■ ■ I ■ ^H H ■ inm Glass. Book. DISCUSSIONS ON PHILOSOPHY AND LITERATURE, EDUCATION AND UNIVERSITY REFORM. C H I E F L Y FROM THE EDINBURGH R E V I E W ; CORRECTED, VINDICATED, ENLARGED, IN NOTES AND APPENDICES, B i SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON, BART. " Truth, like a torch, the more it's shook it shines." LONDON: LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN AND LONGMANS EDINBURGH: MACLACHLAN AND STEWART. M . D C C C . L 1 1. EDINBURGH; PRINTED BY JOHN HUGHES. ^ This publication will not I hope be deemed super- fluous. — Its contents have, in great part, been collected and translated in France and Italy ; in Germany many of the Discussions have been separately translated ; and their general collection has once and again been recom- mended in the leading critical Journals of America. In this country also, a considerable number are comprised in the "Selections from the Edinburgh Eeview" by Mr Crosse. M. Peisse, the learned French translator, has added to the articles, published by him under the name of " Fragments de Philosophie," sundry important con- tributions of his own ; — an Introduction, an Appendix, and Notes. Of the last especially I have frequently availed myself. In reprinting these criticisms, I have made a few unimportant corrections ; and some not unimportant additions, — in length at least, for the new extends to above a half of the old. At the same time, I was not averse from evincing, by the way, the punctual accuracy of certain statements, advanced in these criticisms, which had been variously and, sometimes even, vehemently assailed. In one instance, the counter criticism was indeed of such a character, and came from such a quarter, that I could not in propriety let it pass without a full and formal refu- tation. In preparing an Appendix, supplementary of the pre- vious discussions relative to the English Universities, I [ vi ] insensibly involved myself in a complication of details, which, after a fruitless and wholly unexpected expendi- ture of time, I found that leisure and strength and patience all failed me either to disentangle or to complete ; I was therefore, in the end, constrained to limit the consideration, not only to Oxford exclusively, but exclusively to the edu- cation afforded in its fundamental faculty, that of Arts. And in reference even to this, had I anticipated the amount of tedious toil, which the mere collecting and verifying of the facts would cost, I might have been dis- posed to avoid what, though to me a real labour, is so disproportioned to any apparent result. Apart from the Appendices, the new matter, whether of text or notes, except where distinction was needless, is enclosed within square brackets. Edinburgh ; March 1852. CONTENTS. PHILOSOPHY PAGE I. On the Philosophy of the Unconditioned ; in refer- ence to Cousin's Infinito- Absolute, 1 (Oct. 1829. — Edinburgh Review, Vol. 1., No. xcix., pp. 194-221.) II. Philosophy of Perception, 38 (Oct. 1830— Vol. lii., No. ciii., pp. 158-207.) III. Johnson's Translation of Tennemann's Manual of the History of Philosophy, 08 (Oct. 1832.— Vol. lvi, No. cxi., pp. 160- J 77.) IV. Logic. The recent English treatises on that science, 116 (April 1833— Vol. lvi., No. cxv., pp. 194-238 ) V. Deaf and Dumb. History of their Instruction, in reference to Dalgarno, . 175 (July 1835.— Vol. lxi., No. cxxiv., pp. 407-417.) VI. Idealism ; with reference to the scheme of Arthur Collier, 186 (April 1839.— Vol. lxviii., No. cxxxviii., pp. 337-353.) \ 111 CONTENTS. LITERATURE. PAGE I, EPISTOL.E ObSCURORUM VlRORUM ; THE NATIONAL SATIRE of Germany, 203 (March 1831.— Vol. liii., No. cv., pp. 180-210.) II. On the Revolutions of Medicine ; in reference to Cullen, 238 (July 1832.— Vol. lv., No. ex., pp. 461-479.) EDUCATION. I. On the Study of Mathematics, as an exercise of Mind, 257 (Jan. 1836— Vol. lxii., No. exxvi., pp. 409-455. Note, Vol. lxiii., No. exxvii., pp. 270-275.) II. On the Conditions of Classical Learning. With re- lation to the Defence of Classical Instruction, by Professor Pillans, 328 (Oct. 1836.— Vol. lxiv., No. exxix., pp. 106-124.) III. On the Patronage and Superintendence of Uni- versities, 348 (April 1834— Vol. lix., No. cxix., pp. 196-227.) IV. On the state of the English Universities, with more especial reference to Oxford, 386 (June 1831— Vol. liii., No. cvi., pp. 384-427.) V. On the state of the English Universities, with MORE ESPECIAL REFERENCE TO OXFORD. (SUPPLE- MENTAL.) 435 (Dec. 1831.— Vol. liv.. No. cviii., pp. 478-504.) CONTENTS. IX PAGE VI. On the Eight of Dissenters to Admission into the English Universities, 464 (Oct. 1834.— Vol. lx., No. cxxi., pp. 202-230.) VII. On the Eight of Dissenters to Admission into the English Universities. (Supplemental.) 509 (Jan. 1835.— Vol. lx., No. cxxii., pp. 422-445.) VIII. Cousin on German Schools, 535 (July 1833— Vol. lvii., No. cxvi., pp. 505-542.) I. APPENDIX, PHILOSOPHICAL. (A.) Conditions of the Thinkable systematised ; Alphabet of Human Thought, 577 (B.) Philosophical Testimonies to the limitation of our Knowledge, from the limitation of our Faculties, ... 601 II. APPENDIX, LOGICAL. (A.) Of Syllogism, its Kinds, Canons, Notations, &c, 614 (B.) On Affirmation and Negation, — on Propositional Forms, — on Breadth and Depth, — on Syllogistic, and Syllogistic Notation, 621* III. APPENDIX, EDUCATIONAL. (A.) Academical Patronage and Eegulation, in reference to the University of Edinburgh, 621 X CONTENTS. PAGE B.) The Examination and Honours for a Degree in Arts, during Centuries established in the University op Louvain, 645 (C.) On a Keform of the English Universities: with especial reference to Oxford ; and limited to the Faculty of Arts, 651 Addenda, 743 Corrigenda, 747 Index, 749 «^o o>^9l(^V> PHILOSOPHY I.-PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. IN REFERENCE TO COUSIN'S DOCTRINE OF THE INFINITO-ABSOLUTE.* (October, 1829.) Cours de Philosophie. Par M. Victor Cousin, Professeur de Philosophic a la Faculte des Lettres de Paris. — Introduction a VHistoire de la Philosophie. 8vo. Paris, 1828. The delivery of these Lectures excited an unparalleled sensation in Paris. Condemned to silence during the reign of Jesuit ascen- dency, M. Cousin, after eight years of honourable retirement, not exempt from persecution, had again ascended the Chair of Philo- * [Translated into French, by M. Peisse ; into Italian, by S. Lo Gatto : also in Cross's Selections from the Edinburgh Review. This article did not originate with myself. I was requested to write it by my friend, the late accomplished Editor of the Review, Professor Napier. Personally, I felt averse from the task. I was not unaware, that a discussion of the leading doctrine of the book would prove unintelligible, not only to " the general reader," but, with few exceptions, to our British metaphysi- cians at large. But, moreover, I was still farther disinclined to the under- taking, because it would behove me to come forward in overt opposition to a certain theory, which, however powerfully advocated, I felt altogether unable to admit ; whilst its author, M. Cousin, was a philosopher for whose genius and character I already had the warmest admiration, — an admiration which every succeeding year has only augmented, justified, and confirmed. Nor, in saying this, need I make any reservation. For I admire, even where I dissent ; and were M. Cousin's speculations on the Absolute utterly abo- lished, to him would still remain the honour, of doing more himself, and of contributing more to what has been done by others, in the furtherance of an enlightened philosophy, than any other living individual in France — I might say in Europe. Mr Napier, however, was resolute ; it was the first number A 2 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. sophy ; and the splendour with which he recommenced his acade- mical career, more than justified the expectation which his recent celebrity as a writer, and the memory of his earlier prelections, had inspired. Two thousand auditors listened, all with admira- tion, many with enthusiasm, to the eloquent exposition of doc- trines intelligible only to the few ; and the oral discussion of phi- losophy awakened in Paris, and in France, an interest unexampled since the days of Abclard. The daily journals found it necessary to gratify, by their earlier summaries, the impatient curiosity of the public ; and the lectures themselves, taken in short-hand, and corrected by the Professor, propagated weekly the influence of his instruction to the remotest provinces of the kingdom. Nor are the pretensions of this doctrine disproportioned to the attention which it has engaged. It professes nothing less than to be the complement and conciliation of all philosophical opinion ; and its author claims the glory of placing the key-stone in the arch of science, by the discovery of elements hitherto unobserved among the facts of consciousness. Before proceeding to consider the claims of M. Cousin to origi- nality, and of his doctrine to truth, it is necessary to say a few words touching the state and relations of philosophy in France. After the philosophy of Descartes and Malebranche had sunk into oblivion, and from the time that Condillac, exaggerating the too partial principles of Locke, had analysed all knowledge into sensation, Sensualism, (or, more correctly, Sensuism,) as a psycho- logical theory of the origin of our cognitions, became, in France, of the Review under his direction ; and the criticism was hastily written. In this country the reasonings were of course not understood, and naturally, for a season, declared incomprehensible. Abroad, in France, Germany, Italy, and latterly in America, the article has been rated higher than it deserves. The illustrious thinker, against one of whose doctrines its argument is direct- ed, was the first to speak of it in terms which, though I feel their generosity, I am ashamed to quote. I may, however, state, that maintaining always his opinion, M. Cousin, (what is rare, especially in metaphysical discussions,) declared, that it was neither unfairly combated nor imperfectly under- stood. — In connection with this criticism, the reader should compare what M. Cousin has subsequently stated in defence and illustration of his sys- tem, in his Preface to the new edition of the Introduction a CHistoire de la Philosophie, and Appendix to the fifth lecture (QZuvres,. Serie II. Tome i. pp. vii. ix., and pp. 112-129 ;) — in his Preface to the second edition, and his Advertisement to the third edition of the Fragments Philosophiques (CEuvres, S. III. T. iv.)— and in his Prefatory Notice to the Pensees de Pascal {CEuvres, S. IV. T. i.) — On the other hand, M. Peisse has ably advocated the coun- terview, in his Preface and Appendix to the Fragments de Philosophie, &c] PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCE ; AND IN SCOTLAND. 3 not only the dominant, but almost the one exclusive opinion. It was believed that reality and truth were limited to experience, and experience was limited to the sphere of sense ; while the very highest faculties of mind were deemed adequately explained when recalled to perceptions, elaborated, purified, sublimated, and transformed. From the mechanical relations of sense with its object, it was attempted to solve the mysteries of will and intel- ligence ; the philosophy of mind was soon viewed as correlative to the physiology of organisation. The moral nature of man was at last formally abolished, in its identification with his physical : mind became a reflex of matter ; thought a secretion of the brain. A doctrine so melancholy in its consequences, and founded on principles thus partial and exaggerated, could not be permanent : a reaction was inevitable. The recoil, which began about twenty years ago, has been gradually increasing ; and now it is perhaps even to be apprehended, that its intensity may become excessive. As the poison was of foreign growth, so also has been the antidote. The doctrine of Condillac was, if not a corruption, a development, of the doctrine of Locke ; and, in returning to a better philosophy, the French are still obeying an impulsion communicated from without. This impulsion may be traced to two different sources, — to the philosophy of Scotland, and to the philosophy of Germany. In Scotland, a philosophy had sprung up, which, though pro- fessing, equally with the doctrine of Condillac, to build only on experience, did not, like that doctrine, limit experience to the relations of sense and its objects. Without vindicating to man more than a relative knowledge of existence, and restricting the science of mind to an observation of the fact of consciousness, it, however, analysed that fact into a greater number of more import- ant elements than had been recognised in the school of Condillac. It showed that phenomena were revealed in thought which could not be resolved into any modification of sense, — external or inter- nal. It proved that intelligence supposed principles, which, as the conditions of its activity, can not be the results of its opera- tion ; that the mind contained knowleges, which, as primitive, universal, necessary, are not to be explained as generalizations from the contingent and individual, about which alone all expe- rience is conversant. The phenomena of mind were thus distin- guished from the phenomena of matter ; and if the impossibility of materialism were not demonstrated, there was, at least, demon- strated the impossibility of its proof. This philosophy, and still more the spirit of this philosophy, 4 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. was calculated to exert a salutary influence on the French. And such an influence it did exert. For a time, indeed, the truth operated in silence ; and Eeid and Stewart had already modified the philosophy of France, before the French were content to acknowledge themselves their disciples. In the works of Dege- rando and Laromiguiere, may be traced the influence of Scottish speculation; but it is to Royer-Collard, and, more recently, to Jouffroy, that our countrymen are indebted for a full acknow- ledgment of their merits, and for the high and increasing esti- mation in which their doctrines are now held in France. M. Royer-Collard, whose authority has, in every relation, been exert- ed only for the benefit of his country, and who, once great as a professor, is now not less illustrious as a statesman, in his lectures, advocated with distinguished ability the principles of the Scottish school ; modestly content to follow, while no one was more entitled to lead. M. Jouffroy, by his recent translation of the works of Dr Reid, and by the excellent preface to his version of Mr Dugald Stewart's " Outlines of Moral Philosophy," has likewise power- fully co-operated to the establishment, in France, of a philosophy equally opposed to the exclusive Sensualism of Condillac, and to the exclusive Rationalism of the new German school. Germany may be regarded, latterly at least, as the metaphysi- cal antipodes of France. The comprehensive and original genius of Leibnitz, itself the ideal abstract of the Teutonic character, had reacted powerfully on the minds of his countrymen ; and Rational- ism, (more properly IntellectuaUsm*) has, from his time, always remained the favourite philosophy of the Germans. On the prin- ciple of this doctrine, it is in Reason alone that truth and reality are to be found. Experience affords only the occasions on which intelligence reveals to us the necessary and universal notions of which it is the complement ; and these notions constitute at once * [On the modern commutation of Intellect or Intelligence (No£j, Mens, Intellectus, Verstand), and Reason (Aoyog, Ratio, Vernunft), see Disser- tations on Reid, pp. 668, 669, 693. (This has nothing to do with the con- fusion of Reason and Reasoning.) Protesting, therefore, against the abuse, I historically employ the terms as they were employed by the philosophers here commemorated. This unfortunate reversal has been propagated to the French philosophy, and also adopted in England by Coleridge and his fol- lowers. — I may here notice that I use the term Understanding, not for the noetic faculty, intellect proper, or place of principles, but for the dianoetic or discursive faculty, in its widest signification, for the faculty of relations or comparison ; and thus in the meaning in which Verstand is now employed by the Germans. In this sense I have been able to be uniformly consistent.] PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 5 the foundation of all reasoning, and the guarantee of our whole knowledge of reality. Kant, indeed, pronounced the philosophy of Rationalism a mere fabric of delusion. He declared that a science of existence was beyond the compass of our faculties ; that pure reason, as purely subjective,* and conscious of nothing but * In the philosophy of mind, subjective denotes what is to be referred to the thinking subject, the Ego ; objective what belongs to the object of thought, the Non-Ego. — It may be safe, perhaps, to say a few words in vindication of our employment of these terms. By the Greeks the word vKoxstftevou was equivocally employed to express either the object of know- ledge, (the materia circa quam,) or the subject of existence, (the materia in qua.) The exact distinction of subject and object was first made by the schoolmen 5 and to the schoolmen the vulgar languages are principally indebted for what precision and analytic subtilty they possess. These cor- relative terms correspond to the first and most important distinction in philosophy ; they embody the original antithesis in consciousness of self and not-self, — a distinction which, in fact, involves the whole science of mind ; for psychology is nothing more than a determination of the sub- jective and the objective, in themselves, and in their reciprocal relations. Thus significant of the primary and most extensive analysis in philoso- phy, these terms, in their substantive and adjective forms, passed from the schools into the scientific language of Telesius, Campanella, Berigardus, Gassendi, Descartes, Spinosa, Leibnitz, Wolf, &c. Deprived of these terms, the Critical philosophy, indeed the whole philosophy of Germany, would be a blank. In this country, though familiarly employed in scien- tific language, even subsequently to the time of Locke, the adjective forms seem at length to have dropt out of the English tongue. That these words waxed obsolete was perhaps caused by the ambiguity which had gradually crept into the signification of the substantives. Object, besides its proper signification, came to be abusively applied to denote motive, end, final cause (a meaning not recognised by Johnson). This innovation was probably borrowed from the French, in whose language the word had been similarly corrupted after the commencement of the last cen- tury (Diet, de Trevoux, voce Objet.) Subject in English, as sujet in French, had been also perverted into a synonyme for object, taken in its proper meaning, and had thus returned to the original ambiguity of the correspond- ing term in Greek. It is probable that the logical application of the word (subject of attribution or predication) facilitated or occasioned this confusion. In using the terms, therefore, we think that an explanation, but no apology, is required. The distinction is of paramount importance, and of infinite application, not only in philosophy proper, but in grammar, rhetoric, criti- cism, ethics, politics, jurisprudence, theology. It is adequately expressed by no other terms ; and if these did not already enjoy a prescriptive right, as denizens of the language, it cannot be denied, that, as strictly analogical, they would be well entitled to sue out their naturalization. — [Not that these terms were formerly always employed in the same signification and contrast which they noAv obtain. For a history of these variations, see Dis- 6 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. itself, was therefore unable to evince the reality of aught beyond the phenomena of its personal modifications. But scarcely had the critical philosopher accomplished the recognition of this im- portant principle, the result of which was, to circumscribe the field of speculation by narrow bounds ; than from the very dis- ciples of his school there arose philosophers, who, despising the contracted limits, and humble results, of a philosophy of obser- vation, re-established, as the predominant opinion, a bolder and more uncompromising Rationalism than any that had ever pre- viously obtained for their countrymen the character of philosophic visionaries — " Gens ratione ferox, et mentem pasta chima^ris.' 1 * (" Minds fierce for reason, and on fancies fed.") Founded by Fichte, but evolved by Schelling, this doctrine regards experience as unworthy of the name of science : because, as only of the phenomenal, the transitory, the dependent, it is only of that which, having no reality in itself, cannot be esta- blished as a valid basis of certainty and knowledge. Philosophy must, therefore, either be abandoned, or we must be able to seize the One, the Absolute, the Unconditioned, immediately and in itself. And this they profess to do by a kind of intellectual vision.} In this act, reason, soaring not only above the world of sertations on Reid, p. 806, sq. — Since this article was written, the words have in this country re-entered on their ancient rights; they are now in common use.] * [This line, which was quoted from memory, has, I find, in the original, " furens;" therefore translated — " Minds mad with reasoning — and fancy- fed." The author certainly had in his eye the " ratione insanias " of Terence. It is from a satyr e by Abraham Remi, who, in the former half of the seven- teenth century, was Professor Royal of Eloquence in the University of Paris ; and it referred to the disputants of the Irish College in that illustrious school. The " Hibernian Logicians" were, indeed, long famed over the continent of Europe, for their acuteness, pugnacity, and barbarism ; as is recorded by Patin, Bayle, Le Sage, and many others. The learned Menage was so delighted with the verse, as to declare, that he would give his best benefice (and he enjoyed some fat ones) to have written it. It applies, not only with real, but with verbal, accuracy to the German Rationalists; who in Philosophy (as Aristotle has it), "in making reason omnipotent, show their own impotence of reason," and in Theology (as Charles II. said of Isaac Vossius), — " believe every thing but the Bible."] f " [Intellectuelle Anschauuny ■." — This is doubly wrong. — 1°, In gram- matical rigour, the word in German ought to hstve been " intellectua/e." 2°, In philosophical consistency the intuition ought not to have been called by its authors (Fichte and Schelling) intellectual. For, though this be, in COUSIN'S PHILOSOPHY. 7 sense, but beyond the sphere of personal consciousness, boldly places itself at the very centre of absolute being, with which it claims to be, in fact, identified ; and thence surveying existence in itself, and in its relations, unveils to us the nature of the Deity, and explains, from first to last, the derivation of all created things. M. Cousin is the apostle of Rationalism in France, and we are willing to admit that the doctrine could not have obtained a more eloquent or devoted advocate. For philosophy he has suffered ; to her ministry he has consecrated himself — devoted without reserve his life and labours. Neither has he approached the sanctuary with unwashed hands. The editor of Proclus and Descartes, the translator and interpreter of Plato, and the pro- mised expositor of Kant, will not be accused of partiality in the choice of his pursuits ; while his two works, under the title of Philosophical Fragments, bear ample evidence to the learning, elegance, and distinguished ability of their author. Taking him all in all, in France M. Cousin stands alone : nor can we contem- plate his character and accomplishments, without the sincerest admiration, even while we dissent from the most prominent prin- ciple of his philosophy. The development of his system, in all its points, betrays the influence of German speculation on his opi- nions. His theory is not, however, a scheme of exclusive Rationalism; on the contrary, the peculiarity of his doctrine consists in the attempt to combine the philosophy of experience, and the philosophy of pure reason, into one. The following is a concise statement of the fundamental positions of his system : Reason, or intelligence, has three integrant elements, affording three regulative principles, which at once constitute its nature, and govern its manifestations. These three ideas severally sup- pose each other, and, as inseparable, are equally essential and equally primitive. They are recognised by Aristotle and by Kant, in their several attempts to analyse intelligence into its principles ; but though the categories of both philosophers com- prise all the elements of thought, in neither list are these elements naturally co-arranged, or reduced to an ultimate simplicity. fact, absolutely more correct, yet relatively it is a blunder ; for the intuition, as intended by them, is of their higher faculty, the Reason (Vernunft), and not of their lower, the Understanding or Intellect (Verstand). In modern German Philosophy, Verstand is always translated by lntellectus j and this again corresponds to Nov-.] 8 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. The first of these ideas, elements, or laws, though funda- mentally one, our author variously expresses, by the terms unity, identity, substance, absolute cause, the infinite, pure thought, &c. ; (we would briefly call it the unconditioned.) The second, he denominates plurality, difference, phenomenon, relative cause, the finite, determined thought, &c. ; (we would style it the con- ditioned.) These two elements are relative and correlative. The first, though absolute, is not conceived as existing absolutely in itself; it is conceived as an absolute cause, as a cause which can- not but pass into operation; in other words, the first element must manifest itself in the second. The two ideas are thus con- nected together as cause and effect ; each is only realised through the other ; and tins their connexion, or correlation, is the third inte- grant element of intelligence. Reason, or intelligence, in which these ideas appear, and which, in fact, they make up, is not individual, is not ours, is not even human ; it is absolute, it is divine. What is personal to us, is our free and voluntary activity ; what is not free and not voluntary, is adventitious to man, and does not constitute an integrant part of his individuality. Intelligence is conversant with truth ; truth, as necessary and universal, is not the creature of my volition ; and reason, which, as the subject of truth, is also universal and necessary, is consequently impersonal. We see, therefore, by a light which is not ours, and reason is a revelation of God in man. The ideas of which we are conscious, belong not to us, but to ab- solute intelligence. They constitute, in truth, the very mode and manner of its existence. For consciousness is only possible under plurality and difference, and intelligence is only possible through consciousness. The divine nature is essentially comprehensible. For the three ideas constitute the nature of the Deity; and the very nature of ideas is to be conceived. God, in fact, exists to us, only in so far as he is known; and the degree of our knowledge must always determine the measure of our faith. The relation of God to the universe is therefore manifest, and the creation easily un- derstood. To create, is not to make something out of nothing, for this is contradictory, but to originate from self. We create so often as we exert our free causality, and something is created by us, when something begins to be by virtue of the free cau- sality which belongs to us. To create is, therefore, to cause, not with nothing, but with the very essence of our being — with our COUSIN'S PHILOSOPHY. 9 force, our will, our personality. The divine creation is of the same character. God, as he is a cause, is able to create ; as he is an absolute cause, he cannot but create. In creating the uni- verse, he does not draw it from nothing ; he draws it from him- self. The creation of the universe is thus necessary ; it is a .manifestation of the Deity, but not the Deity absolutely in him- self ; it is God passing into activity, but not exhausted in the act. The universe created, the principles which determined the creation are found still to govern the worlds of matter and mind. Two ideas and their connection explain the intelligence of God ; two laws in their counterpoise and correlation explain the material universe. The law of Expansion is the movement of unity to variety ; the law of Attraction is the return of variety to unity. In the world of mind the same analogy is apparent. The study of consciousness is psychology. Man is the microcosm of existence ; consciousness, within a narrow focus, concentrates a knowledge of the universe and of God ; psychology is thus the abstract of all science, human and divine. As in the external world, all phenomena may be reduced to the two great laws of Action and Reaction ; so, in the internal, all the facts of conscious- ness may be reduced to one fundamental fact, comprising in like manner two principles and their correlation ; and these principles are again the One or the Infinite, the Many or the Finite, and the Connection of the infinite and finite. In every act of consciousness we distinguish a Self or Ego, and something different from self, a Non-ego ; each limited and modi- fied by the other. These, together, constitute the finite element, But at the same instant when we are conscious of these existences, plural, relative, and contingent, we are conscious likewise of a superior unity in which they are contained, and by which they are explained ; — a unity absolute as they are conditioned, sub- stantive as they are phenomenal, and an infinite cause as they are finite causes. This unity is God, The fact of consciousness is thus a complex phenomenon, comprehending three several terms : 1°, The idea of the Ego and Non-ego as Finite ; 2°, The idea of something else as Infinite ; and, 3°, The idea of the Rela- tion of the finite element to the infinite. These elements are revealed in themselves and in their mutual connexion, in every act of primitive or Spontaneous consciousness. They can also be reviewed by Reflection in a voluntary act ; but here reflection distinguishes, it does not create. The three ideas, the three 10 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. categories of intelligence, are given in the original act of instinc- tive apperception, obscurely, indeed, and without contrast. Re- flection analyses and discriminates the elements of this primary synthesis ; and as will is the condition of reflection, and will at the same time is personal, the categories, as obtained through reflection, have consequently the appearance of being also personal and subjective. It was this personality of reflection that misled Kant : caused him to overlook or misinterpret the fact of spon- taneous consciousness ; to individualise intelligence ; and to collect under this personal reason all that is conceived by us as necessary and universal. But as, in the spontaneous intuition of reason, there is nothing voluntary, and consequently nothing personal ; and as the truths which intelligence here discovers, come not from ourselves ; we have a right, up to a certain point, to impose these truths on others as revelations from on high : while, on the con- trary, reflection being wholly personal, it would be absurd to im- pose on others, what is the fruit of our individual operations. Spontaneity is the principle of religion ; reflection of philosophy. Men agree in spontaneity ; they differ in reflection. The former is necessarily veracious ; the latter is naturally delusive. The condition of Reflection is separation : it illustrates by dis- tinguishing ; it considers the different elements apart, and while it contemplates one, it necessarily throws the others out of view. Hence, not only the possibility, but the necessity, of error. The primitive unity, supposing no distinction, admits of no error ; reflection in discriminating the elements of thought, and in con- sidering one to the exclusion of others, occasions error, and a variety in error. He who exclusively contemplates the element of the Infinite, despises him who is occupied with the idea of the Finite ; and vice versa. It is the wayward development of the various elements of intelligence, which determines the imperfec- tions and varieties of individual character. Men under this partial and exclusive development, are but fragments of that humanity which can only be fully realised in the harmonious evolution of all its principles. What Reflection is to the individual, History is to the human race. The difference of an epoch consists exclu- sively in the partial development of some one element of intelli- gence in a prominent portion of mankind ; and as there are only three such elements, so there are only three grand epochs in the history of man. A knowledge of the elements of reason, of their relations and COUSIN'S PHILOSOPHY. 11 of their laws, constitutes not merely Philosophy, but is the con- dition of a History of Philosophy. The history of human reason, or the history of philosophy, must be rational and philosophic. It must be philosophy itself, with all its elements, in all their relations, and under all their laws, represented in striking cha- racters by the hands of time and of history, in the manifested progress of the human mind. The discovery and enumeration of all the elements of intelligence enable us to survey the progress of speculation from the loftiest vantage ground ; it reveals to us the laws by which the development of reflection or philosophy is determined ; and it supplies us with a canon by which the ap- proximation of the different systems to the truth may be finally ascertained. And what are the results ? Sensualism, Idealism, Scepticism, Mysticism, are all partial and exclusive views of the elements of intelligence. But each is false only as it is incomplete. They are all true in what they affirm ; all erroneous in what they deny. Though hitherto opposed, they are, consequently, not incapable of coalition; and, in fact, can only obtain their con- summation in a powerful Eclecticism, — a system which shall com- prehend them all. This Eclecticism is realised in the doctrine previously developed; and the possibility of such a catholic philosophy was first afforded by the discovery of M. Cousin, made so long ago as the year 1817, — " that consciousness con- tained many more phenomena than had previously been sus- pected." The present course is at once an exposition of these principles, as a true theory of philosophy, and an illustration of the mode in which this theory is to be applied, as a rule of criticism in the history of philosophical opinion. As the justice of the appli- cation must be always subordinate to the truth of the principle, we shall confine ourselves exclusively to a consideration of M. Cousin's system, viewed absolutely in itself. This, indeed, we are afraid will prove comparatively irksome ; and, therefore, solicit indulgence, not only for the unpopular nature of the dis- cussion, but for the employment of language which, from the total neglect of these speculations in Britain, will necessarily appear abstruse — not merely to the general reader. Now, it is manifest that the whole doctrine of M. Cousin is involved in the proposition, — that the Unconditioned, the Abso- lute, the Infinite, is immediately knoivn in consciousness, and this ty difference, plurality, and relation. The unconditioned, as an 12 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. original element of knowledge, is the generative principle of his system, but common to him with others; whereas the mode in which the possibility of this knowledge is explained, affords its discriminating peculiarity. The other positions of his theory, as deduced from this assumption, may indeed be disputed, even if the antecedent be allowed ; but this assumption disproved, every consequent in his theory is therewith annihilated. The recogni- tion of the absolute as a constitutive principle of intelligence, our author regards as at once the condition and the end of philosophy ; and it is on the discovery of this principle in the fact of conscious- ness, that he vindicates to himself the glory of being the founder of the new eclectic, or the one catholic, philosophy. The determi- nation of this cardinal point will thus briefly satisfy us touching the claim and character of the system. To explain the nature of the problem itself, and the sufficiency of the solution propounded by M. Cousin, it is necessary to premise a statement of the opinions which may be entertained regarding the Unconditioned, as an immediate object of knowledge and of thought. These opinions may be reduced to four. — 1°, The Uncon- ditioned is incognisablc and inconceivable ; its notion being only negative of the conditioned, which last can alone be positively known or conceived. — 2°, It is not an object of knowledge ; but its notion, as a regulative principle of the mind itself, is more than a mere negation of the conditioned. — 3°, It is cognisable, but not conceivable ; it can be known by a sinking back into identity with the absolute, but is incomprehensible by conscious- ness and reflection, which are only of the relative and the dif- ferent. — 4°, It is cognisable and conceivable by consciousness and reflection, under relation, difference, and plurality. The first of these opinions we regard as true ; the second is held by Kant ; the third by Schelling ; and the last by our author. 1. In our opinion, the mind can conceive, and consequently can know, only the limited, and the conditionally limited. The uncon- ditionally unlimited, or the Infinite, the unconditionally limited, or the Absolute, cannot positively be construed to the mind ; they can be conceived, only by a thinking away from, or abstraction of, those very conditions under which thought itself is realised ; consequently, the notion of the Unconditioned is only negative, — negative of the conceivable itself. For example, on the one hand we can positively conceive, neither an absolute whole, that is, a REVIEWER'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. 13 whole so great, that we cannot also conceive it as a relative part of a still greater whole ; nor an absolute part, that is, a part so small, that we cannot also conceive it as a relative whole, divisible into smaller parts. On the other hand, we cannot positively repre- sent, or realise, or construe to the mind (as here understanding and imagination coincide *), an infinite whole, for this could only be done by the infinite synthesis in thought of finite wholes, which would itself require an infinite time for its accomplishment ; nor, for the same reason, can we follow out in thought an infinite divi- sibility of parts. The result is the same, whether we apply the process to limitation in space, in time, or in degree. The uncon- ditional negation, and the unconditional affirmation of limitation ; in other words, the infinite and the absolute, properly so called,] are thus equally inconceivable to us. * [The Understanding, thought proper, notion, concept, &c, may coincide or not with Imagination, representation proper, image, &c. The two facul- ties do not coincide in a general notion ; for we cannot represent Man or Horse in an actual image without individualising the universal ; and thus contradiction emerges. But in the individual, say, Socrates or Bucephalus, they do coincide ; for I see no valid ground why we should not think, in the strict sense of the word, or conceive the individuals which we represent. Tn like manner there is no mutual contradiction between the image and the concept of the Infinite or Absolute, if these be otherwise possible ; for there is not necessarily involved the incompatibility of the one act of cognition with the other.] f It is right to observe, that though we are of opinion that the terms, Infinite and Absolute, and Unconditioned, ought not to be confounded, and accurately distinguish them in the statement of our own view ; yet, in speaking of the doctrines of those by whom they are indifferently employed, Ave have not thought it necessary, or rather we have found it impossible, to adhere to the distinction. The Unconditioned in our use of language denotes the genus of which the Infinite and Absolute are the species. [The term Absolute is of a twofold (if not threefold) ambiguity, correspond- ing to the double (or treble) signification of the word in Latin. 1. Absolutum means what is freed or loosed; in which sense the Absolute will be what is aloof from relation, comparison, limitation, condition, depen- dence, &c, and thus is tantamount to to dnrohvrov of the lower Greeks. In this meaning the Absolute is not opposed to the Infinite. 2. Absolutum means finished, perfected, completed; in which sense the Ab- solute will be what is out of relation, &c, as finished, perfect, complete, total, and thus corresponds to to 'okov and to r&etou of Aristotle. In this acceptation, — and it is that in which for myself I exclusively use it, — the Absolute is diametrically opposed to, is contradictory of, the Infinite. Besides these two meanings, there is to be noticed the use of the word, for the most part in its adverbial form ; — absolutely (absolute) in the sense of 14 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. As the conditionally limited (which we may briefly call the conditioned) is thus the only possible object of knowledge and of positive thought — thought necessarily supposes conditions. To think is to condition ; and conditional limitation is the fundamental law of the possibility of thought. For, as the greyhound cannot outstrip his shadow, nor (by a more appropriate simile) the eagle outsoar the atmosphere in which he floats, and by which alone he may be supported ; so the mind cannot transcend that sphere of limitation, within and through which exclusively the possibility of thought is realised. Thought is only of the conditioned ; because, as we have said, to think is simply to condition. The absolute is conceived merely by a negation of conceivability ; and all that we know, is only known as " won from the void and formless infinite.' 1 '' How, indeed, it could ever be doubted that thought is only of the conditioned, may well be deemed a matter of the profoundest admiration. Thought cannot transcend consciousness ; conscious- ness is only possible under the antithesis of a subject and object of thought, known only in correlation, and mutually limiting each other ; while, independently of this, all that we know either of subject or object, cither of mind or matter, is only a knowledge in each of the particular, of the plural, of the diiferent, of the modified, of the phenomenal. We admit that the consequence of this doctrine is, — that philosophy, if viewed as more than a science of the conditioned, is impossible. Departing from the particular, we admit, that we can never, in our highest generalisations, rise above the finite ; that our knowledge, whether of mind or matter, can be nothing more than a knowledge of the relative manifesta- tions of an existence, which in itself it is our highest wisdom to recognise as beyond the reach of philosophy, — in the language of St Austin, — " cognoscendo ignorari, et ignorando cognosci." The conditioned is the mean between two extremes, — two incon- ditionates, exclusive of each other, neither of which can be con- ceived as possible, but of which, on the principles of contradiction and excluded middle, one must be admitted as necessary. On this opinion, therefore, reason is shown to be weak, but not deceitful. simply, simplicittr, «7rAaS?), that is, considered in and for itself — considered not in relation. This holds a similar analogy to the two former meanings of Absolute, which the Indefinite (jo do^arov) does to the Infinite (jo ol<7ru%ou). It is subjective as they are objective ; it is in our thought as they are in their own existence. This application is to be discounted, as here irrelevant.] KANT'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. 15 The mind is not represented as conceiving two propositions sub- versive of each other, as equally possible ; but only, as unable to understand as possible, either of two extremes ; one of which, however, on the ground of their mutual repugnance, it is compelled to recognise as true. We are thus taught the salutary lesson, that the capacity of thought is not to be constituted into the mea- sure of existence ; and are warned from recognising the domain of our knowledge as necessarily co-extensive with the horizon of our faith. And by a wonderful revelation, we are thus, in the very consciousness of our inability to conceive aught above the rela- tive and finite, inspired with a belief in the existence of something unconditioned beyond the sphere of all comprehensible reality.* 2. The second opinion, that of Kant, is fundamentally the same as the preceding. Metaphysic, strictly so denominated, the phi- losophy of Existence, is virtually the doctrine of the unconditioned. From Xenophanes to Leibnitz, the infinite, the absolute, the un- conditioned, formed the highest principle of speculation ; but from the dawn of philosophy in the school of Elea until the rise of the Kantian philosophy, no serious attempt was made to investigate the nature and origin of this notion (or notions) as a psychological phenomenon. Before Kant, philosophy was rather a deduction from principles, than an inquiry concerning principles them- selves. At the head of every system a cognition figured, which the philosopher assumed in conformity to his views ; but it was rarely considered necessary, and more rarely attempted, to ascertain the genesis, and determine the domain, of this notion or judgment, previous to application. In his first Critique, Kant undertakes a regular survey of consciousness. He professes to analyse the conditions of human knowledge, — to mete out its limits, — to indicate its point of departure, — and to deter- mine its possibility. That Kant accomplished much, it would be prejudice to deny ; nor is his service to philosophy the less, * [True, therefore, are the declarations of a pious philosophy: — " A God understood would be no God at all ; " — " To think that God is, as we can think him to be, is blasphemy." — The Divinity, in a certain sense, is revealed ; in a certain sense is concealed : He is at once known and unknown. But the last and highest consecration of all true religion, must be an altar — ' AyuuoTa Qeu — " To the unknown and unknowable God.'*'' In this consum- mation, nature and revelation, paganism and Christianity, are at one : and from either source the testimonies are so numerous that I must refrain from quoting any. — Am I wrong in thinking, that M. Cousin would not repudiate this doctrine ?] 16 PHILOSOPHY OF THE I NCOND1TIONED. that his success has been more decided in the subversion of error than in the establishment of truth. The result of his examination was the abolition of the metaphysical sciences, — of rational psy- chology, ontology, speculative theology, &c, as founded on mere petitiones principlorum. Existence is revealed to us only under specific modifications, and these are known only under the con- ditions of our faculties of knowledge. " Things in themselves," Matter, Mind, God, — all, in short, that is not finite, relative, and phenomenal, as bearing no analogy to our faculties, is beyond the verge of our knowledge. Philosophy was thus restricted to the observation and analysis of the phamomcna of consciousness ; and what is not explicitly or implicitly given in a fact of conscious- ness, is condemned, as transcending the sphere of a legitimate speculation. A knowledge of the unconditioned is declared impos- sible ; cither immediately, as a notion, or mediately, as an inference. A demonstration of the absolute from the relative is logically absurd ; as in such a syllogism we must collect in the conclusion what is not distributed in the premises : And an immediate know- ledge of the unconditioned is equally impossible. — But here we think his reasoning complicated, and his reduction incomplete. We must explain ourselves. While we regard as conclusive, Kant's analysis of Time and Space into conditions of thought, we cannot help viewing his deduction of the " Categories of Understanding," and the " Ideas of speculative Reason," as the work of a great but perverse inge- nuity. The categories of understanding are merely subordinate forms of the conditioned. Why not, therefore, generalise the Conditioned — Existence conditioned, as the supreme category, or categories, of thought ? — and if it were necessary to analyse this form into its subaltern applications, why not develope these imme- diately out of the generic principle, instead of preposterously, and by a forced and partial analogy, deducing the laws of the under- standing from a questionable division of logical propositions ? Why distinguish Reason {Vernunft) from Understanding (Ver- stand), simply on the ground that the former is conversant about, or rather tends towards, the unconditioned ; when it is sufficiently apparent, that the unconditioned is conceived only as the negation of the conditioned, and also that the conception of contradictories is one ? In the Kantian philosophy both faculties perform the same function, both seek the one in the many ; — the Idea {Idee) is only the Concept (Begriff) sublimated into the inconceivable ; KANT'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. 17 Reason only the Understanding which has " overleaped itself." Kant has clearly shown, that the idea of the unconditioned can have no objective reality, — that it conveys no knowledge, — and that it involves the most insoluble contradictions. But he ought to have shown that the unconditioned had no objective application, because it had, in fact, no subjective affirmation, — that it afforded no real knowledge, because it contained nothing even conceiv- able, — and that it is self-contradictory, because it is not a notion, either simple or positive, but only a fasciculus of negations — negations of the conditioned in its opposite extremes, and bound together merely by the aid of language and their common cha- racter of incomprehensibility. And while he appropriated Reason as a specific faculty to take cognisance of these negations, hypos- tatised as positive, under the Platonic name of Ideas ; so also, as a pendant to his deduction of the categories of Understanding from a logical division of propositions, he deduced the classifica- tion and number of these ideas of Reason from a logical division of syllogisms. — Kant thus stands intermediate between those who view the notion of the absolute as the instinctive affirmation of an encentric intuition, and those who regard it as the factitious nega- tive of an eccentric generalisation. Were we to adopt from the Critical Philosophy the idea of analysing thought into its fundamental conditions, and were we to carry the reduction of Kant to what we think its ultimate sim- plicity, we would discriminate thought into positive and negative, according as it is conversant about the conditioned or uncondi- tioned. This, however, would constitute a logical, not a psycho- logical distinction ; as positive and negative in thought are known at once, and by the same intellectual act. The twelve Categories of the Understanding would be thus included under the former ; the three Ideas of Reason under the latter ; and to this intent the contrast between understanding and reason would disappear. Finally, rejecting the arbitrary limitation of time and space to the sphere of sense, we would express under the formula of — The Conditioned in Time and Space — a definition of the conceivable, and an enumeration of the three categories of thought.* The imperfection and partiality of Kant's analysis are betrayed in its consequences. His doctrine leads to absolute scepticism. * [See Appendix I., for a more matured view of these categories or con- ditions of thought.] 18 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. Speculative reason, on Kant's own admission, is an organ of mere delusion. The idea of the unconditioned, about which it is con- versant, is shown to involve insoluble contradictions, and yet to be the legitimate product of intelligence. Hume has well observed, " that it matters not whether we possess a false reason, or no reason at all." If " the light that leads astray, be light from heaven," what are we to believe? If our intellectual nature be perfidious in one revelation, it must be presumed deceitful in all ; nor is it possible for Kant to establish the existence of God, Free- will, and Immortality, on the presumed veracity of reason, in a practical relation, after having himself demonstrated its mendacity in a speculative. Kant had annihilated the older metaphysic, but the germ of a more visionary doctrine of the absolute, than any of those refuted, was contained in the bosom of his own philosophy. He had slain the body, but had not exorcised the spectre of the absolute ; and this spectre has continued to haunt the schools of Germany even to the present day. The philosophers were not content to aban- don their metaphysic ; to limit philosophy to an observation of phenomena, and to the generalisation of these phenomena into laws. The theories of Bouterweck, (in his earlier works,) of Bardili, of Reinhold, of Fichte, of Schelling, of Hegel, and of sundry others, are just so many endeavours, of greater or of less ability, to fix the absolute as a positive in knowledge ; but the absolute, like the water in the sieves of the Danaides, has always hitherto run through as a negative into the abyss of nothing. 3. Of these theories, that of Schelling is the only one in regard to which it is now necessary to say any thing. His opinion constitutes the third of those enumerated touching the knowledge of the absolute ; and the following is a brief statement of its prin- cipal positions : — While the lower sciences are of the relative and conditioned, PJiilosophy, as the science of sciences, must be of the absolute — the unconditioned. Philosophy, therefore, supposes a science of .the absolute. Is the absolute beyond our knowledge ? — then is philosophy itself impossible. But howj it is objected, can the absolute be known ? The ab- solute, as unconditioned, identical, and one, cannot be cognised under conditions, by difference and plurality. It cannot, there- fore, be known, if the subject of knowledge be distinguished from the object of knowledge ; in a knowledge of the absolute, exist- SCHELLING'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. 19 ence and knowledge must be identical ; the absolute can only be known, if adequately known, and it can only be adequately known, by the absolute itself. But is this possible? We are wholly ignorant of existence in itself: — the mind knows nothing, except in parts, by quality, and difference, and relation ; consciousness supposes the subject contradistinguished from the object of thought ; the abstraction of this contrast is a negation of consciousness ; and the negation of consciousness is the annihilation of thought itself. The alternative is therefore unavoidable : — either finding the abso- lute, we lose ourselves ; or retaining self and individual conscious- ness, we do not reach the absolute. All this Schelling frankly admits. He admits that a knowledge of the absolute is impossible, in personality and consciousness : he admits that, as the understanding knows, and can know, only by consciousness, and consciousness only by difference, we, as con- scious and understanding, can apprehend, can conceive only the conditioned ; and he admits that, only if man be himself the in- finite, can the infinite be known by him : " NTec sentire Deuin, nisi qui pars ipse Deoram est ; " * ("None can feel God, who shares not in the Godhead.") * [This line is from Manilius. But as a statement of Schelling's doctrine it is inadequate ; for on his doctrine the deity can be known only if fully known, and a full knowledge of deity is possible only to the absolute deity — that is, not to a sharer in the Godhead. Manilius has likewise another (poeti- cally) laudable line, of a similar, though less exceptionable, purport : — " Exemplumque Dei quisque est in imagine parva ; " ("Each is himself a miniature of God.") For we should not recoil to the opposite extreme ; and, though man be not identical with the Deity, still is he " created in the image of God." It is, in- deed, only through an analogy of the human with the Divine nature, that we are percipient and recipient of Divinity. As St Prosper has it : — " Nemo possidet Deum, nisi qui possidetur a Deo." — So Seneca : — " In unoquoque virorum bonorum habitatDcus." — So Plotinus •• — " Virtue tending to consum- mation, and irradicated in the soul by moral wisdom, reveals a God ; but a God destitute of true virtue is an empty name." — So Jacobi: — " From the enjoyment of virtue springs the idea of a virtuous ; from the enjoyment of free- dom, the idea of a free ; from the enjoyment of life, the idea of a living ; from the enjoyment of the divine, the idea of a godlike — and of a God." — So Goethe : — " Waer nicht das Auge sounenhaft, Wie koennten wir das Licht erblicken ? Lebt' nicht in uns des Gottes eigne Kraft, Wie koennte uns das Goettliches entzuecken ? " So Kant and many others. (Thus morality and religion, necessity and 20 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. But Schclling contends that there is a capacity of knowledge above consciousness, and higher than the understanding, and that this knowledge is competent to human reason, as identical with the Absolute itself. In this act of knowledge, which, after Fichte, he calls the Intellectual Intuition, there exists no distinction of subject and object, — no contrast of knowledge and existence ; all difference is lost in absolute indifference, — all plurality in absolute unity. The Intuition itself, — Reason, — and the Absolute are identified. The absolute exists only as known by reason, and reason knows only as being itself the absolute. This act (act!) is necessarily ineffable : " The vision and the faculty divine," to be known, must be experienced. It cannot be conceived by the understanding, because beyond its sphere ; it cannot be described, because its essence is identity, and all description supposes discri- mination. To those who arc unable to rise beyond a philosophy of reflection, Schelling candidly allows that the doctrine of the absolute can appear only a series of contradictions ; and he has at least the negative merit of having clearly exposed the impossibi- lity of a philosophy of the unconditioned, as founded on a know- ledge by difference, if he utterly fails in positively proving the possibility of such a philosophy, as founded on a knowledge in identity, through an absorption into, and vision of, the absolute. Out of Laputa or the Empire it would be idle to enter into an articulate refutation of a theory, which founds philosophy on the annihilation of consciousness, and on the identification of the un- conscious philosopher with God. The intuition of the absolute is manifestly the .work of an arbitrary abstraction, and of a self- delusive imagination. To reach the point of indifference, — by abstraction we annihilate the object, and by abstraction we annihi- late the subject, of consciousness. But what remains? — Nothing. " Nil conscimus nobis." We then hypostatise the zero; we bap- tize it with the name of Absolute ; and conceit ourselves that we atheism, rationally go together.) — The Platonists and Fathers have indeed finely said, that " God is the soul of the soul, as the soul is the soul of the body." " Vita Animse Deus est; haec Corporis. Hac fugiente, Solvitur hoc ; perit hgec, destituente Deo." These verses are preserved to us from an ancient poet by John of Salis- bury, and they denote the comparison of which Buchanan has made so admi- rable a use in his Calvini Epicedium.~\ SCHELLING'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED. 21 contemplate absolute existence, when we only speculate absolute privation.* This truth has been indeed virtually confessed by the two most distinguished followers of Schelling. Hegel at last abandons the intuition, and regards "pure or undetermined exis- tence" as convertible with "pure nothing;" whilst Oken, if he adhere to the intuition, intrepidly identifies the Deity or Absolute with zero. God, he makes the Nothing, the Nothing, he makes God ; " And Naught, Is ev'rything, and ev'rything is Naught." f Nor does the negative chimsera prove less fruitful than the posi- tive ; for Schelling has found it as difficult to evolve the one into the many, as his disciples to deduce the universe and its contents from the first self-affirmation of the " primordial Nothing." "Miri homines ! Nihil esse aliquid statuantve negentve ; Quodque negant statuunt, quod statunntque negant." To Schelling, indeed, it has been impossible, without gratuitous * [The Infinite and Absolute are only the names of two counter imbecilli- ties of the human mind, transmuted into properties of the nature of things,— of two subjective negations, converted into objective affirmations. We tire our- selves, either in adding to, or in taking from. Some, more reasonably, call the thing unfinishable — infinite ; others, less rationally, call it finished — absolute. But in both cases, the metastasis is in itself irrational. Not, however, in the highest degree: for the subjective contradictories were not at first objectified by the same philosophers ; and it is the crowning irrationality of the Infinito- absolutists, that they have not merely accepted as objective what is only sub- jective, but quietly assumed as the same, what are not only different but con- flictive. not only conflictive, but repugnant. Seneca (Ep. 118) has given the true genealogy of the original fictions ; but at his time the consummative union of the two had not been attempted. "Ubi animus aliquid diu protulit, et magnitudinem ejus sequendo lassatus est, infinitum coepit vocari. Eodem modo, aliquid diificulter secari cogitavimus, novissime, crescente difficultate, insecubile inventum est."] f [From the Rejected Addresses. Their ingenious authors have embodied a jest in the very words by which Oken, in sober seriousness, propounds the first and greatest of philosophical truths. Jacobi for Neeb ?) might well say, that, in reading this last consummation of German speculation, he did not know whether he were standing on his head or his feet. The book in which Oken so ingeniously deduces the All from the Nothing, has, I see, been lately translated into English, and published by the Kay Society (I think). The statement of the paradox is, indeed, somewhat softened in the second edition, from which, I presume, the version is made. Not that Oken and Hegel are original even in the absurdity. For as Varro right truly said : — " Nihil tarn absurde dici potest, quod non dicatur ab aliquo philosophorum ; " so the Intuition of God = the Absolute, = the Nothing, we find asserted by the lower Platonists, by the Buddhists, and by Jacob Boehme.] 22 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. and even contradictory assumptions, to explain the deduction of the finite from the infinite. By no salto mortale has he been able to clear the magic circle in which he had enclosed himself. Unable to connect the unconditioned and the conditioned by any natural correlation, he has variously attempted to account for the phe- nomenon of the universe, either by imposing a necessity of self- manifestation on the absolute, *. e. by conditioning the uncon- ditioned ; or by postulating a fall of the finite from the infinite, i. e. by begging the very fact which his hypothesis professed its exclusive ability to explain. — The veil of Isis is thus still unwith- drawn ; * and the question proposed by Orpheus at the dawn of speculation will probably remain unanswered at its setting : — 11 Ylug "hi pot 1'j rt toc ttxvt 'iarcct xxl %&>gis eKctarop] " (" How can I think each, separate, and all, one?") In like manner, annihilating consciousness in order to recon- struct it, Schelling has never yet been able to connect the faculties conversant about the conditioned, with the faculty of absolute knowledge. One simple objection strikes us as decisive, although we do not remember to have seen it alleged. " We awaken," says Schelling, " from the Intellectual Intuition as from a state of death ; we awaken by Reflection, that is, through a compulsory return to ourselves." f We cannot, at the same moment, be in the intellectual intuition and in common consciousness ; we must therefore be able to connect them by an act of memory — of recol- lection. But how can there be a remembrance of the absolute and its intuition ? As out of time, and space, and relation, and difference, it is admitted that the absolute cannot be construed to the understanding ? But as remembrance is only possible under the conditions of the understanding, it is consequently impossible to remember anything anterior to the moment when we awaken into consciousness ; and the clairvoyance of the absolute, even granting its reality, is thus, after the crisis, as if it had never been. We defy all solution of this objection. * [Isis appears as the iEgypto- Grecian symbol of the Unconditioned. (Jlatg — \oioc — Ovaicc: "laeiou, — yvaai; zov ovrog. Plut. I. et O.) In the temple of Athene-Isis, at Sais, on the fane there stood this sublime inscrip- tion: I AM ALL THAT WAS, AND IS, AND SHALL BE ; NOR MY VEIL, HAS IT BEEN WITHDRAWN BY MORTAL. ( u 'Ey&> eiftt ttocu to yeyovog, xxl ov, koc\ ivo/uei/ov, x.a.1 rou ipov 7re7rhov ovtietg ttu f In Fichte's u. Niethhammcr's Phil. Jonrn. vol. iii. p. 211. COUSIN'S DOCTRINE OF THE UNCONDITIONED 23 4. What has now been stated may in some degree enable the reader to apprehend the relations in which our author stands, both to those who deny and to those who admit a knowledge of the absolute. If we compare the philosophy of Cousin with the philosophy of Schelling, we at once perceive that the former is a disciple, though by no means a servile disciple of the latter. The scholar, though enamoured with his master's system as a whole, is sufficiently aware of the two insuperable difficulties of that theory. He saw, that if he pitched the absolute so high, it was impossible to deduce from it the relative ; and he felt, probably, that the Intellectual Intuition — a stumbling-block to himself — would be arrant foolishness in the eyes of his countrymen. — Cousin and Schelling agree, that as philosophy is the science of the unconditioned, the unconditioned must be within the compass of science. They agree that the unconditioned is known, and immediately known : and they agree that intelligence, as com- petent to the unconditioned, is impersonal, infinite, divine. — But while they coincide in the fact of the absolute, as known, they are diametrically opposed as to the mode in which they attempt to realize this knowledge ; each regarding, as the climax of contra- diction, the manner in which the other endeavours to bring human reason and the absolute into proportion. According to Schelling, Cousin's absolute is only a relative ; according to Cousin, Schel- ling's knowledge of the absolute is a negation of thought itself. Cousin declares the condition of all knowledge to be plurality and difference ; and Schelling, that the condition, under which alone a knowledge of the absolute becomes possible, is indifference and unity. The one thus denies a notion of the absolute to conscious- ness ; whilst the other affirms that consciousness is implied in every act of intelligence. Truly, we must view each as triumphant over the other ; and the result of this mutual neutralisation is, — that the absolute, of which both assert a knowledge, is for us incognisable.* * [" Quod genus hoc pugnag, qua victor victus uterque ! " is still further exhibited in the mutual refutation of the two great apostles of the Absolute, in Germany, — Schelling and Hegel. They were early friends, — contemporaries at the same university, — occupiers of the same bursal room, (college chums,) — Hegel, somewhat the elder man, was some- what the younger philosopher, — and they were joint editors of the journal in which their then common doctrine was at first promulgated. So far all was in unison ; but now they separated, locally and in opinion. Both, indeed, stuck to the Absolute, but each regarded the way in which the other pro- 24 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. In these circumstances, we might expect our author to have stated the difficulties to which his theory was exposed on the one side and on the other ; and to have endeavoured to obviate the objections, both of his brother absolutists, and of those who alto- gether deny a philosophy of the unconditioned. This he has not done. The possibility of reducing the notion of the absolute to a negative conception is never once contemplated ; and if one or two allusions (not always, perhaps, correct) are made to his doctrine, the name of Schelling does not occur, as we recollect, in the whole compass of these lectures. Difficulties, by which either the doc- trine of the absolute in general, or his own particular modification of that doctrine, may be assailed, are either avoided, or solved only by still greater. Assertion is substituted for proof ; facts of consciousness are alleged, which consciousness never knew ; and paradoxes, that baffle argument, are promulgated as intuitive truths, above the necessity of confirmation. With every feeling of respect for M. Cousin as a man of learning and genius, we must regard the grounds on which he endeavours to establish his doctrine as assumptive, inconsequent, and erroneous. In vindicat- ing the truth of this statement, we shall attempt to show : — in the first place, that M. Cousin is at fault in all the authorities he quotes in favour of the opinion, that the absolute, infinite, uncon- ditioned, is a primitive notion, cognisable by our intellect ; in the second, that his argument to prove the correality of his three ideas fesseel to reach it, as absurd. Hegel derided the Intellectual Intuition of Schelling, as a poetical play of fancy ; Schelling derided the Dialectic of Hegel, as a logical play with words. Both, I conceive, were right ; but neither fully right. If Schelling's Intellectual Intuition were poetical, it was a poetry transcending, in fact abolishing, human imagination. If Hegel's Dialectic were logical, it was a logic, outraging that science and the condi- tions of thought itself. Hegel's whole philosophy is indeed founded on two errors ; — on a mistake in logic, and on a violation of logic. In his dream of disproving the law of Excluded Middle (between two Contradictories), he inconceivably mistakes Contraries for Contradictories ; and in positing pure or absolute existence as a meDtal datum, immediate, intuitive, and above proof, (though, in truth, this be palpably a mere relative gained by a process of abstraction,) he not only mistakes the fact, but violates the logical law which prohibits us to assume the principle which it behoves us to prove. On these two fundamental errors rests Hegel's dialectic ; and Hegel's dialectic is the ladder by which he attempts to scale the Absolute. — The peculiar doctrine of these two illustrious thinkers is thus to me only another manifestation of an occurrence of the commonest in human speculation ; it is only a sophism of relative self-love, victorious over the absolute love of truth; — " Quod volunt sapiunt, et nolunt sapere qua 3 vera sunt."] (COUSIN ON THE CATEGORIES OF ARISTOTLE AND KANT.) 25 proves directly the reverse ; in the third, that the conditions under which alone he allows intelligence to be possible, neces- sarily exclude the possibility of a knowledge, not to say a con- ception, of the absolute; and in the fourth, that the absolute, as denned by him, is only a relative and a conditioned. In the first place, then, M. Cousin supposes that Aristotle and Kant, in their several categories, equally proposed an analysis of the constituent elements of intelligence; and he also supposes that each, like himself, recognised among these elements the notion of the infinite, absolute, unconditioned. In both these sup- positions we think him wrong. It is a serious error in a historian of philosophy to imagine that, in his scheme of categories, Aristotle proposed, like Kant, " an analysis of the elements of human reason." It is just, how- ever, to mention, that in this mistake M. Cousin has been pre- ceded by Kant himself. But the ends proposed by the two phi- losophers were different, even opposed. In their several tables : — Aristotle attempted a synthesis of things in their multiplicity, — a classification of objects real, but in relation to thought ; — Kant, an analysis of mind in its unity, — a dissection of thought, pure, but in relation to its objects. The predicaments of Aristotle are thus objective, of things as understood ; those of Kant subjective, of the mind as understanding. The former are results a poste- riori — the creations of abstraction and generalisation ; the latter, anticipations a priori — the conditions of those acts themselves. It is true, that as the one scheme exhibits the unity of thought diverging into plurality, in appliance to its objects, and the other, exhibits the multiplicity of these objects converging towards unity by a collective determination of the mind ; while, at the same time, language usually confounds the subjective and objective under a common term ; — it is certainly true, that some elements in the one table coincide in name with some elements in the other. This coincidence is, however, only equivocal. In reality, the whole Kantian categories must be excluded from the Aristotelic list, as entia rationis, as notiones secundce — in short, as determi- nations of thought, and not genera of real things ; while the several elements would be specially excluded, as partial, privative, transcendent, &c. But if it would be unjust to criticise the cate- gories of Kant in whole, or in part, by the Aristotelic canon, what must we think of Kant, who, after magnifying the idea of invest!- 26 PHILOSOPHY OF THE UNCONDITIONED. gating the forms of pure intellect as worthy of the mighty genius of the Stagirite, proceeds, on this false hypothesis, to blame the execution, as a kind of patcli work, as incomplete, as confounding derivative with simple notions ; nay, even, on the narrow prin- ciples of his own Critique, as mixing the forms of pure sense with the forms of pure understanding?* — If M. Cousin also were correct in his supposition that Aristotle and his followers had viewed his categories as an analysis of the fundamental forms of thought, he would find his own reduction of the elements of rea- son to a double principle anticipated in the scholastic division of existence into ens per se and ens per accidens. Nor is our author correct in thinking that the categories of Aristotle and Kant arc complete, inasmuch as they are co-exten- sive with his own. — As to the former, if the Infinite were not excluded, on what would rest the scholastic distinction of ens cate- goricum and ens transcendent ? The logicians require that pre- (licamental matter shall be of a limited and finite nature ;| God, as infinite, is thus excluded : and while it is evident from the whole context of his book of categories, that Aristotle there only contemplated a distribution of the finite, so, in other of his works, he more than once emphatically denies the infinite as an object not Only of knowledge, but of thought; — to oLkuqov otyvuaTOv fi ct7ret%ov — to xTrnpou rJvrs votrou, ovn uiut in the execution of his purpose he is often at fault, often confused, :ni(l sometimes even contradictory. I have endeavoured to point out and to correct these Imperfections in the edition which 1 have not vet finished of his works.] BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 93 result, the uncertainty of every principle ; and the assertion of this uncertainty is — Scepticism. This result is declared even in the sentence, with the preliminary clause of which, Dr Brown abruptly terminates his quotation. But allowing Dr Brown to be correct in transmuting the scep- tical nihilist into a dogmatic realist ; he would still be wrong (on the supposition that Hume admitted the truth of a belief to be convertible with its invincibility) in conceiving, on the one hand, that Hume could ever acquiesce in the same inconsequent con- clusion with himself; or, on the other, that he himself could, without an abandonment of his system, acquiesce in the legitimate conclusion. On this supposition, Hume could only have arrived at a similar result with Reid ; there is no tenable medium between the natural realism of the one and the sceptical nihilism of the other. — " Do you follow," says Hume in the same essay, " the instincts and propensities of nature in assenting to the veracity of sense?" — I do, says Dr Brown. (Lect. xxviii. p. 176. alibi.) — " But these," continues Hume, " lead you to believe that the very perception or sensible image is the external object. Do you dis- claim this principle in order to embrace a more rational opinion, that the perceptions are only representations of something exter- nal?" — It is the vital principle of my system, says Brown, that the mind knows nothing beyond its own states (Lectt. passim) ; philosophical suicide is not my choice ; I must recall my admis- sion, and give the lie to this natural belief., — " You here," pro- ceeds Hume, " depart from your natural propensities and more obvious sentiments ; and yet are not able to satisfy your reason, which can never find any convincing argument from experience to prove, that the perceptions are connected with any external objects." — I allow, says Brown, that the existence of an external world cannot be proved by reasoning, and that the sceptical argu- ment admits of no logical reply. (Lect. xxviii. p. 175.) — " But" (we may suppose Hume to conclude) " as you truly maintain that the confutation of scepticism can be attempted only in two ways (ibid.), — either by showing that its arguments are inconclusive, or by opposing to them, as paramount, the evidence of our natural beliefs, — and as you now, voluntarily or by compulsion, abandon both; you are confessedly reduced to the dilemma, either of acquiescing in the conclusion of the sceptic, or of refusing your assent upon no ground whatever. Pyrrhonism or absurdity ? — choose your horn." 94 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. Were the scepticism into which Dr Brown's philosophy is thus analysed, confined to the negation of matter, the result would be comparatively unimportant. The transcendent reality of an outer world, considered absolutely, is to us a matter of supreme indifference. It is not the idealism itself that we must deplore ; but the mendacity of consciousness which it involves. Conscious- ness, once convicted of falsehood, an unconditional scepticism, in regard to the character of our intellectual being, is the melan- choly, but only rational, result. Any conclusion may now with impunity be drawn against the hopes and dignity of human na- ture. Our Personality, our Immateriality, our Moral Liberty, have no longer an argument for their defence. " Man is the dream of a shadow ;" God is the dream of that dream. Dr Brown, after the best philosophers, rests the proof of our personal identity, and of our mental individuality, on the ground of beliefs, which, as " intuitive, universal, immediate, and irre- sistible," he not unjustly regards as " the internal and never- ceasing voice of our Creator, — revelations from on high, omnipo- tent [and veracious] as their author." To him this argument is however incompetent, as contradictory. What we know of self or person, we know, only as given in consciousness. In our perceptive consciousness there is revealed as an ultimate fact a self and a not- self ; each given as indepen- dent — each known only in antithesis to the other. No belief is more " intuitive, universal, immediate, or irresistible, " than that this antithesis is real and known to be real ; no belief therefore is more true. If the antithesis be illusive, self and not-self, subject and object, /and Thou are distinctions without a difference; and consciousness, so far from being " the internal voice of our Crea- tor," is shown to be, like Satan, " a liar from the beginning." The reality of this antithesis in different parts of his philosophy Dr Brown affirms and denies, — In establishing his theory of percep- tion, he articulately denies, that mind is conscious of aught beyond itself; virtually assorts, that what is there given in consciousness as not-self, is only a phenomena] illusion, — a modification of self. which our consciouness determines us to believe the quality of something numerically and substantially different. Like Narcis- sus again, ho must lament, — " TUe c sum sensi, sed me mea fallil imago." After this implication in one pari of his system that our belief BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 95 in. the distinction of self and not-self is nothing more than the deception of a lying consciousness ; it is startling to find him, in others, appealing to the beliefs of this same consciousness as to " revelations from on high ; " — nay, in an especial manner alleg- ing " as the voice of our Creator," this very faith in the dis- tinction of self and not-self, through the fallacy of which, and of which alone, he had elsewhere argued consciousness of false- hood. On the veracity of this mendacious belief, Dr Brown establishes his proof of our personal identity. (Lect. xii. — xv.) Touching the object of perception, when its evidence is inconvenient, this belief is quietly passed over as incompetent to distinguish not-self from self ; in the question regarding our personal identity, where its testimony is convenient, it is clamorously cited as an inspired witness, exclusively competent to distinguish self from not-self. Yet, why, if, in the one case, it mistook self for not-self it may not, in the other, mistake not-self for self, would appear a problem not of the easiest solution. The same belief, with the same inconsistency, is again called in to prove the individuality of mind. (Lect. xcvi.) But if we are fallaciously determined, in perception, to believe what is sup- posed indivisible, identical, and one, to be plural and different and incompatible, (self = self + not-self) ; how, on the authority of the same treacherous conviction, dare we maintain, that the phcenomenal unity of consciousness affords a guarantee of the real simplicity of the thinking principle ? The materialist may now contend, without fear of contradiction, that self is only an illusive phcenomenon; that our consecutive identity is that of the Delphic ship, and our present unity merely that of a system of co-ordinate activities. To explain the phenomenon, he has only to suppose, as certain theorists have lately done, an organ to tell the lie of our personality ; and to quote as authority for the lie itself, the perfidy of consciousness, on which the theory of a representative perception is founded. « On the hypothesis of a representative perception, there is, in fact, no salvation from materialism, on the one side, short of idealism — scepticism — nihilism, on the other. Our knowledge of mind and matter, as substances, is merely relative ; thev are known to us only in their qualities ; and we can justify the postu- lation of two different substances, exclusively on the supposition of 96 PHILOSOPHY OF PERCEPTION. the incompatibility of the double series of phenomena to eoinhere in one. Is this supposition disproved ? — the presumption against dualism is again decisive. " Entities are not to be multiplied with- out necessity;" — "A plurality of principles is not to be assumed where the phmnomena can be explained by one." In Brown's theory of per- ception, he abolishes the incompatibility of the two series ; and yet his argument, as a dualist, for an immaterial principle of thought, proceeds on the ground, that this incompatibility subsists. (Lect. xcvi. pp. 646, 647.) This philosopher denies us an immediate knowledge of aught beyond the accidents of mind. The accidents which we refer to body, as known to us, are only states or modi- fications of the percipient subject itself; in other words, the qua- lities we call material, are known by us to exist, only as they are known by us to inhere in the same substance as the qualities we de- nominate mental. There is an apparent antithesis, but a real identity. On this doctrine, the hypothesis of a double principle losing its necessity, becomes philosophically absurd; and on the law of parsimony, a psychological unitarianism, at best, is esta- blished. To the argument, that the qualities of the object are so repugnant to the qualities of the subject of perception, that they cannot be supposed the accidents of the same substance ; the uni- tarian — whether materialist, idealist, or absolutist — has only to reply : that so far from the attributes, of the object, being exclu- sive of the attributes of the subject, in this act ; the hypothetical dualist himself establishes, as the fundamental axiom of his philo- sophy of mind, that the object known is universally identical with the subject knowing. The materialist may now derive the subject from the object, the idealist derive the object from the subject, the absolutist sublimate both into indifference, nay, the nihilist subvert the substantial reality of either ; — the hypothetical realist so far from being: able to resist the conclusion of any, in tact accords their assumptive premises to all. The same contradiction would, in like manner, invalidate every presumption in favour of our Liberty of Will. But as Dr Brown throughout his scheme of Ethics advances no argument in support of this condition of our moral being, which his philosophy otherwise tends to render impossible, we shall say nothing of this consequence of hypothetical realism. So much for the system, which its author fondly imagines, " allows to the sceptic no rest iu!<«r for his foot, — no fulcrum BROWN IMPOTENT AGAINST THE SCEPTIC. 97 for the instrument he uses:" so much for the doctrine which Brown would substitute for Reid's ; — nay, which he even supposes Reid himself to have maintained. " Scilicet, hoc totum falsa ratione receptum est ! " * * [In this criticism I have spoken only of Dr Brown's mistakes, and of these, only with reference to his attack on Reid. On his appropriating to himself the observations of others, and in particular those of Destutt Tracy, I have said nothing, though an enumeration of these would be necessary to place Brown upon his proper level. That, however, would require a sepa- rate discussion.] III.-JOHNSOFS TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. (October, 1832.) A Manual of the History of Philosophy ; translated from tlie German of Tennemann. By the Rev. Arthur Johnson, M.A., late Fellow of Wadham College. 8vo. Oxford : 1832. We took up this translation with a certain favourable prepos- session, and felt inclined to have said all we conscientiously could in its behalf ; but alas ! never were expectations more completely disappointed, and we find ourselves constrained exclusively to condemn, where we should gladly have been permitted only to applaud. We were disposed to regard an English version of Tenne- mann's minor History of Philosophy — his " Grundriss" as a work of no inconsiderable utility — if competently executed : but in the present state of philosophical learning in this country we were well aware, that few were adequate to the task, and of those few we hardly expected that any one would be found so disinte- rested, as to devote himself to a labour, of which the credit stood almost in an inverse proportion to the trouble. Few works, indeed, would prove more difficult to a translator. A complete mastery of the two languages, in a philological Bense, was not enough. There was required a comprehensive acquaint- ance with philosophy in general, and, in particular, an intimate knowledge of the philosophy of Kant. Tennemann was a Kan- tian ; lie estimates all opinions by a Kantian standard ; and the language which he employs is significant only as understood pre- cisely in a Kantian application, In stating this, wo have 4 no inten- tion of disparaging the intrinsic value of the work, which, in truth, with all its defects, we highly esteem as the production of TENNEMANN'S MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. 99 a sober, accurate, and learned mind. Every historian of philo- sophy must have his system, by reference to which he criticises the opinions of other thinkers. Eclecticism, as opposed to syste- matic philosophy, is without a meaning. For either the choice of doctrines must be determined by some principle, and that prin- ciple then constitutes a system ; or the doctrines must be arbitra- rily assumed, which would be the negation of philosophy alto- gether. (We think therefore, that M. Cousin, in denominating his scheme distinctively the eclectic, has committed an act of injustice on himself.) But as it was necessary that Tennemann should be of some school, — should have certain opinions, — we think it any thing but a disadvantage that he was of the Kantian. The Cri- tical Philosophy is a comprehensive and liberal doctrine ; and whatever difference may subsist with regard to its positive con- clusions, it is admitted, on all hands, to constitute, by its negative, a great epoch in the history of thought. An acquaintance with a system so remarkable in itself, and in its influence so decisive of the character of subsequent speculation, is now a matter of neces- sity to all who would be supposed to have crossed the threshold of philosophy. The translation of a work of merit like the pre- sent, ought not therefore to be less acceptable to the English reader, because written in the spirit and language of the Kantian system ; — provided, he be enabled by the translator to understand it. But what does this imply ? Not merely that certain terms in the German should be rendered by certain terms in the Eng- lish ; for few philosophical words are to be found in the latter, which suggest the same analyses and combinations of thought as those embodied in the technical vocabulary of the former. The language of German philosophy has sometimes three or four expressions, precisely distinguishing certain generalizations or abstractions ; where we possess only a single word, comprehensive of the whole, or, perhaps, several, each vaguely applicable to all or any. In these circumstances a direct translation was impos- sible. The translator could only succeed by coming to a specific understanding with his reader. He behoved, in the first place, clearly to determine the value of the principal terms to be ren- dered ; which could only be accomplished through a sufficient exposition of that philosophy whose peculiar analyses these terms adequately expressed. In the second place, it was incumbent on him to show in what respects the approximating English term was not exactly equivalent to the original ; and precisely to define 100 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S the amplified or restricted sense, in which, by accommodation to the latter, the former was in his translation specially to be under- stood. At the same time it must be remembered, that the Gmndriss of Tennemann was not intended by its author for an independent treatise. It is merely a manual or text-book ; that is, an outline of statements to be filled up, and fully illustrated in lectures ; — a text-book also for the use of students, who, from their country and course of education, were already more or less familiar with the philosophy of the German schools. In translating this work as a system intended to be complete per se, and in favour of a public unlearned in philosophical discussion, and utterly ignorant of German metaphysics, a competent translator would thus have found it necessary, in almost every paragraph, to supply, to amplify, and to explain. M. Cousin, indeed, when he condescen- ded to translate this work, (we speak only from recollection and a rapid glance,) limited himself to a mere translation. But by him the treatise was intended to be only subordinate to the history of speculation delivered in his lectures ; and was address- ed, among his countrymen, to a numerous class of readers, whose study of philosophy, and of German philosophy, he had himself powerfully contributed to excite. The fact, indeed, of a French translation by so able an interpreter, was of itself sufficient to render a simple version of the work into another European tongue nearly superfluous ; and we were prepared to expect, that, if translated into English, something more would be attempted, than what had been already so well executed in a language with which every student of philosophy is familiar. It was, therefore, with considerable interest, that we read the announcement of an English translation, by a gentleman distin- guished for learning among the Tutors of Oxford ; whose compa- rative merit, indeed, had raised him to several of the most honourable and important offices in the nomination of the two " Venerable Houses." Independently of its utility, we hailed the publication as a symptom of the revival, in England, of a taste fop philosophical speculation ; and this more especially, as it emanated from that University in which, (since its legal constitution had been subverted, and all the subjects taught reduced to the capa- city of one self-elected teacher.) Psychology and Metaphysics, as beyond the average comprehension of the College Fellows, had remained not only untaught, hut their study discouraged, it' not MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. 101 formally proscribed. A glance at Mr Johnson's preface confirmed us in our prepossessions. We were there, indirectly, indeed, but confidently, assured of his intimate acquaintance with philosophy in general, and German philosophy in particular ; nor were we allowed to remain ignorant of the translator's consciousness that he might easily have become the rival of his author. " As far," he says, " as it appeared possible, I have preserved the technical expressions of my author, subjoining for the most part an expla- nation of their meaning, for the benefit of those English readers who may not have plunged into the profound abyss of German metaphy- sics ; " — the expositor himself having of course so plunged, " When- ever," he adds, " it has appeared to me that an observation of my author was of a nature impossible to be apprehended by any but a scholar long familiar with the disputes of the German lecture- rooms, I have endeavoured to express the sense of it in other words;" — necessarily implying that the interpreter himself was thus familiar. And again : — " There are parts of Tennemann, which on this account I had much rather have composed anew than translated, particularly the Introduction." The examination of a few paragraphs of the work, however, proved the folly of our expectations. We found it to be a bare translation ; and one concentrating every possible defect. We discovered, in the first place, that the translator was but superfi- cially versed in the German language ; — in the second, that he was wholly ignorant even of the first letter in the alphabet of German philosophy ; — in the third, that he was almost equally unac- quainted with every other philosophy, ancient and modern ; — in the fourth, that he covertly changes every statement of his author which he may not like ;— in the fifth, that he silently suppresses every section, sentence, clause, word he is suspicious of not under- standing ; — and in the sixth, that he reviles, without charity, the philosophy and philosophers he is wholly incapable of apprecia- ting. — Instead of being of the smallest assistance to the student of philosophy, the work is only calculated to impede his progress, if not at once to tarn him from the pursuit. From beginning to end, all is vague or confused, unintelligible or erroneous. We do not mean to insinuate that it was so intended, (albeit the thought certainly did strike us,) but, in point of fact, this translation is admi- rably calculated to turn all metaphysical speculation into con- tempt. From the character of the work, from the celebrity of its author and of its French translator, and even from the 102 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S academical eminence of Mr Johnson himself, his version would be probably one of the first books resorted to by the English student, for information concerning the nature and progress of philosophical opinions. But in proportion as the inquirer were capable of thinking, would philosophy, as here delineated, appear to him incomprehensible ; and in proportion as he respected his source of information, would he either despair of his own capacity for the study, or be disgusted with the stutly itself. It is, indeed, by reason of the serious injury which this translation might occa- sion to the cause of philosophy in this country, that we find it imperative on us, by annihilating its authority, to deprive it of the power to hurt. But let us be equitable to the author while executing justice on his w r ork. This translation is by no means to be taken as a test of the general talent or accomplishment of the translator. He has certainly been imprudent, in venturing on an undertaking, for which he was qualified, neither by his studies, nor by the character of his mind. That he should ever conceive himself so qualified, furnishes only another proof of the present abject state of philosophical erudition in this country ; for it is less to be ascribed to any overweening presumption in his powers, than to the lamentable lowness of the standard by which he rated their sufficiency. What Mr Johnson has executed ill, there are prob- ably not six individuals in the British empire who could perform well. — But to the proof of our assertions. That Mr Johnson, though a quondam Professor of ancient Saxon, is still an under-graduate in modern German, will, with- out special proof, be sufficiently apparent in the course of our criticism. Of his ignorance of the Kantian philosophy, in the languag which the work of Tcnnemann is written, every page of the translation bears ample witness. The peculiarities of this lan- guage arc not explained ; nay. the most Important sections of the original, from which, by a sagacious reader, these might have been partially divined, are silently omitted, or professedly sup- pressed as unintelligible, I K. g, § 41.) Terms in the original, correlative and opposed, are, not only not translated by terms also correlative and opposed, hut confounded under the same expression, ami. if not rendered at random, translated by the rule of contraries. To take, for example, the mental operations ami their objects: In a few pages we have examined, we Hud among MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY-. 108 other errors, Vernunft (Reason), though strictly used in its proper signification as opposed to Ver 'stand, rendered sometimes by " Reason," but more frequently by " Understanding " or " In- tellect ; " and Verstand (Understanding), in like manner, speci- ally used in opposition to Vernunft, translated indifferently by " Understanding " or " Reason," * Vorstellung (Representation), the genus of which Idee, Begriff, Anschauung are species, is translated " Perception," " Idea," " Apprehension," " Impres- sion," "Thought," " Effort," Sec— Begriff (Notion, Concept), f the object of the Understanding, as opposed to Idee (Idea), the object of the Reason, is commonly translated " Idea," (and this also in treating of the Aristotelian and Kantian philosophies, in which this term has a peculiar meaning very different from its Cartesian universality,) sometimes " Opinion," "Character;" Idee der Vernunft (Idea of Reason) is rendered by " object of Understanding," and Zweck der Vernunft, (scope or end of Rea- son,) by " mental object;" while Anschauung (immediate object of Perception or Imagination) is expressed by " mental Concep- tion" " Perception" &c— Yet Mr Johnson professes, " as far as it appeared possible, to have preserved the technical expressions of his author " ! But of this more in the sequel. Of our translator's knowledge of philosophy in general, a speci- men may be taken from the few short notes of explanation he has appended. These for the most part say, in fact, nothing, or are merely an echo of the text ; where they attempt more, they are uniformly wrong. Take, for example, the two first. At p. 55, on the words Syncretism and Mysticism, we have this luminous annotation : " The force of these terms, as used by the author, will be sufficiently explained in the course of the work. Transl." At p. 70, (and on a false translation,) there is the following note, which, though not marked as the translator's, at once indicates its source : " Idealism is used to denote the theory which asserts the reality of our ideas, J and from these argues the reality of exter- * By the time he is half through the work, our translator seems to have become aware that the Kantians " make a broad distinction between the Understanding and Reason." The discovery, however, had no beneficial effect on his translation. f It will be seen that we do not employ Conception in the meaning attached to it by Mr Stewart. t The stoutest sceptic never doubted that we are really conscious of what we are conscious, — he never doubted the subjective reality of our ideas : the doubt would annihilate itself. 104 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S nal objects.* Pantheism is the opinion that all nature partakes of the divine essence." f — To this head we may refer the author's continual translation of Philosophic by " Moral Philosophy," which he tells us is convertible with Metaphysics in general ; his use of the word " Experimentalism " for Empirism, Philosophy of Experience or of Observation ; to say nothing of the incorrect- ness and vacillation of his whole technical language criticised by any standard. — Under this category may be also mentioned the numerous and flagrant errors in philosophical history. For ex- ample, Joseph Priestley {als Physiker beruehmte) is called " the celebrated Physician;" and Ancillon (pere), thus distinguished from his son, the present Prussian prime minister, himself a dis- tinguished philosopher, is converted from a Calvinist pastor, to a Catholic priest — " Father Ancillon." But lest we should be supposed to have selected these defects, we shall vindicate the rigid accuracy of our strictures by a few extracts. We annex to each paragraph a literal translation, not such, assuredly, as we should offer, were we to attempt a com- plete version of the original, but such as may best enable the English reader to compare Mr Johnson and Tennemann together. We find it convenient to make our observations in the form of notes : in these we pass over much that is imperfect, and can notice only a few of the principal mistakes. We cannot, of course, hope to be fully understood except by those who have some acquaintance with German philosophy. — We shall first quote paragraphs from the Introduction. Johnson's Version, § 1. — " A history of philosophy, to be complete,:}: de- mands a preliminary enquiry respecting the character of this science, as well as respecting its subject-matter, || its form and object ; 1 and also its extent * We had always imagined the proving the reality of external objects to be the negation of Idealism — Realism. f Pantheism, however, is the very denial of such participation ; it asserts that u all nature" and the " divine essence 1 ' are not two, one partaking of the other, but one and the same. X " Complete," inaccurate ; original, Zweckmae&sige. || " Subject-matter;" original, hihult, I, r. contents, the complement of objects. Subject or Subject-matter is the materia subjecta or in qua .- and If employed for the object, materia objecta or drca quam, is always an abuse of philosophical Language, though with us unfortunately a very common one. But to commute these terms in the translation of a Kantian Treatise, where subject and object, subjective and objective, are accurately contradistinguished, and where the distinction forms, in fact, the very cardinal point on which the whole philosophy turns, is to convert light into darkness, order into ohlOB. f " Object ; M original, Xiree/,\ end, aim, scope. The unphQoSOphictJ MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. 105 or comprehensiveness, its method, its importance, and the different ways in which it may be treated. All these particulars, with the bibliography be- longing to it, will form, together with some previous observations on the progress of philosophical research,* the subject of a general introduc- tion." Literal Translation, § 1. — " The history of philosophy, if handled in con- formity to the end in view, presupposes an inquiry touching the conception of the science, conjoining a view of its contents, form, and end, as also of its compass, method, importance, and the various modes in which it may be treated. These objects, along with the history and literature of the history of philosophy, combined with some preparatory observations on the progress of the philosophizing reason, afford the contents of a general introduction to the history of philosophy." Johnson's Version, § 2. — " The human mind has a tendency to attempt to enlarge the bounds of its knowledge, and gradually to aspire to a clear development of the laws and relations of nature, and of its own operations. f At first it does nothing more than obey a blind desire, without accounting to itself sufficiently for this instinctive impulse of the understanding,^ and without knowing the appropriate means to be employed, or the distance by which it is removed from its object. Insensibly this impulse becomes more deliberate, and regulates itself in proportion to the progress of the under- standing, || which gradually becomes better acquainted with itself. Such a deliberate impulse is what we call philosophy, f abuse of the term object for end is a comparatively recent innovation in the English and French languages. Culpable at all times, on the present occa- sion it is equally inexcusable as the preceding. * " Philosophic research." The translation is a vague and unmeaning version of a precise and significant original— philosophirende Vernunft. (See §2.) f This sentence is mangled and wholly misunderstood. " The end of philosophy," says Trismegistus, " is the intuition of unity ; " and to this ten- dency of speculation towards the absolute — to the intensive completion in unity, and not to the extensive enlargement to infinity, of our knowledge, does Tennemann refer. The latter is not philosophy in his view at all. In the translation, Vernunft (Reason), the faculty of the absolute in Kant's system, and here used strictly in that sense, is diluted into " Mind ;" and the four grand Categories are omitted, according to which reason endeavours to carry up the knowledge furnished through the senses and understanding, into the unconditioned. X "Understanding;" just the reverse — "Reason;" original, Vernunft. The author and his translator are in these terms, always at cross-purposes. " Instinctive impulse of the understanding" is also wrong in itself, and wrong as a translation. The whole sentence, indeed, as will be seen from our version, is one tissue of error. || " Understanding;" the same error; " Reason." The whole sentence is ill rendered. *§ " Philosophy ; " das Philosophiren, not philosophy vaguely, but precisely, 100 .JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN S Literal Translation, § 2. — "Man, through the tendency of his Reason (Vernnnft), strives after a systematic completion (Yollendung) of his know- ledge considered in Quantity, Quality, Relation and Modality, and conse- quently endeavours to raise himself to a science of the ultimate principle* and /airs of Nature and Liberty, and of their mutual relations. To this he is at fust impelled by the blind feeling of a want ; he forms no adequate appre- ciation of the problem thus proposed by reason ; and knows not by what way, through what means, or to what extent, the end is to be attained. By degrees his efforts become more reflective, and this in proportion to the dual development of the self- consciousness of reason. This reflective effort we denominate the act of philosopliiziiuj." Johnson's Version, § 3. — " Thereupon arise various attempts to approxi- mate this mental object of the understanding,* attempts more or less differ- ing in respect of their principles, their methods, their consequences,! their extent, and, in general, their peculiar objects. In all these attempts, (which take the name of Philosophic Systems, when they present themselves in a scientific form, and the value of which is proportionate to the degree of intelligence manifested by each particular philosopher,) we trace the gra- dual development of the human understanding,]: according to its peculiar laws." Literal Translation, § 3. — " Out of this effort arise the various attempts of thinkers to approximate to this Idea of reason, or to realize it in thought : attempts more or less differing from each other in principle, in method, in logical consequence, in result, and in the comprehension and general cha- racter of their objects. In these attempts (which, when they present them- selves in a form scientifically complete, are denominated philosophic sysU /us. and possess a value, varying in proportion to the pitch of intellectual culti- vation, and to the point of view of the several speculators) the thinking rea- son developes itself in conformity to its peculiar laws." Johnson's Version, § 4. — " But the development of human reason is itself subject to external conditions, and is sometimes seconded, sometime- retarded, or suspended, according to the different impressions it receives from without."! Literal Translation, § 4. — " But the development of human reason does not take place without external excitement; it is consequently dependent upon external causes, in as much as its activity through the different direction given it from without, is now promoted in its efforts, now cheeked and held back." Johnson's Version, § 5. — "To give an account of the different works pro- philosophic act — philosophizing. — Streben here, and before, is also absurdly translated ' l impulse;" a "deliberate impulse!" a round square! * "Object of the Understanding;" the opposite again; original, Ideedcr 1 'i rniinft. f '* Consequences ; " wrong ; ( 'onsequenz. % u Understanding," usual blunder for Reason, and twice in this §. It is BO frequent in the sequel, that we cannot afford to notice it again. The whole paragraph is in other respects mutilated, and inaccurately rendered. II Mangled and incorrect. MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. 107 duced by the understanding, thus in the progress of improvement, and favoured or impeded by external circumstances, is, in fact, to compose a his- tory of philosophy."* Literal Translation, § 5. — u An account of the manifold efforts made to realize that Idea of reason (§ 2) in Matter and Form, (in other words, to bring philosophy as a science to bear,) efforts arising from the development of reason, and promoted or held in check by external causes- -constitutes, in fact, the History of Philosophy." Johnson's Version, § 6. — " The subject-matter f of the history of philo- sophy, is both external and internal. The internal or immediate embraces, 1. The efforts continually made by the understanding to attain to a percep- tion of the first principles of the great objects of its pursuit, (§ 2,) with many incidental details relating to the subject of investigation, the degree of ardour or remissness which from time to time have prevailed; with the influence of external causes to interest men in such pursuits, or the absence of them. % 2. The effects of philosophy, or the views, methods, and systems it has originated ; effects varying with the energies out of which they sprang. In these we see the understanding avail itself of materials perpetually accu- mulating towards constituting philosophy a science, or rules and principles for collecting materials to form a scientific whole ; or finally, maxims relat- ing to the method to be pursued in such researches. || 3. And lastly: We observe the development of the understanding as an instrument of philosophy, that is to say, the progress of the understanding towards researches in which it depends solely on itself ; in other words, its gradual progress towards the highest degree of independence ; a progress which may be observed in indi- viduals, in nations, and in the whole race of man."^[ Literal Translation, § 6. — " The matter about which the history of philo- sophy is conversant, is consequently both internal and external The internal or proximate matter, comprehends, in the first place, the continued applica- tion of reason to the investigation of the ultimate principles and laws of Na- ture and Liberty ; for therein consists the act of philosophising (§ 2). And here are to be observed great differences in regard to subject and object — to the extensive application and intensive force of the philosophising energy — to internal aims and motives (whether generous or interested) — as likewise to external causes and occasions. It comprehends, secondly, the products of the philosophising act, in other words, philosophic views, methods, and sys- tems, (§ 3,) which are as manifold as the efforts out of which they spring. Through these reason partly obtains materials becoming gradually purer, for philosophy as science, partly rules and principles by which to bind up these materials into a scientific whole, partly, in fine, maxims for our procedure ia the search after philosophy. Thirdly, it comprehends the development of * Mangled and incorrect. f " Subject-matter; " Stoff, matter, or object- matter : see note on § 1. % The whole sentence execrable in all respects ; we cannot criticise it in detail. || In this sentence there are nine errors, besides imperfections. 1 In this sentence, what is suffered to remain is worse treated than what is thrown out. 108 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANNS reason, as the instrument of philosophy, i. e. the excitation of reason to spontaneous inquiry, in conformity to determined laws through internal in- clination, and external occasion, and herein the gradual progress manifested by individuals, nations, and the thinking portion of mankind. This there- fore constitutes an important anthropological phasis of the history of philo- sophy." Johnson's Version, § 7. — u The external matter consists in the causes, events, and circumstances which have influenced the development of philo- sophic reason, and the nature of its productions. To this order of facts belong : 1. The individual history of philosophers, that is to say, the degree, the proportion, and the direction of their intellectual powers ; the sphere of their studies and their lives, the interests which swayed them, and even their moral characters.* 2. The influence of external causes, that is to say, the character and the degree of mental cultivation prevalent in the countries to which they belonged ; the prevailing spirit of the times ; and, to descend still farther, the climate and properties of the country ; its institutions, reli- gion and language.f 3. Tire influence of individuals in consequence of the admiration and imitation they have excited, by their doctrines or example ; au influence which betrays itself in the matter as well as in the manner of their schools." | (Bacon, Locke, Leibnitz.) Literal Translation, § 7. — " The external matter consists in those causes, events, and circumstances, which have exerted an influence on the develop- ment of the philosophising reason, and the complexion of its productions. To this head belong, in the first place, the individual genius of the philo- sopher, i. e. the degree, the mutual relation, and the direction of his intellec- tual faculties, dependent thereon his sphere of view and operation, and the interest with which it inspires him, and withal even his moral character. In the second place, the influence of external causes ou individual genius. Bocfa as the character and state of cultivation of the nation, the dominant spirit of the age, and less proximately the climate and natural qualities of the country, education, political constitution, religion, and language. In the third place, the effect of individual genius itself (through admiration and imitation, pre- cept and example) on the interest, the direction, the particular objects, the kind and method of the subsequent speculation— an influence variously modi- fied in conformity to intellectual character, to the consideration and celebrity of schools established, to writings, their form and their contents." (Bacon, Locke, Leibnitz.) Johnsons Version, § 9. — wt History in general is distinguished, when pro- perly so called, from Annals, Memoirs, &c., by its form : /. e. by the com- bination of its incidents, and their circumstantial development." || * In this sentence there are four inarcuraeies. f In this sentence there are tiro omissions, one essential to the meaning. and one inaccuracy. t Compare the literal version ! || " Circumstantial development ; fnwgmatiachA Dartidbmg. No word occurs more frequently in the historical and philosophical literature of Ger- many and Holland, than pnnjmutisch, or />nn/matict.) ^[ This sentence is inaccurately rendered, and not duly connected with the next. ** This sentence is incomprehensible to all ; but its absurdity can be duly appreciated only by those who know something of the Kantian philosophy. MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. 113 ticulars of our knowledge, and discriminates between its elementary parts so often confounded in practice, with a view to ascertain the true nature of each species : the characteristics of necessity and universality which belong to a priori knowledge being his leading principles."* Literal Translation, § 381. — u Awakened by the scepticism of Hume, Kant directed his attention on the striking difference in the result of meditation in Mathematics and in Philosophy, and upon the causes of this difference. Metaphysic justly attracted his consideration, but he was convinced that its threshold had yet been hardly touched. Reflection, and a scrutiny of the various philosophical systems, especially of the shallow dogmatism of the Wolfian school, suggested to him the thought, that, previous to all dogmatical procedure in philosophy, it was necessary, first to investigate the possibility of a philosophical knowledge ; and that to this end, an inquiry into the different sources of our knowledge, — into its origin, — and its employment, (in other words, Criticism,) was necessary. Thus did he propose to accomplish the work which had been commenced by Locke. Philosophy and mathe- matics, he presupposed to be, in respect of their origin, rational sciences, or sciences of reason. Rational knowledge is distinguished from empirical by its character of necessity and universality. With its possibility stands or falls the possibility of philosophical knowledge, which is of two kinds — synthetic and analytic. The latter rests on the fundamental law of thought ; but what is the principle of synthetic knowledge a priori, as contrasted with empirical, of which perception is the source? That such knowledge exists, is guaranteed by the truth of mathematical, and even of common knowledge, and the effort of reason in metaphysio. is mainly directed to its realization. There is there- fore a science of the highest necessity and importance, which investigates, on principles, the possibility, the foundation, and the employment of such knowledge. Kant opened to himself the way to this inquiry, by taking a strict line of demarkation between philosophy and mathematics, and by a more profound research into the cognitive faculties than had hitherto been brought to bear ; whilst his sagacity enabled him to divine, that synthetic knowledge a priori coincides with the form of our knowledge, and can only be grounded in the laws of the several faculties which co-operate in the cog- nitive act. Then, in order fully to discover these forms of knowledge, ac- cording to the guiding principles of universality and necessity, he undertook a dissection of knowledge, and distinguished [in reflection] what in reality is only presented combined, for the behoof of scientific knowledge." Johnson's Version, § 375 . . . "The laws of ethics are superior to the empiri- cal and determinable free-will which we enjoy in matters of practice, and as- sume an imperative character, occupying the chief place in practical philosophy. This categorical principle becomes an absolute law of universal obligation, giving to our conduct an ultimate end and spring of action ; which is not to be considered as a passion or affection, but as a moral sense of respect for law." Literal Translation, § 383. . . . "The Moral Law, as opposed to an empi- rically determined volition, appears under the character of a Categorical Im- * The same observation is true of this sentence and of the following sec- tion, which we leave 'without note or comment. H 114 JOHNSON'S TRANSLATION OF TENNEMANN'S perative, (absolute Ought [unconditional duty],) and takes its place at the very summit of practical philosophy. This imperative, as the universal rule of every rational will, prescribes with rigorous necessity an universal con- formity to the law [of duty]; and thereby establishes the supreme absolute end and motive of conduct, which is not a pathological feeling, [blind and mechanical,] but a reverence for the law [of duty, rational and free]." That Mr Johnson makes no scruple of violating the good faith of a translator, is a serious accusation — but one unfortunately true. This, indeed, is principally shown, in the history of those philosophers whose speculations are unfavourable to revealed reli- gion. — Speaking of Hume, Tennemann says : — " On the empirical principles of Locke, he investigated with a profoundly penetrating genius the nature of man as a thinking, and as an active being. This led him through a train of consequent reasoning to the scep- tical result that, &c And in these investigations of Hume, philosophical scepticism appeared with a terrific force, pro- fundity (Grundlichkeit), and logical consequence, such as had never previously been witnessed, and at the same time in a form of greater precision, perspicuity and elegance." Thus rendered by Mr Johnson : — " Taking the experimental principles of Locke as the foundation of his system, he deduced from them many acute but specious conclusions respecting the nature and condition of man, as a reasonable agent. He was led on by arguments, the fallacy of which is lost in their ingenuity, to the inference that, &c The investigations of Hume were recommended, not only by a great appearance of logical argumentation, but by an elegance and propriety of diction, and by all those graces of style which he possessed in so eminent a degree, and which made his scepticism more dangerous than it deserved to be." — The same tampering with the text we noticed in the articles on Hobbes and Lord Herbert of Cherbury. — We hardly attribute to intention what Mr Johnson says of Krug, that "he appears to add little to Kant, except a superior degree of obscurity." Krug is known to those versed in German philosophy, not only as a very acute, but as a very lucid writer. In his autobiography, we recollect, he enu- merates perspicuity as the first of his three great errors as an author ; reverence for common sense, and contempt of cant, being the other two. Tennemann attributes to him "uncommon clear- ness." As a specimen of our translator's contemptuous vituperation of some illustrious thinkers, wc shall quote his notes on Fichte and MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY. 115 Schelling, of whose systems, it is almost needless to say, his trans- lation proves him to have understood nothing. After reversing in the text what Tennemann asserts of Fichte's unmerited persecution, we have the following note : — " It is pain- ful to be the instrument of putting on record so much of nonsense and so much of blasphemy as is contained in the pretended philo- sophy of Fichte ; the statement, however, will not be without its good, if the reader be led to reflect on the monstrous absurdities which men will believe at the suggestion of their own fancies, who have rejected the plain evidences of Christianity." [Fichte was, for his country and generation, an almost singularly pious Christian. He was even attacked by the theologians — for his orthodoxy.] — On Schelling's merits we have the following dignified decision : — " The grave remarks of the author on this absurd theory, might perhaps have been worthily replaced by the pithy criticism of Mr Burchell, apud the Vicar of Wakefield, as applied to other absur- dities, videlicet — Fudge — Fudge— Fudge." But enough ! — We now take our leave of Mr Johnson, recom- mending to him a meditation on the excellent motto he has pre- fixed to his translation : — " Difficile est in philosophia pauca esse ei nota, cui non sint aut pleraque aut omnia" 1V.-L0GIC. IN REFERENCE TO THE RECENT ENGLISH TREATISES ON THAT SCIENCE.* (April, 1833.) 1. Artis Logicoe JRudimenta, with Illustrative Observations on each Section. Fourth edition, with Additions. 12mo. Ox- ford : 1828. 2. Elements of Logic. By Richard Whately, D.D., Principal of St Alban's Hall, and late Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. Third edition. 8vo. London : 1829. . 3. Introduction to Logic, from Dr Whately 's Elements of Logic. By the Rev. Samuel Hinds, M.A., of Queen's College, and Vice-Principal of St Alban's Hall, Oxford. 1 2mo. Oxford : 1827. 4. Outline of a New System of Logic, with a Critical Examina- tion of Dr Whately's " Elements of Logic," by George Bentham, Esq. 8vo. London : 1827. 5. An examination of some Passages in Dr Whately's Elements of Logic. By George Cornewall Lewis, Esq., Student of Christ Church. 8vo. Oxford : 1829. 6. A Treatise on Logic on the Basis of Aid rich, with Illustrative Notes by the Rev. John Huyshe, M.A., Brazen-nose College, Oxford. 12mo. Second edition. Oxford: 1833. 7. Questions on AldricKs Logic, with References to the most Popidar Treatises. 12mo. Oxford : 1829. 8. Key to Questions on AldricKs Logic. 12mo. Oxford: 1829. 9. Introduction to Logic. 12mo. Oxford : 1830. 10. Aristotle's Philosojyhy. (An Article in Vol. iii. of the SeTenth * [In French by M. Tcipse ; in Italian by S. Lo Gatto ; in Cross's Selec- tions.] FORTUNE OF LOGICAL STUDY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 117 Edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, now publishing.) By the Rev. Renn Dickson Hampden, M.A., late Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. 4to. Edinburgh : 1832. Nothing, we think, affords a more decisive proof of the ob- lique and partial spirit in which philosophy has been cultivated in Britain, for the last century and a half, than the combined perver- sion and neglect, which Logic — the science of the formal laws of thought — has experienced during that period. Since the time, and principally, we suspect, through the influence of Locke, (who, as Leibnitz observed, " sprevit logicam non intellexit") no country has been so poor in this department of philosophy, whether we estimate our dialectical literature by its mass or by its quality. Loath to surrender the subject altogether, yet unable, from their own misconception of its nature, to vindicate to logic, on the pro- per ground, its paramount importance, as a science a priori, distinct, and independent : the few logical authors who appeared, endeavoured^ on the one hand, by throwing out what belonged to itself, of an unpopular and repulsive character, to obviate disgust; and, on the other, by interpolating what pertained to other branches of philosophy, — here a chapter of psychology, there a chapter of metaphysic, &c. — to conciliate to the declining study a broader interest than its own. The attempt was too irrational to succeed; and served only to justify the disregard it was meant to remedy. This was to convert the interest of science with the interest of amusement : — this was not to amplify logic, but to deform philosophy ; by breaking down their boundaries, and running its several departments into each other. In the Universities, where Dialectic (to use that term in its uni- versality) once reigned " The Queen of Arts," the failure of the study is more conspicuously remarkable. In those of Scotland, the Chairs of Logic have for generations taught any thing rather than the science which they nominally profess ; — a science, by the way, in which the Scots have not lat- terly maintained the reputation once established by them in all,* * " Les Escossois sont bons Philosophes," — pronounced the Dictator of Letters. — (Scaligerana Secunda). — Servetus had previously testified to their character for logical subtility : — " Dialecticis argutiis sibi blandiuntur." (Prcef. in Ptolem. Geogr. 1533.) [My learned Mend, Mr James Broun of the Temple, shews me that the unhappy heretic had here only copied the words of Erasmus,— a far higher authority. (Enc. Morice.)] — For a considerable 118 LOGIC. and still retained in other departments of philosophy. To the philosophers, indeed, of our country, we must confess, that, in period, indeed, there was hardly to be found a continental University of any note, without the appendage of a Scottish Professor of Philosophy. — [In the Key to Barclays Satyricon, it is said of Cardinal Du Perron, under Henry IV. : — " Ejus solicitudine, in Gallia plures Scoti celebri nomine bonas artes pr sunt, quani in ipsa Scotia foventur et aluntnra liege." — Sir Thomas Urquhart is less euphuistic than usual, in his diction of the following passage : — "There was a professor of the Scottish nation, within these sixteen years, in Somure, who spoke Greek with as great ease as ever Cicero did Latine, and could have expressed himself in it as well and as promptly as in any other language, [Urquhart refers to Johannes Camero, the celebrated theologian— and as he himself calls him, the " bibliotheca movens"] ; yet the most of the Scottish nation never having astricted themselves so much to the propriety of words as to the knowledge of things, [?] where there was one preceptor of languages amongst them, there were above forty professors of philosophy. Nay, to so high a pitch did the glory of the Scottish nation attaine over all the parts of France, and for so long a time together continued in that attained height, by vertue of an ascendant, the French considered the Scots to have, above all nations, in matter of their subtlety in philosophical disceptations, that there have not been, till of late, for these several ages together, any lord, gentleman, or other in all that country, who being desirous to have his son instructed in the principles of philosophy, would intrust him to the discipline of any other than a Scottish master ; of whom they were no less proud than Philip was of Aristotle, or Tullius of Cratippus. Aud if it occurred, as very often it did, that a pretender to a place in any French university, having in his tender years been subferulary to some other kind of schooling, should enter into competition with another aiming at the same charge and dignity, whose learning flowed from a Caledonian source, commonly the first was rejected, and the other preferred ; education of youth in all grounds of literature under teachers of the Scottish nation being then held by all the inhabitant- of France to have been attended, cateris paribus, with greater proficiency than any other manner of breeding subordinate to the documents oi' those of an- other country. Nor are the French the only men who have harboured this good opinion of the Scots in behalf of their inward abilities, but many times the Spaniards, Italians, Fleming, Dutch. Hungarians Sweds, aud Polonians. have testified their being of the same mind, by the promotions wherennto, for their learning, they, in all those nation- at several times, have attained." (Jewel, L652, Works, p. 268). — Afl in literature and philosophy, BO in war. Scots officers, in great numbers, and of distinguished merit, figured in the opposite armies ofGnstavns and Ferdinand, — especially of the former; the commandant of the Fort of Bgra, and f Wallenstein, were Scots — with I sprinkling of Irish -gentlemen. tOO, were Long the merchant- of Poland, and the " travelling nier- chants," Anglice, pedlars, of Europe. On tin-, see lt // exclude all other graduates from the now principal other of Tutor, tin* study of logic declined with the ability of those bj whom the science mu FORTUNE OF LOGICAL STUDY IN OXFORD. 123 taught. The original treatises of Aristotle were now found to transcend the College complement of erudition and intellect. They were accordingly abandoned ; and with these the various logical works previously in academical use, which supposed any reach of thought, or an original acquaintance with the Organon. The Compendium of Sanderson stood its ground for a season, when the more elaborate treatises (erst in academical use) of Brerewood, Crackanthorpe, and Smiglecius, were forgotten. But this little treatise, the excellent work of an accomplished logician, was too closely relative to the books of the Organon, and demanded too frequently an inconvenient explanation, to retain its place, so soon as another text-book could be introduced, more accommodated to the fallen and falling standard of tutorial com- petency. Such a text-book was soon found in the Compendium of Aldrich. The dignity of its author, as Dean of Christ Church, and his reputation as an ingenious, even a learned, writer in other branches of knowledge, ensured it a favourable recommen- dation : it was yet shorter than Sanderson's ; written in a less scholastic Latin ; adopted an order wholly independent of the Organon ; and made no awkward demands upon the tutor, as comprising only what was either plain in itself, or could without difficulty be expounded. The book — which, in justice to the Dean, we ought to mention was not originally written for the public — is undoubtedly a work of no inconsiderable talent ; but the talent is, perhaps, principally shown, in the author having performed so cleverly a task for which he was so indifferently prepared. Absolutely considered, it has little or no value. It is but a slight eclectic epitome of one or two logical treatises in common use (that it is exclusively abridged from Wallis is incor- rect) ; and when the compiler wanders from, or mistakes, his authorities, he displays a want of information to be expected, per- haps, in our generation, but altogether marvellous in his. It is clear, that he knew nothing of the ancient, and very little of the modern, logicians. The treatise likewise omits a large proportion of the most important matters ; and those it does not exclude are treated with a truly unedifying brevity. As a slender introduc- tion to the after-study of logic (were there not a hundred better) it is not to be despised ; as a full course of instruction, — as an independent system of the science, it is utterly contemptible. Yet, strange to say, the Compend of Aldrich, having gradually supplanted the Compend of Sanderson, has furnished,, for above 124 LOGIC. a century, the little all of logic doled out in these latter days by the University of Bradwardin and Scotus.* Even the meliorations of the academical system have not proved beneficial to this study : perhaps, indeed, the reverse. Since the institution of honours, — since the re-introduction, however limited, of a real examination for the first degree in arts, a powerful stimu- lus has been applied to other studies, — to that of logic none. Did a candidate make himself master of the Organon ? — he would find as little favour from the dispensers of academical distinction, as he had previously obtained assistance from his tutor. For the public examiners could not be expected, either to put questions on what they did not understand, or to encourage the repetition of such overt manifestations of their own ignorance. The mini- mum of Aldrich, therefore, remained the maximum of the "schools;" and was "got up," not to obtain honour, but to avoid disgrace. — Yet even this minimum was to be made less ; there was " a lower deep beneath the lowest deep." The Com- pendium, a meagre duodecimo of a hundred and eighty pages, to be read in a day, and easily mastered in a week, was found too ponderous a volume for pupil, and tutor, and examiner. It was accordingly subjected to a process of extenuation, out of which it emerged, reduced to little more than a third of its original graei- lity — a skeleton without marrow or substance. " Those who go deep in dialectic," says Aristo Chius, " may be resembled to crab- eaters ; for a mouthful of meat, they spend their time over a heap of shells." But your superficial student of logic, he loses his time without even a savour of this mouthful: and Oxford, in her senility, has proved no Alma Mater, in thus so unpiteously cramming her alumni with the shells alone. As Dr Wltatolv observes : — " A very small proportion even of distinguished stu- dents ever become proficients in logic : and by far the greater * Some thirty years ago, indeed, there was printed, in usxtm acad jiirtntnlis, certain Ezcerpta ex Aristotdu Organo. The execution of that work shows how inadequate its author was to the task he had undertaken. Nothing eotdd be more conducive to the rational Btudy of logic than a syste- matic condensation of the more essential parte of the different treat! the Organon, with original illustration-, and selections from the best com- mentators, ancient and modern. As it is, this petty publication ha- exi no influence on the Logical studies of the University ; \\<' Bhonld like t<> know how many tutors have expounded it in their lectures, how many candidates have been examined on it tin- schools. On the logical authors, at least, of the l diversity, it has exerted none, FORTUNE OF LOGICAL STUDY IN OXFORD. 125 proportion pass through the University without knowing anything at all of the subject. I do not mean that they have not learned by rote a string of technical terms, but that they understand absolutely nothing whatever of the principles of the science.'"' The miracle would be, if they ever did. Logic thus degraded to an irksome, but wholly unprofitable, penance, the absurdity of its longer enforcement was felt by some intelligent leaders of the University. " It was proposed," says Dr Whately, " to leave the study of logic altogether to the option of the candidates ; " a pro- posal hailed with joy by the under-graduates, who had long prayed fervently with St Ambrose, — " A Dialectica Aristotelis libera nos, Damine." * In these circumstances, when even the Heads could not much longer have continued obstinate, and Logic seemed in Oxford on the eve of following the sister sciences of philosophy to an aca- demic grave, a new life was suddenly communicated to the expiring study, and hope, at least, allowed for its ultimate convalescence under a reformed system. This was mainly effected by the publication of the Elements of Dr Whately, then Principal of St Alban's Hall, and recently (we rejoice) elevated to the Archiepiscopal See of Dublin. (No. 2, of the works at the head of this Article.) Somewhat previ- ously, the Rudiraenta (abbreviated Compendium) of Aldrich had been illustrated with English notes by an anonymous author, whom we find quoted in some of the subsequent treatises under the name of Hill. (No. 1.) The success and ability of the Ele- ments prompted imitation and determined controversy. Mr Ben- tham (nephew of Mr Jeremy Bentham) published his Outline and Examination, in which Dr Whately is alternately the object of censure and encomium. (No. 4.) The pamphlet of Mr Lewis (on two points only) is likewise controversial. (No. 5). The Principal, as becoming, was abridged and lauded by his Vice (No. 3) ; and the treatises of Mr Huyshe and others, (Nos. 6, 7, 8, 9) are all more or less relative to Dr Whately 's, and all so many manifestations of the awakened spirit of logical pursuit. The last decade, indeed, has done more in Oxford for the cause of this science than the whole hundred and thirty years pre- * [This addition of St Ambrose to the Litany, I took as recorded by Car- dinal Cusa.] 1 20 LOGIC. ceding;* for since the time of Wallis and AldricL, until the works under review, we recollect nothing on the subject which the University could claim, except one or two ephemeral tracts ; — the shallow Reflections of Edward Bentham, about the middle of the last century ; and after the commencement of the present, a couple of clever pamphlets in vindication of logic, and in extinc- tion of the logic of Kett — which last also was a mooncalf of Alma Mater. * [Since that time, with a rise of the academical spirit, the study of logic has been still more zealously pursued in Oxford, and several resident mem- bers of the University have published treatises on the science, of no ordinary merit. I may chronologically notice those of Mr Wooley, Mr Thomson, Mr Chretien, and Mr Mansel. — To two of these gentlemen I am, indeed, under personal obligations. — Mr Thomson, in the second edition of his Laics of Thought, among other flattering testimonies of his favourable opinion, has done me the honour of publishing the specimen which I had communicated to him, of a scheme of Syllogistic Notation; and I regret to find, that this circumstance has been the occasion of some injustice, both to him and to me. To him : — inasmuch, as he has been unfairly regarded as a mere expo- sitor of my system ; to me : — inasmuch, as his objections to that system have been unfairly regarded as decisive. In point of fact, though we coin- cide, touching the thoroughgoing quantification of the predicate in affirma- tive propositions, we are diametrically opposed, touching the same quantifi- cation in negatives. But, while I am happy, in the one case, to receive even a partial confirmation of the doctrine, from Mr Thomsons able and indepen- dent speculation; I should be sorry, in the other, to subject, what I deem, the truth to the uncanvassed opinion of any human intellect.— To Mr Man.sei, besides sundry gratifying expressions of approval, in his acute and learned Notes on the lindimmta of Aldrich ; 1 am indebted for valuable aid in the determination of a curious point in the history of logic. Instead of Petrus Hispanus being a plagiarist, and his Summulae a translation from the Greek, as supposed by Ehinger, Keckermann, Placcius, J. A. Fabricios, Brucker, — by all, in short, who, for the last two centuries and a half, have treated of the matter; it is DOW certain, that the ' k Synopsis Organic" published under the name of Michael P&ellus (the younger) is itself a mere garbled versiOD of the great logical text-book of the west, and, without any authority, capri- ciously fathered, by Ehinger, as an original work, on the illustrious Byzan- tine. I am now, in fact, able to prove: — that in the Augsburg Library, the Codes from which Ehinger printed, contained neither the title nor the author's name under which his publication appeared; and that in several o\ % the European Libraries there are extant Greek manuscripts, identical with the text of thai publication, ami professing to be merely copies of a transla- tion from the Latin Original of Hispanus. — Thi8 detection enables OS trace the ffa^aT*, "Kyj«\fe, x. t- /. of Imnunides ami the Greeks to the Barbara, Ceiarent, &c. of Hispanus and the Latins.] WORKS REVIEWED. 127 It remains now to inquire : — At what value are we to rate these new logical publications ? — Before looking at their con- tents, and on a knowledge only of the general circumstances under which they were produced, we had formed a presumptive estimate of what they were likely to perform; and found our anticipation fully confirmed, since we recently examined what they had actually accomplished. None of the works are the productions of inferior ability ; and though some of them propose only an humble end, they are all respectably executed. A few of them display talent rising far above mediocrity ; and one is the effort of an intellect of great natural power. But when we look from the capacity of the author to his acquirements, our judg- ment is less favourable. If the writers are sometimes original, their matter is never new. They none of them possess, — not to say a superfluous erudition on their subject, — even the necessary complement of information. Not one seems to have studied the logical treatises of Aristotle ; all are ignorant of the Greek Com- mentators on the Organon, of the Scholastic, Ramist, Cartesian, Wolfian, and Kantian Dialectic. In none is there any attempt at the higher logical philosophy : we have no preliminary deter- mination of the fundamental laws of thought ; no consequent evolution, from these laws, of the system itself. On the con- trary, we find principle buried in detail ; inadequate views of the science; a mere agglutination of its parts; of these some wholly neglected, and others, neither the most interesting nor important, elaborated out of bounds ; — and always, though in very different proportions, too much of the " shell," too little of the " meat." They are rarely, indeed, wise above Aldrich. His partial views of the order and comprehension of the science have determined theirs ; his most egregious blunders are repeated ; and sometimes when an attempt is made at a correction, either Aldrich is right, or a new error is substituted for the old. Even Dr Whately, who, in the teeth of every logician from Alexander to Kant, speaks of " the boundless field within the legitimate limits of the science," " walks in the trodden ways," and is guiltless of " removing the ancient landmark." His work, indeed, never transcends, and generally does not rise to, the actual level of the science ; nor, with all its ability, can it justly pretend to more than a relative and local importance. Its most original and valu- able portion is but the insufficient correction of mistakes touching the nature of logic, long exploded, if ever harboured, among the 128 LOGIC. countrymen of Leibnitz, and only lingering among the disciples of Locke. An articulate proof of the accuracy of these conclusions, on all the works under consideration, would far exceed our limits. Nor is this requisite. It will be sufficient to review that work, in chief, to which most of the others are correlative, and which stands among them all the highest in point of originality and learning ; — and the rest occasionally, in subordination to that one. Nor in criticising Dr Whately's Elements can we attempt to vin- dicate all or even the principal points of our judgment. To show the deficiencies in that work, either of principle or of detail, would, in the universal ignorance in this country of logical phi- losophy and of a high logical standard, require a preliminary exposition of what a system of this science ought to comprehend, far beyond our space, were we even to discuss these points to the exclusion of every other. We must, therefore, omitting imper- fections, confine ourselves to an indication of some of Dr Whately "s positive errors. This we shall attempt, " though the work," as- its author assures us, " has undergone, not only the close exami- nation of himself and several friends, but the severer scrutiny of determined opponents, without any material errors having been detected, or any considerable alteration found necessary." In doing this, nothing could be farther from our intention than any derogation from the merit of that eminent individual, whom, even when we differ most from his opinions, Ave respect, both as a very shrewd, and (what is a rarer phenomenon in Oxford) a very inde- pendent, thinker. The interest of truth is above all personal considerations ; and as Dr Whately. in vindication of his own practice, has well observed : — " Errors are the more carefully to be pointed out in proportion to the authority by which they are sanctioned." " No mercy," says Leasing, " to a distinguished author." This, however, is not our motto ; and if our " scrutiny " be " severe," we arc conscious that it cannot justly be attributed to " determined opposition." We find matter of controversy even in the first page of the Elements, and in regard even to the first question of the doctrine : — What is Logic ? — Dr Whately very properly opens i statement, if not a definition^ of the nature and domain oflo and in no other part of his work have the originality and correct- ness of his views been more applauded, than in the determination of this fundamental problem. He says: — LOGIC— WHAT ? 129 " Logic, in the most extensive sense which the name can with propriety be made to bear, may be considered as the Science, and also as the Art, of Reasoning. Tt investigates the principles on which argumentation is con- ducted, and furnishes rules to secure the mind from error in its deductions. Its most appropriate office, however, is that of instituting an analysis of the process of the mind in reasoning ; and in this point of view it is, as has been stated, strictly a science ; while, considered in reference to the practical rules above mentioned, it may be called the art of reasoning. This distinc- tion, as will hereafter appear, has been overlooked, or not clearly pointed out by most writers on the subject ; logic having been in general regarded as merely an art, and its claim to hold a place among the sciences having been expressly denied." (Elements, p. 1.) Here the enquiry naturally separates into two branches ; — the one concerns the genus, the other the object-matter, of logic. In regard to the former : — Dr Whately's reduction of logic to the twofold category of Art and Science, has earned the praises of his Critical Examiner, but Mr Bentham, it must be acknow- ledged, is as often out in his encomium as in his censure. He observes : — " Dr Whately has in particular brought to view one very important fact, overlooked by all his predecessors, though so obvious, when once exhibited, as to make us wonder that it should not have been remarked : viz. that logic is a science as well as an art. The universally prevailing error, that human knowledge is divided into a number of parts, some of which are arts without science, and others sciences without art, has been fully exposed by Mr [Jeremy] Bentham in his ClirestomatMa. There also it has been shown, that there cannot exist a single art that has not its corresponding science, nor a single science which is not accompanied by some portion of art. The Schoolmen, on the contrary, have, with extraordinary effort, endeavoured to prove that logic is an art only, not a science ; and in that particular instance, Dr Whately is, I believe, one of the first who has ventured to contradict this ill-founded assertion."— (Outline, p. 12 ) In all this there is but one statement with which we can agree. We should certainly " wonder " with Mr Bentham, had any " so obvious and important fact " been overlooked by all Dr Whately's predecessors ; and knowing something of both, should assuredly be less disposed to presume a want of acuteness in the old logi- cians, than any ignorance of their speculations in the new. In the latter alternative, indeed, will be found a solution of the " wonder." Author and critic are equally in error. In the first place, looking merely to the nomenclature, both are historically wrong. " Logic," says Dr Whately, " has been in general regarded merely as an art, and its claim to hold a place among the sciences has been expressly denied." The reverse is 130 LOGIC. true. The great majority of logicians have regarded logic as a science, and expressly denied it to be an art. This is the oldest as well as the most general opinion. — " The Schoolmen/' says Mr Bentham, " have with extraordinary effort endeavoured to prove that logic is an art only." On the contrary, the Schoolmen have not only " with extraordinary effort," but with unexampled una- nimity laboured in proving logic to be exclusively a science ; and so far from " Dr Whately being " (with Mr Jeremy Bentham) " the first to contradict this ill-founded assertion," the paradox of these gentlemen is only the truism of the world beside. This error is the more surprising, as the genus of logic is one of those vexed questions on which, as Ausonius has it, " omnis certat dialectica turba sophorum"; indeed, until latterly, no other perhaps stands so obtrusively for- ward during the whole progress of the study. — Plato and the Platonists considered dialectic as a science ; but with them dialec- tic was a real not a formal discipline, and corresponded rather to the metaphysic than to the logic of the Peripatetics. — Logic is not denned by Aristotle. — His Greek followers, (and a considerable body of the most eminent dialecticians since the revival of letters.) deny it to be either science or art. — The Stoics in general viewed it as a science. — The Arabian and Latin Schoolmen did the same. In this opinion Thomist and Scotist, Realist and Nominalist, con- curred ; an opinion adopted, almost to a man, by the Jesuit, Dominican, and Franciscan Cursualists. — From the restoration of letters, however, and especially during the latter part of the six- teenth century, so many Aristotelians, with the whole boo Ramists. (to whom were afterwards to be added a majority of the Cartesians, and a large proportion of the Eclectics.) maintained that it was an art ; that the error of Sanderson may be perhaps excused in attributing this opinion to " almost all the more recent authors" at his time. Along with these, however, (so far is Dr Whately from having " brought to view this important fact, over- looked by all his predecessors,") there was a very considerable party who anticipated the supposed novelty of this author in denning logic by the doable genus of art and — In the schools of Wolf and Kant. Logic again obtained the name of science. * To make reference to these would be tk trop; we count above i doaen logicians of this class in our own collection. Bu1 independently of the older and less familiar authors, Mr Jeremy Bentham and Dr Wnatelj have do claim (the latter makes none) to originality in this observation. Even the LOGIC— WHAT ? 131 But, — to look beneath the name, — as Dr Whately and his cri- tic are wrong in imagining that there is any novelty in the obser- vation, they are equally mistaken in attributing to it the smallest importance. The question never concerned logic itself, but merely the meaning of the terms by which it should be defined. The old logicians, (however keenly they disputed whether logic were a science or an art, — or neither, — or both, — a science speculative, or a science practical, — or at once speculative and practical,) — never dreamt that the controversy possessed, in so far as logic was concerned, more than a verbal interest.* In regard to the essential nature of logic they were at one ; and contested only, what was the comprehension of these terms in philosophical pro- priety, or rather what was the true interpretation of their Aristo- telic definitions. Many intelligent thinkers denounced, with Vives, the whole problem as frivolous. " Quaestioni locum dedit misera homonymia," says Mark Duncan, among a hundred others. The most strenuous advocates of the several opinions regularly admit, that unless the terms are taken in the peculiar signification for which they themselves contend, that all and each of their adver- saries may be correct ; while, at the same time, it was recognised on all hands, that these terms were vulgarly employed in a vague or general acceptation, under which every opinion might be con- sidered right, or rather no opinion could be deemed wrong. The preparatory step of the discussion was, therefore, an elimination last respectable writer on logic in the British Empire, previous to these gen- tlemen, Dr Richard Kirwan, whose popular and able volumes were published in 1807, defines logic as art and science ; and this in terms so similar to those of Dr Whately, that we cannot hesitate in believing that this author had his predecessor's definition (which we shall quote) immediately in view. " Logic is both a science and an art ; it is a science inasmuch as, by analys- ing the elements, principles, and structure of arguments, it teaches us how to discover their truth or detect their fallacies, and point out the sources of such errors. It is an art, inasmuch as it teaches now to arrange arguments in such manner, that their truth may be most readily perceived, or their falsehood detected." (Vol. i. p. I.) * Father Buffier is unjust to the old logicians, but he places the matter on its proper footing in reference to the new. — " Si la logique est une science. Oui et non ; selon l'idee qu'il vous plait d'attacher au nom de science, &c. Si la logique est un art. Encore un fois, oui et non ; II plait aux logiciens de disputer si la logique est, ou n'est pas un art; et il ne leur plait pas toujours d'avouer ni d'enseigner a leurs disciples, que c'est une pure ou puerile question de nom." (Cours des Sciences, (Logique,) p. 887. ) 132 LOGIC. of these less precise and appropriate significations, which, as they could at best only afford a remote genus and difference, were wholly incompetent for the purposes of a definition. But what the older logicians rejected as a useless truism, the recent embrace as a new and important observation. — In regard to its novelty : — Do Dr Whately and Mr Bentham imagine that any previous logi- cian could ever have dreamt of denying that logic, in their accep- tation of the terms, was at once an art and a science ? Let them look into almost any of the older treatises, and they will find this explicitly admitted, even when the terms Art and Science are employed in senses far less vague and universal than is done by them. — As to its importance: — Do they suppose that a more pre- cise and accurate conception of logic is thus obtained ? The con- trary is true. The term Science Dr Whately employs in its widest possible extension, for any knowledge considered abso- lutely, and not in relation to practice ; and in this acceptation every art in its doctrinal portion must be a science. Art lie defines the application of knowledge to practice ; in which signi- fication, ethics, politics, religion, and all other practical sciences, must be arts. Art and Science are thus distended till they run together. As philosophical terms, they are now altogether worth- less ; too universal to define ; too vacillating between identity and difference, to distinguish. In fact, their application to logic, or any other subject, is hereafter only to undefine, and to confuse : expressing, as they do, not any essential opposition between the things themselves, but only the different points of view under which the same thing may be contemplated by us; — every art being thus in itself also a science, every science in itself also an art. — This Mr Bentham thinks the correction of a universal error, — the discovery of an important fact. If the question in the hands of the old logicians be frivolous, what is it in those of the new ! * * Such is tin- mosl favourable interpretation we can give ofDr Whately's meaning. Bnt the language in which this meaning i- conveyed is most am- bignons and inaccurate. E.g. he says: — ".I sriena is conversant about knowledge only." (P. 56.) Be cannot mean what the words express, that science has knowledge lor its abject-mutter, tor this is nonsense; and the word- do not express, what, from the context, we must presume he l! I that science has no end ulterior to the contemplative act of knowledge itself. Dr Whately thus means by whence what Aristotle meant by speculative a i>nt how different in the precision of their definitions I Qutprrixwp y.t,,) ■ri'ho; oihYiQiiu.- T.ouKriKr,; V ?(yov j — OT, as AveiTOeS has it. l\r tpt LOGIC— WHAT ? 133 So much for the genus, now for the object-matter. — Of Dr Whately's Elements, Mr Hinds says, and that emphati- cally : — " This treatise displays — and it is the only one that has clearly done so — the true nature and use of logic ; so that it may be approached, no longer as a dark, curious, and merely speculative study ; such as one is apt, in fancy, to class with astrology and alchemy." (Pref. p. viii.) These are strong words. We are disposed to admit that Dr Whately, though not right, is perhaps not far wrong with regard to the " true nature and use of logic;" — that he "clearly displays" that nature and use, is palpably incorrect ; and that his is " the only treatise which has clearly done so," is but another proof, that assertion is often in the inverse ratio of knowledge. We shall not dwell on what we conceive a very partial concep- tion of the science, — that Dr Whately makes the process of reasoning not merely its principal, but even its adequate object ; those of simple apprehension and judgment being considered not in themselves as constituent elements of thought, but simply as subordinate to argumentation. In this view logic is made con- vertible with syllogistic. This view, which may be allowed, in so tivam scimus ut sciamus ; per practicam scimus ut operemur. — In like manner, Dr Whately gives, without being aware of it, two very different definitions of the term Art. In one place (p. 1) it is said, " that logic may be called the art of reasoning, while, considered in reference to the practical rules, it furnishes to secure the mind from error in its deductions." This is evidently the A/«- texriHvi x^k ^Qocy^xrau of the Greek interpreters, the logica docens (quce tradit prcecepta) of the Arabian and Latin schools. Again, in another (p. 56) it is said, that u an art is the application of knowledge to practice.' 1 '' If words have any meaning, this definition (not to wander from logic) suits only the A<«- K&xTtxvi h xgytnt %>otl yvftvotaia, TrfiuypoiTcov of the Greek, the logica utens (quce utitur prceceptis) of the Latin Aristotelians. The L. docens, and the L. utens, are, however, so far from being convertible, that, by the great majority ot philosophers, they have been placed in different genera. The Greek logi- cians denied the L. docens to be either science or art, regarding it as an instrument, not a part of philosophy ; the L. utens, on the contrary, they admttted to be a science, and a part of philosophy, but not separable and distinct. The Latins, on the contrary, held in general the L. docens to be a science, and part of philosophy ; the L. utens as neither, but only an in- strument. Some, however made the docens a science, the utens an art ; while by others this opinion was reversed, &c. These distinctions are not to be confounded with the pure and applied logics of a more modern philo- sophy. 134 LOGIC. far as it applies to the logic contained in the Aristotelic treatises now extant, was held by several of the Arabian and Latin school- men ; borrowed from them by the Oxford Crackanthorpe, it was adopted by Wallis ; and from Wallis it passed to Dr Whately. But, as applied to logic, in its own nature, this opinion has been long rejected, on grounds superfluously conclusive, by the im- mense majority even of the Peripatetic dialecticians ; and not a single reason has been alleged by Dr Whately to induce us to waver in our belief, that the laws of thought, and not the laws of reasoning, constitute the adequate object of the science. This error, which we cannot now refute, would, however, be of compa- ratively little consequence, did it not, — as is notoriously the case in Dr Whately's Elements, — induce a perfunctory consideration of the laws of those faculties of thought ; these being viewed as only subsidiary to the process of reasoning. In regard to the " clearness " with which Dr Whately " dis- plays the true nature and use of logic," we can only say, that, after all our consideration, we do not yet clearly apprehend what his notions on this point actually are. In the very pas- sages where he formally defines the science, we find him indistinct, ambiguous, and even contradictory ; and it is only by applying the most favourable interpretation to his words that we are able to allow him credit for any thing like a correct opinion. He says, that " the most appropriate office of logic (as science) is that of instituting an analysis of the process of the mind in reasoning," (p. 1 ;) and again, that " the process (operation) of reasoning is alone the appropriate province of logic."' (Pp. 13. 140.) — The process or operation of reasoning is thus the object- matter about which the science of logic is conversant. Now, a definition which merely affirms that logic is the science which has the process of reasoning for its object, is not a definition of this science at all ; it does not contain the differential quality by which logic is discriminated from other sciences ; and it does not prevent tin- most erroneous opinions (it even suggests them) from being taken up in regard to its nature. Other sciences, as psychology and metaphysic, propose for their object (among the other facul- ties) the operation of reasoning, but this considered in it- nature : Logic, en the contrary, lias the same for its object, but only in its formal capacity ; in fact, it has, in propriety of speech, nothing to do with the prone** or operation, hut Is conversant only LOGIC— WHAT ? 135 with its laws. Dr Whately's definition, is therefore, not only incompetent, but delusive. It would confound logic and psycho- logy and metaphysic, and occasion those very misconceptions in regard to the nature of logic which other passages of the Elements, indeed the general analogy of his work, show that it was not his intention to sanction. But Dr Whately is not only ambiguous ; he is contradictory. We have seen, that, in some places, he makes the process of rea- soning the adequate object of logic ; what shall we think when we find, that, in others, he states that the total or adequate object of logic is language ? But, as there cannot be two adequate objects, and as language and the operation of reasoning are not the same, there is therefore a contradiction. " In introducing," he says, " the mention of language, previously to the definition of logic, I have departed from established practice, in order that it may be clearly understood, that logic is entirely conversant about language ; a truth which most writers on the subject, if indeed they were fully aware of it themselves, have certainly not taken due care to impress on their readers." * (P. 56.) And again : — " Logic is wholly concerned in the use of language." (P. 74.) The term logic (as also dialectic) is of ambiguous deriva- tion. It may either be derived from A6yo$ (luliccdsrog), reason, or our intellectual faculties in general ; or from A6yo? («^o- (po^iKOi), speech or language, by which these are expressed. The science of logic may. in like manner, be viewed either : — 1°, as adequately and essentially conversant about the former, (the internal ^6yo$, verbum mentale,) and partially and accidentally about the latter, (the external *6yos, verbum oris ;) or, 2°, as ade- quately and essentially conversant about the latter, partially and accidentally about the former. The first opinion has been held by the great majority of logi- cians, ancient and modern. The second, of which some traces may be found in the Greek commentators of Aristotle, and in the more ancient Nominalists during the middle ages, (for the later scholastic Nominalists, to whom this doctrine is generally, but falsely, attributed, held in reality the former opinion,) was only fully developed in modern times by philosophers, of whom Hobbes * Almost all logicians, however, impress upon their readers, that logic is (not, indeed, entirely, but) partially and secondarily occupied with language as the vehicle of thought, about which last it is adequately and primarily conversant. 136 LOGIC. may be regarded as the principal. In making the analysis of the operation of reasoning the appropriate office of logic, Dr Whately adopts the first of these opinions ; in making logic entirely con- versant about language, he adopts the second. We can hardly, however, believe that he seriously entertained this last. It is expressly contradicted by Aristotle, {Analyt. Post. i. 10, § 7) ; it involves a psychological hypothesis in regard to the absolute de- pendence of the mental faculties on language, once and again refuted, which we are confident that Dr Whately never could sanction ; and, finally, it is at variance with sundry passages of the Elements, where a doctrine apparently very different is advanced. But, be his doctrine what it may, precision and perspicuity are not the qualities we should think of applying to it. But if the Vice-Principal be an incompetent judge of what the Principal has achieved, he is a still more incompetent reporter of what all other logicians have not. If he had read even a hun- dredth part of the works it behoved him to have studied, before being entitled to assert that Dr Whately 's " treatise is the only one that has clearly displayed the true use and nature of logic," he has accomplished what not one of his brother dialecticians of Oxford has attempted. But the assertion betrays itself: vrirroXftog eL t uc&0eix. To any one on a level with the literature of this science, the statement must appear supremely ridiculous, — that the no- tions held of the nature and use of logic in the Kantian, not to say the Woman school, are less clear, adequate, and correct, than those promulgated by Dr Whately. — A general survey, indeed, of the history of opinions on this subject would prove, that views essentially sound were always as frequent, as the carrying of these views into effect was rare. Many, speculatively, recognised principles of the science, which almost none practically applied to regulate its constitution. — Even the Scholastic logicians display, in general, more enlightened and profound conceptions of the nature of their science than any recent logician of this country. In their multifarious controversies on this matter, the diversity o\' their opinions on subordinate points is not more remarkable, than their unanimity on principal. All their doctrines admit of a favourable interpretation ; some, indeed, for truth and precision, hare seldom been equalled, and never surpassed. Logic they all discriminated from psychology, metaphysic, &c as a rational, not a real, —as & formal, not a material science.— The few who held LOGIC— WHAT ? 137 the adequate object of logic to be things in general, held this, however, under the qualification, that things in general were con- sidered by logic only as they stood under the general forms of thought imposed on them by the intellect, — quatenus secimdis intentionibvs substabant. — Those who maintained this object to be the higher processes of thought, (three, two, or one,) carefully ex- plained, that the intellectual operations were not, in their own nature, proposed to the logician, — that belonged to the psycholo- gist, — but only in so far as they were dirigible, or the subject of laws. The proximate end of logic was thus to analyze the canons of thought ; its remote, to apply these to the intellectual acts. — Those, again, (and they formed the great majority,) who saw this object in second notiojis* did not allow that logic was con- cerned with these second notions abstractly and in themselves, (that was the province of metaphysic,) but only in concrete as applied to first ; that is, only as they were the instruments and regulators of thought. — It would require a longer exposition than * The distinction (which we owe to the Arabians) of first and second notions, (notiones, conceptus, intentiones, intellecta prima et secunda), is necessary to be known, not only on its own account, as a highly philosophical determination, but as the condition of any understanding of the scholastic philosophy, old and new, of which, especially the logic, it is almost the Alpha and Omega. Yet, strange to say, the knowledge of this famous distinction has been loug lost in " the (once) second school of the church." — Aldrich's definition is altogether inadequate, if not positively erroneous. Mr Hill and Dr Whately, followed by Mr Huyshe and the author of Questions on Logic, &c, miscon- ceive Aldrich, who is their only authority, if Aldrich understood himself, and flounder on from one error to another, without even a glimpse of the light. {Hill, pp. 30—33 ; Whately, pp. 173—175 ; Huyshe, pp. 18, 19 ; Questions, pp. 10, 11, 71.) (Of a surety, no calumny could be more unfounded, as now applied to Oxford, than the " clamour" of which Dr Whately is apprehen- sive, — " the clamour against confining the human mind in the trammels of the schoolmen ! ") — The matter is worth some little illustration ; we can spare it none, and must content ourselves with a definition of the terms.— A first notion is the concept of a thing as it exists of itself and independent of any operation of thought ; as, John, Man, Animal, &c. A second notion is the concept, not of an object as it is in reality, but of the mode under which it is thought by the mind; as, Individual, Species, Genus, &c. The former is the concept of a thing, — real, — immediate, — direct : the latter the concept of a concept— formal, — mediate, — reflex. For elucidation of this distinction, and its applications, it is needless to make references. The subject is copiously treated by several authors in distinct treatises, but will be found competently explained in almost all the older systems of logic and philosophy. 133 LOGIC. we can afford, to do justice to these opinions, — especially to the last. When properly understood, they will be found to contain, in principle, all that has been subsequently advanced of any value in regard to the object-matter and scope of logic. Nothing can be more meagre and incorrect than Dr Whately's sketch of the History of Logic. This part of his work, indeed, is almost wholly borrowed from the poverty of Aldrich. As specimens : — Archytas* by Whately as by Aldrich, is set down as in- ventor of the Categories ; and this now exploded opinion is advan- ced without a suspicion of its truth. The same unacquaintance with philosophical literature and Aristotelic criticism is manifested by every recent Oxford writer who has alluded to the subject. We may refer to the Excerpta ex Organo, in usum Academical Juventutis, — to the Oxonia Purgata of Dr Tatham, — to Mr Hill's Notes on Aldrich, — to Mr Husyshe's Logic, — and to the Philosophy of Aristotle by Mr Hampden. This last, even makes the Stagirite derive his moral system from the Pythagoreans ; although the forgery of the fragments preserved by Stoba?us, under the name of Theages, and other ethical writers of that school, has now been for half a century fully established. They stand likewise without an obelus in Dr Gaisford's respectable edition of the Florilegium. [The physical treatises, also, as those under the names of Ocellus Lucanus and Tima?us Locrius, are of the same character ; they are comparatively recent fabrications.] Aristotle would be, indeed, the sorriest plagiary on record, were the thefts believed of him by his Oxford votaries not false only. but ridiculous. By Aldrich it is stated, as on indisputable cvi- * [On Archytas, I may refer the render to three excellent monographs : by Navarrus (Copenhagen, 1820); by Hartcnstein (Leipsic, 1838); and by Oruppe (Berlin, 1840). — The Metaphysical. Physical, and Ethical frag- ments, written in the Doric dialect, and bearing the name of Pythagorean philosophers, are aft, to a critical reader, obtrusively spurious, and on all, this note has been superfluously branded by the German critics and histo- rians of philosophy, for above half a century. Meinera began, and nearly accomplished, the exposition, instead of Plato and Aristotle stealing their philosophies from the Pythagoreans, and their thefts remaining, by a miracle, for centuries, unknown, and even unsuspected; the forgers of these more modem treatises have only impudently translated the doctrines vi' the two philosophers into their supposititious Doric. Their non-exposure, at the time, is the strongest proof of the languid literature of the decline.] HISTORY OF LOGIC. 139 dence, that, while in Asia, he received a great part of his philoso- phy from a learned Jew ; * and this silly and long derided fable even stands uncontradicted in the Compendium to the present day : while, by the Oxford writers at large, he is still supposed to have stolen his Categories and Ethics (to say nothing of his physical doctrines) from the Pythagoreans. What would Schleier- macher or Creuzer think of this ! In discriminating Aristotle's merits in regard to logic, Dr Whately, we are sorry to say, is vague and incorrect. " K"o science can be expected to make any considerable progress, which is not cultivated on right principles. - - The greatest mistakes have always prevailed respecting the nature of logic ; and its province has, in consequence, been extended by many writers to subjects with which it has no proper con- nexion. Indeed, with the exception of Aristotle, (who is himself not entirely exempt from the errors in question,) hardly a writer on logic can be men- tioned who has clearly perceived, and steadily kept in view r throughout, its real nature and object,'' (P. 2.) On the contrary, so far is Aristotle, — so far at least are his logical treatises which still remain, (and these are, perhaps, few to the many that are lost,) from meriting this comparative eulo- gium, that nine-tenths, — in fact, more than nineteen-twentieths, — of these treat of matters, which, if logical at all, can be viewed as the objects, not of pure, but only of an applied logic ; and we have no hesitation in affirming, that the incorrect notions which have prevailed, and still continue to prevail, in regard to the " nature and province of logic," are, without detraction from his merits, mainly to be attributed to the example and authority of the Philosopher himself. — The book of Categories, as containing an objective classification of real things, is metaphysical, not logi- cal. The two books of Posterior Analytics, as solely conversant about demonstrative or necessary matter, transcend the limits of the formal science ; and the same is true of the eight books of Topics, as wholly occupied with probable matter, its accidents and applications. Even the two books of the Prior Analytics, in which the pure syllogism is considered, are swelled with extra- logical discussions. Such, for example, is the whole doctrine of the modality of syllogisms as founded on the distinction of pure, * [The Jews have even made Aristotle a native Israelite, — born at Jeru- salem, — of the tribe of Benjamin, — and a Kabbi deep in the sacred books of his nation. (See Bartoloccii Bibliothecn Eabbivica, t. i. p. 471, sq.) ] 140 LOGIC. necessary, and contingent matter ; — the consideration of the real truth or falsehood of propositions, and the power so irrelevantly attributed to the syllogism of inferring a true conclusion from false premises ; — the distinction of the enthymeme, through the extraformal character of its premises, as a reasoning from signs and probabilities ; — the physiognomic syllogism, &c. &c. The same is true of the book On Enouncement ; and matters are even worse with that on Fallacies, which is, in truth, only a sequel of the Topics. If Aristotle, therefore, did more than any other philosopher for the progress of the science ; he also did more than any other to overlay it with extraneous lumber, and to impede its development under a precise and elegant form Many of his successors had the correctest views of the object and scope of logic ; and even among the schoolmen there were minds who could have purified the science from its adventitious sediment, had they not been prevented from applying their principles to details, by the implicit deference then exacted to the precept and practice of Aristotle,* " It has been remarked," says Dr Whately, after Aldrich, " that the logical system is one of those few theories which have been begun and perfected by the same individual. The history of its discovery, as far as the main principles of the science are concerned, properly commences and ends with Aristotle." (P. 6.) — In so far as " the main principles of the science are concerned," this cannot be denied. It ought, however, to have been stated with greater qualification. Aristotle left to his successors, much to reject, — a good deal to supply, — and the whole to simplify, digest, and arrange. — In regard alone to the deficiencies : — If Dr Whately and the other Oxford logicians are right, (we think decidedly otherwise,) in adding the fourth syllogistic figure, (which, by the way, none of them, from Aldrich downwards, ever hint to the under-graduates not to be of Aristotelic origin,) the Stagiritc is wrong in recognising the exclusive possibility of the other three (Analyt. Pr. i. 23, § 1;) and so far his system can * [M. Barthelemy Samt-Hilaire, to whom, among many other valuable Aristotelic labours of high talent, we owe an excellent French translation of the Organon, with copious notes and introductions, lias combated this opi- nion. (See the Preface to his first volume, especially pp. xvi — &x, cxlii.) I still, however, remain nneon\ ineed : though I eannot now detail inv rea- sons.— Assuredly, I do noi plead guilty to the charge of disparaging the ^•■nin^ of Aristotle : reverencing him as the Prince of PhUosopher$.'\ HISTORY OF LOGIC. 141 hardly be affirmed by them to have been perfected by himself. To say nothing of the five moods subsequently added by Theo- phrastus and Eudemus, the extensive and important doctrine of hypothetical, — a doctrine, in a great measure, peculiar and inde- pendent, — was, probably, an original supplement by these philo- sophers; previous to which, the logical system remained alto- gether defective. [This requires some addition, and some modifi- cation.] The following is Dr Whately's sketch of the fortune of Logic, from Aristotle down to the Schoolmen : — " The writings of Aristotle were not only absolutely lost to the world for about two centuries, [many, if not most, were always extant,] but seem to have been but little studied for a long time after their recovery. An art, however, of logic, derived from the principles traditionally preserved by his disciples, seems to have been generally known, and to have been employed by Cicero in his philosophical works ; but the pursuit of the science seems to have been abandoned for a long time. Early in the Christian era the Peripatetic doctrines experienced a considerable revival ; and we meet with the names of Galen and Porphyry as logicians ; but it is not till the fifth [sixth] century that Aristotle's logical works were translated into Latin by the celebrated Boethius. Not one of these seems to have made any con- siderable advances in developing the theory of reasoning. Of Galen's labours little is known ; and Porphyry's principal work is merely on the Predicables. We have little of the science till the revival of learning among the Arabians, by whom Aristotle's treatises on this as well as on other subjects were eagerly studied." (P. 7.) In this sketch, Dr Whately closely follows Aldrich ; and how utterly incompetent was Aldrich for a guide, is significantly shown by his incomparable (but still uncorrected) blunder of con- founding Galen with Alexander of Aphrodisias ! " Circa annum Christi 140, interpretum princeps Galenus floruit, 'Effryur^ sive Expositor, >cot,r' iioxw, dictus," Galen, who thus flourished at nine years old, never deserved, never received the title of The Com- mentator. This designation, as every tyro ought to know, was exclusively given to Alexander, the oldest and ablest of the Greek interpreters of Aristotle, until it was afterwards divided with him by Averroes. — The names of Theophrastus and Eudemus, the great founders of logic after Aristotle, do not appear. — We say nothing of inferior logicians, but the Aphrodisian and Ammonius Hermice were certainly not less worthy of notice than Porphyry. — Of Galen's logical labours, some are preserved, and of others we know not a little from his own information and that of others. 142 LOGIC. Why is it not stated, here or elsewhere, that the fourth figure has been attributed to Galen, and on what (incompetent) authority ? — Nothing is said of the original logical treatises of Boethius, though his work on Hypothetical is the most copious we possess. — Had Dr Whately studied the subject for himself, he would hardly have failed to do greater justice to the Greek logicians. What does he mean by saying, " we have little of the science till the revival of learning among the Arabians ?" Are Averroes and Avicenna so greatly superior to Alexander and Ammonius? Dr Whately, speaking of the Schoolmen, says : — 11 It may be sufficient to observe, that their fault did not lie in their dili- gent study of logic, and the high value they set upon it, but in their utterly mistaking the true nature and object of the science ; and by the attempt to employ it for the purpose of physical discoveries, involving every subject in a mist of words, to the exclusion of sound philosophical investigation. Their errors may serve to account for the strong terms in which Bacon sometimes appears to censure logical pursuits ; but that this censure was intended to bear against the extravagant perversions, not the legitimate cultivation, of the science, may be proved from his own observations on the subject, in his Advancement of Learning." (P. 8.) It has been long the fashion to attribute every absurdity to the schoolmen; it is only when a man of talent, like Dr Whately. follows the example, that a contradiction is worth while. The Schoolmen, (we except always such eccentric individuals as Ray- mond Lully,) had corrector notions of the domain of logic than those who now contemn them, without a knowledge of their works. They certainly did not " attempt to employ it for the purpoe physical discoveries." We pledge ourselves to refute the accusa- tion, whenever any effort is made to prove it ; till then, we must be allowed to treat it as a groundless, though a common calumny. — As to Bacon, we recollect no such reproach directed by him either against logic or against the scholastic logicians. On the contrary, " Logic," he says, " docs not pretend to invent sciences. or the axioms of sciences, but passes it over with a cuitjuo in sua arte credendwm," * And so say the Schoolmen ; and so Aristotle. * Advancement of Learning: — ami similar statements, frequently occur in the De Arguments and Novum Orgonum. The censure of Bacon, most per- tinent to the point, i-; in tlic Orgonum, Aph. 68. It is, however, directed, nut against the Schoolmen, but exclusively against Aristotle; it does a probate any false theory of the nature ami object of loj thai misapplications of it: ami. at any rate, it willy simws that i MODALITY OF PROPOSITIONS AND SYLLOGISMS. 143 We are not satisfied with Dr Whately's strictures on Locke, Watts, &c., but cannot afford the space necessary to explain our views. One mistake in relation to the former we shall correct, as it can be done in a few words. After speaking of Locke's ani- madversion on the syllogism, Dr Whately says : — " He (Locke) presently after inserts an encomium upon Aristotle, in which he is equally unfortunate ; he praises him for the ' invention of syllo- gisms,' to which he certainly had no more claim than Linnaeus to the creation of plants and animals, or Harvey," &c. (P. 19.) In the first place, Locke's words are, " invention of forms of argu- mentation," which is by no means convertible with " invention of syllogisms" the phrase attributed to him. But if syllogism had been the word, in one sense it is right, in another wrong. " Aristotle," says Dr Gillies, " invented the syllogism," &c. ; and in that author's (not in Dr Whately's) meaning, this may be cor- rectly affirmed. — But, in the second place, Dr Whately is wrong- in thinking, that the word " invention" is used by Locke, in the restricted sense in which it is now almost exclusively employed, as opposed to discovery. In Locke and his contemporaries, to say nothing of the older writers, to invent is currently used for to discover. An example occurs in the sentence of Bacon just quoted ; and in this signification we may presume that " invention" is here employed by Locke, as it was also thus employed in French, by Leibnitz, in relation to this very passage of Locke. But from the History, to proceed to the Science itself. Turning over a few pages, we come to an error not peculiar to Dr Whately, but shared with him by all logicians, — we mean the Modality of propositions and syllogisms; in other words, the necessity , possibility , &c, of their matter, as an object of logical consideration. It has always been our wonder, how the integrity of logic has not long ago been purified from this metaphysical admixture. Kant, whose views of the nature and province of the science were peculiarly correct, and from whose acuteness, after that of Aris- totle, every thing might have been expected, so far from ejecting the Modality of propositions and syllogisms, again sanctioned its the name of Dialectic to Ontology. Aristotle did not corrupt physics by logic, but by nietaphysic. The Schoolmen have sins of their own to answer for, but this, imputed to them, they did not commit. 144 LOGIC. right of occupancy, by deducing from it, as an essential element of logical science the last of his four generic categories, or funda- mental forms of thought. Nothing, however, can be clearer, than that this modality is no object of logical concernment. Logic is a formal science ; it takes no consideration of real existence, or of its relations, but is occupied solely about that existence and those relations which arise through, and are regulated by, the condi- tions of thought itself. Of the truth or falsehood of propositions, in themselves, it knows nothing, and takes no account : all in logic may be held true that is not conceived as contradictory. In rea- soning, logic guarantees neither the premises nor the conclusion, but merely the consequence of the latter from the former ; for a syllogism is nothing more than the explicit assertion of the truth of one proposition, on the hypothesis of other propositions being true in which that one is implicitly contained. A conclusion may thus be true in reality (as an assertion,) and yet logically false (as an inference.) * But if truth or falsehood, as a material quality of propositions and syllogisms be extralogical, so also is their modality. Neces- sity, Possibility, &c, are circumstances which do not affect the logical copula or the logical inference. They do not relate to the connexion of the subject and predicate of the antecedent and consequent as terms in thought, but as realities in existence ; they are metaphysical, not logical conditions. The syll«> inference is always necessary ; is modified by no extraformal condition; and is equally apodietic in contingent as in □ matter. * [In a certain sense, therefore, all logical inference is lnipotlieticaI,-^-\\y\\o- thetically necessary; and tlie hypothetical necessity of logic stands opposed to absolute or simple necessity. The more recent scholastic philosophers have well denominated these two Bpecies, — the necessitas consequentuw and the necessitas consequents. The former is an ideal or formal necessity ; the inevitable dependence of one thought upon another, by reason of our intelli- gent nature. The Latter La a real or materia/ necessity ; the inevitable de- pendence of one thing upon another because of its own nature. The former is a Logical necessity, common to all legitimate consequence, whatever bo the material modality of its objects. The latter is an extralogical noee- over and above the syllogistic inference, and wholly dependent on tl.e mo- dality of the matter consequent. — This ancient distinction, modern philoso- phers have not <»nly Overlooked but confounded. (See 1 contrasted the doc- trines of the Aphrodisian and of Mr Dngald Stewart, in Dissertations on Reid, ]». 7»il a, note *.)] MODALITY OF PROPOSITIONS AND SYLLOGISMS. 145 If such introduction of metaphysical notions into logic be once admitted, there is no limit to the intrusion. This is indeed shown in the vacillation of Aristotle himself in regard to the number of the modes. In one passage (De Interp. c. 1 2, § 1), he enumerates four — the necessary, the impossible, the contingent, the possible ; a determination generally received among logicians. In another (Ibid. § 9), he a'dds to these four modes two others, viz. the true, and, consequently, the false. Some logicians have accordingly admitted, but exclusively, these six modes ; his Greek interpreters, however, very properly observe, (though they made no use of the observation), that Aristotle did not mean by these enumerations to limit the number of modes to four or six, but thought only of sig- nalising the more important. [In general, indeed, as I previously stated, he speaks only of the necessary and contingent. (Anal. passim.)] Modes may be conceived without end ; — as the certain, the probable, the useful, the good, the just, — and what not ? All, however, must be admitted into logic if any are : the line of dis- tinction attempted to be drawn is futile. Such was the confusion and intricacy occasioned by the four or two modes alone, that the doctrine of modals long formed, not only the most useless, but the most difficult and disgusting branch of logic. It was, at once, the criterium et crux ingeniorum. " De modali non gustabit asi?ius," said the schoolmen ; " De modali non gustabit logicus," say we. This subject was only perplexed because different sciences were confounded in it ; and modals ought to be entirely, on principle, (as they have been almost entirely in practice,) relegated from the domain of logic, and consigned to the grammarian and metaphy- sician. This was, indeed, long ago, obscurely perceived by a pro- found T)ut now forgotten thinker. " Pronunciata ilia," says Yives, " quibus additur modus, non dialecticam sed grammaticam quaes- tionem habent." Ramus also felt the propriety of their exclusion, though equally unable to explicate its reasons.* * [M. Barthelemy Saint-Hilaire (Logique d'Aristote, T. I. Pref. p. hv.) says : — " Theophraste et Eudeme, dont on invoque l'autorite, avaient com- battu sur plusieurs points la theorie de la modalite ; ils en avaient change quelques regies ; mais ils l'avaient admise comme partie integrante de la theorie generate. Depuis eux, nul logicien n'a pretendu la supprimer. M. Hamilton est jusqu'a present le seul, si Ton excepte Laurentius Valla, au xv e siecle, qui ait propose ce retranchement." — Valla, whose Dialectica I take shame for overlooking, certainly does reject modals, as a species of logical proposition ; but on erroneous grounds. He confounds formal with material necessity ; and alleges no valid reason for the retrenchment. The reduction K 146 LOGIC. Dr Whately has very correctly stated : — " It belongs exclusively to a syllogism, properly so called, (i. e. a valid argument, so stated that its conclusiveness is evident from the mere form of the expression,) that if letters, or any other unmeaning symbols, be substi- tuted for the several terms, the validity of the argument shall still be evi- dent." (P. 37.) Here logic appears, in Dr Whately's exposition, as it is in truth, a distinct and self-sufficient science. What, then, are we to think of the following passages ? — " Should there be no sign at all to the common term, the quantity of the proposition, (which is called an Indefinite proposition,) is ascertained by the matter; i. e. the nature of the connection between the extremes, which is either Necessary, Impossible, or Contingent," &c, &c. (P. G4.) — " As it is evident, that the truth or falsity of any proposition (its quantity and qua- lity being known) must depend on the matter of it, we must bear in mind, that, in necessary matter all affirmatives are true, and negatives false : in impossible matter, vice versa ; in contingent matter, all universals false, and particulars true : e. g. ' all islands, (or, some islands,) are surrounded by water,' must be true, because the matter is necessary: to say ' no islands, or some — not] &c, would have been false: again, ' some islands are fertile,' ' some are not fertile,' are both true, because it is Contingent Matter: put 1 all," 1 or l no, 1 instead of ' some," 1 and the propositions will be false," &c, &c. (P. 67.) In these passages, (which, it is almost needless to say, are only specimens of the common doctrine,) logic is reduced from an inde- pendent science to a scientific accident. Possible, impossible, neces- sary, and contingent matter, are terms expressive of certain lofty generalisations from an extensive observation of real existence ; and logic, inasmuch as it postulates a knowledge of these generalisa- tions, postulates its own degradation to a precarious appendage, — to a fortuitous sequel, of all the sciences from which that knowledge must be borrowed. If in syllogisms, " unless unmeaning symbols can be substituted for the several terms, the argument is eithor unsound or sophistical;" — why does not the same hold good in propositions, of which syllogisms are but the complement ? But of the Necessary and Contingent to the Apodictic and Problematic is modern, and, I think, erroneous. For all the necessary \b not apodktic or demonstrable j and the contingent ib by no means convertible with the doubtful or problematic. There is here also a mixing of the subjective with the objective. In my view. modes are only material affections of tin 1 predicate, ov. \\ may be, of tin- Bubject; ami tli"M- which, from their generality, have been contemplated in logic, may, 1 think, be reduced to the relation of genua ami .-juries, ami their consecution, thereby, recalled t«» the utmost simplicity. — 1 agree with Mr Mansel, (Pref. p. ii.). it' I do not misapprehend him.] ARGUMENT = MIDDLE TERM. 147 A, and B, and C, know nothing of the necessary, impossible, con- tingent. Is logic a formal science in one chapter, a real science in another ? Is it independent, as a constituted whole ; and yet dependent, in its constituent parts ? We cannot pass without notice Dr Whately's employment of the term Argument. This word he defines, and professes to use in a '•' strict logical sense;" and gives us, moreover, under a dis- tinct head, a formal enumeration of its other various significations in ordinary discourse. The true logical acceptation of the term, he, however, not only does not employ, but even absolutely over- looks ; while, otherwise, his list of meanings is neither well discri- minated, nor at all complete. We shall speak only of the logical omission and mistake. u Reasoning (or discourse) expressed in words is argument; and an argu- ment stated at full length, and in its regular form, is called a syllogism ; the third part of logic, therefore, treats of the syllogism. Every argument con- sists of two parts ; that which is proved; and that by means of which it is proved," &c. And in a note on this : — " I mean, in the strict technical sense ; for, in popular use, the word Argument is often employed to denote the latter of these two parts alone : e. g. this is an argument to prove so and so," &c. (P. 72.) Now, the signification, here (not quite correctly) given as the "popular use" of the term, is nearer to the "strict technical sense" than that which Dr Whately supposes to be such. In technical propriety argument cannot be used for argumentation, as he thinks, — but exclusively for its middle term. In this mean- ing the word (though not with uniform consistency) was employed by Cicero, Quintilian, Boethius, &c. ; it was thus subsequently used by the Latin Aristotelians, from whom it passed even to the Ramists ; * and this is the meaning which the expression always, first and most naturally, suggests to a logician. Of the older dia- lecticians, Crackanthorpe is the only one we recollect, who uses, and professes to use, the word not in its strict logical signification, but with the vulgar as convertible with Reasoning. In vindicat- ing his innovation, he, however, misrepresents his authorities. Sanderson is, if we remember, rigidly correct. The example of * Ramus, in his definitions, indeed, abusively extends the word to both the other terms ; the middle he calls the tertium argumentum. Throughout his writings, however, — and the same is true of those of his friend Talaeus, — argumentum, without an adjective, is uniformly the word used for the middle term of a syllogism ; and in this he is followed by the Ramists and Semi- Ramists in general. 148 LOGIC. Crackanthorpe, and of some French Cartesians, may have seduced Wallis ; and Wallis's authority, with his own ignorance of logical propriety, determined the usage ofAldrich — and of Oxford. — We say again Aldrich's ignorance ; and the point in question supplies a significant example. " Terminus tertius [says he] cui quses- tionis extrema comparantur, Aristoteli Argumentum, vulgo Me- dium." The reverse would be correct : — " Aristoteli Medium, vulgo Argumentum." This elementary blunder of the Dean, corrected by none, is repeated by nearly all his epitomators, expositors, and imitators. It stands in Hill (p. 118) — in Huyshe (p. 84) — in the Questions on Logic (p. 41) — and in the Key to the Questions (p. 101) ; and proves emphatically, that, for a cen- tury and a half, at least, the Organon (to say nothing of other logical works) could have been as little read in Oxford as the Targum or Zendavesta. A parallel to this error is Dr Whately's statement, that " the Major Premiss is often called the Principle." (P. 25.) The major premise is often called the Proposition ; never the Principle. A principle may, indeed, be a major premise ; but we make bold to say, that no logician ever employed the term Principle as a synonym e for major premise. Speaking of the Dilemma, Dr Whately says : — " Most, if not all, writers on this point, either omit to tell, whether the Dilemma is a kind of conditional or of disjunctive argument, or else refer it to the latter class, on account of its having one disjunctive pre- miss ; though it clearly belongs to the class of conditionals." (P. 100.) Most, if not all, logical writers, do not omit to tell this, but Dr Whately, we fear, has omitted to consult them ; and the opinion he himself adopts, so far from being held by few or none, has been, in fact, long the catholic doctrine. For every one logi- cian, during the last century, who does not hold the dilemma to be a conditional syllogism, we could produce ten who do. Dr Whately, — indeed all the Oxford logicians, — adopts the inelegant division of the Hypothetical proposition and sylli e into the Conditional and Disjunctive. This is wrong in itself. The name of the genus should not. without necessity, be founded with that of a Bpecies. But the terms Hypothetical and Conditional are in Bense identical, differing only in the lan- guage from which they are taken. It is likewise wrong on the score of authority ; for the words have been used a- synonymous by those Logicians who. independently of the natural identity HYPOTHETICAL PROPOSITIONS AND^SYLLOGISMS. 141) of the terms, were best entitled to regulate their conventional use. — Boethius, the first among the Latins who elaborated this part of logic, employs indifferently the terms hypotheticus, condi- tionalis, non simplex, for the genus, and as opposed to catego- ries or simplex; and this genus he divides into the Propositio et Syllogismus conjunctivi (called also conjuncti, connexi, per con- nexionem,) equivalent to Dr Whately's Conditionals ; and into the Propositio et Syllogismus disjunctivi (also disjuncti, per disjunc- tionem.) Other logicians have employed other, none better, terms of distinction ; but, in general, all who had freed themselves of the scholastic slime, avoided the needless confusion to which we object. But, to speak now of Hypotheticals in their Aristotelic mean- ing, Dr Whately says : — " Aldrich has stated, through a mistake, that Aristotle utterly despised hypothetical syllogisms, and thence made no mention of them ; but he did indicate his intention to treat of them in some part of his work, which either was not completed by him according to his design, or else (in common with many of his writings) has not come down to us." (P. 104.) Any ignorance of Aristotle on the part of Aldrich is con- ceivable, but in his censure Dr Whately is not himself correct. With the other Oxford logicians, he never suspects the 2wxxoyw/s*oi l£ vvoteffsag of Aristotle and our hypothetical syllogisms, not to be the same. In this error, which is natural enough, he is not without associates even of distinguished name. Those versed in Aristotelic and logical literature are, however, aware, that this opinion has been long, if not exploded, at least rendered extremely improbable. We cannot at present enter on the sub- ject, and must content ourselves with stating, that hypothetical syllogisms, in the present acceptation, were first expounded, and the name first applied to them by Theophrastus and Eude- mus. The latter, indeed, clearly discriminated such hypothetical syllogisms from those of Aristotle ; and, what has not, we believe, been observed, even Boethius expressly declares the 2^AAoy/6s rou tu rifl ^vxy i*"d ovZi ovKkoyiarpog-' 1 {^Andlyt. Post. i. 10, § 7.) — But if the distinction, in its general nature, be unphi- losophical, it is still more irrational at the hands of its reputed author. For Aristotle distinguishes the enthvmeme from the mere syllogism, as a reasoning of a peculiar matter, — from signs and likelihoods; so that, if he over-and-above discriminated these by an accident of form, he would divide the genus by two differ- ences, and differences of a merely contingent association. Yet, strange to say, this improbability has been believed ; — believed without any cogent evidence ; — believed from the most ancient times ; and even when the opinion was at last competently refuted, the refutation was itself so immediately forgotten, that there seems not to be at present a logical author (not to say in England, but) in Europe, who is even aware of the existence o\' the contro- versy.* A discussion of the question would exceed our limits. For those who may wish to study the point, we may briefly indicate ourcesof information ; and these, though few, will be found. w<> think, to be exhaustive. Towards the conclusion of the fifteenth century, the celebrated Rodolphus Agricola, (f L485,) in his posthumous hook. /), Tnvm* Hone Dialectica, recognises it as doubtful, whether Aristotle meant * In this country, some years ago, the question waa stated in i popular miscellany, with his usual ability, by a learned friend to whom \\«' pointed oul the evidence; bul none of the subsequent-writers have profited by the information. ENTHYMEME. 153 to discriminate the Enthymeme from the Syllogism, by any pecu- liarity of form ; and Phrissemius in his Scholia on that book, (1523), shows articulately, that the common opinion was at variance with the statements of the Philosopher. Without, it is probable, any knowledge of Phrissemius, the matter was discussed by Majoragius, in his Reprehensio?ies contra Nizolium, and his Explanations in Aristotelis Rhetoricam, — the latter in 1572. Twenty-five years thereafter, Julius Pacius (who was not appa- rently aware of either) argued the whole question on far broader grounds ; and, in particular, on the authority of four Greek MSS., ejected as a gloss the term kt&lw (imperfectus), (Analyt. Pr. ii. 27, § 3,) on which the argument for the common doctrine mainly rests; which has been also silently done by the Berlin Academicians, in their late splendid edition of Aristotle's works, on two of the three MSS. of the Organon, on which they found. We may notice, that the Masters of Louvain, in their commen- tary on the logical treatises of Aristotle (1535), observe, that " the word imperfectus is not to be found in some codices, but that it ought to be supplied is shewn, both by the Greek [printed] copies and by the version of Boethius." Scaynus, in his Para- phrasis in Organum (1599), adopts the opinion without arguing the question ; and he does not seem to have been aware even of the Commentary of Pacius, published three years before. About 1620, Corydaleus, bishop of Mitylene, who had studied in Italy, maintained in his Logic the opinion of Pacius, but without addi- tional corroboration ; though in his Rhetoric (reprinted by Fabri- cius, in the Biblioiheca Grceca), he adheres to the vulgar doctrinec [Becmanus (Orig. 1608 and Manud. 1626,) and Heumannus (Poec. 1729,) have nothing new or determinate, though they moot the question.] In 1724, Facciolati expanded the argument of Pacius — (for he, as the others, was ignorant of Scaynus, Ma- joragius, Phrissemius, Agricola, &c, and adds nothing of his own except an error or two) — into a special Acroama : but his elo- quence was not more effective than the reasoning of his predeces- sors ; and the question again fell into complete oblivion. Any one who competently reargues the point, will have both to supply and to correct.* * For example. — Pacius (whom Facciolati, by rhetorical hyperbole, pro- nounces — " Aristotelis Interpres, quot sunt, quot fuerunt, quotque futuri sunt, longe prasstantissimus,") establishes it as one of the main pillars of his argument, that the Greek interpreters did not achnmcledge the term ctTshyg : — 154 LOGIC. We proceed to consider a still more important subject — the nature of the Inductive inference ; and regret that we cannot " quoniaru Johannes Grammaticus hie nullam ejus mentionem facit ; et tarn ipse, quam Alexander, superiori libro, explicantes definitionem syllogismi ab Aristotele traditam, ac distinguentes syllogismum ab argumentatione con- stante ex una propositione, non vocant hanc argumentationem enthymema, sed syllogismum poWhiifcfioiTov" (Comm. in Analyt. Pr. ii. 27, § 3.) — Pacius is completely wrong.— Philoponus, or rather Ammonius Hermise, on the place in question {Anal. Pr. ii. c. 27, § 3,) states, indeed, (as far as we recol- lect, for our copy of his Commentary is not at hand,) nothing to the point. [On since referring to the passage, we find that too much had been conceded. M. Peisse, too, notices its irrelevancy.] The fallacy of such negative evi- dence is however shown in his exposition of the Posterior Analytics, where he says; — " 'Ev&vfiyfioi hi etQ-ziTect, oino tov xctTochi^^oiysiv rw t/u ivdv/usiadui tyju fiiocu naoToiaiv." (f. 4. a. Edit. Aid. 1534.) Ammonius also, On the five words of Porphyry (f. 5 a, ed. Aid. 1546) expressly defines the Enthymeme — u A syllogism with one proposition unexpressed; hence called an imperfect syllogism.' 1 '' How inaccurate, moreover, Pacius is in regard to the still higher authority of Alexander, (whose interpretation of the second book of the Prior Analytics, which contains the passage in question, is still in MS., and probably spurious,) may be seen by his Commentary on the first book of the Prior Analytics, (f. 7. a. b. Edit. Aid. 1534,) compared with his Commentary on the Topics, (pp. 6, 7, Edit. Aid. 1513.) This last we shall quote. He is speaking of Aristotle's definition of the Syllogism : — " Ttdevrai/" hi glVgj/ aXA' ov "Tidivro j," as Ttvzg d^iovaiv, cdriaftsvoi tov T^oyov, — ort (t'/jhiv ov'KKoyisix.oig hi svog TS0ivTog hiixvvTcci, otAA' Ik hvo to ikoc-^iarou. Ovg yd(> oi TrtQi AvTi7rciT(>o» (Tarsensem Tyriumve ?) ftovoKyppciTovg ov'k'koytopovg T^iyovatv, ovx tiol avTChoyio^ol, dKh svhscog i^aruuroit. — — Totovroi hi eiat xocl ol pviTOgixol ovKhoytopol, ovg \ v 6 v (A jj ft oct oc Xiyofizv xocl yoc(> iv sxeivotg hoxii yiyvio&oct htoc y.iocg KQOTOcoscog ov'K'Koyio'ftog, tu> ryu srigocv yvu^ipcov ovaocv vtto hixocoTav, «j ruv ocxqooctuv TTQOOTifaoOoti oiov, x. t. A. - — Aio ovhi oi toiovtoi KVQtag av'h'KoyKr^ol, ocKhoc to 'oKov, pr/TOQixol avXhoyiapcoi. E$ uv ovv uyi yva^iftov ion to 'Koc^cthznropivov, ovx Iotiv IkI tovtuv oiov ts tov hi iv6vf>cij- ftotTOg yiyvivdoct avT^hoy to \u.6v xocl yocQ xocl octt ocvtov tov ovopocTog av'h'hoyta l cc6g ovvdioiv Ttvoc T^oycov sotxs a/jpeocivetv' coa7re(> xocl 6 ovft\pY)(pto-pc6g, -^/ijCpay. — From these passages, (which arc confirmed by the anonymous Greek author of the book " Touching Syllogisms,") it is manifest against Pacius : — 1°, That the ' KuOvfwfiet was used by the oldest commentators on Aristotle in the modern signification, as a syllogism of one expressed premise ; and. 2°, That the o-vKhoyto-pog povoh'/} t ufLccTog was not a term of the Aristotelian, but of the Stoical School. This appears clearly from Sextus Empiricus, (lust. ii. § L67 : Contra Math. viii. § 443 ; ed. Fabr.) Boethius, and all the later Greek logi- cians, (with the partial variation of Magentinus and Pachymeres,) also favour the common Opinion. Their authority is. however. o\' little weight, and the general result of the argument stands unaffected. — In these errors, it [fl needless to say, that Facias is follow ed hv Corvdaleus and Faeciolati. [I inav here annex a general Statement of the various meaning in which the term Enthymeme has been employed; and thongh [cannot tarry to pre INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. 155 echo the praises that have been bestowed on Dr Whately's analysis of this process. We do not, indeed, know the logician articulate references to the books in which the several opinions are to be found, this I think will exhibit a far completer view of the multiform sig- nifications of the word than is elsewhere to be found. These meanings maybe first distributed into four categories, according as the word is employed to denote : — I. A thought or proposition in general ; — II. A proposition, part of a syllogism ; — III. A syllogism of some peculiar matter ; — IV. A syllogism of an unexpressed part. I. — Enthymeme denotes a thought or proposition : 1. Of any kind. — See Cicero, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Demetrius, Quin- tilian, Sopater, and one of the anonymous Scholiasts on Hermogenes. 2. Of any kind, with its reason annexed. — See Aristotle, Quintilian. 3. Of imagination or feeling, as opposed to intellection. — Isocrates, Author of the Rhetoric to Alexander, the Halicarnassian. 4. Inventive. — Xenophon. 5. Facetious, witty, antithetic. — Quintilian, Juvenal, Agellius. II. — Enthymeme denotes a proposition, part of a syllogism: 1. Any one proposition. — Held by Neocles (?) ; See Quintilian, Scholiast on Hermogenes, Greek author of the Prolegomena Statuum, Matthsens Cam- ariota. 2. Conclusion of an Epichirema. — Hermogenes, Scholiast on Hermogenes, Rufus, Greek author of the Rhetorical Synopticon, Maximus Planudes, Georgius Pletho, M. Camariota. This category it is impossible always rigorously to distinguish from IV. HI. — Enthymeme denotes a syllogism of a certain matter: 1. Rhetorical of any kind. — Aristotle, Curius Fortunatianus, Harpocratian, Scholiast on Hermogenes, M. Camariota. 2. From consequents, or from opposites — repugnants, contraries, dissimilar s, fyc. — Cicero, Quintilian, Hermogenes, Apsines, Julius Rufinianus. 3. (Leaving that from consequents to be called Epichirenia,) from opposites alone. — Cornificius, Author of the Rhetoric to Herennius, Quintilian, Hermogenes, Apsines. 4. From signs and likelihoods. — Aristotle's special doctrine. TV. — Enthymeme denotes a syllogism in which there is unexpressed: — a) 1. One or two propositions. — So Victorinus in Cassiodorus. See also Cicero, Quintilian and Boethius. b) One proposition ; and here : — 2. Any proposition. — Held by Neocles (?) Quintilian, and the Greek author of the Prolegomena Rhetorica ; see also Scholiast on Hermogenes and G. Pletho. Aristotle and Demetrius allow this, as a frequent accident of rhetorical syllogisms. 3. Either premise.— -This is the common doctrine of the Greek logicians, fol- lowing Alexander and Ammonius, and followed by the Arabians, and of the Schoolmen following Boethius, Cassiodorus, Isidore of Seville, and the Arabians. It is also the doctrine of the moderns. All these parties agree in fathering it on the Stagirite. 4. The major premise; (the non- expression of the minor being allowed to 156 LOGIC. who has clearly defined the proper character of dialectical induc- tion, and there are few who have not in the attempt been guilty of the grossest blunders. Aristotle's doctrine on this point, though meagre, is substantially correct ; but succeeding logicians, in attempting to improve upon their master, have only corrupted what they endeavoured to complete. As confusion is here a prin- cipal cause of error, we must simplify the question by some pre- liminary distinctions and exclusions. The term Induction (kKoiyuyv)) has been employed to denote three very different things : — 1*- The objective process of inves- tigating individual facts, as preparatory to illation ; — 2°, A mate- rial illation of the universal from the singular, warranted either by the general analogies of nature, or by special presumptions afforded by the object-matter of any real science ; — 3°. A. formal illation of the universal from the individual, as legitimated solely by the laws of thought, and abstract from the conditions of this or that particular matter. That the first of these, an inventive process or process of dis- covery, is beyond the sphere of a critical science, is manifest ; nor has Induction, in this abusive application of the term, been ever arrogated to Logic. By logicians, however, the second and third have been confounded into one, and, under every phasis of mis- conception, treated as a simple and purely logical operation. Yet nothing can be clearer than that these constitute two separate operations, and that the second is not properly a logical process at all. In logic, all inference is determined rat ione for nice, the the common syllogism.)— This is held by two Greek logicians, — Leo Magentinus and Georgius Pachymeres. (By the way I may notice that Saxius is wrong in carrying up the former to the seventh century ; for Leo could not be older than the ninth, seeing that he quotes Psellns.) The same opinion I find maintained by Cardanus ; but on a misinterpretation of Averrocs. The conclusion. — The doctrine of Ulpian the commentator o( Demosthenes, of Minucianus, and of a Scholiast on Hermogenes. Though this, as an exclusive opinion, be not right, modern logicians are still farther wrong, in their otherwise erroneous doctrine of Entlmncme, for not recognising as a third order, the non- expression of the conclusion; since this is an ellipsis of the \ cry commonest in OUT practice oi' reasoning. Kecker- niannus, indeed, (ignorant of the ancient doctrine.) while admitting the practice, expressly refuses (o it the name of Entlmncme. Two propositions. — Thifl opinion might seem to he held 1»\ BOme Of the authorities under category II. ] INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. 157 conclusion being necessarily implied in the very conception of the premises. In this second Induction, on the contrary, the illation is effected vi materice, on grounds not involved in the notion of its antecedent. To take, for example, Dr Whately's instance : The naturalist who, from the proposition — " Ox, sheep, deer, goat, (i. e. some horned animals,) ruminate," infers the conclusion — " All horned animals ruminate," may be warranted in this pro- cedure by the material probabilities of his science ; but his illation is formally, is logically vicious. Here, the inference is not neces- sitated by the laws of thought. The some of the antecedent, as it is not thought, either to contain or to constitute, so it does not mentally determine, the all of the consequent ; and the reasoner must transcend the sphere of logic, if he would attempt to vindi- cate the truth of his conclusion. Yet, this, by the almost unani- mous consent of logicians, has been admitted into their science. Induction they have distinguished into perfect and imperfect ; according as the whole concluded was inferred from all, or from some only, of its constituent parts. They thus involved them- selves in a twofold absurdity. For, on the one hand, they recog- nised the consequence of the Imperfect Induction to be legitimate, though, admitting it to be not necessarily cogent ; as if logic could infer with a degree of certainty inferior to the highest : and, on the other, they attempted to corroborate this imbecillity, by calling in real probabilities, — physical, psychological, meta- physical ; which logic could neither, as a formal science, know, nor, as an apodictic science, take into account. This was a corol- lary of the fundamental error to which we have already alluded, — the non-exclusion of all material modality from the domain of logic. Thus, it was maintained, that, in necessary matter, the Imperfect Induction was necessarily conclusive ; as if logic could be aware of what was necessary matter, — as if, indeed, this itself were not the frequent point of controversy in the objective sciences, and did not, in fact, usually vary in them, as these same sciences advanced.* * [Thus, Sir Thomas Browne, expressing the doctrine of naturalists in the seventeenth century, declared it to be " impossible, that a quadruped should lay an egg, or have the bill of a bird.'''' To the older logicians, there- fore, this proposition was of impossible matter. The subsequent discovery of the Ornithorynchus Paradoxus has shown to the naturalist that his twofold impossibility was possible, and the proposition is, consequently, to our re- cent logicians one of possible matter. — "Dogs bark:'''' this was erst of neces- 158 LOGIC. The two first processes to which the name of Induction has been given, being thus excluded, it remains only to say a few words in explanation of the third, — of that Induction, with which alone logic is concerned, but the nature of which has, by almost all logicians, been wholly misrepresented.* Logic does not consider things as they exist really and in themselves, but only the general forms of thought under which the mind conceives them ; in the language of the schools, logic is conversant, not about first, but about second, notions.} Thus a logical inference is not determined by any objective relation of Causality subsisting between the terms of the premises and con- clusion, but solely by the subjective relation of Reason and Con- sequent, under which they are construed to the mind in thought.^ The notion conceived as determining, is the Reason ; the notion conceived as determined, is the Consequent ; and the relation between the two is the Consequence. Now, the mind can think two notions under the formal relation of consequence, only in one or other of two modes. Either the determining notion must be conceived as a whole, containing (under it), and therefore neces- sitating, the determined notion, conceived as its contained part or parts ; — or the determining notion must be conceived as the parts constituting, and, therefore, necessitating the determined notion, conceived as their constituted whole. Considered, indeed, abso- lutely and in themselves, the whole and all the parts are identical. Relatively, however, to us, they are not; for in the order ftf thought, (and logic is only conversant with the laws of thoug the whole may be conceived first, and then by mental ana separated into its parts ; or the parts may be conceived first, and sary matter; — " dogs" were then " all dogs," and the inductive conclusion compulsory and universal. (YVolfii Logica, § 170.) Since an observation of the dogs of Labrador (I think), the proposition, as in our zoologies, BO in our logics, has fallen to contingent matter; " i\o<,:<" are now " some d and the inductive conclusion, petitory, particular, or false. And BO OH. lint in logic, as in theology, — Vdriasse trroris est. * [What follows, OH the Logical doctrine of Induction, is, as it has gene- rally been admitted to be, I am convinced, true. I would, however, new evolve it in somewhat different language. Compare among others: — Wuoihifs Logic (j>. 12<>, aq.) : MonseTa Aldricb (App. p. 50,*?.)] t (See ]». 187, note (*). X [The logical relation of Reason md Consequent, as more than a men corollary of the law of Non contradiction, in its three phases, is, 1 am confi- dent of proving, erroneous.] INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. 159 then by mental synthesis collected into a whole. Logical infer- ence is thus of two and only of two, kinds : — it must proceed, either from the whole to the parts, or from the parts to the whole ; and it is only under the character of a constituted or containing whole, or of a constituting or contained part, that any thing can become the term of a logical argumentation. Before proceeding, we must, however, allude to the nature of the ivhole and part, about which logic is conversant. These are not real or essential existences, but creations of the mind itself, in secondary operation on the primary objects of its knowledge. Things may be conceived the same, inasmuch as they are con- ceived the subjects of the same attribute, or collection of attri- butes, (i. e. of the same nature) : — inasmuch as they are conceived the same, they must be conceived as the parts constituent of, and contained under a whole : — and as they are conceived the same, only as they are conceived to be the subjects of the same nature, this common nature must be convertible with that ivhole. A logical or universal whole is called a genus when its parts are thought as also containing wholes or species ; a species when its parts are thought as only contained parts or individuals. Genus and species are each called a class. Except the highest and the lowest, the same class may thus be thought, either as a genus, or as a species. Such being the nature and relations of a logical whole and parts, it is manifest what must be the conditions under which the two kinds of logical inference are possible. The one of these, the process from the whole to the parts, is Deductive reasoning, (or Syllogism proper) ; the other, the process from the parts to the whole, is Inductive reasoning. The former is governed by the rule : — What belongs (or does not belong) to the containing whole, belongs (or does not belong) to each and all of the covs- tained parts. The latter by the rule : — What belongs (or does not belong) to all the constituent parts, belongs (or does not belong) to the constituted whole. These rules exclusively determine all formal inference; whatever transcends or violates them, tran- scends or violates logic. Both are equally absolute. It would be not less illegal, to infer by the Deductive syllogism an attri- bute, belonging to the whole, of something it was not conceived to contain as a part ; than by the Inductive, to conclude of the whole, what is not conceived as a predicate of all its constituent parts. In either case, the consequent is not thought, as deter- 160 LOGIC. mined by the antecedent ; — the premises do not involve the con- clusion. The Deductive and Inductive processes are elements of logic equally essential. Each requires the other. The former is only possible through the latter; and the latter is only valuable as realizing the possibility of the former. As our knowledge com- mences with the apprehension of singulars, every class or univer- sal whole is consequently only a knowledge at second-hand. Deductive reasoning is thus not an original and independent pro- cess. The universal major proposition, out of which it developes the conclusion, is itself necessarily the conclusion of a foregone Induction, and, mediately or immediately, an inference, — a col- lection, from individual objects of perception, or self-consciousness. Logic, therefore, as a definite and self-sufficient science, must equally vindicate the formal purity of the synthetic illation, by which it ascends to its wholes, as of the analytic illation, by which it re-descends to their parts. (See Note (*) p. 171.) Not only is the Deductive, thus, in a general way, dependent for its possibility on the Inductive, syllogism ; the former is, what has not been observed, — in principle and detail, — in whole and in part, — in end and in means, — in perfection and imperfec- tion, precisely a counterpart or inversion of the latter. The attempts that have been made by almost every logician, except (perhaps?) Aristotle,* to assimilate and even identify the two * [I said perhaps, for Aristotle in his doctrine of Induction, in fact, impli- citly contradicts himself. In his development of the inductive process, he is compelled to recognise, though he was not prepared to signalise, the univer- sal quantification of the predicate in affirmative propositions; a quantification which he elsewhere, once and again, explicitly condemns, as. in all absurd. It was the detection of this his inconsistency, which first led me to the conviction, that the predicate of an affirmative proposition maVyformalfy^ or by the laws of thought, be universal; and from thence, again, to th< viction, (after this article was written), that tin predicate in propositions, both affirmative and negative, should he unexchtsively quantified in logical lan- guage, as if is in logical thought. lien- M. Peisse lias the following note: — " This » perhaps ■' is very right, for it is by no means certain that Aristotle gave to the Inductive 8yll< a form absolutely independent. It is even more probable that he assimilated it t<» the Deductive, Bince he appears t<> prescribe a conversion i^\' the minor premise, in order to legitimate the universal conclusion, (An. Pr. li $ i.); this in etVect is t<» transform it int<> a Byllogism o\' the first figure (in Barbara). It is even this passage which may have seduced subsequent clans, admitting as it does, hou ever, of a different interpretation." INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. 161 processes, by reducing the Inductive syllogism to the schematic proprieties of the Deductive, — proceeding as they do on a total misconception of their analogy and differences, have contributed to involve the doctrine of Logical Induction in a cloud of error and confusion. The Inductive inference is equally independent, and, though far less complex, equally worthy of analysis as the Deductive ; it is governed by its own laws ; and, if judged aright, must be estimated by its own standard. The correlation of the two processes is best exemplified by employing the same symbols in our ascent through an Inductive, and our re-descent through a Deductive syllogism. Inductive. Deductive. x, y, z are A ; B is A ; x, y, z are (whole) B ; x, y, z are (under) B ; Therefore, B is A. Therefore, x, y, z are A. or or A contains x, y, z ; A contains B ; x, y, z constitute B ; B contains x, y, z; Therefore, A contains B. Therefore, A contains x, y, z. These two syllogisms exhibit, each in its kind, the one natural and perfect figure. This will be at once admitted of the Deduc- tive, which is in the first. But the Inductive, estimated, as it has always been, by the standard of the Deductive, will appear a monster. It appears, on that standard, only in the third figure ; * and Aristotle, in expressing the extremes vaguely, as "the one' 1 '' and "the other" is more accurate than the logicians, who astrict the reciprocating proposition to the minor premise. For his example is only of a single case. On the doctrine, indeed, of a quantified predicate, the reciprocation may be, in either premise, or in both.] * We say — Induction appears a syllogism of the third figure, because, though so held by logicians, it is not. [?] The mistake arose from the am- biguity of the copula or substantive verb, which in different relations ex- presses either " are contained under" or " constitute." Thus, taking Aristotle's example : — Man, horse, mule, are long-lived ; Man, horse, mule, are the whole class of animals wanting bile ; Therefore, the whole class of animals wanting bile are long-lived. Now here it is evident that the subject stands in a very different relation to its predicate in the major and in the minor premise ; though in both cases the connexion is expressed by the same copula. In the former, the " are " expresses that the predicate determines the subject as a contained part ; in the latter, that the subject determines the predicate by constituting it a whole. Ex- plicitly thus : 102 LOGIC. then, contrary to the rule of that figure it has an universal con- clusion.* (Analyt. Pr. i. 22, § 8). But when we look less par- Long-lived — contains — Man, horse, mule ; Man, horse, mule, — constitute — Animal wanting bile ; Therefore, Long-lived — contains — Animal wanting bile. That the logicians have neglected to analyze the Inductive inference as an independent process, and attempted to reduce it to the conditions of the De- ductive ; is the cause or the effect of a primary deficiency in their technical language. They have no word to express the synthesis of a logical whole. The word constitute, &c, which we have, from necessity, employed in this sense, belongs properly to the relations of an Essential (Physical or Meta- physical) whole, and parts. [I would now express this somewhat differ- ently ; though not varying in the doctrine itself.] * [It will be seen from the tenor of the text, that by the year 1833, I had become aware of the error in the doctrine of Aristotle and the logicians, which maintains that the predicate in affirmative propositions could only be formally quantified as particular ; nay, that Aristotle, by his practice in the inductive syllogism, virtually contradicts the speculative precept which he, over and over, expressly enounces for syllogism in general. It was not, however, for several years thereafter, that I made the second step ; by admit- ting in negative propositions a particular predicate. The doctrine of a tho- roughgoing quantification of the predicate, with its results, I have, however, publicly taught since the year 1840, at the latest. How this doctrine, when applied, at once simplifies and amplifies the logic of propositions and of syl- logisms, it is not here requisite to state. (But see Appendix II.) I would only remark, in reference to certain recent misapprehensions, that my doc- trine has, and could have, no novelty from a mere recognition, as possible, of the eight propositional forms,— four affirmative and four negative ; — forms, which I thus name and number : — Affirmative. Negative, i. Toto-total . All — is all — . Any — is not any — . ii. Toto-partial . All — is some — . Any — is not some — . iii. Parti-total . Some — is all — . Some — is not any — . iv. Parti-partial . Some — is some — . Some — is not some — . .Every system of logic necessarily contemplated off these; for of these eva tern of the science expressly allowed some, and expressly disallowed the others. By Aristotle and logicians in general, of the Affirmative the even, o\' the Y, - gativeihe odd, numbers arc declared admissible, whilst the Others arc overtly rejected: — formally, at least, and of necessity ; for though a universal quan- tification of the predicate in affirmatives has been frequently recognised, this was by logicians recognised, (if not ignorantly,) as mmaterim, contingently, and therefore extralogically ; nor am 1 aware o( any previous attempt to prove, that, formally or by the laws of thought, even this proposition had a right to claim its place in logic. It is not. therefore, mi a mere enumeration of the eight propositional forms, \\w Less is it on an ignorance of the ordinary objec- tion by logicians,— on a mistake of the meaning of the form- themselves, INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. 163 tially and more profoundly into the matter, our conclusion will be very different. on a blindness to the results of a thoroughgoing quantification of the predi- cate, that I would found any claim of novelty to my New Analytic. Yet on this ground it has been actually contested ! — In general, I may say, that aware of many partial manifestations of discontent with the common doc- trine, I know of no attempt to evince that the doctrine itself is radically wrong. Various of these manifestations are recorded by Mr Baynes in his excellent " Essay on the new Analytic of Logical Forms." The thoroughgoing quantification of the predicate, in its appliance to ne- gative propositions, has been demurred to by logicians well entitled to re- spect, who do not gainsay it in the case of affirmatives. But not only is this application allowable, not only is it systematic, not only is it useful, — it is even necessary. — For, to speak even of its very weakest form, that of parti- partial negation, " Some — is not some — " ; this (to say nothing of its other uses) is the form, and the only form, which we naturally employ in dividing a whole of any kind into parts : — " Some A is not some A." And is this form (that too inconsistently) to be excluded from logic — exempted from demand ? — But, again, to prove both the obnoxious propositions summarily, and at once : — what objection, apart from the arbitrary laws of our present logics, can be taken to the following syllogism ? — " All man is some animal ; Any man is not (no man is) some animal ; Therefore, some animal is not some animaV Vary this syllogism of the third, to any other figure ; it will always be legiti- mate by nature, if illegitimate to unnatural art. Taking it, however, as it is : — The negative minor, with its particular predicate, offends logical prejudice. But it is a propositional form, irrecusable, both as true in itself, and as ne- cessary in practice. — Its converse, again, is even technically allowed ; and no proposition can possibly be right, if its converse is possibly wrong. For, to say, (as has been said, indeed, from Aristotle downwards,) that a parti- total negative proposition is inconvertible ; this is merely to confess, that the rules of the logicians are inadequate to the truth of logic and the realities of nature. In fact, it is to supply this very inadequacy, that the doctrine of a thoroughgoing quantification of the predicate is, perhaps, mainly required. A toto-partial negative cannot, therefore, be scientifically refused. — But if the premises of a syllogism be correct, its conclusion must be obligatory. This conclusion, however, is a parti- partial negative : — " Some animal (say, rational) is not some animal (say, irrational.)" A parti-partial negative is thus a proposition, not only logically valid, but logically indispensable. Nothing, it may be observed, is more easy than to misapply a form ; no- thing is more easy than to employ a weaker, when we are entitled to employ a stronger proposition. But from the special and factitious absurdity, thus emerging, to infer the general and natural absurdity of a propositional form, — this, certainly, is not a logical procedure.— (In part, coincident with what I have elsewhere, and that this very day, been obliged to state.) ] 104 LOGIC. In the first place, we find that the two syllogisms present so systematic a relation of contrast and similarity, that, the perfec- tion of the one being admitted, we are analogically led to presume the perfection of the other. In the propositions, the order of the terms remains unchanged : but the order of the propositions themselves is reversed ; the conclusion of the one syllogism form- ing the major premise of the other. Of the terms the major is common to both ; but (as noticed by Aristotle) the middle term of the one is the minor of the other. In the common minor pre- mise, the terms, though identical, have, with the different nature of the process, changed their relation in thought. In the Induc- tive, the parts being conceived as constituting the whole, are the determining notion ; whereas, in the Deductive, the parts being conceived as contained under the whole, are the deter- mined. But, in the second place, however apparently dissimilar in figure and proportion may be the two syllogisms on this partial standard, it will be found, if we ascend to a higher, that a com- mon general principle regulates a similar, nay, a one exclusive perfection in each. The perfection of figure in all syllogisms is this : — That the middle term should be the determined notion in the proposition, the determining notion in the assumption. — This condition is realized in the first figure of the Deductive syllogism. There the middle term is the subject (contained, determined no- tion) in the proposition or major premise ; and the predicate (con- taining, determining notion) in the minor premise or assumption. — In like manner, in our Inductive syllogism, the middle term is the subject (contained, determined notion) of the proposition, and the constituent (determining notion) of the assumption. Thus, not only are the Inductive and Deductive syllogisms, in a general sense, reversed processes; the perfect figure of the one is the exact evolution or involution of the perfect figure of the other. — The same analogy holds with their imperfections. Taking, for example, what logicians have in genera] given as the perfected figure, but which is, in fact, an unnatural perversion of tho Inductive syllogism, (/. e. its reduction to the first figure, by con- verting the terms of the minor premise,) we shall find, that its reversal into a Deductive Byllogism affords, as we should hive anticipated, only a kindred imperfection (in the third figun INDUCTIVE SYLLOGISM. 165 Inductive. Deductive. x, y, z are A ; B is A ; B is x, y, z ; B is x, y, z ; Therefore, B is A. Therefore, x, y, z are A. or or A contains x, y, z ; A contains B ; x, y, z contain B ; x, y, z contain B ; Therefore, A contains B. Therefore, A contains x, y, z. We call this reduction of the Inductive syllogism an unnatural perversion ; because, in the converted minor premise, the consti- tuent parts are perverted into a containing whole, and the con- taining whole into a subject, contained under its constituent parts. After these hints of what we deem the true nature of logical Induction, we return to Dr Whately ; whose account of this pro- cess is given principally in the two following passages. The first: — " Logic takes no cognisance of Induction, for instance, or of a priori reasoning, &c, as distinct forms of argument ; for when thrown into the syllogistic form, and when letters of the alphabet are substituted for the terms, (and it is thus that an argument is properly to be brought under the cognisance of logic,) there is no distinction between them : — e. g. a ' Property which belongs to the ox, sheep, deer, goat, and antelope, belongs to all horned animals ; rumination belongs to these ; therefore to all.' This, which is an inductive argument, is evidently a syllogism in Barbara. The essence of an inductive argument (and so of the other kinds which are dis- tinguished from it) consists not in the form of the argument, but in the rela- tion which the subject-matter of the premisses bears to that of the conclusion." (P. 110.) — The second: — "In the process of reasoning by which we deduce, from our observation of certain known cases, an inference with respect to unknown ones, we are employing a syllogism in Barbara with the major pre- miss suppressed ; that being always substantially the same, as it asserts, that, ' what belongs to the individual or individuals we have examined, belongs to the whole class under which they come.' " (P. 216.) This agrees, neither with the Aristotelic doctrine, nor with truth. We must presume, from his silence, that our author, in his analysis of the inductive process, was not aware of any essential deviation from the doctrine of Aristotle. This he does not seem to have studied, either in the Organon, or in any of its authentic expositors ; and nothing can be conceived more contradictory, than the statements of the philosopher on this subject and those of Dr Whately. — Aristotle views the Inductive and the Deductive syllo- gisms as, in certain respects, similar in form ; in others, as diame- trically opposed. Dr Whately regards them as formally identical, 166 ' LOGIC. and only discriminated by a material difference, i. e, logically con- sidered, by no difference at all. — Aristotle regards the Deductive syllogism as the analysis of a logical whole into its parts, — as a descent from the (more) general to the (more) particular ; the Inductive as a synthesis of logical parts into a logical whole, — as an ascent from the (more) particular to the (more) general. Dr Whately, on the other hand, virtually annihilates the latter pro- cess, and identifies the Inductive with the Deductive inference. — Aristotle makes Deduction necessarily dependent on Induction ; he maintains that the highest or most universal axioms which con- stitute the primary and immediate propositions of the former, are all conclusions previously furnished by the latter. Whately, on the contrary, implicitly asserts the independence of the syllogism proper, as he considers the conclusions of Induction to be only inferences evolved from a more universal major. — Aristotle recog- nises only a perfect Induction, i. e. an enumeration (actual or pre- sumed) of all the parts ; Whately only an imperfect, i. e. an enu- meration professedly only of some. — To Aristotle, Induction is a syllogism, apparently, of the third figure; to Whately, a syllogism of the first. — If Whately be right, Aristotle is fundamentally wrong ; wrong in admitting Inductive reasoning within the sphere of logic at all ; wrong in discriminating Induction from Syllogism proper ; wrong in all the particulars of the contrast. But that the Philosopher is not in error is evident at once ; whereas the Archbishop's doctrine is palpably suicidal. On that doctrine, the Inductive reasoning is " a syllogism in Barbara, the major premiss being always substantially the same : — What belongs to the individual or individuals we have examiru d f >>• longs to. the whole class under which they come." Now, we ask : — In what manner do we obtain this major % in tin 1 evolution of which all Induction consists ? Here there are only four possible answers. — 1°, This proposition, (like the dictum Induction itself is, ex hypothesi, developed. The fortune of this treatise, especially in its own * [ft never rains hut if pours. Collier's Clavis was subsequently reprint- ed, in a very handsome form, by a literary association in Edinburgh. Would that the books wanting reimpression, were first dealt with!] FATE OF THE CLAVIS UNIVERSALIS. 189 country, has been very different from its deserts. Though the negation of an external world had been incidentally advanced by Berkeley in his Principles of Hitman Knowledge some three years prior to the appearance of the Clavis Universalis, with which the publication of his Dialogues between Hylas and Philo- nous was simultaneous ; it is certain that Collier was not only wholly unacquainted with Berkeley's speculations, but had de- layed promulgating his opinion till after a ten years' meditation. Both philosophers are thus equally original. They are also nearly on a level in scientific talent ; for, comparing the treatise of Collier with the writings of Berkeley, we find it little inferior in metaphysical acuteness or force of reasoning, however deficient it may be in the graces of composition, and the variety of illustra- tion, by which the works of his more accomplished rival are dis- tinguished. But how disproportioned to their relative merits has been the reputation of the two philosophers ! While Berkeley's became a name memorable throughout Europe, that of Collier was utterly forgotten : — it appears in no British biography ; and is not found even on the list of local authors in the elaborate history of the county where he was born, and of the parish where he was hereditary Rector ! Indeed, but for the notice of the Clavis by Dr Reid (who appears to have stumbled on it in the College Library of Glasgow), it is probable that the name of Collier would have remained in his own country absolutely unknown — until, perhaps, our attention might have been called to his remarkable writings, by the consideration they had by accident obtained from the philosophers of other countries. In England the Clavis Uni- versalis was printed, but there it can hardly be said to have been published; for it there never attracted the slightest observa- tion ; and of the copies now known to be extant of the original edition, " numerus vix est totidem, quot Thebarum portce vel divitis ostia Niti." The public libraries of Oxford and Cambridge, as Mr Benson observes, do not possess a single copy. There are, however, two in Edinburgh ; and in Glasgow, as we have noticed, there is another. The only country in which the Clavis can truly be said to have been hitherto published is Germany. In the sixth supplemental volume of the Acta Eruditorum 190 IDEALISM. (1717) there is a copious and able abstract of its contents. Through this abridgement the speculations of Collier became known — particularly to the German philosophers; and we re- collect to have seen them quoted, among others, by Wolf and Bilfinger. In 1756 the work was, however, translated, without retrench- ment, into German, by Professor Eschenbach of Rostock, along with Berkeley's Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous. These two treatises constitute his " Collection of the most distinguished Writers who deny the reality of their own body and of the whole corporeal world," — treatises which he accompanied with " Coun- ter observations, and an Appendix, in which the existence of mat- ter is demonstrated : " These are of considerable value. [I have spoken of them, in Stewart's Dissertation, Note SS.] Speaking of Collier's treatise, the translator tells us : — " If any book ever cost me trouble to obtain it, the Clavis is that book. Every ex- ertion was fruitless. At length, an esteemed friend, Mr J. Selk, candidate of theology in Dantzic, sent me the work, after I had abandoned all hope of ever being able to procure it The preface is wanting in the copy thus obtained — a proof that it was rummaged, with difficulty, out of some old book magazine. It has not, therefore, been in my power to present it to the curi- ous reader, but I trust the loss may not be of any great import- ance." — In regard to the preface, Dr Eschenbach is, however, mistaken ; the original has none. By this translation, which has now itself become rare, the work was rendered fully accessible in Germany ; and the philosophers of that country did not fail to accord to its author the honour due to his metaphysical talent and originality. The best comparative view of the kindred doctrines of Collier and Berkeley is indeed given by Tennemann (xi. 399, sq.) ; whose meritorious History of Philosophy, we may observe, does justice to more than one English thinker, whose works, and even whose name, are in his own country as if they had never been ! Dr Reid's notice of the Clavis attracted the attention of Mr Dugald Stewart and of Dr Parr to the work; and to the nominal celebrity which, through them, its author has thus tardily attain- ed, even in Britain, are we indebted for Mr Benson's interesting Memohs of the Life and Writings of Arthur Collier : forming the second of the two publications prefixed to this article. What was COLLIER'S BIOGRAPHY. 191 his inducement and what his means for the execution of this task, the biographer thus informs us. vF tP vF IF t^F vfc Arthur Collier was born in 1680. He was the son of Arthur Collier, Rector of Langford-Magna, in the neighbourhood of Salis- bury — a living, the advowson of which had for about a century been in possession of the family, and of which his great-grand- father, grandfather, father, and himself, were successively incum- bents. With his younger brother, William, who was also destined for the Church, and who obtained an adjoining benefice, he re- ceived his earlier education in the grammar-school of Salisbury. In 1697 he was entered of Pembroke College, Oxford ; but in the following year, when his brother joined him at the University, they both became members of Balliol. His father having died in 1697, the family living was held by a substitute until 1704, when Arthur, having taken priest's orders, was inducted into the Rectory, on the presentation of his mother. In 1707 he married a niece of Sir Stephen Fox ; and died in 1732, leaving his wife, with two sons and two daughters, in embarrassed circumstances. Of the sons : — Arthur became a civilian of some note at the Com- mons ; and Charles rose in the army to the rank of Colonel. Of the daughters : — Jane was the clever authoress of The Art of In- geniously Tormenting ; and Mary obtained some celebrity from having accompanied Fielding, as his wife's friend, in the voyage which he made in quest of health to Lisbon. Collier's family is now believed to be extinct. Besides the Clavis Universalis (1713), The Specimen of True Philosophy (1730), and the Logology (1732), Collier was the author of two published Sermons on controversial points, which have not been recovered. Of his manuscript works the remains are still considerable, but it is probable that the greater propor- tion has perished. Our author was hardly less independent in his religious, than in his philosophical, speculations. In the latter he was an Idealist ; in the former, an Arian (like Clarke,) — an Apol- linarian, — and a High Churchman, on grounds which high church- men could not understand. Of Collier as a parish priest and a theologian, Mr Benson supplies us with much interesting informa- tion. But it is only as a metaphysician that we at present consider him ; and in this respect the Memoirs form a valuable supplement to the Clavis. Besides a series of letters in exposition of his phi- losophical system, they aiford us, what is even more important, 192 IDEALISM. an insight into the course of study by which Collier was led to his conclusion. With philosophical literature he does not appear to have been at all extensively conversant. His writings betray no intimate acquaintance with the works of the great thinkers of antiquity ; and the compends of the German Scheiblerus and of the Scottish Baronius, apparently supplied him with all that he knew of the Metaphysic of the Schools. Locke is never once alluded to. Descartes and Mallebranche, and his neighbour Mr Norris, were the philosophers whom he seems principally to have studied ; and their works, taken by themselves, were precisely those best adapted to conduct an untrammelled mind of originality and bold- ness to the result at which he actually arrived. Without entering on any general consideration of the doctrine of Idealism, or attempting a regular analysis of the argument of Collier, we hazard a few remarks on that theory, — simply with the view of calling attention to some of the peculiar merits of our author. Mankind in general believe that an external world exists, only because they believe that they immediately know it as existent. As they believe that they themselves exist because conscious of a self or ego ; so they believe that something different from them- selves exists, because they believe that they are also conscious of this not-self or non-ego. In the first place, then, it is self-evident, that the existence of the external world cannot be doubted, if we admit that we do, as we naturally believe we do, — know it immediately as existent. If the fact of the knoivledge be allowed, the fact of the existence can- not be gainsaid. The former involves the latter. But, in the second place, it is hardly less manifest, that if our natural belief in the knowledge of the existence of an external world be disallowed as false, that our natural belief in the exist- ence of such a world can no longer be founded on as true. Yet, marvellous to say, this has been very generally done. For reasons to which we cannot at present advert, it has been almost universally denied by philosophers, that in sensitive per- ception we are conscious of any external reality. On the contrary, they have maintained, with singular unanimity, that what we are immediately cognitive of in that act, is only an ideal object in the mind itself. In so far as they agree in holding this opinion, phi- losophers may be called Idealists in contrast to mankind in general. IDEALISM IN GENERAL. 193 and a few stray speculators who may be called Realists — Natural Realists. In regard to the relation or import of this ideal object, philoso- phers are divided ; and this division constitutes two great and opposing opinions in philosophy. On the one hand, the majority have maintained that the ideal object of which the mind is consci- ous, is vicarious or representative of a real object, unknown im- mediately, or as existing, and known only mediately through this its ideal substitute. These philosophers, thus holding the exist- ence of an external world — a world, however, unknown in itself, and therefore asserted only as an hypothesis, may be appropri- ately styled Cosmothetic Idealists — Hypothetical or Assumptive Realists. On the other hand, a minority maintain, that the ideal object has no external prototype ; and they accordingly deny the existence of any external world. These may be denominated the Absolute Idealists. Each of these great genera of Idealists is, however, divided and subdivided into various subordinate species. The Cosmothetic Idealists fall primarily into two classes, inas- much as some view the ideal or representative object to be a tertium quid different from the percipient mind as from the represented object ; while others regard it as only a modification of the mind itself, — as only the percipient act considered as repre- sentative of, or relative to, the supposed external reality. The former of these classes is again variously subdivided, according as theories may differ in regard to the nature and origin of the vicarious object ; as whether it be material or immaterial, — whe- ther it come from without or rise from within, — whether it ema- nate from the external reality or from a higher source, — whether it be infused by God or other hyperphysical intelligences, or whe- ther it be a representation in the Deity himself, — whether it be innate, or whether it be produced by the mind, on occasion of the presence of the material object within the sphere of sense, &c. &c. Of Absolute Idealism only two principal species are possible ; at least, only two have been actually manifested in the history of philosophy ; — the Theistic and the Egoistic. The former sup- poses that the Deity presents to the mind the appearances which we are determined to mistake for an external world ; the latter supposes that these appearances are manifested to consciousness, in conformity to certain unknown laws, by the mind itself. The N 194 IDEALISM. Theistic Idealism is again subdivided into three; according as God is supposed to exhibit the phenomena in question in his own substance, — to infuse into the percipient mind representative entities different from its own modification, — or to determine the ego itself to an illusive representation of the non-ego* Now it is easily shown, that if the doctrine of Natural Realism be abandoned, — if it be admitted, or proved, that we are deceived in our belief of an immediate knowledge of aught beyond the mind; then Absolute Idealism is a conclusion philosophically inevitable, the assumption of an external world being now an assumption which no necessity legitimates, and which is therefore philosophically inadmissible. On the law of parsimony it must be presumed null. It is, however, historically true, that Natural Realism had been long abandoned by philosophers for Cosmothetic Idealism, before the grounds on which this latter doctrine rests were shown to be unsound. These grounds are principally the following : — 1.) — In the first place, the natural belief in the existence of an external world was allowed to operate even when the natural belief of our immediate knowledge of such a world was argued to be false. It might be thought that philosophers, when they maintained that one original belief was illusive, would not con- tend that another was veracious, — still less that they would assume, as true, a belief which existed only as the result of a belief which they assumed to be false. But this they did. The Cosmothetic Idealists, all deny the validity of our natural belief in our knowledge of the existence of external things ; but we find the majority of them, at the same time, maintaining that such existence must be admitted on the authority of our natural belief of its reality. And yet, the latter belief exists only in and through the former ; and if the former be held false, it is, therefore, of all absurdities the greatest to view the latter as true. Thus Descartes, after arguing that mankind are universally deluded in their conviction that they have any immediate knowledge of aught beyond the modifications of their own minds ; again argues that the existence of an external world must be admitted. — because, if it do not exist, God deceives, in impressing on us a belief in its reality ; but God is no deceiver ; therefore, &c. This * [For a more detailed view of these distinctions, see Diss, on lleid, pp. 816 — 819 ; Compare also above, pp. Gl, $q.~\ IDEALISM IN GENERAL. 195 reasoning is either good for nothing, or good for more than Des- cartes intended. For, on the one hand, if God be no deceiver, he did not deceive us in our natural belief that we know some- thing more than the mere modes of self; but then the funda- mental position of the Cartesian philosophy is disproved: and if, on the other hand, this position be admitted, God is thereby confessed to be a deceiver, who, having deluded us in the belief on which our belief of an external world is founded, cannot be consistently supposed not to delude us in this belief itself. Such melancholy reasoning is, however, from Descartes to Dr Brown, the favourite logic by which the Cosmothetic Idealists in general attempt to resist the conclusion of the Absolute Idealists. But on this ground there is no tenable medium between Natural Real- ism and Absolute Idealism. It is curious to notice the different views, which Berkeley and Collier, our two Absolute Idealists, and which Dr Samuel Clarke, the acutest of the Hypothetical Realists with whom they both came in contact, took of this principle. Clarke was, apparently, too sagacious a metaphysician not to see that the proof of the reality of an external world reposed mainly on our natural belief of its reality ; and at the same time that this natural belief could not be pleaded in favour of his hypothesis by the Cosmothetic Idealist. He was himself conscious, that his philosophy afforded him no arms against the reasoning of the Absolute Idealist ; whose inference he was, however, inclined neither to admit, nor able to show why it should not. Whiston, in his Memoirs, speaking of Berkeley and his Idealism, says : — " He was pleased to send Dr Clarke and myself, each of us, a book. After we had both perused it, I went to Dr Clarke and discoursed with him about it to this effect : — That I, being not a metaphysician, was not able to answer Mr Berkeley's subtile premises, though I did not at all believe his absurd conclusion. I, therefore, desired that he, who was deep in such subtilities, but did not appear to believe Mr Berkeley's conclusions, would answer him ; which task he declined." Many years after this, as we are told in the Life of Bishop Berkeley, prefixed to his works : — " There was, at Mr Addison's instance, a meeting of Drs Clarke and Berkeley to discuss this speculative point ; and great hopes were entertained from the conference. The parties, however, separated without being able to come to any agreement. Dr Berkeley declared himself not well satisfied with the conduct of 196 IDEALISM. his antagonist on the occasion, who, though he could not answer, had not candour enough to own himself convinced." Mr Benson affords us a curious anecdote to the same effect in a letter of Collier to Clarke. From it we learn, — that when Collier originally presented his Clavis to the Doctor, through a friend, on reading the title, Clarke good-humourcdly said : — " Poor gentleman I I pity him. He would be a philosopher, but has chosen a strange task ; for he can neither prove his point himself, nor can the contrary be proved againt him." In regard to the two Idealists themselves, each dealt with this ground of argument in a very different way ; and it must be con- fessed that in this respect Collier is favourably contrasted with Berkeley. — Berkeley attempts to enlist the natural belief of man- kind in his favour against the Hypothetical Realism of the phi- losophers. It is true, that natural belief is opposed to scien- tific opinion. Mankind are not, however, as Berkeley reports, Idealists. In this he even contradicts himself ; for, if they be, in truth, of his opinion, why does he dispute so anxiously, so learn- edly against them ? — Collier, on the contrary, consistently rejects all appeal to the common sense of mankind. The motto of his work, from Mallebranche, is the watchword of his philosophy : — " Vulgi assensus et approbatio circa materiam difficilem, est cer- tum argumentum falsitatis istius opinionis cut assentitur. ,> And in his answer to the Cartesian argument for the reality of matter, from " that strong and natural inclination which all men have to believe in an external world ; " he shrewdly remarks on the in- consistency of such a reasoning at such hands: — " Strange! That a person of Mr Descartes' sagacity should be found in so plain and palpable an oversight ; and that the late ingenious Mr JNorris should be found treading in the same track, and that too upon a solemn and particular disquisition of this matter. That whilst, on the one hand, they contend against the common in- clination or prejudice of mankind, that the visible world is not external, they should yet appeal to this same common inclination for the truth or being of an external world, which on their prin- ciples must be said to be invisible ; and for which therefore (they must needs have known if they had considered it), there neither is, nor can be, any kind of inclination." (P. 81.) 2.) — In the second place, it was very generally assumed in antiquity, and during the middle ages, that an external world was a supposition necessary to render possible the fact of our IDEALISM, WHY SO LATE ? 197 sensitive cognition. The philosophers who held, that the imme- diate object of perception was an emanation from an outer reality, and that the hypothesis of the latter was requisite to account for the phenomenon of the former, — their theory involved the exist- ence of an external world as its condition. But from the moment that the necessity of this condition was abandoned, and this was done by many even of the scholastic philosophers ;- — from the moment that sensible species or the vicarious objects in percep- tion were admitted to be derivable from other sources than the external objects themselves, as from God, or from the mind itself : from that moment we must look for other reasons than the preceding, to account for the remarkable fact, that it was not until after the commencement of the eighteenth century that a doctrine of Absolute Idealism was, without communication, con- temporaneously promulgated by Berkeley and Collier. 3.) — In explanation of this fact, we must refer to a third ground, which has been wholly overlooked by the historians of philosophy ; but which it is necessary to take into account, would we explain how so obvious a conclusion as the negation of the existence of an outer world, on the negation of our immediate knowledge of its existence, should not have been drawn by so acute a race of speculators as the philosophers of the middle ages, to say nothing of the great philosophers of a more recent epoch. This ground is : — That the doctrine of Idealism is incom- patible with the Catholic doctrine of the Eucharist. It is a very erroneous statement of Reid, in which, however, he errs only in common with other philosophers, that " during the reign of the Peripatetic doctrine, we find no appearance of scepticism about the existence wf matter." On the contrary, during the dominance of the scholastic philosophy, we find that the possibility of the non-existence of matter was contemplated ; nay, that the reasons in support of this supposition were expounded in all their cogency. We do not, however, find the conclusion founded on these reasons formally professed. And why ? Because this conclusion, though philosophically proved, was theologically disproved ; and such disproof was during the middle ages sufficient to prevent the overt recognition of any speculative doctrine ; for with all its ingenuity and boldness, philosophy during these ages was con- fessedly in the service of the church, — it was always Philosphia ancillans Theologice. And this because the service was volun- tary ; — a thraldom indeed of love. Now, if the reality of matter 198 IDEALISM. were denied, there would, in general, be denied the reality of Christ's incarnation ; and in particular the transubstantiation into his body of the elements of bread and wine. There were other theological reasons indeed, and these not without their weight ; but this was, perhaps, the only one insuperable to a Catholic. We find the influence of this reason at work in very ancient times. It was employed by the earlier Fathers, and more espe- cially in opposition to Marcion's doctrine of the merely phenome- nal incarnation of our Saviour. — " Non licet " (says Tertidlian in his book De Anima, speaking of the evidence of sense — " non licet nobis in dubium sensus istus revocare, ne et in Christo de fide eorum deliberetur : ne forte dicatur, quod falso Satanam pro- spectant de cselo prascipitatum ; aut falso vocem Patris audierit de ipso testificatam ; aut deceptus sit cum Petri socrum tetegit. Sic et Marcion phantasma eum maluit credere, totius corporis in illo dedignatus veritatem." (Cap. xvii.) And in his book, Adversus Marcionem : — " Ideo Christus non erat quod videbatur, et quod erat mentiebatur ; caro, nee caro ; homo, nee homo : proinde Deus Christus, nee Deus ; cur enim non etiam Dei phantasma portaverit ? An credam ei de interiore substantia, qui sit de exteriore frustratus ? Quomodo verax habebitur in occulto, tarn fallax repertus in aperto ? . . , Jam nunc quum men- dacium deprehenditur Christus caro ; sequitur ut omnia quae per carnem Christi gesta sunt, mendacio gesta sint, — congressus, con- tactus, convictus, ipsae quoque virtutes. Si enim tangendo aliquem, liberavit a vitio, non potest vere actum credi, sine corporis. ipsius veritate. Nihil solidum ab inani, nihil plenum a vacuo perfici licet. Putativus habitus, putativus actus ; imaginarius operator, imaginariae operae." (Lib. hi. c. 8.) — In like manner, St Angus- tin, among many other passages : — " Si phantasma fuit corpus Christi, fefellit Christus ; et si fefellit, Veritas non est. Est autem Veritas Christus ; non igitur phantasma fuit corpus ejus." (Liber De Ixxxiii. Quo3Stionibus, qu. 14.) — And so many others. The repugnancy of the Catholic dogma of transubstantiation with the surrender of a substantial prototype of the species pre- sented to our sensible perceptions, was, however, more fully and precisely signalised by the Schoolmen ; as may be seen in the polemic waged principally on the great arena of scholastic subti- lity — the commentaries on the four books of the Sentences of Peter Lombard. In their commentaries on the first book, especi- ally, will be found abundant speculation of an idealistic tendency. CATHOLICISM INCONSISTENT WITH IDEALISM. 199 The question is almost regularly mooted : — May not God pre- serve the species (the ideas of a more modern philosophy) before the mind, the external ideality represented being destroyed ? — May not God, in fact, object to the sense the species representing an ex- ternal world, that world, in reality, not existing ? To these ques- tions the answer is, always in the first instance, affirmative. Why then, the possibility, the probability even, being admitted, was the fact denied Philosophically orthodox, it was theologically heretical; and their principal argument for the rejection is, that on such hypothesis, the doctrine of a transubstantiated eucha- rist becomes untenable. A change is not, — cannot be, — (spiritu- ally) real. Such was the special reason, why many of the acuter School- men did not follow out their general argument, to the express negation of matter ; and such also was the only reason, to say nothing of other Cartesians, why Mallebranche deformed the simplicity of his peculiar theory with such an assumptive hors d'oeuvre, as an unknown and otiose universe of matter. It is, indeed, but justice to that great philosopher to say, — that if the incumbrance with which, as a Catholic, he was obliged to burden it, be thrown off his theory, that theory becomes one of Absolute Idealism ; and that, in fact, all the principal arguments in sup- port of such a scheme are found fully developed in his immortal Inquiry after Truth. This Mallebranche well knew ; and know- ing it, we can easily understand, how Berkeley's interview with him ended as it did.* Mallebranche thus left little for his Protestant successors to do. They had only to omit the Catholic excrescence ; the reasons vin- dicating this omission they found collected and marshalled to their * [I cannot, however, concur in the praise of novelty and invention, which has always been conceded to the central theory of Mallebranche. His " Vision of all things in the Deity" is, as it appears to me, simply a transfer- ence to man in the flesh, to the Viator, of that mode of cognition, maintained jby many of the older Catholic divines, in explanation of how the Saints, as disembodied spirits, can be aware of human invocations, and, in general, of what passes upon earth. " They perceive" it is said, " all things in God" So that, in truth, the philosophical theory of Mallebranche, is nothing but the extension of a theological hypothesis, long common in the schools ; and with scholastic speculations, Mallebranche was even intimately acquainted. — This hypothesis I had once occasion to express : — " Quidquid, in his tenebris vitce, came latebat, Nunc legis in magno cuncta, heate, Deo."~\ 200 IDEALISM. hand. That Idealism was the legitimate issue of the Malle- branchian doctrine, was at once seen by those competent to meta- physical reasoning. This was signalised, in general, by Bayle, and, what has not been hitherto noticed, by Locke.* It was, * Compare Locke's Examination of P. Malebranclie 1 s Opinion, (§ 20.) When on this subject, we may clear np a point connected therewith, of some interest, in relation to Locke and Newton, and which has engaged the attention of Dr Reid and Mr Dugald Stewart. Reid, who has overlooked the passage of Locke just referred to, says, in deducing the history of the Berkeleian Idealism, and after speaking of Malle- branche's opinion : — " It may seem strange that Locke, who wrote so much about ideas, should not see those consequences which Berkeley thought so obviously deducible from that doctrine There is, indeed, a single passage in Locke's essay, which may lead one to conjecture that he had a glimpse of that system which Berkeley afterwards advanced, but thought proper to suppress it within his own breast. The passage is in Book IV., c. 10, where, having proved the existence of an eternal, intelligent mind, he comes to answer those who conceive that matter also must be eternal, because we cannot conceive how it could be made out of nothing; and, having observed that the creation of mind requires no less power than the creation of matter, he adds what follows : — c Nay, possibly, if we could emancipate ourselves from vulgar notions, and raise our thoughts, as far as they would reach, to a closer contemplation of things, we might be able to aim at some dim and seeming conception, how matter might at first be made and begin to exist, by the power of that eternal first Being ; but to give beginning and being to a spirit, would be found a more inconceivable effect of omnipotent power. But this being what would, perhaps, lead us too far from the notions on which the philosophy now in the world is built, it would not be pardonable to deviate so far from them, or to inquire, so far as gram- mar itself would authorise, if the common settled opinion oppose it ; espe- cially in this place, where the received doctrine serves well enough to our present purpose.' " Reid then goes on at considerable length to show, that " every particular Mr Locke has hinted with regard to that system which he had in his mind, but thought it prudent to suppress, tallies exactly with the system of Berkeley." {Intellectual Powers, Ess. II. ch. 10.) Stewart does not coincide with Reid. In quoting the same passage of Locke, he says of it, that u when considered in connection with some others in his writings, it would almost tempt one to think, that a theory concerning matter, somewhat analogous to that of Boscovich, had occasionally passed through his mind ; " and then adduces various reasons in support of this opi- nion, and in opposition to Reid's. (Philosophical Essays, Ess. II. ch. 1, p. G3.) The whole arcanum in the passage in question is, however, revealed by M. ( 'oste, the French translator of the Essay, and of several other of the works of Locke, with whom the philosopher Heed in the same family, and on the most intimate term*, for the last seven years of his life ; and who, though he has never been consulted, affords Often the most important information in COLLIER'S IDEALISM. 201 therefore, but little creditable to the acuteness of Norris, that he, a Protestant, should have adopted the Mallebranchian hypothesis, without rejecting its Catholic incumbrance. The honour of first promulgating an articulate scheme of absolute idealism was thus left to Berkeley and Collier ; and though both are indebted to Mallebranche for the principal arguments they adduce, each is also entitled to the credit of having applied them with an inge- nuity peculiar to himself. It is likewise to the credit of Collier's sagacity that he has noticed (and he is the only modern philosopher, we have found, to have anticipated our observation,) the incompatibility of the Catholic doctrine of the Eucharist with the non-existence of mat- ter. In the concluding chapter of his work, in which he speaks " of the use and consequences of the foregoing treatise," he enu- merates as one " particular usefulness with respect to religion," regard to Locke's opinions. To this passage, there is in the fourth edition of Coste's translation, a very curious note appended, of which the following is an abstract. " Here Mr Locke excites our curiosity without being inclined to satisfy it. Many persons having imagined that he had communicated to me this mode of explaining the creation of matter, requested, when my transla- tion first appeared, that I would inform them what it was ; but I was obliged to confess, that Mr Locke had not made even me a partner in the secret. At length, long after his death, Sir Isaac Newton, to whom I was accidentally speaking of this part of Mr Locke's book, discovered to me the whole mystery. He told me, smiling, that it was he himself who had imagined this manner of explaining the creation of matter, and that the thought had struck him, one day, when this question chanced to turn up in a conversa- tion between himself, Mr Locke, and the late Earl of Pembroke. The fol- lowing is the way in which he explained to them his thought : — ' We may be enabled' 1 (he said) 4 to form some rude conception of the creation of matter, if we suppose that God by his power had prevented the entrance of any thing into a certain portion of pure space, which is of its nature penetrable, eternal, necessary, infinite ; for henceforward this portion of space would be endowed with impenetrability, one of the essential qualities of matter : and as pure space is absolutely uniform, we have only again to suppose that God communi- cated the same impenetrability to another portion of space, and we should then obtain in a certain sort the notion of the mobility of matter, another quality which is also very essential to itS Thus, then, we are relieved of the embar- rassment of endeavouring to discover what it was that Mr Locke had deemed it advisable to conceal from his readers : for the above is all that gave him occasion to tell us, — ' if we would raise our thoughts as far as they could reach, we might be able to aim at some dim and seeming conception how mat- ter might at first be made,' " &c. — This suffices to show what was the general purport of Locke's expressions, and that Mr Stewart's conjecture is at least nearer to the truth than Dr Reid's. 202 IDEALISM. the refutation it affords of " the real presence of Christ's body in the Eucharist, in which the Papists have grafted the doctrine of transubstantiation." He says : — u Now nothing can be more evident, than that both the sound and ex- plication of this important doctrine are founded altogether on the supposition of external matter ; so that, if this be removed, there is not any thing left whereon to build so much as the appearance of a question. — For if, after this, it be inquired whether the substance of the bread, in this sacrament, be not changed into the substance of the body of Christ, the accidents or sensible ap- pearances remaining as before ; or suppose this should be affirmed to be the fact, or at least possible, it may indeed be shown to be untrue or impossible, on the supposition of an external world, from certain consequential absurdi- ties which attend it ; but to remove an external world, is to prick it in its punctum saliens, or quench its very vital flame. For if there is no external matter, the very distinction is lost between the substance and accidents, or sensible species of bodies, and these last will become the sole essence of ma- terial objects. So that, if these are supposed to remain as before, there is no possible room for the supposal of any change, in that the thing supposed to be changed, is here shown to be nothing at all." (P. 95.) But we must conclude. — What has now been said, in reference to a part of its contents, may perhaps contribute to attract the attention, of those interested in the higher philosophy, to this very curious volume. We need hardly add, that Mr Benson's Memoirs of Collier should be bound up along with it. LITERATURE. I.-EPISTOLJE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM; THE NATIONAL SATIRE OF GERMANY.* (March, 1831.) Epistolce Obscurorum Virorum, aliaque aevi decimi sexti rnoni- menta rarissima. — Die Brief % der Finsterlinge an Magister Ortuinus von Deventer, nebst andern sehr seltenen Beytraegen zur Litter atur-Sitten-und Kirchengeschichte des Sechszehnter Jahrhunderts. Herausgegeben und erlaeutert (lurch Dr Ernst Muench. 8vo. Leipzig : 1827. With the purest identity of origin, the Germans have shown always the weakest sentiment of nationality. Descended from the same ancestors, speaking a common language, unconquered by a foreign enemy, and once the subjects of a general govern- ment, they are the only people in Europe who have passively allowed their national unity to be broken down, and submitted, like cattle, to be parcelled and reparcelled into flocks, as suited the convenience of their shepherds. The same unpatriotic apathy is betrayed in their literary as in their political existence. In other countries taste is perhaps too exclusively national ; in Germany it is certainly too cosmopolite. Teutonic admiration seems, * [Translated into German by Dr Vogler, in the Altes undNeues of 1832 ; after being largely extracted in various other literary journals of the Empire. I am aware of no attempt to gainsay the proof of authorship here detailed ; or, in general, the justice of the criticism. — A considerable number of addi- tions have been inserted in this article ; but these, as they affect no personal interest, it has not been thought necessary often to distinguish.] 204 EPISTOL^ OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. indeed, to be essentially centrifugal ; and literary partialities have in the Empire inclined always in favour of the foreign. The Germans were long familiar with the literature of every other nation, before they thought of cultivating, or rather creat- ing, a literature of their own ; and when this was at last attempted, fai/pee, rcov octtoutcov was still the principle that governed in the experiment. It was essayed, by a process of foreign infusion, to elaborate the German tongue into a vehicle of pleasing commu- nication ; nor were they contented to reverse the operation, until the project had been stultified by its issue, and the purest and only all-sufficient of the modern languages degraded into a Baby- lonish jargon, without a parallel in the whole history of speech. A counterpart to this overweening admiration of the strange and distant, is the discreditable indifference manifested by the Germans to the noblest monuments of native genius. To their eternal disgrace, the works of Leibnitz were left to be collected by a Frenchman ; while the care denied by his countrymen to the great representative of German universality, was lavished, with an eccentric affection, on the not more important specula- tions of Giordano Bruno, Spinoza, and Cudworth. But no neglect, even by their own confession, has weighed so long or so heavily against the Germans, as the want of a collective edition of the works of their great national patriot, Ulrich von Hutten, and of a critical and explanatory edition of their great national satire, the EpisTOLiE Obscurorum Vtrorum. This reproach has, in part, been recently removed. Dr Muench has accomplished the one, and attempted the other; we wish we could say, — accom- plished well, or attempted successfully. We speak at present only of the latter ; and, as an essay towards (what is still want- ing) an explanatory introduction, shall premise a rapid outline of the circumstances which occasioned this celebrated satire, — a satire which, though European in its influence, has yet, as Herder justly observes, " effected for Germany incomparably more, than Hudibras for England, or Garagantua for France, or the Knight of La Mancha for Spain." It gave the victory to Reach* lin over the Begging Friars, and to Luther over the Court of Rome. The Italians excepted, no people took so active a part in the revival of ancient literature as the Germans; yet in no country did the champions of the new intelligence obtain loss adventitious aid in their exertions, or encounter so formidable a resistance RISE OF HUMANE STUDIES IN GERMANY. 205 from the defenders of the ancient barbarism. Germany did not, like Italy and France, allure the learned fugitives from Con- stantinople, to transplant into her seminaries the language and literature of Greece ; and though learning was not here deprived of all liberal encouragement, still the princes and nobles of the Empire did not, as the great Italian families, emulate each other, in a munificent patronage of letters. But what in Germany prin- cipally contributed to impede the literary reformation, was the opposition which it met with in the great literary corporations themselves. In the other countries of Europe, especially in France and England, the first sparks of the rekindled light had been fostered in the universities ; * these were in fact the centres from whence the new illumination was diffused. In Germany, on the contrary, the academic walls contained the most resolute enemies of reform, and in the universities were found the last strongholds of an effete, but intolerant scholasticism. Some, indeed, of the restorers of polite letters, taught as salaried or extraordinary instructors, (professores conducti,) in the universi- ties of Germany ; but their influence was personal, and the tole- ration which they obtained, precarious. Dependent always on the capricious patronage of the Prince, they were viewed as intruders by those bodies who constituted and governed these institutions. From them they encountered, not only discourage- ment, but oppression ; and the biography of the first scholars who attempted, by public instruction, to disseminate a taste for classical literature in the great schools of Germany, exhibits little else than a melancholy series of wanderings and persecutions, — abandoning one university only, in general, to be ejected from another. The restoration of classical literature, (and classical literature involved literature in general,) was in Germany almost wholly accomplished by individual zeal, aided, principally, by one pri- vate institution. This institution was the conventual seminary of St Agnes, near Zwoll, in Westphalia, founded by the pious Thomas a Kempis ; from whence, immediately or mediately, issued nearly the whole band of those illustrious scholars who, iii defiance of every opposing circumstance, succeeded in rapidly * No thanks, however, to the Universities. They, of course, resisted the innovation. A king and a minister, Francis and Wolsey, determined the difference ; but for them, Budaeus and Colet might have been persecuted like "Buschius and Reuehlin. 206 EPISTOLiE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. elevating Germany to a higher European rank in letters, than (rebarbarised by polemical theology and religious wars,) she was again able to reach for almost three centuries thereafter. Six schoolfellows and friends, — Count Maurice von Spiegelberg, Rodolph von Lange (Langius), Alexander Hegius, Lewis Drin- genberg, Antonius Liber, and Rodolphus Agricola, — all trained in the discipline of a Kempis, became, towards the end of the fifteenth century, the apostles of this reform in literature and education ; and this mainly by their exertions with those of their disciples, was, in a few years, happily accomplished throughout the empire. The two first, (we neglect chronology), noblemen of rank and dignitaries in the church, co-operated to this end, by their liberal patronage of other scholars, and more especially by the founda- tion of improved schools ; the four last, by their skill and industry as practical teachers, and by the influence of their writings.* After their return from Italy, where they had studied under Trapezuntius and Gaza, and enjoyed the friendship of Philelphus, Laurentius Valla, and Leonardus Aretinus, Von Lange was nomi- nated Dean of Munster, and Count Spiegelberg, Provost of Em- merich. — Through the influence of the former, himself a Latin poet of no inconsiderable talent, the decayed school of Munster was revived ; supplied with able masters, among whom Camenerius, Csesarius, and Murmellius, were distinguished; and, in spite of every opposition from the predicant friars and university of Cologne, the barbarous schoolbooks were superseded, and the heathen classics studied, as in the schools of Italy and France. From this seminary, soon after its establishment, proceeded Petrus * An account of the Fratres Hieronymici would be an interesting piece of literary history. The scattered notices to be found of this association are meagre and incorrect. We may observe, that the celebrated Frieslander, John Wessel of Gansfurt, an alumnus also of the College of St Agnes, pre- ceded the six confederates, enumerated in the text, as a restorer of letters in Germany. Before Reuchlin, (whom he initiated in Hebrew,) he conjoined a knowledge of the three learned languages ; these, which he had cultivated in Greece, Italy, and France, he taught, at least privately, on his return to Germauy, in the universities of Cologne, Heidelberg, and Basle. His eru- dition, his scholastic subtlety, with his contempt for scholastic authority, obtained for him the title of Lux Mundi and Maguster Contradictionum. In religious opinions, he was the forerunner of Luther. He is not to be con- founded (as has been done) with the famous preacher, Joannes, variously called Wesalius, de ]Yessalia, and even Wesselus, accused by the Dominicans of suspicious intercourse with the Jews, and, through their influence, unjustly eondemned for heresy in 1479, by the Archbishop of Mentz. RISE OF HUMANE STUDIES IN GERMANY. 207 Nehemius, Josephus Horlenius, (the master of Mosellanus,) Ludolphus Heringius, Alexander Moppensis, Tilemannus Mollerus, (the master of Rivius,) &c, who. as able schoolmasters, propagated the improvement in education and letters throughout the north of Germany. A similar reform was effected by Count Spiegelberg in the school of Emmerich. Hegius, a man of competent learning, but of unrivalled talents as a practical instructor, became rector of the school of Daventer ; and he can boast of having turned out from his tuition a greater number of more illustrious scholars than any pedagogue of modern times. Among his pupils were, Desiderius Erasmus, Hermannus Buschius, Joannes Csesarius, Joannes Murmellius, Joannes Glan- dorpius, Conradus Mutianus, Hermannus Torrentinus, Bartho- lomaeus Coloniensis, Conradus Goclenius, the Aedicollii, Joannes and Serratius, Jacobus Montanus, Joannes Peringius, Timannus Camenerius, Gerardus Lystrius, Matthaeus Frissemius, Ludolphus Geringius, &c. Nor must Ortuinus Gratius be forgotten. Dringenberg transplanted the discipline of Zwoll to Schlecht- stadt in Alsace ; and he effected for the south of Germany what his colleagues accomplished for the north. Among his pupils, who almost rivalled in numbers and celebrity those of Hegius, were Conradus Celtes, Jacobus Wimphelingius, Beatus Rhenanus, Joannes Sapidus, Bilibald Pirkheimer, John von Dalberg, Fran- ciscus Stadianus, George Simler, (the master of Melanchthon,) and Henricus Bebelius, (the master of Brassicanus and Heinrich- niann.) Liber taught successfully at Kempten and Amsterdam ; and, when driven from these cities by the partisans of the ancient barbarism, he finally established himself at Alcmar. The most celebrated of his pupils were Pope Hadrian VI. , Nicolaus Clenardus, Alardus of Amsterdam, Cornelius Crocus, and Christophorus Longolius. The genius of Agricola displayed the rarest union of originality, elegance, and erudition. After extorting the reluctant admiration of the fastidious scholars of Italy, he returned to Germany, where his writings, exhortation, and example, powerfully contributed to promote the literary reformation. It was only, however, in the latter years of his short life, that he was persuaded by his friend, Von Dalberg, Bishop of Worms, to lecture publicly (though declining the status of Professor) on the Greek and Roman authors ; and he delivered, with great applause, a few courses,, 208 EPISTOLJE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. alternately at Heidelberg and Worms. Celtes and Buschius were among his auditors. There is no hyperbole in his epitaph by a great Italian : — " Scilicet hoc uno meruit Geraiania, laudis Quicquid habet Latiurn, Graecia quicquid habet." The first restorers of ancient learning in Germany were thus almost exclusively pupils of a Kempis or of his disciples. There was, however, one memorable exception in John Reuchlin (Joan- nes Capnio), who was not, as his biographers erroneously assert, a scholar of Dringenberg at Schlechtstadt.* Of him we are again to speak. We have been thus particular, in order to show that the awa- kened enthusiasm for classical studies did not in Germany origin- ate in the Universities ; and it was only after a strenuous opposition from these bodies that ancient literature at last conquered its re- cognition as an element of academical instruction. At the period of which we treat, the prelections and disputations, the examina- tions and honours, of the different faculties, required only an ac- quaintance with the barbarous Latinity of the middle ages. The new philology was thus not only a hors d'ceuvre in the academical system, or, as the Leipsic Masters expressed it, a " fifth wheel in the waggon ;" it was abominated as a novelty, that threw the an- cient learning into discredit, diverted the studious from the Uni- versities, emptied the schools of the Magistri, and the bursas or colleges over which they presided, and rendered contemptible the once honoured distinction of a degree, j * His connexion with Zwoll and the Brethren of St Jerome may, however, be established through John Wessel, from whom he learned the elements of Hebrew. f " Attamen intellcxi," writes Magister Unkenbunck to Magister Gratius. 44 quod habetis paucos auditores, et est querela vestra, quod Buschius et Ca 1 - sarius trahunt vobis scholares et supposita abinde, cum tamen ipsi non sciunt ita exponere Poetas allegories, sicut vos, et superallegare sacrain scripturam. Credo quod diabolus est in illis Poe'tis. Ipsi destruunt omnes Universitates, et audivi ab uno antiquo Magistro Lipsensi, qui fait Magister 36. aunorum, et dixit mihi, quando ipse fuisset invenis, tunc ilia Universitas bene stetis- set: quia in vigiuti milliaribus nullus Poeta fuisset. Et dixit etiam, quod tunc supposita diligenter compleverunt lectiones suas formales et materiales, seu bursales : et fuit magnum scandalum, quod aliquis studens iret in platen, et non haberct Petrum Hispanum, aut Parva Logicalia sub brachio. Et si fuerunt Grammatici, tunc portabant Partes Alexandri, vel Vade Mecum, vel Exercitium Puerorum, aut Opus Minus, aut Dicta loan. Sinthen. Et in OPPOSITION TO HUMANE STUDIES. 209 In possession of power, it is not to be supposed that the patrons of scholasticism would tamely allow themselves to be stripped of reputation and influence ; and it did not require the ridicule with which the " Humanists," or " Poets" as they were styled, now assailed them, to exasperate their spirit of persecution. Greek in particular, and polite letters in general, were branded as hereti- cal ; * and, while the academical youth hailed the first lecturers on ancient literature in the Universities, as " messengers from Heaven," f the academical veterans persecuted these intruders scliolis advertebant diligenter, et habuerunt in honore Magistros Artium, et quando viderunt uimni Magistrum, tunc fuerunt perterriti, quasi viderent unum Diabolum. Et dicit etiam, quod pro tunc, quater in anno promo ve- bantur Bacculaurii, et semper pro una vice sunt sexaginta aut quinquaginta. Et illo tempore Universitas ilia fuit multum in flore, et quando unus stetit per annum cum dimidio, fuit promotus in Bacculaurium, et per tres annos aut duos cum dimidio, in Magistrum. Et sic parentes eorum fuerunt con- tenti, et libenter exposuerunt pecunias ; quia videbant, quod filii sui vene- runt ad honores. Sed nunc supposita volunt audire Virgilium et Plinium, et alios novos autores, et licet audiunt per quinque annos, tamen non pro- moventur. Et dixit ruihi amplius talis Magister, quod tempore suo fuerunt duo millia studentes in Lyptzick, et Erfordise totidem. Et Viennse quatuor millia, et Colonise etiam tot, et sic de aliis. Nunc autem in omnibus Uni- versitatibus non sunt tot supposita, sicut tunc in una, aut duabus. Et Ma- gistri Lipseuses nunc valde conqueruntur de paucitate suppositorum, quia Poe'tae faciunt eis damnum. Et quando parentes mittunt filios suos in bur- sas, et collegia, non volunt ibi manere, sed vadunt ad Poetas, et student nequitias. Et dixit mihi, quod ipse Liptzick olim habuit quadraginta domi- cellos, et quando ivit in ecclesiam, vel ad forum, vel spaciatum in rubetum, tunc iverunt post eum. Et fuit tunc niagnus excessus, studere in Poetria. Et quando unus confitebatur in confessione, quod occulte audivit Virgilium ab uno Bacculaurio, tunc Sacerdos imponebat ei magnaui poBiiitentiam, vide- licet, jejunare singulis sextis feriis vel orare quotidie septem Psalmos poeni- tentiales. Et juravit mibi in conscientia sua, quod vidit, quod unus magis- trandus fuit rejectus, quia unus de examinatoribus semel in die festo vidit ipsum legere in Terentio. Utinam adhuc staret ita in Universitatibus !" ets. (Epist. Obs. Vir. — Vol. II. ep. 46. See also among others, Vol. II. ep. 58 and 63. We quote these epistles by number, though this be marked in none of the editions. * " Haeresis," says Erasmus, speaking of these worthies, — " haeresis est polite loqui, haeresis Graace scire ; quicquid ipsinon intelligunt, quicquid ipsi non faciunt, haeresis est. In unum Capnionem clamatur, quia linguas cal- let." (Opera III. c. 517. ed. Clerici.) See also Peutinger, in Epist ad Reuchl. (sig. A ii.) Iiutten, Prcef. Neminis. t " Omnino fervebat opus," says Cruciger, " et deserebantur tractationes prioris doctrinal atque futilis, et nitor elegantiaque disciplinae politioris ex- petebantur. Tunc Lipsiam Ricardus Crocus, Britannus, qui in Gallia O 210 EPISTOLiE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. as " preachers of perversion," and " winnowers of the devil's chaff * Conradus Celtes, Hermannus Buschius, and Joannes Rhagius Aesticampianus, were successively expelled from Leipsic ;f other universities emulated the example. The great University of Cologne stood, however, " proudly eminent " in its hostility to the new intelligence ; for improvement was there opposed by the united influence of the Monks and Masters. When Von Lange commenced his reformation of the school of Munster, a vehement auditor fuerat Hieronymi Alexandri [Aleandri], venit, anno Chr. MDXV [MDXIV], professusque doctrinam Graecarum litteraruin, omnium amorem favoremque statim est maximum consecutus : quod hujus linguae non prim- ordia, ut aliqui ante ipsnm, sed integram atque plenam scientiam illius afferre, et posse hanc totam explicare, docereque videretur. Negabat meus pater, credibile nunc esse id, quod ipse tunc cognoverit. Tanquam ccelitus demissum] Crocum omnes veneratos esse aiebat, unumquemque se felicem judicasse, si in familiaritatem ipsius insinuaretur : docenti vero et mercedem, quae postularetur, persolvere ; et quocumque loco temporeque prsesto esse, recusavisse neminem ; si coneubia nocte se conveniri, si quamvis longe extra oppidumjussisset, omnes libenterobsecutifuissent." (Loc. Comm.) (Among the Declamations of Melanckthon, see Oratio de Initiis, &c. and Oratio de Vita Trocedorfii ; see also Camerarius, (the pupil of Croke,) in the Preface to his Herodotus, and in his Life of Melanchthon.) Dr Croke (afterwards an agent of Henry VIH. in the affair of the divorce, and Public Orator of Cambridge) was the first Professor of Greek in Leipsic, and the first author of a grammar of that language, published in Germany. He founded that school which, under his successor, Sir Godfrey Hermann, is now the chief fountain of Hellenic literature in Europe. His life ought to be written. Sir Alexander Croke, in his late splendid history of the family, has collected some circumstances concerning this distinguished scholar ; but a great deal of interesting information still remains ungathered, among his own and the writings of his contemporaries. We could fill a page with mere references. * Buschii VallumHumanitatis, ed. Burckhardi, p. 15. In Leipsic, humane letters were styled by the theologians, Dcemonum cibus, Dcemonum opsonhon, Aegyptiae ollae, virulentae Aegyptiorum dopes. (Panegyricum Lipsiensis Thcologi. — Praef. Lipsiae, 1514.) f We have before us an oration of Aesticampianus, delivered in 1511, on his departure from Leipsic, after the public schools had been closed against him by the faculty of arts. We extract one passage — " Quern enim poet- arum eloquentium non sunt persecuti patres vestri, et quern vos ludibrio non habuistis, qui ad vos expoliendos, quasi ccelitus sunt de?nissi? Nam, ut e multis paucos refcram, Conradum Celten pene hostilitcr expulistis ; Herman- num Buschium diu ac multum vexatum cjecistis ; Joannem quoque Aesticam- pianum variis machinis oppugnatum, tandem evert itis. Quia tandem Poet- arum ad vos veniet? Nemo, hercle, nemo. Inculti ergo jejunique vivetis, foedi animis et inglorii, qui, nisi pcenitentiam egeritis, damnati omnes immo- riemini" PERSECUTION OF THE HUMANISTS AND OF REUCHLIN. 211 remonstrance was transmitted from the faculties of Cologne to the bishop and chapter of that see, reprobating the projected change in the schoolbooks hitherto in use, and remonstrating against the introduction of pagan authors into the course of juve- nile instruction. Foiled in this attempt, the obscurants of that venerable seminary resisted only the more strenuously every effort at a reform within Cologne itself. They oppressed and relegated, one after another, Bartholomaeus Coloniensis, the two Aedicollii (Joannes and Serratius), Joannes Murmellius, Joannes Caesarius, and Hermannus Buschius, as dangerous innovators, who corrupted the minds of youth by mythological fancies, and the study of unchristian authors. Supported, however, by Count Nuenar, dean of the canonical chapter, and the influence of his own rank, Buschius, a nobleman by birth, the scholar of Hegius, and friend and schoolfellow of Erasmus, stood his ground even in Cologne, against the scholastic zealots ; and, though thrice compelled to abandon the field of contest, he finally succeeded in discomfiting, even in their firmest stronghold, the enemies of light. Pliny and Ovid were read along with Boethius and Sedulius ; the ancient school-books — the Doctrinale of Alex- ander, the Disciplines Scholarum, the Catholicon, the Mamrno- trectus, (Mammaetractus,) the Gemma Gemmarum, the Laby- rinthus, the Dormisecure, &c. &c, were at last no longer, even in Cologne, recognised as of exclusive authority ; and, within a few years after their disgrace in this fastness of prescriptive barbarism, they were exploded from all the schools and universities through- out the empire. In this difficult exploit Buschius was aided by Erasmus, Hutten, Melanchthon, Torrentinus, Bebelius, Simler, &c. This was, however, but a skirmish, compared with another kindred and simultaneous contest ; and the obstinacy of Buschius, in defence of classical Latinity, only exasperated the theologians of Cologne to put forth all their strength in opposition to Reuch- lin, a still more influential champion of illumination, and in sup- pression of the more obnoxious study of Hebrew. The character of Reuchlin is one of the most remarkable in that remarkable age ; for it exhibits, in the highest perfection, a combination of qualities which are in general found incompatible. At once a man of the world and of books, he excelled equally in practice and speculation ; was a statesman and a philosopher, a jurist and a divine. Nobles, and princes, and emperors, honoured him with their favour, and employed him in their most difficult 212 EPISTOLJE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM. affairs ; while the learned throughout Europe looked up to him as the " trilingue miraculum," the " phoenix litterarum," the " eruditorum &K