertion is perhaps too sweeping. Anyone who compares Mill's chapters on Sociology, § with Comte's '* Philosophie Positive," will see that without the foundation of Comte Mill's edifice would never have been reared. Yet still, perhaps, there is some truth in the assertion • Mill's "Logic," vol. ii., b. ri., c. iv. " Comte and Positiyism," p. <17. t " Logic," b. vi. I " Comte and Positivism," pp. 70 and 130. § " Logic," bk. vi. m 42 THE METAPnYSICS OF MILL. THE ANTECEDENTS OF MILL. 43 tliat tliat part of tlie new science of Sociology wliicli is " Statics " must be referred to Aristotle as its author, while tliat which is *' Dynamics " is nothing more than the historic law of evolution discussed above. But Conite's application of the law of evolution to a Pliilosophy of History seems to Mill to have been a great achievement. Sucli is the result of an analysis of Mill's relations to Comte and Positivism, which, perliaps, unduly lessens his obligations ; for, after all, the Ibrmulator find systcmatiser of a particular point of view deserves to be called, in a certain sense, an inventor, and the man who comes after him finds his work materially lightened. What Mill liimself says of his obligations to Comte is i)erha|)s too absolutely put.* " My work is indebted to Comte for several important ideas, but a short list would exhaust the chapters and even the pages wliich contain them." In concluding this general review of the interval which elapsed between Hume and Mill, and of Mill's relations to the successive schools of thought wliich ap|)eared in the interval, we may, perhaps, venture upon a generalisation. Mill is the product of Hume, Hartley, and Comte. He is indebted to Hume for Sensationalism, and to Hartley for his Assoc iation- alism, wliile, in accordance with Comte, he adopts Phenomenalism. • *' Examiiiatioii of Hiimilton," eh. xiv., p. 206, note 2, / nmP In many ways, however, it is Herbert Spencer, and not Mill, who is the true culmination of this school. For instead of merely accepting the associational psychology, he has merged it in the broader law of evolution. The doctrine of the development of psychical states out of inseparable associations, is only a special example of the great law of Evolution. This universal doctrine of evolution Herbert Spencer has sought to apply, not only to the development of all forms of being, wdiether material or spiritual, but to the evolution of the relations necessary to knowledge. Thus, so-called a priori conditions of knowledge are shown to be the results of the development of experience in the race. In modern times the experimental school of Philo- sophy has widened itself in many directions. Besides the application of the conception of Evolution, and the larger interpretation of Psychology, which we have already noticed, there is a profounder study of Biology, and the beginnings of an appreciation of the results of Philological labours (as, e.g.^ in Mr. Morell). James Mill saw the importance of this point, but his philo- logy is, of course, anticpiated, being based on nothing better than Home Tooke. These results are due in large measure to the influence of the better elements of Positivism, and to the labours in Germany of Her- bart, Fechner, and Helmholtz. The English writers to whom I principally refer are Bain, Spencer, Lewes, Carpenter, Maudsley, Darwin, Morell, and Sully. .r ,> CONSCIOUSNESS. 45 CHAPTEE IV. CONSCIOUSNESS. Mill liimself mjs that lie al»jures Metaphysics. In 8peakio<5^ of liis relations to Comte and Positivism, he I says that he agrees with the position of that school, so far as it rejects First Causes and Final Causes; his only concern being with " Physical " Causes. But he too is a Psychologist — one of those men through whoso labours, as he says, rather grandiloquently, '^ The Sceptre of Psychology has decidedly returned to Eng- land." And in the foundations on which his Psycho- logy rests, he has to deal with metaphysics, and with those questions on which metaphysics claims to be heard. A passage from his " Examination of Sir William Hamilton's Philosophy " * contains explicitly this avowal. " England is often reproached by con- tinental Thinkers with indifference to the higher philo- sophy. But England did not always deserve this reproach, and is already showing by no doubtful symp- toms that she will not deserve it much lonirer. Her • (( Examination," p. 2, the references througliout are to the 3rd edition. thinkers are again beginning to see, what they had only temporarily forgotten, that a true Psychology is the indispensable scientific basis of Morals, of Politics, of the science and art of Education : that the difficul- ties of metapliysics lie at the root of all science : that those difficulties can only be quieted by being resolved, and that until they are resolved, positively whenever possible, but at any rate negatively, we are never as- sured that any human knowledge, even physical, stands on solid foundations." No clearer or franker avowal could be made by one who is often, though inaccurately, called an English Positivist. The first of these metaphysical questions is undoubt- edly concerned with *•' Consciousness." Here again ]\Iill is explicit. '' When we know," he says, " what any philosopher considers to be revealed in Conscious- ness, we have the key to the entire character of his metaphysical system." * By Mill's own invitation, then, we have to consider what he believes to be revealed in Consciousness ; though, to a great extent, we can only gain this indirectly by discovering his own opinions from his criticisms on Hamilton. Three chapters in his " Examination " — *' The Relativity of Knowledge,'* '' Consciousness as understood by Sir W. Hamilton," and '' The Interpretation of Conscious- ness " — will suffice to acquaint us with Mill's opinior on this question. We shall then, after summing up * " Examination," p. 132. 46 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. the main features of tliat opinion, be able to consider how far it may be considered adequate or satisfactory. "The Relativity of Human Knowledge" merely means, in its broadest and simplest statement, that we. know no m ore of ex ternal_o biects than what the se nses tgTuI But the doctrine itself may be held in two different forms. We may either mean that not only are the sensations all that we can possibly know of the objects, but all that we have any ground for believing to exist. Or else, without committing ourselves to such extreme Idealism, we may only wish to signify by the doctrine tliat, while the Ego and the Non-Ego are undoubtedly realities, yet that they are for us unknow- able, because all that we know about them are the impressions they make upon us. A further discrimi- Bation can, however, be made between two varieties of opinion, contained in the last form of the statement. According to one school, we have in Consciousness, over and above sensations plus an unknowable cause, certain forms of sense and categories of the under- standing (t'.y.. Time, Space, Substantiality, CausaUty, Ac) which are modes under which we are forced to represent to ourselves Things-in-themselves. Accord- ing to another school, these conceptions of Time, Space, Substance, and Cause are not innate forms of the mind, but merely " conceptions put together out of ideas of sensation^ by the known laws of Association." It is, of course, to this last expression of the doctrine, that V CONSCIOUSNESS. 47 1 Mill commits himself. For him, the Relativity of Knowledge means two things : that our knowledge is strictly subjective ; and that we are limited to expe- rience, the mind gradually gaining its ideas, by putting together sensations and ideas of sensations l)y known laws of association. This is the true Sensationahst opinion, differing not a whit, so far, from that of Hume. Let us now turn to another chapter, — that entitle " On Consciousness as understood by Sir W. Hamil- ton." According to Mill, Hamilton has two definitions of " Consciousness," which are by no means consis- tent, and only one of which can be approved.* '^ In the one definition, it is synonymous with direct, im- mediate, or intuitive knowledge ; and we ar e consciou s no,t_onl^^-ouj:&elve%Jjut o f outward objects^ ^"^'[^j in our author's opinion, we know these intuitively." This is, of course, Realism, and in this point, Hamilton is but showing his adherence to the Scotch philo- sophers of Common Sense, Reid and others. It is needless to say that Mill refutes this opinion, as he invariably, in the *' Examination," does any approach to Realism. AVhen Hamilton says, in accordance with a Realistic standpoint, that " it is palpably im- possible that we can be conscious of an act, without being conscious of the object to which that act is relative," Mill retorts that, if the principle is to hold good, Belief becomes identical with Knowledge ; for A / / / « n Examination,' p. 138. 48 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. CONSCIOUSNESS. 49 when we believe, we must be conscious of tlie objects of belief, and so the objects of Belief become one witb the objects of Knowled^^e.* But Hamilton bas anotber definition of Conscious- ness. According to this, "Consciousness is the mind's recognition of its own acts and affections." t He does not mean by this, says Mill, that the mind's acts and affections are one tiling, and tbe mind's recognition of tbem, anotber tbing. No, be denies Bucb an inference. He denies tbat we bave one faculty by wbicli we know or feel and another by which we fr ■*"" '" kn,ow that we kno^f^ and „ kn,QW- that we feel. And Mil thoroughly agrees with him. A long passage is quoted from James Mill's "Analysis," (i. 170-172,) tlie whole purport of wliicli is to prove " the identity of our various mental states, and our consciousness of them." In Mill's opinion, then. Sensation, and the Consciousness of a Sensation are one and the same tbinir'.l The chapter that follows the one we bave been just ftnalysing,li elucidates, to a large extent, Mill's own position, and illustrates tbe method, which, according to bim, Psychology ought to pursue. Tlie verdict of Consciousness, «>., our immediate intuitive conviction, ♦ *■• Examination," p. 145. t I^ i'"*. P- 1'^8- I In his notes on James Mill's Analysis. "Mill says much the same thinsr, altliou<7h with some limitations (which arc, however, more apparent than real), aiul mnch unnecessary vei-l)in?e. [[ •• On the Interpretation of Conseiousnciis," c. Ix. «- * , I ffl being admitted to be without appeal, the question naturally arises. To what does Consciousness bear witness? Hamilton draws a distinction between '' the facts given in the act of consciousness " which must remain undoubted, and " the facts, to the reality of which it only bears evidence," which have been largely doubted by the majority of Philosophers. This, says Mill, is a mis-statement of the question at issue. For it is not questioned whether the factsj cstifiedjoby consciousness are true, but whether consciousness dm ^s^ ac^UiaUy tes%^^ It il not thatjhe testimony is undoubted, and the leradty of the testi- iiio^'caired in question, but whether consciousness is ever witness to anything beyond itself. As a matter of fact7l^iaso|)heif^ ^^ ^^^P inn^noc^^ ] ^ rather the_f^ict of its testimon y. Nor is this absurd. Substitute for " consciousness," the words *' intuitive knowledge," and it is at once clear that intuition itself will not tell us what know- ledo-e is intuitive. It is therefore quite open to doubt o whether consciousness does or does not affirm, any given thing, although at first sight such a doubt appears impossible. The question " what do we know intuitively," or "to what does our consciousness testify," is, then, not a matter of simple self-examina- tion, but of science. There are two methods, Mill continues, in which tbe question is sought to be solved. The first, the Introspective Method, attempts A THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. by carefully sifting our present states of consciousness to pronounce tliose to be ultimate and primary truths, which we cannot by our analysis resolve into something simpler. But inasmuch as the laws of Mind are capable of constructing some conceptions which become so identified with all our consciousness that we cannot but think them intuitive, this process appears to be unsafe. The only way is to discover what truths there are in the mind, whose origin can- not in any reasonable way be accounted for. AMien, after a study of the modes of generation of the mental facts confessedly not original, we have applied the .same jn-ocess to those which are supposed to be original, tlieu only can we say that the phenomena, which remain unaccounted for by those modes of generation, are primary and original elements of the mind. This is the true psycliological method, and Locke, says Mill, w as right in laying the main stress^ upon^ the ' ' origin of ourj ikas . ' ' If now w^e add to the foregoing Mill's theories of Mental Association, the device by which the growth of our Ideas out of sensations is to be explained, we shall have exhausted the whole content of " Conscious- ness " according to Mill. Hume, we remember, enunciated three principles, according to which ideas were associated : Ilesemblance, Contiguity, and Causa- - tion. Accordin*? to Mill the Law of Association has CONSCIOUSNESS. 51 four exemplifications.* Ideas are associated through Similarity, and through Contiguity (which may be equivalent either to Simultaneity or Immediate Suc- cession). The two remaining laws run as follows : " Increased certainty is given by repetition to Ideas associated by contiguity," and '^ the inseparability of the Associated Ideas is transferred to the facts answering to them." The characteristic properties of the Law are that the suggestions they produce are for the time irresistible, and that the suggested ideas (at least when the association is of the syn- chronous kind as distinguished from the successive) become so blended together by a species of ^^ mental chemistry," f that the compound result appears to our consciousness simple. Secondary actions of the Law connect themselves with " laws of obliviscence," and " unconscious mental modifications," I but these we need not here particularly define. We are now in a position to understand Mill's theory of " Consciousness." Let us try and sum up the main features. In the first place, we now see with what propriety Mill is classed with the Se nsat ionalist School . For with him, as with them all^ man's knowledge is t h e result — a complex result it is true, but still a result — • " Examination," pp. 219, 220. " Logic," Bk. \i., c. 4. t Ibid, p. 307. i Ibid, pp. 313, 314, 335, 341—343. E 2 o2 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. COXSCIOUSNESS. 53 of what lie derives from the communications of sense. '* ^Jaiows^n^ythiiig^ PL^iiS^2^^-^-^!5^.1^^ s enses tell him /' Mill, in fact, expressly disavows any other flictor of knowledge in his criticisms of the " pretensions " of the a priori school. There are no innate forms or categories of the mind with him. Those notions which are mistaken for such, are, in reality, complex results of certain associations set up among* the intimations of sense. Nor yet, according to Mill, can we embrace the alternative opinion— that in sensation we are immediately conscious of objects. We are not so conscious immediately, but only Wcliate ly^ Tliese oljcctg a re_ not intuitions, they arc inferences. Mill^ then, is equally the antagonist of the Kantian school, and of the Scotch school of Com- mon-Sense, or Realism. He is a follower, an exiionent of that mode of iiliilosopliy which was inaugurated by Locke, and carried on by Berkeley and Hume. All we know, then, in the first and ultimate resort, are Sensations. But with the Sensation, there is something more. Mill thinks, than the momentary modification of the sensibility. Tliere is also the Conscious ness of the Sensat io n. ^' S ensation and the consciousness of a sensation are one and tiie^?iame i. JLAJIjhhi| <• Tlie Sensation, in fact, carries with it, as a component part of itself, or as identical with itself (given seemingly in one act), the Consciousness of the Sensation, i In the third place, ideas, as we ha ve them , are merely worked up (a» it were) out of sensfttions by certa in laws of A ssociatiDn. These are the all-powerful instruments of the Psychological school, tlie potent alchemy by which all sort of unexpected results are made to appear. Thii s it com es about that we are l)0ssessed ofjiotions^^ .ideas, of which we can iroTtlivest ourselves, wliicli we cannot hejp apply-, inglo t hings, and which a p])ear to be a necessary part (.f our thinking processes, but which are, in reaFity, 4> but *^ the baseless fabric of a vision." AVhen the Sensation, the Consciousness of a ISensation, and the Laws of Association are enumerated, we have the whole content of Consciousness,— at least on its intel- lectual side. Phenomena of volition, and phases of emotion do not come within our present scope. Let us make a few remarks on these three points in turn. The first position is, as Mill points out, com- mon to all those who believe in ^H he Relativity of | knowl^dgCall— J3erkeley, Kant, and MiH agree in this. that all that we can know of objects is what the senses tell us, i.e., phenomena. The divergence appears later. Is Sensation the only factor in the body, or complex, of our knowledge ? Is the whole reality of knowledge to be explained as the mere product of^, Sense? Tliegg2gg^of_our^^nsntions, whatever iiunay * be, must^ be p iit-mi Lof co urt^ for tliatjs^nknowable. Can knowledge, then, be exactly resolved into Sensa- 54 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. CONSCIOUSNESS. 55 f- tions, plus an unknowable cause, or is there anytliing I more to be said? Does the mind interfere in any way, does it add somethin^j^ to experience, which is not gained from experieuec? It does, answers Kant, it adds " forms." It does not, answers Mill : wliat you call "forms" are merely the result of sensation, V worked up by purely natural processes of association.* Knowledo:e, tlien, is experience, and experience is sensation, accordin^^ to Mill. Now in knowledge, there must be some distinction between Reality and Un- reality. What is the Real ? Why is any object —that chair, say— a real object for me? Tliere are two adequate answers, and, so far as I know, only two. You may say, " The object is real for me, because in sensatioE I am immediately conscious of an object, because I am, in this instance, in immediate contact with ol»jective reality." Tliat is the answer of Common Sense, which, in Philosophy, goes by the name of Realism. Or you may say, " The object is real, because it is the construction of my thought, reality being nothing? else than this mental construction. The sensa- tion comes and goes, but my mind fixes it, by bringing it into relation with, and distinguishing it from, every- thing else, and so it becomes a real part of my know- ledge." That is the answer of what may be called Idealism. Mill is precluded from the first answer, because with him, in opposition to Hamilton, we arc • See note at end of Chapter V. a not conscious of objects intuitively. He is precluded from the second answer, because with him the mind does not bring a priori relations to bear upon its experience. Wliat tlien is reaU The Sensation. Remember, too, that ]\Iill cannot fall back upon the general experience of Humanity, or Universal Sen- sationalism, because tliis is just that further contribution made by Spencer to the interpretation of Experience. His position demands tliat in each man's case his stores of knowledge arise out of the sensations he has in past time experienced. " The real," then, is just an indi- vidual man's individual personal sensations. A truly Protagorean answer. It is clear, then, that we must analyse " Sensation," and this leads us to Mill's second position. Sensation is not merely sensation ; it is more, it is the Conscious- ness of a Sensation. Now, in one sense of the words, to say that a sensation and the consciousness of a sensation are one and the same thing, is to utter a truism. It may only be cciuivalent to saying, " When I feel, I feel," which is obvious and unimportant enough. But, of course, on such a slender foundation as this cannot be reared even the ground-plan of knowledge. In reality this is not what we are intended to infer from the words. The consciousness of a sen- sation is "the realising" of a sensation; and the realisation, the making a reality of it, means, when we analyse it, the bringing it into relation with, and i THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. differentiating- it from, any and every other sensation we experience. To be conscious of a sensation means that for lis we accept it into tlie mind as one thing, we so regard it as to make it our own, so that we are able to identify it again when it recurs. But a mere sensa- tion cannot of itself (unless, indeed, we accept the doctrines of Realism) make itself different from every other, so that it can be identified when it recurs. How can it ? It is but an impression on our sensibility, that sensibility being comi.letely passive, ex hjpothesL To raise it from such mere passive impression, to make it real, must be the work of the mind in some way or otiier (liowever we name it) going out to it, ])uttuig relations on it, and then bringing it into Consciousness as one thini?. Now, such " a consciousness of sensa- tion'^ as this is by no means the same thing as sensa- tion ; it is different with all the difference between having and receiving, between activity and passivity. , When Mill, however, says that a sensation and (the consciousness of a sensation are one and the [same thing, we accept the sentence, unthinkingly, because it strikes us as a truism in the first sense of the words. But, really, to raise out of Sensation \\\q edifice of knowledge, it must be used in the second sense of the words, because only such confusion between sentient and mental acts could lead to the success of the attempt to educe all knowledge out of sensation. Mill gets all the benefit out of the first CONSCIOUSNESS. 67 sense of the words, when really what he must mean is the second sense. But Aristotle knew better, when he discriminated between the separate intimations of sense (Ihiai ala67](T€Ls) and something more than mere sense {to b'oTi ala-OavoixeOa.)* Nor can such an analysis of the primary acts of sensation be possibly distasteful to Mill. For the whole spirit of his treatment of Hamilton {e.g. in the chapter "The interpretation of Consciousness") is just this,— that we must not take what appears to be primary as if it were really such : it may be secondary: it may be complex, and not simple : and only further analysis can tell. And the Experiential Philosopher is, as we have seen, justly sceptical of words like " ultimate " and " primary." So we are quite within the procedure of the proper Psychological method of Mill, when we take such a sentence as " sensation and the consciousness of a sensation are one and the same thing," and see whether such a supposed primary act is, or is not, primary,— whether these two are one and the same thing, or not,— whether " a consciousness of a sensation " is really a simple thing, or a complex thing. AYith Mdl's successors, the question is solved in a bolder manner. To later exponents of the Psycho- logical method, consciousness in its primitive condition is resolved into two acts, first, the consciousness of a * De Anima, iii. 1 , 2. US THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. COXSCIOUSNESS. 59 difference, then the consciousness of a siniihirit v.* But if sensation at once iinplies, in one and the same act, the perce])tion of a difference between itself and every- thing else, what else is this bnt *' consciousness testify- ing to something other than itself "—'' the knowing not only that I know, but also nhat I know"— that identical doctrine of Realism, on which, wlien uttered by Hamilton, Mill pours out all the vials of his scatliiiiir criticism? We come now to the third point, _the_ Laws j^ Mental Association . In his study of Association, Mill is, perhaps, not so explicit, nor does he embark on so complete a study, as some of his school, notably Bain. Yet tlie matter is one of paramount importance to liim, for by him the idea of cause is reduced to an inseparable, unconditional association, and on cause Mill rests his entire theory of reasoning. Tliat Mill was not unduly insensible to this importance, we may gather from the following sentence: t ''That which the Law of Gravitation is to Astronomy, that which the elementary properties of the tissues are to Physiology, the Law of the Association of Ideas is to Psychology." What that Law includes we have already seen. What we now have to see,— and it is a question to which Mill never addresses himself,— is what such Association • Cf., among others, Bain, "Senses and Intellect," Introduction ; aiKl " Emotions and Will," p. oiUJ and foUuwing. f " Comtc and Positivism.," P* ^^• implies^ what conditions it postulates either lu the things that are known or the thing tliat knows. Such a question, obviously prior to all the exhibitions of the principle such as we have them in Mill, is exactly that which no Sensationalist or Experientialist philosopher handles. And to ignore it means one of two tilings, either to be a Eealist and not a Sensationalist at all, or else to be guilty of a want of analysis in those very intimations of Consciousness which it is the bounden duty of the experimental psychologist (according to Mill) thoroughly to sift and analyse. What then do we mean by the Association of Sen- sations and Ideas? What does such a faculty pre- suppose ? In the first place, it is clear that associating power should naturally belong to a mind that is active* (actively dealing with and transforming sensations) rather than to a mind that is passive (passively re- ceiving such sensations as they successively present themselves). "To associate" is, of course, to do, rather than to suffer, by the very force of the term. Such an objection may appear mere haggling over words, but in reality it leads us to the very core of ♦ Mill was afterwards not insensible to tliis. Cf. " Dissertations and Discussions," vol. iii., art. on Bain. " Those wlio liave studied the writinjrs of the Association Psychologists, must often have been unfavourably impressed by the almost total absence, in their analy- tical expositions, of the recognition ol any active element as spon- taneity in the mind itself " (p. Ili0« 60 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. CONSCIOUSXESS. 61 the qaestion. We shall see this more clearly by adtlressiDg ourselves to a second point. " Sensations and the resultant ideas are associated according to certain hiws." What does this mean? It means, obviousljj that certain sensations being held in con- sciousness, and their relations, whether of contiguity or resemblance, being ai)i)rehended by the mind, they ai'e associated togetlier. Any process less than this would never result in association. Think what association, in popular senses of the word, means. I associate together the idea of this paper with the idea of an essay. That is to say, having received tlirough my senses certain impressions of a particular kind, to which after due consideration I apply the name of paper, I tlien think of them in relation to other im- liressions wliich I call writing or reading an essay. It is clear that if my first impressions had come and gone, and not been retained, lixed, made permanent, made real, l)y my ever-present consciousness, I could never liave tliought of them in relation to my second impres- sions, because they would not have been there to be thouglit of. In otlier w^ords, thought has to make sensations real before they can be associated ; and, further, they cannot be associated, unless, being made real, they can be identified when they recur. This is all upon the supposition which Mill himself makes for us when he says (as indeed all Sensationalists must) that all that we can know of things is the sensa- r tions we experience. If that is the case, if sensation does not testify to anything beyond itself, then a sen- sation, on analysis, is discovered to amount to nothing more than a particular impression, out of which, by some further process, knowledge and reality are pro- duced. And then naturally we have to consider, as we have done, whether a sensation has not to be trans- formed in some way before it can become a permanent item of knowledge ; and, further, whether, unless it be thus transformed, it can ever become real enough to be associated with any other sensation. t^ There is, however, another supposition which is possible. The sensations may come ready-formed, in a certain way, into our mind. As ready-formed, they must have, of course, their similarities to and differences from otlier sensations already fixed. Then to a mind, purely passive, there would certainly be open the ten- dency to associate them, for the simple reason that the sensations themselves in their resemblances, naturally and of themselves, tend to coagulate into groups. This supposition I say is possible, but it certainly is not possible for Mill. For what does it imply ? That 1/ sensations are fixed in a certain objective order. That is, that when we are conscious of sensations, we are not merely limited within the bounds of consciousness, but that we are passively recipient of a certain objec- tive order, obviously heyond consciousness. And this means that sensations do not merely imply themselves, J^ 62 THE METxlPHYSICS OF MILL. ? but sometliing more tlian themselves, viz., their rehi- tions, their differences,' their resemblances, to and from one another. But this is a Hamiltonian doctrine, in other, words, Realism. As such, then, it is not open to Mill. The conclusion would appear to be this. If Realism be accepted, th en Sen sations ca^n be associated, because they may be conceived as already existing in a certain objective order: but if Sensationalism be accepted, I then Sensations cannot be associated at all, for there ' must first be a mental process (not « feeling") to bring them into relations with one another, in order that they may be associated. So little is it true that Association exi)laiiis Thought, that the reverse is the case. It is Thought which explains the possibility of Association. I CHAPTER V. BODY AND MIND. After the metaphysical question as to the contents of Consciousness and the extent and validity of its testimony, we come to the equally serious meta|)liysical difficulties which surround the words " Matter and Body," and " Mind or Self." Here we have very ex- plicit theories on the part of Mill in the two chapters of his *' Examination," entitled respectively '^ The Psychological Theory of the Belief in an External AYorld," and *' The Psychologic ;al Theory of Matter how for applicable to Mind."* With these theories we must now do our best to acquaint ourselves. "The Psychological Theory" begins by postulating certain conditions " in nature," and certain conditions in the mind itself The conditions it postulates in Nature are as follows : — (i.) Sensations. (ii.) Succession and simultaneousness of Sensations. (iii.) The union of these sensations (both successive * " Examination of Hamilton's Philosopliy," Chaps. XI. and XII. THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. BODY AND MIND. bo aocl simultaneous) into groups, so tliat tlie experience of one sensation authorises lis to expect all the rest, proviilecl that certain antecedent sensations, called organic, are first experienced. The conditions which tlie theory postulates in the mind itself are — (i.) The Law of Expectation and Memory, (ii.) Tlie Laws of the Association of Ideas (which we have already enumerated). With these assumptions, the Psychological theory nndertid^es to prove that the conception of External Matter would necessarily be generated (if it was n( )t an original datum of consciousness) by the known laws of the Mind. The steps in tliis gradual belief in Exter- nality may be reduced to four : — 1. We have a present sensation, and we conceive of possibilities of sensation (by exj)erience). The possi- bibties of sensation are permanent, while the present sensation is fiii»-itive. 2. The possibility of sensation refers not to a single sensation, but to a group of sensations. Now if I experience one of them, I know I could experience all. Hence the possibilities of sensation are conceived of as permanent, not only in opposition to the temporariness of my bodily presence, but to the temporary character of any one of the sensations, of whicli the group re- ferred to is composed. Here we observe that the idea of a " substratum " is in process of formation. i 3. Experience of an order in our sensations leads to the belief in the law of Cause and Effect. Now the antecedent of a sensation is in most cases a possibility of sensation, involving a group of contingent sensa- tions. The Idea of " Cause," therefore, is connected with tliese pcrnuinent possibilities, as are also ideas of "l)0wer," "activity," *' energy," and the like: and the aetual sensations are supposed to have a back- ground in the possibll'dks of sensation. The idea of a *^ substratum" is now fully developed. 4. One more step, and the analysis is complete. We find other people acting on tlie supposition of these permanent possibilities of sensation as well as our- selves : whereas our actual sensations are not common to our fellow-creatures. The World, tlien, of Possible Sensations, belonging to other people, as well as to me, is held to constitute an External World. Sucli is ]\Iiirs extremely acute and subtle analysis of tlie growth of our belief in Externality. Tlie conclu- sion is plain. If we ask What is Matter ? the only answer which a i)sychol()gist can give, is that it is merely " a Permanent Possibility of Sensation." This is all, says Mill, that is essential to the belief in Matter, whether held by philosophers or ordinary humanity. Can the same* analysis be extended to '^Mind?" Will believes that, to a large extent, it can. Just as the Non-Ego might easily have been formed as a conception, by the known laws of the mind, even if F 66 THE METAPHYSICS OP MILL. it was not in consciousness from the becrinnintion that neither Mind nor Matter is anything but a permanent possibi- lity of Sensation. I am conscious of my own body, as a group of possible sensations, connected in a peculiar way with all my sensations, and I observe other bodies closely resembling mine, except that they are not so connected. I conclude, therefore, that they are con- nected with some other than myself, judging from my BODY AND MIND. 67 own experience of my sensations. So, again, these bodies exhibit phenomena, which I know in my case to be the effects of consciousness. Therefore I infer that these other bodies have a consciousness simihir to mine. Similarly, this theory would resolve the Mind of God into a series of Divine thoughts and feelings, prolonged through Eternity, which would cause a belief in it, at least as strong as the belief in my own. And the con- ception of Immortality, as a thread of consciousness prolonged to Eternity, leads essentially to the same results as the ordinary conception. But still there remains '' a final inexplicability." Besides present feelings and possibilities of feelings, we have Memory and Expectation. But how can a series of feelings be aware of itself as a series, so as to remember a sensation that actually existed in the past, or expect that a particular sensation will exist in the future? Here we are face to fiice with an insoluble metaphysical problem.* *' I think by far the wisest thing we can do, is to accept the inexplicable fact, witliout any theory of how it takes place. No such difficulties, however, attend the Psychological theory in its application to Matter." We are now acquainted with the manner in which, according to Mill, by '' known laws of the mind" are generated those notions of the World outside us, and " Esamiuation," p. 212. F 2 68 THE METxlPIIYSICS OF MILL. BODY AND MIND. 69 of the Self witliin lis, of wliich we appear to be so immediately and directly conscious. With Mill, as the preceding analysis will liave shown, tliese are not direct, immediate facts of inhiition, but acts of pro- gressive belief, which can be demonstrated to have grown to l)e what tliey are. It will 1 )e convenient, for many reasons, to examine tlie account of Mind, or Self, first, before proceeding to the treatment of Externality. " Tiie Self" is by Mill, as a disciple of Hume, duly shown to be but "states of consciousness."* " AYe neither know nor can imagine it except as represented by the succession of manifold feelings." But wliat of the permanent something we seem to be conscious of, in contrast with tlie flux of sensations ? This, says Mill (just lilvc the Permanent Substratum we seem to be conscious of with regard to "matter") is wholly covered by the expression "Permanent PossibiUty :'' and so, the mind is nothing but a series of Feelings. At the end of the chapter, however, we find that "the permanent something " is not wholly covered by the bare expression " permanent possibility." There is something else — there is expedatmij and there is memmy, still unaccounted for. How can a mere series be aware of itself in the past, as in memory, or project itself into the future, as in expectation ? Here, says Mill, we are face to face with " a final inexplicabili ty," ♦ - Examination," p. 235. and the wisest thing is to accept the inexplicable fact and be content. Contentment, however, is not an easy virtue, and we cannot help pausing over this "final inexplicability," which looks so remarkably like a confession of failure by the very words in wliich Mill states it. Let us turn, for a moment, to the Psychological Theory of the Belief in an External World. What does it postu- late according to Mill? It postulates, first, tluit the human mind is ca^^able of expcdatmi* But expecta- tion, we find, is just that which the theory of mind cannot explain and has to acce})t as a final inex- plicability. Consequently the Theory of the External World rests on a function of the Mind, which the corresponding theory finds itself unable to explain. That is to say, if words have any meaning, that, as the one theory rests on the other, they both rest on a final inexplicability. Yet, says Mill, with almost un- paralleled hardihood, " No such difficulties attend the theory in its application to matter." f Though Mill allows himself here to speak of a " final inexplicability " he will not allow others to do the same. In the earlier part of his " Examination,"^ he notices with pain that Hamilton had left the rela- tions of Belief and Knowledge unsolved. This he calls "an extremely unphilosophical liberty" to take. The next words are exactly applicable to the present * " Examination," p. 219. f Ibid. p. 212. \ Ibid. p. 116. ■uaA^iBi^^^^_ 70 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. case.* *«But wlieo a tliinker is compelled by one part of liis pliilosopliy to contradict another part, lie cannot leave the conflicting- assertions standing, and throw the responsibility of his scrape on the arduous- ness of the subject. A palpable self-contradiction is not one of the difficulties which can be adjourned, as Monging to a higher department of science." Yet here, notwithstanding these brave words, is an in- stance of lilill talving an « extremely unphilosophical liberty," precisely similar to that which he reprobates in Hamilton. Of course, the truth is that Mill has here got hold of that which must be a stumbling-block in Sensational scliemes of Philosophy, You reduce IMind to a series of feelings, and then have to answer tlie pertinent question, How can a series be aware of itself in past and future time ? The fact is that such a series can never be summed; and Personal Identity vanishes in the process. And yet Mill says that this theory leaves Immortality just as it was before. " It is precisely as easy to conceive that a succession of feelinos, a thread of consciousness, may be prolonged to eternity, as that a spiritual substance continues to exist." t If, indeed despite the feet of Self being "sequent feelings," Personal Identity remains all the same, perliaps this is conceivable. But the ambiguity lurks in the words "thread" and "succession." If it is "a thread" of • •* Examination;' p. 147. f ibid. p. 240. BODY AND MIND. 71 consciousness, it may, of course, be prolonged. Bat a ^' thread" means something one and continuous, and Sensations coming and going (sequent feelings) are not one and continuous. " Successive feelings" are by no means the same thing as " a succession of feel- ings," despite Miirs assertion* that " we are conscious of a succession, in the feet of having successive sensa- tions." For "a succession'^ of feelings, is only possible to a self-consciousness, which remains constant and identical throughout all the successive sensuous modifications. But a self-consciousness, constant and identical, can never be admitted by Mill. There is another objection to Mill's account of Mind or Self which is urged by Dr. M^Cosh in his Examina- tion of Mill's Logic, and which furnishes us, at all events, with a fair " argumentum ad hominem." The system, of which Mill is an advocate, aims at assuming as few original principles as possible. Sensationalism, like Nominalism, accepts AVilliam of Ockham's maxim, " Entia non multiplicanda sunt prseter necessitatem." Tliis is why it wishes to destroy the a priori element of knowledge, and postulates only the '' a poster tori experience. Let us apply this to our present case. The old Ileal istic way of regarding Mind was, of course, to say that we have in our mental modifications, an original and intuitive presentation of Self. In sensa- tion it is always " the Ego having the sensation." * Appendix, p. 256. THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. BODY AND MIND. 73 No sensation comes witliout liaving-, as its uniform ac- companiment tlie consciousness of the Self which feels it. This is, in trutli, the position of Dr. McCosh— that in Sell; we have an immediate presentation or intuition. Mill would replace this bj sometliing more scientific. Instead of tlie Self; then, one and immediate, what have we accordin.cr to Mill ? First, we liave Sensations ; then a series of Sensations; then we have a belief; then, a lielief in Time; then a belief in Time as permanent, and of possibilities in Time.* Tlicse are ol»viously not all one and tlie wime, j-et tliey are all seeming-ly ultimate elements.. So that instead of one ultimate ehiment, as in Realism, we liave got five or six. This is hardly in accordance witli tlie spirit of Ockliam. Somewhat different is the conclusion to which Idealism commits itself in the hands of Kant. Of course, like all those wlio admit the essential Re- lativity of Human Knowled^re, he must say that what the M'ind is in itself we cannot soy, any more than we can say what Matter is in itself. The Self or Mind can only be known by its own Forms, its Cateo:ories, its Relations. Apart from such relations and forms, no human knowledge, we find, is i)ossible. ow, the iii>j>lication of permanent cate^i^'ories and re- lations is of course necessMrily a limitation of know- • The sentence in Mill is (p. 211) :-'» Tliey are attended with the pecnliaiitj that each of them iiivohfs a lielief in more tlian its own present existtnee," /./-. a permanent l.elief of possiltle sensations in the future. Jlcie is Time implieit in tlie earliest operations of consciousness ledg-e; it is just that which makes it Relative instead of Absolute. Ag'ain, human knowledge can only exist as a joint effect of two opposite factors, Object and Subject. Con- sequently, there cannot be knowledge of merely one of the component factors. Thus what Self is iu itself must for ever remain unknown. But this is not the same tiling as reducing Self to Sequent Sensations as Sensationalism does. For ob- serve that we know the Self by the permanency of the relations, which it applies in the construction of its exjierience. Permanent mental categories mean, of course, as we have all along said, a permanent Self- Consciousness, ever present as one and identical to all the impressions of sense, transmuting and transform- ing them out of the bewildering flux into the constant conditions of knowledfie. It is thus that Self-Con- sciousness and Self are assured by an a priori system of metaphysics. To some of the successors of Kant, this limitation of our knowledge of Self seems unnecessary and unreal. Of Self we oudit to have an absolute consciousness — difierentiating itself, as in the categories, retiuiiing again upon itself as in the conclusions of a rational Psychology. " It is an unity in difference, an unity whieli can only be known in difference, but still an unity.'' ♦ • " The Philosophy of Kant," by Edward Caird, pp. 481, 484, 553, 558. 'S 74 _ THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. Wliat is Matter, External Reality, Objective AVorld, to Mill? It is ddiiuMl as '' the Permaiieot Possibility of Sensation." What, are tlie conditions i)ostulated in arrivincr at this result ? Three in the mind : dz,, Ex- pectation, Memory, and tlie Laws of Association : tliree in " iiatnre " : th., Sensations, Succession or Simul- taneonsness of Sensations, and the union of these sensa- tions into ffronps. And so Mill is not wliolly averse to the idea " that the non^ego altogether may be but a mode in which the mind represents to itself the possible modifications of tlie egoJ' As he says in another passage,* " I do not believe that the real externality to IIS of any thing, exc ei>t oHier minds, is capable of proof— The view I take of externality could not be more accurately expressed tlian in Professor Fraser's words : ' For ourselves we can conceive only (1) an externality to our present and transient experience in mr mm possible experience past and future, and (2) an ex- ternality to our own conscious experience in the con- temporaneous, as well as in the i.ast or future ex. perience of oi/^er mim/s.' "' The conclnsion is certainly not one with wbich any Idealist can disagree. The question, of course, is how iar the means, by which the conclusion is readied, are satisfactory. Ihe conclusion is one, wliich is in reality forced ujion Mill hj his predecessors in tlie English school, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. But we \vish to * *• Examination;' p. 232, note. BODY AND MIND. '^ Ml \ know, whether, given tlie essential position of Sensa- tionalism, we can from it explain all that our ordinary belief in the Existence of an External AYorld contains. Idealism, as I understand it, believing that all reality (and therefore the rejility of the External AYorld) is tlie work of Thought, proceeds to show how the mind, by " a priori'' action, by super-imposition of forms, categories and relations, intelligibly constructs its experience into all the Order and llegularity of an. External Worl(L__jizirot? elSecrt btavrSiv t7]v fxidobov TTOLovfjiivq* tjiit Sensationalism, necessarily believing that all reality is actual sensatioii "-^^jj- ^g legiti- mate inferences, has to show how far sensations by themselves can combine, congeal, and crystallise into what we call External Facts, and thus give rise to the idea we have of an uniform Order of Nature. » Turning to ]\Iill for guidance, we are first attracted by his mental postulates. The last of these, the Association of Ideas, we have already discussed in the preceding chapter, and the difiiculty we there found was to understand how sensations can, of themselves and prompted by themselves, associate — which they must do, if the mind is to be conceived of as purely passive. The other two postulates. Expectation and Memory, Mill himself gives up, when he comes to explain '' Mind." They are the " final inexplicability : " those conditions of mental action, which the theory of • Plato, Rep. vi. s. 510. fi^ 76 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. Sensationalism cannot exidain. So that, so far as the Bulijective postuhites go, we are not much helped by the Psychological Tlieory. We turn, then, to the objective postulates, or Sensa- tions viewed in their objective aspect (for Mill's own expression "postulates in Nature" is rather mislead- iog, inasmuch as it is tlie growth of the belief in Kature which we are trying to explain). They are Sensations, sin)ultaneousness and succession of Sensa- tions, and unions of Sensations into groups. A fourth conditiun of Mill which he brings in as testimony to, or veritication of his process, we cannot lay much stress on here: it is our ex])erience of what " other people do'' in relation to tltcir sensations. Of course, we do not as yet believe in other i)eople's existence, unless we prove that there is such a thing as Externality. At all events, we cannot assume the existence of other people, and bring them in as confirmation of our own sulyective proee>ses, when we are actually tracing the growth of an Existence other than ourselves. "With regard to tlie other three, Sensations, of course, are their own evidence; but there is a serious gap between tliem and "succession," " simultaneousness " and " union into groups." Tlie (question here again is the old question— Can " relations " grow out of sen- sations ? For that " simultaneousness," " succession " and " union into groups," are " relations," and not sensations at all, requires very little proof. Sensations BODY AND MIND. 77 are one thing : "the links, which unite and coml)ine them into groups, are quite another. Now by " rela- tions," Idealism means the ** « jyriori''' action of the mind, working up sensations : biit Mill cannot accept such "a priori'' action; consequently the problem becomes pressing — Can sensations in and by themselves combine and arrange themselves into " unions " and " groups"? If Association be the weird alchemy which explains such combination, well and good; Ijut if Association itself be impossible, except to an active and synthetic self-consciousness, it cannot help us out of the difficulty.* Such appear to me to be the difficulties of ^Jill's " postulates," and as the whole theory of Externality rests on the [)ostulates, to these difficulties that theory is liable. That the conclusion is that of the Idealist needs no further assertion. I f MilFs l lip'>^y rnp^^^^g anyth ing, it certainly means that Matter is for us not some tliing objective Inv t merely subjective. Or, as he expressly states it, '' we know no more of things tlian wliat sensations give us," and sensations testify to nothing- but themselves. That being so, we desire to ask two questions liefore proceeding further. In the first place, what are we to understand that knowledge, according to Mill, is? The answer, if we take these chapters we have been considering, is perfectly plain. Knowledge is the * See note at end of Chapter. IB THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. process by wliich ideas are formed out of sensations, and tiie agreement or disagreement of tliese ideas would seem to be knowledge. l\^e turn to tlie " Logic," * and we find, to our auiazcnient, tliat the theory that knowledge has to do with ideas is described as " one of the most iatal errors ever introduced into the philosoi>hy of Logic." " Propositions are not assertions respecting our ideas of things, but assertions respecting the things theaiseives : " the doctrine that " the investigation of truth consists in contemplating and handling our ideas, or conceptions of things, instead of the things themselves" is described as " tantamount _ to the assertion that i/ie o/Jf/ mm/i; ofmqtdruig knowledge \ qf nature m to simig it at sero/^/ haml^ as rejm'sented in otir mil minds" ^Yhlit are we to make of this ? The very doctrine "that the only mode of acquiring know- ledge of nature is to study It at second hand, as repre- sented in our own minds," wliich Mill so earnestly re- pudiates in his " Logic," is an exact description of the doctrine which he as earnestly maintains in ** The Psychological Theory of the Belief in an External World." A better proof could hardly be furnished of the very difierent philosopliical bases on which his two treatises respectively rest. In the second place, we wish to know, with exact- ness, what Mill means by " a phenomenon " ? f Does * " Logric," bk. I. c. V. sec. 1 . t Cf. Hume, edited bv(Jr<-('n jiiid Gi- -sc, TntTCKlnction, vol.i. p. inS. " The Juggle whicli the nioaciii lo-ic performs with the word— * phenomenon.* " BODY AND MIND. 79 he mean a simple intimation of a sense-perception, or does he mean a single, individual, concrete, real, fact ? The first is what he ought to mean, by the require- ments of his Sensationalist position. Sense gives us phenomena ; with phenomena only we have to deal in opposition to the so-called noiimena, or things in themselves ; a phenomenon then is a fact as it appears to us, and as it is represented by our modes of con- sciousness. But " phenomenon " does not mean this, when we are told, as in the " Logic," that a pro- position deals with '' phenomena," and that we are to study Nature first-hand, and not at second hand, as represented in our own minds. " Phenomenon " does not mean this, when the Inductive Methods are applied to phenomena to elicit their laws. Then it means a real, objective, concrete feet, and if that is immediately known by us, then we are not in the position of Ideal- ism but of Realism. The fiict is that Mill as an Inductive Logician supposes that phenomena (objective facts) are imme- diately cognised by us, while Mill as a Psvcholoirist, a critic of Hamilton, and a metaphysician, supposes that phenomena, the facts immediately cognised by us, are mere subjective presentations. Kant, when he uses the word Phenomenon, means the product of an objective and a subjective factor, the result of a sensation on which has come the mental relation of Individuality. Mill must mean what Kant 80 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL, means, minus the a priori mental relation. But only a Realist like Hamilton can mean tliat a phenomenon as an olijective fact, is imiiicdiately cognised, — a i)hilo- soplier wh.o believes th,e Sensation testifies to somethinf^ beyond itself, viz., somctliiu^- external.* ♦ It is very iliffieiilt to be sure of Mill's opinions on some of the pointH ili>ru»r(l in tlii> rli;iptei\ !iMM,vitli-t:m(iiM'_r Mill's iiiiitortajit ** Appendix" in the iinl edition. The ditlieulties may be brietiy suiiiniari-cd. 1, Are " tVelin«rfi " ''nid •' sensations" e^inivrdent expressions ? AFill 8a,ys jis n;nirh,. \vli(,'n he t|Uutes witli ;ipiii"obatii>n .hnnics villi's remark, " liavimj' a sensation and haviiMj a feelin«r are not two thin;is. The \hiv.\i, is one. tlie names only are twd" (p. 1H1»). Bnt ill the Apiterulix, Mill >^.-i'ins to imply more l^y the word '* feelin;,'' "' : and in the 1. ( I'k. i.) he says. •• l-'eelinif is a L'-emis. (»f wliicli Sensation, E mot ion, and Tliouglit are .suljordi- natc specie*;.'' 2. I)(i •• relai intis " ctow out of sensations by the Laws of Assoeia- tion in Mi Ms oi»ini(>n / On pa'je IH. lie says, speak in«^^ of the opinions of his (»\vn selmol. •• I'hiee, Extension, tSii!>stanee, Vu\'-<\ f/tif/ fitf ff'sf, :m: eonee jit ions put toiretlier ont of ideas of sensation by the known laws (tf assoeiation." As 1k> lias jnst licen speakiiij; of Kantian fnrms, T supjiose that 'Time and iJelaiions jsenerally are in< liidod in the ex|)rt>ssi(.n •* ajid t])e rest." In the Appendix, liowever. he takes a ditferent tone. ** \\'*,' are fln-.rfit/ i*on>-ei<:»iis i.l' -rtecvN-ion. in ttie faet of liaving siieeessive sensations" (p. 2.')arts by sometliing in CNirninnn, w7//V7/ i\- not fhr I'aTindx thtitt.s/ 1 lu s. ti nt( inon- ///an fitc itfireemhni of fhr J}yTi it ' Jtr fiiTinijj< fheittitrlt'eM " (p. 2.17 ). Are "relations " *• the (Mhuiinais whieii are themselves sensa- tional," of wliieh he >i»eMks (m page 249? Are tliey Hume's " Tnanners of feelintr." or n-t ' 3. Tlie words '* iierniai • d " p(ls^ibility " arc very [lerplex- iiiL'. " I'crnianent " mn-i mean '• ]»resent with every state of coiiscioiisness." and *• |Nis>iltiliiy " onglit to mean '■ idea." In tliat case. ** matt) -r " defined a*- ■* jiennanent possibility of sen- sat ie.n ■' is an (Xplanaliiin which sadly needs to lie ex].hiinesil>le " but the ** ideal " ? And how then can knowled*_(' be said to be concerned, not with •• ideas," but %vitL " things. "" /, f l> CHAPTER VI. THE PRIMARY QUALITIES OF MATTER. "Of our sensations,"*' says Mill, "there are some which we usually refer to that thread of consciousness of which they form a part, and there are others, which we are in the habit of referring to those Permanent Possibilities of Sensation, which are, in a sense, realised in them." For instance, we have the Sensations of Pleasure and Pain. These are not referred, as a general rule, to any outward object, because they are much more important to us in relation to our own conscious- ness. But there are other sensations, of which, as sensations, we have only a momentary consciousness : we immediately pass from them to the Permanent Possibilities of sensation, of wliich they are a mark. In this latter case, what we really know only as an in- ference is thought to be cognised directly, and Percep- tion takes the place of Sensation. The distinction here noted, corresponds to the distinction between " the Primary " and " the Secondary " qualities of matter. * *' Examination," c. xiii. " Psychological Theoiy of Primary Qualities." a 82 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. Having given the rationale of this historical distinc- tion, MOl proceeds to the examination of what these Primary Qualities are. Although it is possible that we might get an idea of Matter from the sensations only of Smell, Taste, and Hearing, iis a matter of fact, these sensations of Smell, Taste and Hearing are not active by themselves, but only lead to the formation of groups of Possibilities of Sensation through their connection with the sensations referable to the sense of Touch and the Muscles : in other words, these sensations are directly connected, either by laws of co-existence or causation, w^ith the sensations w^hich answer to the terms Resistance, Extension, and Figure. In con- sequence, the Possibilities of sensations of touch and the muscles, form a group within the group, an inner nucleus; and the remaining possibilities are regarded either as effects, of which this nucleus is the cause, or attributes, of wliich the nucleus is the sub- stance. So our idea of Matter comes ultimately to consist of Resistance, Extension, and Figure: these axe held to be its essential constituents. Of these Primary Qualities of Matter, Resistance is ^ the most fundamental. " Resistance " is a sensation of muscular action impeded, simultaneously with which is felt the sensation of touch. These two sensations are always felt together. We feel contact, and we know that were we to exercise our muscles, we should experience resistance. By the Law of Inseparable THE PHIMAHY QUALITIES OF MATTER, 83 Association, no sooner do we feel contact, than we cognise sometliing external, because the former sensa- tion is a mark of the Permanent Possibility of the sensation of resistance and muscular action. Matter, consequently, is considered a " resisting " object, because we experience simultaneously a sensation of touch (of contact) and a sensation of muscular action impeded. More important, however, in many ways, is the account given of ^* Extension." The Psychological Theory of Extension derives it also from a sen- sation of muscular energy. It supposes a dismmi- native semibiUfi/ in muscular action, wliich leads the patient of the sensation to derive from the duration of the muscular action, the notion of Matter as an ex- tended object, just as he derives from the intensity of muscular effort, the notion of Matter as a resisting object. Extension then may be construed as the sen- sation of a muscular effort having a certain continuance, gained by '' the sweep of the arm " or ^^ the sweep of the limb," * and synonymous with a certain " volume of feeling." Now it is evident that this notion of Ex- tension expresses it as a series of muscular efforts— a consciousness of successive states of muscular activity. Whence, then, the " simultaneity^''' with which we grasp the attribute of extension ? Altliough Mill seems to think that tbe simultaneity * " Exaiuination," pp. 269, 270 a 2 81 THE METAPIITSICS OF MttL. THE PEIMAEY QUALITIES OF MATTEE. 85 may be transferred to it from the experience (gained previously,) of tlie possible simultaneity of two sensa- tions in the mind at once, lie tliinks it most probable that the action of the eye contributes to the notion of Extension this idea of simultaneity. The Eye gives, in a moment of instantaneous consciousness, the notion of an extended object* The action of the visual organ, whether in " its sweep over a wide prospect/' or " its adjustment for a distant view," enables the visual sensations to stand as "symbols" for muscular and tactual sensations, which might be experienced or were actually experienced, as slowly successive. Hence it comes that our consciousness of extension is connected as an appendage with our Sensations of Sight (which, in itself, is limited to the impressions of Colour) although, 10 reality, derived from the sensation of continued muscular action. Just as the sensation of continued muscular action gives the notion of linear extension, and extension in any direction, so it will also give the notion of situation and " Figure." And further, it will enable us, by the muscular sensibility connected with it, to compare dilFerent degrees of the attribute of space, le,, difference of length, surface, situation, and form. And lastly, the velocity of the motion will be also given by muscular sensibility, and we discover that a «low /i • u Examination," p. 281. motion for a long time is the same as a (quicker motion with less duration. Thus the Psychological Theory maintains that the notion of length in space, not being in our conscious- ness originally, is constructed out of the notion of length in time by means of muscular and tactual sen- sations. But the participation of the Eye in our actual notion of extension — its action taking the place, and standing as the symbol of possible, or actually-realised muscular sensations — very much alters its character, and makes us imagine that for us Extension derives its meaning from a phenomenon which is synchronous and not successive, the reverse of which, according to Mill, is really the case. Our first task must be to see Mill's position histori- cally, in this question of the Primary Qualities of Matter. Mill had to explain constructively, what Hume and Berkeley had done destructively. Locke's position is that, more or less, of Common-Sense. Secondary Qualities are subjective. Primary Qualities are objective. With regard to the first, we are not outside of the limits of our own consciousness; with regard to the second, we are outside, because we are able to state what are the " real " qualities of matter. Berkeley simply destroyed all difference between the two sets of qualities ; a quality, like " sweetness," and a quality, like " solidity," were both equally relative 86 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. THE PEIMAEY QUALITIES OF MATTER. 87 to our own conscious and subjective apprehension. Hume went even fartlier than this : the so-called Primary were in a sense, less real than the Secondary, because more dependent on mental construction. '* Solid it}-," for example, is more of " an idea," and therefore less ** real," tlian a feeling: to which we g^ive the name " sweet," which is an immediate sensuous impression. After these two philosophers, the question still remained, and required an answer — whjj if both sets of qualities rest on the same subjective basis, is our idea of substance made up rather of qualities, like Re- sistance, Extension, and Figure, than of qualities like Hot, Sweet, and Cold ? Tliis is the question to which Mill had to address himself: and his answer, practi- cally, comes to this — that sensations given in touch I have more the character of permanency. For the rest, his reply merely is a re-affirmation of the fact : we do, as a matter of fact, connect our ideas of Externality and Matter with sensations of Touch (and afterwards, he says, of Sight) rather than with Sensations given by the other three senses, Taste, Smell, and Hearing. What, then, are the Primary Qualities, according to Mill ? Resistance, Extension, and Figure. Of these, incomparably the most important to the metaphysician is the account given of Extension. " Figure " requires no discussion, if the others are established ; and " Re- sistance" need not occupy us long. Resistauce is h gained by the sense of energy impeded, the intensity of effort giving us the notion of Matter as a Resisting Object. Of course it is obvious that mere touch, as " a surface-sense," cannot yield us these results : there can be, in mere touch, no measure of intensity of effort, or impeding of energy. These indications are the results of a sort of sixth sense, newly-invented, of which Hume was ignorant — tlm Muscular Seme,* Mere touch gives us, we are told, only *' the peri- phery " of our bodies : the muscular sense gives us something further — resistance outside, corresponding to muscular reactions inside. Physiologically, the Muscular Sense is defined as " a Motor Nerve, under the control of the will, going out from the Brain, and moving the muscle attached to it; and of a Sensor Nerve, going back to the brain and giving intimation of the motion." Sir Charles Bell and Dr. Thomas Brown, the one a physiologist, the other a psycho- logist, brought into prominence the muscular sense : Mill and Bain make large use of it ; in Germany, ]\Iiiller, in England, Dr. Carpenter, have carried on an extensive inquiry into its nature, f But we must not allow this account of the Muscular Sense to disconcert us, just as though we had here some means of appreliending an actuality, external to our consciousness. For of course, when we say that * Cf. " Logic," bk. i. c. iii. s. 7. par. 3. t McCosh, " Examination of Mill." o8 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. the Muscular Sense gives us, by means of the sense of energy impeded, the idea of Resistance, accurately in- terpreted, this language does not refer to any pheno- mena other than strictly subjective. " Sense of energy impeded " is, of coiu-se, relative to our own conscious- Dess, just as " resistance " is strictly a feeling, and does not of itself and by itself testify to anything more. If once we have given to us, in some way, tlie External Object, then we see at once that the Muscular Sense may immediately acquaint us with the fiict that that External Object is a resisting one : but if all that we have to start with is the Muscular Sense, as a feeling of some sort, and its intimation to us, viz., Resistance, we cannot, except witli an obvious "salto mortal^" arrive at an External Object, of which this Resistance (wliich we only know as '' feeling ") is a quality. Possibly, too, it is right to give some weight to an objection urged by Dr. McCosh. He notices, in the account given of tlie action of the j\Iuscular Sense, the part played by voliimn^ which at once introduces an element above sensations. We may draw out the objection in this way. The Motor-Nerve is under the control of the Will. Now if the Will is to act, if volition determines on setting a particular member in action, we must obviously have formed some idea of the member, before we can make a volition concerning it. That is to say, before the Muscular Sense can be exerted, we must have some idea of a member, which THE PEIMAEY QUALITIES OF MATTEE. 89 member is, of course, external to consciousness, and yet the Muscular Sense is supposed to originate the idea of Externality. Nor is the whole theory free, even physiologically, from doubt. That on which the inference of Ex- ternality mainly depends, — the Muscular Sense and its (Uscriminatke seufiibiUtjj (the power, that is, which it has of distinguishing between a lesser and a greater amount of intensity of effort or impediment of energy) — has been actually denied by some physiologists.* Sensationalist schemes of Philosophy find " Space " a difficult conception to account for : nor is this re- markable. For our conception of Space is, essentially, " synchronous," ?'.irioii of Hume that tlie Idea of Time is merely abstraetetl fr«»m our exiK'iit'Tico of the succession of sensations. (Cf. " Examination," p. 217. >• An entity called Time, I do not and need not postulate." Cf. what he i>ay.> in the oi>ening ehai)ter on "the llehitivity of Knowledge," and James Mill's "Analysis." Vol. ii. p. I'M. •• Tim.' is a collective name for the feeling of the snceession of feelings.") It is not, then, a form, or conceittion prior to Kxpcrience. and ap|)lied to any arw-l e\'ery experience we obtain by an inexitahh;; necessity arising from the mind itself : it, like everytliing else, is a product of Experience : and so far as the i»rincii)le liolds that an aljstraction, as the work of thought, is less in contact with reality than the concrete "facts" from which it is obtained, the idea of Time is less real than that succession of scn,sations from which it is an abstraction. If this be Mill's position (and his system as an Experimental System demands it) the criticism is pertinent which asks, whether any amount of sue nsations can give rise to the conception of a succession of sensations / It can oidy in one way, if there be a mind present to each seniation., holding tlicm in due relations to one another, and transforming into permanencies tlie pcrisliing serieeof sense-im|>res- sions. For we can only talk of a succession, if the first of the series be in our minds cfiually with the last. Time, as a mental form, applied U> -. ii>e, gives rise to the concejjtion " a succession of sensa- tions:" but the reverse hardly holds in the same way; sensations sncceeding one another cannot and do not give rise to the Idea of Time. THE PEIMAKY QUALITIES OF MATTER. 93 itself a derivative, not a primary idea. It is derived from the sequence of sense-impressions. Tlierefore Space is derived from that which is itself derived from sequent sensations. And so before we get to Space at all, we have to face the difficulty, how can sequent sensations give rise to the idea of Sequence itself? The difficulties of Space-derivation are dependent on the prior difficulties of Time-derivation. Let us however pass over this point, and look nar- rowly at the language in wdiich Mill and Bain describe how these Tactual and Muscular Sensations originate the idea of Extension. The muscular sensation * " gives the feeling of linear extension, inasmuch as this is measured by the sweep of a limbj or other organ, moved by muscles." And again, on the next page, words meet us like '' the range of an arm," " the total sreecp of the arm," &c. Now here is a piece of Hterary artifice, not quite so clever as Hume's, because the elder philosopher was an adept at such strategy. These words "sweep" and "range" are at once intelligible, if we pre-suppose the idea of space: but what meaning are we to attach to them without such pre-supposition ? Wliat is " sweej)," if not " sweep through space ? " f ^^^ if Hiq^q words ♦ "Examination," p. 209, &c. t The argument is urged by many critics. Mill's answer in the note to the 13th chapter is, that both he and Bain have been careful to limit the expressions to " feelings." In that case, how is " space " originated at all ? 94 THE METAPHYSICS OF MHX. are only used metaphorically, how are we one step in advance in the origination of Space, or what definite meaning can they be supposed to convey? I say nothing of the words " of the arm " in these expres- sions : though indeed they must mean that in some way or other, we have got hold of " the arm" as an objective reality, apart from and beyond our mere sub- jective consciousness. Hume talked of " points," and " disposition of points " — words which have an unmis- takable objective reference, if they are to mean any- thing. Mill, in his turn, talks of " sweep *' and "range of arm and limb," which, if they are to mean anything, must likewise involve an objective reference, viz., the pre-supposition of Space itself, as a reality. However this may be, the Sensational is tic difficulty of constructing co-existence out of succession, still remains. Tlie idea of Space grows somehow out of the idea of Time. Successive sensations, given by Touch and the Muscular Sense, produce ultimately the idea of Space, which is not successive — which is, in reality nothing, if it is not the co-existence of parts. It is the merit of Mill that he sees this difficulty clearly, and that he tries to meet it. It is the Eye, he gays, which converts, or seems to convert succession into co-existence * " The conception we now have of Extension or Space is an eye-picture, and compre- hends a great number of parts of Extension at once, or • P. 275. THE PRIMAEY QUALITIES OE MATTER. 95 in a succession so rapid that our consciousness con- founds it with simultaneity." Feelings of Touch are successive ; then come the feelings given us by the Eye, and the result is that that which is originally known as successive, now becomes "embraced" as a co-existence. The exact opinions of Mill with regard to the Sensa- tions given by the Eye, are hard to be sure of I am by no means certain that I really apprehend his mean- ing. What, in the case of the Eye, is immediate, in- tuitive, and what is derivative, inferential ? Berkeley, in " the Essay on Vision," said that Colour is the im- mediate object of the Eye, and Distance is an inference. Mill, if we may judge from what he says in other places — as e.g, in his " Dissertations and Discussions " * — seems to defend Berkeley's theory of vision against his critics. So here he seems to agree that " the distinctive impressibility of the Eye is for Colour." t If that is the case, it is obvious that the Eyesight, as feeling, must give us successive sensations, in our notion of Space, just like any other Sense, and not co-existence of parts. The case is not really altered by speaking of the active or muscular sensibility of the eye. The " sweep " of the eye cannot give us, any more than the sweep of an arm, aught but successive sensations. Still the idea of co-existence of parts — the essential idea of Space — remains unaccounted for. * Vol. ii. art. on Bailey. f P- 280. »jO THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. Later speculations cut the knot by practically deny- ing the truth of Berkeley's analysis. Miiller supposes that vision at once and immediately perceives a super- ficies.* Thus, length and breadth, two dimensions of 8i>ace, are at once perceived. It is only when we come to the perception of a Solid, that we leave the sphere of immediate intuition, and reach inferences from sen- sations, or a judgment. A superficies, accordingly, is immediately perceived by the eye: a solid is only mediately perceived, or reached by a judgment or infe- rence. If Mill believed this, he could, of course, prove that co-existence of parts is given by the Eyesight : for the Eye would then immediately * embrace ' as a superficies (which is extension) that which is only sue- c«U ..Led b. ..„h J....i..,. But he ™,M * patlicr different is Helmholtz — who disa.[^rees witli and criticises Miiller. See Wb article on "■ ITie Recent rr<^'" r»f the Theory t»f Vi-i )!i " in the '* Preussische Jahrbiicher " of is<;.s. transhited in Dr. Atkinson's " Popalar Scientific Lectures of Hehiilioltz." In that esisay, althoogli there are many 8cntencr'>, which are thorouglily in the spirit of the Berkleian analysis (ejj.j '* It is clear that the (iiiality of onr sensations, and es{)ecially our sensations of sight, does not Ifive us a true impression of corrcsjionding ciualities in the outer world "'), the Binocular system of vision is supposeti to make some difference, and (if I understand it aright) to generate our notions of distance. For the two eyes look each at different part.s of the object tefore them. Of course, one lias to learn to interpret one's signs ; but the Idealist contention is that one cannot do this without the m prwn form of Space. Once given that, the signs can l>e inter- preted, the different pictures given by the two eyes being now recognised as bein;^^ in different parts of Space. But only starting from one's different eye-feelings, how is the notion of Space to be gained ? THE PEIMAEY QUALITIES OF MATTER. 97 only do so by practically denying Berkeley's Theory of Vision (which he is far from doing) : and then it would surely be a work of supererogation* to trace the growth of ' Space ' out of Tactual and Muscular Sensations, for to the Eye, Space would be an immediate intuition. Here, as elsewhere. Mill would seem to halt be- tween the Sensationalism he inherited from Hume and Berkeley, and the later speculations of the Experiential School. He acknowledges that Space, according to Tactual intimations, can only be a succession of sensa- tions ; but he seems to think that the Eyesight can grasp succession, as co-existence, which it can not do, unless it immediately perceives Space in two dimen- sions. If it does so perceive Space, the whole Psyclio- logical analysis is unnecessary. Space is not an inference at all, it is an Intuition. * At least, for the present purpose. Tlic inquiry as to the manner in which persons born blind derive " Space" fi'om Touch, of course, remaiua C IT 4 PT F 1 ^ V T T V-y -"•«■ '-An. life. ~]l. win. «JL -JI...-JI ...JL. Ik.1 T JL, J>, # r CAUSATION AND THE UNIFOKMITY OF KATUIIE. After our concei.tions of Body and Space, and tlie uiaiiner io wliieli we come to enter tain them, our next c*onccrn is with the constitution of the Nat ural World •3^1.011 l^'elief in the processes of Nature. AVe have, tliat is to sa}', to examiue Mill's o|)iiiions_ on.tlie ques- tions of" Causation " and " Natural Uniformity." On what do In luction and I nductive processes de- jH*nd ? The ground of Induction * answers Mill, is the Uniformity of Nature, which may he tluis defined :— ,iJBt what is true in certain c ases is true of every other case rt'semhlini^ the former in certain assign al)le fes2)ects. How is this Uniformity of Nature HovedJ It is a generalisation from all our Inductions, a con- elusion "per enumerationem siroplicem " from^nduc- tions that we have carried out in past time. Tlie question naturally occurs, " Is not an 'inductio ' per simplicem enunierationem ' a very fallacious one ? " • " Logic," hk. iii. c, iii CAUSATION, AND UNIFORMITY OF NATURE. 99 It is, and it is not, answers Mill. It is in certain cases — cases of a limited range of experience. It is not in others. In the particular case we are consider- ing, it is not fallacious for this reason : the evidence for the axiom of " Natural Uniformity " is ohtained from so large a field of experience, that any real excep- tions, if any such existed, must have come under our notice. These innumerahle Inductions, coinciding in one result, and all pointing in one direction, cover the whole field of Nature's operations. Therefore here the *' enumeratio simplex " is adequate to prove the conclu- sion. Or, as he says in a later chapter,* '' The suhject^ matter of our law is so widely difiused that there is no time, place, or set of circumstances in which it is not fulfilled. It is clear, then, that the law can not be frustrated by any counteracting causes, exce[)t such as never occur, and cannot depend upon any collocations except such as exist at all times and places." Further, of those phenomena of wliich we do not positively know it to be true, one after another is constantly passing from this class into that of known examples of its truth, and any deficiency, or absence of positive know- ledge of its truth, may always be accounted for by the variety and obscurity of the phenomena in these special cases. At the same time, Mill adds, we cannot extend the validity of this Law of Causation beyond the limits of * " Logic," bk. iii. c. xxi. vol. ii. H 2 -"-- --^' ■— *— IttO TITT? lirVT \ 'DTT'VGTPQ AT? UrTT T OUT Experience : we cannot say that every event follows from a cause in distant stellar worlds, for example : such an extension is unauthorised and illeg*itimate.* Anotlier difficulty occurs. If Indiic tion itself rests f ■ ~ "" "*"""■■■"■■ for its validity on the Uniformity of Xatiire (as its major premiss), and the Uniformity of Nature rests on a number of Inductions, Jire we not here in a vicious circle of inference? Tlie answer, says ^lill, lies in a proper view of the function of the llnjor Premiss in a Syllog-ism. If we suppose that the conclusion really rests on, and is proved by, the Major Premiss, then obviously we cannot but suppose that the circular form of the reasoning- given above, is fatal to its validitv. But such is not tlie function of the Major Premiss. It is but the summary, the record, the memorandum in concise language of our experience, so far as it has gone. Both the conclusion, therefore, and the major premiss are alike conclusions from the antecedently observed particular cases. Hence, both the conclusion reached by Induction, and the major premiss — the Uniformity of Nature — are proved by the instances we have observed before, ?>., by our experience.! After these statements of the absolute validity of the Uniformity of Nature, we proceed to Causation, * " Logic," l.k. iii. c. xxi. 8. 4, last par. t Ibid., bk. iii. c. iii. s. 1 j c. xxi. s. 4. <.l CAUSATION, AND UNIFOEMITY OF NATUEE. 101 and the d^^nition of a " Cause."* "The notion, of Cause, being the root of the wliole theory of Induction, it is indispensable," says Mill, " that this idea should, with the utmost practicable degree of precision, be fixed and determined." Now the Law of Causation is y . this : (1) That everv phenomenon, which has a beo^iur lung, must have some Cause, and (2) That given the CausCjlhe effect will invariably follow {mmus counter- actTiig causes). What, then, is a Cause? It is an antecedent, and further, it is an utcarlaUe antecedent. But we must not suppose that " cause " is necessarily one single phenomenon : it is, most frequently, an assemblage of phenomena, the effect following upon a sum of several antecedents. We may, it is true, draw a distinction between a Cause, and the Conditions or the Occasion, the Cause being, as it were, the last in order of time, immediately following on which occurs the event; but this is a convenient, more than a logical distinction. The Cause is the sum of condi- tions : the sum, in feet, of positive and negative con- ditions (" positive " being " the conditions which must be present," " negative " being " those which must be absent "). These negative conditions are further speci- fied as being, either " Counteracting Causes " (which neutralise the effect of the other antecedents by pro- ducing their own) or "Preventing Causes" (which destroy the effect, by simply arresting it). * " Logic," bk. iii. c. v. s. 2. 102 THE METAPHYSICS OF mLL. CAUSATION, AND UNIFOEMITY OF NATURE. 10,3 So far tliCD, Cause is defined as " tlie iiivariablt^ antecedent, or anteced-ents." Is tliis all that tliere is in onr idea of Cause ? No, for day is the invariable antecedent of ni<;lit (and vice versa), and yet no one calls day tlie cause of nig^lit. Why is this? Because the sequence of ni»;lit ui>ou day depends n[)on another condition— viz., tlie rotation of the earth and the con- sequent absence of the sun. The cause then, must be ** nncoiiditioiial " : it must produce the effect, under ^any iniaginal>le su|)position withreg'ard to other things. If night followed day, whether the rotation of tlie eartli ceased or not, then d;iy niiglit rightly be called the cause of night. But it does not, therefore it is not the cause.y The Cause, then, is the invariable, uncon- ditional antecedent " The Cause is the antecedent, or concurrence of antecedents, on whicli the effect is in- variably and unconditionally consequent." * Some furtlier questions, relative to this general sul)- ject, are discussed by Mill, which we may briefly summarise. Is the distinction between " agent " and " patient " a real one ? No, it is merely verbal, patients are always agents. A man's condition, when he takes prussic acid, is as much the cause, or agent of his death, as the prussic acid, f Must a cause always precede, by ever so short an interval, its effect ? No, Mill seems to answer ; some- times it is simultaneous.* Is the type or Causation, and the only source from which we derive the idea, our own voluntary agency ? Certainly not. For the idea of "Power" cannot be derived from my will producing my bodily motions, from Mind acting on Body, because Mind only acts on Body medkttebjj through a chain of antecedents and con- sequents (our nerves and muscles) of wdiich we are not conscious. Nor yet can it be said that the Idea of Power comes from the pow'cr of Self over the volitions, "from myself, producing my Will," because Mill pro- fesses that so far as he is concerned, he is not conscious of this power at all. The fact is that the notion of '^ productive power " as applied to causation, is merely a delusion : all tliat experience does or can generate is an idea of invariable sequence.! It is not difficult to find difficulties in Mill's account of Causatio n, for Mill himself, with that frank incon- sistency, w^ith which many of his theories are ex- pounded, has taken care to leave them on tlie surface. The first difficulty is concerned with the relation whicii he exhibits between the Law of Causation and • ** Logic,'* bk. iii. c. v. s. C. t Ibid. s. 4. ml * " Logic," bk. iii. c. v. s. 7. t 3Iiirs " Examiiiatioii of namilton," c. xvi. pp. Sod-^Gl. " Logic," bk. iii. c. v. s. U. Cp. 104 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. CAUSATION, AND UNIFOEMITY OF NATUEE. 105 the Law of the Uniformity of yat - i i ra. Tliey are, of "■("'ourse, not the same tiling. The first means that no tiling happens without a cause of some sort, the second tliat tlie wliole pliysical workl exhibits uniform, methods and hiws. The first means that we are com- pelled to Iielieve that every antecedent has a conse- quent, a,nd every consequent an antecedent, the second that: wt' a,re com [jelled to believe that uniform sequences of events and causes hold in every possible department of our knowledge about Xfiture. What is the relation between these two? Evidently this — tliat from tlie first — viz., that there is a regidar succession in phenomena — we arrive at tlie second — that all nature exhibits uniform laws. But in all extensions of our knowledge of physical and other jihenomena, Iiow do we proceed ? Vie assume that, if we look long enough, the event we are inspecting will be proved to have a cause, because all nature is uni- form. Thus the ground of a fresh Induction is that which is itself the last result of an Induction. We may press the difficulty even a little fiirther. It is obvious that until we have exhausted all the different departments of knowledge about Nature, we cannot be perfectly sure tliat the Law of Causation holds every- jyhere. It must be therefore dangerous to bring in the assumption of uniformity to fortify ourselves in reducing fresh investigations into cases of this law of uniformity. Mill's answer to this is that, in reality, the conclu- i-l sion of our syllogisms about Nature is proved along witli the assumed major premiss by the amount oL cases we have observed befor^. That is to say that l^xperience proves concurrently loth the increasing Talidity of the General Law of Uniformity and the [.articular instance we are at present observing. Such a concrusion, then, depends strictly on the Experience crone throuo-li, and both General Law and Particular Fact are valid exactly to the same extent— viz., so far as thev are inferences from past experience. This is all the necessity and universality of the Law, that any *' inductio per simplicem enumerationem " can possibly attain to. The difficulty with regard to this circular argument —that Induction depends on the Law of Uniformity and Uniformity itself depends on Induction—lias been met in other ways, and some of them appear certainly more satisfactory than Mill's avowal, which makes our belief in Uniformity depend on our past experience. Tlie later Experiential School would meet it, I suppose, in this way. It is true that in fresh cases of Induction, the Uniformity of Nature, as a Law, is logically prior to this or that uniformity which we prove by its means. But though logically prior, it yet may be historically posterior. Logically, a postulate, it yet may be, historically, a product. In other words, men start now in their fresh explorations with the belief in Uniformity, but the belief itself is the slow result of 108 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. accumulated experiences in past generations. Prior to tlie Individual, it is posterior to tlie Race, just like tliose notions of Time and Space, which men begin with DOW, as a priori notions, though in reality they are (according to Mr. Herbert Spencer*) the products of tlieir fathers' a posteriori experience. The same discrimination between logical priority and historical posteriority serves also to ex^dain other notions. Thus, for examide, logically, the Universal is prior to the Particular : historically, the Particular is prior to the Universal. Logically, Duty, as an idea, is prior to particular cases of " what ought to be done : " his- torically, we arrive at our idea of Duty after a series of particular dutiful acts. But this exi)lanation is due to that enlarjxement of the sphere of Experience, which we have as ' the note' of more modern experientialists than Mill. Experience, to them, is not experience of the indi- vidual, but experience of the race : and so many of these difficulties (among others tlie proof of the validity of Geometrical axioms) are met. But in Jlillj with liis use of "simplex emimeratio" all we have is a belief in Uniformity seemingly proportionate to the experience which ?/v', not our forefathers, have under- gone. However capaUcTof extension the theory may be, as a matter of fact, by Mill it is not so extended. ♦ H. Spen,cer'8 " First Principles," [.p. 1G2— 165. " rsjchol.;>r experience, waiting to become cjTeAc'xeta. The very age of Mythology gives the l)e:^t illustration of liow natural it is for men to apply categories of Causation. Tlic Greeks, in a ^lytho- logical age, were anxious to provide causes for every- thing, — causes for the wind, in an ^olus, causes fi)r thunder in Hephajstos, causes for sea-storms, in Poseidon. They did not realise, it is true, the Uniformity of Nature, — that all Nature exhibits uni- form processes of action and abjures tlieories of Oc- casionalism ; they simply could not : they had not had the experience. But they strictly believed that every event has a cause of some sort, liowever foncifully the category of Causation was applied. Still less, of course, can it be urged that Human Volition forms any exception to this process. Mill himself notes that some Intuitionists believe that the relation of the Will or Ego to action, forms the type of all Causation. And naturally so : for men, in their application of the category of Causality, are guided by those phenomena, of ivhicli they have earliest experience. That some philosophers do not beheve in " the uniformity of Nature" as applied to the sphere of human volition, does not in any way affect the question of the origin- ality of the form of Causation. Whether they do or do CAUSATION, AND UNIFOEMITY OF NATURE. 109 not believe that a motive stands to an act, in precisely the same relation as a physical antecedent stands to a pliysical consequent, they do not, therefore, believe that human action is uncaused : the Ego, the Self is the Cause, — a free cause, a first cause. Leaving now the relation between Causation as a Law and the belief in the Uniformity of Nature, let us l)roceed to Mill's definition of C^^ Here we had 1. «■ ■" ' "•«■*»««—*»-• « ■•"•« •'*"" better put aside all collateral issues, and confine our- selves to the main point* What is a Cause ? It is an invariable unconditional Antecedent^ Let us take each of these attributes iu turn. The relation of Cause and Effect, of Antecedent and Consequent, is discovered by Experience, and yet Cause is the invariable antecedent Does not this word "invariable" open the whole difficulty again ? for what does '^invariable" in com- * Difficulties tlicre undoubtedly are in some of Mill's subsidiary ^ remarks. Kf/. Tlie cause precedes the event, says iMill, sometimes, and yet the distinction between Agent and Patient, is utterly unreal, the Patient is always an Agent. If so it would obviously be truer to say, tlie Cause never prectdes the Effect, for the Effect (being the Patient) is always a Cause (Agent) and therefore can never be posterior to it. Or again, it is not true, according to Mill, to say " cessante causa cessat ct effectus," for a body through which a sword has passed, continues dead, even when the sword has been removed. That is to say, the patient continues, the agent is removed. Yet Patients are always Agents. The r>ody must be conceived of a< continuously the C:iuse of its own death— a somewhat unnecessary inversion of ordinary language. ^y^ 1 i u THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. mon parla nce m eap? Tliat to which no exception has l)een or can be discovered. The last part — the words " can he " are as important as the first. But what must " invariable " mean to Mill ? That to wliich no exception Ms been discovered. In other words " in- variability" is exactly measured by the amount ofex- perience under^^^one. It is a parallel use to tlie word *^ inconceivability," " Inconceivability," for Mill, is strictly relative to experience: so too is invariability. It can have no otlier meanini*-. Tlie misfortune is that Mill is supposed to be in advance of Hume, because he is more scientific. Which is the more logical here ? Hume said that Experience r»f antecedents and consequents led to the formation of a custom of expecting the consequent when we found the antecedent. Mill sa\'s that the Cause is the ante- cedent, invariable so far as our experience has gone. The difference between the custom (founded on past experiences) of finding a consequent, when we come across an antecedent, and Mill's assertion that Cause is the antecedent, invariable, so far as our experience lias gone, is certainly not very great. If there is anv difierence, it is that Hume confines himself wiihin what Lis spte. allows him, while Mill, in using the word invariable, does not always explain that he only means ^'unvaried." As to any real objective validity in Causality, it must be denied by 0„ J,,.. „ „ucU „ b, .ho .,!,„. H.... opoulj CAL^SATION, AND UNIFORMITY OF NATUEE. Ill denies it. Mill does so quite as much when lie makes the relation depend upon a number of experiences, which are of course subjective. If it expresses more than this, if it is an objective relation between objective fiicts, we at once want to know, how Mill's account of externality, limiting it to Permanent Possibilities of Sensation, can admit either of such an objective relation, or of such objective facts, between which the relation is to hold. -^' Let us turn to Mill's second adjective, the word *' unc onditional ." I supi)0se that there is no student of Mill who has not felt some difficulty in understand- ing how this attribute of '' unconditionality " is meant t£j^lJ^PPlJ'^^-^^^ used. We are told that the cause is the sum of *' the conditions," antecedent to an event : * imd yet we are told that the cause is " unconditional." t We are told that an cfiect only follows a cause in the absence of counteracting phenomena : and yet that if the cause is real, the eftect follows ^^ under any ima- ginable supposition with regard to other things." X ]\Iiirs instance of the relation of Night and Day does not throw much light on our confusion. Day is not the cause of night, says Mill, because Niglit following on Day depends on another condition— viz., the rota- tion of the earth. But inasmuch as it would appear tliat the precedence of day is one of the conditions (for it is irai)lied in the rotation of the earth), the theory * " Logic;- bk. iii. c. v. s. 3. f Ibid., s. 6. % Ibii., s. G, par. 2. 11.2 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. which makes a Cause the sum of conditions, must include tliat precedence, in the cause of night. And indeed it is difficult to conceive why tlie analysis which resolves Causation into ohserved sequence, should refuse to find in Day the cause of Night. The spirit, at all events, of Hume's discussion seems to find it quite a satisfoctory enough instance to give of the relation of Causation.* Thewor.l "unconditional," in reality, rests on a view of the relation of mind to nature, quite diftereiit from that whicli Mill unfolds in his Psychological theories. Starting from a purely subjective basis of feeling, it is hard, indeed, to understand its meaning: but if we start from any realistic theory, it becomes, of course, intelligible enough. IVomJ^mi^ at all events, weare entitled to demand this much : that either he shQuld refuse to speak of Cause as the sum of conditions, or else refuse to define Cause, as the unconditional ante- ^^^M. He must either draw a clear distinction be- twoen Cause and Condition (which he does not do) or else abandon his adjective " unconditional." We see, perhaps, the difficulty more clearly, when we observe how Mill has to limit his " unconditionality.'' "Unconditional" just like "invariable" means only "so far as experience has gone." Therefore, although " unconditional " is defined as " under any imaginalile supposition with regard to other things," we find that * " Inqniry/' s. 4, p. 1. CAUSATION, AND UXIFOEMITY OF NATURE. li:i the latter words only mean under any supposition with regard to the things, which have come under our \ experience. Thus in distant parts of the stellar re- gions, events may well be imagined to follow without a cause, just as in that nebulous region 2 + 2 may=i5.* That is to say that intelligence coming across new plie^:"^ nomena may have to alter its laws. No clearer proof is needed to show how little the words " invariable " and " unconditional " mean. We surely ought to mean by them that they hold good for all intelligence : that even if we do arrive at the study of phenomena in distant stellar regions, there too we shall apply our category of Causation just as much as we do in regions that have come already under our study. Then " in- variable " means what it implies. But with Mill, it only means " unvaried within the limits of our expe- rience," not absolutely invariable. The conclusion is forced upon us that these words, " invariable " and " unconditional," by which Mill " developes " his predecessor's doctrine, are but the darkening of the clear counsels of Hume. Hume we"^ could understand : but then Hume invalidated Science. / Mill, to save Science, adds fresh words. The relation of Cause and Efiect is still merely a subjective association, ,' based on past sensations, past experience : yet the rela- tion must be conceived as " invariable " and " uncondi- tional." Hence, complexity and confusion of spirit. ^^ * " Logic," bk. iii. c. sxi, s. 4, last par. I 114 THE METxlPHYSICS OF MILL. One word, finally, as to the qElBi^B) combated by Mill, botli in the " Logic," Bk. iii. c. v. and the chapter on Sir W. Hamilton— the opinion, viz., that Voliti on is the source and type of all our ideas of Power, and tf Ml I iiiiiiiiiiiii I --- » " " ""■ * tiierefoi^'SFCau^ Mill asks, Wliat Idea of Power do we find in ourselves ? (much the same question as Hume asked). Is it Power to act, or Power to will? If the former, there are so many steps between the originating impulse and the consequent action — so much intermediate action of muscles, &c., of which we are iofuorant, — that no idea of Power can thence be derived. This does not appear a wholly satisfactory criticism. A despot, I imagine, feels a real power in giving his orders, though he may be ignorant of the various officials through whom his orders get executed, if he is sure that they will be executed somehow. Some such assurance certainly is possessed by the Will. The second alternative— that what we feel is a Power of Self over the Volitions, or a Power to Will, Mill disposes of without argument. Mill, "in common with one-half the psychological world," is wholly un- conscious of having any such power. It does not necessarily follow that the other half of the psycholo- gical world is equally unconscious. The argument, if argument it be, is capable of too easy a retort But in reality, the opinion itself, that finds in Self mnd in Volition the type of Power in Causation, is CAUSATION, AND UNIFOEMITY OF NATURE. 115 found, I need scarcely say, in JMansel and others and not in Kant. Mansel says * (following in the steps of Cousin, to whom he is largely indebted), that the soul is a power conscious of itself. To Kant, any such assertion would hardly commend itself. To say this of the Soul, is to rise above Categories, is to treat the Soul as a Noumenon, and not, as Ave can only know it, to treat it as exhibiting Phenomena. In one sense, of course, the mere fact of ct priori mental Categories assumes a certain power in the " pure Ego " to impose them ; the mere fact of its bringing a Category of Causation to bear in the construction of an Intelligible World, implies a certain mental activity. But Kant denied the Power of the individual Self over Volition and Actions, and in that sense denied Free AVill to the Ego. On the other hand, Free Will, as shown in Morality, is brought back again. But we are only concerned with the Logical aspect of tliis question, and from that point of view, such a notion of Power in the Self, is alien to the critical methods of Kant. ♦ i ' Prolegomena Logica," p. 139. I 2 MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS. 117 YIII MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS AND NECESSARY TRUTHS. We proceed to the foundations of Geometry and Arithmetic, or iu other words to Mill's treatment of Necessary Truths. A passage in Mill's Autobiography which has been recently quoted,* shows that with regard to these Necessary Truths, Mill purposely chose for his con- sideration Mathematical Axioms, because thus he thought he should carry the war into the very citadel of the enemy. If the Axioms of Geometry were shown to be inductions from experience, much more would other so-called necessary truths, cease to be considered " a priori J* To this attempt, then— to make Mathematical Axioms the result of Experience,— Mill devotes himself in ** Logic," Bk. II. c. V. and vi. These chapters may be divided into three separate questions. * By Professor JcYons, in Contemporary Review for December, 1877. (i.) What is the meaning of Necessary Truth ? (ii.) In what sense and to what extent are Mathe- matical Truths necessary ? or in other words — what is the meaning of Mill's "Hypothetical Mathematics?" (iii.) Are Axioms Experimental Truths ? (i.) Necessary truth as ordinarily defined, is supposed to be that which is independent of any and every ex- perience. It is a priori truth. . Such is, however, not the sense of Necessary Truth o Mill. Necessity to him is necessity and certainty of Inference—not certainty or necessity of truth. In other words the term is applicable to the process of reasoning, not to the a priori conditions of reasoning. (" The certainty ascribed is nothing whatever but certainty of inference.") But inference from what? Inference from assumptions, which, by the conditions of the enquiry are not to be questioned. This then is Mill's definition of Necessary Truth, "Necessary Truth is sucli as necessarily follows from assumptions which cannot be questioned." Why these assumptions are not to be questioned, is a query to which we shall return later. fii.) " The character of necessity, ascribed to the truths of Mathematics,* and even the peculiar certainty (sometimes) attributed to them is an illusion," says ]\Iill. ^Vhy ? Because they relate to purely imaginary objects. " There does not exist either in nature, or ♦ Mill's « Logic," Bk. ii. c. 5, sec. 1. 118 ■THE METxlPnYSICS OF MILL. in the Imman mincl any objects exactly corresponding to the definitions of Geometry." There is no such thing as a " point witlioiit magnitude " or a " straight line, — length without breadth," or a perfect circle. Therefore the assumption implied in the definitions of Geometry " that there exist real things conformable to the definitions " is false.* Now the conclusions of Geometry follow from the definitions, and the definitions themselves are built upon the hypothesis that there exist real things con- formable thereto. Therefore Geometry rests upon a liypothesis — or in other words it is concerned not with such points, circles, straight lines, as are seen in nature ; but witli ideal points, ideal circlesj Xc. The same thing holds good also of the science of number, t " In all propositions concerning numbers, a condition is implied witliout which none of them would be true, and that condition is an assumption which may be false. The condition is that 1 = 1, that all the numbers are numbers of the same or of equal units. Let this be doubtful, and not one of the propositions of Arith- metic will hold true.*' Arithmetic then, and the Science of Numbers as well as, .Geometry, rest on a hypothe- sis, an assumption. What is the conclusion ? It is stated very clearly by Mill I 'Mathematics, of course, is the type of a V * " Not strictly true," ninth edition. t " Logic," bk. ii. c. vi., sec. 3. $ Ibid., sec. I. MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS. 119 L Deductive Science, and its method rests on hypotheses. The result is in JVIill's language " that the Method of all Deductive Sciences is hypothetical." ^^ They proceed by tracing the consequences of certain assumptions, leaving for separate consideration whether the as- sumptions are true or not, and if not exactly true, whether they are a sufficiently near approximation to the truth." While elaborating his own view, Mill takes occasion to adduce arguments against another view of Mathe- matical Necessity, viz., that of the Nominalists, who would resolve all such necessary Truths into merely analytical propositions.* According to them (and we may remember that Hobbes and Leibnitz are among them) the Definitions and Theorems of the Science of Number are merely verbal. We are analysing what we mean by particular terms, straight lines or units, &c., and we affirm no more in the predicate when we say that two and one are three, than what we have already im- plicitly affirmed in the subject. The view is supported by the argument that we do not carry ideas of any particular thing along with us, when we manipulate algebraical or arithmetical symbols, as a and x. In answer to this. Mill asserts that we are throughout dealing with tilings and not with symbols. " Ten must mean ten bodies, or ten sounds, or ten beatings of the pulse." The Symbols are things, and our operations * " Logic," chap. vi. sec. 2. f ttn X . 1 1 1 i JjlLx^ XxxX J-L J. OXv^'O \J£ JixLLX^Xj* upon tliem express facts. As to the other argument of the K'ominalists tliatthe Propositionsof Number, when considered as Propositions relating to things, all seem to be identical propositions, Mill replies that though the subject and predicate of a numerical proposition may have the same denotation (denoting the same objects) yet they may have a different connotation (as implying different states of those same olyects). In " two and one = three," for instance, the subject says ££ CD d) and CD," the predicate this " j> (iii.) IVe come now to the third point — that Axioms are experimental truths.* " What is the ground for our belief in axioms — what is the evidence on which they rest ? They are experimental truths : generaliza- tions from observation." The evidence upon which we believe them is of the same kind as tlie evidence upon which we believe any other fact of external nature — our experience of their truth. They are the simplest and easiest cases of generalization from experience. In order to support this view. Mill has to undertake two tasks. L He has to show that the evidence derived from experience is sufficient to prove axioms. This he does by pointing out how experience con- firms them every moment in our lives. Experimental proofs crowd upon us in profusion without any instance • a Logic," chap. v. sec. 4. MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS. 121 of a possible exception. If then experience is sufficient to convince us of their truth, why should we be at the pains of sujiposing other ''a priori''' evidence necessary ? ii. In the next place, he has to defend his theory against attacks. (a.) " Axioms are seen to be true by merely tJdnJdng of them, not by actual experiment of seeing and feel- ing." But, says IMill, Imagination can so reproduce sensations of form that our mental pictures of lines, circles, &c., are as fit subjects for experimentation, as the realities. {ft.) " The axioms contain an assertion of invaria- bility and universality, e.g.^ one axiom says, two straight lines cannot meet if prolonged to infinity. How is this to be explained by an experience which can never talk of an infinite distance?" ]\Iill answers : that we know that, if the two straight lines would meet, tliey would meet at a finite distance, and we can in imagination transport ourselves to that point, and there in imagination discover that the two convergent lines are not straight lines, but crooked ones. Imagi- nation, and its power to reproduce sensations of form, help us over this difficulty. (y.) '' But the contradictory of these axiomatic truths is inconceivable,'' Mill replies, that what is inconceiv- able is neither necessarily, nor always false. For inconceivability is altogether an accidental thing, or as 122 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. ^ill pots it, " Botli what persons can and wliat tliey cannot conceive is veiy much an affiiir of accident, and dei»ends altogether on their experience and their habits of thoiio:ht." If we have in i)ast experience frequently and constantly found a Proposition true, we believe its contradictory to be inconceivable. If, on the contrary, we have ever found it false, or if tliere exist analogies which suggest tlie possibility of its ever being false, then its contradictory becomes conceivable. Moreover, we have several examples of Propositions once regarded as inconceivable, now recognised not merely as conceivable but as being the only true accoiuits.* E.g., to Newton, that a body should act where it is not, was inconceivable ; now it is recognised, says Mill, in the theory of Gravitation and Magnetism. And on the other hand, we have instances of truths really arrived at by long exi)erience and investigation, which have become so familiar, that some scientific men hold them to be necessary truths, ^.y., tlie first law of motion (which by some is held to be a neces- sary truth), and the laws of chemical composition. So the test of inconceivableness proves nothing, except that " two ideas are so firmly associated in our minds that we find it impossible to disconnect them." Hence the general result follows — that axioms are experimental truths. • u Logic," bk. ii, c. v, sec. 6, MATHEMATICiiL AXIOMS. 123 In examining Mill's doctrines on the subject of Mathematics and Necessary Truths, there are two parts of the subject which we had better keep distinct. The first is expressed in the question : (1.) How far is Mill's own account of Mathe- matics and Geometry satisfactory and consistent with itself? The second will run thus : (2.) Can we believe that Necessity and Univer- sality are to be gained by the Association of Ideas, or, to put it differently, does Mill satisfactorily dispose of the test of In- conceivability of the opposite ? I. Let us first clearly see the difference between Mill and Hume in respect of Mathematical truths. With Hume,* all lines, angles, triangles, and figures with which the Geometrician is conversant, were nothing other than those which we have come across in our experience. Consequently Hume can only allow the mathematician an indefinite approach to exactness. It is all very well for the mathematician to pronounce all right angles equal, but any perfect equality — an equality " beyond what we have instruments and art to ascertain," — Hume says is '' a mere fiction of the mind, useless as well as incomprehensible." From the progressive correction of our actual measurements we have a tendency/ to feign perfect exactness, perfect ♦ Hume's " Treatise," part ii. sec. 4. 124 THE METAPHYSICS OF MttL. equality in tliese cases, but it is notliing else tlian a fiction. In perfect consistency with this we find Hume denying the infinite divisibility of extension. And throughout IIume*s s|>irit is tlie same, as indeed it must be for any philosopher, wlio makes all truths (and therefore all Mathematical trutlis) rest on experience. But just as Hume's doctrine of Cause was supposed to invalidate tlie possibility or truth of Natural Science, so too Hume's doctrine of Mathematical truth evidently supposes " an exactness " very dilierent from what the mathematician himself assumes. And just as Mill made some additions to Hume's doctrine of Causation to save Pliysics, so too he adds to liis predecessor's doctrine of Geometry to save Mathematical Science. The addition is this : that mathematical deductions depend on a hypothesis. We suppose, according to Mill, figm-es exactly corresponding to our definitions, though such do not really exist. The definitions, in fact, represent ideas, though not ideas to w^liich real objects can be found exactly answering. The lines, angles, and figures are ideal lines, angles, and figures. Witli Hume, on tlie contrary, all ideas were merely copies of impressions, and therefore our idea of a line could only be a copy of our impression of a line. This hypothetical character of Mathematics Mill derived from Dugald Stewart, and it is a refinement on Hume. Is this refinement an improvement ? MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS. 125 It is and it is not. We welcome with satisfaction the admission that there can be in the mind ideas, which are not copies of sensible things — ideas to which no external counterpart can exactly be found. We are glad to learn that the mind can manipulate ideal figures, and reason about them, and draw deductions from them — quite apart from tlie external (so-called) realities, with which we are conversant in experience. But then, what becomes of the assertion in the "Logic," that the theory " that knowledge consists in the agreement or disagreement of ideas, is tlie nio.st fatal mistake that ever retarded a scientific observer " ? Knowledge deals witli things, not with our ideas of things, says Mdl. But Mathematical Knowledge, at all events, seems to deal with our ideas of things^ and hot with things, — with our ideas of straight lines, and not with straight lines, such as we meet with in expe- rience. It is perhaps a little superfluous of Mill to say that ten means ten things, ten beats of the pulse, ten counters, &c., after this admission. And further, what have we heard of the mind hitherto, in Mill's system, which will account for this idealising power? The mind is only the permanent possibility of undergoing sensations. Sensations, and associations of sensations and ideas, give us the sum total of our mental furniture on the intellectual side. How then can the mind give us ideal lines, such as do not correspond with what Mill calls external realities ? 1911 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS. 127 How can it liave ideas to wliich no external objects can be found answering ? Of course Mill treats the idealising power as an illusion. But just as Hume might be called upon to account for his *Hendency to feign," of which he makes such conspicuous use, so Mill may be called upon to account for tliis idealising power, this power of framing hypothetical straight lines, which he uses in accounting tor mathematical ^ The real difficulty emerges later. The difficulty is to bring into harmony this hyijothetical character of definitions, and the other doctrine that axioms are nothing but experimental truths. For if " two straight lines cannot enclose a space" be a truth known only by experience, when we talk about straight lines we can only mean such straiglit lines as are known in expe- rience. If, on the other hand, the straight lines we talk about, are not straight lines known in experience, but ideal straight lines, the axiom in question cannot be learnt from experience, because exi)erience never testifies to it, ne¥er presenting us with lines really straight. Either, then, the ideal straight line must be an exact copy of a real straight line, or else axioms are not founded on Experience. Which is Mill's opinion ? It I is impossible to say. Is our mental image an exact "^opy of a reality, or is it not ? In the first section of chapter y. he says, " There exist no points without magnitude; no lines without breadth, nor perfectly straiglit ; no circles with all their radii exactly equal, nor squares with all their angles perfectly right. Their existence, so far as we can form any judgment, would seem to be inconsistent with the physical con- stitution of our planet at least, if not of the universe." In the fifth section he says, " The imaginary lines exactly resemble real ones," and again, " We can frame a mental image, which we may rely on as being precisely similar to the reality."* 11. We proceed to Mill's treatment of the test of Inconceivability. The question now is this: Are the recognised tests "\ of such Truths as the first truths of Mathematics (and indeed all truths of tlie same stringency) — viz., Neces- I sity and Universality, sufiiciently accounted for by the J laws of Association ? The easiest mode of approaching this question is to look at that test which is the negative form of terms like " Necessity " and ^* Uni- * I need not enlarge on this point, as it was strenuously insisted on by I'rofessor Stanley Jevons in Liis article in the (hntr/ii/Mtrarf/ Ileckw fur December, 1877. His summing up of Mill's position is clear, and is adequately supported by his references. 1. Perfectly straight lines do not really exist. 2. We experiment ui»on imaginary straight lines. 3. These imaginary straight lines exactly resemble the real ones. 4. If these imaginary straight lines are not perfectly straight, they will not enable us to prove the truths of Geometry. 5. If they are perfectly straight, then tlie real ones which exactly resemble them must be perfectly straight, ergo, perfectly straight lines do exist. 12S THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. versality*'-— viz., '* tlie Inconceivability of the Opposite Assumption." Tlic first tratlis of Matliematics are Accessary and Universal, because the opposite assump- tion is inconceivable, because we cannot even conceive the possibility of straight lines ever enclosing a space. Mill says that Inconceivability is an accidental thing, depending on experience, and association of ideas.* Inconceivability is of course an ambiguous term, and before we can assent to this, we have to see in what senses it is capable of being used. Fortunately Mill himself helps us here. In his chapter on "The Philosophy of the Conditioned" in " The Examination of Hamilton" he distinguishes three senses of the word. Inconceivable means — (a) that of which the mind can form no repre- sentation, either because no attributes are given out of which a representation could "be framed, or because the attributes given are incompatible. (P) that of which, though the mind can form a representation, it cannot conceive a reali- ^ sation. In this sense the mind is, by the law of association, temporarily debarred from believing it. (y) that, which the mind cannot construe to itself, through a higher notion, or conceive as the • ** Logic," bk. iii. c. v. s. 9. MATHEMATICAL AXIOMS. 129 consequent of a certain reason. This is a Hamilton ian sense of the word, which would render all first truths inconceivable, and must therefore be rejected.* If a thing, continues Mill, is inconceivable in the third sense, it can, obviously, be believed with full understanding. If it is inconceivable in the second sense, it can yet be believed, because we can represent it to ourselves, and " the inability to conceive " only rests upon a limited experience. If it is inconceivable in the first sense, (a) if we can attach any meaning to it, it may be believed, but without understanding, i.e., it may be believed, because if false it would contradict something which is otherwise known to be true, or it may be taken on Authority; but (b) if we cannot attach any meaning to it at all, belief is imix)ssible. Now, in which of these senses, is it inconceivable that two straight lines should enclose a space ? Evi- dently in the first sense, the attributes given are incompatible — straightness does not accord with the enclosure of space. In the second sense of the term, the Antipodes were inconceivable to our forefathers. They could indeed form a picture of them, but they were debarred from believing in them because all ex- * " Examination," pp. 83-89. If K 130 THE METxiPHYSICS OF MILL. perience hitherto had pointed in m opposite direction. Here possibly the association of Ideas generated by experience is quite adequate to explain the incon- ceivability. Is it sufficient to explain inconceivability in the first sense, where inconceivable=unpictiir^ the great Nominalist thinkers, any more than it would be by himself. (ii.) The second argument is that a Concept is really a mental relation between individual things. Thougli things be indi¥idual, the relation can be general or nniversal. Mill replies tliat a relation must mean a gelation between things : and if the things are in- dividual, so is the relation. It follows, too, that a relation cannot be thought witliout thinking the re- lated objects, and the related ol>jects being thought as individual, the relation itself is thought as individual. After these criticisms on Hamilton, Mill states his own position, the usual Nominalist doctrine. It is this * " The formation of a Concept does not consist in separating the attributes which are said to compose it, from all other attributes of the same object, and enabling us to conceive those attributes, disjoined from any others. We neither conceive them nor think them, or cognise them in any way as a thing apart, but solely as forming the idea of an individual object." General Concepts, therefore, we have, properly, none ; we have only complex ideas of objects in the concrete ; we are only thinking of individual objects, but we can attend exclusively to some part of the concrete idea. And what enables us to do this is the employment of Signs and especially of Names. There are one or two criticisms which might be • ** ExamiEatioE," p. 377. made on the way in which Mill treats Hamilton. In the first place, Mill quotes from Berkeley's " Intro- duction to Principles of Human Knowledge," the section 10 which is generally quoted — so far as it goes a very clear enunciation of a Nominalist position. But another section (section 15) introduces a point of view not strictly in harmony with a consistent Nominalism. "A word becomes general," Berkeley thinks, '' by in- volving a symbolical relation to other things." *' Uni- versality does not consist in the absolute positive nature of anything but in the relation it bears to the particulars signified or represented by it: by virtue whereof things particular are rendered universal." It is clear then that to Berkeley ^^ ideas " in themselves particular are universalised by their relations^ — the apprehension of relations being the essence of general knowledge. If such is Berkeley's position, it is obvious that he is not a Nominalist in the sense in which Mill takes him to be. Such a position as is disclosed in the sentences given above explains, in reality, what Hamilton was aiming at, in describing General Ideas as relations. Mill's criticism on the doctrine, which resolves General Ideas into relations, shows clearly how little he attempted to realise what Hamilton (and Berkeley before him) had meant by the word " relation." If "re- lation" only means a link connecting two things, it is possible that if the things are particular and individual, 142 THE METAPHYSICS OP M,ILL. GENERAL IDEAS. 143 the link may be particular and individual also. But *' relation " does not only mean " link of connection : '* it means "aspects," "ways" of regarding things. " Relations established between things," means the things grasped and held togetlier l»y a conception or conceptions. Relation is only another way of speak- ing of " mental forms." If this is the meaning which Hamilton gave (or intended to give) to tlie word, the criticism of Mill does not hit the point at all. How- ever particular and individual the things may be, the view, the aspect in w^hich they are regarded is not individual and particular. The mental form, the mould, as it were, in which the things are run, is on the contrary necessarily general and universal. 01>jects, as Berkeley seems to have thouglit, in themselves par- ticular, are universalised by their relations. This too explains what Hamilton meant by that "potential generality" or "universality" of certain things, of which Mill is so incredulous. It is exactly what Berkeley said when he spoke of things involving a symbolical relation to other things. All that is meant is that a triangle may be taken to stand for any and every triangle ; we may reason about it, draw deduc- tions from it, applicable to all triangles, with perfect truth. Why? Because the triangle is potentially, though not actually, universal. Because the particular triangle "doth equally stand for and represent all recti- lineal triangles whatever." / And finally we see now Hamilton's distinction be- tween Imagination and Thought — between " Anschau- ung" and " Begriff " in reference to this question, though, by a verbal slip, he, as Mill points out, afterwards con- founds the two. A particular individual triangle is a matter for the Imaginative faculty, the Anschauung to present. It must be a triangle of some one kind, either scalene, or isosceles, or equiangular. The potential universality of that triangle, its symbolical relation to all other triangles, cannot be presented by the Imaginative faculty. It is a matter for thouglit, for Begriff. Or in other words, that concej)tion of rela- tions, which is the essence of knowledge, is the work of something higher than Sense or Imagination or any purely Presentative faculty ; it is the work of Mind or Thought, imposing its own forms on the chaotic mate- rials of Sense. Tlie real elucidation of the question of Conceptualism or Nominalism is not reached, until w^e answer the pre- liminary question, What is the course or progress of acquiring Knotvledge? Does Knowledge proceed from the Abstract to the Concrete, or from the Concrete to the Abstract ? Locke, Hume, Mill and all Nominalists assume that the last is the true answer. First individual, concrete, objects, then abstractions from these, in so called ideas. From this point of view, of course, the ideas, being mere copies of things, cannot contain more than 144 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. tlie tilings from whicli tliey are derived. There cannot, for instance, be ideas really general or universal, because tbis would be to add something, not accounted for by tlie particular, individual things of which they are the copies. Hence tbe Nominalist doctrine that whatever generality or uuiversality we have or seem to have in our ideas, is a mere generality or universality of Name. Knowled*?e is from Concrete to Abstract, and concrete things being individual, the abstract ideas are in reality merely individual also. Take tlie other assumption and the question must be differently answered. For now^ the assumption is that the course of knowledge is from Abstract to Concrete ; that in the first stages we have vague generalities, indefinite and undefined relations, and that the develop- ment of knowledge, by Comparison, by the exercise of the Comparative or Rational faculty, leads to the increas- in*' definiteness of these early aud vague specifications until is reached the Concrete Individual Thing. For an Individual Thing, a Concrete thing, is, in reality, very complex and by no means simple, or immediately cognised. A Concrete Individual Tiling has a mass of relations with other things, which keep it in its Indi- viduality, relating it to, differentiating it from, all other things. It cannot therefore be an early product of knowledge. First there is the chaos of Sense- impressions into which the Mind brings order, by imposing forms and relations and categories. Then *■% GENEEAL IDEAS. 145 from the action and re-action of Sense-impressions and Thought-relation, arises the definite Individual Thin"-. The course of knowledge is from Abstract to Concrete. Let us apply this to the case before us. Let us take any general Proposition. Every triangle has its three interior angles equal to two right angles. This general proposition is based, we say, on the general idea of a triangle. How has this general proposition arisen? It has arisen from a certain *' analysis in reflection " * of our general idea of a triangle. Our idea of a triangle is due to " the unconscious synthesis of Perception." The Perception of a triangle is the result of certain relations being imposed on sense- impressions. These relations are imposed almost un- consciously, the normal process in perception being in all cases alike. The general proposition then is the result of an analysis in reflection of that synthesis, or imposing of relations, which goes on unconsciously in perception. First knowledge is abstract, then it is concrete ; first it is an undigested mass of general relations, then it is definite individualisation. First there is the general abstract idea of a triangle ; then (and only in the second place) there is the special individual triangle whether scalene or isosceles or equiangular. When after all this process is concluded (almost unconsciously) we ♦ Cf. Professor Green's " Introduction to Hume," p. 183. 146 THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. make a general proposition and enquire on what it rests, and what account we arc to give of it, we answer that it is due to reflective analysis — reflection analysing the general relations imposed when knowledge was in its abstract stage. To ask then, are General Ideas possible ? is a need- less question. For general ideas are of course abstract ideas : and knowledge is abstract before it becomes individual and concrete. To make General Ideas merely individual ideas, with some specific properties dropped out, is to confuse the later stages of know- ledge with the earlier : to make the course of knowledge proceed from the Concrete to the Abstract, instead of (as it really does) from the Abstract to the Concrete. If all this be so, we can see how it acts upon the Theory of Syllogistic reasoning. For the Theory of the Syllogism is really an answer to the question, what is the place of General Ideas in reasoning ? Mill, consistently with his views of General Ideas, has to deny to the Major Premiss any logical merit as that from which the conclusion is proved. The conclusion does not follow from the Major Premiss, according to Mill. The Major Premiss is but a register, a memo- randum of that, to which experience has testified hitherto. When we say, " All men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal," the conclusion does not follow from the assertion that all men are mortal, but that assertion is proved concurrently with GENEEAL IDEAS. 147 the conclusion, by the course of experience. Mill could not say otherwise. As there are no General Ideas, knowledge must of course be a course of inference from Particular to Particular. But if there are, after all. General Ideas, as the Conceptualist imagines, it is a different thing. Then the Major Premiss becomes something more than a mere register, a memorandum. To it in a very real sense is due the conclusion. The " mortality " which we now formally predicate of man is the recognition by reflective analysis of those early relations, by which we made real and intelligible to ourselves our conceptions of humankind. EPILOGUE. 149 ^iigiir II Jill iJlii«JLJfcwi*JLi imBw' JLmJJLiV ■■'fci l i* * EPILOGUE. With tlie questions of "Necessary Truth," and " General Concepts," an inquiry into the metaphysical foundations of MilPs Philosophy necessarily ends. The special logical doctrines of Mill's " System of Logic " I have not the power or the wish to criticise. It is, in fact, part of the contention of the foregoing pages, tliat the logical doctrines stand on a different basis, as compared with the psychological doctrines revealed whether in criticisms of Hamilton, or expositions of James Mill. Nor is it possible for me to discuss that gravest of metaphysical questions, which forms the subject of Mill's posthumous volume on Nature and Keligion. Two remarks may be ventured on. In the irst place, it is not hard to discover in Mill's views as to God the result of those radical defects of Sensationalism, which are to be found in other parts of his philosophical scheme. It would be difficult, indeed, for Sensationalism, with its two dogmas of the supremacy of the Individual, and the supremacy of Sensation, to arrive at any such conceptions of the Absolute, and the Infinite, and the Super-sensual, as are implied in the philosophical (and popular) belief in the great First Cause. The attempt has twice been made by English Sensationalists, and the result has not been encouraging. In Locke,* the in- consistency of a quasi-materialism on the one side, and a proof of God, which rests on the existence of Spirit, on the other, is too obvious and apparent: and Berkeley's proof of God,t makes the conception rest on just those " presuppositions of Faith," on which, in reality, is based his doctrine of Mind or Spirit. Hume, with his clear-headed logic, and directness of vision, knew too well the limits of the sensationalistic system. The other remark is, that Mill's view of Nature— in which the absence of all feeling of the beauty of the Natural World is so significant a feature— is perhaps explained by the deficiency of any systematic treat- ment of the Emotions, which is a peculiar charac- teristic of nearly all the so-called English Psychological School, with the exception of Bain. In Mill's own case, the complete subjection of his own mind in its earlier stages to that of his Mher (from which it comes that MiU has no Psychology of his own at all, but only an adapted version of the '' Analysis " of James Mill), and the peculiar suppression of emotional culture, which his education exhibited, go far to explain these and other • « Essay, " b. 4, c. 3, para. 6. Cf. b. 1, c. 4, para 8, and b. 4 c. 10. + Cf. " Siris," ajid " Principles of Human Knowledge, sec. Jb. I'dO THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. EPILOGUE. 151 points, as well in his Philosophy, as in his Life. *• The Autohiography " should he read side hy side with the ** Three Essays on Religion."* To speak of systems of Philosophy as " transitional," is the easy and possibly the historical method, when they include some curious inconsistencies. If such a method may he employed here, Mill's system may justly be termed " transitional." Sensationalism is the early phase of English philosophy, Scientific Empiricism is the later. The difference is exactly measured by the rise and study of Biology. Sensationalism is empiri- cism minm Biology ; scientific empiricism is empiri- cism pirn Biology. Hume forms the apex, as it were, of the early phase ; the later phase reaches its culmination in works like G. H. Lewes' " Problems of Life and Mind," and the " Physical Basis of Mind." Mill stands between the earlier and the later, he is not a pure Sensationalist, and he is not a scientific Empiricist. And so, if we judge him by an absolute standard, he is doubly wrong,— wrong from the point of view of the earlier philosophers, and wron;? from the point of view of the later. But if we view him historically, according to a relative standard, he becomes a true and valuable link of connection showing how sensationalism merges itself into a scientific empiricism. His work is, in fact, " transitional" * Cl Autobiography, p, 148. •* I wanted a culture of the emotions." Cf. however, p. 147. 1 Many indications may be found in his philosophy, which yield this result, besides some of those we have been in past pages considering. The characteristic principle of Sensationalism is the passivity of Sense, the passivity of Mind, and thence comes all the difii- culty of understanding how a purely receptive and pas- sive mind can "relate" one feeling to another, can differentiate and discriminate different sensations, can associate one with another. Biology has radically altered the problem. For now, instead of " a passive receptivity of sense," we hear of " a nervous organisa- tion," which is active ; we hear of an organic classifica- tion of relations, whereby the perceptions of difference and similarity are the first constituents of conscious- ness. '^ To rest with the unqualified assertion," says Herbert Spencer, " that antecedent to experience, the mind is a blank, is to ignore the questions— Whence comes the power of organising experiences ?— If at birth there exists nothing but a passive receptivity of impressions, why is not a horse as educable as a man ? Understood in its current form, the experience-hypo- thesis implies that the presence of a definitely-organised nervous system is a circumstance of no moment — a fiict, not needing to be taken into account ! Yet it is the all-important fact— the fact to which, in one sense, the criticisms of Leibnitz and others pointed— the fact, without which such an assimilation of experiences is \ THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. EPILOGUE. 153 inexplicable." * And Lewes, too, is equally clear on this point He discriminates between "sensation properly so-called," and what he terms " ideation " (or the faculty of having ideas), and he pertinently asks « If the mind is ' a tabula rasa ' as to knowledge, and is not even pre-existent as a faculty (according to the metaphysicians) or as organism (according to the biologists), if, in a word, sensations and combinations of sensations create both knowledge and the knowing faculties, how can we explain the phenomena of idiocy ? " f Compared with this empirical development, Mill's psychological criticisms of Hamilton are some- what antiquated. Hear him in a later work, standing before Mr. Bain's psychological labours and comment- ing on what to him is a new revelation. *' Those who have studied the writings of the Association Psychologists, must have often been unfavourably impressed by the almost total absence, in their analytical expositions, of the recognition of any active element, as spontaneity, in the mind itself" J Besides the direct contribution of Biology to Psy- chology in the shape of a "definitely-constituted nervous organism," there is also the indirect result of the study of Heredity. " Hereditary transmission," with all that it entails, is perhaps the most conspicuous • H. Spencer's *' Psychology,*' vol. i., pp. 467, 468. t Lewes, on " Condillac, ' " History of I'hilosophy," vol. ii. t Mill's *' Dissertations and Discussions," toI. iii., art. on *' Bain." II principle of modern scientific empiricism. It is this which explains, or is believed to explain, the long- debated question of " Mental Forms," and reconciles, as 3Ir. Herbert Spencer says in '' First Principles," the school of Kant with the school of Locke, and allows the long-arrested development of Psychology to begin anew. For the " priority " of Forms is shown to be a mere logical priority, — the explanation being that they have been developed by a long course of experiences in the race. In other words, in these and kindred problems the great conception of Historical Evolution plays an important part. But Mill, as we have before noticed, is strangely uninfluenced by the importance of Evolution in Psychology. In this matter, he is still a Sensationalist, still clings to the individual experience of Locke and Berkeley and Hume, instead of the universal Race-experience of Herbert Spencer and Lewes. Very noteworthy, from this point of view, is his admiration of Comte's historical law of Progress ; his surprise at the daring generalisation of an evolution of Thought.* In the matter of later research into *^ nervous organisations " and so forth, he is full of surprise and admiration at Bain ; in the conception of Development, he is full of surprise and admiration at Comte. These are exactly the characteristics of a man who forms a link between two phases of a philosophical sj^stem, who connects together Sensationalism and * In " Comte and Positivism." IM. THE METAPHYSICS OF MILL. EPILOGUE. 155 Scientific Empiricism. A follower of Hume, lie yet sees the imperfections of Sensationalism (as e.r/. in the doctrine of " Causation " ) : a pioneer of Herbert Spencer and Lewes, lie admires from a distance bio- logical analysis, and historical evolution. For, to those who are conversant with later specu- lations, it is clear that the relation between Idealism and Sensationalism is a somewhat different matter to the attitude which the metaphysician must adopt before the scientific empiricism and biology of the later school. In this particular instance of hereditary transmission of " Forms," it is of course, open to an objector to mj that it only puts the difficulty a stage further liack, — and that we nm want to know how the first man who opened bis eyes on the natural world proceeded to systematise liis experience, whereas we took before, a man of the present time, to serve as subject for psychological analysis. But it is clear that such an answer will not be in any way satisfactory to the biologist, nor does it show much comprehension of the bearings of Evolution. Foi: the reply that will be made will be that Intelligence is itself based, by Evolution, on Instinct, and Instinct on still lower automatic functions, and that consequently " Mental forms" were, possibly, in process of construction in much lower organisms than Man. That the meta- physician has his own unanswerable analysis of Con- sciousness, and Relativity of Knowledge, is, of course. undoubted ; if it were proved, perfectly incontestably, that man is developed from apes, or skin-bags, it is none the less true that the consciousness which makes us men, is independent of time and development : but that the methods of Empiricism in the hands of a Lewes, are not the same as those in the hands of a Mill, is a point which, though clear enough (especially after a perusal of the imitators of Spencer), seems to have been hardly sufficiently considered. Just in the same way. Scientific Materialism has its own special views in Ethical theory,* which are by no means the same as the Ethics of Mill, — a point which is equally forgotten by those, who think that in answering utilitarianism, they are answering the moral problems of physiologists. Evolution and " a nervous organisa- tion" play as much part in Ethics, as they do in problems of knowledge. It is this transitional character of Mill's philo- sophical system which makes it, as it seems to me, so imperfect an instrument of education. For the belief is common that Mill is the modern experi- mental philosopher />ar excellence, that in his various works we may find the most recent and best accredited utterances of the experimental school. For this, however, we ought raihrr-to ii^v to Herbert Spencer and G. H. Lewes. -Milfs^ '• Logic " is, of course. , t , 11 1 1 > • ♦ Cf.for instance, MaudsUij'; Kp:/' JCGnscicnce- spol Orgamsation," in "Body and Mind." •..•■•;: ■ :' 156 THE METAPHYSICS OP MILL. to a large extent, exempted from such criticism, but only because, to a large extent, it disavows the metaphysical foundation of the " Examination.'* Yet even here, in those Logical questions which depend upon metaphysical considerations, — as the question of General Ideas, and Abstraction, and possibly, too, the theory of Real Kinds in Nature,— the instability of the foimdation will make itself felt. And, at all events, the student of Mill's " Logic " cannot well be debarred from the study of Mill's deeper, fundamental in- quiries. For, as 3Iill says, with a prophetic insight, of which possibly he did not see the full application, " the difficulties of Metaphysics lie at the root of all Science." A LIST OF C. 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