A BIOGRAPHICAL
HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.
PART I.
ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY.








THE
BIOGRA PHICAL
HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY,
FROM ITS ORIGIN IN GREECE DOWN TO
THE PRESENT DAY.
BY
GEORGE      HENRY     LEWES.' Man is not born to solve the mystery of Existence; but he must nevertheless attempt it,
in order that he may learn how to keep within the limits of the Knowable."-GoETHE.
"For I doubt not through the ages one increasing purpose runs,
And the thoughts of men are widened by the process of the suns."
TENNYSON.
LIBRARY EDITION,
MITCH ENLARGED AND TOROUJGIILY REVISED.
NEW YORK:
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,
346 & 348 BROADWAY.
I DCCC LyII.








PREFACE.
THIS new edition may almost be considered as a new
work, so many are the additions and so extensive the
alterations. Seven new names have been added to the
list of philosophers,-ABELARD, ALGAZZALI, GIORDANO
BRUNO, HARTLEY, DARWIN, CABANIS, and GALL. An
Introduction, setting forth the distinguishing characteristics of Philosophy and Science, replaces the original
Introduction. Under the heads of SOCRATES, the SOPIISTS, ARISTOTLE, BACON, SPINOZA, HUMEE, CONDILLAC,
KANT, and ECLECTICISM, considerable additions and alterations will be found; and, throughout, the revision has
been such that scarcely a paragraph remains unaltered.
The work was written ten years ago, and was addressed to a popular audience. Ten years have not
been without their influence on. the historian; and
moreover, the success of the work has so greatly exceeded any thing that could reasonably have been anticipated-not only in respect to sale, but in the directions
of its influence-that on undertaking this Library Edition I felt the necessity of modifying both the aim and
scope of the work. A graver audience was to be addressed, a graver tone adopted. Without forgetting the
general public, I had now to think also of what students
would require.  Many polemical passages, many ex



iv                   PREFACE.
tracts, and some digressions, have been removed; and
the space thus gained has prevented the new matter
from swelling the work to an inconvenient size. Many
references and other bibliographical details have been
added, although the principle of abstinence from unnecessary citation has still been preserved.
The labor bestowed on this Edition will, I hope, render it more worthy of public acceptance. To my friend,
the Rev. W. G. Clark, of Trinity College, Cambridge,
an acknowledgment is due for the kindness with which
he permitted me to profit by his accomplished scholarship and taste, in the revision of the proofs; but while
thanking him publicly for his many suggestions and
corrections, I must exonerate him from every iota of
responsibility either as to the opinions or the statements
in this volume.
The Introduction explains the purpose of this History
and the principles of its composition; let me therefore
only add here that, although availing myself of the labors of other historians and critics, I have not restricted
myself to them. The works of the vie ions plb;osophers,
with rare exceptions, have been studied at first hand,
and have furnished the extracts and abstracts; that is
to say, I have either collected the passages mysel?, or
have verified them by reference to the originals, in almost all cases. While, therefore, this History makes no
pretension to a place beside the many erudite and comprehensive Histories previously published, it claims to
be regarded as something very different from a mere
compilation. The novelty of its conception made direct
acquaintance with the originals indispensable. Having
to exhibit the Biography of Philosophy in its rise,
growth, and development, I could not always have




PREFACE.                    V
drawn my material from writers who had no such aim;
many of the passages most significant for my purpose
being totally disregarded by my predecessors.
In another respect also I have innovated, namely, in
the constant interweaving of criticism with exposition.
This was necessary to my purpose of proving that no
metaphysical system has had in it a principle of vitality;
none has succeeded in establishing itself, because none
deserved to succeed. In this way I have been led to
express every conclusion to which the study of metaphysical problems has led me; in some places-especially in the refutation of Sensationalism, and in the
physiological discussion of psychological questionsI have been forced to content myself with a brief and
imperfect exposition of my own views; and the reader
is requested to regard them rather in their bearing as
criticisms, than as expressing what I have to say on
such difficult topics.
The following list comprises some of the many general
Histories which the student will find useful, should he
desire anipler detail than was consistent with the size
and plan of this volume:
In English.-Ritter, History of Philosophy, 3 vols.;
Tennemann, Manual of the History of Philosophy,
1 vol.; Victor Cousin, Introduction to the I~istory
of Philosophy, 1 vol.; IMorell, History of Speculative Philosophy in the Nineteenth Century, 2 vols.
(2d edition, much improved).
In French.-Degerando, Histoire Comparee des Systemes de Philosophie, 4 vols. (2d edition); Renouvier, J3anuel de la Philosophic Ancienne, 2 vols.,
and Manuel de la Philosophie Ioderne, 1 vol.;
Damiron, Histoire de la Philosophie en France au




Vi                    PREFACE.
XIX Siecle, 1 vol.; Galuppi, Lettres Philosophiques, 1 vol.
In German.-Ritter, Geschichte der Philosophie, 9 vols.;
Tennemann, Geschichte der Philosophie, 11 vols.;
Hegel, Geschichte der Philosophie, 3 vols.; Zeller,
Die Philosophie der Griechen, 2 vols.; Brandis,
Geschichte der Griechisch-R5mischen Philosophie,
2 vols.




CONTENTS.
PART I.-ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY.
PAGE
INTRODUCTION......................................................  Xi
FIRST EPOCH.
Speculations on the Nature of the Universe.
CHAPTER     I. THE PHYSICISTS.-Thales.-Anaximenes.-Diogenes of
A pollonia.......................................................  1
CHAPTER II. THE MATHEMATICIANS.-Anaximander of Miletus.-Pythagoras.-Philosophy of Pythagoras.-Translations from Aristotle's
M etaphysics.....................................................  10
CHAPTER     III. THE ELEATICS. —Xenophanes.-The Philosophy of
Xenophanes.-Parmenides.-Zeno of Elea........................ 37
SECOND EPOCH.
Speculations on the Creation of the Universe, and on the Origin of
Knowledge.
Heraclitus.-Anaxagoras.-Empedocles.-Democritus................ 63
THIRD EPOCH.
Intellectual Crisis.-The Insufficiency of all Attempts towards a Solution
of the Problem of Existence, as well as that of Knowledge, produces the
Sophists.
THE SOPHISTS.-What were they?-Protagoras....................... 102
FOURTH EPOCH.
A New Era opened by the Invention of a NVew Method.
SocRATES.-The Life of Socrates.-Philosophy of Socrates............. 122.
FIFTH EPOCH.
Partial Adoption of the Socratic Method.
The Megaric School.-Euclid.-The Cyrenaic School.-Aristippus.-The
Cynics.-Antisthenes and Diogenes............................. 169




viii                         CONTENTS.
SIXTH EPOCH.
Complete Adoption and Application of the Socratic Method.
PLATO.-Life of Plato.-Plato's Writings: their Character, Object, and
Authenticity.-Plato's Method.-Plato's Ideal Theory.-Plato's Psychology.-Summary of Plato's Dialectics.-Plato's Theology and
Cosmology.-Plato's View of the Beautiful and the Good.-Plato's
Ethics..........................................................  186
SEVENTH EPOCH.
Philosophy again reduced to a System: Close of the Socratic Movement.Aristotle.
CHAPTER I. ARISTOTLE.-Life of Aristotle.-Aristotle's Method.Aristotle's Logic. —Aristotle's Metaphysics....................... 241
CHAPTER II. SUMMARY OF THE SOCRATIC MOVEMENT............... 266
EIGHTH EPOCH.
Second Crisis of Greek Philosophy: the Skeptics, Epicureans, Stoics,
and the 2ew Academy.
CHAPTER     I.  THE SKEPTICS.-Pyrrho............................ 268
CHAPTER     II. THE EPICUREANS.-Epicurus....................... 274
CHAPTER III. THE STOICS.-Zeno................................. 281
CHAPTER IV. THE NEW ACADEMY.-Arcesilaus and Carneades..... 293
CHAPTER     V. SUMMARY OF THE EIGHTH EPOCH.................... 305
NINTH EPOCH.
Philosophy allies itself with Faith: the Alexandrian Schools.
CHAPTER I. RISE OF NEO-PLATONISM.-Alexandria.-Philo......... 307
CHAPTER II. ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY AND NEO-PLATONISM.-Plotinus.-The Alexandrian Dialectics.-The Alexandrian Trinity.The Doctrine of Emanation...................................... 314
CHAPTER III. PROCLUS........................................... 332
CONCLUSION OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY................................ 336
PART II.-MODERN PHILOSOPHY.
TRANSITION PERIOD.
FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.-Scholasticism.-Life of Abelard.-Philosophy
of Abelard.-Algazzali.-Revival of Learning.-Giordano Bruno.... 343




CONTENTS.                              ix
FIRST EPOCH.
Foundation of the Inductive Method.
The Life of Bacon.-Bacon's Method.-The Spirit of Bacon's Method.Was the Method New and Useful............................... 898
SECOND EPOCH.
Foundation of the Deductive Method.
CHAPTER I. DESCARTES.-Life of Descartes.-The Method of Descartes.-Application of tie Method.-Is the Method True......... 435
CHAPTER II. SPINOZA.-Spinoza's Life.-Spinoza's Doctrine........ 456
CHAPTER III. FIRST CRISIS IN MODERN PHILOSOPHY................. 493
THIRD EPOCH.
Philosophy reduced to a Question of Psychology.
CHAPTER I. HOBBES.......................................... 495
CHAPTER II. LocKE.-Life of Locke.-On the Spirit of Locke's Writings.-Locke's Method.-The Origin of our Ideas —Elements of
Idealism and Skepticism in Locke.-Locke's Critics............... 506
CIAPTER      III.  LEIBNITZ..........................................  541
CHAPTER IV. SUMMARY OF THE THIRD EPOCH..................... 546
FOURTH EPOCH.
The Subjective Nature of Knowledge leads to Idealism.
BERKELEY.-The Life of Berkeley.-Berkeley and Common Sense.Idealism........................................................  548
FIFTH EPOCH.
The Arguments of Idealism carried out into Skepticism.
HUME.-Life of Hume.-Hume's Skepticism.-Hume's Theory of Causation............................................................  570
SIXTH EPOCH.
The Origin of RKowledge reduced to Sensation by the confusion of
Thought with Feeling: the Sensational School.
CHAPTER     I. CONDILLAC.-Life of Condillac.-Condillac's System... 589
CHAPTER II. HARTLEY.-Life of Hartley.-Hartley's System........ 603
CHAPTER III. DARWIN............................................. 609
SEVENTH EPOCH.
Second Crisis: Idealism, Skepticism, and Sensationalism producing
the Reaction of Common Sense.
REID..............................................................  618
1*




X                              CONTENTS.
EIGHTH EPOCH.
Recurrence to the Fandamental Question respecting the Origin of
Knowledge.
KANT.-Life of Kant.-Kant's Historical Position.-Kant's Psychology.Consequences of Kant's Psychology.-Examination of Kant's Fundamental Principles.......................................... 630
NINTH EPOCH.
Ontology reasserts its Claim.-The Demonstration of the Subjectivity
of Knowledge once more leads to Idealism.
CHAPTER I. FICHTE.-Life of Fichte.-Fichte's Historical Position.Basis of Fichte's System.-Fichte's Idealism.-Application of Fichte's
Idealism.......................................................  675
CHAPTER II. SCHELLING.-Life of Schelling.-Schelling's Doctrines.. 705
CHAPTER III. HEGEL.-Life of Hegel.-Hegel's Method.-Absolute
Idealism.-Hegel's Logic.-Application of the Method to Nature and
History, Religion and Philosophy.............................. 715
TENTH EPOCH.
Psychology seeking its Basis in Physiology.
CHAPTER I. CABANIS............................................ 740
CHAPTER II. PHRENOLOGY.-Life of Gall.-Gall's Historical Position.
-Cranioscopy.-Phrenology as a Science.......................... 749
ELEVENTH EPOCH.
Philosophyfinally relinquishing its Place in favor of Positive Science.
CHAPTER I. ECLECTICIS M......................................... 769
CHAPTER II. AUGUSTE COMTE..................................... 776
CONCLUSION.....................................................  788
IND  EX...........................................................  791




INTRODUCTION.
~ I. ON THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE.
PHILOSOPHY is everywhere in Europe fallen into discredit.
Once the pride and glory of the greatest intellects, and still
forming an important element of liberal culture, its present decadence is attested no less by the complaints of its few followers
than by the thronging ranks of its opponents. Few now believe
in its large promises; still fewer devote to it that passionate patience which is devoted by thousands to Science. Every day
the conviction gains strength that Philosophy is condemned, by
the very nature of its impulses, to wander forever in one tortuous labyrinth within whose circumscribed and winding spaces
weary seekers are continually finding themselves in the trodden
tracks of predecessors, who, they know, could find no exit.
Philosophy has been ever in movement, but the movement
has been circular; and this fact is thrown into stronger relief by
contrast with the linear progress of Science. Instead of perpetually finding itself, after years of gigantic endeavor, returned to
the precise point from which it started, Science finds itself year
by year, and almost day by day, advancing step by step, each
accumulation of power adding to the momentum of its progress;
each evolution, like the evolutions of organic development, bringing with it a new functional superiority, which in its turn becomes the agent of higher developments. Not a fact is discovered but has its bearing on the whole body of doctrine; not a
mechanical improvement in the construction of instruments but
opens fresh sources of discovery. Onward, and forever onward,
mightier and forever mightier, rolls this wondrous tide of discovery, and the "thoughts of men are widened by the process of
the suns."  While the first principles of Philosophy are to this
day as much a matter of dispute as they were two thousand
years ago, the first principles of Science are securely established,




Xii                     INTRODUCTION.
and form the guiding lights of European progress. Precisely
the same questions are agitated in Germany at the present moment that were agitated in ancient Greece; and with no more
certain Methods of solving them, with no nearer hopes of ultimate success. The History of Philosophy presents the spectacle of thousands of intellects-some the greatest that have made
our race illustrious-steadily concentrated on problems believed
to be of vital importance, yet producing no other result than a
conviction of the extreme facility of error, and the remoteness of
any probability that Truth can be reached.*  The only conquest
has been critical, that is to say, psychological.  Vainly do some
argue that Philosophy has made no progress hitherto, because
its problems are so complex, and require more effort than the
simpler problems of Science; vainly are we warned not to conclude from the past to the future, averring that no progress will
be made because no progress has been made.      Perilous as it
must ever be to set absolute limits to the future of human capacity, there can be no peril in averring that Philosophy never
will achieve its aims, because those aims lie beyond all human
scope.  The difficulty is impossibility.  No progress can be
made because no certainty is possible. To aspire to the knowledge of more than phenomena,-their resemblances, co-existences, and successions,-is to aspire to transcend the inexorable
limits of human faculty.  To know more, we must be more.
The reader will have perceived that I use the word Philosophy
in some restricted sense; and as this is the sense which will be
attached to it throughout the present History, an explanation
becomes requisite. In all countries the word Philosophy has
come to be used with large latitude, designating indeed any and
every kind of speculative inquiry; nay, in England, as Hegel
notices with scorn,t microscopes, telescopes, barometers, and
balances, are freely baptized " philosophical instruments;"-New* Compare Kant in the Preface to the 2d ed. of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft: "Der Metaphysik... ist das Schicksal bisher noch so giinstig
nicht gewesen dass sie den sichern Gang einer Wissenschaft einzuschlagen
vermogt hatte; ob sie gleich lter ist als alle iibrige...  Es ist also kein
Zweifel dass ihr Verfahren bisher ein blosses Herumtappen, und, was das
Schlimmste ist, unter hlossen Begriffen gewesen soy."
t Geschichte der Philosophie, i. 72.




INTRODUCTION.                   xiii
ton is called a philosopher; and even Parliamentary proceedings
get named philosophical;-so wide a range is given to this
word. Such expressions may be criticised, but no criticism 6will
root them out of our language; and it is futile to argue against
whatever has become thus familiar and extensive. Nevertheless, when any one undertakes to write a History of Philosophy,
he must define the limits of his undertaking; and as I have not
the slightest intention of including either microscopic inquiries,
or Parliamentary debates, within my narrative, but of rigorously
limiting it to such topics as are comprised in other Histories of
Philosophy, it is indispensable to define the word " Philosophy,"
by limiting it exclusively to Metaphysics, in direct antithesis to
Science. This is the sense it bears in all other Histories; except
that the demarcation from Science is not always rigorously made.
In the early days of speculation all Philosophy was essentially
metaphysical, because Science had not distinctly emerged. The
particular sciences then cultivated, no less than the higher generalities on Life, Destiny, and the Universe, were studied on one
and the same Method; but in the course of human evolution a
second Method grew up, at first timidly and unconsciously, gradually enlarging its bounds as it enlarged its powers, and at last
separating itself into open antagonism with its parent and rival.
The child then destroyed its parent; as the mythic Zeus, calling
the Titans to his aid, destroyed Saturn and usurped his throne.
Observation and Experiment were the Titans of the new Method.
There are many who deplore the encroachment of Science,
fondly imagining that Philosophy would respond better to the
wants of man. This regret is partly unreasoning sentiment,
partly ignorance of the limitations of human faculty. Even
among those who admit that Philosophy is an impossible attempt, there are many who think it should be persevered in, because of the lofty views it is supposed to open to us. This is as
if a man desirous of going to America should insist on walking
there, because journeys on foot are more poetical than journeys
by rail and steam; in vain is he shown the impossibility of
crossing the Atlantic on foot; he admits that grovelling fact,
but his lofty soul has visions of some mysterious overland route
by which he will pass. He dies without reaching America, but




XiV                  INTRODUCTION.
to the last gasp he maintains that he has discovered the route
on which others may reach it.
0 Reader! let us hear no more of the lofty views claimed as
the exclusive privilege of Philosophy. Ignorant indeed must the
man be who nowadays is unacquainted with the grandeur and
sweep of scientific speculation in Astronomy and Geology, or
who has never been thrilled by the revelations of the Telescope
and Microscope. The heights and depths of man's nature, the
heights to which he aspires, the depths into which he searches,
and the grander generalities on Life, Destiny, and the Universe,
find as eminent a place in Science as in Philosophy, with the
simple difference that they are less vague and are better founded.
And even were we compelled to acknowledge that the lofty
views of Philosophy were excluded from Science, the earnest
mind would surely barter such loftiness for Truth. Our struggle, our passion, our hope, is for Truth, not for loftiness; for sincerity, not for pretence. If we cannot reach certain heights, let
us acknowledge them to be inaccessible, and not deceive ourselves and others by phrases which pretend that these heights
are accessible. Bentham warns us against "question-begging
epithets;" and one of these is the epithet "lofty," with which
Philosophy allures the unwary student. As a specimen of the
sentiment so inappropriately dragged in to decide questions not
of sentiment but of truth, consider the following passage delivered from the professorial chair to students whose opinions were to
be formed:
"A spirit of most misjudging contempt has for many years
become fashionable towards the metaphysical contemplations of
the elder sages. Alas! I cannot understand on what principles.
Is it, then, a matter to be exulted in that we have at length discovered that our faculties are only formed for earth and earthly
phenomenal Are we to rejoice at our own limitations, and
delight that we can be cogently demonstrated to be prisoners of
sense and the facts of sense? In those early struggles after a
higher and more perfect knowledge, and in the forgetfulness of
every inferior science through the very ardor of the pursuit,
there is at least a glorious, an irresistible testimony to the loftier
destinies of man; and it might almost be pronounced that in




INTRODUCTION.                    XV
such a view, their very errors evidence a truth higher than all
our discoveries can disclose! When Lord Bacon, with his clear
and powerful reasonings, led our thinkers from these ancient
regions of thought (then newly opened to the modern world) to
the humbler but more varied and extensive department of inductive inquiry, I represent to myself that angel-guide, all light and
grace, who is pictured by our great poet as slowly conducting
the first of our race from Paradise, to leave him in a world, vast,
indeed, and varied, but where thorns and thistles abounded, and
food-often uncertain and often perilous-was to be gained only
by the sweat of the brow and in the downcast attitude of servile
toil."*
It would be an insult to the reader's understanding to answer
the several absurdities and" question-begging" positions of this
passage, which however is a typical specimen of much that may
be met in modern writers; all that I feel called upon to notice
is the opening sentence. Contempt for the metaphysical speculations of the elder sages is the last feeling I should acknowledge,
however erroneous I may believe them to be. They were the
precursors of modern Science. Without them we should have
been in darkness. The forlorn hope of Humanity can never be
an object of contempt. We follow the struggles of the early
thinkers with intense interest, because we trace in their defeats
the causes of future victory.
The historical connection of Science with Philosophy, and the
essential differences between them, which led to their separation
and the final neglect of Philosophy, will be understood better
when the characteristics of the two are clearly set forth. The
object of both is the same, namely, Explanation of all phenomena. Their characteristic differences, therefore, do not lie in the
thing sought, so much as in the Method of search. I have met
with no satisfactory statement of these characteristic differences;
and the readiest way I can think of to make them intelligible,
will be to exhibit the Metaphysical and Scientific Methods in
* Archer Butler, Lectures on the Hist. of Ancient Philosophy, ii. 109. The
varied and accurate erudition of Mr. W. H. Thompson's notes to these lectures gives these volumes their chief value.




Xvi                     INTRODUCTION.
operation on the search after the causes of the same phenomenon; for instance, that of " Table-turning."*
A few persons stand round a table, gently resting their hands
on it, but sedulously careful not to push in any direction. In a
little while the table moves, at first slowly, afterwards with growing velocity. The persons are all of the highest respectability,
above suspicion of wilful deceit. The phenomenon is so unexpected, so unprecedented, that an explanation is imperiously demanded. We have here an illustration of the origin of Philosophy. In presence of unusual phenomena, men are unable to
remain without some explanation which shall render intelligible
to them how the unusual event is produced. They are spectators merely; condemned to witness the event, unable to penetrate directly into its causes, unable to get behind the scenes
and see the strings which move the puppets, they guess at what
they cannot see. In this way Man is interpres Naturce. Whether
he be metaphysician or man of science, his starting-point is the
same; and they are in error who say that the metaphysician
differs from the man of science in drawing his explanation from
the recesses of his own mind in lieu of drawing it from the observation of facts. Both observe facts, and both draw their interpretations from their own minds. Nay, strictly considered,
there is necessarily, even in the most familiar fact, the annexation of mental inference-something added by the mind, suggested by, but not given in, the immediate observation. Facts
are the registration of direct observation and indirect inference,
congeries of particulars partly sensational, partly ideal. The scientific value of facts depends on the validity of the inferences bound
up with them; and hence the profound truth of Cullen's paradox,
that there are more false facts than false theories current.
The facts comprised in the phenomenon of " Table-turning"
* There is difficulty in selecting a suitable illustration, because if an undisputed scientific truth be chosen, the reader may not be able to place himself at the metaphysical point of view: whereas if a disputed point be
chosen he may perhaps himself adopt the metaphysical explanation, and refuse to acknowledge the scientific explanation. "Table-turning" escapes
both objections. The mania is sufficiently recent to permit our vividly realizing the mental condition of the theorists; and the error is sufficiently exploded to admit of being treated as an error.




INTRODUCTION.                  Xvii
are by no means so simple as they have been represented. Let
us however reserve all criticism, and fix our attention solely on
the phenomenon, which, expressed in rigorous terms, amounts to
this:-the table turns; the cause of its turning unknown. To
explain this, one class of metaphysical minds refers it to the
agency of an unseen spirit: connecting this spiritual manifestation with others which have been familiar to him, the interpreter
finds no difficulty in believing that a spirit moved the table; for
the movement assuredly issued fiom no human agency; the respectable witnesses declare they did not push. Unless the table
moved itself, therefore, the conclusion must be that it was moved
by a spirit.
Minds of another class gave another explanation, one equally
metaphysical, although its advocates scornfully rejected the spiritual hypothesis. These minds were indisposed to admit the existence of Spirits as agents in natural phenomena; but their interpretation, in spite of its employing the language of science,
was as utterly removed from scientific induction as the spiritual
interpretation they despised. They attributed the phenomenon
to Electricity. Connecting this supposed electrical manifestation
with some other facts which seemed to warrant the belief of nervous action being identical with electricity, they had no hesitation in affirming that electricity streamed from the tips of the
fingers; and it was even suggested by one gentleman that " the
nervous fluid had probably a rotatory action, and a power of
throwing off some of its surplus force."
Each of these explanations was very widely accepted by the
general public, although few persons of any reasoning power
now accept them. The obvious defect in both lies in the utter
absence of any guarantee. We ought to be satisfied with no
explanation which is without its valid guarantee. Before we
purchase silver spoons we demand to see the mark of Silversmiths' Hall, to be assured that the spoons are silver, and not
plated only. The test of the assayer dispels our misgivings. In
like manner when the motion of a table is explained by spiritual
agency, instead of debating whether the spirit bring airs from
heaven or blasts from hell, we suffer our skepticism to fall on the
preliminary assumption of the spirit's presence. Prove the pres



Xviii                 INTRODUCTION.
ence of the spirit, before you ask us to go further. We may
admit that, ifpresent, the spirit is capable of producing this motion of the table; but we cannot permit you to assume such a
presence merely to explain such a movement; for if the fact to
be explained is sufficient proof of the explanation, we might
with equal justice assume that the movement was caused by an
invisible dragon who turned the table by the fanning of his awful
wings.
A similar initial error is observable in the electrical hypothesis.
Electricity may be a less intrinsically improbable assumption, but
its presence requires proof. After that step had been taken, we
should require proof that electricity could comport itself with
reference to tables and similar bodies in this particular manner.
We have various tests for the presence of electricity; various
means of ascertaining how it would act upon a table. But seeing that the gentleman who spoke so confidently of " currents
issuing from the tips of the fingers" never once attempted to
prove that there were currents; and knowing moreover that these
currents, if present, would not make a table turn, all men of true
scientific culture dismissed the explanation with contempt.
Such were the metaphysical Methods of explaining the phenomenon. Let us now watch the scientific Method. The point
sought is the unknown cause of the table's movement. To reach
the unknown we must pass through the avenues of the known;
we must not attempt to reach it through the unknown. Is
there any known fact with which this movement can be allied?
The first and most obvious suggestion is, that the table was
pushed by the hands which rested on it. There is a difficulty
in the way of this explanation, namely, that the persons declare
solemnly they did not push; and, as persons of the highest respectability, we are bound to believe them. Is this statement of
any value? The whole question is involved in it. But the philosophical mind is very little affected by guarantees of respectability in matters implicating sagacity rather than integrity.
The Frenchman assured his friend that the earth did turn round
the sun, and offered his parole d'honneur as a guarantee; but in
the delicate and difficult questions of science paroles d'honneur
have a quite inappreciable weight. We may therefore set aside




INTRODUCTION.                   xix
the respectability of the witnesses, and, with full confidence in
their integrity, estimate the real value of their assertion, which
amounts to this: they were not conscious of pushing. We now
see that the fact, which was imagined to be simple, namely, that
" the persons did not push," turns out to be excessively dubious,
namely, " they were not conscious of pushing."  If we come to
examine such a case, we find Physiology in possession of abundant examples of muscular action accompanied by no distinct
consciousness, and some of these examples are very similar to
those of the unconscious pushing, which may have turned the
table; and we are thus satisfied of three important points:1. Pushing is an adequate cause, and will serve to explain the
movement of the table, as well as either the supposed spirit or
electricity. 2. Pushing may take place without any distinct
consciousness on the pait of those who push. 3. Expectant attention is known to produce such a state of the muscles as would
occasion this unconscious pushing.
Considered therefore as a mere hypothesis, this of unconscious
pushing is strictly scientific; it may not be true, but it has fulfilled the preliminary conditions. Unlike the two hypotheses it
opposes, it assumes nothing previously unknown, or not easily
demonstrable; every position has been verified; whereas the
metaphysicians have not verified one of their positions: they
have not proved the presence of their agents, nor have they
proved that these agents, if present, would act in the required
manner. Of spirit we know nothing, consequently can predicate
nothing. Of electricity we know something, but what is known
is not in accordance with the table-turning hypothesis. Of pushing we know that it can and does turn tables. All then that is
required to convert this latter hypothesis into scientific certainty,
is to prove the presence of the pushing in this particular case.
And it is proved in many ways, positive and negative, as I showed
when the phenomenon first became the subject of public investigation. Positive, because if the hands rest on a loose tablecloth, or on substances with perfectly smooth surfaces which
will glide easily over the table, the cloth or the substances will
move, and not the table. Negative, because if the persons are
duly warned of their liability to unconscious pushing, and are




XX                    INTRODUCTION.
told to keep vigilant guard over their sensations, they do not
move the table, although previously they have moved it frequently. When we have thus verified the presence of unconscious pushing, all the links in the chain have been verified, and
certainty is complete.
Reviewing the three explanations which the phenomenon of
table-turning called forth, we elicit one characteristic as distinguishing the scientific Method, namely, the verification of each
stage in the process, the guaranteeing of each separate point, the
cultivated caution of proceeding to the unknown solely through
the avenues of the known. The germinal difference, then, between the metaphysical and scientific Methods, is not that they
draw their explanations from a different source, the one employing Reasoning where the other employs Observation, but that
the one is content with an explanation which has no further
guarantee than is given in the logical explanation of the difficulty; whereas the other imperatively demands that every assumption should be treated as provisional, hypothetical, until it
has been confronted with fact, tested by acknowledged tests, in
a word, verified. The guarantee of the metaphysician is purely
logical, subjective: it is the intellectus sibi permissus; the
guarantee of the other is derived from a correspondence of the
idea with experience. As Bacon says, all merely logical explanations are valueless, the subtlety of nature greatly surpassing that
of argument: "Subtilitas naturae subtilitatem  argumentandi
multis partibus superat;" and he further says, with his usual
felicity, " Sed axiomata a particularibus rite et ordine abstracta
nova particularia rursus facile indicant et designant."  It is these
"new particulars" which are reached through those already
known, and complete the links of the causal chain.
Open the history of Science at any chapter you will, and its
pages will show how all the errors which have gained acceptance
gained it because this important principle of verification of particulars was neglected. Incessantly the mind of man leaps forward to " anticipate" Nature, and is satisfied with such anticipations if they have a logical consistence. When Galen and Aristotle thought that the air circulated in the arteries, causing the
pulse to beat, and cooling the temperature of the blood, they




INTRODUCTION.                     Xxi
were content with this plausible anticipation; they did not verify
the facts of the air's presence, and its cooling effect; when they
said that the "spirituous blood" nourished the delicate organs,
such as the lungs, and the " venous blood" nourished the coarser
organs, such as the liver; when they said that the "spirit,"
which was the purer element of the blood, was formed in the
left ventricle, and the venous blood in the right ventricle, they
contented themselves with unverified assumptions. In like manner, when in our own day physiologists of eminence maintain
that in the organism there is a Vital Force which suspends chemical actions, they content themselves with a metaphysical unverified interpretation of phenomena. If they came to rigorous
confrontation with fact, they would see that so far from chemical
action being "suspended" it is incessantly at work in the organism; the varieties observable being either due to a difference of
conditions (which will produce varieties out of the organism), or
to the fact that the action is masked by other actions.
If the foregoing discussion has carried with it the reader's assent, he will perceive that the distinguishing characteristic of
Science is its Method of graduated Verification, and not, as some
think, the employment of Induction in lieu of Deduction. All
Science is deductive, and deductive in proportion to its separation from ordinary knowledge, and its co-ordination into systematic Science. " Although all sciences tend to become more
and more deductive," says a great authority, "they are not
therefore the less inductive; every step in the deduction is still
an induction. The opposition is not between the terms Inductive and Deductive, but between Deductive and Experimental."*
Experiment is the great instrument of Verification. The difference between the ancient and modern philosophies lies in the
facility with which the one accepted axioms and hypotheses as
the basis for its deductions, and the cultivated caution with which
the other insists on verifying its axioms and hypotheses before
* Mill's System of Logic: perhaps the greatest contribution to English
speculation since Locke's Essay. Had Mr. Mill invented a new terminology
and expressed himself with less clearness, he would assuredly have gained
that reputation for profundity which, by a thorough misconception of the
nature of thought, is so often awarded to obscurity.




Xxii                 INTRODUCTION.
deducing conclusions from them. We guess as freely as the
ancients; but we know that we are guessing; and if we chance
to forget it, our rivals quickly remind us that our guess is not
evidence. Without guessing, Science would be impossible. We
should never discover new islands, did we not often venture seawards with intent to sail beyond the sunset. To find new land,
we must often quit sight of land. As Mr. Thompson admirably
expresses it: —"Philosophy proceeds upon a system of credit,
and if she never advanced beyond her tangible capital, our wealth
would not be so enormous as it is."*  While both metaphysician
and man of science trade on a system of credit, they do so with
profoundly different views of its aid. The metaphysician is a
merchant who speculates boldly, but without that convertible
capital which can enable him to meet his engagements. Ile
gives bills, yet has no gold, no goods to answer for them; these
bills are not representative of wealth which exists in any warehouse. Magnificent as his speculations seem, the first obstinate
creditor who insists on payment makes him bankrupt. The
man of science is also a venturesome merchant, but one fully
alive to the necessity of solid capital which can on emergency be
produced to meet his bills; he knows the risks he runs whenever
that amount of capital is exceeded; he knows that bankruptcy
awaits him if capital be not forthcoming.
The contrast therefore between Philosophy and Science, or
Metaphysics and Positive Philosophy, is a contrast of Method;
but we must not suppose that the Method of the one is Deduction, while that of the other is Observation. Nothing cal be
more erroneous than the vulgar notion of the " Inductive Method,"
as one limited to the observation of facts. Every instructed
thinker knows that facts of observation are particular theories;
that is to say, every fact which is registered as an observation is
constituted by a synthesis of sensation and inference. We shall
see this illustrated presently. To it must be added the truth
that Science is constantly making discoveries by Reasoning alone,
aloof from any immediate exercise of Observation, aloof indeed
from the very phenomena it classifies; for when facts are regis* Outlines of the Laws of Thought, p. 312.




INTRODUCTION.                  XXiii
tered in formulas, we resign ourselves to the manipulation of
these formulas as symbols or equations, assured that the result
will accord with Nature. Fresnel predicted the change in polarization from no observation of facts immediately lying before
him, but from a happy elucidation of algebraic symbols. Astronomy is more studied on paper than through the telescope,
which however is called upon to verify the results figured on
paper. So that if we compare our astronomical and geological
theories with the cosmical speculations of a Plato or a Hegel,
we shall not find them deficient in the speculative daring which
outruns the slow process of observation, but we shall find the
difference to lie initially in the rigor with which our deductive
formulas are established, and in the different estimates we form
of what is valid evidence.
Galileo made Astronomy a science when he began to seek the
unknown through the known, and to interpret celestial phenomena by those laws of motion which were recognized on the surface of the earth. Geology became possible as a science when
its principal phenomena were explained by those laws of the
action of water, visibly operating in every river, estuary, and bay.
Except in the grandeur of its sweep, the mind pursues the same
course in the interpretation of geological facts which record. the
annals of the universe, as in the interpretation of the ordinary
incidents of daily life. To read the pages of the great Stonebook, and to perceive from the wet streets that rain has recently
fallen, are the same intellectual processes. In the one case the
mind traverses immeasurable spaces of time, and infers that the
phenomena were produced by causes similar to those which have
produced similar phenomena within recent experience; in the
other case, the mind similarly infers that the wet streets and
swollen gutters have been produced by the same cause we have
frequently observed to produce them. Let the inference span
with its mighty arch a myriad of years, or span but a few minutes, in each case it rises from the ground of certain familiar indications, and reaches an antecedent known to be capable of producing these indications. Both inferences nay be wrong: the
wet streets may have been wetted by a water-cart, or by the
bursting of a pipe. We cast about for some other indication of




Xxiv                  INTRODUCTION.
rain besides the wetness of the streets and the turbid rush of
gutters, which might equally have been produced by the bursting of a water-pipe. If we see passers-by carrying wet umbrellas,
some still held above the head, our inference is strengthened by
this indication, that rain, and no other cause, produced the phenomena. In like manner, the geologist casts about for other
indications besides those of the subsidence of water, and as they
accumulate, his conviction strengthens.
While this is the course of Science, the course of Philosophy
is very different. Its inferences start from no well-grounded
basis; the arches they throw are not from known fact to unknown fact, but from some unknown to some other unknown.
Deductions are drawn from the nature of God, the nature of
Spirit, the essences of Things, and fiom what Reason can postulate. ~ Rising from such mists, the arch so brilliant to look upon
is after all a rainbow, not a bridge.
To make his method legitimate, the Philosopher must first
prove that a co-ordinate correspondence exists between Nature
and his Intuitional Reason,* so that whatever is true of the one
must be true of the other. The geologist, for example, proceeds on the assumption that the action of waters was essentially the same millions of years ago as it is in the present day;
so that whatever can be positively proved of it now, may be confidently asserted of it then.  He subsequently brings evidence
to corroborate his assumption by showing that the assumption is
necessary and competent to explain facts not otherwise to be
consistently explained. But does the Philosopher stand in a
similar position? Does he show any validity in his preliminary
assumption? Does he produce any evidence for the existence of
a nexus between his Intuitional Reason and those noumena or
essences, about which he reasons; does he show the probability
of there being such a correspondence between the two, that what
* By Intuitional Reason I here wish to express what the Germans call
Vernunft, which they distinguish from Verstand, as Coleridge tried to make
Englishmen distinguish between Reason and Understanding. The term
Reason is too deeply rooted in our language to be twisted into any new direction; and I hope by the unusual' Intuitional Reason" to keep the reader's
attention alive to the fact that by it is designated the process of the mind
engaged in transcendental inquiry.




INTRODUCTION.                    XXV
is true of the one may be accepted as probable of the other 
Nothing of the kind. He assumes that it is so. He assumes, as
a preliminary to all Philosophy, that Intuitional Reason is competent to deliver verdicts, even when the evidence is entirely
furnished by itself. He assumes that Intuitions are face to face
with Existences, and have consequently immediate knowledge of
them. But this immense assumption, this gratuitous begging of
the whole question, can only be permitted after a demonstration
that the contrary assumption must be false. Now it is certain
that we can assume the contrary, and assume it on evidence as
cogent as that which furnishes his assumption. I can assume
that Intuitions are not face to face with Existences; indeed this
assumption seems to me by far the most probable; and it is
surely as valid as the one it opposes? I call upon the metaphysician to prove the validity of his assumption, or the invalidity
of mine. I call upon him for some principle of verification. He
may tell me (as in past years the Hegelians used to tell me, not
without impatience) that " Reason must verify itself;" but unhappily Reason has no such power; for if it had, Philosophy
would not be disputing about first principles; and when it claims
the power, who is to answer for its accuracy, quis custodiet ipsos
custodes? If Philosophy is possible, its only basis rests on the
correspondence between Nature and Intuitional Reason. But a
correct analysis of our intellectual processes will furnish a solvent
which will utterly destroy the last shred of organic basis out of
which Philosophy grows.
Reasoning, if I rightly apprehend it, is the same intellectual
process as Perception, with this difference, that Perception is inferential respecting objects present, and Reasoning is inferential
respecting objects absent. In the laxity of current language,
sensations and perceptions are almost convertible terms; but if
we rigorously separate from our perceptions all those elements
not actually given in the momentary sensations, it will be evident
that Perception is distinguished from Sensation by the addition
of certain inferences: as when we perceive a substance to be
hard, square, odorous, sweet, etc., from certain inferences rising
out of its form, color, etc., although we do not actually touch,
smell, or taste the object. What is this process of inference? It
2




XXvi                  INTRODUCTION.
is a presentation before the consciousness of something which has
been formerly observed in conjunction with the object, and is
therefore supposed to be now actually present in fact, although
not present in sensation. I have no sensation of sweetness when
I see the lumnp of sugar; but the sight of the sugar brings before
my consciousness the sweetness, which the sugar will bring to
my sensibility when in contact with my tongue. I perceive the
sweetness; and I do this by making present to my mind what is
absent from sense. I infer that the lump of white substance before me is sugar, as I infer that it rains when I see, fron  my
window, water falling on the streets. In both cases the inference
may be wrong. The white substance may be salt; the falling
water may be the spray of the garden-hose. But in each and
every case of Perception, a something is added to the Sensation,
and that something is inferential, or the assumption of some
quality present in fact which is not present in sense.
Reasoning is likewise inferential, but about objects which, although they were formerly given in sense, are now absent altogether. Reasoning is the presentation before the consciousness,
of objects which, if actually present, would affect the consciousness in a similar way. It mentally supplies their existence.
Thus, when from the wet streets and turbulent gutters I conclude,
or infer, that it has rained, I make present to myself the phenomena of falling water in somewhat the same order as the falling water would follow if present. On closely attending to any
chain of Reasoning we shall find that if it were possible to realize all the links in the chain, i. e. so to place the actual objects in
their connected series that we could see them, this mental series
would become a visible series, and, in lieu of reasonings, would
afford direct perceptions. Good reasoning is the ideal assemblage of facts, and their re-presentation to the mind in the order
of their actual series. It is seeing with the mind's eye. Bad
reasoning will always be found to depend on some of the objects
not being mentally present; some links in the chain are dropped
or overlooked; some objects instead of being re-presented are
left absent, or are presented so imperfectly that the inferences
from them are as erroneous as the inferences from  imperfect
vision are erroneous. Bad reasoning is imperfect re-presentation.




INTRODUCTION.                 XXVii
This explanation of the intellectual operations is, I believe,
novel; should it be accepted, it will light up many obscure questions. But for the present we must only notice its bearing on
Philosophy. When the table-turners concluded that electricity
was the cause of the table's movement, they did not make present
to their minds the real facts of electricity and its modes of operations; otherwise they would have seen that electricity would not
turn the table round, and they would have seen this almost as
vividly as if a battery had been then and there applied to the
table. Faraday, on the contrary, did make these facts mentally
present, so as not to need the actual presence of a battery; and
his correct reasoning might not be owing to any greater general
vigor of ratiocination, but to his greater power of making these
particular facts mentally present. Describe an invention to Dr.
Neil Arnott, and he will be able to reason on its practicability
almost as well as if he saw the machine in operation: because
he can mentally make present to himself all the details of structure, and from these infer all the details of action, just as his
direct inferences would follow the actual presentation of the
objects. There are two modes of detecting false logic, and there
are but two: either we must reduce the argument to a series of
sensations-make the facts in question visible to sense, and show
that the sequences and co-existences of these facts are not what
the reasoner asserted them to be; or we must mentally supply
the place of this visible demonstration, and by re-presenting the
objects before the mind, see where their sequences and co-existences differ from what the reasoner asserted them to be.
If all Reasoning be the re-presentation of what is now absent
but formerly was present, and can again be made present,-in
other words, if the test of accurate reasoning is its reduction to
fact,-then is it evident that Philosophy, dealing with transcendental objects which cannot be present, and employing a Method
which admits of no. verification (or reduction to the test of fact)
must be an impossible attempt. And if I am asked how it is
that philosophers have reasoned at all on transcendental subjects,
since according to my statement they could only reason by
making such subjects present to their minds, the reply is that
they could not, and did not, make present to their minds any




XXViii               INTRODUCTION.
such subjects at all; the Infinite was really conceived by them
as Finite, the Unconditioned as Conditioned, Spirit as Body,
Noumenon as Phenomenon; for only thus were these things
conceivable at all. Thus it is only possible to take the first step
in Philosophy by bringing transcendental subjects within the
sphere of experience, i. e. making them no longer transcendental.
Thus, and thus only, is it possible for us to reason on such topics.
All this will doubtless be utterly denied by metaphysicians.
They proceed on the assumption that Intuitional Reason, which
is independent of experience, is absolute and final in its guarantee. The validity of its conclusions is self-justified. Hegel
boldly says, " Whatever is rational is real, and whatever is real is
rational,-das Vernuinftige ist wirklich und das Wirkliche verniunftig." And writers of less metaphysical rigor frequently
avow the axiom, and always imply it. Thus in a remarkable
article on Sir W. Hamilton, which appeared in the Prospective
Review (understood to be by Mr. James Martineau), we read that
Philosophy in England has dwindled down to mere Psychology
and Logic, whereas its proper business is with the notions of
Time, Space, Substance, Soul, God; "to pronounce upon the
validity of these notions as revelations of real Existence, and, if
they be reliable, use them as a bridge to cross the chasm from
relative Thought to absolute Being. Once safe across, and
gazing about it in that realm, the mind stands in presence of the
objects of Ontology."
"; Once safe across;" this is indeed the step which constitutes
the whole journey; unhappily we have no means of getting safe
across; and in this'helplessness we had better hold ourselves
aloof from the attempt. If a man were to discourse with amplitude of detail and eloquence of conviction respecting the inhabitants of Sirius, setting forth in explicit terms what they were
like, what embryonic forms they passed through, what had been
the course of their social evolution and what would be its ultimate stage, we should first ask, And pray, Sir, what evidence
have you for these particulars? what guarantee do you offer for
the validity of these conclusions? If he replied that Intuitional
Reason assured him these things must be so from the inherent
necessities of the case, he having logically evolved these conclu



INTRODUCTION.                  XXiX
sions from the data of Reason; we should suppose him to be
either attempting to mystify us, or to be hopelessly insane. Nor
would this painful impression be removed by his proceeding to
affirm that he never thought of trusting to such fallacious arguments as could be furnished by observation and experimenttests wholly inapplicable to objects so remote from all experience,
objects accessible only by Reason.
In the present day, speculations on Metaphysics are not, intrinsically, more rational than speculations on the development
of animated beings peopling Sirius; nay, however masked by
the ambiguities of language and old familiarities of speculation,
which seem to justify Metaphysics, the attempt of the Philosopher is really less rational, the objects being even less accessible.
Psychology has taught us one lesson at least, namely, that we
cannot know causes and essences, because our experience is limited to sequences and phenomena.    Nothing is gained by
despising Experience, and seeking refuge in Intuition. The
senses may be imperfect channels, but at any rate they are in
direct communication with their objects, and are true up to a certain point. The error arising from one sense may be corrected
by another; what to the eye appears round, the hand feels to be
square. But Intuition has no such safeguard. It has only itself
to correct its own errors. Holding itself aloof from the corroborations of Sense, it is aloof from all possible verification, because
it cannot employ the test of confrontation with fact.
This conviction has been growing slowly. It could never
have obtained general acceptance until Philosophy had proved
its incapacity by centuries of failure. In the course of our History we shall see the question of Certitude continually forced
upon philosophers, always producing a crisis in speculation,
although always again eluded by the more eager and impatient
intellects. Finally, these repeated crises disengage the majority
of minds from so hopeless a pursuit, and set them free to follow
Science which has Certitude. If our History has any value, it is
in the emphatic sanction it thus gives to the growing neglect of
Philosophy, the growing preference for Science. In the former
edition I adopted the common view which regards the distinction between Philosophy and Science as lying in the pursuit of




XXX                   INTRODUCTION.
different objects. "Philosophy aspires to the knowledge of
essences and causes. Positive Science aspires only to the knowledge of Laws. The one pretends to discover what things are,
in themselves, apart from their appearances to sense; and whence
they came. The other only wishes to discover their modus operandi, observing the constant co-existences and successions of
phenomena among themselves, and generalizing them into some
one Law." But this I no longer regard as the whole truth. It
does not discriminate between scientific and metaphysical speculation on subjects within the scope of Science; such for instance
as the phenomena of life, or such as table-turning. The vital and
fundamental difference between the two orders of speculation
does not lie in their objects, but in their methods. A priori,
indeed, we might conclude that such a circumscription of the
aims of speculation as is implied in Science would necessarily
bring about a corresponding change in Method; in other words,
that men having once relinquished the pursuit of essences and
causes would have been forced to adopt the Method of Verification, because that alone was competent to lead to certitude. But
History tells a different tale. Men did not adopt the Method of
Verification because they had previously relinquished all attempts
to penetrate into causes; but they relinquished all attempts to
penetrate into causes because they found that the only Method
which could lead to certainty was the Method of Verification,
which was not applicable to causes. Hence a gradual elimination followed the gradual rise of each particular science; till at
last, in the doctrine of Auguste Comte, all inquiry is limited to
such objects as admit of verification, in one way or another.
The Method of Verification, let us never forget, is the one
grand characteristic distinguishing Science from Philosophy,
modern inquiry from ancient inquiry. Of the ancients, Fontenelle felicitously says: " Souvent de faibles convenances, de
petites similitudes, des discours vagues et confus, passent chez
eux pour des preuves: aussi rien ne leur coute a prouver."  The
proof is, with us, the great object of solicitude. We demand certainty; and as the course of human evolution shows certainty to
be attainable on no other Method than the one followed by Science, the condemnation of Metaphysics is inevitable.




INTRODUCTION.                  XXxi
Grand, indeed, has been the effort of Philosophy; great the
part it has played in the drama of civilization; but the part is
played out. It has left the legacy bequeathed by every great
effort. It has enriched all succeeding ages, but its work is accomplished. Men have grown less presumptuous in speculation,
and inconceivably more daring in practice. They no longer
attempt to penetrate the mystery of the universe, but they explore the universe, and yoke all natural forces to their splendid
chariot of Progress. The marvels of our age would have seemed
more incredible to Plato, than were the Arabian Nights to Bentham; but while Science thus enables us to realize a wonderland
of fact, it teaches us to regard the unhesitating temerities of Plato
and Plotinus as we regard the efforts of a child to grasp the moon.
Philosophy was the great initiator of Science. It rescued the
nobler part of man from the dominion of brutish apathy and
helpless ignorance, nourished his mind with mighty impulses,
exercised it in magnificent efforts, gave him the unslaked, unslakable thirst for knowledge which has dignified his life, and
enabled him to multiply tenfold his existence and his happiness.
Having done this, its part is played. Our interest in it now is
purely historical.
The purport of' this history is to show how and why the interest in Philosophy has become purely historical.- In this purport
lies the principal novelty of the work. There is no other History of Philosophy written by one disbelieving in the possibility
of metaphysical certitude.
~ II. LIMITS OF THE WORK.
Having explained what is the final purpose of this History,
and makes it subservient to the general History of Humanity
rather than to any philosophical system, I will now briefly indicate the reasons which, apart from the limitations of my own
knowledge, have determined the selection of the illustrative
types. Brucker, having no purpose beyond that of accumulating
materials, includes in his History the speculations of Antediluvian, Scythian, Persian, and Egyptian thinkers. Mr. Maurice,
who has a purpose, also includes Hebrew, Egyptian, Hindoo,




XXxii                  INTRODUCTION.
Chinese, and Persian philosophies.* Other historians vary in
their limits, upon not very intelligible grounds. I begin with
Greece, because in the history of Grecian thought all the epochs
of speculative development are distinctly traceable; and as I write
the Biography of Philosophy, it is enough for my purpose if anywhere I can find a distinct filiation of ideas. Rome never had a
philosophy of its own; it added no new idea to the ideas borrowed from Greece. It occupies no place therefore in the
development of Philosophy, and is omitted from    this Biography.
The omission of the East, so commonly believed to have exercised extensive and profound influence on Greece, will to many
readers seem less excusable. But to unfold the arguments which
justify the omission here, would require more space than can be
spared in this Introduction. It is questionable whether the East
had any Philosophy distinct from its Religion; and still more
questionable whether Greece borrowed its philosophical ideas.t
True it is that the Greeks themselves supposed their early teachers to have drunk at the Eastern fount. True it is that modern
orientalists, on first becoming acquainted with the doctrines of
the Eastern sages, recognized strong resemblances to the doctrines of the Greeks; and a Rotht finds Aristotle to be the first
independent thinker, all his predecessors having drawn their
speculations fiom the Egyptian; while a Gladiscl~ makes it
quite obvious (to himself) that the Pythagorean system is nothing
but an adoption of the Chinese, the Heraclitic system an adoption of the Persian, the Eleatic of the Indian, the Empedoclean
of the Egyptian, the Anaxagorean of the Jewish. But neither
the vague tradition of the Greeks, nor the fallacious ingenuity of
moderns, weigh heavy in the scale of historical criticism. It is
true that coincidences of thought are to be found between
Grecian and many other systems; but coincidences are no evi* Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, part i., second edition, 1850: a
work of singular fascination and great ingenuity.
t I have elsewhere stated reasons for this belief.-Edinburgh Review, April,
1847, p. 852 sq.
4 Geschichte unserer abendliindischen Philosophie, i. p. 228 sq.
~ Die Religion und die Philosophie in ihrer weltgesch. Entwickelung.




INTRODUCTION.                 XXxiii
dence of direct filiation; and he has studied the history of speculation to little purpose who is not thoroughly familiar with the
natural tendency of the mind to sweep into the same tracks,
where others have been before, where others will find themselves
afterwards. Moreover, many of these coincidences, upon which
historical theories are based, turn out, on close inspection, to be
merely verbal, or at the best, approximative. Thus the physical
speculations of the Greeks often coincide in expression with those
of modern science. Does this prove that the moderns borrowed
their science fiom the ancients? M. Dutens thought so, and has
written an erudite but singularly erroneous book to prove it.
Democritus asserted the Milky Way to be only a cluster of stars;
but the assertion was a mere guess, wholly without proof, and
gained no acceptance. It was Galileo who discovered what Democritus guessed. Thus also Empedocles, Pythagoras, and Plato,
are said to have been perfectly acquainted with the doctrine of
gravitation; and this absurdity is made delusive by dint of
forced translations, which elicit something like coincidence of
expression, although every competent person detects the want of
coincidence in the ideas.*
Waiving all discussion of disputable and disputed points, it is
enough that in Greece fiom the time of Thales, and in Europe
fromn the time of Descartes, a regular development of Philosophy
is traceable, quite sufficient for our purpose, which is less that of
narrating the lives and expounding the opinions of various thinkers, than of showing how the course of speculation necessarily
brought about that radical change in Method which distinguishes
Philosophy from Science. In pursuance of such an aim it was
perfectly needless to include any detailed narrative of the speculations which, under the name of Scholasticism, occupied the
philosophical activity of the Middle Ages. Those speculations
were either subordinate to Theology, or were only instrumental
in perfecting philosophical language; and in this latter respect
the historian of Philosophy is no more called upon to notice
them, than a writer on the art of War would be called upon to
* Karsten expresses the distinction well: " Empedocles poetice adumbravit
idem quod tot seculis postea mathematicis rationibus demonstratum est a Newtono."-Philos. Graecor'um Operum Reliquice, p. xii.




XXXiV                INTRODUCTION.
give a history of the armorers of Milan or the sword-manufacturers of Toledo.
The same principle which determines the selection of Epochs
also determines the selection of the points of doctrine to be expounded. It is obvious that in nothing like the space to which
this work is limited could even the barest outline of all the opinions held by all the philosophers be crowded; nor would ten
times the space suffice for an exposition of those opinions with
any thing like requisite detail. Brucker's vast compilation, and
Ritter's laborious volumes, are open for any student desirous of
more detailed knowledge; but even they are imperfect. My
purpose is different; I write, the Biography, not the Annals of
Philosophy, and I am more concerned about the doctrines
peculiar to each thinker than about those held by him in common with others. If I can ascertain and make intelligible the
doctrines which formed the additions of each thinker to the previous stock, and which helped the evolution of certain germs of
philosophy, collateral opinions will need only such mention as is
necessary to make the whole course of speculation intelligible.
Thus limited in scope, I may find myself more at ease in the discussion of those points on which attention should be fastened.
More space can be given to fundamental topics. In restricting
myself to Descartes, Spinoza, and Kant, without noticing Cartesians, Spinozists, and Kantians, I also on the same principle restrict myself to what is in each thinker peculiar to him, and
directly allied to the course of philosophical development. The
student who needs the Pandects of Philosophy will have to look
elsewhere: this work only pretends to be a Summary.




FIRST EPOCH.
SPECULATIONS ON THE NATURE OF THE UNIVERSE.
CHAPTER I.
THE PHYSICISTS.
~ I. THALES.
ALTHOUGH the events of his life, no less than the precise doctrines of his philosophy, are shrouded in mystery, and belong to
the domain of fable, nevertheless Thales is very justly considered
as the father of Greek Speculation. He made an epoch. He
laid the foundation-stone of Greek philosophy. The step he took
was small, but it was decisive. Accordingly, although nothing
but a few of his tenets remain, and those tenets fragmentary and
incoherent, we know enough of the general tendency of his doctrines to speak of him with some degree of certitude.
Thales was born at Miletus, a Greek colony in Asia Minor.
The date of his birth is extremely doubtful; but the first year of
the 36th Olympiad (B. c. 636) is generally accepted as correct.
He belonged to one of the most illustrious families of Phoenicia,
and took a conspicuous part in all the political affairs of his
country,-a part which earned for him the highest esteem of his
fellow-citizens. His immense activity in politics has been denied
by later writers, as inconsistent with the tradition, countenanced
by Plato, of his having spent a life of solitude and meditation;
while on the other hand his affection for solitude has been questioned on the ground of his political activity. It seems to us
that the two things are perfectly compatible. Meditation does
1




2                    THE PHYSICISTS.
not necessarily unfit a man for action; nor does an active life
absorb all his time, leaving him none for meditation. The wise
man will strengthen himself by meditation before he acts; and
he will act, to test the truth of his opinions.
Miletus was one of the most flourishing Greek colonies; and
at the period we are now speaking of, before either a Persian or a
Lydian yoke had crushed the energies of its population, it was a
fine scene for the development of mental energies. Its commerce
both by sea and land was immense. Its political constitution
afforded the finest opportunities for individual development.
Thales both by birth and education would naturally be fixed
there, and would not travel into Egypt and Crete for the prosecution of his studies, as some maintain, although upon no sufficient authority. The only ground for the conjecture is the fact
of Thales being a proficient in mathematical knowledge; and
from very early times, as we see in Herodotus, it was the fashion
to derive the origin of almost every branch of knowledge from
Egypt. So little consistency is there however in this narrative
of his voyages, that he is said to have astonished the Egyptians
by showing them how to measure the height of their pyramids
by their shadows. A nation so easily astonished by one of the
simplest of mathematical problems could have had little to teach.
Perhaps the strongest proof that he never travelled into Egyptor that, if he travelled there, he never came into communication
with the priests-is the absence of all trace, however slight, of
any Egyptian doctrine in the philosophy of Thales which he
might not have found equally well at home.
The distinctive characteristic of the Ionian School, in its first
period, was its inquiry into the constitution of the universe.
Thales opened this inquiry.  It is commonly said: "Thales
taught that the principle of all things was water." On a first
glance, this will perhaps appear a mere extravagance. A smile
of pity may greet it, accompanied by a reflection on the smiler's
part, of the unlikelihood of his ever believing such an absurdity.
But the serious student will be slow to accuse his predecessors of




THALES.                        3
sheer and transparent absurdity.  The history of Philosophy
may be the history of errors; it is not a history of follies. All
the systems which have gained acceptance have had a pregnant
meaning, or they would not have been accepted. The meaning
was proportionate to the opinions of the epoch, and as/ such
is worth penetrating. Thales was one of the most extraordinary
men that ever lived, and produced an extraordinary revolution.
Such a man was not likely to have enunciated a philosophical
thought which any child might have refuted. There was deep
meaning in the thought, to him at least. Above all, there was deep
meaning in the attempt to discover the origin of things. Let us
endeavor to penetrate the meaning of his thought; let us see if
we cannot in some shape trace its rise and growth in his mind.
It is characteristic of philosophical minds to reduce all imaginable diversities to one principle.  As it is the inevitable
tendency of religious speculation to reduce polytheism to monotheism,-to generalize all the supernatural powers into one
expression,-so also was it the tendency of early philosophical
speculation to reduce all possible modes of existence into one
generalization of Existence itself.
Thales, speculating on the constitution of the universe, could
not but strive to discover the one principle-the primary Factthe substance, of which all special existences were but the modeos
Seeing around him constant transformations-birth and death,
change of shape, of size, and of mode of existence-he could not
regard any one of these variable states.of existence as Existence
itself. He therefore asked himself, What is that invariable Existence of which these are the variable states? In a word, What
is the beginning of things?
To ask this question was to open the era of philosophical
inquiry. Hitherto men had contented themselves with accepting
the world as they found it; with believing what they saw; and
with adoring what they could not see.
Thales felt that there was a vital question to be answered
relative to the beginning of things. He looked around him, and




4                     THE PHYSICISTS.
the result of his meditation was the conviction that Moisture was
the Beginning.
He was impressed with this idea by examining the constitution
of the earth. There also he found moisture everywhere. All
things he found nourished by moisture; warmth itself he
declared to proceed from moisture; the seeds of all things are
moist. Water when condensed becomes earth. Thus convinced
of the universal presence of water, he declared it to be the
beginning of things.
Thales would all the more readily adopt this notion from
its harmonizing with ancient opinions; such for instance as
those expressed in Hesiod's Theogony, wherein Oceanus and
Thetis are regarded as the parents of all such deities as had any
relation to Nature. "He would thus have performed for the
popular religion that which modern science has performed for
the Book of Genesis: explaining what was before enigmatical."*
It is this which gives Thales his position in Philosophy.
Aristotle calls him o rr rosau'r,  dpr.XYS  qpiXooopiag, the man
who made the first attempt to establisr a physical Beginning,
without the assistance of myths.  He has consequently been
accused of Atheism by modern writers; but Atheism is the
growth of a much later thought, and one under no pretence to
be attributed to Thales, except on the negative evidence of
Aristotle's silence, which we conceive to be directly counter
to the supposition, since it is difficult to believe Aristotle
would have been silent had he thought Thales believed or disbelieved in the existence of any thing deeper than Water, and prior
to it. Water was the adp, the beginning of all. When Cicero,
following and followed by writers far removed from the times of
Thales, t says that he " held water to be the beginning of things,
but that God was the mind which created things out of the
water," he does violence to the chronology of speculation. We
* Benj. Constant, Du Polytheisme Romain, i. 167.
t And uncritically followed by many moderns who feel a difficulty in
placing themselves at the point of view of ancient speculation.




ANAXIMENES.                       5
agree with Hegel that Thales could have had no conception of
God as Intelligence, since that is the conception of a more
advanced philosophy. We doubt whether we had any conception of a Formative Intelligence or of a Creative Power. Aristotle* very explicitly denies that the old Physicists made any
distinction between Matter (a iv X  xa; r vfoxsipsvov) and the
Moving Principle or Efficient Cause (m dp pX  rs xv'rsgS); and he
further adds that Anaxagoras was the first who arrived at a conception of a Formative Intelligence.t Thales believed in the Gods
and in the generation of the Gods: they, as all other things, had
their origin in water. This is not Atheism, whatever else it may be.
If it be true that he held all things to be living, and the world to
be full of demons or Gods, there is nothing inconsistent in this
with his views about Moisture as the origin, the starting-point,
the primary existence.
It is needless however to discuss what were the particular
opinions of a thinker whose opinions have only reached us in
fragments of uncritical tradition; all we certainly know is that
the step taken by Thales was twofold in its influence:-first, to
discover the Beginning, the prima materia of all things (' dp'i);
secondly, to select from among the elements that element which
was most potent and omnipresent. To those acquainted with
the history of the human mind, both these notions will be significant of an entirely new era.
~ II. ANAXIMENES.
Anaximander is by most historians placed after Thales. We
agree with Ritter in giving that place to Anaximenes. The
reasons on which we ground this arrangement are, first, that in
so doing we follow our safest guide, Aristotle; secondly, that the
doctrines of Anaximenes are the development of those of Thales;
whereas Anaximander follows a totally different line of speculation. Indeed, the whole ordinary arrangement of the Ionian
* Arist. Metaph. i. 8.
t It will presently be seen that Diogenes was the first to conceive this.




6                    THE PHYSICISTS.
School seems to have proceeded on the conviction that each disciple not only contradicted his master, but also returned to the
doctrines of his master's teacher. Thus Anaximander is made to
succeed Thales, though quite opposed to him; whereas Anaximenes, who only carries out the principles of Thales, is made the
disciple of Anaximander. When we state that 212 years, i. e.
six or seven generations, are taken up by the lives of the four
individuals said to stand in the successive relations of teacher and
pupil, Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, and Anaxagoras, the
reader will be able to estimate the value of the traditional relationship.
The truth is, only the names of the great leaders in philosophy
were thought worth preserving; all those who merely applied or
extended the doctrine were very properly consigned to oblivion.
This is also the principle upon which the present history is composed. No one will therefore demur to our placing Anaximenes
second to Thales: not as his disciple, but as his historical successor; as the man who, taking up the speculation where Thales
and his disciples left it, transmitted it to his successors in a more
developed form.
Of the life of Anaximenes nothing further is known than that
he was born at Miletus, probably in the 63d Olympiad (B. c. 529),
others say in the 58th Olympiad (B. c. 548), but there is no possibility of accurately fixing the date. He is said to have discovered the obliquity of the Ecliptic by means of the gnomon.
Pursuing the method of Thales, he could not satisfy himself
of the truth of his doctrine. Water was not to him the most
significant element. He felt within him a something which
moved him he knew not how, he knew not why; something
higher than himself; invisible, but ever-present: this he called
his life. His life he believed to be air. Was there not also
without him, no less than within him, an ever-moving, everpresent, invisible air? The air which was within him, and which
he called Life, was it not a part of the air which was without
him? and, if so, was not this air the Beginning of things?




DIOGENES OF APOLLONIA.                   7
He looked around him and thought his conjecture was confirmed; The air seemed universal.*  The earth was as a broad
leaf resting upon it. All things were produced from it; all things
were resolved into it. When he breathed, he drew in a part of
the universal life. All things were nourished by air, as he was
nourished by it.
To Anaximenes, as to most of the ancients, Air breathed and
expired seemed the very stream of life, holding together all the
heterogeneous substances of which the body was composed, giving
them not only unity, but force, vitality. The belief in a living
world-that is to say, of the universe as an organism-was very
ancient, and Anaximenes, generalizing from the phenomena of
individual life to universal life, made both dependent on Air. In
many respects this was an advance on the doctrine of Thales,
and the reader may amuse himself by finding its coincidence with
some speculations of modern science. A grave chemist like
Dumas can say, "Les Plantes et les Animaux derivent de l'air,
ne sent que de l'air condens6, ils viennent de lair et y retournent;"
and Liebig, in a well-known passage of the Chemical Letters, eloquently expresses the same idea.
~ III. DIOGENES OF APOLLONIA.
Diogenes of Apollonia is the proper successor to Anaximenes,
although, from the uncritical arrangement usually adopted, he is
made to represent no epoch whatever. Thus, Tennemann places
him after Pythagoras. Hegel, by a strange oversight, says that
we know nothing of Diogenes but the name.
Diogenes was born at Apollonia, in Crete. More than this
we are unable to state with certainty; but as he is said to have
been a contemporary of Anaxagoras, we may assume him to have
flourished about the 80th Olympiad (B. c. 460). His work On
* When Anaxirenes speaks of Air, as when Thales speaks of Water, we
must not understand these elements as they appear in this or that determinate form on earth, but as Water and Air pregnant with vital energy and
capable of infinite transmutations.




8                    THE PHYSICISTS.
Nature was extant in the time of Simplicius (the sixth century
of our era), who extracted some passages from it.
Diogenes adopted the tenet of Anaximenes respecting Air as
the origin of things; but he gave a wider and deeper signification to the tenet by attaching himself more to its analogy with
the Soul.*  Struck with the force of this analogy, he was led to
push the conclusion to its ultimate limits. What is it, he may
have asked himself, which constitutes Air the origin of things?
Clearly its vital force. The air is a Soul; therefore it is living
and intelligent. But this Force or Intelligence is a higher thing
than the Air, through which it manifests itself; it must consequently be prior in point of time; it must be the apXn philosophers have sought. The Universe is a living being, spontaneously
evolving itself, deriving its transformation from its own vitality.
There are two remarkable points in this conception, both indicative of very great progress in speculation. The first is the
attribute of Intelligence, with which the dpX; is endowed. Anaximenes considered the primary substance to be an animated
substance. Air was Life, in his system, but the Life did not
necessarily imply Intelligence. Diogenes saw that Life was not
only Force, but Intelligence; the air which stirred within him
not only prompted, but instructed. The Air, as the origin of all
things, is necessarily an eternal, imperishable substance; but as
soul, it is also necessarily endowed with consciousness. " It knows
much," and this knowledge is another proof of its being the primary substance; "for without Reason," he says, "it would be
impossible for all to be arranged duly and proportionately; and
whatever object we consider will be found to be arranged and
ordered in the best and most beautiful manner."  Order can result only from Intelligence; the Soul is therefore the first (apx ).
This conception was undoubtedly a great one; but that the
* By Soul (Auvx;) we must understand Life in its most general meaning,
rather than Mind in the modern sense. Thus the treatise of Aristotle 7repi
Auvxls is a treatise on the Vital Principle, including Mind, not a treatise on
Psychology.




DIOGENES OF APOLLONIA.                 9
reader may not exaggerate its importance, nor suppose that the
rest of Diogenes' doctrines were equally reasonable and profound,
we must for the sake of preserving historical truth advert to one
or two of his applications of the conception. Thus:
The world, as a living unity, must like other individuals derive
its vital force from the Whole: hence he attributed to the world
a set of respiratory organs, which he fancied he discovered in the
stars. All creation and all material action were but respiration
and exhalation. In the attraction of moisture to the sun, in the
attraction of iron to the magnet, he equally saw a process of respiration. Man is superior to brutes in intelligence because he
inhales a purer air than brutes who bow their heads to the
ground.
These naive attempts at the explanation of phenomena will
suffice to show that although Diogenes had made a large stride,
he had accomplished very little of the journey.
The second remarkable point indicated by his system is the
manner in which it closes the inquiry opened by Thales. Thales,
starting from the conviction that one of the four elements was
the origin of the world, and Water that element, was followed
by Anaximenes, who thought that not only was Air a more universal element than Water, but that, being life, it must be the
universal Life. To him succeeded Diogenes, who saw that not
only was Air Life, but Intelligence, and that Intelligence must
have been the First of Things.
We concur therefore with Ritter in regarding Diogenes as the
last philosopher attached to the Physical method; and that in
his system the method receives its consummation. Having thus
traced one great line of speculation, we must now cast our eyes
upon what was being contemporaneously evolved in another direction.
1l




CHAPTER II.
THE HEMEEMATICIANS.
~ I. ANAXIMANDER OF MILETUS.' As we now, for the first time in the history of Greek Philosophy, meet with contemporaneous developments, the observation will not perhaps be deemed superfluous that in the earliest
times of philosophy, historical evidences of the reciprocal influence of the two lines either entirely fail or are very unworthy of
credit; on the other hand, the internal evidence is of very limited value, because it is impossible to prove a complete ignorance
in one, of the ideas evolved and carried out in the other; while
any argument drawn from an apparent acquaintance therewith
is far from being extensive or tenable, since all the olden philosophers drew from one common source-the national habit of
thought. When indeed these two directions had been more
largely pursued, we shall find in the controversial notices sufficient evidence of an active conflict between these very opposite
views of nature and the universe. In truth, when we call to
mind the inadequate means at the command of the earlier philos,
ophers for the dissemination of their opinions, it appears extremely probable that their respective systems were for a long
time known only within a very narrow circle. On the supposition, however, that the philosophical impulse of these times was
the result of a real national want, it becomes at once probable
that the various elements began to show themselves in Ionia
nearly at the same time, independently and without any external
connection."*
* Ritter, i. 265.




ANAXIMANDER OF MILETUS.                   11
The chief of the school we are now about to consider was
Anaximander' of Miletus, whose birth may be dated in the 42d
Olympiad (B. c. 610). He is sometimes called the friend and
sometimes the disciple of Thales. We prefer the former relation; the latter is at any rate not the one in which this history
can regard him. His reputation, both for political and scientific knowledge, was very great; and many important inventions are ascribed to him, amongst others that of the sun-dial
and the sketch of a geographical map.  His calculations of the
size and distance of the heavenly bodies were committed to writing in a small work, which is said to be the earliest of all philosophical writings. IIe was passionately addicted to mathematics, and fralned a series of geometrical problems.  He was the
leader of a colony to Apollonia; and he is also reported to
have resided at the court of the tyrant Polycrates, in Samos,
where also lived Pythagoras and Anacreon.
No two historians are agreed in their interpretation of Anaximander's doctrines; few indeed are agreed as to the historical
position he is to occupy.
Anaximander is stated to have been the first to use the term
dpXx for the Beginning of things.    What he meant by this
term principle is variously interpreted by the ancient writers;
for, although they are unanimous in stating that he called it the
infinite (ro a<rslpov), what he understood by the infinite is yet
undecided.*
On a first view, nothing can well be less intelligible than this
tenet: " The Infinite is the origin of all things."  It either looks
like the monotheism of a far later date,t or like the word-jugglery of mysticism. To our minds it is neither more nor less
* Ritter, i. 267.
t Which it certainly could not have been. To prevent any misconception of the kind, we may merely observe that the Infinite here meant, was
not even the Limitless Power, much less the Limitless Mind, implied in the
modern conception. In Anaxagoras, who lived a century later, we find rb
arulpov to be no more tlhan vastness.-See Simplicius, Phys. 33, b, quoted in
Ritter.




12                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
difficult of comprehension than the tenet of Thales, that " Water
is the origin of all things." Let us cast ourselves back in imagination into those early days, and see if we cannot account for the
rise of such an opinion.
On viewing Anaximander side by side with his great predecessor and friend, Thales, we cannot but be struck with the exclusively abstract tendency of his speculations. Instead of the
meditative Metaphysician, we see a Geometrician. Thales, whose
famous maxim, "Know thyself," was essentially concrete, may
serve as a contrast to Anaximander, whose axiom, " The Infinite
is the origin of all things," is the ultimate effort of abstraction.
Let us concede to him this tendency; let us see in him the geometrician rather than the moralist or physicist; let us endeavor
to understand how all things presented themselves to his mind
in the abstract form, and how mathematics was the science of
sciences, and we shall then perhaps be able to understand his
tenets.
Thales, in searching for the origin of things, was led, as we
have seen, to maintain water to be that origin. But Anaximander, accustomed to view things in the abstract, could not
accept so concrete a thing as Water: something more ultimate
in the analysis was required. Water itself, which in common
with Thales, he held to be the material of the universe, was it
not subject to conditions?  What were those conditions  This
Moisture, of which all things are made, does it not cease to be
moisture in many instances? And can that which is the origin
of all, ever change, ever be confounded with individual things?
Water itself is a thing; but a Thing cannot be All Things.
These objections to the doctrine of Thales caused him to reject, or rather to modify, that doctrine. The dpXZ, he said, was
not Water; it must be the Unlimited All, ro airsipov.
Vague and profitless enough this theory will doubtless appear.
The abstraction "All" will seem a mere distinction in words.
But in Greek Philosophy, as we shall repeatedly notice, distinctions in words were generally equivalent to distinctions in things.




ANAXIMANDER OF MILETUS.                13
And if the reader reflects how the mathematician, by the very
nature of his science, is led to regard abstractions as entities,to separateform, and treat of it as if it alone constituted body,there will be no difficulty in conceiving Anaximander's distinction between all Finite Things and the Infinite All.
It is thus only we can explain his tenet; and this explanation
seems borne out by the testimony of Aristotle and Theophrastus,
who agree, that by the Infinite he understood the multitude of
elementary parts out of which individual things issued by separation. "By separation:" the phrase is significant. It means
the passage fiom the abstract to the concrete,-the All realizing
itself in the Individual Thing. Call the Infinite by the name of
Existence, and say, " There is existence per se, and Existence per
eliud; the former is Existence, the ever-living fountain whence
flow the various existing Things." In this way we may, perhaps,
make Anaximander's meaning intelligible.
Let us now hear Ritter. Anaximander "is represented as arguing that the primary substance must have been infinite to be
all-sufficient for the limitless variety'of produced things with
which we are encompassed. Now, although Aristotle especially
characterizes this infinite as a mixture, we must not think of it
as a mere multiplicity of primary material elements; for to the
mind of Anaximander it was a Unity immortal and imperishable
-an ever-producing energy. This production of individual
things he derived from an eternal motion of the Infinite."
The primary Being, according to Anaximander, is unquestionably a Unity. It is One yet All. It comprises within itself the
multiplicity of elements from which all mundane things are composed; and these elements only need to be separated from it to
appear as separate phenomena of nature. Creation is the decomposition of the Infinite. How does this decomposition originate? By tire eternal motion which is the condition of the
Infinite. "He regarded," says Ritter, "the Infinite as being in
a constant state of incipiency, which, however, is nothing but
a constant secretion and concretion of certain immutable ele



14                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
ments; so that we might well say, the parts of the whole are
constantly changing, while the whole is unchangeable."
The idea of elevating an abstraction into a Being-the origin
of all things-is baseless enough; it is as if we were to say,
"There are numbers 1, 2, 3, 20, 80, 100; but there is also
Number in the abstract, of which these individual numbers are
but the concrete realization: without Number there will be no
numbers." Yet so difficult is it for the human mind to divest
itself of its own abstractions, and to consider them as no more
than as abstractions, that this error lies at the root of the majority
of philosophical systems. It may help the reader to some tolerance of Anaximander's error to learn that celebrated philosophers of modern times, Hegel and others, have maintained precisely the same tenet, though somewhat differently worded:
they say, that Creation is God passing into activity, but not exhausted by the act; in other words, Creation is the mundane
existence of God; finite Things are but the eternal motion, the
manifestation of the All.
Anaximander separated himself from Thales by regarding the
abstract as of higher significance than the concrete: and in this
tendency we see the origin of the Pythagorean school, so often
called the mathematical school. The speculations of Thales tended towards discovering the material constitution of the universe;
they were founded, in some degree, upon an induction from observed facts, however imperfect that induction might be. The
speculations of Anaximander were wholly deductive; and, as
such, tended towards mathematics, the science of pure deduction.
As an example of this mathematical tendency we may allude
to his physical speculations. The central point in his cosmopceia was the earth; for, being of a cylindrical form, with a base
in the ratio 1: 3 to its altitude, it was retained in its centre by
the aid and by the equality of its distances from all the limits
of the world.
From the foregoing exposition the Reader may judge of the
propriety of that ordinary historical arrangement which places




PYTHAGORAS.                     15
Anaximander as the successor of Thales. It is clear that he
originated one of the great lines of speculative inquiry, and that
one, perhaps, the most curious in all antiquity. By Thales,
Water, the origin of things, was held to be a real physical element, which in the hands of his successors became gradually
transformed into a merely representative emblem of something
wholly different (Life or Mind); and the element which lent its
name as the representative was looked upon as a secondary
phenomenon, derived from that primary force of which it was the
emblem. Water was the real primary element with Thales; with
Diogenes, Water (having previously been displaced for Air) was
but the emblem of Mind. Anaximander's conception of the All,
though abstract, is nevertheless to a great degree physical: it is
All Things. His conception of the Infinite was not ideal; it
had not passed into the state of a symbol; it was the mere description of the primary fact of existence. Above all, it involved
no conception of intelligence except as a mundane finite thing.
His TiO a'rspov was the Infinite Existence, but not the Infinite
Mind. This later development we shall meet with hereafter in
the Eleatics.
~ II. PYTHAGORAS,
The life of Pythagoras is enshrouded in the dim magnificence
of legends, from which the attempt to extricate is hopeless. Certain general indications are doubtless to be trusted; but they are
few and vague.
As a specimen of the trouble necessary to settle any one point
in this biography, we will here cite the various dates given by
ancient authors and modern scholars as the results of their inquiries into his birth. Diodorus Siculus says 61st Olympiad;
Clemens Alex., 62d 01.; Eusebius, 63d or 64th 01.; Stanely,
53d 01.; Gale, 60th O1.; Dacier, 47th 01.; Bentley, 43d Oi.;
Lloyd, 43d 01.; Dodwell, 52d 01.; Ritter, 49th 01.; Thirlwall, 51st 01.: so that the accounts vary within the limits of
eighty-four years. If we must make a choice, we should decide




16                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
with Bentley; not only from respect for that magnificent scholar,
but because it agrees with the probable date of the birth of one
known to have been Pythagoras's friend and contemporary, Anaximander.
Pythagoras is usually classed amongst the great founders of
Mathematics; and this receives confirmation from what we know
of the general scope of his labors, and from the statement that
he was chiefly occupied with the determination of extension and
gravity, and measuring the ratios of musical tones. His science
and skill are of course absurdly exaggerated, as indeed is every
portion of his life. Fable assigns him the place of a saint, a
worker of miracles, and a teacher of more than human wisdom.
His very birth was marvellous, some accounts making him the
son of Hermes, others of Apollo: in proof of the latter, he is
said to have exhibited a golden thigh. With a word he tamed
the Daunian bear, which was laying waste the country; with a
whisper he restrained an ox from devouring beans. He was
heard to lecture at different places, such as Metapontum and
Taurominium, on the same day and at the same hour. As he
crossed the river, the river-god saluted him with " Hail, Pythagoras!" and to him the harmony of the Spheres was audible
music.
Fable enshrines these wonders. But that they could exist,
even as legendary lore, is significant of the greatness of Pythagoras. It is well said by Sir Lytton Bulwer that "not only all
the traditions respecting Pythagoras, but the certain fact of the
mighty effect that in his single person he afterwards wrought in
Italy, prove him also to have possessed that nameless art of making a personal impression upon mankind, and creating individual
enthusiasm, which is necessary to those who obtain a moral
command, and are the founders of sects and institutions. It is
so much in conformity with the manners of the time and the
objects of Pythagoras, to believe that he diligently explored the
ancient religious and political systems of Greece, from which he
had been long a stranger, that we cannot reject the traditions




PYTHAGORAS.                     17
(however disfigured with fable) that he visited Delos, and affected to receive instructions from the pious ministrants of Delphi."*
It is no ordinary man whom Fable exalts into its poetical region.
Whenever you find romantic or miraculous deeds attributed, be
certain that the hero was great enough to sustain the weight of
this crown of fabulous glory.
But the fact thus indicated is a refutation of the ordinary tradition of his having borrowed all his learning and philosophy
from the East. Could not so great a man dispense with foreign
teachers? Assuredly he could, and did. But his countrymen,
by a very natural process of thought, looked upon his greatness
as the result of his Eastern education. No man is a prophet in
his own country; and the imaginative Greeks were peculiarly
prone to invest the distant and the foreign with striking attributes.
They could not believe in wisdom springing up from amongst
them; they turned to the East as to a vast and unknown region,
whence all novelty, even of thought, must come.
When we consider, as Ritter observes, how Egypt was peculiarly the wonder-land of the olden Greeks, and how, even in
later times, when it was so much better known, it was still, as it
is to this day, so calculated to excite awe by the singular character of its people, which, reserved in itself, was always obtruding on the observer's attention through the stupendous structures of national architecture, we can easily imagine how the
Greeks were led to establish some connection between this mighty
East and their great Pythagoras.
But, although we can by no means believe that Pythagoras
was much indebted to Egypt for his doctrines, we are not skeptical as to the account of his having travelled there. Samos was in
constant intercourse with Egypt. If Pythagoras had travelled
into Egypt, or indeed listened to the relations of those who had
done so, he would have thereby obtained as much knowledge of
Egyptian customs as appears in his system; and that without
* Athens, its Rise and Fall, ii. 412.




18                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
having had the least instruction from the Priesthood. The doctrine of metempsychosis was a public doctrine with the Egyptians; though, as Ritter says, he might not have been indebted
to them even for that. Funeral customs and abstinence from
particular kinds of food were things to be noticed by any traveller.
But the fundamental objection to Pythagoras having been instructed by the Egyptian Priests, is to be sought in the constitution of the priestly caste itself. If the priests were so jealous
of instruction as not to bestow it even on the most favored ol
their countrymen unless belonging to their caste, how unreasonable to suppose that they would bestow it on a stranger, and one
of a different religion!
The ancient writers were sensible of this objection. To get
rid of it they invented a story which we shall give as it is given
by Brucker. Polycrates was in friendly relations with Amasis,
King of Egypt, to whom he sent Pythagoras, with a recommendation to enable him to gain access to the Priests. The king's
authority was not sufficient to prevail on the Priests to admit a
stranger to their mysteries: they referred Pythagoras therefore
to Thebes, as of greater antiquity. The Theban Priests were
awed by the royal mandate, but were loth to admit a stranger
to their rites. To disgust the novice, they forced him to undergo
several severe ceremonies, amongst which was circumcision. But
he could not be discouraged. He obeyed all their injunctions with
such patience that they resolved to take him into their confidence. He spent two-and-twenty years in Egypt, and returned
perfect master of all science. This is not a bad story: but there
is one objection to it-it is not substantiated.
To Pythagoras the invention of the word Philosopher is
ascribed. When he was in Peloponnesus he was asked by Leontius, what was his art. "I have no art; I am a philosopher,"
was the reply. Leontius never having heard the name before,
asked what it meant. Pythagoras gravely answered, "This life
may be compared to the Olympic games: for as in this assembly
some seek glory and the crowns; some by the purchase or by




PYTHAGORAS.                    19
the sale of merchandise seek gain; and others, more noble than
either, go there neither for gain nor for applause, but solely to
enjoy this wonderful spectacle, and to see and know all that
passes. We, in the same manner, quit our country, which is
Heaven, and come into the world, which is an assembly where
many work for profit, many for gain, and where there are but
few who, despising avarice and vanity, study nature. It is these
last whom I call Philosophers; for as there is nothing more noble
than to be a spectator without any personal interest, so in this
life the contemplation and knowledge of nature are infinitely
more honorable than any other application." It is necessary to
observe that the ordinary interpretation of Philosopher, as Pythagoras meant it, a " lover of wisdom," is only accurate where the
utmost extension is given to the word "lover."  Wisdom must
be the " be-all and the end-all here" of the philosopher, and not
simply a taste or a pursuit. It must be his mistress, to whom a
life is devoted. This was the meaning of Pythagoras. The word
which had before designated a wise man was doog. But he
wished to distinguish himself from the Sophoi, or philosophers
of his day, by name, as he had done by system. What was the
meaning of Sophos? Unquestionably what we mean by a wise
man, as distinct from a philosopher; one whose wisdom is practical, and turned to practical purposes; one who loves wisdom
not for its own sake so much as for the sake of its uses. Now
Pythagoras loved wisdom for its own sake. Contemplation was
to him the highest exercise of humanity: to bring wisdom down
to the base purposes of life was desecration. He called himself
therefore a Philosopher-a Lover of Wisdom-to demarcate
himself fiom those who sought Wisdom only as a power to be
used for ulterior ends.
This interpretation of the word Philosopher may explain some
of his opinions. Above all, it explains the constitution of his
Secret Society, into which no one was admitted except after a
severe initiation. For five years the novice was condemned to
silence. Many relinquished the task in despair; they were




20               THE MATHEMATICIANS.
unworthy of the contemplation of pure wisdom. Others, in
whom the tendency to loquacity was observed to be less, had the
period commuted. Various humiliations had to be endured;
various experiments were made of their powers of self-denial.
By these Pythagoras judged whether they were worldly-minded,
or whether they were fit to be admitted into the sanctuary of
science. Having purged their souls of the baser particles by
purifications, sacrifices, and initiations, they were admitted to the
sanctuary, where the higher part of the soul was purged by the
knowledge of truth, which consists in the knowledge of immaterial and eternal things. For this purpose he commenced with
Mathematics, because, as they just preserve the medium between
corporeal and incorporeal things, they can alone draw off the
mind from Sensible things and conduct them to Intelligibles.
Shall we wonder, then, that he was venerated as a God? He
who could transcend all earthly struggles, and the great ambitions of the greatest men, to live only for the sake of wisdom,
was he not of a higher stamp than ordinary mortals? Well
might later historians picture him as clothed in robes of white,
his head crowned with gold, his aspect grave, majestical, and
calm; above the manifestation of any human joy, of any human
sorrow; enwrapt in contemplation of the deeper mysteries of existence; listening to music and the hymns of Homer, Hesoid,
and Thales, or listening to the harmony of the spheres. And to
a lively, talkative, quibbling, active, versatile people like the
Greeks, what a grand phenomenon must this solemn, earnest,
silent, meditative man have appeared!
From Sir Lytton Bulwer's Athens we borrow the following
account of the political career of Pythagoras: —"Pythagoras
arrived in Italy during the reign of Tarquinius Superbus, according to the testimony of Cicero and Aulus Gellius, and fixed his
residence in Croton, a city in the bay of Tarentum, colonized by
Greeks of the Achean tribe. If we may lend a partial credit to
the extravagant fables of later disciples, endeavoring to extract
from florid super-addition some original germ of simple truth, it




PYTHAGORAS.                     21
would seem that he first appeared in the character of a teacher
of youth, and, as was not unusual in those times, soon rose from
the preceptor to the legislator. Dissensions in the city favored
his objects. The Senate (consisting of a thousand members,
doubtless of a different race from the body of the people-the
first the posterity of the settlers, the last the native population)
availed itself of the arrival and influence of an eloquent and renowned philosopher. le lent himself to the consolidation of
aristocracies, and was equally inimical to democracy and tyranny.
But his policy was that of no vulgar ambition. He refused, at
least for a time, ostensible power and office, and was contented
with instituting an organized and formidable society, not wholly
dissimilar to that mighty Order founded by Loyola in times comparatively recent. The disciples admitted into this society underwent examination and probation: it was through degrees that
they passed into its higher honors, and were admitted into its
deeper secrets. Religion made the basis of the fraternity, but
religion connected with human ends of advancement and power.
He selected the three hundred who at Croton formed his Order,
from the noblest families, and they were professedly reared to
know themselves, that so they might be fitted to command the
world. It was not long before this society, of which Pythagoras
was the head, appears to have supplanted the ancient Senate and
obtained the legislative administration. In this Institution Pythagoras stands alone; no other founder of Greek philosophy resembles him. By all accounts he also differed from the other
sages of his time in his estimation of the importance of women.
He is said to have lectured to, and taught them. His wife was
herself a philosopher, and fifteen disciples of the softer sex rank
among the prominent ornaments of his school. An Order based
upon so profound a knowledge of all that can fascinate or cheat
mankind could not fail to secure a temporary power. His influence was unbounded in Croton: it extended to other Italian
cities; it amended or overturned political constitutions; and had
Pythagoras possessed a more coarse and personal ambition, he




22                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
might perhaps have founded a mighty dynasty, and enriched our
social annals with the result of a new experiment. But his was
the ambition not of a hero, but a sage. He wished rather to
establish a system than to exalt himself. His immediate followers
saw not all the consequences that might be derived from the
fraternity he founded; and the political designs of his gorgeous
and august philosophy, only for awhile successful, left behind
them but the mummeries of an impotent freemasonry, and the
enthusiastic ceremonies of half-witted ascetics.
" It was when this power, so mystic and so revolutionary, had,
by the means of branch societies, established itself throughout a
considerable portion of Italy, that a general feeling of alarm and
suspicion broke out against the sage and his sectarians. The
anti-Pythagorean risings, according to Porphyry, were sufficiently numerous and active to be remembered long generations
afterwards. Many of the sage's friends are said to have perished,
and it is doubtful whether Pythagoras himself fell a victim to the
rage of his enemies, or died a fugitive amongst his disciples at
Metapontum. Nor was it until nearly the whole of Lower Italy
was torn by convulsions, and Greece herself drawn into the contest as pacificator and arbiter, that the ferment was allayed. The
Pythagorean institutions were abolished, and the timocratic democracies of the Achseans rose upon the ruins of those intellectual
but ungenial oligarchies.
" Pythagoras committed a fatal error when, in his attempt to
revolutionize society, he had recourse to aristocracies for his
agents. Revolutions, especially those influenced by religion, can
never'be worked out but by popular emotions. It was from this
error of judgment that he enlisted the people against him; for
by the account of Neanthes, related by Porphyry, and indeed
from all other testimony, it is clearly evident that to popular
not party commotion his fall must be ascribed. It is no less
clear that after his death, while his philosophical sect remained,
his political code crumbled away. The only seeds sown by
philosophers which spring up into great States, are those




PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.              23
that, whether for good or evil, are planted in the hearts of the
Many."
We cannot omit the story which so long amused the world,
respecting his discovery of the musical chords. Hearing one day,
in the shop of a blacksmith, a number of men striking successively
a piece of heated iron, he remarked that all the hammers, except
one, produced harmonious chords, viz. the octave, the fifth, and
the third; but the sound between the fifth and the third was discordant. On entering the workshop, he found the diversity of
sounds was owing to the difference in the weight of the hammers.
He took the exact weights, and on reaching home suspended four
strings of equal dimensions, and hanging a weight at the end of
each of the strings equal to the weight of each hammer, he struck
the strings, and found the sounds correspond with those of the
hammers. He then proceeded to the formation of a musical scale.
On this, Dr. Burney, in his History of Music, remarks: " Though
both hammers and anvil have been swallowed by ancients and
moderns with most ostrich-like digestion, yet upon examination and
experiment it appears that hammers of different size and weight
will no more produce different tones upon the same anvil, than
bows or clappers of different size will from the same string or bell."
We close here our account of the life of Pythagoras, reminding
the reader that one great reason for the fabulous and contradictory assertions collected together in histories and biographies
arises from the uncritical manner in which the " authorities" have
been used. To take only one "authority" as an example: Iamblicus wrote his Life of Pythagoras with a view of combating the
rising doctrine of Christianity, and of opposing by implication a
Pagan philosopher to Christ. The miracles that were attributed
to Pythagoras have no better source than this.
~ III. PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.
There is no system in the whole course of our history more
difficult to seize and represent accurately than that commonly
known as the Pythagorean. It has made prodigious noise in the




24                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
world; so much so as to be often confounded with its distant
echoes. An air of mystery, always inviting to a large class, surrounds it. The marvellous relations concerning its illustrious
founder, the supposed assimilation it contains of various elements
of Eastern speculation, and the supposed symbolical nature of its
doctrines, have all equally combined to render it attractive and
contradictory. Every dogma in it has been traced to some prior
philosophy. Not a vestige will remain to be called the property
of the teacher himself, if we restore to the Jews, Indians, Egyptians, Chaldeans, Phoenicians, nay even Thracians, those various
portions which he is declared to have borrowed from them.
All this pretended plagiarism we incline to think extremely
improbable: Pythagoras was a consequence of Anaximander;
and his doctrines, in as far as we can gather from their leading
tendency, were but a continuation of that abstract and deductive
philosophy of which Anaximander was the originator.
At the outset we must premise, that whatever interest there
may be in following out the particular opinions recorded as belonging to Pythagoras, such a process is quite incompatible with
our plan. The greatest uncertainty still exists, and must forever exist amongst scholars, respecting the genuineness of those
opinions. Even such as are recorded by trustworthy authorities
are always vaguely attributed by them to " the Pythagoreans,"
not to Pythagoras. Modern criticism has clearly shown that the
works attributed to Timseus and Archytas are spurious; and that
the supposed treatise of Ocellus Lucanus on the "Nature of the
All" cannot even have been written by a Pythagorean. Plato
and Aristotle, the only ancient writers who are to be trusted in
this matter, do not attribute any peculiar doctrines to Pythagoras.
The reason is simple. Pythagoras taught in secret; and never
wrote. What he taught his disciples it is impossible accurately
to learn from what those disciples themselves taught. His influence
over their minds was unquestionably immense; and this influence
would communicate to his school a distinctive tendency, but not
one accordant doctrine; for each scholar would carry out that




PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.                  25
tendency in the direction which best suited his tastes and
powers.*
The extreme difficulty of ascertaining accurately what Pythagoras thought, or even what his disciples thought, will not embarrass us if we can but ascertain the general tendency of their
speculations, and, above all, the peculiarity of their method.
For this difficulty-which, to the critical historian insuperable,
only affects us indirectly-renders indeed our endeavor to seize
the characteristic method and tendency more hazardous and
more liable to contradiction; but it does not compel us to interrupt our march for the sake of storming every individual fortress
of opinion we may encounter on our'way. We have to trace
out the, map of the philosophical world; we must be careful to
ascertain the great outlines of each country: this we may be
enabled to do without absolutely being acquainted with the internal varieties of that country, for geographers are not bound
to be also geologists.
What were the method and tendency of the Pythagorean
school? The method, purely deductive; the tendency, wholly
towards the consideration of abstractions as the only true materials of science. Hence the name not unfrequently given to
that school, of "the Mathematical."  The list of Pythagoreans
embraces the greatest names in mathematics and astronomy,Archytas and Philolaus, and subsequently Hipparchus and
Ptolemy.t
* We assume this to be the case; but we do not assume it groundlessly.
We are guided by the striking analogy afforded by the celebrated Saint-Simon. Like Pythagoras, the Frenchman published no complete account of
his system. He communicated it to his disciples; and, as his influence over
their minds was almost unparalleled, the tendency of his philosophy took
deep root, though producing very different fruits in different minds. Those
moderately acquainted with French writers will appreciate this when we
simply enumerate MM. Augustin Thierry, Auguste Comte, Pierre Leroux,
Michel Chevalier, Le Pere Enfantin, and M. Bazard, all disciples of SaintSimon.
t 2Eschylns, a disciple of Pythagoras, makes his Titan boast of having
discovered for men, Number, the highest of the sciences; Ka' ui/v aptOfpv,
toxov ao(LtaAdrwr, il6pov airois. —Prom., 459.
2




26                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
We may now perhaps, in some s6rt, comprehend what Pythagoras meant when he taught that Numbers were the principles
of Things: rouv dplOio'S alrouv Esivac r-r' o~diaS,* or, to translate
more literally, "Numbers are the cause of the material existence
of Things;" ovlac being here evidently the expression of concrete
existence. This is confirmed by the wording of the formula
given elsewhere by Aristotle, that Nature is realized from Numbers: rqv (qR)dv sk dpj8uiOv duvv~r-afi.t Or again: Things are
but the copies of Numbers: ^P,~tv s7vaB r ra'- i rciv dpOio3v.1
What Pythagoras meant was, that numbers were the ultimate
nature of things. Anaximander saw that things in themselves
are not final; they are constantly changing both position and
attributes; they are variable, and the principle of existence must
be invariable; he called that invariable existence THE ALL.
Pythagoras saw that there was an invariable existence lying
beneath these varieties; but he wanted some more definite expression for it, and he called it Number. Thus each individual
thing may change its position, its mode of existence; all its peculiar attributes may be destroyed except one, namely, its numerical attribute. It is always " One" thing; nothing can destroy
that numerical existence. Combine the Thing in every possible
variety of ways, and it still remains " One;" it cannot be less than
"one," it cannot be made more than "one."  Resolve it into its
minutest particles, and each particle is one. Having thus
found that numerical existence was the only invariable existence, he was easily led to proclaim all Things to be but copies
of Numbers. "All phenomena must originate in the simplest
elements," says Sextus Empiricus, " and it would be contrary to
reason to suppose the Ptinciple of the Universe to participate in
the nature of sensible phenomena. The Principia are consequently not only invisible and intangible, but also incorporeal."
As numerical existence is the ultimate state at which analysis
can arrive with respect to finite Things, so also is it the ultimate
* Aristot. Metaph. i. 6.  t De CCalo, iii. 1.   t Metaph. i. 6.




PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.               27
state at which we can arrive with respect to the Infinite, or Existence in itself. The Infinite, therefore, must be One. One is
the absolute number; it exists in and by itself; it has no need
of any relation with any thing else, not even with any other
number; Two is but the relation of One to One. All modes of
existence are but finite aspects of the Infinite; so all numbers
are but numerical relations of the One. In the original One
all numbers are contained, and consequently the elements of the
whole world.
Observe, moreover, that One is necessarily the &pXn —the beginning of things so eagerly sought by philosophers, since, whereever you begin, you must begin with One. Suppose the number be three, and you strike off the initial number to make two,
the second then will be One. In a word, One is the Beginning
of all things.
The verbal quibble on which this, as indeed the whole system
reposes, need not excite any suspicion of the sincerity of Pythagoras. The Greeks were unfortunately acquainted with no language but their own: and, as a natural consequence, mistook
distinctions in language for distinctions in things. It has been
well said by Dr. Whewell, that " all the first attempts to comprehend the operations of Nature led to the introduction of abstract conceptions, vague indeed, but not therefore unmeaning.
And the next step in philosophizing necessarily was to make
those vague abstractions more clear and fixed, so that the logical
faculty should be able to employ them securely and coherently.
But there were two ways of making this attempt; the one, by
examining the words only, and the thoughts which they call up;
the other, by attending to the facts and things which bring these
abstract terms into use. The Greeks followed the verbal or notional course, and failed."*
It is only by means of the above explanation that we can any
way credit the belief in distinctions so wire-drawn as those of
* History of the Inductive Sciences, i. 84.




28                 THE MATHEMATICIANS.
Pythagoras; it is only thus that we can understand how he
could have held that Numbers were Beings. Aristotle attributes this philosophy to the fondness of Pythagoras for mathematics, which concerns itself with the abstract, not with the
material existence of sensible things; but surely this is only half
the explanation? The mathematicians in our day not only reason entirely with symbols, which stand as the representatives of
things, without having the least affinity or resemblance to the
things (being wholly arbitrary marks), but very many of these
men never trouble themselves at all with inspecting the things
about which they reason by means of symbols. Much of the
science of Astronomy is carried on by those who never use a
telescope; it is carried on by figures upon paper, and calculations of those figures. Because, however, astronomers use numbers as symbols, they do not suppose that numbers are more
than symbols. Pythagoras was not able to make this distinction. He believed that numbers were things in reality, not
merely in symbol. When therefore Ritter says that the Pythagorean formula "can only be taken symbolically," lie appears
to us to commit a great anachronism, and to antedate by several
centuries a mode of thought at variance with all we know of
Greek Philosophy; at variance also with the express testimony
of Aristotle, who says, "The Pythagoreans did not separate
Numbers from Things. They held number to be the Principle
and Material of things, no less than their essence and power."*
The notion that because we, in the present state of philosophy,
cannot conceive Numbers otherwise than as symbols, therefore
Pythagoras must have conceived them in the same way, is one
* Metaph. i. 5. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say, " Numbers are
the beginning of things, the cause of their material existence (iXt7v ro7S ova:
Aristotle has before defined 4Ou as causa materialis, cap. 3) and of their modifications (us,rdOi0 rs icai tG15)."
The whole chapter should be consulted by those who believe in the symbolical use of numbers; a belief Aristotle had certainly no suspicion of. I
have translated all the passages bearing on this point at the close of this
Section.




PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.                29
which has been very widely spread, but which we hold to be as
great an anachronism as Shakespeare's Hector quoting Aristotle,
or Racine exhibiting the etiquette of Versailles in the camp of
Aulis. And Ritter himself, after having stated with considerable
detail the various points in this philosophy, admits that the
essential doctrine rests on "the derivation of all in the world
from mathematical relations, and on the resolution of the relations of space and time into those of units or numbers. All proceeds from the original one, or primary number, or from the
plurality of units or numbers into which the one in its life-development divides itself." Now, to suppose that this doctrine was
simply mathematical, and not mathematico-cosmological, is to
violate all principles of historical philosophy; for it is to throw
the opinions of our day into the period of Pythagoras. For a
final proof, consider the formula, tI~iLv sevai r'a  ovr a rov
dps8i0v, "Things are the copies of Numbers."  This formula,
which of all others is the most favorable to the notion we are
combating, will on a close inspection exhibit the real meaning
of Pythagoras to be directly the reverse of symbolical. Symbols
are arbitrary marks, bearing no resemblance to the things they
represent; a, b, c, x are but letters of the alphabet; the mathematician makes them the symbols of quantities, or of things;
but no one would call x the copy of an unknown quantity. But
what is the meaning of Things being copies of Numbers, if they
are Numbers in essence? The meaning we must seek in anterior explanations. We shall there find that Things are the
concrete existences of abstract Existence; and that when numbers
are said to be the principia, it is meant that the forms of material things, the original essences, which remain invariable, are
Numbers.* Thus a stone is One stone; as such it is a copy of
One; it is the realization of the abstract One into a concrete
* Hence we must caution against supposing Pythagoras to have anticipated the theory of " definite proportions." Numbers are not the laws of
combination, nor the expression of those laws, but the essences which remain invariable under every variety of combination.




30                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
stone. Let the stone be ground to dust, and the particle of
dust is still a copy, another copy of the One.
The reader will bear in mind that we have only a few mystical
expressions, such as, "Number is the principle of Things,"
handed down to us as the doctrines of a Thinker who created a
considerable school, and whose influence on philosophy was
undeniably immense. We have to interpret these expressions
as we best can. Above all, we have to give them some appearance of plausibility; and this not so much an appearance of
plausibility to modern thinkers as what would have been plausible to the ancients. Now, as far as we have familiarized ourselves with the antique modes of thought, our interpretation of
Pythagoras is one which, if not the true, is at any rate very
analogous to it; by such a logical process he might have arrived
at his conclusions, and for our purpose this is almost the same as
if he had arrived at them by it.
This history has but to settle two questions respecting Pythagoras: first, did he regard Numbers as symbols merely, or as
entities? Second, if he regarded them as entities, how could he
have arrived at such an opinion? The second of these questions
has been answered in a hypothetical manner in the remarks just
made; but of course the explanation is worthless if the first question be negatived, and to that question therefore we now turn. If
we are to accept the authority of Aristotle, the question is distinctly
and decisively answered, as we have seen, in favor of the reality
of Numbers. It is true that doubts are thrown on the authority
of Aristotle, who is said to have misunderstood or misrepresented
the Pythagorean doctrine; but when we consider the comprehensiveness and exactness of Aristotle's mighty intellect; when
we consider further that he had paid more than his usual attention to the doctrines of the Pythagoreans, having written a
special treatise thereon, we shall be slow to reject any statement
he may make unless better evidence is produced; and where can
better evidence be sought? Either we must accept Aristotle, or
be silent on the whole matter; unless, indeed, we prefer-as




PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.                31
many prefer-our own sagacity to his authority. It may be
stated as a final consideration; that the view taken by the Stagirite is in perfect conformity with the opinions of Anaximander;
so that given, the philosophy of the master, we might a priori
deduce the opinions of the pupil.
The nature of this Work forbids any detailed account of the
various opinions attributed to Pythagoras on subsidiary points.
But we may instance his celebrated theory of the music of the
spheres as a good specimen of the deductive method employed
by him. Assuming that every thing in the great Arrangement
(x6ot0og), which he called the world, must be harmoniously
arranged, and, assuming that the planets were at the same proportionate distances from one another as the divisions of the
monochord, he concluded that in passing through the ether they
must make a sound, and that this sound would vary according to
the diversity of their magnitude, velocity, and relative distance.
Saturn gave the deepest tone, as being the furthest from the
earth; the Moon gave the shrillest, as being nearest to the earth.
It may be necessary just to state that the attempt to make
Pythagoras a Monotheist is utterly without solid basis, and
unworthy of detailed refutation.
His doctrine of the Transmigration of Souls has been regarded
as symbolical; with very little reason, or rather with no reason
at all. He defined the soul to be a Monad (unit) which was
self-moved.* Of course the soul, inasmuch as it was a number,
was One, i. e. perfect. But all perfection, in as far as it is
moved, must pass into imperfection, whence it strives to regain
its state of perfection. Imperfection he called a.departure from
unity; two therefore was accursed.
The soul in man is in a state of comparative imperfection.t
It has three elements, Reason (voGV), Intelligence (qp'v), and
* Aristot., De Animd, i. 2.
t Thus Aristotle expresses himself when he says that the Pythagoreans
maintained the soul and intelligence to be a certain combination of numbers,
ra 69 Troovi (sc. rv ldpi0Vpiv i droso) 4sX- Kai viw. —Jetaphs, i. 5.




32                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
Passion (utoigs): the two last man has in common with brutes;
the first is his distinguishing characteristic. It has hence been
concluded that Pythagoras could not have maintained the doctrine of transmigration, his distinguishing man from brutes being
a refutation of those who charge him with the doctrine.*  The
objection is plausible, and points out a contradiction; but there
is abundant evidence for the belief that transmigration was
taught.t The soul, being a self-moved monad, is One, whether
it connect itself with two or with three; in other words, the
essence remains the same whatever its manifestations. The One
soul may have two aspects, Intelligence and Passion, as in
brutes; or it may have the three aspects, as in man. Each of
these aspects may predominate, and the man will then become
eminently rational, or able, or sensual. He will be a philosopher,
a man of the world, or a beast. Hence the importance of the
Pythagorean initiation, and of the studies of Mathematics and
Music.
"This soul, which can look before and after, can shrink and
shrivel itself into an incapacity of contemplating aught but the
present moment, of what depths of degeneracy is it capable!
What a beast it may become! And if something lower than
itself, why not something higher? And if something higher
and lower, may there not be a law accurately determining its
elevation and descent? Each soul has its peculiar evil tastes,
bringing it to the likeness of different creatures beneath itself;
why may it not be under the necessity of abiding in the condition of that thing to which it had adapted and reduced itself?2"
In closing this account of a very imperfectly known doctrine,
we have only further to exhibit its relation to the preceding
philosophy. It is clearly an offshoot of Anaximander's doctrine,
* Pierre Leroux, De l'Humaniti, i. 890-426.
t Plato distinctly mentions the transmigration into beasts.-Phcdrus, p. 45.
And the Pythagorean Timaeus, in his statement of the doctrine, also expressly includes beasts.-Timcus, p. 45.
t Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy.




PHILOSOPHY OF PYTHAGORAS.               33
which it develops in a more logical manner. In Anaximander
there remained a trace of physical inquiry; in Pythagoras
science is frankly mathematical. Assuming that number is the
real invariable essence of the world, it was a natural deduction
that the world is regulated by numerical proportions; and from
this all the rest of his system followed as a consequence. Anaximander's system is but a rude and daring sketch of a doctrine
which the great mathematical genius of Pythagoras developed.
The Infinite of Anaximander became the One of Pythagoras.
Observe that in neither of these systems is Mind an attribute of
the Infinite. It has been frequently maintained that Pythagoras
taught the doctrine of "a soul of the world."  But there is no
solid ground for the opinion, any more than for that of his
Theism, which later writers anxiously attributed to him. The
conception of an Infinite Mind is much later than Pythagoras.
He only regarded Mind as a phenomenon; as the peculiar manifestation of an essential number; and the proof of this assertion
we take to lie in his very doctrine of the soul. If the Monad,
which is self-moved, can pass into the state of a brute or of
a plant, in which state it successively loses its Reason (voS) and
its Intelligence (pp'?v) to become merely sensual and concupiscible, does not this abdication of Reason and Intelligence distinctly
prove them to be only variable manifestations (phenomena) of
the invariable Essence? Assuredly; and those who argue for
the Soul of the World as an Intelligence in the Pythagorean
doctrine, must renounce both the doctrine of transmigration and
the central doctrine of the system, the invariable Number as the
Essence of things.
Pythagoras represents the second epoch of the second Branch
of Ionian Philosophy; he is parallel with Anaximenes.
20




34                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
Translationsfrom the 5th Chapter of Book I. of Aristotle's
Metaphysics.
"In the age of these philosophers [the Eleats and Atomists],
and even before them, lived those called Pythagoreans, who
at first applied themselves to mathematics, a science they improved; and, having been trained exclusively in it, they fancied
that the principles of mathematics were the principles of all
things.
" Since numbers are by nature prior to all things, in Numbers
they thought they perceived'greater analogies with that which
exists and that which is produced (oo01P-ara qroXXa ro7s outi
xaci rsyovogs), than in fire, earth, or water. So that a certain
combination of Numbers was justice; and a certain other combination of Numbers was Reason and Intelligence; and a certain
other combination of Numbers was opportunity (xaipoS); and so
of the rest.
"Moreover, they saw in Numbers the combinations of harmony. Since therefore all things seemed formed similarly to
Numbers, and Numbers being by nature anterior to things, they
concluded that the elements (,rosxsEa) of Numbers are the elements of things, and that the whole heaven is a harmony and
a Number. Having indicated the great analogies between Numbers and the phenomena of heaven and its parts, and with the
phenomena of the whole world (riv o'Xv 6iaxo~tFr~iv), they
formed a system; and if any gap was apparent in the system,
they used every effort to restore the connection. Thus, since
Ten appeared to them a perfect number, potentially containing
all numbers, they declared that the moving celestial bodies (ra
sepol/eva xa.ra rov oupavov) were ten in number; but because
only nine are visible they imagined (~ro0ioi) a tenth, the Anticthone.
We have treated of all these things more in detail elsewhere.
But the reason why we recur to them is this-that we may
learn from these philosophers also what they lay down as their




ARISTOTLErS METAPHYSICS.              35
first principles, and by what process they hit upon the causes
aforesaid.
"They maintained that Number was the Beginning (Principle, apX4) of things, the cause of their material existence, and
of their modifications and different states. The elements (drojXseia)
of Number are Odd and Even. The Odd is finite, the Even
infinite. Unity, the One, partakes of both these, and is both
Odd and Even. All number is derived from the One. The
heavens, as we said before, are composed of numbers. Other
Pythagoreans say there are ten Principia, those called co-ordinates:
The finite and the infinite.
The odd and the even.
The one and the many.
The right and the left.
The male and the female.
The quiescent and the moving.
The right line and the curve.
Light and darkness.
Good and evil.
The square and the oblong.
"... All the Pythagoreans considered the elements as material; for the elements are in all things, and constitute the
world....... The finite, the infinite, and the One they maintained
to be not separate existences, such as are fire, water, etc.; but
the abstract Infinite and the abstract One are respectively the
substance of the things of which they are predicated, and hence,
too, Number is the substance of all things (auro ti aVErsipov,
xa; aIr TO',eI otdlotv sdiv'a rourov). They began by attending
only to the Form, and began to define it; but on this subject
they were very imperfect. They define superficially; and that
which suited their definition they declared to be the essence
(causa materialis) of the thing defined; as if one should maintain that the double and the number two are the same thing,




36                THE MATHEMATICIANS.
because the double is first found in the two. But two and the
double are not equal (in essence), or if so, then the one would
be many; a consequence which follows from their (the Pythagorean) doctrine."
(We add also a passage from the 7th Chapter of the same Book.)
"; The Pythagoreans employ the Principia and Elements more
strangely than even the Physiologists; the cause of which is
that they do not take them from sensible things (auo'ra oux sk
a~cOriv). However, all their researches are physical; all their
systems are physical. They explain the production of heaven,
and observe that which takes place in its various parts, and its
revolutions; and thus they employ their Principles and Causes,
as if they agreed with the Physiologists, that whatever is is
material (a1~'O-ov), and is that which contains what we call
heaven.
"But their Causes and Principles we should pronounce sufficient (xav&s) to raise them up to the conception of Intelligible
things,-of things above sense (Esravagf3vai xcl sq;i' Ma dvovwepw
Trv OvT'v); and would accord with such a conception much
better than with that of physical things."
This criticism of Aristotle's is a perfect refutation of those who
see in Pythagoras the traces of symbolical doctrine. Aristotle
sees how much more rational the doctrine would have been had
it been symbolical; but this very remark proves that it was
not so.




CHAPTER III.
THE ELEATICS.
~ I. XENOPHANES.
THE contradictory statements which so long obscured the question of the date of Xenophanes' birth, may now be said to be
satisfactorily cleared up. M. Victor Cousin's essay on the subject will leave few readers unconvinced.* We may assert therefore with some probability, that Xenophanes was born in the
40th Olympiad (B. c. 620-616), and that he lived nearly a hundred years. His birthplace was Colophon, an Ionian city of
Asia Minor; a city long famous as the seat of elegiac and gnomic
poetry, and ranking the poet Mimnermus among its celebrated
men. Xenophanes cultivated this species of poetry from youth
upwards; it was the joy of his youth, the consolation of his manhood, and support of his old age. Banished from his native city,
he wandered over Sicily as a Rhapsodist;f  a profession he exercised apparently till his death, though, if we are to credit Plutarch, with very little pecuniary benefit. He lived poor, and died
poor. But he could dispense with riches, having within him treasures inexhaustible. He whose whole soul was enwrapt in the contemplation of grand ideas, and whose vocation was the poetical
expression of those ideas, needed but little worldly grandeur.
He seems to have been one of the most remarkable men of anti* Nouveaux Fi'agmens Philosophiques.-The critical reader will observe
some misstatements in this essay, but on the whole it is well worthy of
perusal. Karsten's Xenophabnis Carminwum Reliquiae is of great value.
t The Rhapsodists were the Minstrels of antiquity. They learned poems
by heart, and recited them to assembled crowds on the occasions of feasts.
Homer was a rhapsodist, and rhapsodized his own verses.




38                      THE ELEATICS.
quity, and also one of the most fanatical. He had no pity for
the idle and luxurious superstitions of his time; he had no tolerance for the sunny legends of Homer, defaced as they were by
the errors of polytheism. He, a poet, was fierce in the combat
he perpetually waged with the first of poets: not from petty
envy; not from petty ignorance; but from the deep sincerity of
his heart, from the holy enthusiasm of his reverence. He who
believed in one God, supreme in power, goodness, and intelligence, could not witness without pain the degradation of the
Divine in the common religion. He was not dead to the poetic
beauty of the Homeric fables, but keenly alive to their religious
falsehood. Plato, whom none will accuse of wanting poetical
taste, made the same objection. The latter portion of the second
and the beginning of the third books of Plato's Republic are but
expansions of these verses of Xenophanes:
"Such things of the Gods are related by Homer and Hesiod
As would be shame and abiding disgrace to any of mankind;
Promises broken, and thefts, and the one deceiving the other."
He who firmly believed in
"One God, of all beings divine and human the greatest,
Neither in body alike unto mortals, neither in spirit,"*
could not but see, "more in sorrow than in anger," the gross anthropomorphism of his fellows:
"But men foolishly think that Gods are born like as men are,
And have too a dress like their own, and their voice and their figure:
But if oxen and lions had hands like ours, and fingers,
Then would horses like unto horses, and oxen to oxen,
Paint and fashion their god-forms, and give to them bodies
Of like shape to their own, as they themselves too are fashioned."t
* This is too important a position to admit of our passing over the original:
E' Oibs Tv rT eoL'at Kai avOp(o7rlcT  iEyTlaros
Ore iqpas OvjIroThlv b&loi'os olsr v6,ia.-Fragm. i., ed. Kaarsten.
Wiggers, in his Life of Socrates, expresses his surprise that Xenophanes
was allowed to speak so freely respecting the State Religion in Magna
Graecia, when philosophical opinions much less connected with religion
had proved so fatal to Anaxagoras in Athens. But the apparent contradiction is perhaps reconciled when we remember that Xenophanes was a
poet, and poets have in all ages been somewhat privileged persons.
t Fragments v. and vi. are here united, as in Ritter; the sense seems




XENOPHANES.                      39
In confirmation of which satire he referred to the Ethiopians,
who represent their gods with flat noses and black complexion;
while the Thracians give them blue eyes and ruddy complexions.
Having attained a clear recognition of the unity and perfection of the Godhead, it became the object of his life to spread
that conviction abroad, and to tear down the thick veil of superstition which hid the august countenance of truth. He looked
around him, and saw mankind divided into two classes: those
who speculated on the nature of things, endeavoring to raise
themselves up to a recognition of the Divine; and those who
yielded an easy unreflecting assent to the superstitions which
composed religion. The first class speculated; but they kept
their speculations to themselves, and to a small circle of disciples.
If they sought truth, it was not to communicate it to all minds:
they did not work for humanity, but for the few. Even Pythagoras, earnest thinker as he was, could not be made to believe in
the fitness of the multitude for truth. He had two sorts of doctrine to teach: one for a few disciples, whom he chose with extreme caution; the other for those who pleased to listen. The
former doctrine was what he believed the truth; the latter was
what he thought the masses were fitted to receive. Xenophanes
recognized no such distinction. Truth was for all men; to all
men he endeavored to present it; and for three-quarters of a
century he, the great Rhapsodist of Truth, emulated his countryman Homer, the great Rhapsodist of Beauty, and wandered into
many lands, uttering the thought which was working in him.
What a contrast is presented by these two Ionian singers! contrast in purpose, in means, and in fate. The rhapsodies of the
philosopher, once so eagerly listened to and affectionately preserved in traditionary fragments, are now only extant in briefest
extracts contained in ancient books, so ancient and so uninteresting as to be visited only by some rare old scholars and a few
to demand this conjunction. But Clemens Alexandrinus quotes the second Fragment as if it occurred in another part of the poem; introducing
it with Kai rdtXv utloa, "and again he says." —Karsten, p. 41.




40                     THE ELEATICS.
dilettanti spiders; while the rhapsodies of the blind singer are
living in the brain and heart of thousands and thousands, who
go back to them as the fountain-source of poetry, the crystal
mirror of an antique world.
The world presented itself to Homer in pictures, to Xenophanes
in problems. The one saw Nature, enjoyed it, and painted it.
The other also saw Nature, but questioned it, and wrestled with
it. Every trait in Homer is sunny clear; in Xenophanes there
is indecision, confusion. In Homer there is a resonance of gladness, a sense of manifold life, activity, and enjoyment. In Xenophanes there is bitterness, activity of a spasmodic sort, infinite
doubt, and infinite sadness. The one was a poet singing as the
bird sings, carolling for very exuberance of life; the other was a
Thinker, and a fanatic. He did not sing, he recited:
" Ah! how unlike
To that large utterance of the early Gods!"
That the earnest philosopher should have opposed the sunny
poet, opposed him even with bitterness, on account of the degraded actions and motives which he attributed to the Gods, is
natural; but we must distinguish between this opposition and
satire. Xenophanes was bitter, not satirical. The statement derived from Diogenes, that he wrote satires against Homer and Hesiod, is erroneous.* Those who think otherwise are referred to
the excellent essay of Victor Cousin, before mentioned, or to
Ritter.
Rhapsodizing philosophy, and availing himself, for that purpose, of all that philosophers had discovered, he wandered from
place to place, and at last came to Elea, where he settled. Hegel
questions this: he says he finds no distinct mention of such a
fact in any of the ancient writers; on the contrary, Strabo, in his
* riypaft,e Ka E v,caitv, Kai sasyeias,,Kai idpfsovs Kara'HatoLov ica'Otripov.
Here, says M. Cousin, the word idlf3ovs is either an interpolation of a copyist, as Feurlin and Rossi conjecture, or else it is a misstatement by Diogenes.
There is not a single iambic verse of his remaining. But in his hexameters
he opposes Homer and Hesiod, as we have seen.




XENOPHANES.                      41
sixth book, when describing Elea, speaks of Parmenides and
Zeno as having lived there, but is silent respecting Xenophanes,
which Hegel holds to be suspicious. Indeed the words of Diogenes Laertius are vague. He says, "Xenophanes wrote two
thousand verses on the foundation of Colophon, and on a colony
sent to Elea." This by no means implies that he lived there.
Nevertheless we concur with the modern writers who, from the
various connections with the Eleatics observable in his fragments,
maintain that he must actually have resided there. The reader
is again referred to M. Cousin on this point. Be that as it may,
Xenophanes terminated a long and active life without having
solved the great problem. The indecision of his acute mind
sowed the seeds of that skepticism which was hereafter to play so
large a part in philosophy. All his knowledge enabled him only
to know how little he knew. His state of mind is finely described
by Timon the sillograph, who puts into the mouth of Xenophanes
these words:
"Oh that mine were the deep mind, prudent and looking to both sides!
Long, alas! have I strayed on the road of error, beguiled,
And am, now, hoary of years, yet exposed to doubt and distraction
Manifold, all-perplexing, for whithersoever I turn me
I am lost in the One and All." —(is v ravr6 re rayv dveX6sro.)*
It now remains for us to state some of the conclusions at which
this great man arrived. They will not, perhaps, answer to the
reader's expectation; as with Pythagoras, the reputation for extraordinary wisdom seems ill justified by the fragments of that
wisdom which have descended to us. But although to modern
philosophy the conclusions of these early thinkers may appear
trivial, let us never forget that it is to these early thinkers that
we owe our modern philosophy. Had there not been many a
" Gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge, like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought,"t
* Preserved by Sextus Empiricus, Hypot. Pyrrhon. i. 224; and quoted
also by Ritter, i. 443.
t Tennyson.




42                    THE ELEATICS.
we should not have been able to travel on the secure terrestrial
path of slow inductive science. The impossible has to be proved
impossible, before men will consent to limit their endeavors to
the compassing of the possible. And it was the cry of despair
which escaped from Xenophanes, the cry that nothing can be
certainly known, which first called men's attention to the nothingness of knowledge, as knowledge was then conceived. Xenophanes
opens a series of thinkers, which attained its climax in Pyrrho.
That he should thus have been at the head of the monotheists,
and at the head of the skeptics, is sufficient to entitle his speculations to an extended consideration here.
~ II. THE PHILOSOPHY OF XENOPHANES.
The great problem of existence had early presented itself to his
mind; and the resolution of that problem by Thales and Pythagoras had left him unsatisfied.  Neither the physical nor the
mathematical explanation could still the doubts which rose within
him. On all sides he was oppressed with mysteries, which these
doctrines could not penetrate. The state of his mind is graphically painted in that one phrase of Aristotle's: " Casting his eyes
upwards at the immensity of heaven, he declared that The One
is God."  Overarching him was the deep blue, infinite vault,
immovable, unchangeable, embracing him and all things; that
he proclaimed to be God. As Thales had gazed abroad upon the
sea, and felt that he was resting on its infinite bosom, so Xenophanes gazed above him at the sky, and felt that he was encompassed by it. Moreover it was a great mystery, inviting yet defying scrutiny. The sun and moon whirled to and fro through
it; the stars were
" Pinnacled dim in its intense inane."
The earth was constantly aspiring to it in the shape of vapor, the
souls of men were perpetually aspiring to it with vague yearnings. It was the centre of all existence; it was Existence itself.
It was The One,-the Immovable, on whose bosom the Many
were moved.




THE PHILOSOPHY OF XENOPHANES.              43
Is not this the explanation of that opinion universally attributed to him, but always variously interpreted, " God is a sphere?"
The Heaven encompassing him and all things, was it not The
One Sphere which he proclaimed to be God?
It is very true that this explanation does not exactly accord
with his physics, especially with that part which relates to the
earth being a flat surface, whose inferior regions are infinite, by
which he explained the fixity of the earth. M. Cousin, in consequence of this discrepancy, would interpret the phrase as metaphorical. "The epithet spherical is simply a Greek locution, to
indicate the perfect equality and absolute unity of God, and of
which a sphere may be an image. The ~cpalipxo'; of the Greeks
is the rotundus of the Latins. It is a metaphorical expression,
such as that of square, meaning perfect; an expression which,
though now become trivial, had at the birth of mathematical
science something noble and elevated in it, and is found in most
elevated compositions of poetry. Simonides speaks of a'man
square as to his feet, his hands, and his mind,' meaning an accomplished man; and the metaphor is also used by Aristotle.
It is not, therefore, surprising that Xenophanes, a poet as well as
a philosopher, writing in verse, and incapable of finding the metaphysical expression which answered to his ideas, should have
borrowed from the language of imagination the expression which
would best render his idea."
We should be tempted to adopt this explanation, could we be
satisfied that the Physics of Xenophanes were precisely what it
is said they were, or that they were such at the epoch in which
he maintained the sphericity of God. This latter difficulty is insuperable, but has been unobserved by all critics. A man who
lives a hundred years, necessarily changes his opinions on such
subjects; and when opinions are so lightly grounded, as were
those of philosophers at that epoch, it is but natural to admit
that the changes may have been frequent and abrupt. In this
special instance, scholars have been aware of the very great and
irreconcilable contradictions existing between certain opinions




44                    THE ELEATICS.
equally authentic; showing him to have been decidedly Physical
(Ionian) in one department, and as decidedly Mathematical (Pythagorean) in another.
As to the case in point, Aristotle's express statement of Xenophanes having " looked up at heaven, and pronounced The One
to be God," is manifestly at variance with any belief in the infinity of the lower regions of the earth. The One must be the
Infinite.
To return, however, to his Monotheism, or more properly
Pantheism, which is the greatest peculiarity of his doctrine: he
not only destroyed the notion of a multiplicity of Gods, but he
proclaimed the Self-existence and Intelligence of The One.
God must be Self-existent; for to conceive Being as incipient is
impossible. Nothing can be produced from Nothing. Whence,
therefore, was Being produced? From itself? No; for then it
must have been already in existence to produce itself, otherwise
it would have been produced from nothing. Hence the primary
law: Being is self-existent. If self-existent, consequently eternal.
As in this it is implied that God is all-powerful and all-wise
and all-existent, a multiplicity of Gods is inconceivable.
It also follows that God is immovable, when considered as
The All:
"Wholly unmoved and unmoving it ever remains in the same place,
Without change in its place when at times it changes appearance."
The All must be unmoved; there is nothing to move it. It
cannot move itself; for to do so it must be external to itself.
We must not suppose that he denied motion to finite things
because he denied it to the Infinite. He only maintained that
The All was unmoved. Finite things were moved by God:
" without labor, he ruleth all things by reason and insight." His
monotheism was carefully distinguished from anthropomorphism,
as the verses previously quoted have already exemplified. Let
us only further remark on the passage in Diogenes Laertius,
wherein he is said to have maintained that "God did not resemble man, for he heard and saw all things without respira



THE PHILOSOPHY OF XENOPHANES.              45
tion." This is manifestly an allusion to the doctrine of Anaximenes that the soul was air. The intelligence of God, being
utterly unlike that of man, is said to be independent of respiration.*
It is necessary to caution the reader against the supposition
that by the One God Xenophanes meant a Personal God, distinct from the universe. He was a monotheist in contradistinction to his polytheistical contemporaries; but his monotheism
was pantheism. Indeed this point would never have been
doubted, notwithstanding the ambiguity of language, if moderns
had steadily kept before their minds the conceptions held by the
Greeks of their Gods as personifications of the Powers of Nature.
When Xenophanes argued against the polytheism of his contemporaries, he argued against their personifying as distinct deities the various aspects of The One; he was wroth with their
degradation of the divine nature by assimilating it to human
nature, by making these powers persons, and independent existences,-conceptions irreconcilable with that of the unity of God.
He was a monotheist therefore, but his monotheism was panthe
ism; he could not separate God from  the world, which was
merely the manifestation of God; he could not conceive God
as the One Existent, and admit the existence of a world not God.
There could be but One Existence with many modes; that one
was God.
There is another tenet of almost equal importance in his system, and one which marks the origin of that skeptical philosophy which we shall see henceforward running through all the
evolutions of this history, always determining a crisis in speculation. Up to the time of Xenophanes philosophy was unsuspectingly dogmatical: it never afterwards recovered that simple
position. He it was who began to doubt, and to confess the in* Only by thus connecting one doctrine with another can we hope to understand ancient philosophy. It is in vain that we puzzle ourselves with
the attempt to penetrate the meaning of these antique fragments of thought
unless we view them in relation to the opinions of their epoch.




46                     THE ELEATICS.
competence of Reason to solve doubts and compass the exalted
aims of philosophy. Yet the doubt was moral rather than psychological. It was no systematic skepticism: an earnest spirit
struggling after Truth, whenever he obtained, or thought he obtained, a glimpse of her celestial countenance, he proclaimed his
discovery, however it might contradict what he had before announced. Long travel, various experience, examination of different systems, new and contradictory glimpses of the problem he
was desirous of solving,-these working together produced in
his mind a skepticism of a noble, somewhat touching sort, wholly
unlike that of his successors. It was the combat of contradictory
opinions in his mind, rather than disdain of knowledge. His
faith was steady, his opinions vacillating. He had a profound
conviction of the existence of an eternal, all-wise, infinite Being;
but this belief he was unable to reduce to a consistent formula.
There is deep sadness in these verses:
" Surely never hath been, nor ever shall be a mortal
Knowing both well the Gods and the All, whose nature we treat of;
For when by chance he at times may utter the true and the perfect,
He wists not unconscious; for error is spread over all things."
In vain M. Cousin attempts to prove that these verses are not
skeptical; many of the recorded opinions of Xenophanes are of
the same tendency. The man who had lived to find his most
cherished convictions turn out errors, might well be skeptical of
the truth of any of his opinions. But this skepticism was vague;
it did not prevent his proclaiming what he held to be the truth;
it did not prevent his search after truth.
For although Truth could never be compassed in its totality
by man, glimpses could be caught.'AXX&i xpov,rouvw'rs
(pauvpiaxovuv apsirvov: we cannot indeed be certain that our knowledge is absolute; we can only strive our utmost, and believe our
opinions to be probable. This is not scientific skepticism; it
does not ground itself on an investigation of the nature of Intelligence and the sources of our knowledge: it grounds itself
solely on the perplexities into which philosophy is thrown. Thus




THE PHILOSOPHY OF XENOPHANES.               47
reason (i. e. the logic of his day) taught him that God the Infinite could not be infinite, neither could he be finite. Not infinite, because non-being alone, as having neither beginning,
middle, nor end, is unlimited (infinite). Not finite, because one
thing can only be limited by another, and God is one, not many.
In like manner did logic teach him that God was neither
moved nor unmoved. Not moved, because one thing can only
be moved by another, and God is one, not many; not unmoved,
because non-being alone is unmoved, inasmuch as it neither goes
to another, nor does another come to it.
With such verbal quibbles as these did this great thinker
darken his conception of the Deity. They were not quibbles to
him; they were the real conclusions involved in the premises
from which he reasoned. To have doubted their validity would
have been to doubt the possibility of philosophy. He was not quite
prepared for that: and Aristotle in consequence calls him " somewhat clownish," &ypo04xlopog (Met. i. 5); meaning that his conceptions were rude and undigested, instead of being systematized.
Although in the indecision of Xenophanes we see the germs
of later skepticism, we are disposed to agree with M. Cousin in
discrediting his absolute skepticism-resting on the incomprehensibility of all things —xac'raX'iAa m'averv. Nevertheless some
of M. Cousin's grounds appear to us questionable.*
The reader will, perhaps, have gathered from the foregoing,
that Xenophanes was too much in earnest to believe in the incomprehensibility of all things, however the contradictions of his
logic might cause him to suspect his and other people's conclusions. Of course, if carried out to their legitimate consequences,
his principles lead to absolute skepticism; but he did not so
* E. g. He says: "It appears that Sotion, according to Diogenes, attributed to Xenophanes the opinion, all things are incomprehensible; but Diogenes adds that Sotion was wrong on that point." (Fragmens, p. 89.) Now
this is altogether a misstatement. Diogenes says: "Sotion pretends that
no one before Xenophanes maintained the incomprehensibility of all things;
but he is wrong." Diogenes here does not deny that Xenophanes held the
opinion, but that any one held it before him.




48                    THE ELEATICS.
carry them out, and we have no right to charge him with consequences which he himself did not draw. Indeed, it is one of
the greatest and commonest of critical errors, to charge the originator or supporter of a doctrine with consequences which he
did not see, or would not have accepted had he seen them.
Because they may be contained in his principles, it by no means
follows that he saw them. A man would be ridiculed if lie
attributed to the discoverer of any law of nature the various discoveries which the application of that law might have produced;
nevertheless these applications were all potentially existing in
the law; but as the discoverer of the law was not aware of them,
he does not get the credit. Why, then, should a man have the
dis-credit of conseqences contained, indeed, in his principles, but
which he himself could not see?   On the whole, although
Xenophanes was not a clear and systematic thinker, it cannot
be denied that he exercised a very remarkable influence on the
progress of speculation; as we shall see in his successors.
~, 1II. PARMENIDES.
The readers of Plato will not forget the remarkable dialogue
in which he pays a tribute to the dialectical subtlety of Parmenides; but we must at the outset caution them against any
belief in the genuineness of the opinions attributed to him by
Plato. If Plato could reconcile to himself the propriety of altering the sentiments of his beloved master, Socrates, and of
attributing to him such as he had never entertained; with far
greater reason could he put into the mouth of one long dead,
sentiments which were the invention of his own dramatic genius.
Let us read the Parmenides, therefore, with extreme caution;
let us prefer the authority of Aristotle and the verses of Parmenides which have been preserved.
Parmenides was born at Elea, somewhere about the 61st
Olympiad (B. c. 536). This date does not contradict the rumor
which, according to Aristotle, asserted him to have been a disciple of Xenophanes, whom he might have listened to when that




PARMENIDES.                     49
great rhapsodist was far advanced in years. The most positive
statement, however, is that by Sotion, of his having been taught by
Ameinias and Diochoetes the Pythagorean. But both may be true.
Born to wealth and splendor, enjoying the esteem and envy
which always follow splendor and talents, it is conjectured that
his early career was that of a dissipated voluptuary; but Diochoetes taught him the nothingness of wealth (at times, perhaps,
when satiety had taught him the nothingness of enjoyment), and
led him from the dull monotony of noisy revelry to the endless
variety and excitement of philosophic thought. He forsook the
feverish pursuit of enjoyment, to contemplate "the bright countenance of Truth, in the quiet and still air of delightful studies." *
But this devotion to study was no egoistical seclusion. It did
not prevent his taking an active share in the political affairs of
his native city. On the contrary, the fruits of his study were
shown in a code of laws which he drew up, and which were
deemed so wise and salutary, that the citizens at first yearly
renewed their oath to abide by the laws of Parmenides.
"And something greater did his worth obtain,
For fearless virtue bringeth boundless gain."
The first characteristic of his philosophy, is the decided distinction between Truth and Opinion: in other words, between
the ideas obtained through the Reason and those obtained
through Sense. In Xenbphanes we noticed a vague glimmering
of this notion; in Parmenides it attained to something like
clearness. In Xenophanes it contrived to throw an uncertainty
over all things; which, in a logical thinker, would become
absolute skepticism. But he was saved from skepticism by his
faith. Parmenides was saved from it by his philosophy. He
was perfectly aware of the deceitful nature of opinion; but he was
also aware that within him there was certain ineradicable convictions, in which, like Xenophanes, he had perfect faith, but which
he wished to explain by reason. Thus was he led in some sort to
* Milton.
3




50                   THE ELEATICS.
anticipate the celebrated doctrine of innate ideas. These ideas
were concerning necessary truths; they were true knowledge:
all other ideas were uncertain.
The Eleatics, as Ritter remarks, believed that they recognized
and could demonstrate that the truth of all things is one and
unchangeable; perceiving, however, that the human faculty of
thought is constrained to follow the appearance of things, and
to apprehend the changeable and the many, they were forced to
confess that we are unable fully to comprehend the divine truth
in its reality, although we may rightly apprehend a few general
principles. Nevertheless, to suppose, in conformity with. human
thought, that there is actually both a plurality and a change, would
be but a delusion of the senses. While, on the other hand, we
must acknowledge, that in all that appears to us as manifold and
changeable, including all particular thought as evolved in the
mind, the Godlike is present, unperceived indeed by human
blindness, and become, as it were beneath a veil, indistinguishable.
We may make this conception more intelligible if we recall
the mathematical tendency of the whole of this school. Their
knowledge of Physics was regarded as contingent-delusive.
Their knowledge of Mathematics eternal-self-evident.  Parmenides was thus led by Xenophanes on the one hand, and Diochcetes on the other, to the conviction of the duality of human
thought. His Reason, i. e. the Pythagorean logic, taught him
that there is naught existing but The One (which he did not,
with Xenophanes, call God; he called it Being). His Sense, on
the other hand, taught him that there were Many Things, because of his manifold sensuous impressions. Hence he maintained two Causes and two Principles: the one to satisfy the
Reason; the other to accord with the explanations of Sense.
His work on " Nature" was therefore divided into two parts: in
the first is expounded the absolute Truth, as Reason proclaims
it; in the second, human Opinion, accustomed to
"Follow the rash eye, and ears with singing sounds confused, and tongue,"
which is but a mere seeming (o6ga, appearance); nevertheless




PARMENIDES.                          51
there is a cause of this seeming; there is also a principle, consequently there is a doctrine appropriate to it.
It must not be imagined, that Parmenides had- a mere vague
and general notion of the uncertainty of human knowledge. He
maintained that thought was delusive because dependent upon
organization. He had as distinct a conception of this celebrated
theory as any of his successors, as may be seen in the passage
preserved by Aristotle in the 5th chapter of the 4th book of his
Metaphysics, where, speaking of the materialism of Democritus,
in whose system sensation was thought, he adds, that others have
shared this opinion, and proceeds thus: "Empedocles affirms,
that a change in our condition (riv     siv) causes a change in
our thought:
"' Thought grows in men according to the impression of the moment;'*
and, in another passage, he says:
"'It is always according to the changes which take place in men
That there is change in their thoughts.'"
Parmenides expresses himself in the same style:
"Such as to each man is the nature of his many-jointed limbs,
Such also is the intelligence of each man; for it is
The nature of limbs (organization) which thinketh in men,
Both in one and in all; for the highest degree of organization
gives the highest degree of thought."t
Now, as thought was dependent on organization, and as each
* Hpbs 7rapetv yap piSrt dalterat dvOp4rowlf.
t The last sentence, "for the highest degree of organization gives the
highest degree of thought," is a translation which, differing from that of
every other we have seen, and being, as we believe, of some importance in
the interpretation of Parmenides' system, it is necessary to state at full our
reasons. Here is the original of the verses in the text':'S2s yap ZKaaras NXEt Kpa~av PetX'wv rotvKdPtrrwv,
Tig v6oS dvOpcproirat rapiarricev. Tb yap Gafir
ELEriv o7rEp fpovit pcXtwiov fvlat davOpwnrota%,
Kal Iraatv, icat 7ravri' r yap,rXiov lart vodtla.
The last sentence Ritter translates"For thought is the fulness."
Objecting to Hegel's version of rtb vrov, " the most," and'to that of Brandis,




52                        THE ELEATICS.
organization differed in degree from every other, so would the
opinions of men differ.   If thought be sensation, it requires but
little reflection to show, that, as sensations from the same object
differ according to the senses of different persons, and indeed
differ at different times with the same person, therefore one
opinion is not more true than another, and all are equally false.
But Reason is the same in all men: that alone is the fountain of
certain knowledge. All thought derived from sense is but a
"the mightier," Ritter says the meaning is " the full."  But we shall then
want an interpretation of " the full."  What is it? He elsewhere slightly
alters the phrase thus:
" The fulness of all being is thought."
We speak with submission, but it appears to us that Ritter's assertion respecting rba rXov meaning " the full," or " the fulness," is unwarrantable.
The ordinary meaning is certainly "the more" or "the most," and hence
used occasionally to signifype:fection, as in Theocritus:
Ka' rtag (oKoX)taS rK i Tr rt rXov IKEO Iaaas.-Idy. i. 20.
When Parmenides, therefore, uses the phrase ro 7rXov lari v4rpa, he seems to
us to have the ordinary meaning in view; he speaks of ru 7rAXov as a necessary
consequence of the 7roAvady7rros. Man has many-jointed limbs, ergo many
sensations; if he had more limbs he would have more sensations; the highest degree of organization gives the highest degree of thought. This explanation is in conformity with what Aristotle says on introducing the passage; is in conformity with the line immediately preceding:
-Eartv 8nErp povEfsi ceXiv buot al dOOpwrota;
is in conformity with the explanation of the scholiast Asclepias, rT 7rXiov arls
v6drfa, rpoayTyveraut K rJS TrXiovvOS ulorlatows Kai dixptfscarrpas; and, finally, is in
conformity with the opinion attributed to Parmenides by Plutarch, that
"sentir et penser ne lui paraissaient choses distinctes, ni entre elles ni de
l'organisation." 
It is on this account we reject the reading of rroXvrXdyKcrwv, " far-wandering," in place of 7rovdKadTrrwv, "many-jointed," suggested by Karsten. The
change is arbitrary and for the worse; roXvn7rdyKrwv having reference only to
the feet, whereas the simile in Parmenides is meant to apply to the whole
man.
The meaning of the verses is, therefore, that the intelligence of man is
formed according to his many-jointed frame, i. e. dependent on his organization.
i Ch. Renouvier, flanuel de la Philosophic Ancienne, i. 152, who cites Plutarch,
Opin. des Philos. iv. 5.




PARMENIDES.                        53
seeming (Jas); but thought derived from   Reason is absolutely
true.  Hence his antithesis to 6oka is always 1ri1rs, faith.
This is the central point in his system. He was thereby enabled to avert absolute skepticism, and at the same time to admit
the uncertainty of ordinary knowledge. He had therefore two
distinct doctrines, each proportioned to the faculty adapted to it.
One doctrine, of Absolute Knowledge (Metaphysics, pser& TM'
Qpudixa), with which the faculty of pure Reason was concerned,
a doctrine called in the language of that day, the "science of
Being." The other doctrine, of Relative Knowledge, or Opinion
(Physics, r& qu0p'xa&), with which the faculty of Intelligence, or
Thought, derived from Sense, was concerned, and which may be
called the Science of Appearance.
On the science of Being, Parmenides did not differ much from
his predecessors, Xenophanes and Pythagoras. He taught that
there was but one Being; non-Being was impossible. The latter
assertion amounts to saying that non-existence cannot exist; a
position which may appear extremely trivial to the reader not
versed in metaphysical speculations; but which we would not
have him despise, inasmuch as it is a valuable piece of evidence
respecting the march of human opinion. It is only one of the
many illustrations of the tendency to attribute positive qualities
to words, as if they were things, and not simply marks of things;
a tendency admirably exposed by James Mill, and subsequently
by his son.* It was this tendency which so greatly puzzled the
early thinkers, who, when they said that "a thing is not," believed that they nevertheless predicated existence, viz. the existence of non-existence. A thing is, and a thing is not; these
* "Many volumes might be filled with the frivolous speculations concerning the nature of Being (ra Sv, obata, Ens, Entitas, Essentia, and the like),
which have arisen from overlooking this double meaning of the words to be;
from supposing that when it signifies to exist, and when it signifies to be some
specified thing, as to be a man, to be Socrates, to be seen, to be a phantom, or
even to be a nonentity, it must still at the bottom answer to the same idea;
and that a meaning must be found for it which shall suit all these cases."John Mill, System of Logic, i. 4, first ed.




5-1                   THE ELEATICS.
two assertions seemed to be affirmations of two different states of
existence; an error from which, under some shape or other, later
thinkers have not always been free.
Parmenides, however, though affirming that Being alone existed and that non-Being was impossible, did not see the real
ground of the sophism. He argued that Non-Being could not be,
because Nothing can come out of Nothing (as Xenophanes taught
him); if therefore Being existed, it must embrace all existence.
Hence he concluded that The One was all Existence, identical,
unique, neither born nor dying, neither moving nor changing. It
was a bold step to postulate the finity of the One, Xenophanes
having declared it to be necessarily infinite. But there is abundant evidence to prove that Parmenides regarded The One as finite.
Aristotle speaks of it as the distinction between Parmenides and
Melissus: "The unity of Parmenides was a rational unity (roixar& Xoyov Mvos); that of Melissus was a material unity (ro0 xar';^Xv iXnv). Hence the former said that The One was finite
(resrspadfsovov), but the latter said it was infinite (oralspov)."
From which it appears that the ancients conceived the Rational
unity as limited by itself; a conception it is difficult for us to
understand. Probably it was because they held The One to be
spherical: all the parts being equal: having neither beginning,
middle, nor end: and yet self-limited.
The conception of the identity of thought and existence is expressed in some remarkable verses by Parmenides, of which, as a
very different interpretation has been drawn from them, we shall
give a literal translation:
"Thought is the same thing as the cause of thought:
For without the thing in which it is announced
You cannot find the thought; for there is nothing, nor shall beExcept the existing."
Now, as the only Existence was The One, it follows that The
One and Thought are identical; a conclusion which by no means
contradicts the opinion before noticed of the identity of human
thought and sensation, both of these being merely transitory
modes of Existence.




ZENO OF ELEA.                    55
Respecting the second or physical doctrine of Parmenides, we
may briefly say that, believing it necessary to give a science of
Appearances, he sketched out a programme according to the
principles reigning in his day. He denied motion in the abstract,
but admitted that according to appearance there was motion.
Parmenides represents the logical and more rigorous side of
the doctrine of Xenophanes, from which the physical element is
almost banished, by being condemned to the region of uncertain Sense, Knowledge. The ideal element alone was really
nourished by the speculations of Parmenides. Although he preserved himself fiom  skepticism, as we saw, nevertheless the
tendency of his doctrine was to forward skepticism. In his exposition of the uncertainty of kiowledge, he retained a saving
clause,-that, namely, of the certainty of Reason. It only remained for successors to apply the same skepticism to the ideas
of Reason, and Pyrrhonism was complete.
~ IV. ZENO OF ELEA.
Zeno, by Plato called the Palamedes of Elea, must not be confounded with Zeno the Stoic. He was on all accounts one of the
most distinguished of the ancient philosophers; as great in his
actions as in his works; and remarkable in each for a strong, impetuous, disinterested spirit. Born at Elea about the 70th Olympiad (B. c. 500), he became the pupil of Parmenides, and, as some
say, his adopted son.
The first period of his life was spent in the calm solitudes of
study. From his beloved friend and master he had learned to
appreciate the superiority of intellectual pleasures-the only
pleasures that do not satiate. From him also he had learned to
despise the splendors of rank and fortune, without becoming misanthropical or egoistical. He worked for the benefit of his fellowmen, but declined the recompense of rank, or worldly honors,
with which they would have repaid those labors. His recompense was the voice of his own heart, beating calmly in the
consciousness of its integrity. The absence of ambition in so




56                    THE ELEATICS.
intrepid and exalted a mind, might well have been the wonderment of antiquity; for it was no skeptical indifference, no disdain
for the opinions of his fellow-men, which made him shun office.
He was a delicate no less than an impetuous man, extremely
sensitive to praise and blame; as may be seen in his admirable
reply to one who asked him why he was so hurt by blame: " If
the blame of my fellow-citizens did not cause me pain, their approbation would not cause me pleasure." In timid minds,
shrinking from the coarse ridicule of fools and knaves, this sensitiveness is fatal; but in those brave spirits who fear nothing but
their own consciences, and who accept no approbation but such
as their consciences can ratify, this sensitiveness lies at the root
of much heroism and noble endeavor. One of those men was
Zeno. His life was a battle, but the battle was for Truth; it
ended tragically, but it was not fought in vain.
Perhaps of all his moral qualities his patriotism has been the
most renowned. He lived at the period of Liberty's awakening,
when Greece was everywhere enfranchising herself, everywhere
loosening the Persian yoke, and endeavoring to found national institutions on Liberty. In the general effervescence and enthusiasm
Zeno was not cold. His political activity we have no means of
judging; but we learn that it was great and beneficial. Elea was
but a small colony; but Zeno preferred it to the magnificence of
Athens, whose luxurious, restless, quibbling, frivolous, passionate,
and unprincipled citizens he contrasted with the provincial modesty
and honesty of Elea. He did, however, occasionally visit Athens,
and there promulgated the doctrines of his master, as we see by
the opening of Plato's dialogue, the Parmenides. There he
taught Pericles.
On the occasion of his last return to Elea, he found it had
fallen into the hands of the tyrant Nearchus (or Diomedon or
Demylos: the name is differently given by ancient writers). He,
of course, conspired against him, failed in his project, and was
captured. It was then, as Cicero observes, that he proved the
excellence of his master's doctrines, and proved that a coura



ZENO OF ELEA.                    57
geous soul fears only that which is base, and that fear and pain
are for women and children, or men who have feminine hearts.
When Nearchus interrogated him as to his accomplices, he threw
the tyrant into an agony of doubt and fear by naming all the
courtiers: a master-stroke of audacity, and in those days not discreditable. Having thus terrified his accuser, he turned to the
spectators, and exclaiming, " If you can consent to be slaves from
fear of what you see me now suffer, I can only wonder at your
cowardice."  So saying, he bit his tongue off, and spat it in the
face of the tyrant. The people were so roused that they fell upon
Nearchus and slew him.
There are considerable variations in the accounts of this story
by ancient writers, but all agree in the main narrative given
above. Some say that Zeno was pounded to death in a huge
mortar. We have no trustworthy account of his death.
As a philosopher, Zeno's merits are peculiar. He was the inventor of that logic so celebrated as Dialectics. This, which, in
the hands of Socrates and Plato, became a powerful weapon of
offence, is, by the universal consent of antiquity, ascribed to Zeno.
It may be defined as "A refutation of error by the reductio ad
absurdum as a means of establishing the truth." The truth to
be established in Zeno's case was the system of Parmenides; we
must not, therefore, seek in his arguments for any novelty beyond
the mere exercise of dialectical subtlety. He brought nothing
new to the system; but he invented a great method of polemical
exposition. The system had been conceived by Xenophanes;
precision had been given to it by Parmenides; and there only
remained for Zene the task of fighting for and defending it;
which task he admirably fulfilled. "The destiny of Zeno was
altogether polemical. Hence, in the external world, the impetuous existence and tragical end of the patriot; and, in the
internal world, the world of thought, the laborious character of
Dialectician." *
It was mis fighter's destiny which caused him to perfect the
* Cousin, Fragmens Philosophiques, art. Zenon d'Elie.
30




58                   THE ELEATICS.
art of offence and defence. He very naturally wrote in prose;
of which he set the first example: for, as the wild and turbulent
enthusiasm of Xenophanes would instinctively express itself in
poetry, so would the argumentative subtlety of Zeno naturally
express itself in prose. The great Rhapsodist wandered from
city to city, intent upon earnest and startling enunciation of the
mighty thoughts stirring confusedly within him; the great Logician was more intent upon a convincing exposition of the
futility of the arguments alleged against his system, than upon
any propagande of the system itself; for he held that the truth
must be accepted when once error is exposed. " Antiquity,"
says M. Cousin, "attests that he wrote not poems, like Xenophanes and Parmenides, but treatises, and treatises of an eminently prosaic character: that is to say, refutations."
The reason of this may be easily guessed. Coming as a young
man to Athens, to preach the doctrine of Parmenides, he must
have been startled at the opposition which that doctrine met
with from the subtle, quick-witted, and empirical Athenians,
who had already erected the Ionian philosophy into the reigning
doctrine. Zeno, no doubt, was at first stunned by the noisy objections which on all sides surrounded him; but, being also one
of the keenest of wits, and one of the readiest, he would soon
have recovered his balance, and in turn assailed his assailers.
Instead of teaching dogmatically, he began to teach dialectically.
Instead of resting in the domain of pure science, and expounding
the ideas of Reason, he descended upon the ground occupied by
his adversaries-the ground of daily experience and sense-knowledge-and turning their ridicule upon themselves, forced them
to admit that it was more easy to conceive The Many as a produce of The One, than to conceive The One on the assumption
of the existing Many.
" The polemical method entirely disconcerted the partisans of
the Ionian philosophy," says M. Cousin, "and excited a lively
curiosity and interest for the doctrines of the Italian (Pythagorean) school; and thus was sown, in the capital of Greek civili



ZENO OF ELEA.                     59
zation, the fruitful germ of a higher development of philosophy."
Plato has succinctly characterized the difference between Parmenides and Zeno by saying, that the master established the existence of The One, and the disciple proved the non-existence of
The Many.
When he argued that there was but One thing really existing,
all the others being only modifications or appearances of that
One, he did not deny that there were many appearances, he only
denied that these appearances were real existences. So, in like
manner, he denied motion, but not the appearance of motion.
Diogenes the Cynic, who, to refute his arguments against motion,
rose and walked, entirely mistook the argument; his walking
was no more a refutation of Zeno, than Dr. Johnson's kicking a
stone was a refutation of Berkeley's denial of matter. Zeno
would have answered: Very true; you walk: according to
Opinion (Tr  onartarov) you are in motion; but according to
Reason you are at rest. What you call motion is but the name
given to a series of similar conditions, each of which, separately
considered, is rest. Thus, every object filling space equal to its
bulk is necessarily at rest in that space; motion from one spot
to another is but a name given to the sum-total of all these intermediate spaces in which the object at each moment is at rest.
Take the illustration of the circle: a circle is composed of a
number of individual points, or straight lines; not one of these
lines can individually be called a circle; but all these lines, considered as a totality, have one general name given them, viz. a
circle. In the same way, in each individual point of space, the
object is at rest; the sum-total of a number of these states of
rest is called motion.
The original fallacy is in the supposition that Motion is a thing
superadded, whereas, as Zeno clearly saw, it is only a condition.
In a falling stone there is not the "stone" and a thing called
" motion;" otherwise there would be also another thing called
"rest."  But both motion and rest are names given to express




60                    THE ELEATICS.
conditions of the stone. Even rest is a positive exertion of force.
Rest is force resistant, and Motion is force triumphant. It follows
that matter is always in motion; which amounts to the same as
Zeno's saying, there is no such thing as motion.
The other arguments of Zeno against the possibility of Motion
(and he maintained four, the third of which we have above explained,) are given by Aristotle; but they seem more like the ingenious puzzles of dialectical subtlety than the real arguments
of an earnest man. It has, therefore, been asserted, that they
were only brought forward to ridicule the unskilfulness of his
adversaries. We must not, however, be hasty in rescuing Zeno
from his own logical net, into which he may have fallen as easily
as others. Greater men than he have been the dupes of their
own verbal distinctions.
Here are his two first arguments:
1. Motion is impossible, because before that which is in motion can reach the end, it must reach the middle point; but this
middle point then becomes the end, and the same objection applies to it-since to reach it the object in motion must traverse
a middle point; and so on ad infinitum, seeing that matter is infinitely divisible.  Thus, if a stone be cast four paces, before
it can reach the fourth it must reach the second; the second
then becomes the end, and the first pace the middle; but before
the object can reach the first pace, it must reach the half of the
first pace, and before the half it must reach the half of that half;
and so on ad infinitum.
2. This is his famous Achilles puzzle. We give both the statement and refutation as we find it in Mill's Logic (ii. 453).
The argument is, let Achilles run ten times as fast as a tortoise,
yet, if the tortoise has the start, Achilles will never overtake him;
for, suppose them to be at first separated by an interval of a thousand feet; when Achilles has run these thousand feet, the tortoise
will have run a hundred, and when Achilles has run those hundred, the tortoise will have got on ten, and so on forever: therefore Achilles may run forever without overtaking the tortoise.




ZENO OF ELEA.                    61
Now the "forever" in the conclusion means, for any length of
time that can be supposed; but in the premises, "forever" does
not mean any length of time-it means any number of subdivisions
of time. It means that we may divide a thousand feet by ten,
and that quotient again by ten, and so on as often as we please;
that there never need be an end to the subdivisions of the distance, nor, consequently, to those of the time in which it is performed. But an unlimited number of subdivisions may be made
of that which is itself limited. The argument proves no other
infinity of duration than may be embraced within five minutes.
As long as the five minutes are not expired, what remains of
them may be divided by ten, and again by ten, as often as we
like, which is perfectly compatible with their being only five
minutes altogether. It proves, in short, that to pass through
this finite space requires a time which is infinitely divisible, but
not an infinite time; the confounding of which distinction Hobbes
had already seen to be the gist of the fallacy.
Although the credit of seeing the ground of the fallacy is
given by Mill to Hobbes, we must also observe that Aristotle had
clearly seen it in the same light. His answer to Zeno, which
Bayle thinks "pitiable," was, that a foot of space being only potentially infinite, but actually finite, it could be easily traversed
in a finite time.
We have no space to follow Zeno in his various arguments
against the existence of a multitude of things. His position may
be briefly summed up thus:-There is but one Being existing,
necessarily indivisible and infinite. To suppose that The One
is divisible, is to suppose it finite. If divisible, it must be infinitely divisible. But, suppose two things to exist, then there
must necessarily be an interval between those two; something
separating and limiting them. What is that something? It
is some other thing. But then, if not the same thing, it also
must be separated and limited; and so on ad infinitum. Thus
only One thing can exist as the substratum for all manifold appearances.




62                   THE ELEATICS.
Zeno closes the second great line of independent inquiry,
which, opened by Anaximander, and continued by Pythagoras,
Xenophanes, and Parmenides, we may characterize as the Mathematical or Absolute system. Its opposition to the Ionian, Physical or Empirical system was radical and constant. But, up to
the coming of Zeno, these two systems had been developed almost in parallel lines, so little influence did they exert upon each
other. The two systems clashed together on the arrival of Zeno
at Athens. The result of the conflict was the creation of a new
method-Dialectics. This method created the Sophists and the
Skeptics. It also greatly influenced all succeeding schools, and
may be said to have constituted one great peculiarity of Socrates
and Plato, as will be shown.
We must, however, previously trace the intermediate steps
which philosophy took, before the crisis of Sophistry, which preceded the era of Socrates.




SECOND EPOCH.
SPECULATIONS ON THE CREATION OF THE UNIVERSE, AND
ON THE ORIGIN OF KNOWLEDGE.
CHAPTER I.
~ 1. HERACLITUS.
"LIFE is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those
who feel." This, Horace Walpole's epigram, may be applied to
Democritus and Heraclitus, celebrated throughout antiquity as
the laughing and the weeping philosophers:
"One pitied, one condemned the woeful times;
One laugh'd at follies, and one wept o'er crimes."
Modern criticism has indeed pronounced both these characteristics to be fabulous; but fables themselves are often only exaggerations of truth, and there must have been something in each
of these philosophers which formed the nucleus round which the
fables grew. Of Heraclitus it has been well said, "The vulgar
notion of him as the crying philosopher must not be wholly discarded, as if it meant nothing, or had no connection with the
history of his speculations. The thoughts which came forth in
his system are like fragments torn from his own personal being,
and not torn from it without such an effort and violence as must
needs have drawn a sigh from the sufferer. If Anaximenes discovered that he had within him a power and principle which
ruled over all the acts and functions of his bodily frame, Herac



64                     HERACLITUS.
litus found that there was a life within him which he could not
call his own, and yet it was, in the very highest sense, himself,
so that without it he would have been a poor, helpless, isolated
creature;-a universal life, which connected him with his fellowmen,-with the absolute source and original fountain of life."*
Heraclitus was the son of Blyson, and was born at Ephesus,
about the 69th Olympiad (B. c. 503). Of a haughty, melancholy temper, he refused the supreme magistracy which his fellow-citizens offered him, on account, according to Diogenes
Laertius, of their dissolute morals; but as he declined the offer
in favor of his brother, we are disposed to think his rejection was
grounded on some other cause. Is not his rejection of magistracy
in perfect keeping with what else we know of him? For instance: playing with some children near the temple of Diana,
he answered those who expressed surprise at seeing him thus
occupied, "Is it not better to play with children, than to share
with you the administration of affairs?" The contempt which
pierces through this reply, and which subsequently grew into
confirmed misanthropy, may have been the result of morbid
meditation, rather than of virtuous scorn. Was it because the
citizens were corrupt, that he refused to exert himself to make
them virtuous? Was it because the citizens were corrupt, that
he retired to the mountains, and there lived on herbs and roots,
like an ascetic? If Ephesus was dissolute, was there not the rest
of Greece for him to make a home of? He fled to the mountains, that he might there, in secret, prey on his own heart. He
was a misanthrope, and misanthropy is madness, not virtuous indignation; misanthropy issues from the morbid consciousness of
self, not from the sorrowful opinion formed of others. The aim
of his life had been to explore the depths of his own nature.
This has been the aim of all ascetics, as of all philosophers: but
in the former it is morbid anatomy; in the latter it is science.
The contemptuous letter in which he declined the courteous
* Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy.




HERACLITUS.                    65
invitation of Darius to spend some time at his court, will best
explain his character:
" Heraclitus of Ephesus to the King Darius, son of Hystaspes,
health!
"All men depart from the paths of truth and justice. They
have no attachment of any kind but avarice; they only aspire to
a vain-glory with the obstinacy of folly. As for me, I know not
malice; I am the enemy of no one. I utterly despise the vanity
of courts, and never will place my foot on Persian ground. Content with little, I live as I please."
Misanthropy was the nucleus of the fable of Heraclitus as a
weeping philosopher, who refused the magistracy because the
citizens were corrupt. The story of his attempting to cure himself of a dropsy by throwing himself on a dunghill, hoping that
the heat would cause the water within him to evaporate, is apocryphal.
The Philosophy of Heraclitus was, and is, the subject of dispute. HIe expressed himself in such enigmatical terms, that he
was called "the Obscure."  A few fragments have been handed
down to us.*  From these it would be vain to hope that a consistent system could be evolved; but from them, and from other
sources, we may gather the general tendency of his doctrines.
The tradition which assigns him Xenophanes as a teacher, is
borne out by the evident relation of their systems. Heraclitus is
somewhat more Ionian than Xenophanes: that is to say, in him
the physical explanation of the universe is more prominent. At
the same time, Heraclitus is neither frankly Ionian nor Italian;
he wavers between the two. The pupil of Xenophanes would
naturally regard human knowledge as a mist of error, through
which the sunlight only gleamed at intervals. But the inheritor
of the Ionian doctrines would not adopt the conclusion of the
* Schleiermacher has collected, and endeavored to interpret them, in
Wolf and Buttmann's Museum der Alterthumswinssenschaften, vol. i. part iii.




66                     HERACLITUS.
Mathematical school, namely, that the cause of this uncertainty
of knowledge is the uncertainty of sensuous impressions; and
that consequently Reason is the only fountain of truth. Heraclitus was not mathematician enough for such a doctrine: he
was led to maintain a doctrine directly opposed to it. He maintained that the senses are the sources of all true knowledge, for
they drink in the universal intelligence. The senses deceive
only when they belong to barbarian souls: in other words, the
ill-educated sense gives false impressions, the rightly-educated
sense gives truth. Whatever is common is true; whatever is
remote from the common, i. e. the exceptional, is false.  The
True is the Unhidden.* Those whose senses are open to receive
the Unhidden, the Universal, attain truth.
As if to mark the distinction between himself and Xenophanes
more forcibly, he says: "Inhaling through the breath the Universal Ether, which is Divine Reason, we become conscious. In
sleep we are unconscious, but on waking we again become intelligent; for in sleep, when' the organs of sense are closed, the
mind within is shut out from all sympathy with the surrounding
ether, the universal Reason; and the only connecting medium is
the breath, as it were a root, and by this separation the mind
loses the power of recollection it before possessed. Nevertheless
on awakening the mind repairs its memory through the senses,
as it were through inlets; and thus, coming into contact with
the surrounding ether, it resumes its intelligence. As fuel when
brought near the fire is altered and becomes fiery, but on being
removed again becomes quickly extinguished; so too the portion
of the all-embracing which sojourns in our body becomes more
irrational when separated from it; but on the restoration of this
connection, through its many pores or inlets, it again becomes
similar to the whole."
Can any thing be more opposed to the Eleatic doctrine? That
system rests on the certitude of pure Reason; this declares that
*'AXlOi sa r t X0Oov. This kind of play upon words is verycharacteristic of metaphysical thinkers in all ages.




HERACLITUS.                    67
Reason left to itself, i. e. the mind when it is not nourished by
the senses, can have no true knowledge. The one system is exclusively rational, the other exclusively material; but both are
pantheistical, for in both it is the universal Intelligence which
becomes conscious in man,-a conception pushed to its ultimate
limits by Hegel. Accordingly Hegel declares that there is not
a single point in the Logic of Heraclitus which he, Hegel, has
not developed in his Logic.
The reader will remark how in Heraclitus, as in Parmenides,
there is opened the great question which for so long agitated the
schools, and which still agitates them,-the question respecting
the origin of our ideas. He will also remark how the two great
parties, into which thinkers have divided themselves on the question, are typified in these two early thinkers. In Parmenides
the idealist school, with its contempt of sense; in Heraclitus the
materialist school, with its contempt of every thing not derived
from sensation.
With Xenophanes, Heraclitus agreed in denouncing the perpetual delusion which reigned in the mind of man; but he placed
the cause of that delusion in the imperfection of human Reason,
not, as Xenophanes had done, in the imperfection of Sense. He
thought that man had too little of the Divine Ether (soul) within
him. Xenophanes thought that the senses clouded the intellectual vision. The one counselled man to let the Universal mirror
itself in his soul through the senses; the other counselled him to
shut himself up within himself, to disregard the senses, and to
commune only with ideas.
It seems strange that so palpable a contradiction between two
doctrines should ever have been overlooked. Yet such is the
fact. Heraclitus is said to have regarded the world of Sense as
a perpetual delusion: and this is said in the very latest and not
the least intelligent of Histories, to say nothing of former works.
Whence this opinion?  Simply fiom the admitted skepticism of
both Heraclitus and Xenophanes with respect to Phenomena
(appearances). It is true they both denied the certainty of




68                       HERACLITUS.
human knowledge, but they denied this on different grounds.
" Man has no certain knowledge," said Heraclitus, " but God has;
and vain man learns from God just as the boy from the man."
In his conception, human intelligence was but a portion of the
Universal Intelligence; but a part can never be otherwise than
imperfect.  Hence it is that the opinion of all mankind upon
any subject (common sense) must be a nearer approximation to
the truth than the opinion of any individual; because it is an
accumulation of parts, making a nearer approach to the whole.
While therefore he maintained the uncertainty of all knowledge, he also maintained its certainty. Its origin was Sense;
being sensuous and individual, it was imperfect, because individual; but it was true as far as it went. The ass, he scornfully
said, prefers thistles to gold. To the ass gold is not so valuable
as thistle.  The ass is at once right and wrong. Man is equally
right and wrong in all positive affirmations; for nothing truly
is, about which a positive affirmation can be made.  "All is,"
he said, "and all is not; for though in truth it does come into
being, yet it forthwith ceases to be!"
We are here led to his celebrated doctrine of all things as a
"perpetual flux and reflux," which Hegel declares to be an anticipation of his own celebrated dogma, Seyn und Nichtseyn ist
dasselbe: "Being and Non-Being is the same."*        Heraclitus
conceived the principle-dapX —of all things to be Fire. To
him Fire was the type of spontaneous force and activity; not
flame, which was only an intensity of Fire, but a warm, dry
vapor-an Ether; this was the beginning. He says: "The
world was made neither by Godt nor man; and it was, and is,
* Much of the ridicule which this logical canon has excited, especially in
England, has been prompted by the blindest misunderstanding. The laughers, misled by verbal ambiguity, have understood Hegel to say that Existence and Non-Existence was one and the same, as if by Nichtseyn he meant
Nothing. He meant by Nothing No Thing-no phenomenon. The position
is perhaps absurd, but it is not for metaphysicians to say soe
t This is the translation given in Ritter: it is not however exact; ovre riS
0Osv is the original, i. e. "neither one of the Gods," meaning of course one
of the polytheistic Deities.




HERACLITUS.                     69
and ever shall be, an ever-living fire in due measure self-enkindled and in due measure self-extinguished."  That this is but a
modification of the Ionian system, the reader will at once discern.
The Fire, which here stands as the semi-symbol of Life and Intelligence, because of its spontaneous activity, is but a modification of the Water of Thales and the Air of Anaximenes; moreover, it is only semi-symbolical. Those who accept it as a pure
symbol overlook the other parts of the system. The system
which proclaims the senses as the source of all knowledge necessarily attaches itself to a material element as the primary one.
At the same time this very system is in one respect a deviation
from the Ionian; in the distinction between sense-knowledge and
reflective knowledge. Hence we placed Diogenes of Apollonia
as the last of the pure Ionians; although chronologically he
came some time after Heraclitus, and his doctrine is in many
respects the same as that of Heraclitus.
This Fire which is forever kindling into flame, and passing
into smoke and ashes; this restless, changing flux of things
which never are, but are ever becoming; this he proclaimed to
be God, or the One.
Take his beautiful illustration of a river: "No one has ever
been twice on the same stream; for different waters are constantly flowing down; it dissipates its waters and gathers them
again-it approaches and it recedes-it overflows and falls." This
is evidently but a statement of the flux and reflux, as in his
aphorism that " all is in motion; there is no rest or quietude."
Let us also add here what Ritter says:
"The notion of life implies that of alteration, which by the
ancients was generally conceived as motion.  The Universal
Life is therefore an eternal motion, and therefore tends, as every
motion must, towards some end, even though this end, in the
course of the evolution of life, present itself to us as a mere
transition to some ulterior end. Heraclitus on this ground supposed a certain longing to be inherent in Fire, to gratify which
it constantly transformed itself into some determinate form of




70                    ANAXAGORAS.
being, without, however, any wish to maintain it, but in the
mere desire of transmuting itself from one form into another.
Therefore, to make worlds is Jove's pastime."
He explained phenomena as the concurrence of opposite tendencies and efforts in the motion of the ever-living Fire, out of
which results the most beautiful harmony. All is composed of
contraries, so that the good is also evil, the living is dead, etc.
The harmony of the world is one of conflicting impulses, like
that of the lyre and the bow. The strife between opposite tendencies is the parent of all things: orX/jios0 C'dv'rv pJ/v c'r'ip
6sr qLcXVTWv o fancxisvls, xOI' crou SV 0gv 6so'siSE  OS 6 s  Ji JV6pjrOU5,
TroUs pv 6oUXous s''oi~1as rous s s XsupouS. Nor is this simple metaphor: the strife here spoken of is the splitting in two of that
which is in essence one; the contradiction which necessarily lies
between the particular and the general, the result and the force,
Being and Non-Being. All life is change, and change is strife.
Heraclitus was the first to proclaim the absolute vitality of
Nature, the endless change of matter, the mutability and perishability of all individual things, in contrast with the eternal
Being, the supreme Harmony whch rules over all.
The view we have taken of his doctrines will at once explain
the position in which we have placed them. He stands with one
foot on the Ionian path, and with the other on the Italian; but
his attempt is not to unite these two: his office is negative; he
has to criticize both.
~ II. ANAXAGORAS.
Anaxagoras is generally said to have been born at Clazomense
in Lydia, not far from Colophon. Inheriting from his family a
splendid patrimony, he seemed born to figure in the State; but,
like Parmenides, he disregarded all such external greatness, and
placed his ambition elsewhere. Early in life, so early as his
twentieth year, the passion for philosophy engrossed him. Like
all young ambitious men, he looked with contempt upon the intellect exhibited in his native city. His soul panted for the




ANAXAGORAS.                        71
capital. The busy activity, and the growing importance of
Athens, solicited him. He yearned towards it, as the ambitious
youth in a provincial town yearns for London; as all energy
longs for a fitting theatre on which to play its part.
He came to Athens. It was a great and stirring epoch. The
countless hosts of Persia had been scattered by a handful of
resolute men.   The political importance of Greece, and of
Athens, the Queen of Greece, was growing to a climax. The
Age of Pericles, one of the most glorious in the long annals of
mankind, was dawning. The Poems of Homer formed the subject of literary conversation, and of silent enjoyment. The early
triumphs of Eschylus had created a Drama, such as still remains the wonder and delight of scholars and critics. The
young Sophocles, that perfect flower of antique art, was then in
his bloom, meditating on that Drama which he was hereafter to
bring to perfection in the Antigone and the (Edipus Rex.  The
Ionian philosophy had found a home at Athens; and the young
Anaxagoras shared his time with Homer and Anaximenes.*
Philosophy soon obtained the supreme place in his affections.
The mysteries of the universe tempted him. He yielded himself
to the fascination, and declared that the aim and purpose of his
life was to contemplate the heavens.  All care for his affairs
was given up. His estates ran to waste, whilst he was solving
problems. But the day he found himself a beggar, he exclaimed,
"To Philosophy I owe my worldly ruin, and my soul's prosperity." He commenced teaching, and he had illustrious pupils
in Pericles, Euripides, and Socrates.
He was not long without paying the penalty of success. The
* By this we no more intimate that he was a disciple of Anaximenes (as
some historians assert) than that he was a friend of Homer. But in some
such ambiguous phrase as that in the text, must the error of calling him the
disciple of Anaximenes have arisen. Brucker's own chronology is strangely
at variance with his statement: for he places the birth of Anaximenes, 56th
Olympiad; that of Anaxagoras, 70th Olympiad: thus making the master
fifty-six years old at the birth of the pupil; and the pupil only became such
in the middle of his life.




't~2  ~ANAXAGORAS.
envy and uncharitableness of some, joined to the bigotry of
others, caused an accusation of impiety to be brought against
him. He was tried, and condemned to death, but owed the
mitigation of his sentence into banishment, to the eloquence of
his friend and pupil, Pericles. Some have supposed that the
cause of his persecution was this very friendship of Pericles;
and that the statesman was struck at through the unpopular
philosopher. The supposition is gratuitous, and belongs rather
to the ingenuity of modern scholarship, than to the sober facts
of history. In the persecution of Anaxagoras there is nothing
but what was very natural; it occurred afterwards in the case of
Socrates, and it has subsequently occurred a thousand times in
the history of mankind, as the simple effect of outraged convictions. Anaxagoras attacked the religion of his time: he was
tried and condemned for his temerity.
After his banishment he resided in Lampsacus, and there preserved tranquillity of mind until his death. "It is not I who
have lost the Athenians; it is the Athenians who have lost me,"
was his proud reflection. He continued his studies, and was
highly respected by the citizens, who, wishing to pay some mark
of esteem to his memory, asked him on his death-bed in what
manner they could do so. He begged that the day of his death
might be annually kept as a holiday in all the schools of Lampsacus. For centuries this request was fulfilled. He died in his
seventy-third year. A tomb was erected to him in the city, with
this inscription:
" This tomb great Anaxagoras confines,
Whose mind explored the heavenly paths of Truth."
His philosophy contains so many contradictory principles, or
perhaps it would be more correct to say, so many contradictory
principles are attributed to him, that it would be vain to attempt
a systematic view of them. We shall, as usual, confine ourselves
to leading doctrines.
On the great subject of the origin and certainty of our knowledge, he differed from Xenophanes and Heraclitus. He thought,




ANAXAGORAS.                        73
with the former, that all sense-knowledge is delusive; and, with
the latter, that all knowledge comes through the senses. Here is
a double skepticism brought into play. It has usually been held
that these two opinions contradict each other; that he could not
have maintained both. Yet both opinions are tenable. His reason
for denying certainty to the senses, was the incapacity of distinguishing all the real objective elements of which things are made.
Thus the eye discerns a complex mass which we call a flower; but
discerns nothing of that of which the flower is composed. In other
words, the senses perceive phenomena, but do not, and cannot observe noumena,*-an anticipation of the greatest discovery of
modern psychology, though seen dimly and confusedly by Anaxagoras. Perhaps the most convincing proof of his having so conceived knowledge is in the passage quoted by Aristotle: "Things
are to each according as they seem to him" (oi r   aolaurac acuroi
qra o'vHa, ola &v sfroXa/3w13 ).  What is this but the assertion of all
knowledge being confined to phenomena?   It is further strengthened by the passage in Sextus Empiricus, that "phenomena are
the criteria of our knowledge of things beyond sense," i. e., things
inevident are evident in phenomena (r-T rQ-v adUjXcwv xaraOXC scrJ,
rot qpasvolsva).
It must not, however, be concluded fiom the above, that Anaxagoras regarded sense as the sole origin of knowledge. He held
that the Reason (Xo7yo) was the regulating faculty of the mind,
as Intelligence (voUs) was of the universe. The senses are accurate in their reports; but their reports are not accurate copies of
Things. They reflect objects; but they reflect them as these
objects appear to Sense. Reason has to control these impressions, to verify these reports.
* Noumenon is the antithesis to Phenomenon, which means Appearance;
YNoumenon means the Substratum, or, to use the scholastic word, the Substance. Thus, as matter is recognized by us only in its manifestations (phenomena), we may logically distinguish those manifestations from the thing
manifested (noumenon). And the former will be the materia circa quam;
the latter, the materia in qua.. Noumenon is therefore equivalent to the Essence; Phenomenon to the Manifestation.
4




74                      ANAXAGORAS.
Let us now apply this doctrine to the explanation of some of
those apparently contradictory statements which have puzzled all
the critics. For instance, Anaxagoras says that snow is not white
but black, because the water of which it is composed is black.
Now, in this he could not have meant that snow did not appear
to our senses white; his express doctrine of sense-knowledge forbids such an interpretation. But reason told him that the Senses
gave inaccurate reports; and, in this instance, Reason showed
him  how their report was contradictory, since the water was
black, yet the snow white. Here, then, is the whole theory
of knowledge exemplified: Sense asserting that snow is white;
Reflection asserting that snow being made from black water could
not be white.  He had another illustration-Take two liquids,
white and black, and pour the one into the other drop by drop:
the eye will be unable to discern the actual change as it is gradually going on; it will only discern it at certain marked intervals.
Thus did he separate himself at once from Xenophanes and
Heraclitus. From the former, because admitting Sense to be the
only criterion of things, the only source of knowledge, he could
not regard the XoyoS as the unfailing source of truth, but merely
as the reflective power, whereby the reports of sense were controlled. From the latter, because reflection convinced him that
the reports of the senses were subjectively true, but objectively
false.* (Heraclitus maintained that the reports of the senses were
alone certain.) Both Xenophanes and Heraclitus had principles
of absolute certitude; the one proclaimed Reason, the other Sense,
to be that principle.  Anaxagoras annihilated the one by showing
that the Reason was dependent on the senses for materials; and
* Subjective and objective are now almost naturalized: it may not be superfluous, nevertheless, to explain them. The subject means the " Mind of
the Thinker " (Ego), the object means the " Thing thought of" (Non-BEo).
In the above passage " the reports of the senses being subjectively true,"
means that the senses truly inform us of their impressions; but these impressions are not at all like the actual objects (as may be shown by the broken
appearance of a stick, half of which is dipped in water), and therefore the
reports are " objectively false."




ANAXAGORAS.                        75
he annihilated the other by showing that the materials were fallacious.
Having thus, not without considerable difficulty, brought his
various opinions on human knowledge under one system, let us
endeavor to do the same for his cosmology. The principle of his
system is thus announced: "Wrongly do the Greeks suppose that
aught begins or ceases to be; for nothing comes into being or is
destroyed; but all is an aggregation or secretion of pre-existent
things; so that all becoming might more correctly be called becoming-mixed, and all corruption becoming separate." What is
the thought here? It is that instead of there being a Creation,
there was only an arrangement; instead of one first element, there
was an infinite number of elements. These elements are the
celebrated honzmomerice:
"Ex aurique putat micis consistere posse
Aurum, et de terris terrain concrescere parvis;
Ignibus ex ignem, huinorem ex humoribus esse;
Caetera consimili fingit ratione putatque."*
This singular opinion which maintains that flesh is made of
molecules of elementary flesh, and bones of elementary bones,
and so forth, is intelligible when we remember his theory of
knowledge. The Sense discerns elementary differences in matter,
and reflection confirms the truth of this observation. If Nothing
can proceed from Nothing, all things can be only an arrangement
of existing things; but when in this Arrangement certain things
are discovered to be radically distinguished from each other, gold
from blood for example,-either the distinction observed by the
Senses is altogether false, or else the things distinguished must
be elements. But the first horn of the dilemma is avoided by
* Lucretius, i. 839."That gold from parts of the same nature rose,
That earths do earth, fires fire, airs air compose,
And so in all things else alike to those."-CRExcH.
There seems to be good reason to believe that not Anaxagoras, but Aristotle,
was the originator of the word homeomerice. See Ritter, i. 286.




76                    ANAXAGORAS.
the sensuous nature of all knowledge; if the Senses deceive us
in this respect, and Reason does not indicate the deception,
then is knowledge all a delusion; therefore, unless we adopt
skepticism, we must abide by the testimony of the Senses, as to
the distinction of things. But, having granted the distinction,
we must grant that the things distinguished are elements; if not,
whence the distinction? Nothing can come of Nothing; blood
can only become blood, gold can only become gold, mix them
how you will; if blood can become bone, then does bone become
something out of nothing, for it was not bone before, and it is
bone now. But, as blood can only be blood, and bone only be
bone, whenever they are mingled it is a mingling of two elements, homoeomerice.
In the beginning therefore there was the infinite composed of
homoeomerice, or elementary seeds of infinite variety. So far
from The All being The One, as Parmenides and Thales equally
taught, Anaxagoras proclaimed The All to be The Many. But
the mass of elements were as yet unmixed. What was to mix
them? What power caused them to become arranged in one
harmonious all-embracing system?
This power Anaxagoras declared to be Intelligence (vo0s),
the moving force of the Universe. He had, on the one hand, rejected Fate, as an empty name; on the other, he rejected Chance,
as being no more than the Cause unperceived by human reasoning (rhiv ru'Xv, a`XV o lv oxv &v(privw X0o7y/tl). This is
another remarkable glimpse of what modern philosophy was
to establish. Having thus disclaimed these two powers, so potent in early speculation, Fate and Chance, he had no other
course left than to proclaim Intelligence the Arranging Power.*
This seems to us, on the whole, the most remarkable speculation of all the pre-Socratic epoch; and indeed is so very near the
philosophic precision of modern times, that it is with difficulty we
* We have his own words reported by Diogenes, who says that his work
opened thus:'" Formerly all things were a confused mass; afterwards, Intelligence coming, arranged them into worlds."




ANAXAGORAS.                       77
preserve its original simplicity. We will cite a portion of the
fragment preserved by Simplicius,wherein Intelligence is spoken of:-" Intelligence (vous) is infinite, and autocratic; it is
mixed up with nothing, but exists alone in and for itself. Were
it otherwise, were it mixed up with any thing, it would participate in the nature of all things; for in all there is a part of all;
and so that which was mixed with intelligence would prevent it
from exercising power over all things."*-In this passage we
have an expression of the modern conception of the Deity acting
through invariable laws, but in no way mixed up with the matter acted on.
Will not the foregoing remarks enable us to meet Aristotle's
objection to Anaxagoras, that "he uses Intelligence as a machine,t
in respect to the formation of the world; so that, when he is
embarrassed how to explain the cause of this or that, he introduces Intelligence; but in all other things it is any cause but
Intelligence which produces things?" Now, surely this is a very
unfair criticism, and could only be valid against one who, like
Malebranche, saw God everywhere. Anaxagoras assigned to Intelligence the great Arrangement of the homoeomerice; but of
course he supposed that subordinate arrangements were carried
on by themselves. The Christian thinker some centuries back
believed that the Deity created and ordained all things; nevertheless when he burnt his finger, the cause of the burn he attributed to fire, and not to God; but when the'thunder muttered in
the sky he attributed that to no cause but God. Is not this
similar to the conception formed by Anaxagoras? What he can
explain, he does explain by natural causes; whatever he is embarrassed to explain, whatever he does not understand, he attrib* This passage perfectly accords with what Aristotle says, De Animd, i. 2,
and Metaph. i. 7.
t This is an allusion to the theatrical artifice of bringing down a God
from Olympus, to solve the difficulty of the denouement,-the Deus ex
machind of Horace. We make this remark to caution the reader against
supposing that the objection is to a mechanical intelligence.




78                    ANAXAGORAS.
utes to God. It is here we see the force of Anaxagoras's opinion
respecting Chance as an unascertained cause: what others called
the effect of Chance, he called the effect of the universal Intelligence.
On the same grounds we object to the reasoning of Plato.
Those who have read the Phcado,-and who has not read it in
some shape or other, either in the original diction, or in the dim
and misty version of some translator — those who have read the
Phcedo, we say, will doubtless remember the passage in which
Socrates is made to express his poignant disappointment at the
doctrine of Anaxagoras, to which he had at first been so attracted. This passage has an air of authenticity. It expresses a real
disappointment, and the disappointment of Socrates, not merely
of Plato. We believe firmly that Socrates is here expressing his
own opinion; and it is rarely that we can say this of opinions
promulgated by Plato under the august name of his master.
Here is the passage in the misty version of Thomas Taylor: we
make no alterations, otherwise we should hold ourselves responsible for the whole:
"But having once heard a person reading from a certain book,
composed as he said by Anaxagoras, when he came to that part
in which he says that intellect orders and is the cause of all
things, I was delighted with this cause, and thought that in a
certain respect it was an excellent thing for intellect to be the
cause of all; and I considered if this was the case, disposing intellect would adorn all things, and place every thing in that
situation in which it would subsist in the best manner. If any
one therefore should be willing to discover the cause through
which every thing is generated or corrupted, or is, he ought to
discover how it may subsist in the best manner, or suffer, or perform any thing else. In consequence of this, therefore, it is proper
that a man should consider nothing else, either about himself or
about others, except that which is the most excellent and the best;
but it is necessary that he who knows this should also know that
which is subordinate, since there is one and the same science of




ANAXAGORAS.                     79
both. But thus reasoning with myself, I rejoiced, thinking that
I had found a preceptor in Anaxagoras who would instruct me
in the causes of things agreeable to my own conceptions; and
that he would inform me in the first place whether the earth is
flat or round, and afterwards explain the cause of its being so, adducing for this purpose that which is better, and showing that it
is better for the earth to exist in this manner. And if he should
say that it is situated in the middle, that he would besides this
show that it was better for it to be in the middle-and if he
should render all this apparent to me, I was so disposed as not
to require any other species of cause; for I by no means thought,
after he had said that all these were orderly disposed by intellect, he would introduce any other cause for their subsistence except that which shows that it is better for them to exist in this
manner. Hence I thought that in rendering the cause common
to each particular and to all things, he would explain that which
is best for each, and is the common good of all. And indeed I
would not have exchanged these hopes for a mighty gain! But
having obtained his books with prodigious eagerness, I read them
with great celerity, that I might with great celerity know that
which is best and that which is base.
"But from this admirable hope, my friend, I was forced away,
when in the course of my reading I saw him make no use of intellect, nor employ certain causes for the purpose of orderly disposing particulars, but assign air, ether, and water, and many
other things equally absurd, as the causes of things. And he
appeared to me to be affected in a manner similar to him who
should assert that all the actions of Socrates are produced by intellect; and afterwards, endeavoring to relate the causes of each
particular action, should say that I now sit here because, in the
first place, my body is composed of bones and nerves, and that
the bones are solid and are separated by intervals from each
other; but that the nerves, which are by nature capable of intension and remission, cover the bones together with the skin in
which they are contained. The bones therefore, being suspended




80                    ANAXAGORAS.
from their joints, the nerves, by straining and relaxing them,
enable me to bend my limbs as at present; and through this
cause I here sit in an inflected position. And again, should assign other such like causes of my now conversing with you,
namely, voice, and air, and hearing, and a thousand other particulars, neglecting the true cause, that since it appeared to the
Athenians better to condemn me on this account, it also appeared
to me better and more just to sit here, and thus abiding, sustain
the punishment which they have ordained me; for otherwise, by
the dog, as it appears to me, these bones and nerves would have
been carried long ago either into Megara or Boeotia through an
opinion of that which is best, if I had not thought it more just
and becoming to sustain the punishment ordered by my country,
whatever it might be, than to withdraw myself and run away.
But to call things of this kind causes is extremely absurd. Indeed, if any one should say that without possessing such things
as bones and nerves I could not act as I do, he would speak the
truth; but to assert that I act as I do at present through these,
and that I operate with this intellect, and not from a choice of
what is best, would be an assertion full of extreme negligence and
sloth: for this would be the consequence of not being able to collect by division that the true cause of a thing is very different
from that without which a cause would not be a cause."
Now this reasoning we take to be an ignoratio elenchi. The
illustration made use of is nothing to the purpose, and would be
admitted by Anaxagoras as true, without in the least impugning
his argument.
The Intelligence, which Anaxagoras corrceived, was in no wise
a moral Intelligence: it was simply the primurn mobile, the allknowing and motive force by which the arrangement of the elements was affected. Hence from a passage in Aristotle, some
have inferred that the vouS was only a physical principle, the sole
office of which was to set matter in motion. This is an error
easy of explanation. Men are still so accustomed to conceive the
divine Intelligence as only a more perfect and exalted human




ANAXAGORAS.                       81
Intelligence, that where they see no traces of the latter they are
prone to question the existence of the former. When Anaxagoras says that Nous was the creative principle, men instantly
figure to themselves a Nous similar to human intelligence. On
examination, they find that such an intelligence as they conceive
has no place in the doctrine, whereupon they declare that Intelligence has no place there; the Nous, they aver, means no more
than Motion, and might have been called Motion.
But fortunately Simplicius has preserved a long passage from
the work of Anaxagoras; we have already quoted a portion of
it, and shall now select one or two sentences in which the Nous,
as a cognitive power, is distinctly set forth; and we quote these
the more readily because Ritter, to whom we are indebted for the
passage, has not translated it:-" Intelligence is, of all things,
the subtlest and purest, and has entire knowledge of all. Every
thing which has a soul, whether great or small, is governed by
the Intelligence (vouS xparesT).  Intelligence knows all things
(?Cvrca'yvw voug), both those that are mixed and those that are
separated; and the things which ought to be, and the things
which were, and those which now are, and those which will be;
all are arranged by Intelligence (vravrc isx0eotfa's vouC*)."  Here
the creative, or rather disposing, faculty is not more distinctly
expressed than the cognitive. The Nous both knows and acts:
this is its duplicate existence. A grand conception: one seldom
rivalled in ancient speculation; one so far in advance of the epoch
as to be a puzzle to all critics.
The relation in which the system of Anaxagoras stands to
other systems may be briefly characterized. The Infinite Matter
of the Ionians became in his hands the homwcomerice. Instead of
one substance, such as Water, Air, or Fire, he saw the necessity
of admitting Many substances, At the same time, he carried out
* It would be needless after this to refer to the numerous expressions
of Aristotle in confirmation. The critical reader will do well to consult
Trendelenburg, Comment. Aristot. de Anim., p. 466 et seq. Plato, in speaking
of the voot, adds Kai zIvx4.-Craty., p. 40a.
4*




82                    ANAXAGORAS.
the Pythagorean and Eleatic principle of The One; thus avoiding the dialectical thrusts of Zeno against the upholders of The
Many. Hegel and M. Cousin would call this eclecticism; and
in one sense they would be correct; but inasmuch as Anaxagoras was led to his doctrine by the development which the Ionian
and the Eleatic principles had taken, and was not led to it by
any eclectical method, we must protest against the application
of such a name. There was a truth dimly recognized by the
Ionians, namely, that the material phenomena are all reducible
to some noumenon or noumena, some apx?. What that Beginning was, they variously sought. Anaxagoras also sought it;
and his doctrine of perception convinced him that it could not
be One principle, but Many; hence his homoeomerice. So far he
was an Ionian. But there was also a truth dimly seen by the
Eleatics, namely, that The Many could never be resolved into
One; and as without One there could not be Many, and with
the Many only there could nbt be One; in other words, as God
must be The One from whom the multiplicity of things is derived, the necessity of admitting The One as The All and the
Self-existent was proved. This reasoning was accepted by Anaxagoras.  He saw that there were Many things; he saw also the
necessity for The One. In so far he was an Eleatic.
Up to this point the two doctrines had been at variance: a
chasm of infinite depth yawned between them. Zeno's invention
of Dialectics was a result of this profound difference. It was
reserved for Anaxagoras to bridge over the chasm which could
not be filled up. He did so with consummate skill. He accepted both doctrines, with some modifications, and proclaimed
the existence of the Infinite Intelligence (The One) who was the
Architect of the Infinite Matter (homceomerice, the Many). By
this means he escaped each horn of the dilemma; he escaped
that which gored the Ionians, namely, as to how and why the
Infinite Matter became fashioned into worlds and beings; since
Matter by itself can only be Matter. He escaped that which
gored the Eleatics, as to how and why the Infinite One, who was




EMPEDOCLES.                     83
pure and unmixed, became the Infinite Many, impure and mixed;
since one thing could never be more than one thing. It must
have some one thing on which to act, for it cannot act upon
itself. Anaxagoras escaped both by his dualistic theory of Mind
fashioning, and Matter fashioned.
A similar bridge was thrown by him over the deep chasm separating the Sensualists from the Rationalists, with respect to the
origin of knowledge. He admitted both Sense and Reason;
others had only admitted either Sense or Reason.
These two points entitle Anaxagoras to a very high rank in
the history of Philosophy; and we regret to see that Aristotle
uniformly speaks disparagingly of him, but we believe that the
great Stagirite did not clearly apprehend the force of the doctrine he was combating.
~ III. EMPEDOCLES.
We are forced to differ from all historians we have consulted,
except De Gerando, who hesitates about the matter, respecting
the place occupied by Empedocles. Brucker classes him among
the Pythagoreans; Ritter, amongst the Eleatics; Zeller and
Hegel, as the precursor of the Atomists, who precede Anaxagoras; Renouvier, as the precursor of Anaxagoras; Tennemann
placing Diogenes of Apollonia between Anaxagoras and Empedocles, but making Democritus precede them. When we
come to treat of the doctrines of Empedocles, we shall endeavor
to show the filiation of ideas from Anaxagoras. Meanwhile it is
necessary to examine the passage in Aristotle, on which very
contradictory opinions have been grounded.
In the 3d chapter of the 1st book of Aristotle's Metaphysics,
after a paragraph on the system of Empedocles, occurs this passage: "But Anaxagoras of Clazomenve being superior to him
(Empedocles) in respect of age, but inferior to him in respect of
opinions, said that the number of principles was infinite."  By
"superior" and "inferior" we preserve the antithesis of the origi



84:                    EMPEDOCLES.
nal; but it would be more intelligible to say, "older" and
"inferior."
There are two other interpretations of this passage. One of
them is that of M. Cousin (after Hegel), who believes that the
antithesis of Aristotle is meant to convey the fact of Anaxagoras,
although older in point of time, being more recent in point of
published doctrine than Empedocles, having written after him.
This is his translation: "Anaxagoras, qui naquit avant ce
dernier, mais qui ecrivit apres lui."
The second is that adopted by M. Renouvier from M. Ravaisson,
who interprets it as meaning that the doctrine of Anaxagoras,
though more ancient in point of publication, is more recent in
point of thought; i. e. more developed philosophically, although
historically earlier.
Now we believe both these interpretations to be erroneous.
There is no ground for them except the antithesis of Aristotle;
and the original of this disputed passage is,'Avagayopocg 6O 
KXagojhievstos q7S IsU'VXiX6'rp6aporpos'Y rTObOU,'roTs 6' fp7iS; iu"arSpo5;
which is rendered by MM. Pierron and Zevort: " Anaxagore de
Clazomene, Paine d'Empedocle, n'etait pas arrive a un systlme
aussi plausible."*
This agrees with our version. We confess however that on a
first glance M. Cousin's version better preserves the force of
the antithesis?- pJLv XiLx;a s'porspos —ros 6' epyoIS vrspoS. But
other reasons prevent a concurrence in this interpretation. MM.
Pierron and Zevort, in their note on the passage, remark: "Mais
les mots Epy?%, gpyo.,, dans une opposition, ont ordinairement une
signification vague, comme re, revera, chez les Latins, et, chez
nous, en fait, en realite'"  The force of the objection does not
strike us. If Anaxagoras was in fact, in reality, posterior to
Empedocles, we can only understand this in the sense M. Cousin
has understood Aristotle; and moreover, MM. Pierron and
Zevort here contradict their translation, which says that, in point
* La Metaphysique d'Arisiote, iL 238




EMPEDOCLES.                       85
of fact, the system of Anaxagoras was not so plausible as that of
Empedocles.
More weight must be laid on the meaning of {VJrspos, which
certainly cannot be exclusively taken to mean posterior in point
of time. In the 11th chapter of Aristotle's 5th book he treats
of all the significations of rpo6-rspos and icr-spos. One of these
significations is superiority and inferiority. In the sense of inferiority {tr~spos is often used by the poets. Thus Sophocles:'t  utapav  0os, Kai yvvaiKds crTEpov!' 0 shameful character, below a woman!"
" Inferior" is the primitive meaning; in English we say, " second
to none," for " inferior to none."
This meaning of {~-repos, namely, of inferiority, is the one
always understood by the old commentators on the passage in
question; none of them understood a chronological posteriority.
IHpIpopo0 indicates priority in point of time; {'U-rspos inferiority in
point of merit. Thus Philoponus: "Prior quidem tempore, sed
posterior et mancus secundum opinionem" (fol. 2 a); and the
anonymous scholiast of the Vatican MS.: rp6sporpo 7yov r, XpovW,
oXX' v~drspos xxa' iXXsqrwv xawr r7rv 6Soav —" first indeed in time,
but second and inferior in point of doctrine."
The only question which now remains to be answered in order
to establish the truth of the foregoing interpretation of fjc"rspos, is
this: Did Aristotle regard the system of Anaxagoras as inferior
to that of Empedocles?
This question we can answer distinctly in the affirmative. The
reader will remember our citation of the passage in which Aristotle blames Anaxagoras for never employing his First Cause
(Intelligence) except upon emergencies.   Aristotle continues
thus: "Empedocles employs his causes more abundantly, though
not indeed sufficiently,-Koca  Ep/%sAoxXg Es;' riov pev TroMU
Xproai TroT acr'orss, ou pj oUiSs ixavs. —Met. i. 4.
Chronology is moreover in favor of our view. Anaxagoras
was born about the 70th Olympiad; Empedocles, by general con



86                    EMPEDOCLES.
sent, is said to have flourished in the 84th Olympiad; this would
make Anaxagoras at least fifty-six years old at the time when Empedocles published his doctrine, after which age it is barely probable that Anaxagoras would have begun to write; and even this
probability vanishes when we look upon the life of Anaxagoras,
who was teaching in Athens about the 76th or 77th Olympiad,
and who died at Lampsacus, in exile, in the 88th Olympiad, viz.
sixteen years after the epoch in which Empedocles is said to
have flourished.
Trusting that the above point was not unworthy of brief discussion, we will now commence the narrative.
Empedocles was born at Agrigentum, in Sicily, and flourished
about the 84th Olympiad (B. c. 444). Agrigentum was at that
period at the height of its splendor, and was a formidable rival
to Syracuse. Empedocles, descended from a wealthy and illustrious family, acquired a high reputation by his resolute espousal
of the democratic party. Much of his wealth is said to have
been spent in a singular but honorable manner: namely, in bestowing dowries on poor girls, and marrying them to young men
of rank and consequence. Like most of the early philosophers,
he is supposed to have been a great traveller, and to have gathered in distant lands the wondrous store of knowledge which he
displayed. It was assumed that only in the far East could he have
learned the potent secrets of Medicine and Magic; only from the
Egyptian Magi could he have learned the art of prophecy.
It is probable, however, that he did travel into Italy, and to
Athens. But in truth we can mention little of his personal history that is not open to question. His name rivals that of Pythagoras in the regions of fable. The same august majesty of
demeanor and the same marvellous power over nature are attributed to both. Miracles were his pastimes. In prophecy, in
medicine, in power over the winds and rains, his wonders were
so numerous and so renowned, that when he appeared at the
Olympic Games all eyes were reverentially fixed upon him. His
dress and demeanor accorded with his reputation. Haughty,




EMPEDOCLES.                      87
impassioned, and eminently disinterested in character, he refused
the government of Agrigentum when freely offered him by the
citizens; but his love of distinction showed itself in priestly garments, a golden girdle, the Delphic crown, and a numerous train
of attendants. He proclaimed himself to be a God whom men
and women reverently adored. But we must not take this literally: he probably only "assumed by anticipation an honor
which he promised all soothsayers, priests, physicians, and
princes of the people."
Fable has also taken advantage of the mystery which overhangs
his death, to create out of it various stories of marvel. One relates that, after a sacred festival, he was drawn up to heaven in a
splendor of celestial effulgence. Another, and more popular one
is, that he threw himself headlong into the crater of Mount -Etna,
in order that he might pass for a God, the cause of his death being unknown; but one of his brazen sandals, thrown out in an
eruption, revealed the secret.
A similar uncertainty exists as to his Teachers and his Writings.
Pythagoras, Parmenides, Xenophanes, and Anaxagoras have all
been positively named as his Teachers. Unless we understand
the word Teachers in a figurative sense, we must absolutely reject these statements. Diogenes Laertius, who reports them, does
so in his dullest manner, with an absence of criticism remarkable
even in him.* Considering that there was, at least, one hundred
and forty years between Pythagoras and Empedocles, we need no
further argument to disprove any connection between them.
Diogenes, on the authority of Aristotle (as he says), attributes
to Empedocles the invention of Rhetoric; and Quinctilian (iii. c. 1)
has repeated the statement. We have no longer the work of
Aristotle; but, as Ritter says, the assertion must have arisen
firom a misunderstanding, or have been said in jest by Aristotle,
because Empedocles was the teacher of Gorgias: most likely
* Diogenes is one of the stupidest of the stupid race of compilers. His
work is useful, because containing occasional extracts, but can rarely be relied on for any thing else.




88                     EMPEDOCLES.
from a misunderstanding, since Sextus Empiricus mentions Aristotle as having said that Empedocles first incited, or gave an impulse to Rhetoric.*  Aristotle, in his Rhetoric, declares that
Corax and Tisias were the first to publish a written Treatise on
Eloquence. We feel the less hesitation in rejecting the statement of Diogenes, because in the very passage which succeeds he
is guilty of a very gross misquotation of Aristotle, who, as he
says, "in his book of The Poets speaks of Empedocles as Homeric,
powerful in his eloquence, rich in metaphors, and other poetical
figures."t Now this work of Aristotle on the Poets is fortunately
extant, and it proclaims the very reverse of what Diogenes alleges.
Here is the passage:-" Custom, indeed, connecting the poetry
or making with the metre, has denominated some elegiac poets,
others epic poets: thus distinguishing poets, not according to the'nature of their imitation, but according to that of their metre
only; for even they who composed treatises of Medicine, or Natural Philosophy in verse, are denominated Poets: yet Homer and
Empedocles have nothing in common except their metre; the former, therefore, justly merits the name of Poet; the other should
rather be called a Physiologist than a Poet.":
It is, indeed, quite possible that Diogenes may have had before
him  a book aspl frosrwjv, perhaps one of the many spurious
treatises current under Aristotle's name; but it is not probable
that Aristotle would have expressed an opinion so contrary to the
one given in his authentic work.
The diversity of opinion, with respect to the position of Empedocles, indicated at the opening of this Chapter, is not without
significance. That men such as Hegel, Ritter, Zeller, and Tennemann should see reasons for different classification, cannot be
without importance to the Historian. Their arguments destroy
each other; but it does not therefore follow that they all build
upon false grounds. Each view has a certain truth in it; but,
not being the whole truth, it cannot prevail. The cause of the
* fHporov KEKLVIKEVaL.-Adv. Mat. vii.
t Diog. Laert. lib. viii. c. ii. ~ 8, p. 57.  $ De Poet. c. i.




EMPEDOCLES.                        89
difference seems to be this: Empedocles has something of the
Pythagorean, Eleatic, Heraclitic, and Anaxagorean systems in
his system; so that each historian, detecting one of these elements, and omitting to give due importance to the others, has
connected Empedocles with the system to which that one element belongs. Ritter and Zeller have, however, been aware of
some of the complex relations of the doctrine, but failed, we
think, in giving it its true position.
Respecting human knowledge, Empedocles belongs partly to
the Eleatics. With them, he complained of the imperfection of
the Senses; and looked for truth only in Reason, which is partly
human and partly divine: it is partly clouded by the senses.
The divine knowledge is opposed to sensuous knowledge; for
men cannot approach the divine, neither can he seize it with the
hand nor the eye.    Hence Empedocles conjoined the duty of
contemplating God in the mind. But he appears to have proclaimed the existence of this divine knowledge without attempting to determine its relation to human knowledge.   In this respect he resembles rather Xenophanes than Parmenides.*
We have no clear testimony of his having studied the works
of Anaxagoras; but, if we had, it might not be difficult to explain his inferior theory of knowledge; for, in truth, the theory
of Anaxagoras was too far in advance of the age to be rightly
apprehended.   Empedocles, therefore, adhered to the Eleatic
theory.  With Xenophanes, he bewailed the delusion of the
senses and experience. Listen to his lament:
"Swift-fated and conscious, how brief is life's pleasureless portion!
Like the wind-driven smoke, they are carried backwards and forwards,
Each trusting to naught save what his experience vouches,
On all sides distracted; yet wishing to find out the whole truth,
In vain; neither by eye nor ear perceptible to man,
Nor to be grasped by mind: and thou, when thus thou hast wandered,
Wilt find that no further reaches the knowledge of mortals."
* Having quoted Aristotle's testimony of the sensuous nature of knowledge in the Empedoclean theory, we need only here refer to it; adding that,
in this respect, Empedocles ranks with Parmenides rather than with Xenophanes.




90                      EMPEDOCLES.
These verses seem to indicate a skepticism of Reason as well
as of the Senses; but other passages show that he upheld the
integrity of Reason, which he thought was only prevented from
revealing the whole truth because it was imprisoned in the body.
Mundane existence was, in his system, the doom of such immortal souls as had been disgraced from Heaven. The Fall of Man
he thus distinctly enunciated:
" This is the law of Fate, of the Gods an olden enactment,
If with guilt or murder a Daemon* polluteth his members,
Thrice ten thousand years must he wander apart from the blessed.
Hence, doomed I stray, a fugitive from Gods and an outcast,
To raging strife submissive."
But he had some more philosophical ground to go upon when
he wished to prove the existence of Reason and of the Divine
Nature. He maintained that like could only be known by like:
through earth we learn the earth, through fire we learn fire,
through strife we learn strife, and through love we learn love.
If, therefore,t like could only be known by like, the Divine could
only be known by Divine Reason; and, inasmuch as the Divine
is recognized by man, it is a proof that the Divine exists. Knowledge and Existence mutually imply each other.
Empedocles resembles Xenophanes also in his attacks on anthropomorphism. God, he says, has neither head adjusted to
limbs, like human beings, nor legs, nor hands:
"He is, wholly and perfectly, mind ineffable, holy,
With rapid and swift-glancing thought pervading the whole world."
We may compare these verses with the line of Xenophanes" Without labor he ruleth all things by reason and insight."
* An immortal soul.
t We are here thinking for Empedocles; we have no other authority for
this statement, than that something of the kind is wanting to make out a
plausible explanation of what is only implied in the fragments extant. The
fragments tell us that he believed in Reason as the transcendent faculty;
and also that Reason did in some way recognize the Divine. All we have
done is to supply the link wanting.




EMPEDOCLES.                        91
Thus far Empedocles belonged to the Eleatics. The traces of
Pythagoras are fewer; for we cannot regard as such all those
analogies which the ingenuity of some critics has detected.*  In
his life, and in his moral precepts, there is a strong resemblance
to Pythagoras; but in his philosophy we see none beyond metempsychosis, and the consequent abstinence from animal food.
Heraclitus had said there was nothing but a perpetual flux of
things, that the whole world of phenomena was as a flowing river,
ever-changing yet apparently the same. Anaxagoras had also
said that there was no creation of elements, but only an arrangement. Empedocles was now to amalgamate these views. "Fools!"
he exclaims,
" Who think aught can begin to be which formerly was not,
Or, that aught which is, can perish and utterly decay.t
Another truth I now unfold: no natural birth
Is there of mortal things, nor death's destruction final;
Nothing is there but a mingling, and then a separation of the mingled,
Which are called a birth and death by ignorant mortals.":
So distinct a relationship as these verses manifest towards both
Heraclitus and Anaxagoras will account for the classification
adopted by Hegel, Zeller, and Renouvier; at the same time it
gives greater strength to our opinion of Empedocles as the successor of these two.
The differences are, however, as great as the resemblances.
Having asserted that all things were but a mingling and a separation, he must have admitted the existence of certain primary
elements, which were the materials mingled.
Heraclitus had affirmed Fire to be both the principle and the
element; both the moving, mingling force, and the mingled
matter. Anaxagoras, with great logical consistency, affirmed
that the primary elements were homceomerice, since nothing could
* See them noticed in Zeller, Philos. der Griechen, pp. 169-173 (1845).
t Compare Anaxagoras, as quoted above: " Wrongly do the Greeks suppose that aught begins or ceases to be."
t Compare Anaxagoras: "So that all-becoming might more properly be
called becoming mixed, and all-corruption becoming separate."




92                    EMPEDOCLES.
proceed from nothing, and whatever was arranged must, therefore, be an arrangement of primary elements. Empedocles affirmed that the primary elements were four, viz. Earth, Air, Fire,
and Water: out of these all other things proceed; all things are
but the various minglings of these four.
Now, that this is an advance on both the preceding conceptions will scarcely be denied; it bears indubitable evidence of
being a later conception, and a modification of its antecedents.
Nevertheless, although superior as a physiological view, it has not
the logical consistency of the view maintained by Anaxagoras;
for, as Empedocles taught that like can only be known by like,
i. e. that existence and knowledge were identical and mutually
implicative, he ought to have maintained that whatever is recognized by the mind as distinct, must be distinct in esse.
With respect to the Formative Power, we see the traces of Heraclitus and Anaxagoras in about the same proportion. Heraclitus maintained that Fire was impelled by irresistible Desire to
transform itself into some determinate existence. Anaxagoras
maintained that the infinite Intelligence was the great Architect
who arranged all the material elements, the Mind that controlled
and fashioned Matter. The great distinction between these two
systems is, that the Fire transforms itself, the Nous transforms
something which is radically different from itself. Both these
conceptions were amalgamated by Empedocles. He taught that
Love was the creative power. Wherever there is a mixture of
different elements, Love is exerted.
Here we see the Desire of Heraclitus sublimed into its highest
expression, and the Nous of Anaxagoras reduced to its moral expression, Love. The difficulties of the Heraclitean doctrine,
namely, as to how Fire can ever become any thing different from
Fire, are avoided by the adoption of the Anaxagorean dualism;
while the difficulties of the Anaxagorean doctrine, namely, as to
how the great Arranger was moved and incited to arrange the
primary elements, are in some measure avoided by the natural
desire of Love (Aphrodite).




EMPEDOCLES.                      93
But there was a difficulty still to be overcome. If Love was
the creator, that is, the Mingler, what caused separation? To
explain this, he had recourse to Hate. As the perfect state of
supramundane existence was Harmony, the imperfect state of
mundane existence was Discord. Love was, therefore, the Formative Principle, and Hate the Destructive. Hence he said that
"All the members of God war together, one after the other."
This is but the phrase of Heraclitus, "Strife is the parent of all
things." It is nevertheless most probable that Empedocles regarded Hate as only a mundane power, as only operating on the
theatre of the world, and nowise disturbing the abode of the
Gods.* For, inasmuch as man is a fallen and perverted God,
doomed to wander on the face of the earth, sky-aspiring, but
sense-clouded; so may Hate be only perverted Love, struggling
through space. Does not this idea accord with what we know
of his opinions? His conception of God, that is, of the One, was
that of a "sphere in the bosom of harmony fixed, in calm rest,
gladly rejoicing." This quiescent sphere, which is Love, exists
above and around the moved World. Certain points are loosened from the combination of the elements, but the unity established by Love continues. Ritter is convinced that "Hate has
only power over the smaller portion of existence, over that part
which, disconnecting itself from the whole, contaminates itself
with crime, and thereby devolves to the errors of mortals."
Our account of Empedocles will be found to vary considerably
from that in Aristotle; but our excuse is furnished by the great
Stagirite himself, who is constantly telling us that Empedocles
gave no reasons for his opinions. Moreover, Aristotle makes
us aware that his own interpretation is open to question; for he
says, that this interpretation can only be obtained by pushing
the premises of Empedocles to their legitimate conclusions; a
process which destroys all historical integrity, for what thinker
does push his premises to their utmost limits?
* An opinion subsequently put forth by Plato in the Phcedrus.




94                     DEMOCRITUS.
~ IV. DEMOCRITUS.
The laughing Philosopher, the traditional antithesis to Heraclitus, was born at Abdera (the new settlement ot the Teians after
their abandonment of Ionia), in the 80th Olympiad (B. c. 460).
His claim to the title of Laugher, o ysXac;lvos, has been disputed,
and by moderns generally rejected. Perhaps the native stupidity
of his countrymen, who were renowned for abusing the privilege
of being stupid, afforded him incessant matter for laughter.
Perhaps he was by nature satirical, and thought ridicule the test
of truth. He was of a noble and wealthy family, so wealthy
that it entertained Xerxes at Abdera. Xerxes in recompense
left some of his Magi to instruct the young Democritus. Doubtless it was their tales of the wonders of their native land, and
the deep unspeakable wisdom of their priests, which inspired him
with the passion for travel.  I, of all men," he says, "of my
day, have travelled over the greatest extent of country, exploring
the most distant lands; most climates and regions have I visited,
and listened to the most experienced and wisest of men; and
in the calculations of line-measuring no one hath surpassed me,
not even the Egyptians, amongst whom I sojourned five years."
In travel he spent his patrimony; but he exchanged it for an
amount of knowledge which no one had previously equalled.
The Abderites, on his return, looked on him with vague wonder. The sun-burnt traveller brought with him knowledge which,
to them, must have appeared divine. He exhibited a few samples
of his lore, foretold unexpected changes in the weather, and was
at once exalted to the summit of that power to which it is a
nation's pride to bow. He was offered political supremacy, but
wisely declined it.
It would be idle to detail here the various anecdotes which tradition hands down respecting him. They are mostly either impossible or improbable. That, for instance, of his having put out
his eyes with a burning-glass, in order that he might be more
perfectly and undisturbedly acquainted with his reason, is in vio



]REMOCRITUS.                    95
lent contradiction to his theory of the eye being one of the great
inlets to the soul. Tradition is less questionable in its account
of his having led a quiet, sober life, and of his dying at a very
advanced age. More we cannot credit.
Respecting his Philosophy there is some certain evidence; but
it has been so variously interpreted, and is in many parts so obscure, that historians have been at a loss to give it its due position in relation to other systems. Reinhold, Brandis, Marbach,
and Hermann view him as an Ionian; Buhle and Tennemann,
as an Eleatic; Hegel, as the successor of Heraclitus, and the
predecessor of Anaxagoras; Ritter, as a Sophist; and Zeller, as
the precursor of Anaxagoras. Of all these attempts at classification, that by Ritter seems to me the worst. Because Democritus has an occasional phrase implying great vanity-and those
mentioned by Ritter seem to us to imply nothing of the kindhe is said to be a Sophist!
Democritus is distinguished from the Ionians by the denial of
all sensible quality to the primary elements; from the Eleatics
by his affirmation of the existence of a multiplicity of elements;
from Heraclitus on the same ground; from Anaxagoras, as we
shall see presently; and from Empedocles, by denying the Four
Elements, and the Formative Love. All these differences are
radical. The resemblances, such as they are, may have been coincidences, or derived from one or two of the later thinkers: Parmenides and Anaxagoras, for example.
What did Democritus teach? This question we will endeavor
to answer somewhat differently from other historians; but our
answer shall be wholly grounded on precise and certain data,
with no other originality than that of developing the system
from its central principles.
To commence with Knowledge, and with the passage of Aristotle, universally accredited, though variously interpreted: " Democritus says, that either nothing is true, or what is true is not
evident to us. Universally in his system, the sensation constitutes the thought, and as at the same time it is but a change




96                       DEMOCRITUS.
[in the sentient being], the sensible phenomena (i. e. sensations)
are of necessity true."  This pregnant passage means, I think,
that sensation, inasmuch as it is sensation, must be true: that is,
true subjectively; but sensation, inasmuch as it is sensation, cannot be true objectively. M. Renouvier thinks that Democritus
was the first to introduce this distinction; but our readers will
remember that it was the distinction established by Anaxagoras.
Sextus Empiricus quotes the very words of Democritus: "The
sweet exists only inform, the bitter in form, the hot in form, the
cold in form, color in form; but in causal reality (aOlrd   )t
only atoms and space exist.    The sensible things which are
supposed by opinion to exist have no real existence, but only
atoms and space exist."I  When he says that sweetness, heat,
color, etc., exist in form only, he means that they are sensible
images constantly emanating from things; a notion we shall explain presently. A little further on, Sextus reports the opinion,
that we only perceive that whichfalls in upon us according to
the disposition of our bodies; all else is hidden from us.
Neither Condillac nor Destutt de Tracy has more distinctly
identified sensation and thought, than in the above passages.
But Democritus does so in the spirit of Kant rather than that of
Condillac; for, although with the latter he would say, "Penser,
c'est sentir," yet he would with the former draw the distinction
between phenomenal and noumenal perception.
But did sensation constitute all knowledge? Was there nothing to guide man but the reports of his senses? Democritus
said there was Reflection.~
This Reflection was not the source of absolute truth, but ful*'Hro( otfOv gva ar] 6E Ia by'itv y' dJ7'Xov. OX)s 5e ta tia rviroAapadvutv p5p6v~raLv C lv rivt at'rOnetv raTurvv' JTvat aXXoiwwarv, rO Oanv6pEovov KarT rTiv alrOitslv 1f
avdyKr.Cs dai04s eTvaa. —Metaph. iv. 5.
+ Modern editors read iros, " in reality." We are inclined however to preserve the old reading, as more antithetical to v6pqy.
t Adv. Mathem. vii. 163.
~ Aidvoia: etymology, no less than psychology, justifies this translation.




DEIOCRITUS.                       97
filled a controlling office, and established certitude, as far as there
could be certitude in human knowledge. And the existence of
this Reflection was asserted very much in the style of the celebrated addition to the aphorism, "Nothing is in the Mind which
was not previously in the Senses," when Leibnitz added, " except
the Mind itself." Democritus, aware that most of our conceptions are derived through the senses, was also aware that many
of them were utterly independent, and in defiance of the Senses.
Thus the "infinitely small" and the "infinitely great" escape
Sense, but are affirmed by Reflection. So also the atoms which
his Reason told him were the primary elements of things, he
could never have known by Sense.
Thus far we have seen Democritus only as the inheritor
of Anaxagoras; but the epoch we are now considering was distinguished by the greater attention bestowed on the origin of
knowledge, and we may reasonably expect that Democritus had
devoted considerable thought to the subject, and had originated
some view of his own.
He was not content with the theory of Anaxagoras. There
were difficulties which remained unsolved by it; which, indeed,
had never been appreciated. This was the grand problem Democritus set himself to solve: How do we perceive external things?
It is no answer to say that we perceive them by the senses.
This is no better an explanation than that of the occult quality
of opium, given by Moliere's physician: " L'opium endormit parce
qu'il a une vertu soporifique."  The question arises-How is it
that the senses perceive?
No one had asked this question; to have asked it, was to form
an era in the history of Philosophy. Men began by reasoning
on the reports of the senses, unsuspicious of error; when they
saw any thing, they concluded that what they saw existed, and
existed as they saw it. Afterwards came others who began to
question the accuracy of the senses. Lastly, came those who
denied that accuracy altogether, and pronounced the reports to
5




98                    DEMOCRITUS.
be mere delusions. Thus the question forced itself on the mind
of Democritus-In what manner could the senses perceive external things? Once settle the modus operandi, and then the
real efficacy of the senses may be estimated.
The hypothesis by which he attempted to explain perception
was both ingenious and bold; and many centuries elapsed before
a better one was suggested. He supposed that all things were
constantly throwing off images of themselves (ai'6wXa,) which,
after assimilating to themselves the surrounding air, enter the
soul by the pores of the sensitive organ. The eye, for example,
is composed of aqueous humors; and water sees. But how does
water see   It is diaphanous, and receives the image of whatever is presented to it.
This is a very rude and material hypothesis; but did not
philosophers, for centuries, believe that their senses received impressions of things? and did they not suppose that images of
things were reflected in the mind?  This latter hypothesis
is, perhaps, less obviously fantastic and gratuitous; but it is
also less tenable; for how is it that the mind becomes a mirror
reflecting the images? The hypothesis stands as much in need
of explanation as the phenomenon it pretends to explain.
The hypothesis of Democritus, once admitted, serves its purpose; at least, to a considerable extent.  Only the external
surface of a body is thrown off in the shape of an si'w.Xov or image, and even that only imperfectly and obscurely. The figure
thrown off is not a perfect image of the object throwing it off.
It is only an image of the external form, and is subject to variations in its passage to the mind. This being the case, the strictly
phenomenal nature of all knowledge is accurately exhibited. The
idols or images, being themselves imperfect, our knowledge is
necessarily imperfect.
With this theory of knowledge how could he answer the
other, greater, question of Creation? It is said that he rejected
The One of the Eleatics, The four of Empedocles, and the Ho



DEMOCRITUS.                     99
mceomerice of Anaxagoras, and declared Atoms, invisible and
intangible, to be the primary elements; and that all things were
but modes of one of the triple arrangements, namely, configuration, combination, and position. The atom, being indivisible, is
necessarily one; and, being one, is necessarily self-existent. By
this hypothesis, therefore, Democritus satisfied the demands of
those who declared that the self-existent must be One; and
of those who declared that there were many things existing, and
that the One could never be more than the One, never become
the Many. He amalgamated the Ionian and Eleatic schools in
his speculation, correcting both.  He, doubtless, derived this
idea from the homoeomerice of Anaxagoras; or, as those who place
Anaxagoras later than Democritus would say, originated this
idea. It becomes a question, therefore, which of these speculations bears the impress of greater maturity. On this question we
cannot hesitate to pronounce. The idea of homoeomerice betrays
its more primitive nature in this-it attributes positive qualities
to atoms, which qualities are not changed or affected by combination or arrangement. The idea of the atom divested of all
quality, and only assuming that quality as phenomenal when in
combination with other atoms, and changing its quality with
every change of combination, is indubitably a far more scientific
speculation; it is also obviously later in point of development.
From the axiom that only "like can act upon like," Anaxagoras formed his homoomerice. Democritus accepted the axiom,
but gave it a wider application. If only like can act upon like,
said he, then must all things be alike in esse; and the only differences are those of phenomena, i. e. of manifestation; these depend on combination and arrangement.
Atomism is homoeomerianism stripped of qualities. It is therefore the system of Anaxagoras greatly improved.
The Atomism of Democritus has not been sufficiently appreciated as a speculation. It is one of the profoundest yet reached
by human subtlety. Leibnitz, many centuries afterwards, was




100                    DEMOCRITUS.
led to a doctrine essentially similar; his celebrated "Monadologie" is but Atomism, with a new terminology. Leibnitz called
his Monad a force, which to him was the prima materia. So
also Democritus denied that atoms had any weight; they had
only force, and it was the impulsion given by superior force
which constituted weight. It is worthy of remark that not only
did these thinkers concur in their doctrine of atomism, but also,
as we have seen, in their doctrine of the origin of knowledge: a
coincidence which gives weight to the supposition that in both
minds one doctrine was dependent on the other.
From what has already been said, the reader may estimate
Ritter's assertion, that it would be in vain to seek for any profounder view in the theory of Democritus than that common to all
mechanical physicists who sought to reduce every thing to mathematical conceptions: an assertion as preposterous as that which
follows it, namely, that Democritus arrived at his atomic theory
in the same way as modern physicists,-fiom a bias for the mechanical consideration of Nature. Ritter here contradicts himself.
Having first declared that there was nothing in the Democritian
theory but what the Ionians had previously discovered, he next
declares that this theory is the same as that of the modern atomic
theory. We are puzzled to which decision we shall award the
palm of historical misconception. The modern atomic theory is
the law of definite proportions; the ancient theory is merely the
affirmation of indefinite combinations. Between these two conceptions there is precisely the difference between Positive Science
and Philosophy. Instead of being similar conceptions, they were
neither arrived at in the same way, nor have they the same signification.
Attempts have been made, from certain expressions attributed
to Democritus, to deduce an Intelligence, somewhat similar to
that in the Anaxagorean doctrine, as the Formative Principle.
But the evidence is so small and so questionable, that we refrain
from pronouncing on it. Certain it is that he attributed the




DEMOCRITUIS.                   101
formation of things to Destiny; but whether that Destiny was
intelligent or not is uncertain.
In conclusion, we may observe that his system was an advance
on that of his predecessors. In the two great points of psychology and physics, which we have considered at length, it is impossible to mistake a very decided progress, as well as the opening of a new line in each department.




THIRD EPOCH.
INTELLECTUAL CRISIS.-THE INSUFFICIENCY           OF ALL ATTEMPTS TOWARDS A SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM             OF EXISTENCE, AS WELL AS THAT OF KNOWLEDGE, PRODUCES
THE SOPHISTS.
CHAPTER I.
THE SOPHISTS.
~ I. WHAT WERE THEY?
THE Sophists are a much calumniated race.   That they should
have been so formerly is not surprising; that they should be so
still, is an evidence that historical criticism is yet in its infancy.
In raising our voices to defend them we are aware of the paradox; but looked at nearly, the paradox is greater on the side of
those who credit and repeat the traditional account. In truth,
we know of few charges so unanimous, yet so paradoxical, as that
brought against the Sophists.* It is as if mankind had consented
to judge of Socrates by the representation of him in The Clouds.
The caricature of Socrates by Aristophanes is quite as near the
* It is proper to state that the novel view of the position and character of
the Sophists advanced in this Chapter was published five years before the
admirable Chapter of Mr. Grote's History of Greece, wherein that erudite
and thoughtful writer brings his learning and sagacity to the most thorough
elucidation of the question it has yet received. In claiming priority in this
point of historical criticism, it is right for me to acknowledge that Mr. Grote
substantiates his view with overwhelming force of argument and citation;
and in revising the present Chapter, I have been much indebted to his
criticisms and citations.




THE SOPHISTS.                    103
truth as the caricature of the Sophists by Plato;* with this difference, that in the one case it was inspired by political, in the
other by speculative antipathy.
On the Sophists we have only the testimony of antagonists;
and the history of mankind clearly proves that the enmities
which arise from difference of race and country are feeble compared with the enmities which arise from difference of creed:
the former may be lessened by contact and intercourse; the latter are only aggravated. Plato had every reason to dislike the
Sophists and their opinions; he therefore lost no occasion of
ridiculing the one and misrepresenting the other. And it is
worthy of especial remembrance that this hostility was peculiarly
Platonic, and not Socratic; for, as Mr. Grote reminds us, there is
no such marked antithesis between Socrates and the Sophists in
the biographical work of Xenophon. Plato, however, and those
who followed Plato, misrepresented the Sophists, as in all ages
antagonists have misrepresented each other.
The Sophists were wealthy; the Sophists were powerful; the
Sophists were dazzling, rhetorical, and not profound. Interrogate
human nature-above all, the nature of philosophers-and ask
what will be the sentiment entertained respecting these Sophists
by their rivals. Ask the solitary thinker what is his opinion of
the showy, powerful, but shallow rhetorician who usurps the attention of the world. The man of convictions has at all times a
superb contempt for the man of mere oratorical or dialectical display. The thinker knows that the world is ruled by Thought;
yet he sees Expression gaining the world's attention. He knows,
perhaps, that he has within him thoughts pregnant with human
welfare; yet he sees the giddy multitude intoxicated with the
enthusiasm excited by some plausible fallacy, clothed in enchanting language. He sees through the fallacy, but cannot make
others as clear-sighted. His warning is unheeded; his wisdom
is spurned; his ambition is frustrated: the popular Idol is carried
* See in particular that amusing dialogue, the Euthydemus, which is quite
as exaggerated as Aristophanes.




104                   THE SOPHISTS.
onward in triumph. The neglected thinker would not be human
if he bore this with equanimity. He does not. He is loud and
angry in lamenting the fate of a world that can so be led; loud
and angry in his contempt of one who could so lead it. Should
he become the critic or historian of his age, what exactness ought
we to expect in his account of the popular idol?
Somewhat of this kind was the relation in which the Sophists
and Philosophers stood to each other.
The Sophists were hated by some because they were powerful,
by others because shallow; and were misrepresented by all. In
later times their antagonism to Socrates has brought them illwill; and this ill-will was strengthened by the very prejudice of
the name. Could a Sophist be other than a cheat and a liar?
As well ask, could a Devil be other than Evil? In the name of
Sophist all odious qualities are implied, and this implication perverts our judgment. Call the Sophists Professors of Rhetoric,
which is their truest designation, and then examine their history;
it will produce a very different impression.
Much discussion has been devoted to the meaning of the word
Sophist, and to the supposed condemnation it everywhere carried.;" A Sophist, in the genuine sense of the word, was a wise man, a
clever man, one who stood prominently before the public as distinguished for intellect or talent of some kind. Thus Solon and
Pythagoras are both called Sophists; Thamyras, the skilful bard,
is called a Sophist; Socrates is so denominated, not merely by
Aristophanes, but by  Eschines. Aristotle himself calls Aristippus, and Xenophon calls Antisthenes, both of them disciples of
Socrates, by that name. Xenophon, in describing a collection of
instructive books, calls them the writings of the old poets and
Sophists. Plato is alluded to as a Sophist even by Isocrates;
Isocrates himself was harshly criticised as a Sophist, and defends
both himself and his profession. Lastly, Timon, who bitterly satirized all the philosophers, designated them all, including Plato
and Aristotle, by the general name of Sophists."* This proves
* Grote, viii. 480.




THE SOPHISTS.                   105
the vagueness with which the term was employed: a like discrepancy might be detected in the modern use of the word " metaphysician," which is a term of honor or reproach, according to
the speaker. Zeller says that the specific name of Sophist at
first merely designated one who taught philosophy for pay. The
philosophy might be good or bad; the characteristic designated
by the epithet Sophistical was its demand of money-fees. The
narrower meaning was given it by Plato and Aristotle.*  It matters little, however, what was the meaning attached to the name.
Even were it proved that " Sophist" was as injurious in those
days as " Socialist" in our own, it would no more prove that the
Sophists really taught the doctrines attributed to them, than the
mingled terror and detestation with which "Socialist doctrines"
are described in almost all modern journals, pamphlets, speeches,
and reviews, prove that the Socialists really teach what is there
imputed to them.
We said it was a paradox to maintain that the Sophists really
promulgated the opinions usually attributed to them; and by
this we mean that not only are some of those opinions nothing
but caricatures of what was really maintained, but also that, in
our interpretation of the others, we grossly err, by a confusion of
Christian with Heathen views of morality. Moderns cannot help
regarding as fearfully immoral, ideas which by the Greeks were
regarded as moral, or at least as not disreputable. For instance:
the Greek orators are always careful to impress upon their audience, that in bringing a charge against any one they are actuated by the strongest personal motives; that they have been injured by the accused; that they have good honest hatred as a
motive for accusing him. Can any thing be more opposite to
Christian feeling? A Christian accuser is just as anxious to extricate himself from any charge of being influenced by personal
considerations, as the Greek was of making the contrary evident.
A Christian seeks to place his motive to the account of abstract
justice; and his statement would be received with great suspicion
* Philosophsie der G riechen, erster Theil, 1856, p. 750.
5%w




106                  THE SOPHISTS.
were it known that a personal feeling prompted it. The reason
of this difference is, that the Christian Ethics do not countenance
vengeance; the Greek Ethics not only countenanced vengeance,
but very much reprobated informers: consequently, whoever
made an accusation had to clear himself from the ignominy
of being an informer, and to do so he showed his personal
motives.
This example will prepare the reader to judge, without precipitancy, the celebrated boast attributed to the Sophists, that
they could "make the worse appear the better reason." This
was said to be the grand aim of their endeavors. This was
called their avowed object. To teach this art, it is said, they
demanded enormous sums; and to learn it enormous sums were
readily given, and given by many.
These assertions are severally false. We will take the last first.
It is not true that enormous sums were demanded. Isocrates affirms that their gains were never very high, but had been maliciously exaggerated, and were very inferior to the gains of dramatic actors. Plato, a less questionable authority on such a
point, makes Protagoras describe his system of demanding remuneration: "I make no stipulation beforehand; when a pupil
parts from me, I ask from him such a sum as I think the time
and the circumstances warrant; and I add, that if he deems the
demand too great, he has only to make up his own mind what is
the amount of improvement which my company has procured to
him, and what sum he considers an equivalent for it. I am content to accept the sum so named by himself, only requiring him
to go into a Temple and make oath that it is his sincere belief."
Plato objects to this, and to every other mode of "selling wisdom;" but, as Mr. Grote remarks, "such is not/the way in which
the corrupters of mankind go to work."
But let us waive the question of payment, to consider the
teaching paid for. The Sophists, it is said, and believed, boasted
that they could teach the art of making the worse appear the
better reason; and in one sense this is true; but understanding




THE SOPHISTS.                  107
this art as moderns have understood it, and thereby forming our
notion of the Sophists, let us ask, Is it credible that such an art
should have been avowed, and, being avowed, should be rewarded,
in a civilized state? Let us think, for an instant, of what are its
moral, or rather immoral, consequences. Let us reflect how
utterly it destroys all morality; how it makes the very laws but
playthings for dialectical subtlety. Then let us ask whether, as
we understand it, any State could have allowed such open blasphemy, such defiance of the very fundamental principle of honesty and integrity, such demolition of the social contract.
Could any State do this? and was Athens that State? We
ask the reader to realize for himself some notion of the Athenians
as citizens, not merely as statues; to think of them as human
beings, full of human passions, not simply as architects, sculptors,
poets, and philosophers. Having done this, we ask him whether
he can believe that these Athenians would have listened to a
man proclaiming all morality a farce, and all law a quibbleproclaiming that for a sum of money he could instruct any one
how to make an unjust cause appear a just one? Would not
such a proclamation be answered with a shout of derision, or of
execration, according to the belief in his sincerity? Could any
charlatan, in the corruptest age, have escaped lapidation for such
effrontery? Yet the Sophists were wealthy, by many greatly
admired, and were selected as ambassadors on very delicate missions. They were men of splendid talents, of powerful connections. Around them flocked the rich and noble youth of every
city they entered. They were the intellectual leaders of their
age. If they had been what their adversaries describe them,
Greece could only have been an earthly Pandemonium, where
Belial was King.
To believe this is beyond our power. Indeed such a paradox
it would be frivolous to refute, had it not been maintained for
centuries. Some have endeavored to escape it by maintaining
that the Sophists were held in profound contempt; and certain
passages are adduced from Plato in proof thereof. But the fact




108                    THE SOPHISTS.
appears to us to be the reverse of this. The wealth and power
of the Sophists-the very importance implied in Plato's constant
polemic against them-prove that they were not objects of contempt. Objects of aversion they might be to one party: the
successful always are. Objects of contempt they might be, to
some sincere and profound thinkers. The question here, however, is not one relating to individuals, but to the State. It is
not whether Plato despised Gorgias, but whether Athens allowed
him to teach the most unblushing and undisguised immorality.
There have been daring speculators in all times. There have
been men shameless and corrupt. But that there has been any
speculator so daring as to promulgate what he knew to be grossly immoral, and so shameless as to avow it, is in such contradiction to our experience of human nature as at once to be rejected.*
It is evident, therefore, that in teaching the art of "making
the worse appear the better reason," the Sophists were not guilty
of any thing held to be reprehensible; however serious thinkers,
such as Plato and Aristotle, might detest the shallow philosophy
from which it sprang.
But if this art was not reprehensible, except to severe minds,
such as Plato and Aristotle, it is clear that it could not have
been the art which its antagonists and defamers have declared it
to be. If, as we have shown, universal human nature would have
rebelled against a teaching which was avowedly immoral, the
fact that the Sophists were not stoned, but were highly considered and well paid, is proof that their teaching was either not what
we are told it was, or that such teaching was not considered immoral by the Greeks. Both of these negatives will be found
true. The teaching of the Sophists was demonstrably not what
* We are told by Sextus that Protagoras was condemned to death by
the Athenians, because lie professed himself unable to say whether the
Gods existed, or what they were, owing to the insufficiency of knowledge.
Yet the Athenians are supposed to have tolerated the Sophists as they are
understood by moderns!




THE SOPHISTS.                   109
is usually attributed to them, and what they did teach was very
far from being considered as immoral. Let us consider both
these points.
In the first place, Mr. Grote has shown beyond dispute that the
Sophists had no doctrine in common; they formed no sect or
school of thought, such as modern Germans indicate under the
name of Die Sophistik. There never was a Sophistik. Each
teacher had his own doctrinal views, and was not more bound to
the opinions of the others than a modern Barrister is bound to
share the theology of the Bar, or than a modern teacher of Elocution is bound to vote on the same side with all other professors. No sooner is this fact apprehended, than the absurdity of
attributing to "the Sophists" opinions expressed by one Sophist,
and that too in a caricature by Plato, is at once apparent. Moreover, the absurdity of talking of the "sophistical doctrine" becomes apparent, and we are forced to speak only of the " sophistical art," reserving for any special animadversion the special
name of the offending sinner.
The Sophists taught the art of disputation.  The litigious
quibbling nature of the Greeks was the soil on which an art like
that was made to flourish. Their excessive love of lawsuits is
familiar to all versed in Grecian history. The almost farcical
representation of a lawsuit given by AEschylus in his otherwise
awful drama, The Eumenides, shows with what keen and lively
interest the audience witnessed even the very details of litigation.
For such an appetite food would not long be wanting. Corax
and Tisias wrote precepts of the art of disputation. Protagoras
followed with dissertations on the most remarkable points of
law; and Gorgias composed a set accusation,and apology for
every case that could present itself.  People, in short, were
taught to be their own advocates.
This was by no means an immoral art. If it might or did
lead to immorality, few Greeks would have quarrelled with an
art so necessary. "Without some power of persuading or confuting, or defending himself against accusations, or, in case of




110                   THE SOPHISTS.
need, accusing others, no man could possibly hold an ascendant
position. He had probably not less need of this talent for private
informal conversations to satisfy his own political partisans, than
for addressing the public assembly formally convoked. Even
commanding an army or a fleet, without any laws of war or
habit of discipline, his power of keeping up the good-humor,
confidence, and prompt obedience of his men, depended not a little on his command of speech. Nor was it only to the leaders
in political life that such an accomplishment was indispensable.
In all democracies, and probably in several Governments which
were not democracies but oligarchies of an open character, the
courts of justice were more or less numerous, and the procedure
oral and public; in Athens especially the Dicasteries were both
very numerous and were paid for attendance. Every citizen had
to go before them in person, without being' able to send a paid
advocate in his place, if he either required redress for wrong
offered to himself, or was accused of wrong by another. There
was no man therefore who might not be cast or condemned, or
fail in his own suit, even with right on his side, unless he possessed some power of speech to unfold his case to the Dicasts, as
well as to confute the falsehoods and disentangle the sophistry
of an opponent. To meet such liabilities, from which no citizen,
rich or poor, was exempt, a certain training in speech became
not less essential than a certain training in arms."* Thus was
it that even quibbling ingenuity, "making the worse appear the
better reason," became a sort of virtue, because it was obtained
only by that mastery over argument which was the Athenian's
ambition and necessity. We can send a paid advocate to quibble
for us, and do not therefore need such argumentative subtlety.
But let us ask, are barristers pronounced the " corruptors of mankind," and is their art called the art of "making the worse appear
the better reason," as if that, and that alone, were the purport of
all pleading? Yet, in defending a criminal, does not every bar* Grote, viii. 468-4.




THE SOPHISTS.                  11l
rister exert his energy, eloquence, subtlety, and knowledge "to
make the worse appear the better reason?"  Do we reprobate
Sergeant Talfourd or Sir Frederick Thesiger, if they succeed in
gaining their client's cause, although that cause be a bad one?
On the contrary, the badness of the cause makes the greatness of
the triumph.
Now let us suppose Sergeant Talfourd to give lessons in forensic oratory; suppose him to announce to the world, that for a
certain sum he would instruct any man in the whole art of exposition and debate, of the interrogation of witnesses, of the tricks
and turning-points of the law, so that the learner might become
his own advocate: this would be contrary to legal etiquette;
but would it be immoral? Grave men might, perhaps, object
that Mr. Talfourd was offering to make men cheats and scamps,
by enabling them to make the worse appear the better reason.
But this is a consequence foreseen by grave men, not acknowledged by the teacher. It is doubtless true that owing to oratory,
ingenuity, and subtlety, a scamp's cause is sometimes gained;
but it is also true that many an honest man's cause is gained,
and many a scamp frustrated, by the same means. If forensic
oratory does sometimes make the worse appear the better reason,
it also makes the good appear in all its strength. The former is
a necessary evil, the latter is the very object of a court of justice.
"If," says Callicles, in defence of Gorgias, to Socrates, " any one
should charge you with some crime which you had not committed, and carry you off to prison, you would gape and stare, and
would not know what to say; and, when brought to trial, however contemptible and weak your accuser might be, if he chose
to indict you capitally, you would perish. Can this be wisdom,
which, if it takes hold of a gifted man, destroys the excellence of
his nature, rendering him incapable of preserving himself and
others from the greatest dangers, enabling his enemies to plunder
him of all his property, and reducing him to the situation of
those who, by a sentence of the Court, have been deprived of all
their rights?"




112                   THE SOPHISTS.
If it be admitted that Sergeant Talfourd's instruction in forensic oratory would not be immoral, however unusual, we have
only to extend the sphere and include politics, and represent to
ourselves the democratic state of Athens, where demagogues
were ever on the alert, and we shall be fully persuaded that the
art of the Sophists was not considered immoral; and, as further
proof, we select the passage in Plato's Republic, as coming fiom
an unexceptionable source.
Socrates, speaking of the mercenary teachers whom the people
call Sophists, says: "These Sophists teach them only the things
which the people themselves profess in assemblies; yet this they
call wisdom. It is as if a man had observed the instincts and
appetites of a great and powerful beast, in what manner to
approach it, how or why it is ferocious or calm, what cries it
makes, what tones appease and what tones irritate it; after
having learnt all this, and calling it wisdom, commenced teaching it without any knowledge of what is good, just, shameful and
unjust among these instincts and appetites; but calling that
good which flatters the animal, and that bad which irritates it;
because he knows not the difference between what is good in
itself and that which is only relatively good."*
There is the usual vein of caricature in this description (which
is paraphrased in the Quarterly Review,f and there given as if
the undoubted and unexaggerated doctrines of the Sophists);
but it very distinctly sets forth the fact that the Sophists did not
teach any thing contrary to public morals, however their art may
have offended abstract morality. Indeed the very fact of their
popularity would prove that they did but respond to a public
want; and because they responded to this want they were paid
by the public in money. Plato constantly harps upon their being mercenaries; but he was wealthy, and could afford such sarcasms. The Greeks paid their Musicians, Painters, Sculptors,
Physicians, Poets, and Teachers in Schools; why therefore
* Plato, Rep. vi. s91.  t No. xlii. p. 288.




THE SOPHISTS.                 113
should they not pay their Philosophers? Zeno of Elea was
paid; so was Democritus; but both of these have been sometimes included amongst the Sophists. We see nothing whatever more derogatory in the acceptance of money by Philosophers than by Poets; and we know how the latter stipulated
for handsome payment.
Having done our best to show that the "Sophistical art"that alone which the Sophists had in common-was not immoral, or at any rate was not regarded as immoral by the Greeks,
we will now see how the case stands with respect to the old
accusation of their having corrupted the Athenian youth, and of
their doctrines being essentially corrupting.
That the Athenians did not consider the Sophists as corruptors
of youth is unequivocally shown in two facts: they did not impeach the Sophists, and they did impeach Socrates. When
Anaxagoras and Protagoras " sapped the foundations of morality"
by expressing opinions contrary to the religion of Athens, they
were banished; but who impeached Gorgias, or Iippias, or
Prodicus?
The art however may have been essentially corrupting, although to contemporaries it did not appear so. We believe it
was so, if it is to be made responsible for all the consequences
which can logically be deduced from it. But "logical consequences" are unjust standards. Men are not responsible for
what others may consider their doctrines "lead to." It was on
the ground of such remote deduction that Socrates was put to
death; and on such grounds the Sophists have been the by-,word of reproach. Mr. Grote grapples directly with the fact,
where he declares Athens at the close of the Peloponnesian war
was not more corrupt than Athens in the days of Miltiades and
Aristides; and had it been more corrupt, we should demand
quite other evidence than that usually alleged, before believing
the corruption due to the Sophists.
Why then did Plato.speak of the Sophists with so much
asperity? Why did he consider their teaching so dangerous?




114                    THE SOPHISTS.
Because he differed from them in toto. He hated them for the
same reason that Calvin hated Servetus; but having a more
generous nature than Calvin, his hatred of their doctrines did
not assume so disgraceful a form. If his allegations are to condemn the Sophists, they must equally condemn all the public men
of that day. " Whoever will read either the Gorgias or the Republic, will see in how sweeping and indiscriminate a manner he
passes the sentence of condemnation. Not only the Sophists
and all the Rhetors, but all the Musicians and either Dithyrambic or Tragic Poets, all the Statesmen past as well as present,
not excepting even the great Pericles, receive from his hand
one common stamp of dishonor."*   But so far is he fiom considering the Sophists as peculiar corruptors of Athenian morality,
" that he distinctly protests against that supposition in a remarkable passage of the Republic. It is, he says, the whole people or
the society, with its established morality, intelligence, and tone
of sentiment, which is intrinsically vicious; the teachers of such
a society must be vicious also, otherwise their teaching would
not be received; and even if their private teaching were ever so
good, its effect would be washed away, except in some few privileged natures, by overwhelming influences."t
The truth is that, in as far as the Sophists taught any doctrine
at all, their doctrine was ethical; and to suppose men teaching
immoral ethics, i. e. systems of morality known by them to be
immoral, is absurd. To clear up this point we must endeavor to
ascertain what that doctrine was.
Plato's account is on the face of it a caricature, since it is impossible that any man should have seriously entertained such a
doctrine. What Protagoras and Gorgias thought is not given,
but only a misrepresentation of what they thought. Plato seizes
hold of one of their doctrines, and, interpreting it in his own
* Grote, viii. 537.
t Ibid. p. 59. The passage referred to is Repub. vi. 492 (page 888, ed.
Bekker), and the Sophists are mentioned by name as the teachers of whom
it treats.




THE SOPHISTS.                    115
way, makes it lead to the most outrageous absurdity and immorality. This is as if Berkeley's doctrine had been transmitted
to us by Beattie. Berkeley, it is well known, denied the existence of the external world, resolving it into a simple world of
ideas. Beattie taunted him with not having followed out his
principles, and with not having walked over a precipice. This
was a gross misrepresentation; an ignoratio elenchi; Beattie
misunderstood the argument, and drew conclusions from his
misunderstanding. Now suppose him to have written a dialogue
on the plan of those of Plato: suppose him making Berkeley
expound his argument in the way he (Beattie) interpreted it,
with a flavor of exaggeration for the sake of effect, and of absurdity for the sake of easy refutation: how would he have made
Berkeley speak? Somewhat thus: " Yes, I maintain that there is
no such external existence as that which men vulgarly believe in.
There is no world of matter, but only a world of ideas. If I
were to walk over a precipice, I should receive no injury; it is
only an ideal precipice."
This is the interpretation of a Beattie; how true it is most
men know: it is, however, quite as true as Plato's interpretation
of the Sophists. From Berkeley's works we can convict Beattie.
Plato we can convict from experience of human nature: experience tells us that no man, far less any set of men, could seriously,
publicly, and constantly broach doctrines thought to be subversive of all morality, without incurring the heaviest penalties.
To broach immoral doctrines with the faintest prospect of success,
a man must do so in the name of rigid Morality. To teach
immorality, and openly to avow that it is immoral, was, according to Plato, the office of the Sophists;* a statement which
carries with it its own contradiction.
* This passage in the Protagoras is often referred to as a proof of the
shamelessness of the Sophists, and sometimes of the ill-favor with which
they were regarded. It is to us only a proof of Plato's tendency to caricature.




116                    THE SOPHISTS.
~ II. PROTAGORAS.
Nothing can be more erroneous than to isolate the Sophists
from previous teachers, as if they were no direct product of the
speculative efforts which preceded them. They illustrate the
crisis at which philosophy had arrived. They took the negative,
as Socrates took the positive issue out of the dilemma.
Protagoras, the first who is said to have avowed himself a
Sophist, was born at Abdera, where Democritus first noticed him
as a porter, who showed great address in inventing the knot.*
The consequence was that Democritus gave him instructions in
Philosophy. The story is apocryphal, but indicates a connection
to have existed between the speculations of the two thinkers.
Let us suppose Protagoras to have accepted the doctrine of Democritus; with him to have rejected the unity of the Eleatics
and to have maintained the existence of the Many. With this
he also learned that thought is sensation, and that all knowledge
is therefore phenomenal. There were two theories in the Democritean system which he could not accept, viz. the Atomic and
Reflective. These two imply each other. Reflection is necessary
for the idea of Atoms; and it is from the idea of Atoms not perceived by the sense, that the existence of Reflection is proved.
Protagoras rejected the Atoms, and could therefore reject Reflection. He said that Thought was Sensation,-and all knowledge
consequently individual.
Did not the place of his birth no less than the traditional story
lead one to suppose some connection with Democritus, we might
feel authorized to adopt certain expressions of Plato, and consider
Protagoras to have derived his doctrine from Heraclitus. He
certainly resembles the last-named in the main results to which
his speculations led him. Be that as it may, the fact is unques* What the precise signification of r76X7 is we are unable to say. A porter's
knot, such as is now used, is the common interpretation. Perhaps Protagoras had contrived a sort of wooden machine such as the glazier's use,
and which is used by the porters in Greece and Italy to this day.




PROTAGORAS.                      117
tionable, that he maintained the doctrine of Thought being identical with and limited by Sensation. Now, this doctrine implies
that every thing is true relatively-every sensation is a true sensation; and, as there is nothing but sensation, knowledge is inevitably fleeting and imperfect. In a melancholy mind, as in
that of Heraclitus, such a doctrine would deepen sadness, till it
produced despair. In minds of greater elasticity, in men of greater
confidence, such a doctrine would lead to an energetic skepticism.
In Protagoras it became the formula: "Man is the measure of
all things."
Sextus Empiricus gives the psychological doctrine of Protagoras very explicitly; and his account may be received without
suspicion. We translate a portion of it:
"Matter," says Protagoras, "is in a perpetual flux;* whilst it
undergoes augmentations and losses, the senses also are modified,
according to the age and disposition of the body." Hie said, also,
that the reasons of all phenomena (appearances) resided in matter as substrata ('ro's Xoyovug vrvrvwv r'v (paivopSUvwv'0oxsth'al Ev r,7
sIX); so that matter, in itself, might be whatever it appeared to
each. But men have different perceptions at different times, according to the changes in the thing perceived. Whoever is in a
healthy state perceives things such as they appear to all others
in a healthy state, and vice versa. A similar course holds with
respect to different ages, as well as in sleeping and waking. Man
is therefore the criterion of that which exists; all that is perceived by him exists, that which is perceived by no man does not
exist"t
Now, conceive men conducted by what they thought irresistible arguments to such a doctrine as the above, and then see how
naturally all the skepticism of the Sophists flows from it. The
difference between the Sophists and the Skeptics was this: they
* Tv v'vrv ivarv dvat, an expression which, if not borrowed by Sextus
from Plato, would confirm the conjecture above respecting Heraclitus, as
the source of Protagoras's system.
t Hypot. Pyrrhon. p. 44.




118                    THE SOPHISTS.
were both convinced of the insufficiency of all knowledge, but
the Skeptics contented themselves with the conviction, while
the Sophists, satisfied with the vanity of all endeavor to penetrate the mysteries of the universe, began to consider their relations to other men: they devoted themselves to politics and
rhetoric.*  If there was no possibility of Truth, there only remained the possibility of Persuasion. If one opinion was as true
as another-that is, if neither were true,-it was nevertheless desirable, for the sake of Society, that certain opinions should prevail; and, if Logic was powerless, Rhetoric was efficient. Hence
Protagoras is made to say, by Plato, that the wise man is the
physician of the soul: he cannot indeed induce truer thoughts
into the mind, since all thoughts are equally true; but he can
induce healthier and more profitable thoughts. He can in the
same way heal Society, since by the power of oratory he can introduce good useful sentiments in the place of those base and
hurtful.t
This doctrine may be false; but is it not a natural consequence
of the philosophy of the epoch? It may be immoral; but is it
necessarily the bold and shameless immorality attributed to the
Sophists? To us it appears to be neither more nor less than the
result of a sense of the radical insufficiency of knowledge. Protagoras had spent his youth in the study of philosophy; he had
found that study vain and idle; he had utterly rejected it, and
had turned his attention elsewhere. A man of practical tendencies, he wanted a practical result. Failing in this, he sought
another path, firmly impressed with the necessity of having
something more definite wherewith to enter the world of action.
Plato could see no nobler end in life than that of contemplating
Being,-than that of familiarizing the mind with the eternal
Good, the Just, and the Beautiful,-of which all goodness, justice, and beautiful things were the images. With such a view
of life it was natural that he should despise the skepticism of the
* See Plato's definition of the sophistical art, Sophista, p. 146.
t The(etetus, p. 228.




PROTAGORAS.                    119
Sophists. This skepticism is clearly set forth in the following
passage from the speech of Callicles, in Plato's Gorgias:
"Philosophy is a graceful thing when it is moderately cultivated in youth; but, if any one occupies himself with it beyond
the proper age, it ruins him; for, however great may be his natural capacity, if he philosophizes too long he must of necessity be
inexperienced in all those things which one who would be great
and eminent must be experienced in. He must be unacquainted
with the laws of his country, and with the mode of influencing
other men in the intercourse of life, whether private or public,
and with the pleasures and passions of men; in short, with human characters and manners. And when such men are called
upon to act, whether on a private or public occasion, they expose
themselves to ridicule, just as politicians do when they come to
your conversation, and attempt to cope with you in argument;
for every man, as Euripides says, occupies himself with that in
which he finds himself superior; that in which he is inferior he
avoids, and speaks ill of it, but praises what he excels in, thinking that in doing so he is praising himself. The best thing, in
my opinion, is to partake of both. It is good to partake of philosophy by way of education, and it is not ungraceful in a young
man to philosophize. But, if he continues to do so when he
grows older, he becomes ridiculous, and I feel towards him as I
should towards a grown person who lisped and played at childish
plays. When I see an old man still continuing to philosophize,
I think he deserves to be flogged. However great his natural
talents, he is under the necessity of avoiding the assembly and
public places, where, as the poet says, men become eminent, and
to hide himself, and to pass his life whispering to two or three
striplings in a corner, but never speaking out any thing great,
and bold, and liberal."
That Protagoras, no less than Prodieus,* was a teacher of ex* Prodicus is especially excepted by Aristophanes in his sweeping condemnation of the Sophists; and, indeed, the author of the well-known parable, The Choice of.Hercules, must command the respect even of antagonists.




120                   THE SOPHISTS.
cellent morality, if not of the highest abstract views of the Good,
is clearly made out, not only in Mr. Grote's work, but in that of
Zeller, where the Sophists are unfavorably treated on the whole,*
and is indeed supported by the testimony of Plato and Xenophon.
The ethics of the Sophists may not have been of a very lofty
kind, but they were considered, even by enemies, to be adapted
to the exigencies of the day. They doubted the possibility of
Philosophy; they were assured only of the advantage of Oratory.
In their visits to various cities, they could not fail to remark
the variety of laws and ordinances in the different States.
This variety impressed them with a conviction that there were no
such things as Right and Wrong by nature, but only by convention. This, therefore, became a fundamental precept with them.
It was but a corollary of their dogma respecting Truth. For
man there was no Eternal Right, because there was no Eternal
Truth;'ro 6ixaJov xoal r aldXpov ou qpUdEi adXXO. vo: law was but
the law of each city. "That which appears just and honorable
to each city, is sofor that city, as long as the opinion is entertained," says Protagoras in the Thecetetus (p. 229). This denial
of abstract Truth and abstract Justice is easily pushed to absurd
and immoral consequences; but we have no evidence that such
consequences were maintained by the Sophists. Plato often
judges them by such consequences; but independently of the
want of any confidence in his representations as faithful, we can
often detect in Plato himself evidences of the exaggeration of his
general statements. Thus, he on various occasions makes the
Sophists maintain that Might is Right. Moderns, who always
accept him as positive testimony, have therefore unanimously repeated this statement. Yet, it is obvious that they could not
have held this opinion except in a very qualified form. And, in
* See Philos. der Griechen, i. 775. In one of his notes, Zeller alludes to
Steinhart's doubt respecting the authorship of the Myth, attributed by Plato
to Protagoras, as being " quite worthy of Plato himself." This is very characteristic of the ordinary tone of commentators, and we may well ask with
Zeller, "Aber warum soil er fur Protagoras zu gut seyn?"




PROTAGORAS.                   121
the first Book of the Republic, Thrasymachus the Sophist is made
to explain his meaning; namely, that Justice is the law ordained
by the party which is strongest in the State. Thus, in a democracy the enactments of the people are the laws: these laws are
for their advantage; therefore just. Now, in this admission, by
Plato, of a qualification of the abstract formula, " Might is Right,"
we see evidence of that formula never having been promulgated
by the Sophists; it was only an interpretation by Plato. What
they meant was this: All law is but convention: the convention
of each State is therefore justfor it; and, inasmuch as any such
convention must necessarily be ordained by the strongest party,
i. e. must be the will of the many, so we may see that justice is
but the advantage of the strongest.
The foregoing will, we trust, suffice to show that the tenets
attributed to them by Plato, are often caricatures, and admit of
very different explanation. Well might Gorgias exclaim, on
reading the Dialogue which bears his name, " I did not recognize
myself. The young man, however, has great talent for satire."
The Sophists were the natural production of the opinions of
the epoch. In them we see the first energetic protest against the
possibility of metaphysical science. This protest, however, must
not be confounded with the protest of Bacon —must not be mistaken for the germ of positive philosophy. It was the protest of
baffled minds. The Philosophy of the day led to skepticism;
but with Skepticism no energetic man could remain contented.
Philosophy was therefore denounced, not because a surer, safer
path of inquiry had been discovered, but because Philosophy was
found to lead nowhither. The skepticism of the Sophists was a
skepticism with which no great speculative intellect could be
contented.  Accordingly with Socrates Philosophy again reasserted her empire.
6




FOURTH EPOCH.
A NEW ERA OPENED BY THE INVENTION OF A NEW
METHOD.
CHAPTER I.
SOCRATES.
~ I. THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.
WHILST the brilliant Sophists were reaping money and renown
by protesting against Philosophy, and teaching the word-jugglery
which they called Disputation and Oratory, there suddenly appeared amongst them a strange antagonist. He was a perfect
contrast to them. They had slighted Truth; they had denied
her. Ile had made her his soul's mistress; and, with patient
labor, with untiring energy, did his large wise soul toil after perfect communion with her. They had deserted Truth for Money
and Renown.   He had remained constant to her in poverty.
They professed to teach every thing. He only knew that he
knew nothing; and denied that any thing could be taught. Yet
he believed he could be of service to his fellow-men; not by
teaching, but by helping them to learn. His mission was to
examine the thoughts of others. This he humorously explained
by reference to his mother's profession, namely that of a midwife.
What she did for women in labor he could do for men pregnant
with ideas. He was an accoucheur of ideas. He assisted ideas
in their birth, and, having brought them into light, he examined
them, to see if they were fit to live: if true, they were welcomed;




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.               123
if false, destroyed. And for this assistance he demanded no pecuniary recompense, but steadfastly refused every bribe of the
kind.
He was the declared questioner of all men who were renowned
for wisdom, or any intellectual eminence; and they were somewhat puzzled with their new antagonist. Who is he?-Socrates,
the son of Sophroniscus. What does he?-Converse. For what
purpose?-To expose error.
Some gorgeous Sophists, in their flowing robes, followed. by
crowds of eager listeners, treated the poor and humbly-clad Socrates with ineffable contempt. He was rude and ungainly in
his movements; unlike all respectable citizens in his habits.
Barefoot, he wandered about the streets of Athens absorbed in
thought; sometimes he stood still for hours, fixed in meditation.
Every day he strolled into the market-place, and disputed with
all who were willing. In appearance he resembled a Silenus.
His flattened nose, with wide and upturned nostrils, his projecting eyeballs, his thick and sensual lips, his squab figure and unwieldy belly, were all points upon which ridicule might fasten.
Yet when this Silenus spoke there was a witchery in his tongue
which fascinated those whom his appearance had disgusted; and
Alcibiades declared that he was forced to stop his ears and flee
away, that he might not sit down beside Socrates and "grow old
in listening to his talk." Let us hear Alcibiades describe him.*
" I will begin the praise of Socrates by comparing him to a certain statue. Perhaps he will think that this statue is introduced
for the sake of ridicule; but I assure you that it is necessary for
the illustration of truth. I assert, then, that Socrates is exactly
like those Silenuses that sit in the sculptor's shops, and which
are carved holding flutes or pipes, but which, when divided in
two, are found to contain withinside the images of the gods. I
assert that Socrates is like the Satyr Marsyas; that your form
and appearance are like these Satyrs, I think that even you will
* Plato, Symposium, Shelley's translation.




124                     SOCRATES.
not venture to deny; and how like you are to them in all other
things, now hear. Are you not scornful and petulant  If you
deny this, I will bring witnesses. Are you not a piper, and far
more wonderful a one than he? for Marsyas, and whoever now
pipes the music that he taught, that music which is of heaven,
and described as being taught by Marsyas, enchants men through
the power of the mouth; for, if any musician, be he skilful or
not, awakens this music, it alone enables him to retain the minds
of men, and from the divinity of its nature makes evident those
who are in want of the Gods and initiation. You differ only
from Marsyas in this circumstance, that you effect without instruments, by mere words, all that he can do; for, when we hear
Pericles, or any other accomplished orator, deliver a discourse,
no one, as it were, cares any thing about it. But when any one
hears you, or even your words related by another, though ever so
rude and unskilful a speaker, be that person a woman, man, or
child, we are struck and retained, as it were, by the discourse
clinging to our minds.
"If I was not afraid that I am a great deal too drunk, I would
confirm to you by an oath the strange effects which I assure you
I have suffered from his words, and suffer still; for, when I hear
him speak, my heart leaps up far more than the hearts of those
who celebrate the Corybantic Mysteries; my tears are poured
out as he talks-a thing I have seen happen to many others besides myself. I have heard Pericles and other excellent orators,
and have been pleased with their discourses, but I suffered nothing of this kind; nor was my soul ever on those occasions disturbed and filled with self-reproach, as if it were slavishly laid
prostrate. But this Marsyas here has often affected me in the
way I describe, until the life which I lead seemed hardly worth
living. Do not deny it, Socrates; for I well know that if even
now I chose to listen to you, I could not resist, but should again
suffer the same effects; for, my friends, he forces me to confess,
that while I myself am still in want of many things, I neglect
my own necessities, and attend to those of the Athenians. I stop




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              125
my ears, therefore, as from the Sirens, and flee away as fast as
possible, that I may not sit down beside him and grow old in
listening to his talk; for this man has reduced me to feel the
sentiment of shame, which I imagine no one would readily believe was in me; he alone inspires me with remorse and awe;
for I feel in his presence my incapacity of refuting what he says,
or of refusing to do that which he directs; but, when I depart
from him, the glory which the multitude confers overwhelms me.
I escape, therefore, and hide myself from him, and when I see
him I am overwhelmed with humiliation, because I have neglected to do what I have confessed to him ought to be done; and
often and often have I wished that he were no longer to be seen
among men. But, if that were to happen, I well know that I
should suffer far greater pain; so that where I can turn, or what
I can do with this man, I know not. All this have I and many
others suffered from the pipings of this Satyr.
"And observe how like he is to what I said, and what a wonderful power he possesses. I know that there is not one of you
who is aware of the real nature of Socrates; but since I have begun, I will make him plain to you. You observe how passionately Socrates affects the intimacy of those who are beautiful,
and how ignorant he professes himself to be; appearances in
themselves excessively Silenic. This, my friends, is the external
form with which, like one of the sculptured Sileni, he has clothed
himself; for, if you open him, you will find within admirable
temperance and wisdom: for he cares not for mere beauty, but
despises more than any one can imagine all external possessions,
whether it be beauty, or wealth, or glory, or any other thing for
which the multitude felicitates the possessor. He esteems these
things, and us who honor them, as nothing, and lives among
men, making all the objects of their Admiration the playthings of
his irony. But I know not if any one of you have ever seen the
divine images which are within, when he has been opened and
is serious. I have seen them, and they are so supremely beautiful, so golden, so divine and wonderful, that every thing which




126                     SOCRATES.
Socrates commands surely ought to be obeyed, even like the voice
of a God.
"Many other and most wonderful qualities might well be
praised in Socrates, but such as these might singly be attributed
to others. But that which is unparalleled in Socrates is, that he
is unlike, and above comparison with all other men, whether
those who have lived in ancient times, or those who exist now;
for, it may be conjectured, that Brasidas and many others are
such as was Achilles. Pericles deserves comparison with Nestor
and Antenor; and other excellent persons of various times may,
with probability, be drawn into comparison with each other.
But to such a singular man as this, both himself and his discourses are so uncommon, no one, should he seek, would find a
parallel among the present or the past generations of mankind;
unless they should say that lie resembled those with whom I
lately compared him; for, assuredly, he and his discourses are
like nothing but the Sileni and the Satyrs. At first I forgot to
make you observe how like his discourses are to those Satyrs
when they are opened; for, if any one will listen to the talk of
Socrates, it will appear to him at first extremely ridiculous; the
phrases and expressions which he employs fold around his exterior the skin, as it were, of a rude and wanton Satyr. He is always talking about brass-founders, and leather-cutters, and skindressers; and this is his perpetual custom, so that any dull and
unobservant person might easily laugh at his discourse. But, if
any one should see it opened, as it were, and get within the sense
of his words, he would then find that they alone of all that enters
into the mind of man to utter, had a profound and persuasive
meaning, and that they were most divine; and that they presented to the mind innumerable images of every excellence, and
that they tended towards objects of the highest moment, or rather
towards all that he who seeks the possession of what is supremely
beautiful and good need regard as essential to the accomplishment of his ambition.
" These are the things, my friends, for which I praise Socrates."




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.                127
This Silenus was the most formidable antagonist that the Sophists had encountered; but this is small praise for him who was
hereafter to become one of the most reverenced names in the
world's Pantheon-who was to give a new impulse to the human
mind, and leave, as an inheritance to mankind, the grand example of an heroic life devoted to Truth and crowned with martyrdom.
Every thing about Socrates is remarkable-personal appearance, moral physiognomy, position, object, method, life and
death. Fortunately, his character and his tendencies have been
so clearly pictured in the works of Plato and Xenophon, that although the portrait may be flattered, we are sure of its resemblance.
He was born B. c. 469, the son of Sophroniscus, a sculptor,*
and Pheenarete, a midwife. His parents, though poor, managed,
it is said, to give him the ordinary education. Besides which,
he learned his father's art; whether he made any progress in it
we are unable to say: probably not, as he relinquished it early.
A group of Graces, which tradition attributed to the chisel of
Socrates, was exhibited for centuries among the art treasures of
the Acropolis; but we have of course no means of determining
the authenticity of the relic. Diogenes Laertius tells us that
Crito, a wealthy Athenian, charmed with the manners of Socrates, is said to have withdrawn him from the shop, and to have
educated him. This Crito afterwards became a reverential disciple of the great genius he had discovered.
Considering that we have his own assertion as evidence of his
having early studied Physics, for which he had an astonishing
longing, and considering further that he so entirely relinquished
that study, even declaring it to be impious,t it is of little importance to discuss, with German critics, whether he did or did not
* Dr. Wiggers says, that Timon the Sillograph calls Socrates, with a sneer,
o6o,60s,  " a stone-scraper." He forgets that W0ol6oS was one of the names
for a sculptor, as Lucian informs us in the account of his early life.
t In Xenophon, " madness."-Mernorab., lib. i. e. 1.




128                     SOCRATES.
learn from Archelaus and Anaxagoras. That he learned oratory
from Prodicus* is not discountenanced by the passage in Xenophon,t where he is made to say, "You despise me because you
have squandered money upon Protagoras, Gorgias, Prodicus, and
so many others, in return for their teaching; whereas I am forced
to draw my philosophy from my own brain;" for certainly, if
any one can claim originality, it is Socrates: his philosophy he
learned from no one. He struck into a new path. Instead of
trying to account for the existence of the universe, he was ever
craving, as Mr. Maurice well says, for a light to show him his
own path through it. 
He did not commence teaching till about the middle of his
career. We have but few records of the events which filled up
the period between his first leaving his father and his first teaching. One of these was his marriage with Xanthippe, and the
domestic squabbles which ensued. She bore him three children.
The violence of her temper, and the equanimity with which he
submitted to it, are proverbial. She has become a type; her
name is synonymous with Shrew. He gave a playful explanation of his choice by remarking, that " those who wish to become
skilled in horsemanship select the most spirited horses; after
being able to bridle those, they believe they can bridle all others.
Now, as it is my wish to live and converse with men, I married
this woman, being firmly convinced that in case I should be able
to endure her, I should be able to endure all others."~
Before he gave himself up to teaching, he performed military
service in three battles, and distinguished himself in each. In
the first, the prize of bravery was awarded to him. He relinquished his claim in favor of Alcibiades, whom it might encourage to deserve such honor. Various anecdotes are related of him
during his campaigns. In spite of the severity of winter, when
the ice and snow were thick upon the ground, he went barefoot
* Plato, Meno, p. 96.       t Convivium, i. 5.
\ Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, i. 118.
~ Xenophon, Convivium, ii.




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              129
and lightly clad. On one occasion he stood before the camp
for four-and-twenty hours on the same spot, wrapt in meditation.  Plato has given us a beautiful description of Socrates during the campaign, which we quote in the translation
by Shelley:
"At one time we were fellow-soldiers, and had our mess together in the camp before Potidaea. Socrates there overcame
not only me, but every one besides, in endurance of toils: when,
as happens in a campaign, we were reduced to few provisions,
there were none who could sustain hunger like Socrates: and,
when we had plenty, he alone seemed to enjoy our military fare.
He never drank much willingly; but, when he was compelled, he
conquered all even in that to which he was least accustomed,
and, what is most astonishing, no person ever saw Socrates drunk
either then or at any other time. In the depth of winter (and
the winters there are excessively rigid) he sustained calmly incredible hardships: and, amongst other things, whilst the frost
was intolerably severe, and no one went out of their tents, or, if
they went out, wrapt themselves up carefully and put fleeces
under their feet, and bound their legs with hairy skins, Socrates
went out only with the same cloak on that he usually wore, and
walked barefoot upon the ice, more easily indeed than those who
had sandalled themselves so delicately: so that the soldiers
thought that he did it to mock their want of fortitude. It would
indeed be worth while to commemorate all that this brave man
did and endured in that expedition.
"In one instance he was seen early in the morning, standing
in one place, wrapt in meditation, and, as he seemed not to be
able to unravel the subject of his thoughts, he still continued to
stand as inquiring and discussing within himself; and, when
noon came, the soldiers observed him, and said to one another,' Socrates has been standing there thinking, ever since the morning.' At last some Ionians came to the spot, and, having supped,
as it was summer, bringing their blankets, they lay down to sleep
in the cool: they observed that Socrates continued to stand there




130                     SOCRATES.
the whole night until morning, and that, when the sun rose, he
saluted it with a prayer, and departed.
"I ought not to omit what Socrates is in battle; for, in that
battle after which the Generals decreed to me the prize of courage, Socrates alone of all men was the savior of my life, standing by me when I had fallen and was wounded, and preserving
both myself and my arms from the hands of the enemy. On
that occasion I entreated the Generals to decree the prize, as it
was most due, to him. And this, O Socrates, you cannot deny,
that when the Generals, wishing to conciliate a person of my
rank, desired to give me the prize, you were far more earnestly
desirous than the Generals, that this glory should be attributed,
not to yourself, but me.
"But to see Socrates when our army was defeated and scattered in flight at Delium, was a spectacle worthy to behold. On
that occasion I was among the cavalry, and he on foot, heavily
armed. After the total rout of our troops, he and Laches retreated
together: T came up by chance, and, seeing them, bade them be
of good cheer, for that I would not leave them. As I was on
horseback, and therefore less occupied by a regard of my own
situation, I could better observe, than at Potidaea, the beautiful
spectacle exhibited by Socrates on this emergency. How superior was he to Laches in presence of mind and courage! Your
representation of him on the stage, O Aristophanes, was not
wholly unlike his real self on this occasion; for he walked and
darted his regards around with a majestic composure, looking
tranquilly both on his fiiends and enemies; so that it was evident to every one, even from afar, that whoever should venture
to attack him would encounter a desperate resistance. He and
his companion thus departed in safety; for those who are scattered in flight are pursued and killed, whilst men hesitate to
touch those who exhibit such a countenance as that of Socrates,
even in defeat."
WVe must cast a glance at his public career. His doctrine being Ethical, there is great importance in seeing how far it was




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              131
practical. He proclaimed the supremacy of Virtue over all other
rules of life; he exhorted men to a brave and unflinching adhesion to Justice, as the only real happiness; he declared that the
unjust alone are unhappy. Was he himself virtuous? was he
happy? The question is pertinent; fortunately it can be answered.
His bravery as a soldier was surpassed by his bravery as a
Senator. He had that high moral courage which can brave not
only death, but opinion. He presents an example, almost unique
in history, of a man who could defy a tyrant, and also defy a
tyrannical mob, an impetuous, imperious mob. The Thirty Tyrants on one occasion summoned him, together with four others,
to the Tholus, the place in which the Prytanes took their meals.
He was there commanded to bring Leon of Salamis to Athens.
Leon had obtained the right of Athenian citizenship, but fearing
the rapacity of the tyrants, had retired to Salamis. To bring
back Leon, Socrates steadily refused. He says himself, that the
"Government, although it was so powerful, did not frighten me
into doing any thing unjust; but, when we came out of the Tholus, the four went to Salamis and took Leon, but I went away
home. And perhaps I should have suffered death on account of
this, if the Government had-not soon been broken up."
On another occasion he braved the clamorous mob. He was
then a Senator, the only State office he ever held. The Athenian
Senate consisted of the Five Hundred who were elected from the
ten tribes. During a period of thirty-five or thirty-six days the
members of each tribe in turn had the presidency, and were called Prytanes. Of the fifty Prytanes, ten had the presidency every
seven days; each day one of these ten enjoyed the highest dignity, with the name of Espitates. He laid every thing before
the assembly of the people, put the question to the vote, examined
the votes, and, in short, conducted the whole business of the assembly. He enjoyed this power, however, only for a single day;
for that day he was intrusted with the keys of the citadel and
the treasury of the republic.




132                     SOCRATES.
Socrates was Epistates on the day when the unjust sentence
was to be passed on the Admirals who had neglected to bury the
dead after the battle of Arginusae. To take care of the burial of
the dead was a sacred duty.* The shades of the unburied were
believed to wander restlessly for a hundred years on the banks
of the Styx. After the battle of Arginusse, a violent storm arose,
which prevented the Admirals from obtaining the bodies of the
slain. In order to remedy this, they left behind them some inferior officers (Taxiarchs) to attend to the office. But the violence
of the storm rendered it impossible. The Admirals were tried.
They produced the evidence of the pilots to show that the tempest had rendered the burial impracticable; besides which they
had left the Taxiarchs behind, so that the blame, if any, ought to
fall on the latter. This produced its natural effect on tje people,
who would instantly have given an acquittal if put to the vote.
But the accusers managed to adjourn the assembly, pretending
that it was too dark to count the show of hands. In the mean
while the enemies of the Admirals did all they could to inflame
the minds of the people. The lamentations and mournful appearance of the kinsmen of the slain, who had been hired for the
tragic scene, had a powerful influence on the assembly. The
votes were to be given on the general question, whether the Admirals had done wrong in not taking up the bodies of the
dead; and, if they should be condemned by the majority (so the
Senate ordained), they were to be put to death and their property confiscated. But to condemn all by one vote was contrary
to law. The Prytanes, with Socrates at their head, refused to
put the illegal question to the vote. The people became furious,
and loudly demanded that those who resisted their pleasure,
should themselves be brought to trial. The Prytanes wavered,
yielded. Socrates alone remained firm, defying the threats of
the mob. He stood there to administer justice. He would not
administer injustice. In consequence of his refusal, the ques* The Antigone of Sophocles is founded on the saeredness of this duty.




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              133
tion could not be put to the vote, and the assembly was again
adjourned. The next day a new Epistates and other presidents
succeeded, and the Admirals were condemned.*
It was impossible for Socrates to enter the market-place without at once becoming an object of attention. His ungainly figure, his moral character, and his bewitching tongue, excited and
enchained curiosity. He became known to every citizen. Who
had not listened to him? Who had not enjoyed his inimitable
irony? Who had not seen him demolish the arrogance and pretension of some reputed wise man? Socrates must have been a
terrible antagonist to all people who believed that they were wise
because they could discourse fluently; and these were not few.
He always declared that he knew nothing. When a man professed knowledge on any point, especially if admiring crowds
gave testimony to that profession, Socrates was sure to step up to
him, and, professing ignorance, entreat to be taught. Charmed
with so humble a listener, the teacher began. Interrogated, he
unsuspectingly assented to some very evident proposition; a conclusion from that, almost as evident, next received his assent;
from that moment he was lost. With great power of logic, with
much ingenious subtlety, and sometimes with daring sophistication, a web was formed from which he could not extricate himself.
His own admissions were proved to lead to monstrous conclusions; these conclusions he repugned, but could not see where
the gist of his error lay. The laughter of all bystanders bespoke
his defeat. Before him was his adversary, imperturbably calm,
apparently innocent of all attempt at making him ridiculous.
Confused, but not confuted, he left the spot indignant with himself, but more indignant with the subtlety of his adversary.
It was thus that Socrates became mistaken for a Sophist; but
he was distinguished from the Sophists by his constant object.
Whilst they denied the possibility of truth, he only sought to
make truth evident, in the ironical, playful, and, sometimes, quib* Wiggers, pp. 51-55.




134                     SOCRATES.
bling manner in which he destroyed the arguments of opponents.
Truth was his object, even in his lightest moments.
This sort of disputation daily occurred in Athens; and by it,
doubtless, Socrates acquired that notoriety which induced Aristophanes to select him as the Sophist hero of the comedy of The
Clouds. No one will doubt that to his adversaries he must have
been an exasperating opponent. No one was safe from his attack.
No one who presumed to know any thing could escape him. In
confirmation, let us quote the account Socrates gives of his procedure, as reported by Plato in the Apology. Socrates there describes his sensations on hearing that Apollo had declared him to
be the wisest of men. He could not understand this. Knowing
himself to be wise in nothing, yet not daring to think the words
of the god could be false, he was puzzled. "I went to one of
those who are esteemed to be wise, thinking that here, if anywhere, I should prove the oracle to be wrong, and to be able to
say,'Here is a man wiser than I.' After examining this man
(I need not name him, but he was one of the politicians), and
conversing with him, it was my opinion that this man seemed to
many others, and especially to himself, to be wise, but was not
so. Thereupon I tried to convince him that he thought himself
wise, but was not. By this means I offended him and many of
the bystanders. When I went away, I said to myself,' I am
wiser than this man; for neither of us, it would seem, knows any
thing valuable: but he, not knowing, fancies he does know; I,
as I really do not know, so I do not think I know. I seem, therefore, to be in one small matter wiser than he.' After this I went
to another still wiser than he, and came to the same result; and
by this I affronted him too, and many others. I went on in the
same manner, perceiving with sorrow and fear that I was making
enemies; but it seemed necessary to postpone all other considerations to the service of the god, and therefore to seek for the
meaning of the oracle by going to all who appeared to know any
thing. And, O Athenians, the impression made on me was this:
The persons of most reputation seemed to me nearly the most




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.             135
deficient of all; other persons of much smaller account seemed
much more rational.
"When I had done with the politicians, 1 went to the poets,
tragic, dithyrambic, and others, thinking that I should surely find
myself less knowing than they. Taking up those of their poems
which appeared to me most labored, I asked them (that I might
at the same time learn something from them) what these poems
meant? I am ashamed, 0 Athenians, to say the truth, but I
must say it; there was scarcely a person present who could not
have spoken better concerning their poems than they. I soon
found that what poets do, they accomplish not by wisdom, but
by a kind of natural turn, and an enthusiasm like that of prophets and those who utter oracles; for these, too, speak many fine
things, but do not know one particle of what they speak.
" Lastly, I resorted to artificers; for I was conscious that I myself knew, in a manner, nothing at all, but should find them
knowing many valuable things. And in this I was not mistaken;
they knew things which I knew not, and were, so far, wiser than
I. But they appeared to me to fall into the same error as the
poets; each, because he was skilled in his own art, insisted upon
being the wisest man in other and greater things; and this
mistake of theirs overshadowed what they possessed of wisdom.
From this search, 0 Athenians, the consequences to me have
been, on the one hand, many enmities, and of the most formidable kind, which have brought upon me many false imputations; but, on the other hand, the name and general repute of a
wise man."
Socrates, like Dr. Johnson, did not care for the country. " Sir,"
said the Doctor, "when you have seen one green field, you have
seen all green fields: Sir, I like to look upon men. Let us walk
down Cheapside." In words of the same import does Socrates
address Phaedrus, who accused him of being unacquainted even
with the neighborhood of Athens. " I am very anxious to learn;
and from fields and trees I can learn nothing. I can only learn
from men in the city." And he was always to be found where




136                      SOCRATES.
men were assembled.* Ready to argue with every one, he demanded money from none. He gave no lectures: he only talked.
He wrote no books: he argued.t   He cannot properly be said
to have had a school, since he did not even give a systematic exposition of his doctrine. What has been called his school, must
be understood to refer to the many delighted admirers whose
custom it was to surround him whenever he appeared, to talk
with him as often as possible, and to accept his leading opinions.
" At what time Socrates relinquished his profession as a statuary we do not know; but it is certain that all the middle and
later part of his life, at least, was devoted exclusively to the selfimposed task of teaching; excluding all other business, public or
private, and to the neglect of all means of fortune. We can
hardly avoid speaking of him as a teacher, though he himself disclaimed the appellation; his practice was to talk or converse.
Early in the morning he frequented the public walks, the gymnasia for bodily training, and the schools where youths were receiving instruction; he was to be seen in the market-place at the
hour when it was most crowded, among the booths and tables
where goods were exposed for sale; his whole day was usually
spent in this public manner. He talked with any one, young or
old, rich or poor, who sought to address him, and in the hearing
of all who stood by; not only he never either asked or received
any reward, but he made no distinction of persons, never withheld his conversation from any one, and talked on the same general subjects with all... As it was engaging, curious, and
instructive to hear, certain persons made it their habit to attend
him in public, as companions and listeners. These men, a fluctuating body, were commonly known as his disciples and scholars;
though neither he nor his personal friends ever employed the
* Xenophon, Memorab. i. 1. KaiZ sXty p2v S rob ro)X, rTOlS A 3ovXouEvoit
t We are, therefore, disposed to accept as historical, the language Plato
puts into his mouth respecting the inefficiency of books. Books cannot be
interrogated, cannot answer; therefore, cannot teach: we can oniy learn
from them that which we knew before.-Phcedrus, p. 96.




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              137
terms teacher and disciple to describe the relation between them.
Now no other person in Athens, nor in any other Grecian city,
appears ever to have manifested himself in this perpetual and indiscriminate manner, as a public talker for instruction. By the
peculiar mode of life which Socrates pursued, not only his conversation reached the minds of a much wider circle, but he became more abundantly known as a person. While acquiring a
few friends and admirers, and raising a certain intellectual interest
in others, he at the same time provoked a large number of personal enemies. This was probably the reason why he was selected by Aristophanes and the other comic writers to be attacked
as a general representative of philosophical and rhetorical teaching."*
Although Socrates was a knight-errant of philosophy, ever on
the alert to rescue some forlorn truth from the dungeons of prejudice, and therefore was not scrupulous as to who or what his
adversary might be, yet his especial enemies were the Sophists.
He never neglected an opportunity of refuting them. He combated them with their own weapons, and on their own ground.
He knew all their tactics. He knew their strength and their
weakness. Like them he had studied Physics, in the speculations of the early thinkers; and like them had seen that these
speculations led to no certainty. But he had not, like them,
made skepticism a refuge; he had not proclaimed Truth to be a
Phantom, because he could not. embrace her. No: defeated in
his endeavor to penetrate the mysteries of the world without, he
turned his attention to the world within. For Physics he substituted Morals. The certitude which he failed to gain respecting the operations of nature, had not shaken his conviction of the
certitude of the moral truths which his conscience irresistibly
impressed upon his attention.  The world of sense might be
fleeting and deceptive. The voice of conscience could not deceive.  Turning his attention inwards, he discovered certain
* Grote, viii. 555.




138                     SOCRATES.
truths which admitted of no question. They were eternal, inmutable, evident. These he opposed to the skepticism of the
Sophists. Moral certitude was the rock upon which his shipwrecked soul was cast. There he could repose in safety. From
its heights he could survey the world, and his relation to it.
Thus was his life spent. In his old age he had to appear before his judges to answer the accusations of Impiety and Immorality. He appeared, and was condemned.
When we think upon the character of this great man, whose
virtues, luminous in the distance, and surrounded with the halo
of imperishable glory, so impose on our imaginations, that they
seem as evident as they were exalted, we cannot hear of his trial
and condemnation without indignant disgust at the Athenians.
But, for the sake of humanity, let us be cautious ere we decide.
The Athenians were volatile, credulous, and cruel: all masses of
men are; and they, perhaps, were eminently so. But it is too
much to suppose that they, or any people, would have condemned
Socrates had he appeared to them what he appears to us. Had
a tyrant committed such a deed, the people would have avenged
it. But Socrates was not to them what he appears to us. He
was offensive to them, and paid the penalty.
A great man cannot be understood by his contemporaries.
He can only be understood by his peers; and his peers are few.
Posterity exalts a great man's fame by producing a number of
great men to appreciate him. The great man is also necessarily
a reformer in some shape or other. Every reformer has to combat with existing prejudices and deep-rooted passions. To cut
his own path, he must displace the rubbish which encumbers it.
He is therefore in opposition to his fellow-men, and attacks their
interests. Blinded by prejudice, by passion, and by interest,
men cannot see the excellence of him they oppose; and hence
it is that, as Heine so admirably says, " wherever a great soul gives
utterance to his thoughts, there also is Golgotha."
Reformers are martyrs; and Socrates was a reformer. Although,
therefore, his condemnation appears to us very unjust and very




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.                139
frightful, to the Athenians it was no more than the banishment of
Empedocles, or the condemnation of Protagoras. Pure as were
his intentions, his actions and opinions were offensive. He incurred the hatred of party-spirit; and by that hatred fell.  We
recognize the purity of his intentions; he does not oppose us.
We can pardon what we believe to be his errors, because those
errors wage no war with our interests. Very differently were
the Athenians situated. To them he was offensive. He hated
injustice and folly of all kinds, and never lost an occasion of exposing them. A man who undertakes to be the critic of his age
cannot escape the critic's penalty.  Socrates censured freely,
openly.*
But, perhaps, the most exasperating part of his behavior was
the undisguised contempt which he uniformly expressed for the
readiness with which men assumed they had a capacity for government. Only the wise, he said, were fit to govern, and they
were few. Government is a science, and a difficult science. It
is infinitely more difficult to govern a State than to govern the
helm of a ship. Yet, the same people who would not trust themselves in a ship without an experienced pilot, not only trust themselves in a State with an inexperienced ruler, but also endeavor
to become rulers themselves. This contempt was sufficient to
cause his condemnation; but a better pretext was wanted, and
it was found in his impiety. His defenders, ancient and modern,
have declared that he was not guilty of impiety; and Xenophon
"wonders " that the charge could have been credited for an instant. But we believe that the charge was as much merited as
in the case of the other philosophers against whom it was made.f
He gave new interpretations to the reigning dogmas; and op* The masterly account of the trial of Socrates, given by Mr. Grote, should
be read and re-read by all interested in this subject.
t Sextus Empiricus, speaking of the Socratic heresy, calls it urs ipavtAovqav trb 6Oov.-Adv. Math. ii. p. 69.-Plato's dialogues of The Second Alcibades and the Euthyphro are evidence enough of Socrates' opposition to the
Mythology of his day.




140                     SOCRATES.
posing the mythological interpretations, he was chargeable with
impiety.
It has been remarked by an anonymous writer, that, in complying with the rites of his country, Socrates avoided her superstitions. The rite of sacrifice, so simple and natural that it harmonizes with all and any religious truth, required to be guarded
against a great abuse, and against this he warned his countrymen.
"When," says Xenophon, "he sacrificed, he feared not his offering would fail of acceptance in that he was poor; but, giving
according to his ability, he doubted not but, in the sight of the
Gods, he equalled those men whose gifts and sacrifices overspread
the whole altar; for Socrates always reckoned upon it as a most
indubitable truth, that the service paid the Deity by the pure
and pious soul was the most grateful service.
" When he prayed, his petition was only this,-that the Gods
would give to him those things that were good. And this he did,
forasmuch as they alone knew what was good for man. But he
who should ask for gold or silver, or increase of dominion, acted
not, in his opinion, more wisely than one who should pray for
the opportunity to fight, or game, or any thing of the like nature; the consequence whereof being altogether doubtful, might
turn, for aught he knew, not a little to his disadvantage."*
It was more difficult for the philosopher either innocently to
comply with, or safely to oppose, that part of the popular religion
which related to oracles and omens. Socrates appears to have
done what was possible, and what therefore was best ultimately,
towards correcting this great evil.
"He likewise asserted, that the science of divination was necessary for all such as would govern successfully, either cities or
private families; for, although he thought every one might 9hoose
his own way of life, and afterwards, by his industry, excel therein (whether architecture, mechanics, agriculture, superintending
the laborer, managing the finances, or practising the art of war),
* Memorabilia, i. 8.




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              141
yet even here, the Gods, he would say, thought proper to reserve
to themselves, in all these things, the knowledge of that part of
of them which was of the most importance, since he who was
the most careful to cultivate his field, could not know of a certainty who should reap the fruit of it.
"Socrates therefore esteemed all those as no other than madmen who, excluding the Deity, referred the success of their designs to nothing higher than human prudence. He likewise
thought those not much better who had recourse to divination
on every occasion, as if a man was to consult the oracle whether
he should give the reins of his chariot into the hands of one ignorant or well-versed in the art of driving, or place at the helm
of his ship a skilful or unskilful pilot.
"He also thought it a kind of impiety to importune the Gods
with our inquiries concerning things of which we may gain the
knowledge by number, weight, or measure; it being, as it seemed
to him, incumbent on man to make himself acquainted with whatever the Gods had placed within his power: as for such things
as were beyond his comprehension, for these he ought always to
apply to the oracle; the Gods being ever ready to communicate
knowledge to those whose care had been to vender them propitious."*
The trial of Socrates belongs rather to the history of Greece
than to the history of Philosophy. It was a political trial. His
bearing during the whole period was worthy of him: calm,
grave, and touching; somewhat haughty perhaps, but with the
haughtiness of a brave soul fighting for the truth. It increased
the admiration of his admirers, and exasperated his adversaries.
Plato, then a young man, was present at the trial, and has
preserved an admirable picture of it in his Apology. The closing speech, made by Socrates, after sentence of death had been
pronounced, is supposed to be given with substantial accuracy
by Plato. We extract it:* Memorabilia, i 1.




142                    SOCRATES.
"It is for the sake of but a short span, 0 Athenians, that you
have incurred the imputation from those who wish to speak evil of
the city, of having put to death Socrates, a wise man (for those
who are inclined to reproach you will say that I am wise, even
if I am not). Had you waited a short time the thing would have
happened without your agency; for you see my years; I am.far
advanced in life, and near to death. I address this not to all of
you, but to those who have voted for the capital sentence, and
this, too, I say to the same persons,-Perhaps you think that I
have been condemned for want of skill in such modes of working
upon your minds, as I might have employed with success, if I
had thought it right to employ all means in order to escape from
condemnation. Far from it: I have been condemned, and not
from want of things to say, but from want of daring and shamelessness; because I did not choose to say to you the things which
would have been pleasantest for you to hear, weeping, and lamenting, and saying and doing other things which I affirm to be unworthy of me; as you are accustomed to see others do. But
neither did I then think fit to do or say any thing unworthy of a
freeman; nor do I now repent of having thus defended myself.
I would far rather have made the one defence and die, than have
made the other and live. Neither in a court of justice, nor in
war, ought we to make it our object that, whatever happen, we
may escape death. In battle it is often evident that a man may
save his life by throwing away his arms and imploring mercy of
his pursuers; and in all other dangers there are many contrivances by which a person may get off with life if he dare do or say
every thing. The difficulty, 0 Athenians, is not to escape from
death, but from guilt; for guilt is swifter than death, and runs
faster. And now I, being old and slow of foot, have been overtaken by Death, the slower of the two; but my accusers, who
are brisk and vehement, by wickedness, the swifter. We quit
this place: I have been sentenced by you to death; but they,
having sentence passed upon them, by Truth, of guilt and injustice. I submit to my punishment, and they to theirs.




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              143
"But I wish, 0 men who have condemned me, to prophesy
to you what next is to come. I say, then, that, immediately
after my death, there will come upon you a far severer punishment than that which you have inflicted upon me; for you have
done this, thinking by it to escape from being called to account
for your lives. But I affirm that the very reverse will happen to
you. There will be many to call you to account whom I have
hitherto restrained, and whom you saw not; and, being younger,
they will give you more annoyance, and you will be still more
provoked; for, if you think by putting men to death to deter
others from reproaching you with living amiss, you think ill.
That mode of protecting yourselves is neither very possible nor
very noble: the noblest and the easiest too is not to cut off other
people, but so to order yourselves as to attain the greatest excellence.
"Thus much I beg of you: When my sons grow up, punish
them, O Athenians, by tormenting them as I tormented you, if
they shall seem to study riches, or any other ends, in preference
to virtue. And, if they are thought to be something, being really nothing, reproach them, as I have reproached you, for not attending to what they ought, and fancying themselves something
when they are good for nothing. And, if you do this, both I
and my sons shall have received what is just at your hands.
" It is now time that we depart, I to die, you to live; but which
has the better destiny is unknown to all except the God."
This is very grand and impressive, and paints the character of
the man. Magno animo et vultu carcerem intravit, says Seneca.
He consoled his weeping friends, and gently upbraided them for
their complaints at the injustice of the sentence. No man ever
faced death with greater calmness; for no man ever welcomed it
with greater faith as a new birth to a higher state of being.
He would have been executed the next day, but it happened
that the next day was the first of the festival of the Delian Theoria, during which no criminal could be put to death. This festival lasted thirty days. Socrates, though in chains and awaiting




144                    SOCRATES.
his end, spent the interval in cheerful conversation with his
friends, and in composing verses. "During this time," says
Xenophon, "he lived before the eyes of all his fiiends in the
same manner as in former days; but now his past life was most
admired on account of his present calmness and cheerfulness of
mind." On the last day he held a conversation with his friends
on the immortality of the soul. This forms the subject of Plato's
Phcedo. The arguments in that dialogue are most probably
Plato's own; and it is supposed that the dying speech of Cyrus,
in Xenophon's Cyropcedia, is a closer copy of the opinions of
Socrates.
Phoedo, describing the impression produced on him by the
sight of Socrates on this final day, says:-" I did not feel the
pity which it was natural I should feel at the death of a friend:
on the contrary, he seemed to me perfectly happy as I gazed on
him and listened to him: so calm and dignified was his bearing.
And I thought that he only left this world under the protection
of the Gods, who destined him to a more than mortal felicity in
the next." He then details the conversation on the immortality
of the soul; after which, he narrates the close of that glorious
life in language worthy of it. Even in the English version of
Taylor the beauty of the narrative stands manifestly out.
"When he had thus spoke, he rose, and went into a room,
that he might wash himself, and Crito followed him: but he
ordered us to wait for him. We waited, therefore, accordingly,
discoursing over, and reviewing among ourselves, what had been
said, and sometimes speaking about his death, how great a calamity it would be to us; and sincerely thinking that we, like
those who are deprived of their father, should pass the rest of our
life in the condition of orphans.,But, when he had washed himself, his sons were brought to him (for he had two little ones, and
one considerably advanced in age), and the women belonging to
his family likewise came in to him: but when he had spoken to
them before Crito, and had left them such injunctions as he
thought proper, he ordered the boys and women to depart; and




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              145
he himself returned to us. And it was now near the setting of
the sun: for he had been absent for a long time in the bathingroom. But, when he Same in from washing, he sat down, and
did not speak much afterwards; for, then, the servant of the
eleven magistrates came in, and, standing near him, I do not perceive that. in you, Socrates (says he), which I have taken notice
of in others; I mean that they are angry with me, and curse
me, when, being compelled by the magistrates, I announce to
them that they must drink the poison. But, on the contrary, I
have found you at the present time to be the most generous,
mild, and best of all the men who ever came into this place: and,
therefore, I am now well convinced that you are not angry with
me, but with the authors of your present condition. You know
those whom I allude to. Now, therefore (for you know what I
came to tell you), farewell! and endeavor to bear this necessity
as easily as possible. And at the same time, bursting into tears,
and turning himself away, he departed.
"Then Crito gave the sign to the boy that stood near him.
And the boy departing, and, having staid for some time, came,
bringing with him the person that was to administer the poison,
and who brought it properly prepared in a cup. But, Socrates,
beholding the man,-It's well, my friend (says he); but what is
proper to do with it? for you are knowing in these affairs. You
have nothing else to do (says he) but when you have drunk it to
walk about, till a heaviness takes place in your legs, and afterwards lie down: this is the manner in which you should act.
And, at the same time, he extended the cup to Socrates. But
Socrates received it from him, and, indeed, with great cheerfulness; neither trembling nor suffering any alteration for the
worse in his color or countenance, but, as he was accustomed to
do, beholding the man with a bull-like aspect. What say you
(says he) respecting this potion? Is it lawful to make a libation
of it, or not? We only bruise (says he), Socrates, as much as
we think sufficient for the purpose. I understand you (says he);
but it is certainly both lawful and proper to pray to the Gods,




146                    SOCRATES.
that my departure from hence thither may be attended with
prosperous fortune; which I entreat them to grant may be the
case. And, at the same time ending his,discourse, he drank the
poison with exceeding facility and alacrity. And thus far, indeed,
the greater part of us were tolerably well able to refrain from
weeping; but, when we saw him drinking, and that he had drunk
it, we could no longer restrain our tears. But from me, indeed,
notwithstanding the violence which I employed in checking
them, they flowed abundantly; so that, covering myself with my
mantle, I deplored my misfortune. I did not, indeed, weep for
him, but for my own fortune, considering what an associate I
should be deprived of. But, Crito, who was not able to restrain
his tears, was compelled to rise before me. And Apollodorus,
who, during the whole time prior to this, had not ceased from
weeping, then wept aloud, and with great bitterness; so that he
infected all who were present except Socrates. But Socrates,
upon seeing this, exclaimed: What are you doing, excellent
men? For, indeed, I principally sent away the women, lest they
should produce a disturbance of this kind. For I have heard it
is proper to die attended with propitious omens. Be quiet, therefore, and summon fortitude to your assistance. But when we
heard this we blushed, and restrained our tears. But he, when
he found, during his walking, that his legs felt heavy, and had
told us so, laid himself down in a supine position. For the man
had ordered him to do so. And, at the same time, he who gave
him the poison, touching him at intervals, considered his feet
and legs. And, after he had vehemently pressed his foot, he
asked him if he felt it. But Socrates answered he did not. And,
after this, he again pressed his thighs: and, thus ascending with
his hand, he showed us that he was cold and stiff. And Socrates also touched himself, and said that when the poison reached
his heart he should then leave us. But now his lower belly was
almost cold; when, uncovering himself (for he was covered) he
said (which were his last words), Crito, we owe a cock to Asculapius. Discharge this debt, therefore, for me, and don't neglect




THE LIFE OF SOCRATES.              147
it. It shall be done (says Crito); but consider whether you have
any other commands. To this inquiry of Crito he made no reply; but shortly after moved himself, and the man covered him.
And Socrates fixed his eyes. Which, when Crito perceived, he
closed his mouth and eyes. This was the end of our associate;
a man, as it appears to me, the best of those whom we were acquainted with at that time; and, besides this, the most prudent
and just."
Thus perished this great and good man, a martyr to Philosophy. His character we have endeavored to represent fairly,
though briefly.  Let us now add the summing-up of Xenophon, who loved him tenderly, and expressed his love gracefully:
"As to myself, knowing him of a truth to be such a man as I
have described; so pious towards the Gods, as never to undertake
any thing without first consulting them; so just towards men, as
never to do any injury, even the very slightest, to any one, whilst
many and great were the benefits he conferred on all with whom
he had any dealings; so temperate and chaste, as not to indulge
any appetite or inclination at the expense of whatever was modest
and becoming; so prudent, as never to err in judging of good
and evil, nor wanting the assistance of others to discriminate
rightly concerning them; so able to discourse upon, and define
with the greatest accuracy, not only those points of which we
have been speaking, but likewise every other, and looking as it
were into the minds of men, discover the very moment for reprehending vice, or stimulating to the love of virtue: experiencing, as I have done, all these excellencies in Socrates, I can
never cease considering him as the most virtuous and the most
happy of all mankind. But, if there is any one who is disposed
to think otherwise, let him go and compare Socrates with any
other, and afterwards let him determine."*
After ages have cherished the memory of his virtues and his
* Memo'rabilia, iv. 7.




148                      SOCRATES.
fate; but without profiting much by his example, and without
learning tolerance from his story.
~ II. PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.
Opinions vary so considerably respecting the philosophy of
Socrates, and materials whereby they can be tested are so scanty,
that any attempt at exposition must be made with diffidence.
The historian has to rely solely on his critical skill; and on such
grounds, he will not, if prudent, be very confident.
Amongst the scattered materials from which an opinion may
be formed are, 1st. The very general tradition of Socrates having
produced a revolution in thought; in consequence of which he
is by all regarded as the initiator of a new epoch; and by some
as the founder of Greek Philosophy, properly so called. 2dly.
The express testimony of Aristotle, that he first made use of definitions and proceeded by induction.*    These two positions
involve each other. If Socrates produced a revolution in philosophy, he could only have done so by a new Method. That
Method we see exhibited in the phrase of Aristotle, but it is
there only exhibited in a brief concentrated manner, and requires
to be elucidated.
Assuredly we may echo Mr. Grote's statement, that it requires
at the present day some mental effort to see any thing important
in the invention of notions so familiar as those of Genus-Definition-Individual things as comprehended in a genus-what
each thing is, and to what genus it belongs, etc. Nevertheless
four centuries before Christ these terms denoted mental processes
which few, if any but Socrates; had a distinct recognition of, in
the form of analytical consciousness. "The ideas of men* "There are two things of which Socrates must justly be regarded as the
author, the Inductive Reasoning and Abstract Definitions,"-ros r'7raKrIK0ov
X6youv Kta ra bpiaceai Ka6)aov. (Arist. Metaph. xiii. 4.) Xenophon has several indications of the inductive method: he also says that Socrates always
proceeded from propositions best known to those less known, which is a
definition of Induction.




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.               149
speakers as well as hearers, the productive minds as well as the
recipient multitude-were associated together in groups, favorable rather to emotional results, or to poetical, rhetorical narrative, and descriptive effect, than to methodical generalization, to
scientific conception, or to proof either inductive or deductive.
That reflex act of attention which enables men to understand,
compare, and rectify their own mental process was only just beginning. It was a recent novelty on the part of the rhetorical
teachers to analyze the component parts of a public harangue,
and to propound some precepts for making men tolerable speakers. It may be doubted whether any one before Socrates ever
used the words Genus and Species (originally meaning Family
and Form), in the philosophical sense now exclusively appropriated to them. Not one of those many names (called by logicians names of the second intention) which imply distinct attention to various parts of the logical process, and enable us to
criticize it in detail, then existed. All of them grew out of the
schools of Plato, Aristotle, and the subsequent philosophers, so
that we can thus trace them in their beginning to the common
root and father, Socrates."* The novelty was very distasteful
to all who were not seduced by it. Men resent being forced to
rigor of speech and thought; they call you "pedantic" if you
insist on their using terms with definite meanings; they prefer
the loose flowing language of indefinite association which picks
up in its course a variety of heterogeneous meanings; and are
irritated at any speaker who points out to them the inaccuracy
of their phrases. Aristotle says it was thought bad taste in his
day — a&xpi/3oXoyia txporpsrk: and Timon the Sillograph sarcastically calls Socrates one of the acxpl/36ooyoi, as if precision of
language were a vice.
"The notions of Genus, subordinate genera, and individuals
as comprehended under them, were at that time newly brought
into clear consciousness in the human mind. The profusion of
* Grote, viii. 578.




150                     SOCRATES.
logical distribution employed in some of the dialogues of Plato
seems partly traceable to his wish to familiarize his hearers with
that which was then a novelty, as well as to enlarge its development and diversify its mode of application." " We must always
consider the Method of Socrates in conjunction with the subjects
to which he applied it.... On such questions as these-What
is justice?-What is piety?-What is democracy?-What is
law?-every man fancied that he could give a confident opinion,
and even wondered that any other person should feel a difficulty. When Socrates, professing ignorance, put any such question, he found no difficulty in obtaining an answer, given offhand and with very little reflection. The answer purported to
be the explanation or definition of a term, familiar indeed, but of
wide and comprehensive import,-given by one who had never
before tried to render to himself an account of what it meant.
Having got this answer, Socrates put fresh questions, applying it
to specific cases, to which the respondent was compelled to give
answers inconsistent with the first; showing that the definition
was either too narrow or too wide, or defective in some essential condition. The respondent then amended his answer; but
this was a prelude to other questions, which could only be
answered in ways inconsistent with the amendment; and the
respondent, after many attempts to disentangle himself, was
obliged to plead guilty to the inconsistencies, with an admission
that he could make no satisfactory answer to the original query
which at first had appeared so easy and familiar.. The discussion first raised by Socrates turns upon the meaning of some
large generic term. The queries whereby he follows it up bring
the answer given into collision with various particulars which it
ought not to comprehend, or with others which it ought to 6omprehend, but does not.  The inconsistencies into which the
hearer is betrayed in his various answers proclaim to him the
fact that he has not yet acquired any thing like a clear and full
conception of the common attribute which binds together the
various particulars embraced under some term which is ever




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.             151
upon his lips. He is thus put upon the train of thought which
leads to a correction of the generalization, and lights him on to
that which Plato calls seeing the One in the Many, and the
Many in the One."*
Because Socrates employed Induction, it is frequently stated
that he anticipated Bacon's Inductive Method. Passages can
certainly be quoted in which Socrates and Bacon hold very similar language; and in some respects their reform was analogous;
but the differences are more profound than the resemblances.
The aim and purpose of Socrates was confessedly to withdraw
the mind fiom contemplating the phenomena of nature, and to
fix it on its own phenomena: truth was to be sought by looking
inwards, not by looking outwards. The aim and purpose of Bacon's philosophy was the reverse of this; he exhorted men to the
observation and interpretation of nature, and energetically denounced all attempts to discover the operations of mind. If
Socrates pushed too far this contempt of physics, Bacon pushed
too far his contempt of psychology: the exaggeration was, in
each case, produced by the absurdities of contemporaries.
Not more decided is the contrast between their conceptions
of Induction. With Socrates it was little more than Inductio
per enumerationem simplicem, or "reasoning by analogy,"-the
mere collection of particular facts,-a process which it was Bacon's peculiar merit to have utterly destroyed. The whole force
of the Novum Organum may be said to be directed against this
erroneous method. The triviality of the method may indeed be
seen in the quibbles to which it furnishes support in Plato; it
may be seen also in the argument used by Aristippus to justify
his living with Lais the courtesan. "Do you think, Diogenes,
that there is any thing odd in inhabiting a house that others have inhabited before you?-No. Or sailing in a ship in
which many men have sailed before you?-No. By parity of
reasoning, then, there is nothing odd in living with a woman
* Grote, viii. 583-8.




152                     SOCRATES.
whom many men have lived with before."    This quibble is
a legitimate Socratic induction; and it was made by a pupil of
Socrates. It is only a parody of the arguments by which it was
proved that to inflict injustice is more painful than to suffer it;
one of the many startling dogmas attributed to Socrates. Whoever supposes this Induction to be the Baconian Induction (which
is an interrogation of nature), has missed the sense of the Novum
Organum. Indeed, to suppose that such a conception as Bacon's could have been originated so early in the history of
science, is radically to mistake the course of human development.
Mr. Grote has quoted several striking passages from Bacon,*
to show the parallel between the spirit and purpose of the Baconian and Socratic Methods; and probably most readers will
agree with him when he says that Socrates " sought to test the
fundamental notions and generalizations respecting man and
society in the same spirit in which Bacon approached those of
Physics: he suspected the unconscious process of the growing
intellect, and desired to revise it, by comparison with particulars,
and from particulars, too, the most clear and certain, but which,
from being of vulgar occurrence, were least attended to. And
that which Socrates described in his language as the'conceit of
knowledge without the reality' is identical with what Bacon
designates as the primary notions-the puerile observations-the
aberrations of the intellect left to itself." But in spite of this resemblance the difference is profound, and it rises into unmistakable distinctness when we consider the results in the philosophies
of the two; the Socratic Method is seen developed in Plato and
Aristotle, the Baconian in Newtonm and Faraday; and if, as was
stated in our Introduction, the adoption of the Method of graduated Verification was not owing to a previous circumscription of
the aims of Philosophy, but, on the contrary, if this Method necessarily led to the circumscription, it follows that systems so
metaphysical as those which came out of the Socratic teaching
* Vol. viii. p. 612.




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.              153
must have been the produce of a very different Method from
that which led to modern science.
Conceit of knowledge, without the reality, was by Socrates
perpetually stigmatized as the most disgraceful of mental defects,*
and the whole effort of his terrible questioning-the "cross-examining Elenchus"-was to make men aware of this conceit, to
prove to them that their knowledge was a sham, as Carlyle would
call it. Instead of the loose, heterogeneous conceptions with
which men deceived themselves and others into the belief of
knowledge, he insisted on the substitution of rigorous and distinct conceptions.
How could this be done but by definitions? To know the
essence of a thing you must consider it as distinct fiom every
thing else, you must define it; by defining it you demarcate it
from what it is not, and so present the thing before you in its
essence.
It was a fundamental conviction with him that it is impossible
to start from one true thought, and be entangled in any contradiction with another true thought; knowledge derived from any
one point, and obtained by correct combination, cannot contradict that which has been obtained fiom any other point. He
believed that Reason was pregnant with Truths, and only needed
an accoucheur. An accoucheur he announced himself; his main
instruments were Definitions.  By Definition he enabled the
thinker to separate the particular thought he wished to express,
from the myriad of other thoughts which clouded it. By Definition he enabled a man to contemplate the essence of a thing,
because he admitted nothing which was not essential into the
definition.
The radical mistake here is the confusion between Definitions
of Names and Definitions of Things. In the Definition of a Name
nothing more is applied than the meaning intended to be affixed;
* Plato, Apologia, p. 29 (p. 114, ed. Bekker): Ka Trovro ris obic daiaOia IaTcy
agrr7 4  7rovifiaro;t, b TO7U olseaaL elivat oa b o  ev l;
tT~




154                     SOCRATES.
in the definition of a Thing there is, over and above this intended
meaning, the assertion of a corresponding fact which the definition
describes.
We have more than once commented on the natural tendency
of the early thinkers to mistake distinctions in words for distinctions in things. We have now to signalize, in the history of
speculation, the reduction of this tendency to a systematic formula. Names henceforth have the force of things.* A correct
Definition is held to be a true description of the Thing per se:
the explanation of terms as equivalent to the explanation of things,
and the exhibition of the nature of any thing in a definition as
equivalent to our actual analysis of it in a laboratory-are the
central errors of the Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy. These
errors continue to flourish in all the metaphysical systems of the
present day.
When stated in a naked manner, the absurdity of this Method
is apparent; but it may be so disguised as to look profoundly
philosophic. Hence the frequent use of such locutions as that
certain properties are "involved in the idea" of certain things;
as if being involved in the idea, i. e. being included in the definition, necessarily implied a correspondent objective existence; as if
human conceptions were the faithful copies of external things.
The conceptions of men widely differ; consequently different
properties are "involved" in these different conceptions; but all
cannot be true, and the question arises, Which-conception is
true? To answer this question by any thing like a definition, is
to argue in a circle. A principle of certitude' must be sought.
That principle, however, is still to seek.
The influence of the theory of definitions will be more distinctly discernible as we proceed. It is the one grand characteristic of the Method Socrates originated. In it must be sought
the explanation of his views of Philosophy.
He has been almost taunted with never having promulgated
* See Plato's Cratylus, passim.




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.              1 55
any system of his own. His rank in the history of philosophy
has been questioned, and has been supposed to be only that of a
moralist. A passage of Aristotle has been quoted as decisive on
this point: "The speculations of Socrates were only concerning
Ethics, and not at all concerning Nature in general" ('rgs O'X,
qv'sewg). But this is not all the passage: it continues thus:
"In these speculations he sought the Abstract (ro xacoX0o), and
was the first who thought of giving definitions."  Now in this
latter portion we believe there is contained a hint of something
more than the mere moralist-a hint of the metaphysician. On
turning to another part of Aristotle's treatise* we accordingly
find this hint more clearly brought out; we find an express indication of the metaphysician. The passage is as follows: " Socrates
concerned himself with ethical virtues, and he first sought the
abstract definitions of these. Before him Democritus had only
concerned himself with a part of Physics, and defined but the
Hot and the Cold. But Socrates, reasonably (su3Xoyw), sought
the Essence of Things, i. e. sought what exists."
Moveover, in another passage (lib. iii. c. 2) Aristotle reproaches
Aristippus for having rejected science, and concerned himself
solely with morals. This is surely negative evidence that Socrates was not to be blamed for the same opinion; otherwise he
would have been also mentioned.
It was a natural mistake to suppose that Socrates was only a
Moralist, seeing that his principal topics were always Man and
Society, and never Physical speculations, which he deemed beyond
the reach of human intellect. If, however, Socrates had been
merely a Moralist, his place in the history of Philosophy would
not have been what it is; no Plato, no Aristotle would have
called him master. He made a new epoch. The previous philosophers had directed their attention to external Nature, endeavoring to explain its phenomena; he gave up all such speculations,
and directed his attention solely to the nature of Knowledge.
* Metaph. xiii. 4.




156                     SOCRATES.
Men speculated at random. They sought truth, but they only
built hypotheses, because they had not previously ascertained the
limits and conditions of inquiry. They attempted toform sciences
before having settled the conditions of Science. It was the peculiar merit of Socrates to have proposed, as the grand question
of philosophy, the nature and conditions of Science.
The reader may now begin to appreciate the importance of
Definitions in the Socratic Method, and may understand why
Socrates did not himself invent systems, but only a Method. He
likened himself to a Midwife, who, though unable to bring forth
children herself, assisted women in their labors. He believed
that in each man lay the germs of wisdom. He believed that
no science could be taught; only drawn out. To borrow the
ideas of another was not to learn; to guide one's self by the
judgment of another was blindness. The philosophers, who pretended to teach every thing, could teach nothing; and their ignorance was manifest in the very pretension. Each man must
conquer truth for himself, by rigid struggle with himself. He,
Socrates, was willing to assist any man when in the pains of
labor: he could do no more.
Such being the Method, we cannot wonder at his having attached himself to Ethical rather than to Physical speculations.
His philosophy was a realization of the inscription at DelphosKnow Thyself. It was in himself that he found the ground of
certitude which was to protect him against skepticism. It was
therefore moral science which he prized above all others. Indeed, we have great reason to believe that his energetic denouncement of Physical speculations, as reported by Xenophon,
was the natural, though exaggerated, conclusion to which he had
been hurried by a consideration of the manifold absurdities into
which they drew the mind, and the skepticism which they induced. There could be nothing but uncertainty on such subjects.
" I have not leisure for such things," he is made to say by Plato,
" and I will tell you the reason: I am not yet able, according to
the Delphic Inscription, to Know myself; and it appears to me




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.              157
very ridiculous, while ignorant of myself, to inquire into what I
am not concerned in."* That he did, however, at one period
occupy himself with them is clear from other sources, and is a
point in the comedy of the Clouds, where he is represented " airtreading and speculating about the sun," —dspo&/3ar xali rspppovW
<rv 1Xiov,-and his disciples seeking things hidden underground
—'r xacei ys. This has led many to suppose that Aristophanes
knew nothing whatever of Socrates, but only took him as an
available comic type of the Sophists,-a supposition to which there
are several objections.  Firstly, it is not usual in satirists to select
for their butt a person of whom they know nothing. Secondly,
Socrates, of all Athenians, was the most notorious, and most easily
to be acquainted with in a general way. Thirdly, he could not
be a type of the Sophists, in as far as related to physical speculations, since we well know the Sophists scouted physics. Fourthly, he did occupy himself with Physics early in his career; and
probably did so when Aristophanes satirized him, although in
after-life he regarded such speculations as trivial.
It was quite possible that Aristophanes should have made no
such nice discrimination between the dialectical quibbling of Socrates and that of the Sophists, as would prevent him fiom representing Socrates teaching "the art to make the worse appear the
better reason;"t but it is scarcely credible that he should have
made so flagrant a mistake as to accuse Socrates of busying himself with Physics, when every one of the audience could answer that
Socrates never troubled himself at all about it. In our day Proudhon and Louis Blanc are often classed together as teachers of the
same Socialist doctrines; or Strauss and Feuerbach as teachers
of the same theological doctrines; but no satirist would laugh at
Louis -Blanc for his astronomical speculations, or at Strauss for his
devotion to the Microscope. The Aristophanic evidence, therefore, seems perfectly admissible as respects the physical speculations of Socrates at or about the time when the Clouds was pro* PhKdwus, p. 8.        t Nubes, v. 112-15.




158                       SOCRATES.
duced. If they were afterwards relinquished, it was because they
led to no certainty.
That Philosophy, and not Morals, was really the aim of Socrates, is clear from his subordination of all morals to science.  He
considers Virtue to be identical with Knowledge.* Only the wise
man, said he, can be brave, just, or temperate. Vice of every
kind is Ignorance; and involuntary, because ignorant. If a man
is cowardly, it is because he does not rightly appreciate the importance of life and death. He thinks death an evil, and flees it.
If he were wise, he would know that death is a good thing, or,
at the worst, an indifferent one, and therefore would not shun it.
If a man is intemperate, it is because he is unable to estimate the
relative value of present pleasure and future pain. Ignorance misleads him. It is the nature of man to seek good and shun evil:
he would never seek evil, knowing it to be such; if he seeks it,
he mistakes it for good: if he is intemperate, it is because he is
unwise.
Method was his all-in-all. Nor is it impossible to trace the
origin of this conception in his mind. The Pythian oracle had
declared him to be the wisest of men. The assertion greatly
puzzled him, for he found on deep introspection that he knew
nothing; all his fancied knowledge was that conceit of knowledge without the reality, which he saw puffing up other men;
and his sole distinction was that he knew the depth of his own
* (povrIvfg ietro elva rdaan rat aperdS.-Aristot. Ethic. Nicomach. vi. 13.
Plato, in the Meno, makes him maintain that Virtue cannot be Science, cannot be taught. But this is not Socratic. " Whether Virtue can be taught
was a question much agitated in the time of Socrates, who appears to give
contradictory decisions on different occasions. Comp. Plat. Meno, pp. 96, 98,
with Protagoras, p. 361, in the latter of which passages he censures his own
inconsistency, in first denying that Virtue can be taught, and then maintaining that Virtue is Science. Ascending to Xenophon, Mem. i. 2, 19, Socrates
seems to have adopted the common-sense view that Virtue is partly matter
of teaching, partly of practice (daorrdv), and partly of natural disposition. But
Xenophon was unconscious of the logical difficulty of reconciling this with
that identification of Virtue with Science or Wisdom which he elsewhere distinctly attributes to his master."-Thompson's Note to Buler's History of
Philosophy, i. 374.




PHILOSOPIY OF SOCRATES.             159
ignorance, while they believed themselves to be knowing; and it
was because he knew this that he understood the meaning of the
oracle. Thus much we have on his explicit authority. If we
now consider that his title of the "wisest" was owing to the
profound consciousness of the unreality of all which hitherto had
passed for wisdom (the proof of which was exposed by means of his
cross-examining Elenchus), we shall be able to understand how it
was he came to make his Method in and for itself the great aim of
Philosophy, and how instead of desiring to make converts to any
system, or to gain acceptance for any special theories on physics
or ethics, he always and everywhere desired to awaken the crossexamining spirit in the minds of his hearers, so that each in his
own turn might awaken it in others, because in this, and this
alone, consisted real Wisdom. Previous philosophies had shown.
the futility of speculation; certitude was nowhere to be had; all
such theories were but the conceit of knowledge. The Method
which he taught was that by which alone man could become
wiser and better.
It is clear that the novelty of the Method so completely fascinated him, as to prevent his detecting the confusion he made between end and means. And the reader may understand how
such a confusion might very naturally have maintained itself, if
he reflects how very analogous is the pursuit of purely m'athematical science by hundreds who care nothing for the applications of mathematics. Lying at the base of all physical science
is a great and complex science of Quantity,-the one indispensable Instrument by means of which Knowledge becomes Science
(for Science is only quantitative knowledge); but so vast and so
complex is this Instrument, that numerous intellects are constantly engaged in studying and perfecting it, never once withdrawn
from it by any attempt at application. In a similar way Socrates,
and for the most part Plato likewise, cared exclusively for Method;
perfecting the Instrument of search, rather than seeking.
Although Socrates was not the first to teach the doctrine of
the immortality of the soul, he was the first to give it a philo



160                     SOCRATES.
sophical basis. Nor can we read without admiration the arguments by which he anticipated writers on Natural Theology, by
pointing out the evidences of a beneficent Providence. Listen
to Xenophon:
"I will now relate the manner in which I once heard Socrates discoursing with Aristodemus, surnamed the Little, concerning the Deity; for observing that he neither prayed nor sacrificed
to the Gods, but, on the contrary, ridiculed and laughed at those
who did, he said to him:
"Tell me, Aristodemus, is there any man whom you admire
on account of his merit  Aristodemus having answered'Many,'
-Name some of them, I pray you. I admire, said Aristodemus,
Homer for his Epic poetry, Melanippides for his dithyrambics,
Sophocles for tragedy, Polycletus for statuary, and Zeuxis for
painting.
" But which seems to you most worthy of admiration, Aristodemus?-the artist who forms images void of motion and intelligence, or one who hath the skill to produce animals that are
endued not only with activity, but understanding?-The latter,
there can be no doubt, replied Aristodemus, provided the production was not the effect of chance, but of wisdom and contrivance.But since there are many things, some of which we can easily
see the use of, while we cannot say of others to what purpose
they were produced, which of these, Aristodemus, do you suppose
the work of wisdom?-It should seem the most reasonable to
affirm it of those whose fitness and utility are so evidently apparent.
"But it is evidently apparent that He who at the beginning
made man, endued him with senses,because they were good for
him; eyes, wherewith to behold whatever was visible; and ears,
to hear whatever was to be heard; for say, Aristodemus, to what
purpose should odors be prepared, if the sense of smelling had
been denied? or why the distinctions of bitter and sweet, of savory
and unsavory, unless a palate had been likewise given, conveniently placed, to arbitrate between them and declare the difference?




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.             161
Is not that Providence, Aristodemus, in a most eminent manner
conspicuous, which, because the eye of man is so delicate in its
contexture, hath therefore prepared eyelids like doors, whereby
to secure it, which extend of themselves whenever it is needful,
and again close when sleep approaches? Are not these eyelids
provided as it were with a fence on the edge of them, to keep off
the wind and guard the eye? Even the eyebrow itself is not
without its office, but, as a penthouse, is prepared to turn off the
sweat, which, falling from the forehead, might enter and annoy
that no less tender than astonishing part of us. Is it not to be
admired that the ears should take in sounds of every sort, and yet
are not too much filled by them? That the fore-teeth of the animal should be formed in such a manner as is evidently best
suited for the cutting of its food, as those on the side for grinding
it to pieces? That the mouth, through which this food is conveyed, should be placed so near the nose and eyes as to prevent
the passing unnoticed whatever is unfit for nourishment; while
Nature, on the contrary, hath set at a distance and concealed
from the senses all that might disgust or any way offend them?
And canst thou still doubt, Aristodemus, whether a disposition
of parts like this should be the work of chance, or of wisdom and
contrivance — I have no longer any doubt, replied Aristodemus;
and, indeed, the more I consider it, the more evident it appears
to me that man must be the masterpiece of some great artificer;
carrying along with it infinite marks of the love and favor of Him
who hath thus formed it.
"And what thinkest thou, Aristodemus, of that desire in the
individual which leads to the continuance of the species? Of
that tenderness and affection in the female towards her young,
so necessary for its preservation? Of that unremitted love of
life, and dread of dissolution, which take such strong possession
of us from the moment we begin to be? I think of them, answered Aristodemus, as so many regular operations of the same
great and wise Artist,. deliberately determining to preserve what
he hath made.




162                     SOCRATES.
"But, farther (unless thou desirest to ask me questions), seeing,
Aristodemus, thou thyself art conscious of reason and intelligence,
supposest thou there is no intelligence elsewhere a Thou knowest thy body to be a small part of that wide extended earth
which thou everywhere beholdest: the moisture contained in it,
thou also knowest to be a small portion of that mighty mass of
waters, whereof seas themselves are but a part, while the rest of
the elements contribute out of their abundance to thy formation.
It is the soul then alone, that intellectual part of us, which is
come to thee by some lucky chance, from I know not where.
If so be there is indeed no intelligence elsewhere: and we must
be forced to confess, that this stupendous universe, with all the
various bodies contained therein,-equally amazing, whether we
consider their magnitude or number, whatever their use, whatever their order,-all have been produced, not by intelligence,
but by chance!-It is with difficulty that I can suppose otherwise, returned Aristodemus; for I behold none of those Gods
whom you speak of as making and governing all things; whereas I see the artists when at their work here among us.-Neither
yet seest thou thy soul, Aristodemus, which, however most assuredly governs thy body; although it may well seem, by thy
manner of talking, that it is chance, and not reason, which governs thee.
" I do not despise the Gods, said Aristodemus: on the contrary, I conceive so highly of their excellence, as to suppose they
stand in no need either of me or of my services.-Thou mistakest
the matter, Aristodemus; the greater magnificence they have
shown in their care of thee, so much the more honor and service
thou owest them.-Be assured, said Aristodemus, if I once could
be persuaded the Gods take care of man, I should want no monitor to remind me of my duty.-And canst thou doubt, Aristodemus, if the Gods take care of man? Hath not the glorious
privilege of walking upright been alone bestowed on him, whereby
he may with the better advantage survey what is around him,
contemplate with more ease those splendid objects which are




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.             163
above, and avoid the numerous ills and inconveniences which
would otherwise befall him? Other animals indeed they have
provided with feet, by which they may remove from one place
to another; but to man they have also given hands, with which
he can form many things for his use, and make himself happier
than creatures of any other kind. A tongue hath been bestowed
on every other animal; but what animal, except man, hath the
power of forming words with it, whereby to explain his thoughts,
and make them intelligible to others?
"But it is not with respect to the body alone that the Gods
have shown themselves thus bountiful to man. Their most excellent gift is that soul they have infused into him, which so far
surpasses what is elsewhere to be found; for by what animal,
except man, is even the existence of those Gods discovered, who
have produced and still uphold, in such regular order, this beautiful and stupendous frame of the universe? What other species
of creature is to be found that can serve, that can adore them?
What other animal is able, like man, to provide against the assaults of heat and cold, of thirst and hunger? that can lay up
remedies for the time of sickness, and improve the strength nature
has given by a well-proportioned exercise? that can receive like
him information or instruction; or so happily keep in memory
what he hath seen, and heard, and learnt? These things being
so, who seeth not that man is, as it were, a God in the midst of
this visible creation? so far doth he surpass, whether in the endowments of soul or body, all animals whatsoever that have been
produced therein; for if the body of the ox had been joined to
the mind of man, the acuteness of the latter would have stood
him in small stead, while unable to execute the well-designed
plan; nor would the human form have been of more use to the
brute, so long as it remained destitute of understanding! But in
thee, Aristodemus, hath been joined to a wonderful soul a body
no less wonderful; and sayest thou, after this, the Gods take no
thought for me?  What wouldst thou then more to convince
thee of their care?




164                    SOCRATES.
" I would they should send and inform me, said Aristodemus,
what things I ought or ought not to do, in like manner as thou
sayest they frequently do to thee.-And what then, Aristodemus?
supposest thou, that when the Gods give out some oracle to all
the Athenians they mean it not for thee? If by their prodigies
they declare aloud to all Greece, to all mankind, the things
which shall befall them, are they dumb to thee alone? And art
thou the only person whom they have placed beyond their care?
Believest thou they would have wrought into the mind of man a
persuasion of their being able to make him happy or miserable,
if so be they had no such power? or would not even man himself, long ere this, have seen through the gross delusion? How
is it, Aristodemus, thou rememberest or remarkest not, that the
kingdoms and commonwealths most renowned as well for their
wisdom as antiquity, are those whose piety and devotion hath
been the most observable? and that even man himself is never
so well disposed to serve the Deity as in that part of life when
reason bears the greatest sway, and his judgment is supposed in
its full strength and maturity? Consider, my Aristodemus, that
the soul which resides in thy body can govern it at pleasure;
why then may not the soul of the universe, which pervades and
animates every part of it, govern it in like manner? If thine
eye hath the power to take in many objects, and these placed at
no small distance from it, marvel not if the eye of the Deity can
at one glance comprehend the whole. And as thou perceivest it
not beyond thy ability to extend thy care, at the same time, to
the concerns of Athens, Egypt, Sicily, why thinkest thou, my
Aristodemus, that the Providence of God may not easily extend
itself through the whole universe?
" As therefore, among men, we make best trial of the affection
and gratitude of our neighbor by showing him kindness, and discover his wisdom by consulting him in his distress, do thou in
like manner behave towards the Gods; and if thou wouldst experience what their wisdom and what their love, render thyself
deserving the communication of some of those divine secrets




PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.             165
which may not be penetrated by man, and are imparted to those
alone who consult, who adore, who obey the Deity. Then shalt
thou, my Aristodemus, understand there is a Being whose eye
pierceth throughout all nature, and whose ear is open to every
sound; extended to all places, extending through all time; and
whose bounty and care can know no other bound than those
fixed by his own creation.
"By this discourse, and others of the like nature, Socrates
taught his fiiends that they were not only to forbear whatever
was impious, unjust, or unbecoming before man; but even when
alone they ought to have a regard to all their actions, since the
Gods have their eyes continually upon us, and none of our designs can be concealed from them"*
To this passage we must add another equally deserving of attention:
"Even among all those deities who so liberally bestow on us
good things, not one of them maketh himself an object of our
sight. And He who raised this whole universe, and still upholds
the mighty frame, who perfected every part of it in beauty and
in goodness, suffering none of these parts to decay through age,
but renewing them daily with unfading vigor, whereby they are
able to execute whatever he ordains with that readiness and precision which surpass man's imagination; even He, the supreme
God, who performeth all these wonders, still holds himself invisible, and it is only in his works that we are capable of admiring
him. For consider, my Euthydemus, the sun, which seemeth as
it were set forth to the view of all men, yet suffereth not itself
to be too curiously examined; punishing those with blindness
who too rashly venture so to do; and those ministers of the Gods,
whom they employ to execute their bidding, remain to us invisible; for though the thunderbolt is shot from on high, and breaketh in pieces whatever it findeth in its way, yet no one seeth it
when it falls, when it strikes, or when it retires; neither are the
* Memorabilia, i. 4.




166                      SOCRATES.
winds discoverable to our sight, though we plainly behold the
ravages they everywhere make, and with ease perceive what
time they are rising. And if there be any thing in man, my
Euthydemus, partaking of the divine nature, it must surely be
the soul which governs and directs him; yet no one considers
this as an object of his sight. Learn, therefore, not to despise
those things which you cannot see; judge of the greatness of
the power by the effects which are produced, and reverence the
Deity:"*
In conclusion, we must notice the vexed question of the Demon
of Socrates. The notion most generally current is that he believed himself.accompanied by a Dsemon, or Good Angel, who
whispered counsels in his ear, and forewarned him on critical occasions. This has been adduced as evidence of his "superstition;" and one writer-to be sure he is a Frenchman-makes it
a text to prove that Socrates was mad.t  Olympiodorus said that
the Daemon only meant Conscience, an explanation which, while
it effaces the peculiar characteristics of the conception, is at the
same time totally inapplicable to those cases when the " Dameonic
voice" spoke to Socrates concerning the affairs of his fiiends, as
we read in Plato's Theages. By other writers the Damon has
been considered as purely allegorical.
The first point necessary to be distinctly understood is, that
Socrates believed in no special Dremon at all; and to translate
Plutarch's treatise into De Genio Socratis, and hence to speak of
le demon de Socrate, is gross misconception.  Nowhere does
Socrates, in Plato or Xenophon, speak of a genius or demon, but
always of a dcemonic something (0ro S6IovIov, 6Saiovov ri), or of a
sign, a voice, a divine sign, a divine voice.t The second point
* Memorabilia, iv. 3.
t Leut, Du Demon de Socrate, 1886. A new edition of this work appeared
in 1856, and excited a " sensation."
t See passages cited in Zeller, ii. 28 (1846). Mr. Thompson in his note to
Butler, i. 375, says:-" Clemens Alexandrinus in one passage conjectures that
the azy6voov of Socrates may have been a familiar genius. Strom. v. p. 592.
This conjecture becomes an assertion in Lactantius (l)st. D. ii. 14) who con



PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES.                 167
necessary to be remembered is, that this "divine voice" was only
an occasional manifestation, and exercised only a restraining influence. On the great critical occasions of his life, if the voice
warned him against any step he was about to take, he unhesitatingly obeyed it; if the voice was unheard, he concluded that
his proposed step was agreeable to the Gods. Thus, when on
his trial, he refused to prepare any defence, because when he was
about to begin it the voice restrained him, whereupon he resigned himself to the trial, convinced that if it were the pleasure of
the Gods that he should die, he ought in no wise to struggle-if
it were their pleasure that he should be set free, defence on his
part was needless.
This is his own explicit statement; and surely in a Christian
country abounding in examples of persons believing in direct
intimations from  above, there can be little difficulty in crediting such a statement.   Socrates was a profoundly religious
man; he was moreover, as we learn from Aristotle, a man of
that bilious melancholic temperament* which has in all times
been observed in persons of unusual religious fervor, such as is
implied in those momentary exaltations of the mind which are
mistaken for divine visits; and when the rush of thought came
upon him with strange warning voices, he believed it was the
Gods who spoke directly to him. Unless we conceive Socrates
as a profoundly religious man, we shall misconceive the whole
spirit of his life and teaching. In many respects he was a fanatic,
but only in the noble sense of the word: a man, like Carlyle,
intolerant, vehement, "possessed" by his ideas, but, like Carlyle,
preserved from  all the worst consequences of such intolerance
and possession by an immense humor and a tender heart. His
verts the dcBmonium into dcemon. Apuleius, it is true, had already led the
way to this error in his treatise De Deo Socratis. It is adopted without
scruple by Augustine and other Christian writers; and, as might have been
expected, by Ficinus and the earlier moderns, as Stanley and Dacier, in
whose writings the dcemonium appears full-fledged as " an attendant spirit"
or "good angel."
* N6tov AyEayxoAXLIv, Aristotle, Problem. 30.




168                     SOCRATES.
Saturnine melancholy was relieved by laughter, which softened
and humanized a spirit otherwise not less vehement than that of
a Dominic or a Calvin. Thus strengthened and thus softened,
Socrates stands out as the grandest figure in the world's Pantheon: the bravest, truest, simplest, wisest of mankind.




FIFTH EPOCH.
PARTIAL ADOPTION OF THE SOCRATIC METHOD.
~ I. THE MEGARIC SCHOOL.-EUCLID.
"SSEVERAL philosophers," says Cicero, "drew from the conversations of Socrates very different results; and, according as
each adopted views which harmonized with his own, they in
their turn became heads of philosophical schools all differing
amongst each other." It is one of the peculiarities of a philosophical Method, to adapt itself indiscriminately to all sorts of
systems. A scientific Method is confined to one: if various and
opposing systems spring from it, they spring from an erroneous
or imperfect application of it.
We must not be surprised therefore to find many contradictory systems claiming the parentage of Socrates. But we must
be on our guard against supposing that this adaptation to various
systems is a proof of the excellence of the Socratic Method. It
is only a proof of its vagueness. It may be accepted as a sign
of the great influence exercised upon succeeding philosophers;
it is no sign that the influence was in the right direction.
As we said, Socrates had no school; he taught no system.
He exhibited a Method; and this Method his hearers severally
applied. Around him were men of various ages, various temperaments, and various opinions. He discoursed with each upon his
own subject: with Xenophon on politics; with Theages or
Theaetetus on science; with Antisthenes on morals; with Ion on
poetry. Some were convinced by him; others were merely refuted. The difference between the two is great. Of those who
8




170               THE MEGARIC SCHOOL.
were convinced, the so-called Socratic Schools were formed;
those who were only refuted became his enemies.    But, of
the former, some were naturally only more or less convinced;
that is, were willing to adopt his opinions on some subjects, but
remained stubborn on others. These are the imperfect Socratists.
Amongst the latter was Euclid of Megara.
EUCLID, who must not be confounded with the great Mathematician, was born at Megara; date probably between 450 and
440 B. c. He had early imbibed a great love of philosophy, and
had diligently studied the writings of Parmenides and the other
Eleatics. From Zeno he acquired great facility in dialectics;
and this continued to be his chief excellence even, after his acquaintance with Socrates, who reproved him for it as sophistical.
His delight in listening to Socrates was so great that he frequently exposed his life to do so. A decree was passed, in consequence of the enmity existing between Athens and Megara,
that any inhabitant of Megara found in Athens should forfeit his
life; Euclid, however, braved the penalty. He frequently came
to Athens at night, disguised as a female. The distance was
twenty miles. At the end of his journey he was recompensed
by the fascinating conversation of Socrates; and he returned to
meditate on the results of their arguments.
Brucker's supposition that a rupture was caused between them
in consequence of Socrates having reproved Euclid's disputatious
tendency, is wholly without foundation, and seems contradicted
by the notorious fact that when, on the death of Socrates, Plato
and the majority of the disciples retired to Megara, in fear of
some popular outbreak of the Athenians, who were in a state of
rage against all the philosopher's friends, Euclid received them
well. Bound by the same ties of friendship towards the illustrious martyr, and sharing some of his opinions, the Socratists made
some stay in Megara. Differences however arose, as they will
amongst all communities of the kind. Plato and some others
returned to Athens, as soon as the state of the public mind admitted their doing so with safety. The rest remained with Euclid.




EUCLID.                     171
"The character of the Megaric doctrine," says Ritter, "so far
as it is possible to fix it in the defective state of our information,
may be briefly given as the Eleatic view enlarged by the Socratic conviction of the moral obligation, and the laws of scientific
thought."
We confess our inability to comprehend this. In Euclid we
have no hint of "moral obligation;" in Socrates we fail to detect the "laws of scientific thought."  If by the former Ritter
means, that Euclid gave an Ethical and Socratic meaning to the
Eleatic doctrine, he is correct; if by the latter he means, that
Euclid adopted the Socratic Method of Induction and Definitions,
he is hopelessly wrong; and, if this is not what he means by
" laws of scientific thought," we are at a loss to understand him.
Euclid agreed with the Eleatics in maintaining that there was
but One unalterable Being, to be known by Reason only. This
One Being was not simply The One; neither was it simply Intelligence; it was The Good. This One Being received various
names according to its various aspects: thus it was sometimes
Wisdom   (?pov6vjm); sometimes God (&sos); at others Reason
(vo0g); and so forth. This One Good ('v ro adyaov) is the only
Being that really exists; every thing opposed to it has nothing
but a phenomenal, transitory existence.
Such is the outline of his doctrine, as presented by Diogenes
Laertius. In it the reader will have no difficulty in detecting
both the Eleatic and Socratic elements. The conception of God
as ro dyacov-the Good-is purely Socratic; and the denial of
any existence to things opposed to the Good is an explanation of
that passage in Plato's Republic, where Socrates declares God
not to be the author of all things, but only of such as are good.*
The Megaric doctrine is therefore the Eleatic doctrine, with
an Ethical tendency borrowed from Socrates, who taught that
virtue was not any partial cultivation of the human mind, but
constitutes the true and entire essence of the rational man, and
* Mr 7radvTwv airtov rtv OEsv, aX\a rG>v aya03v.-ii. 100.




172               THE MEGARIC SCHOOL.
indeed of the whole universe. The identification of Virtue with
Wisdom is also Socratic.
With respect to Euclid's dialectics there is one point, often
alluded to, variously interpreted, and which is in direct opposition to the Method of Socrates. In refuting his adversaries he
did not attack the premises, but the conclusion.* This is certainly not the manner of Socrates, who always managed to draw
new conclusions from old premises, and who, as Xenophon says,
proceeded from the generally known to the less known. As if
to mark this distinction more completely, we are told that Euclid
rejected the analogical mode of reasoning (,rov 6o, ncapa3oX!g
XGyov). If, said he, the things compared are alike, it is better to
confine the attention to that originally in question; if the things
compared are unlike, there must be error in the conclusion.
This precept strikes into the weakness of Socrates' method of
induction; which was a species of analogical reasoning not of
the highest order.
In dialectics therefore we see Euclid following out the Eleatic
tendency, and carrying forward the speculations of Zeno. It
was this portion of his doctrine that his immediate followers,
Eubulides, Diodorus, and Alexinus, undertook to carry out. The
Socratic element was further developed by Stilpo.
"The majority of the later members of the Megaric School,"
says Ritter, " are famous either for the refutation of opposite doctrines, or for the invention and application of certain fallacies;
on which account they were occasionally called Eristici and Dialectici. Still it may be presumed that they did not employ
these fallacies for the purposes of delusion, but of instructing
rash and hasty thinkers, and exemplifying the superficial vanity
of common opinion. At all events, it is certain that they were
mainly occupied with the forms of thought, more perhaps with a
* Diog. Laert. ii. 107. This is paraphrased by Enfield into the following
contradictory statement:-" He judged that legitimate argumentation consists in deducing fair conclusions from acknowledged premises." —ist. of
Phil. i. 199.




ARISTIPPUS.                   173
view to the discovery of particular rules, than to the foundation
of a scientific system or method."
~ II. THE CYRENAIC SCHOOL.-ARISTIPPUS.
Among the "imperfect Socratists" we must rank Aristippus,
the founder of the Cyrenaic School, which borrowed its name
from the birthplace of its founder-Cyrene, in Africa.
Aristippus was descended from wealthy and distinguished parents, and was consequently thrown into the vortex of luxurious
debauchery which then characterized the colony of Minye. He
came over to Greece to attend the Olympic games: there he
heard so much of the wisdom of Socrates that he determined on
listening to his enchanting discourse. He made Socrates an offer
of a large sum of money, which, as usual, was declined. The
great Talker did not accept money; but he willingly admitted
Aristippus among the number of his disciples. It is commonly
asserted that the pupil did not agree well with his master, and
that his fondness for pleasure was offensive to Socrates. There
is no good authority for such an assertion. He remained with
Socrates until the execution of the latter; and there was no bond
on either side to have prevented their separation as soon as they
disagreed. The impression seems to have originated in the discussion reported by Xenophon,* wherein Aristippus expresses
his political indifference, and Socrates, by an exaggerated extension of logic, endeavors to prove his views to be absurd. But
this is simply a divergence of opinion, such as must have existed
between Socrates and many of his followers. It merely shows
that Aristippus thought for himself. Socrates with such men as
Aristippus and Alcibiades reminds one of Dr. Johnson with the
"young bloods" Topham Beauclerk and Bennet Langton: he
was wise enough and tolerant enough not to allow his virtue to
be scandalized by their love of pleasure.
From Athens he went to zEgina, where he met with Lais, the
* M~emoralrilia, ii. 1.




174               THE CYRENAIC SCHOOL.
world-renowned courtesan, whom he accompanied to Corinth.
On his way from Corinth to Asia he was shipwrecked on the
island of Rhodes. On the sea-coast he discovered a geometrical
diagram, and exclaimed, "Take courage; I see here the footsteps
of men."  On arriving at the principal town, he managed to
procure for himself and friends a hospitable reception. He used
to say, " Send two men amongst strangers, and you will see the
advantage of the philosopher."
Aristippus was one of those
"Children of the Sun, whose blood is fire;"
but to strong sensual passions he united a calm regulative intellect. Prone to luxury, he avoided excess. Easy and careless in
ordinary affairs, he had great dominion over his desires. Pleasure was his grand object in life; but he knew how to temper
enjoyment with moderation.  In disposition he was easy and
yielding, a "fellow of infinite mirth," a philosopher whose brow
was never "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought."  He
had none of that dignity which mistakes a stiff neck for healthy
virtue. He had no sternness. Gay, brilliant, careless, and enjoying, he became the ornament and delight of the Court of
Dionysius; that Court already illustrious by the splendid genius
of Plato and the rigid abstinence of Diogenes. The grave deportment of Plato and the savage virtue of Diogenes had less
charm for the Tyrant than the easy gayety of Aristippus, whose
very vices were elegant. His ready wit was often put to the
test. On one occasion three hetcerce were presented for him to
make a choice: lie took them all three, observing that it had
been fatal even to Paris to make a choice. On another occasion,
in a dispute with iEschines, who was becoming violent, he said:
"Let us give over. We have quarrelled, it is true; but I, as
your senior, have a right to claim the precedency in the reconciliation."'*  In his old-age he appears to have returned to Cyrene,
and there opened his school.
* Several of his repartees are recorded by Laertius. We add the best of




ARISTIPPUS.                      17a
His philosophy, as Hegel remarks, takes its color from his personality. So individual is it, that we should have passed it over
entirely, had it not been a precursor of Epicureanism. Its relation to Socrates is also important.
In the only passage in which, as far as we know, Aristotle*
mentions Aristippus, he speaks of him as a Sophist.  What does
this mean? Was he one of the professed Sophists?      No. It
means, we believe, that he shared the opinion of the Sophists respecting the uncertainty of Science.  That he did share this
opinion is evident from Sextus Empiricus,t who details his reasons: such as, that external objects make different impressions
on different senses; the names which we impose on these objects
express our sensations, but do not express the things; there is
no criterium of truth; each judges according to his impressions;
none judge correctly.
In so far he was a Sophist; but, as the disciple of Socrates,
he learned that the criterium of truth must be sought within.
He dismissed with contempt all physical speculations, as subjects
beyond human comprehension, and concentrated his researches
upon the moral constitution of man.
In so far he was a Socratist. But, although he took his main
direction from Socrates, yet his own individuality quickly turned
him into by-paths which his master would have shunned.    His
was not a scientific intellect. Logical deduction, which was
the rigorous process of his master, suited neither his views nor
his disposition.  He was averse fiom abstract speculations.  His
them:-Scinus, the treasurer of Dionysius, a man of low character but immense wealth, once showed. Aristippus over his house. While he was expatiating on the splendor of every part, even to the floors, the philosopher spat
in his face. Scinus was furious.  "Pardon me," exclaimed Aristippus,
"there was no other place where I could have spat with decency." One
day, in interceding with the Tyrant for a friend, he threw himself on his
knees. Being reproached for such want of dignity, lie answered, " Is it my
fault if Dionysius has his ears in his feet?" One day lie asked the Tyrant
for some money. Dionysius made him own that a philosopher had no need
of money. "' Give, give," replied Aristippus, "and we will settle the question at once." Dionysins gave. "N ow," said the philosopher, " I have no
need of money."       * MLtaph. iii. 2.    t Adv. Math. vii. 173.




176               THE CYRENAIC SCHOOL.
tendency was directly towards the concrete. Hence, while Socrates was preaching about The Good, Aristippus wished to specify what it was; and resolved it into Pleasure. It was the pith
and kernel of Socrates' Ethical system, that Happiness was the
aim and desire of all men-the motor of all action; men only
erred because of erroneous notions of what constituted Happiness. Thus the wise man alone knew that to endure an injury
was better than to inflict it; he alone knew that immoderate
gratification of the senses, being followed by misery, did not
constitute Happiness, but the contrary. Aristippus thought this
too vague. He not only reduced this general idea to a more
specific one. namely, Pleasure; he endeavored to show how
truth had its only criterium in the sensation of pleasure or of
pain. Of that which is without us we can know nothing truly;
we only know through our senses, and our senses deceive us
with respect to objects. But our senses do not deceive us with
respect to our sensations. We may not perceive things truly;
but it is true that we perceive. We may doubt respecting external objects; we cannot doubt respecting our sensations.
Amongst those sensations we naturally seek the repetition of
such as are pleasurable, and shun those that are painful.
Pleasure, then, as the only positive good, and as the only positive test of what was good, he declared to be the end of life;
but, inasmuch as for constant pleasure the soul must preserve its
dominion over desires, this pleasure was only another form of the
Socratic temperance. It is distinguished from the Socratic conception of Pleasure, however, in being positive, and not merely
the gratification of a want. In the Phcedo, Socrates, on being
released from his chains, reflects upon the intimate connection
of pleasure and pain; and calls the absence of pain, pleasure.
Aristippus, on the contrary, taught that pleasure is not the mere
removal of pain: they are both positive emotions; non-pleasure
and non-pain are not emotions, but as it were the sleep of the soul.*
* Diog. LaePt. ii' 89.




ANTISTHENES.                  177
In the application of this doctrine to ethics, Aristippus betrays both his Sophistic and Socratic education.  With the
Sophists he regarded pleasure and pain as the proper criteria of
actions; no action being in itself either good or bad, but only
such according to convention. With Socrates, however, he regarded the advantages acquired by injustice to be trifling;
whereas the evils and apprehensions of punishment are considerable; and pleasure was the result, not of individual prosperity
alone, but of the welfare of the whole State.
In reviewing the philosophy, such as it was, of Aristippus, we
cannot fail to be struck with the manifest influence of Socrates;
although his method was not followed, we see the ethical tendency predominating. In the Megaric School the abstract idea
of The Good (-ro dyadov) of Socrates, was grounded on the Eleatic
conception of The One. In the Cyrenaic, the abstract conception was reduced to the concrete, Pleasure; and this became
the only ground of certitude, and morals the only science. In
the Cynic School we shall see a still further development in this
direction.
~ III. THE CYNICS.-ANTISTHENES AND DIOGENES.
Cynicism is an imposing blasphemy. It imposed on antiquity;
it has imposed on many modern imaginations by the energy of
its self-denials; but it is a "blasphemy against the divine beauty
of life," blasphemy against the divinity of man. To lead the
life of a Dog is not the vocation of Man.
Nevertheless there were some points both in the characters
and doctrines of the founders of this School which may justly
claim the admiration of mankind.  Their contemporaries regarded them with feelings mingled with awe. We at least may
pay a tribute to their energy.
Antisthenes was born at Athens, of a Phrygian mother. In
early life he distinguished himself at the battle of Tanagra.
After this he studied under Gorgias, the Sophist, and established
a school for himself; but, captivated by the practical wisdom of
&O




178                   THE CYNICS.
Socrates, he ceased to teach, and became once more a pupil;
nay more, he persuaded all his pupils to come with him to
Socrates, and there learn true wisdom. This is genuine modesty, such as philosophers have rarely exhibited. He was then
somewhat advanced in life; his opinions on many points were
too deeply rooted to be exchanged for others; but the tendency
of the Socratic philosophy towards Ethics, and the character of
that system as leading to the moral perfection of man, seemed
entirely to captivate him. It will be remembered that Socrates
did not teach positive doctrines; he enabled each earnest thinker
to evolve a doctrine for himself. All Socrates did, was to give
an impulsion in a certain direction, and to furnish a certain
Method. His real disciples accepted the Method; his imperfect
disciples only accepted the impulsion. Antisthenes was of the
latter. Accordingly his system was essentially personal. He
was stern, and his doctrine was rigid; he was proud, and his
doctrine was haughty; he was cold, and his doctrine was unsympathizing and self-isolating; he was brave, and his doctrine
was a battle. The effeminacy of the luxurious he despised; the
baseness of courtiers and flatterers he hated. He worshipped
Virtue; but it was Virtue sometimes ferocious and unbending.
Even whilst with Socrates he displayed his contempt of ordinary usages, and his pride in differing from other men. He
used to appear in a threadbare cloak, with ostentatious poverty.
Socrates saw through it all, and exclaimed, "I see your vanity,
Antisthenes, peering through holes in your cloak!"  How different was this from Socrates  He, too, had inured himself to
poverty, to heat, and to cold, in order that he might bear the
chances of fortune; but he made no virtue of being ragged,
hungry, and cold. Antisthenes thought he could only preserve
his virtue by becoming a savage. He wore no garment except a
coarse cloak; allowed his beard to grow; carried a wallet and a
staff; and renounced all diet but the simplest. His manners
corresponded to his appearance. Stern, reproachful, and bitter
in his language; careless and indecent in his gestures. His con



DIOGENES.                     179
tempt of all sensual enjoyment was expressed in his saying, "I
would rather be mad than sensual!"*
On the death of Socrates he formed a school, and chose for
his place of meeting a public place in that quarter of Athens
called the Cynosarges, from which some say the sect of Cynics
derives its name; others derive it from the snarling propensities
of the founder, who was frequently called "The Dog." As he
grew old, his gloomy temper became morose: he became so insupportable that all his scholars left him, except Diogenes of
Sinope, who was with him at his death. In his last agony,
Diogenes asked him whether he needed a friend. " Will a friend
release me from this pain?" he replied. Diogenes gave him a
dagger, saying, "This will."  "I wish to be freed from pain,
not from life," was the reply.
The contempt he uniformly expressed for mankind may be
read in two of his sayings. Being asked, what was the peculiar
advantage to be derived from philosophy, he answered, " It enables me to keep company with myself."  Being told that he
was greatly praised by many, "Have I done any thing wrong,
then, that I am praised?" he asked.t
DIOGENES of Sinope is generally remembered as the representative of Cynicism; probably because more anecdotes of his life
have descended to us. He was the son of a banker at Sinope,
who was convicted of debasing the coin; an affair in which the
son was also supposed to have been implicated. Diogenes fled
to Athens. From the heights of splendor and extravagance, he
found himself reduced to squalid poverty. The magnificence of
poverty, which Antisthenes proclaimed,: attracted him. Poor,
* It is thus we would interpret Diog. Laert. vi. 8:-Mavcqv I&Xpaov 
fareistv. Ritter gives this version:-" I had rather go mad than experience
pleasure;" which is an outrageous sentiment.
t Dr. Enfield, who generally manages to introduce some blunder into
every page, has spoiled this repartee, by giving it as a reply to the praise of
a bad man. Yet the language of Diogenes Laertius is very explicit; —HoAXo
a~s nratrvoi, (vi. 8).
X See the Banquet of Xenophon.




180                    THE CYNICS.
he was ready to embrace the philosophy of poverty; an outcast,
he was ready to isolate himself from society; branded with disgrace, he was ready to shelter himself under a philosophy which
branded all society. Having in his own person experienced how
little wealth and luxury can do for the happiness of man, he was
the more inclined to try the converse; having experienced how
wealth prompts to vice, and how desires generate desires, he was
willing to try the efficacy of poverty and virtue. He went to
Antisthenes; was refused.  He continued to offer himself to
the Cynic as a scholar; the Cynic raised his knotty staff, and
threatened to strike him if he did not depart. "Strike!" replied Diogenes; "you will not find a stick hard enough to conquer my perseverance." Antisthenes, overcome, accepted him
as a pupil.
To live a life of virtue was henceforward his sole aim. That
virtue was Cynicism. It consisted in the complete renunciation
of all luxury-the subjugation of all sensual desires. It was a
war carried on by the Mind against the Body. As with the
Ascetics of a Inter day, the basis of a pure life was thought to be
the annihilation of the Body; the nearer any one approached to
such a suicide, the nearer he was to the ideal of virtue. The
Body was vile, filthy, degraded, and degrading; it was the curse
of man; it was the clog upon the free development of Mind; it
was wrestled with, hated, and despised. This beautiful Body,
so richly endowed for enjoyment, was regarded as the "sink of
all iniquity."
Accordingly, Diogenes limited his desires to necessities. Ha
ate little; and what he ate was of the coarsest. He tried to
live upon raw meat and unboiled vegetables, but failed. His
dress consisted solely of a cloak: when he asked Antisthenes for
a shirt, he was told to fold his cloak in two; he did so. A wallet and a huge stick completed his accoutrements.  Seeing a
little boy drinking water out of his scooped hand, he threw
away his cup, declaring it superfluous.  He slept under the
marble porticoes of the buildings, or in his celebrated Tub,




DIOGENES.                     181
which was his place of residence. He took his meals in public.
In public he performed all those actions which decency has condemned to privacy. Decency of every kind he studiously outraged. It was a part of his system to do so. Every thing, not
in itself improper, ought, he said, to be performed publicly.
Besides, he was wont to annoy people with indecent gestures;
had he a philosophical reason for that also?
Doubts have been expressed respecting his Tub, which, it is
thought, was only an occasional residence, and used by him as
expressive of his contempt for luxury. We incline, however, to
the tradition. It is in keeping with all we know of the man;
and that a Tub could suffice for a domicile we may guess from
Aristophanes.*
It is not difficult to imagine the effect created by the Cynics
in the gay, luxurious city of Athens. There the climate, no less
than the prevailing manners, incited every one to enjoyment.
The Cynics told them that enjoyment was unworthy of men;
that there were higher and purer things for man to seek. To
the polished elegance of Athenian manners the Cynics opposed
the most brutal coarseness they could assume. To the friendly
flatteries of conversation they opposed the bitterest pungencies
of malevolent frankness.  They despised all men; and told
them so.
Now, although we cannot but regard Cynicism as a very preposterous doctrine-as a feeble solution of the great problem of
morals, and not a very amiable feebleness-we admit that it required some great qualities in its upholders. It required a great
rude energy; a fanatical logicality of mind; a power over self,narrow it may be, but still a power. These qualities are not
common qualities, and therefore they command respect. Any
deviation from the beaten path implies a certain resolution; a
steady and consistent deviation implies force. All men respect
* Knights, 793: the people are there spoken of as having been forced to
live, during the war, in " pigeon-holes and corners of turrets:" ynrapiois Kai
vpytiots; unless, indeed, this is purely a metaphorical expression.




182                     THE CYNICS.
force. The power of subjugating ordinary desires to one remote
but calculated end, always impresses men with a sense of unusual
power. Few are aware that to regulate desires is more difficult
than to subjugate them-requires greater power of mind, greater
will, greater constancy. Yet every one knows that abstinence is
easier than temperance: on the same principle, it is easier to be
a Cynic than a wise and virtuous Epicurean.
That which prevents our feeling the respect for the Cynics
which the ancients seem to have felt, and which, indeed, some
portions of the Cynical doctrine would otherwise induce us to
feel, is the studious and uncalled-for outrages on common decency and.humanity which Diogenes, especially, perpetrated. All
the anecdotes that have come down to us seem to reveal a snarling and malevolent spirit, worshipping Virtue only because it
was opposed to the vices of contemporaries; taking a pride in
poverty and simplicity only because others sought wealth and
luxury. It may be well to raise an earnest protest against the
vices of one's age; but it is not well to bring virtue into discredit
by the manner of the protest. Doubtless the Athenians needed
reproof and reformation, and some exaggeration on the opposite
side might have been allowed to the reformers. But Diogenes
was so feeble in doctrine, so brutal in manner, that we doubt
whether the debauchery of the first profligate in that profligate
city were more reprehensible than the debauchery of pride which
disgraced the Cynic. The whole character of the man is exhibited in one anecdote. Plato had given a splendid entertainment
to some friends. Diogenes entered, unbidden, and stamping on
the rich carpets, said, "Thus I trample on the pride of Plato;"
whereupon Plato admirably replied, "With greater pride, 0
Diogenes."
Diogenes, doubtless, practised great abstinence. He made a
virtue of his necessity; and, being poor, resolved to be ostentatiously poor. The ostentation being novel, was mistaken for
something greater than it was; being in contradiction to the
universal tendency of his contemporaries, it was supposed to




DIOGENES.                    183
spring from higher motives. There are men who bear poverty
meekly; there are men who look upon wealth without envy,
certain that wealth does not give happiness; there are men
whose souls are so fixed on higher things as utterly to disregard
the pomps and shows of the world; but none of these despise
wealth, they disregard it; none of these display their feelings,
they are content to act upon them. The virtue which is loud,
noisy, ostentatious, and self-affirmative, looks very like an obtrusive egoism. And this was the virtue of the Cynics. Pretending to reform mankind, it began by blaspheming humanity;
pretending to correct the effeminacies of the age, it studiously
outraged all the decencies of life. Eluding the real difficulty of
the problem, it pretended to solve it by unabashed insolence.
In his old age Diogenes was taken captive by pirates, who
carried him to Crete, and exposed him for sale as a slave. On
being asked what he could do, he replied, "Govern men: sell
me, therefore, to one who wants a master." Xeniades, a wealthy
Corinthian, struck with this reply, purchased him, and, on returning to Corinth, gave him his liberty and consigned his children to his education. The children were taught to be Cynics,
much to their own satisfaction. It was during this period that
his world-renowned interview with Alexander took place. The
prince, surprised at not seeing Diogenes joining the crowd of his
flatterers, went to see him. He found the Cynic sitting in his
tub, basking in the sun. "I am Alexander the Great," said he.
"I am Diogenes the Cynic," was the reply. Alexander then
asked him if there was any thing he could do for him. "Yes,
stand aside from between me and the sun." Surprised at such
indifference to princely favor-an indifference so strikingly contrasted with every thing he could hitherto have witnessed-he
exclaimed, "Were I not Alexander, I would be Diogenes!" One
day, being brought before the King, and being asked who he
was, Diogenes replied, " A spy on your cupidity;" language, the
boldness of which must have gained him universal admiration,
because implying great singularity as well as force of character.




184                   THE CYNICS.
Singularity and Insolence may be regarded as his grand characteristics. Both of these are exemplified in the anecdote of his
lighting a lamp in the daytime, and peering about the streets as
if earnestly seeking something: being asked what he sought, he
replied, "A Man."  The point of this story is lost in the usual
version, which makes him seek "an honest man." The words
in Laertius are simply,'av'pwrov ry —"( I seek a man."  Diogenes did not seek honesty; he wanted to find a Man, in whom
honesty would be included with many other qualities. It was
his constant reproach to his contemporaries, that they had no
manhood. He said he had never seen men; at Sparta he had
seen children; at Athens, women.   One day he called out,
"Approach, all men!"  When some approached, he beat them
back with. his club, saying, "I called for men; ye are excrements.'
Thus he lived till his ninetieth year, bitter, brutal, ostentatious, and abstemious; disgracing the title of "The Dog" (for a
dog has affection, gratitude, sympathy, and caressing manners),
yet growling over his unenvied virtue as a cur growls over his
meatless bone, forever snarling and snapping without occasion;
an object of universal attention, and from many quarters, of unfeigned admiration. One day his friends went to see him. On
arriving at the portico under which he was wont to sleep, they
found him still lying on the ground wrapped in his cloak. He
seemed to sleep. They pushed aside the folds of his cloak: he
was dead.*
The Doctrine of the Cynics may be briefly expounded. Antisthenes, as the disciple of Gorgias, was imbued with the sophistical
principles respecting Science; principles which his acquaintance
with Socrates did not alter. He maintained that Science was
impossible. He utterly rejected the Socratic notion of Defini* It was thought that he had committed suicide by holding his breath,-a
physical impossibility. Other versions of the cause of his death were current in antiquity'; one of them seems consistent with his character; it makes
him die in consequence of devouring a neat's foot raw.




THE CYNICS.                    185
tions. He said that a Definition was nothing but a series of
words (Xoyov hajcxpov, "a long discourse"); for which Aristotle
calls him an ignoramus.* To the Socratic notion of a Definition, as including the essence of a thing, he opposed the Sophistic
notion of a Definition, as expressing a purely subjective relation.
You can only express qualities, not essences; you can call a
thing silver, but you cannot say in what it consists. Your definition is only verbal: hence the first step in education should be
the study of words.t
What was the consequence of this skepticism? The consequence was, that the Cynics answered arguments by facts.
When some one was arguing in support of Zeno of Elea's notion
respecting the impossibility of movement, Diogenes rose and
walked. Definitions might prove that there was no motion;
but definitions were only verbal, and could be answered by facts.
This refuge found in common-sense against the assaults of
logic, enabled the Cynics to shape a doctrine of morals which
had some certain basis. As they answered arguments by facts,
so they made actions take the place of precepts.  Instead of
speculating about virtue, they endeavored to be virtuous. Socrates had brought philosophy from the clouds; the Cynics
endeavored to bring it into daily practice. Their personal dispositions gave the peculiar coloring to their doctrine, as that of
Aristippus had done to the Cyrenaic.
*'Araaisros. —Metaph. viii. 8.
t Arrian, Epictet., Diss. i. 17, quoted in Ritter and Preller, Hist. Philos.
Graco-Romanre exfontium locis contexta (Hamburg, 1838), p. 174.




SIXTH EPOCH.
COMPLETE ADOPTION AND APPLICATION OF THE SOCRATIC
METHOD.-PLATO.
~ I. LIFE OF PLATO.
PERHAPS of all ancient writers, Plato's name is the best known.
Homer himself is unknown to many who have some dim notion
of Plato as the originator of the so-called Platonic love. There
is a great and wide-spread interest about the Grecian sage. The
young and romantic have strange, romantic ideas of him. " The
general reader," especially if a dabbler in fashionable philosophy,
or rather in the philosophy current in fashionable novels, has a
very exalted notion of him as the "great Idealist." The theological reader regards him with affection, as the stout and eloquent upholder of the doctrine of the immateriality and immortality of the soul. The literary critic often regards him as the
type of metaphysical eloquence, and classes with him every
vapory, mystical, metaphorical writer of "poetical philosophy."
Now, except that of the theologian, these notions, derived at
second-hand, are all false. It would be idle to inquire how such
extravagant opinions came into circulation. Enough for us that
they are false. Plato was any thing but " dreamy;" any thing
but "an Idealist," as that phrase is usually understood. He was
an inveterate dialectician, a severe and abstract thinker, and a
great quibbler. His metaphysics are of a nature to frighten
away all but the most determined students, so abstract and so
subtle are they. His morals and politics, so far from having any
romantic tinge, are the ne plus ultra of logical severity; hard,




LIFE OF PLATO.                     187
uncompromising, and above humanity.     In a word, Plato the
man was almost completely absorbed in Plato the Dialectician: he had learned to look upon human passion as a disease, and human pleasure as a frivolity. The only thing worth
living for was truth. Dialectics was the noblest exercise of humanity.
Even the notions respecting his style are erroneous. It is not
the " poetical" metaphorical style usually asserted. It has unmistakable beauties, but not the beauties popularly attributed
to it. Its immense power is dramatic power. The best dialogues are inimitable scenes of comedy.     Character, banter,
irony, and animation are there, but scarcely any imagery, and
that seldom beautiful.* His object was to refute or to convince;
his illustrations are therefore homely. When fit occasion arrives
he can be eloquent and familiar.   He clothes some myths in
language of splendid beauty; and there are many felicitous
passages scattered through the dreary waste of dialectical quibbling and obscurity. These passages have been quoted by various writers; hence readers have supposed that Plato always
wrote in such strains. But very fine passages are also to be
found in Aristotle, who is nevertheless a repulsive writer on the
whole.
In truth, Plato is a very difficult, and, as far as regards matter,
somewhat tedious writer; this is the reason of his being so little
read: for we must not be deceived by the many editions. He is
often mentioned and often quoted at second-hand; but he is
rarely read, except by professed scholars and critics. Men of
culture usually attack a dialogue or two out of curiosity. Their
curiosity seldom inspirits them to further progress. The difficul* ( Even upon abstract subjects, whether moral, metaphysical, or mathematical, the language of Plato is clear as the running stream; and in simplicity and sweetness vies with the humble violet which perfumes the vale."
-Dr. Enfield, Hist. of Phil. ii. 221. Whenever you meet with such trash as
this, be dubious that the writer of it ever read Plato. Aristotle capitally
describes Plato's style as "a middle species of diction between verse and
prose." It has rhythm rather than imagery.




188                    LIFE OF PLATO.
ty of mastering the ideas, and their unsatisfactory nature when
mastered, are barriers to any general acquaintance with Plato.
But those who persevere believe themselves repaid; the journey
has been difficult, but it was worth performing.
Aristocles, surnamed Plato (tlle broad-browed),* the son of
Ariston and Perictione, was born at Athens or Agina, 01. 87.3,
on the 7th Thargelion (about the middle of May, B. c. 430).
His childhood and youth consequently synchronize with the
Peloponnesian war, the most active and brilliant period of Grecian thought and action. His lineage was illustrious: on the
maternal side he was connected with Solon.
So great a name could not escape becoming the nucleus of
many fables, and we find the later historians gravely repeating
various miraculous events connected with him. He was said to
be the child of Apollo, his mother a virgin. Ariston, though
betrothed to Perictione, delayed his marriage because Apollo
had appeared to him in a dream, and told him that she was with
child.
Plato's education was excellent; and in gymnastics he was
sufficiently skilled to contend at the Pythian and Isthmian games.
Like a true Greek, he attached extreme importance to gymnastics, as doing for the body what dialectics did for the mind; and,
like a true Greek, he did not suffer these corporeal exercises to
absorb all his time and attention: poetry, music, and rhetoric
were assiduously cultivated, and with some success. He wrote
an epic poem, besides some tragedies, dithyrambics, lyrics, and
epigrams. The epic he is said to have burned in a fit of despair
on comparing it with Homer. The tragedies he burned on be* Some writers incline to the opinion that "Plato" was the epithet of
broad-browed; others of broad-shouldered; others, again, that it was expressive of the breadth of his style. This last is absurd. The author of the
article Plato in the Penny Cyclopaedia pronounces all the above explanations
to be "idle, as the name of Plato was of common occurrence among the
Athenians of that time." But surely Aristocles was not endowed with this
surname of Plato without cause? Unless he derived the name from a relation, he must have derived it from one of the above causes.




LIFE OF PLATO.                   189
coming acquainted with Socrates. The epigrams have been partially preserved. One of them is very beautiful:'Aaripa; tiaOpeis, aarfln)p 6ld' e'O yevoiftiv
Ovpavas, iWs ro)Ao is 8pacatv t's a P(3nrw.
"Thou gazest on the stars, my Life! Ah! gladly would I be
Yon starry skies, with thousafn-eyes, that I might gaze on thee!"
His studies of poetry were mingled with those of philosophy,
which he must have cultivated early; for we know that he was
only twenty when he first went to Socrates, and we also know
that he had been taught by Cratylus before he knew Socrates.
Early he must have felt
"A presence that disturbed him with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean, and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man:
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things."
A deep and meditative spirit led him to question Nature in
her secret haunts. The sombre philosophy of Heraclitus suited
well with his melancholy youth. Skepticism, which was the
fever of that age, had seized on Plato as on all the rest. This
skepticism, together with an imperious craving for belief which
struggled with the skepticism, found breathing-room in the doctrines of Socrates; and the young scholar learned that without
impugning the justice of his doubts, he could escape them by
seeking Truth elsewhere.
He remained with Socrates ten years, and was separated from
him only by death. He attended his beloved master during the
trial; undertook to plead his cause; indeed, began a speech
which the violence of the judges would not allow him to continue; and pressed his master to accept a sum of money sufficient to purchase his life.
On the death of Socrates he went to Megara to visit Euclid,
as we mentioned before. From thence he proceeded to Cyrene,




190                  LIFE OF PLATO.
where he was instructed in mathematics by Theodorus, whom
he had known in Athens, if we may credit the Thecetetus, where
Theodorus is represented discoursing with Socrates. From Cyrene he went to Egypt, in company, it is said, with Euripides.
There is very little authority for this visit, and that Euripides
was his companion is not very probable, because Euripides had
been dead some years. The influence of Egypt on Plato has
certainly been exaggerated. There is no trace, in his works, of
Egyptian research. "All he tells us of Egypt indicates at most
a very scanty acquaintance with the subject; and although he
praises the industry of the priests, his estimate of their scientific
attainments is far from favorable."*
In these travels the broad-browed meditative man greatly enlarged the Socratic doctrine, and indeed introduced antagonistic
elements.  But he strictly preserved the Socratic Method.
"' Whilst studious youth," says Valerius Maximus, "were crowding td Athens from every quarter in search of Plato for their
master, that philosopher was wandering along the winding banks
of the Nile, or the vast plains of a barbarous country, himself a
disciple to the old men of Egypt."
He returned at last, and eager scholars flocked around him.
With a mind richly stored by foreign travel and constant meditation, he began to emulate his beloved master, and devote himself to teaching. Like Socrates, he taught gratuitously. The
Academia, a public garden in the neighborhood of Athens, was
the favorite resort of Plato, and gave its name to the school
which he founded. This garden was planted with lofty planetrees, and adorned with temples and statues; a gentle stream
rolled through it, with
"A sound as of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
Which to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune."
It was a delicious retreat, "for contemplation framed." The
* Ritter, ii. 147.




LIFE OF PLATO.                   191
longing thoughts of posterity have often hovered round it as the
centre of myriad associations. Poets have sung of it. Philosophers have sighed for it.
"See there the olive grove of Academe,
Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird
Thrills her thick-warbled notes the summer long.''
In such a spot, where the sound
< Of becs' industrious nurmur oft invites
To studious musing,"
one would imagine none but the Graces could enter; and coupling this with the poetical beauties of Plato's Dialogues, people
have supposed that the lessons in the Academy were magnificent outbursts of eloquence and imagery upon philosophical
subjects.
Nothing can be further from the truth. The lectures were
hard exercises of the thinking faculty, and demanded great power
of continued abstraction. Whatever graces might have adorned
Plato's compositions, his lectures were not literary, but dialectical
exercises.
Ritter thinks differently.  "His school was less a school of
hardy deeds for all, than of polished culture for the higher
classes, who had no other object than to enhance the enjoyment
of their privileges and wealth." Does this mean that Plato did
not teach Stoicism? If so, it is a truism; if not, a falsism; since
what has Dialectics to do with " hardy deeds?"  We are then
informed that it was "a school of polished culture for the higher
classes:" a mere assertion, and a questionable one. The " higher
classes" principally frequented the Sophists; besides, Plato's lectures were gratuitous, and every free citizen might attend them,
on certain conditions. There were no aristocratical exclusives
in Athens; there were no "polished circles," with a culture differing from that of the other free citizens. When Ritter says
that their object was "to enhance the enjoyment of their privileges and wealth," we are at a loss to conceive his meaning, because we do not see how they were to do this by listening to




192                      LIFE OF PLATO.
speculations on essences and archetypal Ideas; the more so as
Ritter himself tells us Plato's views of justice and honor were
" wholly impracticable in the corrupt state of the Athenian constitution; and all empirical knowledge, such as is indispensable
to a politician, was in his view contemptible."*
Whatever their purpose, the Lectures were severe trials to the
capacities of students; and their purely argumentative nature
may have originated the story respecting the inscription over the
door of his Academy, "Let none but Geometricians enter here;"
a story which is very widely circulated, although wholly without good evidence.t The story is in direct contradiction to Plato's
views of Geometry, which he excludes from Philosophy, because
it assumes its axioms without proof, and because it occupies a
middle position between Opinion and Philosophy, more accurate
than the one, but less certain than the other.:
In his fortieth year Plato made his first visit to Sicily.  It was
then he became acquainted with Dionysius I., the Tyrant of
Syracuse, Dion, his brother-in-law, and Dionysius II.       With
Dionysius I. he soon came to a rupture, owing to his political
opinions; and he so offended the Tyrant, that his life was
threatened. Dion, however, interceded for him; and the Tyrant
* Some countenance seems given to the ordinary notion of Plato's Lectures by the tradition that even some women attended them. We confess
this statement is to us suspicious, especially as it is also said that one woman
disguised herself in man's clothes. Disguise, then, was necessary. The
fact, however, if correct, would only show the high cultivation of the hetcerst
(for such the women must have been); and when we think of such women
as Aspasia, we see no reason for supposing they could not follow the abstrusest lectures.
t Mr. Thompson says the only authorities for the inscription are Philoponus, in his Commentary on Aristotle, De Anima, and a verse in the
Chsliads of Tzetzes. See Notes to Butler's Lectures, ii. 79.
$ I have been unable to recover a passage in the Republic where Plato
expresses himself as in the text, but I found this, which approximates to
it, although not the passage I had in my mind. See Repub. vi. towards
the end, beginning, MavOdvw, E017, K.rT..... and ending, &dvoicav e KaXerv
Pfor tOK67s r)vi TJ(V yew Erp1iTjL  76 Kai rAV TV TOLOtTWV I4tv, aAXX oe vowv, se
pmra6 Tr d6trs sC Kai vor rev da'votav oaiav.




LIFE OF PLATO.                  193
spared his life, but commissioned Pollis, the Spartan Ambassador, in whose ship Plato was to return, to sell him as a slave.
He was sold accordingly. Anniceris of Cyrene bought him, and
immediately set him free. On his return to Athens, Dionysius
wrote, hoping that he would not speak ill of him. Plato contemptuously replied, that he had not "leisure to think of Dionysius."
Plato's second visit to Syracuse was after the death of Dionysius I., and with the hope of obtaining from Dionysius II. the
establishment of a colony according to laws framed by himself.
The colony was promised; but never granted. Plato incurred
the Tyrant's suspicions of having been concerned in Dion's conspiracy; but he was allowed to return home in peace.
He paid a third visit; and this time solely to endeavor to reconcile Dionysius with his uncle Dion. Finding his efforts fruitless, and perhaps dangerous, he returned.
In the calm retirement of the Academy, Plato passed the remainder of his days.  Lecturing and writing were his chief
occupations. The composition of those dialogues which have
been the admiration of posterity, was the cheering solace of his
life, especially of his declining years. He died at the advanced
age of eighty-three.
Plato was intensely melancholy.  That great broad brow,
which gave him his surname, was wrinkled and sombre. Those
brawny shoulders were bent with thought, as only those of
thinkers are bent. A smile was the utmost that ever played
over his lips; he never laughed. "As sad as Plato," became a
phrase with the comic dramatists. He had many admirers;
scarcely an friends.
In Plato, the thinker predominated over the man. That great
expansive intellect had so fixed itself upon the absorbing questions of philosophy, that it had scarcely any sympathy left for
other matters. Hence his constant reprobation of Poets. Many
suppose that the banishment of poets from his Republic was but
an insincere extension of his logical principles, and that he really




194                  LIFE OF PLATO.
loved poetry too well to condemn it. Plato's opposition to poets
was however both deep and constant. He had a feeling not unallied to contempt for them, because he saw in them some resemblance to the Sophists, in their indifference to truth, and preference for the arts of expression. The only poetry Plato ever
praises is moral poetry, which is versified philosophy. His soul
panted for Truth. Poets, at the best, he held to be inspired
madmen, unconscious of what fell from their lips. Let the reader
open the Ion (it has been translated by Shelley); he will then
perceive the cause of poets being banished from the Republic.
Plato had a repugnance to poetry, partly because it was the dangerous rival of philosophy, partly because he had a contempt for
pleasure.*  It is true that he frequently quotes Homer, and, towards the close of the Republic, some misgivings of having
harshly treated the favorite of his youth, escape him; but he
quickly withdraws them, and owns that Truth alone should be
man's object.
There is something unpleasant in Plato's character, which
finds its echo in his works. He was a great, but not an amiable
man; his works are great, but lamentably deficient. His ethics
are the ethics of a logician, not of a large-souled man, familiar
with and sympathizing with the complexities of life; they are
suited only to an impossible state of humanity.
In bringing forward this view of Plato's character, we shall
doubtless shock many preconceptions. The Plato we have drawn,
if not so romantic as that usually drawn, is the only one which
seem to us consonant with what the ancient writers transmit.
Let no one object to our assertion of his constant melancholy,
on the ground of the comic talent displayed in his Dialogues.
The comic writers are not the gayest men; even Moliere, whose
humor is so genial, overflowing, and apparently spontaneous, was
one of the austerest. Comedy often springs from the deepest
melancholy, as if in sudden rebound. Moreover, in Plato's
* Comp. Phikbus, p. 131.




PLATO'S WRITINGS.                 195
comedy there is almost always some under-current of bitterness:
it is Irony, not Joyousness.
~ II. PLATO'S WRITINGS: THEIR CHARACTER, OBJECT, AND
AUTHENTICITY.
Before attempting an exposition of Plato's doctrines, it may be
useful to say something respecting the character and authenticity
of his Dialogues. Modern criticism, which spares nothing, has
not left them untouched. Dialogues, the authenticity of which
had never been questioned in antiquity, have been rejected by
modern critics upon arbitrary grounds.
We cannot enter here into the details; we have no space; and,
had we space, we might be excused from combating the individual positions, when we refuse to accept as valid the fundamental
assumptions on which they repose. Internal evidence is generally deceptive; but the sort of internal evidence supposed to be
afforded by comparative inferiority in artistic execution, is never
free from great suspicion. Some of Plato's dialogues not being
found equal to the exalted idea which his great works have led
men to entertain, are forthwith declared to be spurious. But
what writer is at all times equal to the highest of his own flights?
What author has produced nothing but chefs-d'oeuvre? Are
there not times when the most brilliant men are dull, when the
richest style is meagre, when the compactest style is loose? The
same subjects will not always call forth the same excellence;
how unlikely then that various subjects should be treated with
uniform power! The Theages could hardly equal the Thecetetus;
the Euthydemus must be inferior to the Gorgias. No one thinks
of disputing Shakspeare's claim to the Merry Wives of Windsor,
because it is immeasurably inferior to Twelfth Night, which, in
its turn, is inferior to Othello.
Besides the dialogues rejected on account of inferior art, there
are others rejected on account of immature or contradictory opinions. But this ground is as untenable as the former. No one
has yet been able to settle definitively what was Plato's philos



196                 PLATO'S WRITINGS.
ophy; yet opinions are said to be unworthy of that unsettled
philosophy! A preconceived notion of Plato's having been a
pure Socratist, has led to the rejection of whatever seemed contradictory to Socratic views. But there is abundant evidence to
show that Plato was not a mere exponent of Socratic opinions.
Moreover, in a long life a man's opinions undergo many modifications; and Plato was no exception to the rule. He contradicts himself constantly. He does so in works the authenticity
of which no one has questioned; and we are not to be surprised
if we find him doing so in others.
It is somewhat amusing to observe the confidence of modern
criticism on this point.* An Ast, or a Socher, or a Schleiermacher, rejects, on the most fallacious assumptions, the authenticity of dialogues quoted by Aristotle as the works of his master,
Plato. Now really, to suppose that Aristotle could be mistaken
on such a matter is a great extension of the conjectural privilege;
but to make this supposition on no better ground than that
of internal evidence, derived from inferiority of execution, or
variation in opinion in the works themselves, seems truly preposterous.
The ancients themselves admitted the Epinomis, the Eryxias,
the Axiochus, and the Second Alcibiades, to be spurious. The
Epistles are also now generally regarded as forgeries. With
these exceptions, we really see no reason for rejecting any of the
dialogues. The Theages and the Hippias Major are certainly as
much in Plato's manner as Measure for Measure is in Shakspeare's; indeed, the Hippias seems to us a remarkably happy
specimen of his dramatic talent.
But whether all the Dialogues were the production of Plato
or not, they equally serve the purpose of this history, since no one
* " According as the deification has directed itself to this or that aspect
of his character, the opinions raised as to the genuineness or falsity of
his works have fluctuated; so that we might safely say, the more his writings have been examined, the more has the decision of their authenticity
become complicated."-Ritter.




PLATO S WRITINGS.                 197
denies them to be Platonic. We may therefore leave this question, and proceed to others.
Do the Dialogues contain the real opinions of Plato? This
question has three motives. 1st. Plato himself never speaks in
proprid persona, unless indeed the Athenian in the Laws be accepted as representing him; a supposition in which we are inclined to concur. 2dly. From certain passages in the Phcedrus
and the Epistles, it would appear that Plato had a contempt for
written opinions, as inefficient for instruction. 3dly. On the testimony of a phrase in Aristotle, it is supposed that Plato, like
Pythagoras, had exoteric and esoteric opinions; the former being, of course, those set forth in his Dialogues.
We will endeavor to answer these doubts. The first is of very
little importance; the second of greater; the last of very great importance. That Plato adopts the dramatic form, and preserves
it, is true; but this form, which quite baffles us with Shakspeare,
baffles us with no one else. It is easy to divine the opinions of
Aristophanes, Moliere, or Schiller. It is still more easy to divine
the opinions of Plato, because, unlike the dramatists, he selects
his dialogues solely with a view to the illustration of his opinions.
Besides, it is reasonable to suppose that "Socrates," in the Dialogues, represents Platonic opinions seen through the manner of
Socrates. And, whatever the variations may be with respect to
subordinate points, we find but one Method in all the Dialogues,
but one conception of science; in a word, we find an unmistakable tendency, which we pronounce to be Platonic.
Respecting his opinion on the insufficiency of books to convey
instruction, we may first quote what " Socrates " says on the subject in the Phcedrus:
" Writing is something like painting; the creatures of the latter art look very like living beings; but, if you ask them a question, they preserve a solemn silence. Written discourses do the
same: you would fancy, by what they say, that they had some
sense in them; but, if you wish to learn, and therefore interrogate them, they have only their first answer to return to all ques



198                 PLATO'S WRITINGS.
tions. And when the discourse is once written, it passes from
hand to hand, among all sorts of persons, those who can understand it, and those who cannot. It is not able to tell its story
to those only to whom it is suitable; and, when it is unjustly
criticised, it always needs its author to assist it, for it cannot defend itself. There is another sort of discourse, which is far better
and more potent than this.-What is it? That which is written
scientifically in the learner's mind. This is capable of defending
itself, and it can speak itself, or be silent, as it sees fit.-You
mean the real and living discourse of the person who understands
the subject; of which discourse the written one may be called
the picture? Precisely.-Now, think you that a sensible husbandman would take seed which he valued, and wishing to produce a harvest, would seriously, after the summer had begun,
scatter it in the gardens of Adonis,* for the pleasure of seeing it
spring up and look green in a week? Or do you not rather
think that he might indeed do this for sport and amusement;
but, when his purpose was serious, would employ the art of agriculture, and, sowing the seed at the proper time, be content to
gather in his harvest in the eighth month? The last, jndoubtedly.-And do you think that he who possesses the knowledge
of what is just, and noble, and good, will deal less prudently with
his seeds than the husbandman with his? Certainly not.-He
will not, then, set about sowing them with a pen and a black
liquid; or (to drop the metaphor) scattering these truths by means
of discourses, which cannot defend themselves against attack, and
which are incapable of adequately expounding the truth. No
doubt he will,for the sake of sport, occasionally scatter some of
the seeds in this manner, and will thus treasure up memoranda
for himself, in case he should fall into the forgetfulness of old
age, and for all others who follow in the same track; and he will
be pleased when he sees the blade growing up green."t
Now, this remarkable passage is clearly biographical. It is the
* " The gardens of Adonis," a periphrasis for mignonette-boxes.
t Phadrus, p. 98.




PLATO'S WRITINGS.                 199
justification of Socrates' philosophical career. But it must not
be too rigorously applied to Plato, whose voluminous writings
contradict it; nor must we suppose that those writings were designed onlyfor amusement, or as memoranda for his pupils. The
main idea of this passage is one which few persons would feel
disposed to question. We are all aware that books labor under
very serious deficiencies; they cannot replace oral instruction.
The frequent misapprehensions of an author's meaning would in a
great measure be obviated if we had him by our side to interrogate him. And oral instruction has the further advantage of not
allowing the reader's mind to be so passive as it is with a book:
the teacher by his questions excites the activity of the pupil. All
this may reasonably be conceded as Plato's opinion, without at
all affecting the serious purpose of his writings. Plato thought
that conversation was more instructive than reading; but he knew
that reading was also instructive, and he wrote: to obviate as
much as possible the necessary inconveniences of written discourse, he threw all his works into the form of dialogue. Hence
the endless repetitions, divisions, and illustrations of positions almost self-evident. The reader is fatigued by them; but, like
Addison's tediousness, they have a " design" in them: that design is, by imitating conversation, to leave no position unexplained. As a book cannot be interrogated, Plato makes the book
anticipate interrogations. The very pains he takes to be tedious,
the very minuteness of his details, is sufficient to rescue his works
from the imputation of being mere amusements. He was too
great an artist to have sacrificed his art to any thing but his convictions. That he did sacrifice the general effect to his scrupulous dialectics, no one can doubt; and we believe that he did
so for the sake of deeply impressing on the reader's mind the
real force of his Method. Had the critics recognized Plato's
real drift, we believe they would have spared much of their censure, and hesitated before pronouncing against the genuineness
of certain dialogues.
Connected with Plato's expressions respecting the imperfection




200                   PLATO'S WRITINGS.
of written works, there is the passage in Aristotle, referring to
the aypacpa 6Soyara, or " unwritten opinions," which is supposed
to indicate an esoteric doctrine. If Aristotle's words do bear
that meaning, then is the opinion consistent and valid, which
regards the exoteric works-the Dialogues-as mere divertisements. Let us examine it.
Aristotle says that Plato, in the Timceus, maintained space
and matter to be the same, but that, in what are called the unwritten opinions (9v ro'is Xsyo0svoIS dypolS &6oyruCaal), he considered space and place (rov roflrov xai q-jv XOpav) to be the same.*
From such a passage it is surely somewhat gratuitous to conclude
that Plato had an esoteric doctrine.  The aypaqpa 60oylara probably meant his lectures, or, as Ritter suggests, notes taken from the
lectures by his scholars. At any rate, there is no ground for
supposing them to have been esoterical opinions; the more so as
Aristotle, his most illustrious pupil, never speaks of any such distinct doctrine, but draws his statements of Plato's views from
published works.
We are convinced that the Dialogues contain the real opinions
of Plato, in as far as Plato ventured to express them.  We make
this reservation because it is pretty generally known that in the
Socratic philosophy individual opinions were not of so much importance as Method. It would perhaps be better to say, therefore,
that the Dialogues exhibit Plato's real Method and tendencies.
Certain it is that the Method and tendencies can only rightly be
appreciated after a survey of all the Dialogues. The ancients,
we are told by Sextus Empiricus,t were divided amongst them* Phys. iv. c. 2, p. 53. Ritter, who refers to but does not cite the passage,
gives us to understand that, in these unwritten opinions, " much was explained differently, or, at least, more definitely than in the Dialogues." But no such
conclusion can be drawn from Aristotle. There is no greater difference alluded to in the passage than may frequently be found between one dialogue
and another. If the written (published) opinions differ, surely those unwritten may be allowed also to differ from the written? If the Republic differs
from the Timceus, surely the "unwritten opinion" may differ from the
Timasus.
t Pyrrhon. Hypot. i. p. 44.




PLATO'S WRITINGS.                  201
selves as to whether Plato was a skeptic or a dogmatist. Nor
was the dispute irrational: for, as some of the Dialogues are expository and dogmatical, and others are mere exercises of the
dialectical method-mere contests in which nothing is definitively settled-any one having studied only one class of these Dialogues would think Plato either a skeptic or a dogmatist, according to the nature of those which he had read. Thus Cicero, an
ardent admirer, says, "Plato affirms nothing; but, after producing many arguments, and examining a question on every side,
leaves it undetermined." This is true of such dialogues as the
Thecetetus, or the Hippias Major; but untrue of the Phcedo,
Timceus, Laws, etc.
This, leads us to a consideration of the various attempts at
classifying the Dialogues. That some sort of classification should
be adopted is admitted by all; but no two persons seem to agree
as to the precise arrangement. Any attempt at chronological arrangement must inevitably fail. Certain dialogues can be satisfactorily shown to have been written subsequently to some
others; but any regular succession is beyond our ingenuity. We
may be pretty sure that the Phcedrus was the earliest,* or one of
the earliest, and the Laws the latest. We may be sure that the
Republic was earlier than the Laws, because the latter is a maturer view of politics. But when the Republic was written baffles
conjecture. It is usually placed with the Timceus and the Laws;
that is to say, with the last products of its author. But we demur to this on several accounts. The differences of style and of
ideas observable in the Republic and the Laws, imply considerable distance between the periods of composition. Besides, a man
not writing for his bread does not so soon resume a subject which
he has already treated with great fulness. Plato had uttered
his opinions in the Republic. He must have waited till new ideas
were developed, before he could be tempted again to write; for
* See on this point Mr. Thompson's note to Butler's Lectures on Hist. of
Ancient Phil. ii. p. 44.
9*




202                  PLATO'S WRITINGS.
observe, both these dialogues are expository and dogmatical:
they express Plato's opinions; they are not merely dialectical exercises.
It strikes us also that there is but one safe principle to be applied to the testing of such points. Whenever two works exhibit variations of opinion, we should examine the nature of the
variations and ask, which of the two opinions is the later in development-which must have been the earlier?
Let us take an example. In the Republic (iii. p. 123) he attempts to prove that no one can excel in two arts; that the
comic poet cannot be the same as the tragic, the same actor cannot act in tragedy and comedy with success. In the Amatores
(p. 289) he has the same idea, though there only mwtioned
briefly.* In the Symposium, however, Plato's opinion is directly
the reverse; for, in a celebrated passage, he makes Socrates convince Agathon that the tragic and comic poet are the same person. Now, it is not difficult to decide which is the earlier opinion: in the Republic it is the logical consequence of his premises;
but in the Symposium that opinion is corrected by experience,
for in the poets of his own day Plato found both tragedy and
comedy united; and as Socrates is made to convince Agathon,
we may conclude that the former opinion was not uncommon,
and that Plato here makes a retractation. No one will deny
that the former opinion is superficial. The distinction between
tragedy and comedy is such that it seems to imply a distinct nature to attain excellence in each. But Euripides, Shakspeare,
Racine, Cervantes, Calderon, and many others, confute this
seeming by their dramas.
Perhaps a still more conclusive example is that of the " crea* According to Ritter's principle, this would prove the Republic to be later
than the Amatores. He maintains, and with plausibility, that, when a subject which has been developed in one dialogue is briefly assumed in another,
the latter is subsequent in composition. (Ritter, vol. ii. p. 183.) Yet, on
this principle the Phcedo is earlier than the Phadrus, inasmuch as the doctrine of reminiscence is developed in the former and alluded to in the latter.




PLATO'S WRITINGS.                 203
tion of Ideas," so expressly stated in the Republic, and the " eternity and uncreated nature of Ideas," as expressly stated in the
Timceus. So radical a difference in the most important position
of his philosophy, would, at once separate the epochs at which
the two dialogues were composed. And to this may be added
the difference in artistic treatment between the Republic and the
Timceus. The former, although expository, has much of the vivacity and dramatic vigor of the early dialogues. The Timceus
and the Laws have scarcely a trace of art.
Ritter has well observed that "the excellence of the Platonic
dialogues, as pieces of art, is twofold:-the rare imitative powers
exhibited in the dialogue, and the acuteness with which philosophical matters are dialectically treated.  No one will deny
that these two qualities have only an outward connection, and
consequently that they cannot advance equally.'With the philosopher the latter is manifestly the more important, whereas the
former is of secondary importance. The degree of perfection
therefore in any dialogue, as such, affords at most a very uncertain means for the determination of its date; whereas the greatest weight ought to be laid on the dialectical skill." In proportion as the dialectical skill became mature, it is natural to suppose that the dramatic imitation was less cared for. In proportion as Plato became settled in his convictions he became anxious
solely for their clear exposition. He began life with a love of
poetry; but this he soon abandoned for philosophy.
The whole inquiry may seem idle; but until something like a
positive arrangement of his works can be made, there will be no
end to the misconceptions of his opinions; for it is preposterous
to cite passages in support of a doctrine, before having ascertained the date of the work whence the passages are drawn.
Yet this is the way critics and historians draw up an imaginary
outline of Plato's philosophy, and squabble amongst each other
as to who is right. When it is said that Plato held such or such
an opinion, it should be distinctly understood at what period of
his career he held it; because, in so long a career, and with so




204                 PLATOrS WRITINGS.
many changes of opinion, it is necessary to be precise. For our
own part we can scarcely name a single opinion held by him
throughout his works. Even the Socratic idea of Virtue being
identical with Knowledge, consequently of Vice being Ignorance,
and therefore involuntary-even this idea he learned in his oldage to repudiate, as we see in the Laws (book v. p. 385), where
he calls incontinence, no less than ignorance ( 6V' dJaOc'av; 6&'
axpa&rsav), the causes of vice. In the same sense (book iv. p.
138), after speaking of anger and pleasure as causes of error, he
says, " There is a third cause of our faults, and that is ignorance"
(rpirov "yvoamv eriv c apErL&arwv oadciav). So that here he places
ignorance only as a third cause; and by so doing destroys the
whole Socratic argument respecting the identity of Virtue and
knowledge.*
This being the case, it will readily be acknowledged, that to
make up a doctrine from passages culled here and there, must
inevitably lead into error. A consistent doctrine cannot be made
out. Indeed it is questionable whether Plato ever elaborated
one. Like Socrates, he occupied himself with Method rather
than with results; like Socrates, he had doubts respecting the
certainty of knowledge on the higher subjects of thought; like
Socrates, he sought Truth, without professing to have found her.
As a chronological arrangement has been impossible, a philosophical arrangement has frequently been attempted. The most
celebrated is that of Schleiermacher, who divides the Dialogues
into three classes:-" 1st. Elementary dialogues, or those which
contain the germs of all that follows,-of logic as the instrument
of philosophy, and of ideas as its proper object; consequently,
of the possibility of the conditions of knowledge: these are the
Phcedrus, Lysis, Protagoras, Laches, Charmides, Euthyphro,
* The Meno is a further confirmation. In it virtue is shown to be unsusceptible of being taught; ergo, it is not Knowledge. This would make the
Meno one of the latest works. Neither of these contradictions has, to our
knowledge, been noticed before. It was our intention to insert a Chapter on
the self-contradictions of Plato, but the space such a Chapter must have occupied, would have been utterly beyond our limits.




PLATO'S WRITINGS.                  205
and Parmenides; to which he subjoins, as an appendix, the
Apologia, Crito, Ion, Hippias Minor, Hipparchus, Minos, and
Alcibiades II.  2d. Progressive dialogues, which treat of the
distinction between philosophical and common knowledge in
their united application to the two proposed and real sciences,
Ethics and Physics: these are the Gorgias, Thecetetus, Meno,
Euthydemus, Cratylus, Sophistes, Politicus, Symposium, Phccdo,
and Philebus; with an appendix containing the Theages, Amatores, Alcibiades I., Menexemus, Hippias Major, and Clitophon.
3d. Constructive dialogues, in which the practical is completely
united with the speculative; these are the Republic, Timceus,
Critias, with an appendix containing the Laws and the Epistles."*  There is considerable ingenuity in this; and it has been
adopted by Bekker in his edition. It has however been much
criticised, as every such attempt must necessarily be.  Van
Heusde, in his charming work,t has suggested another. He proposes three classes: 1, those wherein the subject-matter relates
to the Beautiful; 2, those wherein it relates to the True; 3,
those wherein it relates to the Practical. Of the first are those
concerning Love,Beauty, and the Soul. Of the second, those
concerning Dialectics, Ideas, Method; in which Truth and the
means of attaining it are sought. Of the third, those concerning
justice; i. e. morals and politics. These three classes represent
the three phases of the philosophical mind: the desire for Truth,
the appreciation of Truth, and the realization of it, in an application to human life.
There is one great objection to this classification, namely, the
impossibility of properly arranging the Dialogues under the separate heads. The Phcedrus, which Van Heusde believes devoted
to Love and Beauty, Schleiermacher has clearly shown to be devoted to Dialectics. So of the rest: Plato mixes up in one dialogue very opposite subjects. Van Heusde is also under the er* Penny Cyclopaedia, Art. Plato, p. 236.
t Initia Philosophice Platonice, i. p. 72.




206                 PLATO'S WRITINGS.
roneous conviction of Plato's having been only a Socratist till he
went to Megara, where he became imbued with the Eleatic doctrines; and that it was in his maturer age that he became acquainted with the Pythagorean philosophy.
It may be presumptuous to suggest a new classification, yet it
is difficult to resist the temptation. It seems to us that the Dialogues may reasonably be divided into the two classes named by
Sextus Empiricus:-Dogmatic and Agonistic, or Expository and
Polemical. The advantage of this division is its clearness and
practicability. There will always be something arbitrary in the
endeavor to classify the dialogues according to their subjectmatter, because they are almost all occupied with more than one
subject. Thus the Republic would certainly be classed under
the head of Ethics; yet it contains very important discussions
on the nature of human knowledge, and on the theory of Ideas;
and these discussions ought properly to be classed under the
head of Metaphysics. Again, the Phacdrus is more than half
occupied with discourses about Love; but the real subject of the
work is Dialectics.
In the division we propose, such inconveniences are avoided.
It is easy to see which dialogues are polemical and which are
expository. The Hippias Major and the Timceus may stand as
representatives of each class. In the former no attempt is made
to settle the question raised. Socrates contents himself with refuting every position of his antagonist. In the Timceus there is
no polemic of any sort: all is calmly expository.
A further subdivision might also be made of the agonistic
dialogues, into such as are purely polemical and such as by
means of polemics enforce ideas.  Sometimes Plato only destroys; at other times the destruction is a clearance of the
ground, which opens to us a vista of the truth: of this kind is
the Thecetetus.
We are however firmly persuaded that one distinct purpose
runs through all the Dialogues, whatever may be their varieties
of form or of opinion; one great and fruitful purpose which may




PLATO'S MIETIIOD.                   207
rightly be called the philosophy of Plato, and which we will now
attempt to exhibit.
~ IIIo PLATO'S METHOD.
By some, Plato is regarded as the mere literary exponent of
the Socratic doctrines; by others, as the real founder of a new
epoch and of a new philosophy. Both of these views appear to
us questionable; but on the subject of Plato, errors are so numerous, and we had almost said so inevitable, that no one wlio
rightly appreciates the difficulty of ascertaining the truth, will
be disposed to dogmatize.  Although we claim the right of enforcing our opinions-a right purchased with no contemptible
amount of labor in the inquiry-we would be distinctly uncder
stood to place no very great confidence in their validity. After
this preface, we trust, we may speak openly without incurring
the charge of dogmatism, lwhen simply recording the results of
study.*
Plato we hold to be neither a simple Socratist, nor the creator
of a new philosoplhyo Ie was the inheritor of all the wisdom of
his age. lHe fully seized the importance of the Socratic Method;
he adopted it, enlarged it. But he also saw the importaince of
those iceas which his predecessors had so laboriously excogitated;
lie adopted and enlarged the leading features of -tihl Pythagoreans and the Eleatics, of Anaxagoracs and HLeraclitlu. With vast
learningl and a puissant Method5, le created an -inJUlence which is
not yet totally extinct. But his philosophy was ct ('icial, not dogmatical.  -Ie enlarged, ameliorated the views of others, introducing little that was new into thle philosophy of his ao'e.  Iie
was the culminatingi point of Greek philosophy. i  n hIs works' It has been a principle with us throughont, to abstain from all unnecessary references. The absence of suceh references renders it the more
needful for us to state that, previous to writing this Section, we renewed
our acquaintance with Plato by carefully reading a ll ids wot)ks, with the exception of two of the minor ones. (Since the first editionl of this work a
complete translation of Plato has appeared, so that the Eiglis. reader has
now the means of testing the validity of our.oncl.sions.)




208                  PLATO'S METHOD.
all the various and conflicting tendencies of preceding eras were
collected under one Method.
That Method was doubtless the Method of Socrates, with some
modifications, or rather with some enlargement. Schleiermacher,
in a profound and luminous essay on the Worth of Socrates as a
Philosopher,* looks upon the service rendered to Philosophy by
Socrates as consisting less in the truths arrived at, than in the
mode in which truth should be sought. Alluding to this view,
John Mill has said, " This appears to us to be, with some modifications, applicable likewise to Plato. No doubt the disciple
pushed his mere inquiries and speculations over a more extended
surface, and to a much greater depth below the surface, than
there is any reason to believe the master did. But, though he
continually starts most original and valuable ideas, it is seldom
that these, when they relate to the results of inquiry, are stated
with an air of conviction, as if they amounted to fixed opinions.
But, when the topic under consideration is the proper mode of
philosophizing-either the moral spirit in which truth should be
sought, or the intellectual processes and methods by which it is
to be attained; or when the subject-matter is not any particular
scientific principle, but knowledge in the abstract, the differences
between knowledge and ignorance, and between knowledge and
mere opinion-then the views inculcated are definite and consistent, are always the same, and are put forth with the appearance
of earnest and matured belief. Even in treating of other subjects,
and even when the opinions advanced have the least semblance
of being seriously entertained, the discourse itself has generally a
very strong tendency to illustrate the conception, which does
seem to be really entertained, of the nature of some part or other
of the process of philosophizing. The inference we would draw
is, that on the science of the Investigation of Science, the theory
of the pursuit of truth, Plato had not only satisfied himself that
* Translated by Bishop Thirlwall, in the Philological Museum, and reprinted in the English version of Dr. Wigger's Life of Socrates.




PLATO S METHOD.                  209
his predecessors were in error, and how, but had also adopted
definite views of his own; while on all or most other subjects he
contented himself with confuting the absurdities of others, pointing out the proper course for inquiry, and the spirit in which it
should be conducted, and throwing out a variety of ideas of his
own, of the value of which he was not quite certain, and which
he left to the appreciation of any subsequent inquirer competent
to sit in judgment upon them."
We have here to examine what that Method was which Plato
constantly pursued. Socrates, as we have shown, relied upon
the Inductive or Analogical Reasoning, and on Definitions, as
the two principles of investigation. The incompleteness of these
principles we have already pointed out; and Plato himself found
it necessary to enlarge them.
Definitions form the basis of all Philosophy. To know a thing
you must also know what it is not. In ascertaining the real Definition, Socrates employed his accoucheur's art (rsXv/ luaieu'rwx),
and proceeded inductively. Plato also used theselhrts; but he
added to them the more efficient processes of Analysis and Synthesis, of generalization and classification.*
Analysis, which was first insisted on by Plato as a philosophic
process, is the decomposition of the whole into its separate parts;
whereby, after examining those parts attentively, the idea of the
whole is correctly ascertained. To use Platonic language, Analysis is seeing the One in the Many. Thus, if the subject be
Virtue, the general term Virtue must first be decomposed into
all its parts, i. e. into all the Virtues; and from a thorough
examination of the Virtues a clear idea of Virtue may be attained.t
Definitions were to Plato what general or abstract ideas were
to later metaphysicians. The individual thing was held to be
transitory and phenomenal, the abstract idea was eternal. Only
* Consult Van Hensde, Initia Philosoph.. Platonicc, ii. parts ii. 97, 98.
t A good example of his mode of conducting an inquiry may be seen
in the Gorgiass




210                  PLATO'S METHOD.
concerning the latter could philosophy occupy itself. But Socrates, although insisting on proper Definitions, had no conception
of the classification of those Definitions which must constitute
philosophy. Plato, therefore, by the introduction of this process,
shifted philosophy from the ground of inquiries into man and
society to that of Dialectics. What was Dialectics? It was the
art of discoursing, i. e. the art of thinking, i. e. logic. Plato uses
the word.Dialectics, because with him Thinking was a silent discourse of the soul, and differed from speech only in being silent.
In this conception of Philosophy as Dialectics, Plato absorbed
the conversational method of Socrates, but gave it a new direction.
How erroneous the notion is which supposes that Plato's merit
was exclusively literary, may be gathered from the above brief
outline of his Method. He was pre-eminently a severe Dialectician. This is his leading peculiarity; but he has clothed his
method in such attractive forms that the means have been mistaken for the end. His great dogma, like that of his master,
Socrates, was the necessity of an untiring investigation into general terms (or abstract ideas). He did not look on life with the
temporary interest of a passing inhabitant of the world. He
looked on it as an immortal soul longing to be released from itg
earthly prison, and striving to catch by anticipation some faint
glimpses of that region of eternal Truth where it would some day
rest. The fleeting phenomena of this world he knew were nothing more; but he was too wise to overlook them. Fleeting and
imperfect as they were, they were the indications of that eternal
Truth for which he longed, footmarks on the perilous journey,
and guides unto the wished-for goal. Long before him wise and
meditative men perceived that sense-knowledge would only be
knowledge of phenomena; that every thing men call Existence
was but a perpetual flux-a something which, always becoming,
never was; that the reports which our senses made of these
things partook of the same fleeting and uncertain character.
He could not, therefore, put his trust in them; he could not




PLATO'S METHOD.                   211
believe that Time was any thing more than the wavering image
of Eternity.
But he was not a Skeptic. These transitory phenomena
were not true existences; but they were images of true existences. Interrogate them; classify them; discover what qualities they have in common; discover that which is invariable,
necessary, amidst all that is variable, contingent; discover The
One in The Many, and you have penetrated the secret of Existence.*
Now in reducing this Platonic language to a modern formula,
what is the thought 8 The thought is simply this: Things exist
as classes and as individuals. These classes are but species of
higher classes; e. g. men are individuals of the class Man, and
Man is a species of the class Animal. But Philosophy, which is
deductive, has nothing to do with individuals; it is occupied
solely with classes. General Terms, or abstract ideas, are therefore the materials with which Philosophy works.
These General Terms, Plato said, stood for the only real Existences, the only objects of Philosophy. And as far as expression
is concerned, he would seem to be in perfect accordance with
modern thinkers. But we must be cautious how we mistake
these coincidences of expression for coincidences of doctrine.
Plato's philosophy was an inarticulate utterance, curious to the
historian, but valueless as a solution of the problem.
We are here led to the origin of the world-famous dispute of
Realism and Nominalism, which may be summed up in a sentence. The Realists maintain, that every General Term (or Abstract idea), such as Man, Virtue, etc., has a real and independent existence, quite irrespective of any concrete individual determination, such as Smith, Benevolence, etc. The Nominalists, on
the contrary, maintain, that all General Terms are but the crea* To refer the reader to particular passages wherein this doctrine is expressed, or implied, would be endless: it runs through all his works, and
is the only constant doctrine to be found there. Perhaps the easiest passage
where it may be read is Philebus, p. 238-6.




212               PLATO'S IDEAL THEORY.
tions of the mind, designating no distinct entities, being merely
used as marks of aggregate conceptions.
In Realism, Plato separated himself from his master Socrates.
On this point we have the indubitable, but hitherto little noticed,
testimony of Aristotle, who, after speaking of the Socratic
Method of Induction and Definition, says:-" But Socrates gave
neither to General Terms nor to Definitions a distinct existence."*
This is plain enough. Aristotle, in continuation, obviously speaks
of Plato:-" Those who succeeded him gave to these General
Terms a separate existence, and called them Ideas."
Thus we are introduced to Plato's famous Ideal theory; which,
although confused and contradictory enough in detail, as is the
case with all his special opinions, is clear enough in its general
tendency.
~ IV. PLATO'S IDEAL THEORY.
The word Idea has undergone more changes than almost any
word in philosophy; and nothing can well be more opposed to
the modern sense of the word than the sense affixed to it by
Plato. If we were to say, that Ideas were tantamount to the
Substantial Forms of the schoolmen, we should run the risk of
endeavoring to enlighten an obscurity by an obscurity no less
opaque. If we were to say, that the Ideas were tantamount to
Universals, the same objection might be raised. If we were to
say, that the Ideas were General Terms or Abstract Ideas, we
should mislead every Nominalist into the belief that Plato was
an " Idealist;" otherwise the last explanation would be pertinent.
It will be better, however, to describe first, and to define afterwards. Plato, according to Aristotle, gave to General Terms a
distinct existence, and called them Ideas. He became a Realist;
* Met. xiii. 4,'AX)' ab,pv XIowptrns r7a Kai a6ov on Xwptar1 Caroft, oval rous
bptvois.-The wording of this may appear strange. Many have supposed
universals to exist separately; but how a separate existence could be given
to Definitions may puzzle the stoutest Realist. We believe the difficulty
vanishes, if we remember that the Platonic Definitions and Universals were
the same things; Aristotle's phrase is, however, ambiguous.




PLATOS8 IDEAL THEORY.               213
and asserted, that there was the Abstract Man no less than the
Concrete Men; the latter were Men only in as far as they participated in the Ideal Man. No one will dispute that we have a
conception of a genus-that we do conceive and reason about
Man quite independently of Smith or Brown, Peter or Paul. If
we have such a conception, whence did we derive it? Our experience has only been of the Smiths and Browns, the Peters
and Pauls; we have only known men. Our senses tell us nothing of Man. Individual objects only give individual knowledge.
A number of stones placed before us will afford us no knowledge,
will not enable us to say, These are stones; unless we have previously learned what is the nature of Stone. So, also, we must
know the nature of Man, before we can know that Jones and
Brown are Men. We do know Man, and we know Men; but
our knowledge of the former is distinct from that of the latter,
and must have a distinct source; so, at least, thought the Realists. What is that source? Reflection, not sense.
The Realists finding The One in The Many,-in other words,
finding certain characteristics common to all Men, and not only
common to them but necessary to their being Men,-abstracted
these general characteristics from the particular accidents of
individual men, and out of these characteristics made what they
called Universals (what we call genera). These Universals existed per se. They are not only conceptions of the mind; they
are entities; and our perceptions of them are formed in the
same manner as our perceptions of other things.
Greek Philosophy, no less than Greek Art, was eminently Objective. Now what is the objective tendency, but the tendency
to transform  our conceptions into perceptions-to project our
ideas out of us, and then to look at them as images, or as entities? Let then the conception of genera be rendered objective,
and the Realist doctrine is explained. Our conceptions were held
by Realism to be perceptions of existing Things; these Plato
called Ideas, which he maintained to be the only real existences;
they were the noumena of which all individual things were the




214              PLATO'S IDEAL THEORY.
phenomena.   If then we define the Platonic "Idea," to be a
"Noumenon," or " Substantial Form," we shall not be far wrong:
and most of the disputes respecting the real meaning of the term
will be set aside; for example, Ritter's wavering account of the
word-in which he is at a loss to say whether Idea means the
universal, or whether it does not also mean the individual.
That Plato usually designates a General Term by the word Idea,
there can be no doubt; there can be no doubt also that he sometimes designates the essence of some individual thing an Idea, as
in the Republic, where he speaks of the Idea of a Table fiom
which all other Tables were formed. There is no contradiction
in this:-a general form is as necessary for Tables as for Men:
this Idea, therefore, equally partakes of generality, even where
exemplified by particular things.
We must now endeavor to indicate the position occupied by
Ideas in the Platonic cosmology. To Socrates Plato was indebted for his Method; yet not wholly indebted, seeing that he
enlarged the conception transmitted to him. To Pythagoras he
was indebted for his theory of Ideas; yet not wholly indebted,
seeing that he modified it and rendered it more plausible. What
he did for Method we have seen: let us now see how he transformed the Pythagorean doctrine.
Aristotle; in a memorable passage, says -"Plato followed
Socrates respecting definitions, but, accustomed as he was to inquiries into universals (S6&'ro ~r rna'i rspl rs-v xao6Xou), he supposed that definitions should be those of intelligibles (i. e. noumena), rather than of sensibles (i. e. phenomena): for it is impossible to give a general definition to sensible objects, which are
always changing. Those Intelligible Essences he called Ideas;
adding that sensible objects were different from Ideas, and received from them their names; for it is in consequence of their
participation (xarm'& pBssv) in Ideas, that all objects of the same
genus receive the same name as the Ideas. He introduced the
word participation. The Pythagoreans say, that'Things are




PLATO'S IDEAL THEORY.                215
the copies of Numbers.' Plato says,'the participation;' he only
changes the name."*
With due submission, we venture to question the assertion of
Aristotle in the last sentence. Plato did more than change a
name. The conception alone of Ideas, as generical types, is a
great advance on the conception of Numbers. But Plato did
not stop here. He ventured on an explanation of the nature and
the degree of that participation of sensible objects in Ideas.
And Aristotle himself, in another place, points out a fundamental distinction. "Plato thought that sensible Things no less
than their causes were Numbers; but the causes are Intelligibles
(i. e. Ideas), and other things Sensibles."t Surely this is something more than the invention of a name! It gives a new character to the theory; it renders it at once more clear, and more
applicable.
The greatest difficulty felt in the Ideal theory is that of participation. How, and in how far, does this participation take
place? A question which Plato did not, and could not, solve.
All that he could answer was, that human knowledge is necessarily imperfect, that sensation troubles the intellectual eye, and
only when the soul is free from the hindrances of the body shall
we be able to discern things in all the ineffable splendor of truth.
But, although our knowledge is imperfect, it is not false. Reason enables us to catch some glimpses of the truth, and we must
endeavor to gain more. Whatever is the object of the soul's
thought, purely as such, is real and true. The problem is to
separate these glimpses of the truth from the prejudices and
errors of mere opinion.
In this doctrine, opinion is concerned only with Appearances
(phenomena); philosophy, with Existence. Our sensation, judgments, opinions, have only reference to rX& y7vyvosva; our philosophic conceptions have reference to ra'&'vra. The whole matter
* Medtaph. i. 6.  1 Ib. i. 7,'AAXa obur Riv votlroVS airiovs, ro6rovro  alcrrOroiS.




216               PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
is comprised in Plato's answer to Diogenes, who thought he demolished the theory of Ideas by exclaiming, "I see indeed a
table; but I see no Idea of a table." Plato replied, "Because
you see with your eyes, and not with your reason." Hence at
the close of the 5th Book of his Republic, he says that those
only are to be called Philosophers who devote themselves to the
contemplation of ro' Ov, i. e. Existence.
The phenomena which constitute what we perceive of the
world (i. e. the world of sense) are but the resemblances of matter
to Ideas. In other words, Ideas are the Forms of which material Things are copies; the noumena, of which all that we
perceive are the Appearances (phenomena). But we must not
suppose these copies to be exact; they do not at all participate
in the nature of their models; they do not even represent them,
otherwise than in a superficial manner. Or perhaps it would be
more correct to say, that Ideas do not resemble Things; the man
does not resemble his portrait, although the portrait may be a
tolerable resemblance of him; a resemblance of his aspect, not of
his nature. If, then, the Ideas as they exist realized in Nature,
do not accurately resemble the Ideas as they exist per se-i. e.
if the phenomena are not exact copies of the noumena-how are
we ever to attain a knowledge of Ideas and of Truth? This
question plunges us into the midst of his psychology, which we
must first explain before the whole conception of the Ideal theory can be made consistent.
~ V. PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
After the dreary dialectics of the two preceding Sections, it is
some refreshment to be able to open this Section with a myth,
and that perhaps the most fascinating of all Plato's myths.
In the Phcedrus Socrates very justly declares his inability to
explain the real nature of the soul. But though he cannot exhibit it, he can show what it resembles. Unable to give a demonstration, he can paint a picture; and that picture he paints
as follows:




PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.               217
"We may compare it to a chariot, with a pair of winged horses
and a driver. In the souls of the Gods, the horses and the drivers are entirely good: in other souls only partially so, one of the
horses excellent, the other vicious. The business, therefore, of the
driver is extremely difficult and troublesome.
"Let us now attempt to show how some living beings came
to be spoken of as mortal, and others as immortal. All souls are
employed in taking care of the things which are inanimate; and
travel about the whole of heaven in various forms. Now, when the
soul is perfect, and has wings, it is carried aloft, and helps to administer the entire universe; but the soul which loses its wings,
drops down till it catches hold of something solid, in which it
takes up its residence; and, having a dwelling of clay, which
seems to be self-moving on account of the soul which is in it, the
two together are called an animal, and mortal. The phrase' immortal animal' arises not from any correct understanding, but
from a fiction: never having seen, nor being able to comprehend,
a deity, men conceived an immortal being, having a body as well
as a soul, united together for all eternity. Let these things,
then, be as it pleases God; but let us next state from what cause
a soul becomes unfledged.
"It is the nature of wings to lift up heavy bodies towards the
habitation of the Gods; and, of all things which belong to the
body, wings are that which most partakes of the divine. The
divine includes the beautiful, the wise, the good, and every thing
of that nature. By these the wings of the soul are nourished
and increased; by the contraries of these, they are destroyed.
"Jupiter, and the other Gods, divided into certain bands,
travel about in their winged chariots, ordering and attending to
all things, each according to his appointed function; and all who
will, and who can, follow them. When they go to take their
repasts, they journey towards the summit of the vault of heaven.
The chariots of the Gods, being in exact equilibrium, and therefore easily guided, perform this journey easily, but all others with
difficulty; for one of the two horses, being of inferior nature,
10




218               PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
when he has not been exceedingly well trained by the driver,
weighs down the vehicle, and impels it towards the earth.
"The souls which are called immortal (viz. the Gods), when
they reach the summit, go through, and, standing upon the convex outside of heaven, are carried round and round by its revolution, and see the things which lie beyond the heavens. No
poet has ever celebrated these supercelestial things, nor ever will
celebrate them, as they deserve. This region is the seat of Existence itself: Real Existence, colorless, figureless, and intangible
Existence, which is visible only to Mind, the charioteer of the
soul, and which forms the subject of Real Knowledge. The
minds of the Gods, which are fed by pure knowledge, and all
other thoroughly well-ordered minds, contemplate for a time this
universe of'Being' per se, and are delighted and nourished by
the contemplation, until the revolution of the heavens brings them
back again to the same point. In this circumvolution, they contemplate Justice itself, Temperance itself, and Knowledge; not
that knowledge which has a generation or a beginning, not that
which exists in a subject which is any of what we term beings,
but that Knowledge which exists in Being in general; in that
which really Is. After thus contemplating all real existences,
and being nourished thereby, these souls again sink into the interior of the heavens, and repose.
" Such is the life of the Gods. Of other souls, those which best
follow the Gods, and most resemble them, barely succeed in lifting
the head of the charioteer into the parts beyond the heavens,
and, being carried round by the circumvolution, are enabled
with difficulty to contemplate this universe of Self-Existence.
Others, being encumbered by the horses, sometimes rising and
sometimes sinking, are enabled to see some Existences only. The
remainder only struggle to elevate themselves, and, by the unskilfulness of their drivers, coming continually into collision, are
lamed, or break their wings, and, after much labor, go away without accomplishing their purpose, and return to feed upon mere
opinion.




PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.                219
"The motive of this great anxiety to view the supercelestial
plain of Truth is that the proper food of the soul is derived from
thence, and, in particular, the wings, by which the soul is made
light and carried aloft,-are nourished upon it. Now it is an inviolable law that any soul which, placing itself in the train of
the Gods, and journeying along with them, obtains a sight of any
of these self-existent Realities, remains exempt from all harm
until the next circumvolution, and, if it can contrive to effect
this every time, is forever safe and uninjured. But if, being unable to elevate itself to the necessary height, it altogether fails of
seeing these realities, and, being weighed down by vice and oblivion, loses its wings and falls to the earth, it enters into and animates some Body. It never enters, at the first generation, into
the body of a brute animal; but that which has seen most enters into the body of a person who will become a lover of wisdom, or a lover of beauty, or a person addicted to music, or to
love; the next in rank, into that of a monarch who reigns according to law, or a warrior, or a man of talents for command;
the third, into a person qualified to administer the State, and
manage his family affairs, or carry on a gainful occupation;
the fourth into a person fond of hard labor and bodily exercises, or skilled in the prevention and curing of bodily diseases;
the fifth, into a prophet, or a teacher of religious ceremonies;
the sixth, into a poet, or a person addicted to any other of the
imitative arts; the seventh, into a husbandman or an artificer;
the eighth, into a sophist, or a courtier of the people; the ninth,
into a despot and usurper. And, in all these different fortunes,
they who conduct themselves justly will obtain next time a more
eligible lot; they who conduct themselves unjustly a worse. The
soul never returns to its pristine state in less than ten thousand
years, for its wings do not grow in a shorter time; except only
the soul of one who philosophizes with sincerity or who loves
with philosophy. Such souls, after three periods of one thousand
years, if they choose thrice in succession this kind of life, recover
their wings in the three thousandth year, and depart. The other




220               PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
souls, at the termination of their first life, are judged, and, having received their sentence, are either sent for punishment into
the places of execution under the earth, or are elevated to a place
in heaven, in which they are rewarded according to the life which
they led while here. In either case they are called back on the
thousandth year, to choose or draw lots for a new life. Then a
human soul often passes into the body of a beast, and that of a
beast, if it has ever been human, passes again into the body of a
man; for a soul which has never seen the Truth at all cannot enter into the human form, it being necessary that man should be
able to apprehend many things according to kinds, which kinds
are composed of many perceptions combined by reason into one.
Now, this mode of apprehending is neither more nor less than
the recollecting of those things which the soul formerly saw when
it journeyed along with the Gods, and, disregarding what we
now call beings, applied itself to the apprehension of Real Being. It is for this reason that the soul of the philosopher is refledged in a shorter period than others; for, it constantly, to the
best of its power, occupies itself in trying to recollect those things
which the Gods contemplated, and by the contemplation of
which they are Gods; by which means being lifted out of, and
above, human cares and interests, he is, by the vulgar, considered
as mad, while in reality he is inspired."
This is unquestionably the poetry of philosophy, and it is from
such passages that the popular opinion respecting Plato has been
formed; but they represent only a small portion of the real
thinker. Towards the close the reader will have remarked that
tile famous doctrine of reminiscence is implied. This doctrine
may be seen fully developed in the Phcedo; it seems to have been
a fundamental one. The difficulties of conceiving the possibility
of any knowledge other than the sense-knowledge, which the Sophists had successfully proved to lead to skepticism, must early
have troubled Plato's mind. If we know nothing but what our
senses teach us, then is all knowledge trivial. Those who admit
the imperfection of the senses and fall back upon Reason, beg




PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.                221
the question. How do we know that Reason is correct? How
can we be assured that Reason is not subject to some such inevitable imperfection as that to which sense is subject?
Here the ever-recurring problem of human knowledge presents itself. Plato was taught by Socrates that beyond the world
of Sense, there was the world of eternal Truth; that men who
differed greatly respecting individual things did not differ respecting universals; that there was a common fund of Truth, from
which all human souls drew their share. Agreeing with his
master that there were certain principles about which there
could be no dispute, he wished to know how he came by those
principles.
All who have examined the nature of our knowledge, are aware
that it is partly made up of direct impressions received by the
senses, and partly of ideas which never were, at least in their
ideal state, perceived by the senses. It is this latter part which
has agitated the schools. On the one side, men have declared it
to be wholly independent of the senses-to be the pure action of
the soul. In its simplest form, this doctrine may be called the
doctrine of Innate Ideas. On the other side, men have as vigorously argued that, although all our ideas were not absolutely
derived from the senses in a direct manner, yet they were all so
derived in an indirect manner: thus, we have never seen a mermaid; but we have seen both a fish and a woman, and to combine these two impressions is all that the mind does in conceiving
a mermaid. This doctrine is pushed to its limits in the eighteenth-century philosophy, which says, Penser,c'est sentir: thought
is a transformed sensation.
Plato, in adopting the former view, rendered it more cogent
than most of his successors; for is it not somewhat gratuitous to
say, we are born with such and such ideas? It is different from
saying we are born with certain faculties: that would be admissible. But, to be driven into a corner, and on being asked,
whence came those ideas? to answer, they are innate,-is a pure
petitio principii.  What proof have you that they are in



222               PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
nate? Merely the proof that you cannot otherwise account for
them?
Plato was more consistent. He said The Soul is and ever was
immortal. In its anterior states of existence it had accurate conceptions of the eternal Truth. It was face to face with Existence.
Now, having descended upon earth, having passed into a body,
and, being subject to the hindrances of that bodily imprisonment,
it is no longer face to face with Existence: it can see Existence
only through the ever-changing flux of material phenomena.
The world is only becoming, never is. The Soul would apprehend
only the becoming, had it not some recollection of its anterior
state-had it not in some sort the power of tracing the unvarying Idea under the varying phenomena. When, for example, we
see a stone, all that our senses convey is the appearance of that
stone: but, as the stone is large or small, the soul apprehends
the Idea of Greatness; and this apprehension is a reminiscence
of the world of Ideas, awakened by the sensation. So when we
see or hear of a benevolent action, besides the fact, our Soul apprehends the Idea of Goodness. And all our recollection of Ideas
is performed in the same way. It is as if in our youth we had
listened to some mighty orator whose printed speech we are reading in old age. That printed page, how poor and faint a copy
of that thrilling eloquence! how we miss the speaker's piercing,
vibrating tones, his flashing eye, his flashing face! And yet that
printed page in some dim way recalls those tones, recalls that
face, and stirs us somewhat as we then were stirred. Long years
and many avocations have somewhat effaced the impression he
first made, but the printed words serve faintly to recall it. Thus
it is with our immortal Souls. They have sojourned in that
celestial region where the voice of Truth rings clearly, where the
aspect of Truth is unveiled, undimmed. They are now sojourning in this fleeting, flowing river of life, stung with resistless
longings for the skies, and solaced only by the reminiscences of
that former state which these fleeting, broken, incoherent images
of Ideas awaken in them.




PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.                223
It is a mistake to suppose this a mere poetical conception.
Plato never sacrifices logic to poetry. If he sometimes calls
poetry to his aid, it is only to express by it those ideas which
logic cannot grasp, ideas which are beyond demonstration; but
he never indulges in mere fancies. Instead therefore of saying
that Reason was occupied with innate ideas, he consistently said
that every thing which the senses did not furnish was a reminiscence of the world of Ideas.
We are now in a condition to answer the question with which
the last Section was closed,-How  to ascertain the Truth, if
Phenomena are not exact copies of Noumena. The sensation
awakens recollection, and the recollection is of Truth; the soul
is confronted with the Many by means of Sense, and by means
of Reason it detects the One in the Many; i. e. the particular
things perceived by Sense awaken the recollection of Universals
or Ideas. But this recollection of Truth is always more or less
imperfect. Absolute Truth is for the Gods alone. No man is
without some of the divine spark. Philosophers alone have any
large share; and they might increase it by a proper method.
The philosophy of Plato has two distinct branches, somewhat
resembling what we found in Parmenides. The universe is divided into two parts: the celestial region of Ideas, and the
mundane region of material phenomena. These answer very
well to the modern conception of Heaven and Earth. As the
phenomena of matter are but copies of Ideas (not, as some suppose, their bodily realization), there arises a question: How do
Ideas become Matter? In other words: How do Things participate in Ideas?  We have mooted the question in the former
Section, where we said that it admitted of no satisfactory solution; nor does it; and we must not be surprised to find Plato
giving, at different times, two very different explanations. These
two explanations are too curious to be overlooked. In the Republic, he says that God, instead of perpetually creating individual things, created a distinct type (Idea) for each thing. From
this type all other things of the class are made. Thus, God made




224               PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
the Idea of a bed: according to this type, any carpenter may
now fashion as many beds as he likes, in the same way as an
artist may imitate in his paintings the types already created, but
cannot himself create any thing new. The argument, as an
illustration of Plato's Method, may be given here:
"Shall we proceed according to our usual Method? That
Method, as you know, is the embracing under one general Idea
the multiplicity of things which exist separately, but have the
same name. You comprehend?
" Perfectly.
"Let us take any thing you like. For instance, there is a
multiplicity of beds and tables?
"Certainly.
" But these two kinds are comprised, one under the Idea of a
bed, and the other under the Idea of a table?
"Without doubt.
"And we say that the carpenter who makes one of these articles, makes the bed or the table according to the Idea he has of
each. For he does not make the Idea itself. That is impossible?
"Truly, that is impossible.
"Well, now, what name shall we bestow on the workman
whom I am now going to name?
" What workman?
"Him  who makes what all the other workmen make separately.
"You speak of a powerful man!
"Patience; you will admire him still more. This workmen
has not only the talent of making all the works of art, but also
all the works of nature; plants, animals, every thing else; in a
word, himself.*  He makes the Heaven, the Earth, the Gods;
every thing in Heaven, Earth, or Hell.
* Td re aXAa tKai iavrdv. We are inclined to regard this passage as corrupt, the self-creation of God being certainly no Platonic notion; at least
not countenanced by any other passage in any other work. The scholiast
makes no comment on it..




PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.               225
"You speak of a wonderful workman, truly!
"You seem to doubt me? But, tell me, do you think there is
no such workman; or, do you think that in one sense any one
could do all this, but in another no one could? Could you not
yourself succeed in a certain way?
"In what way?
" It is not difficult; it is often done, and in a short time. Take
a mirror, and turn it round on all sides: in an instant you will
have made the sun and stars, the earth, yourself, the animals and
plants, works of art, and all we mentioned.
" Yes, the images, the appearances, but not the real things.
"Very well; you comprehend my opinion. The painter is a
workman of this class, is he not?
" Certainly.
"You will tell me that he makes nothing real, although he
makes a bed in a certain way?
"Yes; but it is only an appearance, an image.
" And the carpenter, did you not allow that the bed which he
made was not the Idea which we call the essence of the bed, the
real bed, but only a certain bed?,"I said so, indeed.
"If, then, he does not make the Idea of the bed, he makes
nothing real, but only something which represents that which
really exists. And, if any one maintain that the carpenter's work
has a real existence he will be in error."*
In the Timceus, perhaps the most purely expository of all his
works, and unquestionably one of the latest, Plato takes a totally
different view of the creation of the world. God is there said,
not to create types (Ideas); but these types having existed from
all eternity, God in fashioning Chaos fashioned it after the model
of these Ideas. In this view there is no participation in the nature of Ideas, but only a participation in their form.
Whichever hypothesis he adopted (and Plato did not much
* Repub. x. 467-8, ed. Bekker.
10*




226               PLATO'S PSYCHOLOGY.
care for either), this conception of Heaven and Earth as two different regions, is completed by the conception of the double nature of the soul; or rather, of two souls: one Rational and the
other Sensitive. These two souls are closely connected, as the
two regions of Ideas and Phenomena are connected. Neither of
them is superfluous; neither of them, in a human sense, sufficient: they complete each other. The Sensitive soul awakens
the reminiscences of the Rational soul; and the Rational soul,
by detecting the One in the Many, preserves Man from the skepticism inevitably resulting from mere sense-knowledge.
Thus did Plato resume in himself all the conflicting tendencies
of his age; thus did he accept each portion of the truth supposed
to be discovered by his predecessors, and reconcile these portions
in one general tendency. In that vast system, all skepticism and
all faith found acceptance: the skepticism was corrected, the faith
was propped up by more solid arguments. He admitted, with
the skeptics, the imperfection of all sense-knowledge; but, though
imperfect, he declared it not worthless: it is no more like the
Truth than phenomena are like Ideas; but, as phenomena are in
some sort modelled after Ideas, and do, therefore, in some dim
way, represent Ideas, so does sense-knowledge lead the patient
thinker to something like the Truth: it awakens in him reminiscence of the Truth. As Ritter says, "He shows, in detail,
that in the world of sense there is no perfect likeness, but that
an object which at one time appears like, is at another thought
to be unlike, and is, therefore, defective in completeness of resemblance, and has at most but a tendency thereto. The same
is the case with the Beautiful, the Good, the Just, the Holy, and
with all that really is; in the sensible world there is nothing
exactly resembling them, neither similar nor dissimilar; all,
however, that possesses any degree of correspondence with these
true species of being is perceived by us through the senses, and
thereby reminds us of what truly is. From this it is clear that
he had previously seen it somewhere, or been conscious of it,
and, as this could not have been in the present, it must have




SUMMARY OF PLATO'S DIALECTICS.           227
been in some earlier state of existence. In this respect there is
a close connection between this doctrine and the view of sensible
objects, which represents them as mere copies or resemblances of
the super-sensible truth; for, even in perception, a feeling arises
upon the mind, that all we see or hear is very far from reaching
to a likeness to that which is the true being and the absolutely
like; but that, striving to attain, it falls short of perfect resemblance; and consequently, the impressions of the sense are mere
tokens of the eternal ideas, whose similitude they bear, and of
which they are copies."
~ VI. SUMMARY OF PLATO'S DIALECTICS.
Having exhibited Plato's conceptions of Method, of Ideas, and
of the Soul, it will now be convenient to take a brief review of
them, to exhibit their position in the general doctrine.
Dialectics was the base of the Platonic doctrine.  Indeed,
Plato believed in no other Science; Dialectics and Philosophy
were synonymous. For Dialectics (or Logic) to be synonymous
with Philosophy, the theory of Ideas was necessary. Dialectics
is the science of general propositions, of general terms, of universals. To become the science it must necessarily be occupied with
more important things. Ideas are these important things; for
Ideas are at once the only real Existences, and General Terms.
Whoso discoursed about General Terms discoursed about Existence; and deeper than that, no science could hope to penetrate.
Plato, whose opinions can scarcely ever be accepted as final, is
both explicit and constant in his conception of Dialectics as the
science. To determine the real nature of science, he devotes an
entire dialogue: the Thewtetus. That remarkable work is purely critical; it refutes the opinions of adversaries, in such a way
as to leave no doubt as to Plato's own opinion. All attempts to
constitute science either upon perception (a;'o'ots) or upon opinion (og'a) he refutes in an irresistible manner. Perception can
only be of objects which have no stability, which have no real
Existence. Opinion, though it be correct, is unable to constitute




228         SUMMARY OF PLATO'S DIALECTICS.
science; for there are two sorts of opinion,-false and true; and
to distinguish the true from the false would require a science
which knew the Truth. It follows, as a necessary consequence,
that Ideas, which are the real immutable elements of science,
must be known in themselves, and that science consists in seeking the order of development of these Ideas; that is to say, in
Dialectics.
Owing to the Ideal theory, Dialectics was necessarily the science; that is, the science of Being. The distinction between his
Dialectics and the Logic of his successors is very marked. While
he spoke of Dialectics as the art of methodical classification of
genera,-the art of speaking upon general notions,-he did not
confine it to subjective truth; for he believed this subjective
truth to be only a reflex of the objective reality: he believed
that abstract ideas were images of real existences. Dialectics
was therefore not only the " art of thinking," but the science of
immutable being.
In the twofold aspect of Creation there was this division of
knowledge:
PERCEPTION.
Matter, phenomena,'r yiyv6'/sva = Sensation = Opinion.
DIALECTICS.
Existence, Ideas, T'& v ra= Abstract Ideas=Science.
In the everchanging flux of Becoming, which was the object
of Perception, there were traces of the immutable Being, which
was the object of science. This distinction may be applied to
Plato's own manifold works. We may say of them that the
opinions on psychology, physics, ethics, and politics are constantly changing, uncertain; but amidst all these various opinions there reigns one constant Method. He never wavers as to
Dialectics. We may therefore fully understand the importance
bestowed on Dialectics; and we may also clearly see what is
meant by identifying his Philosophy with Dialectics.
The basis of the Platonic doctrine therefore is Dialectics; the




PLATO'S THEOLOGY AND COSMOLOGY.          229
subject-matter of Dialectics consists of Ideas; and the Method
consists of Definitions, Analysis, and Induction.
~ VII. PLATO'S THEOLOGY AND COSMOLOGY.
Hitherto we have been occupied solely with the general doctrine; we have now to descend to particulars. But, as so often
remarked, particular doctrines have scarcely any stability in the
Platonic writings; what is advanced to-day is refuted to-morrow;
accordingly, critics and historians have squabbled about these
wavering opinions, as if agreement were possible. One declares
Plato held one opinion; and cites his passages in proof. Another thinks his predecessor a blockhead; and cites other passages wholly destructive of the opinion Plato is said to have
maintained. A third comes, and, stringing passages from one
dialogue to passages from another, interprets the whole in his
own way. A consistent Theological doctrine will not therefore
be expected from us: we can only reproduce some of the Platonic notions, those especially which have influenced later thinkers.
In the same way as Plato sought to detect the One amidst the
Multiplicity of material phenomena, and, having detected it, declared it to be the real essence of matter, so also did he seek to
detect the One amidst the Multiplicity of Ideas, and, having detected it, declared it to be God. What Ideas were to Phenomena, God was to Ideas: the last result of generalization. God
was thus the One Being comprising within himself all other Beings, the Ev xaod roXXa, the Cause of all things, celestial and terrestrial. God was the supreme Idea. Whatever view we take
of the Platonic cosmology-whether God created Ideas, or
whether he only fashioned unformed matter after the model of
Ideas-we are equally led to the conviction, that God represented the supreme Idea of all Existence; the great Intelligence,
source of all other Intelligences; the Sun whose light illumined
creation. God is perfect, ever the same, without envy, wishing
nothing but good: for, although a clear knowledge of God is
impossible to mortals, an approximation to that knowledge is




230        PLATO'S THEOLOGY AND COSMOLOGY.
possible: we cannot know what he is, we can only know what
he is like. He must be good, because self-sufficing; and the
world is good, because he made it. Why did he make it? God
made the world because he was free from envy, and wished that
all things should resemble him as much as possible; he therefore persuaded Necessity to become stable, harmonious, and fashioned according to Excellence. Yes, persuaded is Plato's word;
for there were two eternal Principles, Intelligence and Necessity,
and from the mixture of these the world was made; but Intelligence persuaded Necessity to be fashioned according to Excellence.*  He arranged chaos into Beauty.    But, as there is
nothing beautiful but Intelligence, and as there is no Intelligence
without a Soul, he placed a Soul into the body of the World,
and made the World an animal.
Plato's proof of the world being an animal is too curious a
specimen of his analogical reasoning to be passed over. There is
warmth in the human being; there is warmth also in the world:
the human being is composed of various elements, and is therefore called a body; the world is also composed of various elements, and is therefore a body; and, as our bodies have souls,
the body of the world must have a soul; and that soul stands in
the same relation to our souls, as the warmth of the world stands
to our warmth.t  Having thus demonstrated the world to be an
animal, it was but natural he should conceive that animal as resembling its creator, and human beings as resembling the universal animal, To crav.'jov. As soon as the World, that image
of the eternal Gods, as soon as that vast Animal began to move,
live, and think, God looked upon his work, and was glad.1
But although God in his goodness would have made nothing
* Mclpypivr yap oZv 6 rofie roV 6apoovU yivtvLs t davdyKrS r Ka vov avUrdaeows
iyevviO7l, vo 3e &vdyKrs &dp6vyros i r  i E c iL v atr'v rwv ytyvopivvwv rd TrA~Tra eri
TO 3TArsarov aye(v.-Timceus, p. 56.
t Philebus, pp. 170-1.
$'Its e KivOfv abra Kai;dv rsv6tnae r7wv ai'tiwv OaQv yeyovas a'yaXpa S yevvfiaa; rar)ip, jy7yaao r Kica tvpavOeis rt In 6a\piAov Spotov 7rps Tra apdaStyia
rctvroa17a adrpydcaaOat.-Timnaus, p. 86.




PLATO'S THEOLOGY AND COSMOLOGY.             231
evil, he could not prevent the existence of it. Various disputes
have been warmly carried on by scholars, respecting the nature
of this Evil which Plato was forced to admit. Some have conceived it nothing less than the Manichsean doctrine. Thus much
we may say: the notion of an antagonist principle is inseparable
from every religious formula: as God can only be Good, and as
Evil does certainly exist, it must exist independently of him; it
must be eternal. Plato cut the matter very short by his logical
principle,-that since there was a Good, there must necessarily
be the contrary of Good, namely, Evil. If Evil exists, how does
it exist, and where? It cannot find place in the celestial region
of Ideas. It must therefore necessarily dwell in the terrestrial
region of phenomena: its home is the world; it is banished
from heaven. And is not this logical?   What is the world of
Phenomena but an imperfect copy of the world of Ideas, and
how can the imperfect be the purely Good? When Ideas are
" realized," as the Pantheists would say, when Ideas, pure immutable essences, are clothed in material forms, or when matter is
fashioned after the model of those Ideas, what can result but imperfections? The Ideas are not in this world: they are only in
a state of becoming,'vrws ovrwa, not y7yvopsva. Phenomena are
in their very nature imperfect: they are perpetually striving to
exist as realities. In their constitution there is something of the
divine: an image of the Idea, and some participation in it; but
more of the primeval chaos.
Those, therefore, who say that Plato thought that "Evil was
inherent in matter," though expressing themselves loosely, express themselves on the whole correctly. Matter was the great
Necessity which Intelligence fashioned. Because it was Necessity and unintelligent, it was Evil, for Intelligence alone can be
good.*
* In the Laws, x. pp. 201-2, he curiously distinguished the vovs from the'Xvfi in this manner. The tpvx6 (vital principle) is the self-moving principle;
but, inasmuch as it is sometimes moved to bad as well as to good (rZv re dyaOv airiav Jivalc puvxiv Kai riv KaKOv), it was necessary to have some other




232         PLATO'S THEOLOGY AND COSMOLOGY.
Now, as this world of phenomena is the region where Evil
dwells, we must use our utmost endeavors to escape from it.
And how escape? By suicide?-No. By leading the life of
the Gods; and every Platonist knows that the life of the Gods
consists in the eternal contemplation of Truth, of Ideas. Thus, as
on every side, are we forced to encounter Dialectics as the sole
salvation for man.
From the above explanation of the nature of Evil, it will be
seen that there is no contradiction in Plato's saying, that the
quantity of Evil in this life exceeded that of the Good; it exceeds
it in the proportion that phenomena exceed noumena,-that
matter exceeds Ideas.
But although Evil be a necessary part of the world, it is in
constant struggle with Good. What is this but the struggle of
Becoming?   And man is endowed with Free Will and Intelligence: he may therefore choose between Good and Evil.* And
according to his choice will his future life be regulated. Metempsychosis was a doctrine Plato borrowed from Pythagoras;
and in that doctrine he could find arguments for the enforcement of a sage and virtuous life, which no other afforded at that
epoch.
We have said nothing of the arguments whereby Plato proves
the existence of God; for we have been forced to pass over many
details: but we cannot close this chapter without alluding to an
argument often used in modern times, and seldom suspected to
have had so ancient an upholder,-God is proved to exist, by
the very feeling of affinity to his nature which stirs within our
souls.
Such opinions as those above set down were certainly expressed by Plato at different times: but we again warn the
principle which should determine its direction. He therefore makes vovs
(intelligence) the principle which determines the soul (whether the soul of
the world or of man,_it is the same) to good; and uvola (ignorance-want of
nous) which determines it to evil
* Laws, x. p. 217.




THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE GOOD.             233
reader against supposing them to have been his constant views.
They are taken from works written at wide intervals, and bearing
considerable difference of opinion; and in those very works there
are occasional glimpses of an appalling doctrine, namely, that
man is but the plaything of God, who alternately governs and
forsakes the world. The first clause of this sentence seems derived from Heraclitus, who said, " that making worlds was the
sport of Demiurgos."  Plato's words are these: avOpw.ov 6i OEov
r,rcaOyviov sivai jscu cXav,4svov: and this is said to be man's greatest excellence.* The second clause is formally expressed by
Plato thus: "God," he says, "alternately governs and forsakes
the world; when he governs it, things go on well: it is the age
of gold; when he forsakes it, the world suddenly turns round in
a contrary orbit,-a fearful crisis takes place, all things are disordered, mundane existence is totally disarranged, and only after
some time do things settle down to a sort of order, though of a
very imperfect kind."t
~ VIII. PLATO'S VIEW OF THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE GOOD.
So much has been written and talked in modern times of ro
xaXov, "the Beautiful," as conceived by Plato, and this by persons who never read a line of his works, that we must devote a
few sentences to it.
The bond which unites the human to the divine is Love. And
Love is the longing of the Soul for Beauty; the inextinguishable
desire which like feels for like, which the divinity within us feels
for the divinity revealed to us in Beauty. This is the celebrated
Platonic Love, which, from having originally meant a communion of two souls, and that in a rigidly dialectical sense, has
been degraded to the expression of maudlin sentiment between
the sexes. Platonic love meant ideal sympathy; it now means
the love of a sentimental young gentleman for a woman he cannot or will not marry.
* Laws, vii. p. 82.              t Politicus, p. 280.




234          THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE GOOD.
But what is Beauty? Not the mere flattery of the senses. It
does not consist in harmonious outlines and resplendent colors:
these are but the indications of it. Beauty is Truth. It is the
radiant image of that which was most splendid in the world of
Ideas. Listen to Plato's description of it in the Phcedrus:"For, as we have already said, every human soul has actually
seen the Real Existences, or it would not have come into a
human shape. But it is not easy for all of them to call to mind
what they then saw; those, especially, which saw that region
for a short time only, and those which, having fallen to the earth,
were so unfortunate as to be turned to injustice, and consequent
oblivion of the sacred things which were seen by them in their
prior state. Few, therefore, remain who are adequate to the recollection of those things. These few, when they see here any
image or resemblance of the things which are there, receive a
shock like a thunderbolt, and are in a manner taken out of themselves; but, from deficiency of comprehension, they know not
what it is which so affects them. Now, the likenesses which
exist there of Justice and Temperance, and the other things
which the soul honors, do not possess any splendor; and a few
persons only, with great difficulty, by the aid of dull, blunt, material organs, perceive the terrestrial likenesses of those qualities,
and recognize them. But Beauty was not only most splendid
when it was seen by us forming part of the heavenly possession
or choir, but here also the likeness of it comes to us through the
most acute and clear of our senses, that of sight, and with a
splendor which no other of the terrestrial images of supercelestial Existences possess.  They, then, who are not fresh from
heaven, or who have been corrupted, are not vehemently impelled towards that Beauty which is aloft when they see that
upon earth which is called by its name; they do not, therefore,
venerate and worship it, but give themselves up to physical
pleasure after the manner of a quadruped. But they who are
fresh from those divine objects of contemplation, and who have
formerly contemplated them much, when they see a godlike




TIIE BEAUTIFUL AND THE GOOD.            235
countenance or form, in which celestial beauty is imaged and
well imitated, are first struck with a holy awe, and then, approaching, venerate this beautiful object as a god, and, if they
were not afraid of the reputation of too raving a madness, would
erect altars, and perform sacrifices to it.
"And the warmth and genial influence derived from the atmosphere which beauty generates around itself, entering through
the eyes, softens and liquefies the inveterate induration, which
coats and covers up the parts in the vicinity of the wings, and
prevents them from growing. This being melted, the wings begin to germinate and increase, and this, like the growing of the
teeth, produces an itching and irritation which disturbs the
whole frame of the soul. When, therefore, by the contemplation of the beautiful object, the induration is softened and the
wings begin to shoot, the soul is relieved from its pain and
rejoices; but when that object is absent, the liquefied substance hardens again, and closes up the young shoots of the
wings, which consequently boil up and throb, and throw the
soul into a state of turbulence and rage, and will neither
allow it to sleep nor remain at rest, until it can again see
the beautiful object, and be relieved. For this reason it never
willingly leaves that object, but for its sake deserts parents,
and brothers, and friends, and neglects its patrimony, and despises all established usages on which it valued itself before.
And this affection is Love."
The reader is doubtless by this time familiar enough with the
Platonic philosophy to appreciate this passage. He will see the
dialectical meaning of this poetical myth. He will comprehend,
also, that the Platonic Love is naturally more appropriate between
two men, master and pupil, than between the two sexes; because
it is then purer, and less disturbed by other feelings.
Beauty is the most vivid image of Truth: it is divinity in its
most perceptible form. But what is the Good? The Good, ro
dMyaUov, is God, but God considered in the abstract.  Truth,
Beauty, Justice, are all aspects of the Deity; Goodness is his




236                  PLATO'S ETHICS.
nature. The Good is therefore incapable of being perceived; it
can only be known in reflection. In the same manner as the
sun is the cause of sight, and also the cause of the objects of
sight growing and being produced, so also the Good is the cause
of science, and the cause of being to whatever is the object of
science: and, as the sun itself is not sight, nor the object of sight,
but presides over both; so also the Good is not science, nor the
object of science, but is superior to both, for they are not the
Good, but goodly.
~ IX. PLATO'S ETHICS.
Plato was a Socratist, Hitherto, however, we have seen him
following his master only in his Method. The speculations on
Ideas, Reminiscence, Metempsychosis, God, etc., were things he
did not learn from Socrates, although the Socratic Method led
him to these conceptions. We have before seen that Socrates
occupied himself almost exclusively with Ethical topics; and it
is in Ethics, therefore, that we may expect to find Plato resembling him.
Plato's ethical opinions are logical rather than ethical; that
is to say, they are deductions from certain abstract logical premises, not from investigations into human nature. Thus, when
"engaged with the discussion of particular sciences, he resolves
them into the science of Good; when engaged with the particular virtues, he resolves them into the virtue of Science."* Everywhere the Good and the True are convertible terms, and Virtue
is the same as Science. There is, moreover, considerable contradiction in his various works on this, as on other points. In one
dialogue (Timceus) he advocates Free Will; in another (Hippias
Minor), Fatalism.  Sometimes vice is involuntary, at other
times voluntary: sometimes, indeed generally, vice is nothing
but ignorance; elsewhere, as we have shown, vice is said to be
partly ignorance and partly incontinence. Virtue is said to be
* Archer Butler, Lectures, ii. 61.




PLATO'S rETICS.                  237
Science; yet Knowledge alone does not constitute Happiness,
nor can Virtue be taught.
Although, therefore, many passages may be quoted in which
morals are worthily spoken of, we cannot but regard as chimerical any attempt to deduce from them an ethical system. All
that can safely be relied on is general views; such, for instance,
as his subordination of Ethics to Dialectics. As M. De Gerando
well observes, "he did not found his ethics on a principle of
obligation, on the definition of duty, but on the tendency to perfection."
In Plato's Ethics the passions are entirely set aside; they are
regarded as disturbances in the moral economy. Virtue is purely a matter of intelligence; and the intellect has therefore not
only a regulative office, but the supreme direction of all action.*
Now, as Chamfort admirably said, "the Philosopher who would
set aside the passions, resembles a Chemist who would extinguish
his fire."  We are all aware that it is very common "to know
the right, and yet the wrong pursue;" that the passions not only
disturb the regulative action of Reason, but positively triumph
over it; and that morals are our mores, our habits, as much as
our beliefs.
The Ethics of Plato might suit the inhabitants of another
world; they are useless to the inhabitants of this. His Politics
are his Ethics applied to the State, and labor under the same
errors. But his Utopian Government, the Republic, has had too
much celebrity for us to neglect it.
The Republic is unquestionably one of the most interesting of
his works; and so slow has been the progress of social science,
compared with every other science, that many of the views Plato
has there put forth are still entertained by very serious thinkers;
* We cannot interrupt our exposition with any examples; they are too
numerous. But we may remind the student of that passage in the Gorgias
respecting the misery of the unjust man, in which Plato endeavors to prove
that he who does an injury suffers more than he who endures it.




238                  PLATO'S ETHICS.
whereas his views on morals seldom, his views on physics never
find a defender.
The weakness of man is the cause why States are formed. As
he cannot suffice to himself, he must live in society. This society
should be an image of man himself. The faculties which belong
to him must find a proper field of activity in society; and this
vast union of intellects should form but one intelligence. Thus
man's virtues are, 1. ~pov~6s, wisdom; 2. dvUpsla, fortitude; 3.
~p.Ppo~U6vi, temperance; 4. cSxaioU'6v, justice. The State, therefore must have its Rulers, the philosophers, who will represent
wisdom; its Soldiers, who will represent fortitude; its Craftsmen
and burghers, who will represent temperance. Justice is a quality which must be shared by all classes, as lying at the root of
all virtuous action.
In wisdom and justice we have the alpha and omega of Plato's
doctrine: justice is wisdom in act. The office of the Rulers is
therefore to ordain such laws as will eventually prevent all injustice in the State. Their first care will be to instil into the
minds of the citizens just notions respecting the Deity. All those
who attribute to the Deity the passions and imperfections of men
must be banished: hence the famous banishment of the poets,
of which so much has been said. This law, pushed to its rigorous conclusions, is the law of fanaticism. Whatever the Rulers
believed respecting Religion, was to be the Religion of the State.
Strange that a pupil of Socrates should have advocated a law,
the operation of which caused his master's condemnation! But
there are other causes for the banishment of the poets besides
their fictions respecting the Gods. They enervate the soul by
pictures of immoderate desires; they give imitations of the vices
and follies of men; they overstep the limits of that moderation
which alone can balance the soul. Even the musicians are to
be banished; those at least who are plaintive and harmonious.
Only the Dorian and the Phrygian music can be admitted; the
one impetuous and warlike, the other calm.
There is a germ of Stoicism in Plato, and that germ is here




PLATO'S ETHICS.                 239
seen developed. A measured equability of mind was his ideal
of human happiness, and any thing which interfered with it was
denounced. Poetry and music interfered with this equability,
and so did conjugal love. As the State could not subsist without children, children must be begotten. But parents are foolishly fond; they are avaricious for their children; ambitious for
them. Husbands are also foolishly fond. To prevent these disturbances of good order, Plato ordains community of wives, and
interdicts parentage. Women are to be chosen for marriage as
brood-mares are chosen. The violent women to be assorted to
the mild men; the mild to be assorted to violent men. But the
children belong to the State. They are, therefore, to be consigned to the State Nurses, who will superintend their early education.  Because children manifest different capacities, Plato
thought with St. Simon, that each citizen should be ranked according to his capacity, the State would undertake to decide to
which class the young man should belong. But, if domestic life
is thus at a blow sacrificed to the public good, do not imagine
that women will lose their occupations. No: women must share
with men the toils of war and agriculture. The female dog guards
sheep as well as the male; why should not the women guard
the State?*  And, as some few women manifest a capacity for
philosophy, those few will share with men the government.
With community of wives and children, it is natural that community of property should be joined. Property is the great disturber of social life; it engenders crimes and luxuries which are
scarcely better than crimes. Property, therefore, must be abolished. The State alone has riches.
In one word, the Family, no less than the individual, is sacrificed to the State; the State itself being an Abstraction. Like
the Utopists of modern days, Plato has developed an ia priori
theory of what the State should be, and by this theory all human
feelings are to be neglected; instead of developing a theory a
* This is Plato's own illustration.




240                  PLATO'S ETHICS.
posteriori, i. e. from an investigation into the nature of human
wants and feelings.
By thus reducing the Republic to its theoretical formula, we
are doubtless viewing it in its most unfavorable light. Its value,
and its interest, do not consist in its political ideas, but in its
collateral suggestions on education, religion, and morals. But
these are beside our present purpose.*
Willingly would we discourse upon this remarkable book at
greater length; but, although we have only touched on a few
points connected with Plato, we have already exhausted the space
we could afford, and must close here this imperfect account of
one of the greatest minds of antiquity. If we have assigned him
his due position in the history of human development-if we
have in some sort presented the reader with a clue, whereby he
may traverse the labyrinth of that celebrated but much misrepresented writer-if we have succeeded in conveying some impression' of the man, more consonant with truth than that usually
accredited, we have performed our task.
* In the Laws, many of the political and social notions are modified; but
the general theory is the same.




SEVENTH EPOCH.
PHILOSOPHY AGAIN REDUCED TO A SYSTEM: CLOSE OF THE
SOCRATIC MOVEMENT.-ARISTOTLE.
CHAPTER I.
ARISTOTLE.
~ I. LIFE OF ARISTOTLE.
WHEN Plato was leaving Athens for the journey into Sicily,
of which we have spoken, and which occupied him three years
or more, Aristotle appeared in that active city, a restless youth
of seventeen; rich both in money and in knowledge, eager, impetuous, truth-loving, and insatiable in his thirst for philosophy.
Tidings of the wondrous men who made that city illustrious, and
whose fame still sheds a halo round its ruins, had reached him
in his native land; tidings of the great thinkers and the crowded
schools had lured him, though so young, to Athens.
Aristotle was born at Stagira, a colony in Thrace, Olympiad
99 (B. c. 384.) His father, Nicomachus, was an eminent physician, who had written several works on medicine and natural
history; so that Aristotle's love of such subjects may be called
hereditary. And this hereditary love so conspicuous in the marvellous results of the two treatises on the History of Animals
and the Parts of Animals-works which modern science is daily
enabling us to appreciate better-may have been fostered by the
opportunities Stagira offered him in his boyhood. It was a town
on the western side of the Strymonic Gulf, just where the general
11




242                    ARISTOTLE.
line of coast takes a southerly direction. Immediately south, a
promontory ran out towards the east, effectually screening the
town and its little harbor Capros (formed by the island of the
same name), from the violence of the squalls coming up the.iEgean. "In the terraced windings too, by which the visitor
climbs through the orange groves of Sorento, he may without
any great violence imagine the narrow and steep paths by which
an ancient historian and chorographer describes those who crossed
the mountains out of Macedonia, as descending into the valley of
Arethusa, where was seen the tomb of Euripides and the town of
Stagira."*
Aristotle, losing his parents at an early age, was consigned to
the care of a certain Proxenus, who had him instructed in all the
physical knowledge of the time. Proxenus died, and Aristotle
then fulfilled his desire of seeing Athens.
During the three years of Plato's absence Aristotle was not
idle. He prepared himself to be a worthy pupil. His wealth
enabled him to purchase those costly luxuries, Books-there was
no cheap Literature in those days-and in them he studied the
speculations of the early thinkers, with a zeal and intelligence of
which his own writings bear ample evidence. There were also
some friends and followers of Socrates and Plato still at Athens:
men who had listened to the entrancing conversation of the " old
man eloquent," who could still remember with a smile his keen
and playful irony; and others who were acquainted with some
of the deep thoughts brooding in the melancholy soul of Plato.
These Aristotle eagerly questioned, and from them prepared himself to receive the lessons of his future teacher.
Plato returned. His school was opened, and Aristotle joined
the crowd of his disciples, amongst whom the penetrating glance
of the master soon detected the immortal pupil. Plato saw that
the impetuous youth needed the curb; but there was promise of
greatness in that very need. His restless activity was charac* Blakesleyei Life of Aristotle, p. 12.




LIFE OF ARISTOTLE.                243
terized by Plato in an epithet: "Aristotle is the Mind of my
school."
Aristotle continued to listen to Plato for seventeen years; that
is, till the death of the latter. But he did not confine himself to
the Platonic Philosophy: nor did he entirely agree with it. And
from this disagreement has arisen the vulgar notion of a personal
disagreement between Master and Pupil: a notion, to be sure,
propped up with pretended anecdotes, and refuted by others
equally authentic. Much has been written on this quarrel, and
on what people call Aristotle's ingratitude. We place no reliance on it. The same thing was said of Plato with respect to
Socrates; and we have excellent reasons for treating that as calumny. In his writings Aristotle doubtless combats the opinion
of Plato; but he always mentions him with respect, sometimes
with tenderness. If that be ingratitude, it is such as all pupils
have manifested who have not been slavish followers.*
It was a wise thought of Macedonian Philip to give his son
Alexander such a preceptor as Aristotle. For four years was the
illustrious pupil instructed by the illustrious master in poetry,
rhetoric, and philosophy; and, when Alexander departed on his
Indian expedition, a scholar of Aristotle's, one Calisthenes, attended him.t Both from Philip and from Alexander, the Stagirite
received munificent assistance in all his undertakings: especially
in the collection of natural curiosities, which were selected from
captured provinces, to form the materials of the History of Animals.
"The conqueror is said, in Athenseus, to have presented his
master with the sum of eight hundred talents (about two hundred thousand pounds sterling) to meet the expenses of his History of Animals, ahd, enormous as the sum is, it is only in pro* The question is discussed with ability by Mr. Blakesley in his Life of
Aristotle, pp. 24-28. See also Stahr's article on Aristotle in the Dictionary
of Greek and Romarn Biography.
+ The story that Aristotle himself accompanied Alexander is now universally discredited.




244                     ARISTOTLE.
portion to the accounts we have of the vast wealth acquired by
the plunder of the Persian treasures. Pliny also relates that
some thousands of men were placed at his disposal for the purpose of procuring zoological specimens, which served as materials for this celebrated treatise.'*  However he acquired his
materials, it is becoming daily more evident that his work was
based on direct knowledge, on actual inspection and dissection,
not, as in Pliny's case, on what others reported. Several of the
most astonishing discoveries of modern naturalists are found to
have been distinctly known to Aristotle; and even on such subtle
questions as the affinities of animals, we are sometimes forced to
come round to his classification. "Thus, in the end," says Professor Forbes, in summing up his discussion on the classification
of Acalephs, "we revert curiously enough to the views of the
affinities of these Animals proposed by Aristotle, who plainly included under the designation of axacX-;y, both Actiniae and Medusae: not from any vague guess, or in compliance with the popular recognition of their resemblance, but from a careful study of
their structure and habits, as-the varied notices preserved to us
in the first, fourth, and fifth, eighth, and ninth books of the History of Animals prove beyond question."t
After a long interval Aristotle returned to Athens and opened
a school in the Lyceum: a school which eclipsed all the others
both in numbers and importance. It is curiously illustrative of
his restless vivacious temperament that he could not stand still
and lecture, but delivered his opinions whilst walking up and
down the shady paths of the Lyceum, attended by his eager followers. Hence his disciples were- called the Walking Philosophers-Peripatetics.
Mr. Blakesley thinks that it was Aristotle's delicate health
which, combined with the wish to economize time, induced him
* Blakesley, p. 68.
t Forbes, Monograph of the Naked-Eyed Medusae, p. 88. On the subject of
Aristotle's zoological knowledge generally, see Meyer, Aristotelis Thierkunde,
1855, and De Blainville, Histoire des Sciences de i' Organisation, 1S45.




LIFE OF ARISTOTLE.                245
to lecture while walking. Diogenes Laertius attributes its origin
to a regard for the health of his pupil, Alexander. The point is
unimportant; enough for us to know that he did lecture while
walking to and fro along the shady paths of the Lyceum. Protagoras, as Mr. Blakesley reminds us, is represented by Plato as
teaching in the same way; although not perhaps so systematically as Aristotle.
His lectures were of two kinds, scientific and popular-acroamatic or acroatic, and exoteric. The former were for the more advanced students, and those who were capable of pursuing scientific
subjects: he delivered these in the morning. The latter were afternoon lectures to a much larger class, and treated of popular subjects-rhetoric, politics, and sophistics. Much learning and ingenuity has been thrown away in the endeavor to determine the
precise nature of these two kinds of instruction; but we cannot
here discuss it. Those who conclude that the distinction between
the esoteric and exoteric was a distinction of doctrine seem to us
in error; the distinction was, as above stated, purely that of subject-matter.  Dialectics and Poetics are not addressed to the
same hearers.
He spent a long laborious life in the pursuit of knowledge, and
wrote an incredible number of works, about a fourth of which
it is calculated are extant; the division, arrangement, and authenticity of which has long been a pet subject of contention
among scholars; but, as no agreement has yet been effected,
we should have to swell our pages with arguments rather than
results.
The influence these works, spurious as well as genuine, have
exercised on European culture, is incalculable, and we shall hereafter have to speak of the tyranny of this influence. Nor was
it alone over European culture they exercised a despotic sway.
"Translated in the fifth century of the Christian era into the
Syriac language by the Nestorians who fled into Persia, and from
Syriac into Arabic four hundred years later, his writings furnished the Mohammedan conquerors of the East with a germ of sci



246                    ARISTOTLE.
ence which, but for the effect of their religious and political institutions, might have shot up into as tall a tree as it did produce
in the west; while his logical works, in the Latin translation
which Boethius,'the last of the Romans,' bequeathed as a legacy to posterity, formed the basis of that extraordinary phenomenon, the Philosophy of the Schoolmen. An empire like this,
extending over nearly twenty centuries of time, sometimes more,
sometimes less despotically, but always with great force, recognized in Bagdad and in Cordova, in Egypt and in Britain, and
leaving abundant traces of itself in the language and modes
of thought of every European nation, is assuredly without a parallel."*
~ II. ARISTOTLE'S METHOD.
Plato and Aristotle may be said to contain all the speculative
philosophy of Greece: whoso knows them, knows all that Greece
had to teach. It is not our plan to draw comparisons between
the greatness of two great men, otherwise these two would furnish a happy subject. We have endeavored to point out in what
way Plato advanced the Philosophy of his age. We have now
to do the same by Aristotle.
Aristotle was the most learned man of antiquity, but this learning did not enervate the vigor of his mind. He studiously
sought, both in books and in external nature, for materials wherewith to build a doctrine. Before laying down his own views he
always examines the views of his predecessors with tedious minuteness; and his own opinions often seem brought out in his
criticisms rather than dogmatically affirmed.. Hence some have
declared his Method to be the historical Method; a misconception not to be wondered at when we consider the abundance of
historical detail, and the absence of any express definition of his
Method in his writings.
Unlike Plato, Aristotle never mentions the nature of his Meth* Blakesley, p. i.




ARISTOTLE'S METHOD.                247
od; but he has one, and we must detect it. We may expect to
find it somewhat resembling that of his master, with some modifications of his own. Plato, as Van Heusde, in the Initia Platonicce remarks, stands a middle point between Socrates and Aristotle. The Method of Socrates was one of Investigation; that
of Aristotle was one of Demonstration. The Definition and Induction of Socrates were powerful, but vague; the syllogism of
Aristotle rendered them powerful and precise. Plato, as it were,
fills'up the gap between these two thinkers; by the addition of
Analysis and Classification he reduced the Socratic Method to a
more systematic form, and gave it precision. Where Plato left
it, Aristotle took it up; and, by still further modifications, all
of which had but one aim,-i. e. greater precision,-he gave it a
solidity which enabled it to endure for centuries.
Wherein did Plato and Aristotle fundamentally differ? Until the time of Hegel the general explanation of this difference was
briefly to this effect: Plato is an Idealist, Aristotle a Materialist;
the one a Rationalist, the other an Empiric: one trusting solely
to Reason, the other solely to Experience. This explanation Hegel refuted by showing, that although Aristotle laid more stress
upon experience than did Plato, yet he also expressly taught that
Reason alone could form science.*
Let us, then, try if we can penetrate the real difference. And
to do so, we must first ask, What was the fundamental position
of the Platonic doctrine? That question admits of but one answer. The root of Plato's philosophy is the theory of Ideas,
whereby Dialectics became science. If here Aristotle be found to
agree with his master, there can be no fundamental difference
between them; if here he be found to differ, we may be able to
deduce from it all other differences.
Aristotle radically opposed the Ideal theory; and the greater
part of his criticisms of Plato are criticisms of that theory. He
does not deny to Ideas a subjective existence: on the contrary,
* Hegel, Gesehichte der Phis ii/. 811 s8.




248                     ARISTOTLE.
he makes them the materials of science; but he is completely opposed to their objective existence, calling it an empty and poetical metaphor. He says, that on the supposition of Ideas being
Existences and Models, there would be several Models for the
same Thing; since the same thing may be classed under several
heads. Thus, Socrates may be classed under the Ideas of Socrates, of Man, of Animal, and of Biped; or Philosopher, General,
and Statesman. The "stout Stagirite" not only perceived the
logical error of the Ideal theory, but also saw how the error originated. He profoundly remarked, that Ideas are nothing but
productions of the Reason, separating, by a logical abstraction,
the particular objects from those relations which are common to
them all. He saw that Plato had mistaken a subjective distinction for an objective one; had mistaken a relation, which the
understanding perceived between two objects, for the evidence of
a separate existence. The partisans of the theory of Ideas, Aristotle likens to those who, having to enumerate the exact number
of things, commence by increasing the number, as a way of simplifying the calculation. In this caustic illustration we may see
the nature of his objection to the Platonic doctrine. What, indeed, was the Ideal theory, but a multiplication of the number of
Existences? Men had before imagined that things were great,
and heavy, and black or brown. Plato separated the qualities
of greatness, weight, and color, and made these qualities new existences.
Having disproved the notion of Ideas being Existences,-in
other words, of General Terms being any thing more than the
expressions of the Relations of individual things,-Aristotle was
driven to maintain that the Individual Things alone existed. But,
if only individuals exist, only by sensation can they be known;
and, if we know them by sensation, how is the universal, To
xoad0ou, ever known-how do we get abstract ideas? This question was the more pertinent because science could only be a science of the Universal, or, as we moderns say, a science of general
truths; now inasmuch as Aristotle agreed with Plato in main



ARISTOTLE'S METHOD.                249
taining that sense cannot furnish us with science,* which is always
founded on general truths (Universals), it was needful for him to
show how we could gain scientific knowledge.
Plato's solution of the problem has already been exhibited; it
was the ingenious doctrine of the soul's reminiscence of a former
apprehension of truth, awakened by those traces of Ideas which
sensation discovered in Things. This solution did not satisfy
Aristotle. He, too, was aware that reminiscence was indispensable; but by it he meant reminiscence of previous experience,
not of an anterior state of existence in the world of Ideas. By
sensation we perceive particular things; by induction we perceive
the general in the particular. Sensation is the basis of all knowledge: but we have another faculty besides that of sensation; we
have Memory. Having perceived many things, we remember
our sensations, and by that remembrance we are enabled to discern wherein things resemble and wherein they differ; and this
Memory then becomes an art whereby a general conception is
formed: this art is Induction. The natural method of investigation, he says, is to collect all the facts or particulars, and afterwards deduce from these the general causes of all things and
their actions.t This is accomplished by Induction, which he
aptly calls the pathway from particulars to generals —sra7ywy7
6 hq arT. ~v xaOxa~Co'Ta E' T&ra xaUOXou'<oSosg.t  Man alone has
this art. The distinction between, brutes and men is, that the
former, although they have Memory, have no Experience; that
is to say, have not the art which converts Memory into Experience-the art of Induction. Man is the reasoning animal.
That Aristotle meant Induction by the art of which he speaks
as furnished by experience, may be proved by one luminous
passage of the Metaphysics. "Art commences when, fiom   a
great number of Experiences, one general conception is formed
* Analyt. Post. i. 81.
t Ibid.; comp. also Hist. Animal. i. 6.
T Topic. i. 10. comp. what Coleridge says on Method as a path of Transit,
Discourse on M3ethod affixed to Encyclop. MAetropolitana.
11*




250                ARISTOTLE'S METHOD.
which will embrace all similar cases.* And, lest there should
be any misunderstanding of his definition, he proceeds to illustrate it. "Thus, if you know that a certain remedy has cured
Callias of a certain disease, and that the same remedy has produced the same effect on Socrates, and on several other persons,
that is Experience; but to know that a certain remedy will cure
all persons attacked with that disease is Art: for Experience is
the knowledge of individual things (<.v xoasxa~ra); Art is that
of Universals (T(rv xaokXou)."
The commencement of Positive Science-the awakening to an
appreciation of the nature and processes of Science-lies in that
passage. In the Socratic conception of Induction we saw little
more than Analogical Reasoning; but in this Aristotelian conception we see the Collection of Instances, and the generalization
from those Instances which Science claims as part of its Method.
Nor was this a random guess of the old Stagirite's: it was the
logical deduction from his premises respecting knowledge. Hear
him again: " Experience furnishes the principles of every science.
Thus Astronomy is grounded on observation; for, if we were properly to observe the celestial phenomena, we might demonstrate
the laws which regulate them. The same applies to other sciences. If we omit nothing that observation can afford us respecting phenomena, we could easily furnish the demonstration of all
that admits of being demonstrated, and illustrate that which is
not susceptible of demonstration."t  And, in another place, when
abandoned in his investigation by phenomena, he will not hazard
an assertion. "We must wait," he says, "for further phenomena,
since phenomena are more to be trusted than the conclusion of
reason."
Looked at in a general way, the Aristotelian Method seems to
be the Method of positive Science; but on closer meditation we
shall detect their germinal difference to be the omission in Aris* riverat de rrXvvl Brav ie 7roXXav r75s fiArtptaS IvooItdrwv KaO06ov ufia yivTrat
irep? riv bfotiov bdvr6ArO, Met. i. 1.
t Analyt. Prior. i. 80.




ARISTOTLE'S METHOD.                251
totle of the principle, so much insisted on in the Introduction to
this History, namely, the rigorous Verification of each inductive
step. The value of the truth expressed by a syllogism does not
consist solely in its accurate distribution, but also in the accuracy
of its major premise: we may form unexceptionable Syllogisms
which shall be absurdly erroneous, as when we say, All black
birds are crows; This bird is black: ergo, This bird is a crow.
In the physical and metaphysical speculations of the ancients,
we are constantly meeting with syllogisms as perfect as this,and as absurd; because the ancients generally threw their ingenuity into logical deduction, and scarcely ever into preliminary
verification. When Aristotle therefore lays down as a canon the
necessity of ascertaining generals from an examination of particulars, his canon, admirable indeed, needs to be accompanied by
a distinct recognition of the equal necessity of verification. Contrasted with the Platonic Method, Aristotle's is seen to great advantage. Plato, believing that the stimulus awakened by a single
idea would enable a man to arrive at the knowledge of all ideas,
in consequence of the necessary connection supposed to exist between theme could very well dispense with Induction. But Aristotle maintained that the completeness of knowledge is only obtainable through completeness of experience; every single idea is
awakened in us by a separate sensation, and only on a comparison of like and unlike in phenomena are differences perceived.
He complains of Plato very justly, for neglecting details in haste
to judge of universals.
Aristotle had, therefore, a novel and profound conception of
scientific Method; but because he did not-and, indeed, in that
age could not-confine himself to Experience and the generalizations of Experience, he could not effectually carry out his own
scheme. His conception was just; but the application of such a
Method could have led him only a short way, because there was
not sufficient Experience then accumulated, fiom which to generalize with any effect. Hence his speculations are not always
carried on upon the Method which he himself laid down. Im



252                 ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.
patient at the insufficiency of facts, he jumps to a conclusion.
Eager, as all men are, to solve the problems which present themselves, he solved them d priori. He applied his syllogism before
he had verified the exactitude of his premises.
The distinction between Aristotle and Plato is, that while both
admitted that science could only be formed from Universals, Tr&
xao'Xou, Aristotle contended that such Universals had purely a
subjective existence, i. e. that they were nothing more than the
inductions derived from  particular facts. He, therefore, made
Experience the basis of all Science, and Reason the Architect.
Plato made Reason the basis. The tendency of the one was to
direct man to the observation and interrogation of Nature; that
of the other was to direct man to the contemplation of Ideas.
The distinction between Aristotle and Bacon is, that while
they both insist upon the observation and generalization of facts,
as alone capable of furnishing correct ideas, Aristotle believed
that he could observe those primary facts of Existence and Cause,
which Bacon wisely declared beyond the human ken. While
both insisted on the necessity of experience, while both saw that
the science of the "general" must be framed from the inductions
of the particular, they differed profoundly as to the nature of that
"general."  Bacon endeavored in particular facts to trace the
general laws; Aristotle endeavored in particular facts to trace
the general ideas.
To understand this, we must cast a glance at Aristotle's Logic.
~ III. ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.
It is often remarked, that Aristotle's use of the word Dialectics
differs from Plato's use of it. Indeed, with Plato, dialectics was
the science of Being; with Aristotle, it was no more than the instrument of Thought. But it is highly necessary that we should
clearly understand the position occupied by Logic in the Aristotelian philosophy; the more so as after-ages prized the Logic
above all his other works.
Logic is the science of Affirmation; Affirmation is the active




ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.               253
operation of the Mind on that which sensation has presented to
it; in other words, Affirmation is Thought. Affirmations may
be true or false: there can be no falsehood in Sensation. If you
have a sensation of an object, it must be a true sensation; but
you may affirm something false of it. Every single thought is
true, but when you connect two thoughts together, that is, when
you affirm something of another thing, you may affirm that which
is false. Every thing, therefore, that you think about may be reduced to a Proposition; in fact, thoughts are a series of Propositions. To understand the whole nature of Propositions-to understand the whole Art of Thinking-is the province of Logic.
By a very natural confusion, Aristotle, thus convinced of the
importance of language, was led to maintain that truth or falsehood did not depend upon things, but upon words, or rather upon combinations of words-upon Propositions. Logic, therefore,
to him, as to Plato, though in a different way, became the real
Organon of Science. But, as John Mill remarks, "the distinction between real and nominal definitions, between definitions of
words and what are called definitions of things, though conformable to the ideas of most Aristotelian logicians, cannot, as it appears to us, be maintained. We apprehend that no definition
is ever intended to explain and unfold the nature of the thing.
It is some confirmation of our opinion that none of those writers
who have thought that there were definitions of things have ever
succeeded in discovering any criterion by which the definition of
a thing can be distinguished from any other proposition relating
to that thing. The definition, they say, unfolds the nature of the
thing: but no definition can unfold its whole nature; and every
proposition in which any quality whatever is predicated of the
thing unfolds some part of its nature. The true state of the case
we take to be this: All definitions are of names, and of names
only; but, in some definitions, it is clearly apparent that nothing
is intended except to explain the meaning of the word; while, in
others, besides explaining the meaning of the word, it is intended
to be implied that there exists a thing corresponding to the




254                 ARISTOTLErS LOGIC.
word. Whether this be or be not implied in any given case,
cannot be collected from the mere form of expression.'A centaur is an animal with the upper parts of a man and the lower
parts of a horse,' and'a triangle is a rectilineal figure with three
sides,' are, in form, expressions precisely similar; although, in the
former, it is not implied that any thing conformable to the term
really exists, while in the latter it is; as may be seen by substituting, in both definitions, the word means for is. In the first
expression,'a centaur means an animal,' etc., the sense would
remain unchanged: in the second,'a triangle means,' etc., the
meaning would be altered, since it would be obviously impossible
to deduce any of the truths of geometry from a proposition expressive only of the manner in which we intend to employ a particular sign.
"There are, therefore, expressions commonly passing for definitions which include in themselves more than the mere explanation of the meaning of a term. But it is not correct to call an
expression of this sort a peculiar kind of definition. Its difference
from the other kind consists in this, that it is not a definition, but
a definition and something more. The definition given above of
a triangle, obviously comprises not one, but two propositions, perfectly distinguishable. The one is,'There may exist a figure
bounded by three straight lines;' the other,' and this figure may
be termed a triangle.' The former of these propositions is not
a definition at all; the latter is a mere nominal definition or explanation of the use and application of a term. The first is
susceptible of truth or falsehood, and may therefore be made
the foundation of a train of reasoning. The latter can neither be true nor false; the only character it is susceptible of, is
that of conformity or disconformity to the ordinary usage of language.
" There is a real distinction, then, between definitions of names
and what are erroneously called definitions of things; but it is
that the latter, along with the meaning of a name, covertly asserts a matter of fact. This covert assertion is not a definition,




ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.                   255
but a postulate. The definition is a mere identical proposition,
which gives information only about the use of language, and
from which no conclusions respecting matters of fact can possibly be drawn. The accompanying postulate, on the other
hand, affirms a fact which may lead to consequences of every
degree of importance. It affirms the real existence of things
possessing the combination of attributes set forth in the definition; and this, if true, may be foundation sufficient to build a
whole fabric of scientific truth."*
This profound and luminous distinction was not seen by
Aristotle, and his whole system was vitiated in consequence of
the oversight. He thought that Logic was not only the Instrument of Thought, but, as such, the Instrument of investigating
Causes. In his Logic the first place was occupied by the celebrated Categories. They are ten in number, and are as follows:
Obrla..................................  Substance.
lI6cov..................................  Quantity.
lIo7ov.................................  Quality.
Ips   ri.................................  Relation.
O telv.................................  Action.
IIdaxLv...............................  Passion.
Ho...................................  The where.
6r..................................  The when.
KcOat................................  Position  in space.'EXetI.................................  Possession.
These Categories, or, as the Latin writers say, Predicaments,
were intended to be an enumeration of those classes or genera,
under some of which every thing was to be reduced. They
were held to be the most universal expressions for the various
relations of things; they could not further be analyzed, but
remained the fundamental definitions of things. It is, however,
as has been remarked,t a mere catalogue of the distinctions
rudely marked out by the language of familiar life, with little or
no attempt to penetrate, by philosophic analysis, to the rationale
even of those common distinctions. Such an analysis, however
* System of Logic, i. 195-7.    t Mili' System of Logic, L 60.




256                 ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.
superficially conducted, would have shown the enumeration to
be both redundant and defective. Some objects tre omitted,
and others repeated several times under different heads. It is
like a division of animals into men, quadrupeds, horses, asses,
and ponies.
The remark is just, and would have been admitted as just by
Aristotle himself, since he does not pretend the classification is
complete, but confesses that the same object may, under different categories, be at once a quality and a relation. But Aristotle does not usually ascribe much importance to this enumeration of the most general notions; so that we may regard it as
nothing more than an attempt to exhibit in a clear light the
signification of words taken absolutely, in order to show how
truth and falsehood consist in the right or wrong combination of
these elements.*
However imperfect this attempt at classification may be, it
was held to be a satisfactory attempt for many centuries; nor
was any one bold enough to venture on another until Kant, who,
as we shall see, had quite a different object. We have not here
to criticise it, but to exhibit its historical position. The idea of
examining the forms of thought could scarcely have originated
earlier. Previous speculators had occupied themselves with inquiries into the origin and nature of knowledge' Aristotle saw
that it was time to inquire into the necessary forms of thought.
To do this, to analyze the various processes of the mind, and to
exhibit the "art of thinking" in all its details, is the object of
his Logic.
Some had declared sense-knowledge to be deceitful; others
had declared that sense-knowledge was perfectly faithful, as far
as it went, but that it was incapable of penetrating beneath
phenomena. Skepticism was assuming a menacing attitude.
Aristotle, in his way, endeavored to meet it, and he met it
* Ritter, iii. 66, where also will be found the authorities for the previous
sentence.




ARISTOTLE S LOGIC.                257
thus: It is true that the knowledge derived from our senses is
not always correct; true also that our senses are to be trusted,
as far as they go. A sensation, as a sensation, is true; but any
affirmation you may make about that sensation may be either
true or false, according to the affirmation. If an oar dipped in
the water appears to you to be broken, the sensation you have
is accurate enough; you have that sensation. But if, on the
strength of that sensation, you affirm that the oar is broken, your
affirmation is false. Error lies not in false sensation, but in false
affirmation.
Like Plato, he held it to be indispensable to understand words
if we are to understand thoughts; a position which, as we saw
in the teaching of Socrates, was both novel and at the time important, because it called attention to the extreme laxity of language under which men disguised the laxity of their reasoning.
A word, he said, is in itself indifferent; it is neither true nor
false: truth or falsehood must result from a combination of words
into a proposition. No thought can be erroneous; error is only
possible to propositions.
Hence the necessity of Logic, which is the science of affirmations; it is in the Enunciate Proposition, owrocqav-rxos Xo'yo, that
we must seek truth or falsehood. This proposition is subdivided
into Affirmative and Negative Propositions, which are mutually
opposed, and give rise to Contradiction so soon as they are asserted in the same sense of one and the same thing: e. g. "It
is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be."
The principle of Contradiction he declares to be the deepest
of all; for on it all Demonstration is founded. Because, however, he confounded truth of Language with truth of Thought,
and supposed that Thought was always the correlate of Fact, he
fell into the mistake of maintaining truth of Language, or Propositions, to be identical with truth of Being. He did not recognize the fact that we can frame Propositions which shall be
based on the principle of Contradiction and which shall nevertheless be false.




258                  ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.
Having erected Propositions, or the affirmative and negative
combinations of Language, into such an exalted position, it became necessary to attend more closely to names, and thus we
get the Predicables, a five-fold division of general Names, not
grounded, as usual, upon a difference in their meaning, that is,
in the attribute which they connote, but upon a difference in the
kind of class which they denote. We may predicate of a thing
five different varieties of class-name:
rfvos................................  a Genus.
E7os.................................  a  Species.
Atapopd..............................  a Difference.
"Itov................................  a Property.
Sv/J3e3f7K6r...........................  an Accident.
" It is to be remarked of these distinctions that they express
not what the predicate is in its own meaning, but what relation
it bears to the subject on which it happens on the particular
occasion to be predicated. There are not some names which are
exclusively general and others which are exclusively species or
differentiae; but the same name is referred to one or another
Predicable, according to the subject of which it is predicated
on the particular occasion. Animal, for instance, is a genus
with respect to Man or John; a species with respect to substance or Being. The words genus, species, etc., are therefore
relative terms; they are names applied to certain predicates, to
express the relation between them and some given subject: a
relation grounded, not upon what the predicate connotes, but
upon the class which it denotes, and upon the place which in
some given classification that class occupies relatively to the particular subject."*
Induction and Syllogism are the two great instruments of his
Logic. All knowledge must rest upon some antecedent conviction; and both in Induction and Syllogism we see how this
takes place. Induction sets out, from particulars already known,
* Mill, System of Logic, i. 162.




ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.                 259
to arrive at a conclusion; Syllogism sets out, from some general
principle, to arrive at particulars.* There is this remarkable distinction, however, established by him between the two, namely,
that the general principle from which the syllogism proceeds is
better known in itself and in its own nature, while the particulars
from which Induction proceeds are better known to us.t How
came he by this surprising distinction  Thus: the particulars
of Induction are derived from Sense, and are more liable on that
account to error; whereas the general principle of the Syllogism
is known in itself, is further removed from the fallacies of sense,
and is xaro  -ro'v Xoyov 7yvwpplrespov. Do we not always doubt
whether we have rightly understood any thing until we have
demonstrated that it follows by necessity from some general
principle? And does not this lead to the conviction that the
Syllogism is the proper form  of all science?  Moreover, as
the Syllogism proceeds from the general, the general must
be better known than the particular, since the particular is
proved by it.
Aristotle here lands us on a jagged reef of paradox: that
which is better known to us is of less value than that which is
known in itself. Sensations are less trustworthy than ideas. The
particulars are sensibles, but in and for themselves they are nothing; they exist only in relation to us. Nevertheless we are
forced to make them our point of departure. We begin with
sensuous knowledge to reach ideal knowledge. In this manner
we proceed from the world of experience to that higher world of
cognition.
The various investigations into the nature of Propositions
which Aristotle prosecuted, were necessary to form the basis of
his theory of reasoning, i. e. the Syllogism. He defined the Syllogism to be an enunciation in which certain Propositions being
laid down, a necessary conclusion is drawn, distinct from the
* Anlyt. Post. i. 1.
t iaUre& Fiv oZv  rp6repos Kta  yvwptlopro epoS b  a roV piTO   ov auXooycffLbs, iy7v d'
ivapyiorepos b Sia ri7s iraywoyfs.-Analyt. Prior. ii. 24.




260                 ARISTOTLE'S LOGIC.
Propositions and without employing any idea not contained in
the Propositions. Thus:
All bad men are miserable;
Every tyrant is a bad man:
ergo
All tyrants are miserable.
His examination of the sixteen forms of the Syllogism exhibits
great ingenuity, and, as a dialectical exercise, was doubtless sufficient; but it must not detain us here. The theory of the Syllogism is succeeded by the theory of Demonstration.  If all
knowledge owes its existence to anterior knowledge, what is this
anterior knowledge? It is the major proposition of a Syllogism.
The conclusion is but the application of the general to the particular. Thus, if we know that Tyrants are miserable, we know
it because we know that All bad men are miserable; and the
middle term tells us that Tyrants are bad men. To know, is to
bo aware of the cause; to demonstrate, is to give the Syllogism
which expresses the knowledge we have. It is therefore necessary that every scientific Syllogism should repose upon principles
that are true, primitive, more evident in themselves than the
conclusion, and anterior to the conclusion. These undemonstrable principles are Axioms, Hypotheses, etc., according as they
are self-evident, or as they presuppose some affirmation or negation; they are Definitions when they limit themselves to an explanation of the essence of the thing defined, without affirming
any thing respecting its existence.
The proper subjects of demonstration are those universal attributes of particular things which make them what they are, and
which may be predicated of them. It is one thing to know that
a thing is so; another thing to know why it is so: hence the
two orders of demonstrations, the Tro orI, " the demonstration of
the cause from a consideration of the effect," and the ro-t &or',
"the demonstration of the effect from the presence of the cause."
We close this exposition of the leading points of Aristotle's
Logic with his own somewhat touching words, as he concludes




ARISTOTLESS METAPHYSICS.             -21
his work: "We have had no works of predecessors to assist us
in this attempt to construct a science of Reasoning; our own
labors have done it all. If, therefore, the work appears to you
not too inferior to the works on other sciences which have been
formed with the assistance of successive laborers in the same department, you will show some indulgence for the imperfections
of our work, and some gratitude for the discoveries it contains."
~ IV. ARISTOTLE'S METAPHYSICS.
The problem which the early thinkers had set themselves to
solve was that of the First Cause. Aristotle maintained that
there were Four Causes, not one, and each of these must be taken
into consideration. The four Causes were as follows:-I. The
Material Cause, the Essence, Tr oi  v Esfva,-the Invariable Existence, which philosophers so variously sought. Perhaps  Essence" is the best translation of the phrase. II. The Substantial
Cause, urGoxstsvov, the " Substance" of the Schoolmen. III. The
Efficient Cause, capxn rs xsv7c~sco, "the Principle of Motion."
IV. The Final Cause, T o0 s'vsxa xaI raiyadov, "the Purpose and
End." These Causes were all recognized separately by the early
speculators, but no one had recognized them as connected, and
as all necessary.
Aristotle is right in his criticism on his predecessors;- but his
own theory is extremely vicious. It makes speculation subordinate to logical distinctions; it makes the Categories the'great
instrument of investigation; and it creates that spirit of useless
and quibbling distinction which was the characteristic vice of the
schoolmen, who were almost all fervent Aristotelians. In one
word, the nearer Aristotle approached to systematic precision,
the wider he wandered from sound principles of inquiry. And
this because of his fundamental error in supposing that Logic
was an Organon, i. e. that subjective distinctions must accord with
objective distinctions. In consequence of which, instead of interrogating Nature he interrogated his own mind.
This may seem at variance with his notion of the necessity of




262             ARISTOTLE'S METAPHYSICS.
sense-experience, and at variance with his Method; but, as we
before observed, the rigorous application of his Method was barely possible; and, however excellent as a precept, it was so vague
as to be almost inevitably vitiated in practice. The process of
vitiation was this: Experience was necessary, as affording the
materials for Reason to work with. Any reasoning not founded
on a knowledge of phenomena must be false; but here was Aristotle's mistake: it by no means follows, that all reasoning founded on a knowledge of phenomena will be true. He thought that
Experience could not deceive. But, to make his Method perfect,
he should have laid down the rules for testing that Experience
-for "interrogating" Nature-for discriminating what was pertinent to the question in hand-for establishing a proper "experimentum crucis."  Thus " facts," as they are called, are notoriously valuable in proportion only to the value of the verification to
which they have been submitted. People talk of " facts" as if
facts were to produce irresistible convictions; whereas facts are
susceptible of very various explanations, and, in the history of
science, we find the facts constant, but the theories changing:
that is to say, Nature has preserved one uniform course, her ordinary operations are open to all men's inspection, and men have
endeavored to explain these operations in an endless variety of
ways. Now, from a want of a proper knowledge of the conditions of scientific inquiry, Aristotle's Method became fruitless.
The facts collected were vitiated by a false theory: his senseexperience was wrongly interpreted.
It is time, however, to give his solution of the great metaphysical problem of Existence. Matter, he said, exists in a threefold
form. It is,-I. Substance, perceptible by the senses, which is
finite and perishable. This Substance is either the abstract substance, or the substance connected with form, JsoS. II. The
higher Substance, which, though perceived by the sense, is imperishable; such as are the heavenly bodies. Here the active
principle (vefpysa, actus) steps in, which, in so far as it contains
that which is to be produced, is understanding (vovS). That




ARISTOTLE'S METAPHYSICS.             263
which it contains is the purpose (Tr oJ  v exa), which purpose is
realized in the act. Here vWe have the two extremes of potentiality and agency, matter and thought. The celebrated entelechie is the relation between these two extremes, it is the point
of transition between 66vapji;and gvspyla, and is accordingly the
Cause of Motion, or Efficient Cause, and represents the Soul. III.
The third form of Substance is that in which the three forms of
power, efficient cause, and effect are united: the Absolute Substance: eternal, unmoved: God himself. God, as the Absolute
Unmoved Eternal Substance, is Thought. The Universe is a
thought in the Mind of God; it is " God passing into activity,
but not exhausted in the Act."  Existence, then, is Thought: it
is the activity of the Divine Reason. In Man the thought of the
Divine Reason completes itself, so as to become self-conscious.
By it Man recognizes in the objective world his own nature
again; for thought is the thinking of thought —'~rlv q v6o~jS,
vols $j v6ytfl.
If we were occupied in this History with the particular opinions of Philosophers, rather than with their Methods and historical position in the development of speculation, we should dwell
at some length on Aristotle's distinction between the primary
and secondary qualities of bodies, which, according to Sir William Hamilton, he was the first to establish,* as also on the doctrine of Substantial Forms, which Hamilton says he did not
teach (it was the Arabian commentators who misinterpreted
Aristotle on this point); nor should we omit the claim to the
discovery of the doctrine of Association of Ideas, which Hamilton
has set up for him, with a vast array of Aristotelian erudition,
proving indeed that Aristotle did recognize the facts of Association, but by no means proving that he recognized Association as
the grand law of intellectual action. Our limits forbid such discursive wanderings from the purpose of this work, and we are
forced to leave untouched the very points which in our opinion
* Hamilton's Reid, p. 826.




264              ARISTOTLE'S METAPHYSICS.
constitute the pre-eminence of Aristotle. In a history of Science
greater justice could be done to his encyclopaedic knowledge and
marvellous power of systematization.* Here we have but to consider him as the philosopher who, resuming in himself all the
results of ancient speculation, so elaborated them into a co-ordinate system, that for twenty centuries he held the world a slave.
Plato was a great speculative genius, and a writer unapproached in the art of imaginary conversations having a polemical purpose; and in most literary minds he will ever remain
a greater figure than his pupil, Aristotle. But while I concede
Plato's immeasurable superiority as a writer, I conceive his inferiority as a thinker to be no less marked. Aristotle seems to
me to have been the greatest intellect of antiquity, an intellect
at once comprehensive and subtle, patient, receptive, and original.
He wrote on Politics, and the treatise, even in the imperfect state
in which it has reached us, is still in many respects one of the
best works on the subject. He wrote on Poetry, and the few
detached passages which survive are full of valuable details. He
wrote on Natural History, and his observations are still valuable,
his reflections still suggestive. He wrote on Logic, and for many
centuries no one could suggest any improvement. "Aristotle,"
says Hegel, "penetrated into the whole universe of things, and
subjected to the comprehension its scattered wealth; and the
greatest number of the philosophical sciences owe to him their
separation and commencement. While in this manner science
separates itself into a series of definitions, the Aristotelian philosophy at the same time contains the most profound speculative
ideas. He is more comprehensive and speculative than any one
else." While, therefore, the majority will prefer Plato, who, in
spite of his difficulties, is much easier to read than Aristotle, yet
all must venerate the latter as a grand intellectual phenomenon,
to which scarcely any parallel can be suggested.
* Should I ever be enabled to complete a long projected plan, of writing,
as a companion to the present work, a Biographical History ofScience, I will
endeavor to present Aristotle in this light.




ARISTOTLE'S METAPHYSICS.              265
His vast learning, his singular acuteness, the wide range of his
investigations, and the astonishing number and the excellence of
his works, will always make him a formidable rival to his more
fascinating master. " A student passing from the works of Plato,"
it has been well said, " to those of Aristotle, is struck first of all
with the entire absence of that dramatic form and that dramatic
feeling with which he has been familiar. The living human
beings with whom he has conversed have passed away. Protagoras, and Prodicus, and Hippias are no longer lounging upon
their couches in the midst of groups of admiring pupils; we
have no walks along the walls of the city; no readings beside
the Ilissus; no lively symposia, giving occasion to high discourses about love; no Critias recalling the stories he had heard
in the days of his youth, before he became a tyrant of ancient
and glorious republics; above all, no Socrates forming a centre
to these various groups, while yet he stands out clear and distinct in his individual character, showing that the most subtle of
dialecticians may be the most thoroughly humorous and humane
of men. Some little sorrow for the loss of those clear and beautiful pictures will perhaps be felt by every one; but by far the
greater portion of readers will believe, that they have an ample
compensation in the precision and philosophical dignity of the
treatise, for the richness and variety of the dialogue. To hear
solemn disquisitions solemnly treated; to hear opinions calmly
discussed without the interruptions of personalities; above all, to
have a profound and considerate judge, able and not unwilling
to pronounce a positive decision upon the evidence before him;
this they think a great advantage, and this and far more than
this they expect, not wrongly, to find in Aristotle."*
* Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy.
12




CHAPTER II.
SUMMARY OF THE SOCRATIC MOVEMENT.
FOR the sake of historical clearness we may here place a few
words respecting the position of the Socratic Movement (as we
may call the period from the Sophists down to Aristotle) in the
history of Speculation.
What Socrates himself effected we have already seen. He
appeared during the reign of utter skepticism.  The various
tentatives of the early thinkers had all ended in a skepticism,
which was turned to dexterous use by the Sophists. Socrates
banished this skepticism by the invention of a new Method. He
withdrew men from the metaphysical speculations about Nature,
which had led them into the inextricable confusion of doubt.
He bade them look inward. He created Moral Philosophy.
The Cyrenaics and the Cynics attempted to carry out this tendency; but, as they did so in a one-sided manner, their endeavor
was only partially successful.
Plato, the youngest and most remarkable of the disciples of
Socrates, accepted the Method, but applied it more universally.
Nevertheless Ethics formed the most important of his speculations. Physics were only subordinate and illustrative of Ethics.
The Truth-the God-like existence-which he forever besought
men to contemplate, that they might share it, had always an
Ethical object: it was sought by man for his own perfection.
How to live in a manner resembling the Gods was the fundamental problem which he set himself to solve. But there was a
germ of scientific speculation in his philosophy, and this germ
was developed by his pupil, Aristotle.
The difference between Socrates and Aristotle is immense:
Plato, however, fills up the interval. In Plato, we see the tran



SUMMARY OF THE SOCRATIC MOVEMENT.         267
sition-point of development, both in Method and in Doctrine.
Metaphysical speculations are intimately connected with those of
Ethics. In Aristotle, Ethics only form one branch of philosophy:
Metaphysics and Physics usurp the larger share of his attention.
One result of Aristotle's labors was precisely this: he brought
Philosophy round again to that condition from which Socrates
had wrested it; he opened the world again to speculation.
Was then the advent of Socrates nullified? No. The Socratic
Epoch conferred the double benefit on humanity of'having first
brought to light the importance of Ethical Philosophy, and of
having substituted a new and incomparably better Method for
that pursued by the early speculators. That Method sufficed for
several centuries.
In Aristotle's systematization of the Socratic Method, and,
above all, in his bringing Physics and Metaphysics again into
the region of Inquiry, he paved the way for a new epoch,-the
epoch of Skepticism; not the unmethodical Skepticism of helpless baffled guessers, like that which preceded Socrates, but the
methodical and dogmatic exposure of the vanity of philosophy.




EIGHTH EPOCH.
SECOND CRISIS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY: THE SKEPTICS, EPICUREANS, STOICS, AND THE NEW ACADEMY.
CHAPTER I.
TIHE SKEPTICS.
~ I. PYRRHO.
IN the curious train which accompanied the expedition of
Alexander into India, there was a serious, reflective man, who
followed him with purely philosophical interest: that man was
Pyrrho, the founder of the Skeptical philosophy. Conversing
with the Gymnosophists of India, he must have been struck
with their devout faith in doctrines so unusual to him; and this
spectacle of a race of wise and studious men believing a strange
creed, and acting upon their belief, may have led him to reflect
on the nature of belief. He had already, by the philosophy of
Democritus, been led to question the origin of knowledge: he
had learned to doubt; and now this doubt became irresistible.
On his return to Elis he became remarked for the practical
philosophy which he inculcated, and the simplicity of his life.
The profound and absolute skepticism with which he regarded
all speculative doctrines, had the same effect upon him as upon
Socrates: it made him insist wholly on moral doctrines. He
was resigned and tranquil, accepting life as he'found it, and
guiding himself by the general precepts of common-sense. Socrates, on the contrary, was uneasy, restless, perpetually ques



THE SKEPTICS.                    269
tioning himself and others, despising metaphysical speculations,
but eager for truth. Pyrrho, dissatisfied with all the attempts
of his predecessors to solve the great problems they had set to
themselves, declared the problems insoluble. Socrates was also
dissatisfied; he too declared that he knew nothing; but his
doubt was an active, eager, questioning doubt, used as a stimulus
to investigation, not as a final result of all investigation; The
doubt of Pyrrho was a reprobation of all philosophy; the doubt
of Socrates was the opening through which a new philosophy
was to be established. Their lives accorded with their doctrines.
Pyrrho, the grand Priest of Elis, lived and died in happiness,
peace, and universal esteem.*: Socrates lived in perpetual warfare, was always misunderstood, was ridiculed as a sophist, and
perished as a blasphemer.
The precise doctrines of Pyrrho it is now hopeless to attempt
to recover. Even in antiquity they were so mixed up with those
of his followers, that it was found impossible to separate them.
We are forced, therefore, to speak of the skeptical doctrines as
they are collected and systematized by that acute and admirable
writer, Sextus Empiricus.
The stronghold of Skepticism is impregnable. It is this:
There is no Criterium of Truth. After Plato had developed his
Ideal Theory, Aristotle crushed it by proving it to be purely
subjective. But then the theory of Demonstration, which Aristotle placed in its stead, was not that equally subjective? What
was this boasted Logic,' but the systematic arrangement of Ideas
obtained originally through Sense? According to Aristotle,
knowledge could only be a knowledge of phenomena; although
he too wished to make out a science of Causes. And what are
Phenomena? Phenomena are the Appearances of things. But
where exists the Criterium of the truth of these Appearances?
* All the stories about him which pretend to illustrate the effects of his
skepticism in real life are too trivial for refutation, being obviously the
invention of those who thought Pyrrho ought to have been consistent in
absurdity.




270                   THE SKEPTICS.
How are we to ascertain the exactitude of the accordance of
these Appearances with the Things of which they are Appearances? We know full well that Things appear differently to
us at different times; appear differently to different individuals;
appear differently to different animals. Are any of these Appearances true? If so, which are? and how do you know which
are true?
Moreover, reflect on this: We have five senses, each of which
reveals to us a different quality in the object. Thus an Apple is
presented to us: we see it, smell it, feel it, taste it, hear it bitten; and the sight, smell, feeling, taste, and sound, are five different Appearances-five different Aspects under which we perceive the Thing. If we had three Senses more, the Thing would
have three qualities more; it would present three more Appearances: if we had three Senses less, the Thing would have but
three qualities less. Are these qualities wholly and entirely dependent upon our Senses, or do they really appertain to the
Thing?  And do they all appertain to it, or only some of them?
The differences of the impressions made on different people seem
to prove that the qualities of things are dependent on the Senses.
These differences at any rate show that things do not present
one uniform series of Appearances.
All we can say with truth is, that Things appear to us in such
and such a manner. That we have Sensations is true; but we
cannot say that our Sensations are true images of the Things.
That the Apple we have is brilliant, round, odorous, and sweet,
may be very true, if we mean that it appears such to our senses;
but, to keener or duller vision, scent, tact, and taste, it may be
dull, rugged, offensive, and insipid.
Amidst this confusion of sensuous impressions, Philosophers
pretend to distinguish the true from the false; they assert that
Reason is the Criterium of Truth: Reason distinguishes. Plato
and Aristotle are herein agreed. Very well, reply the Skeptics,
Reason is your Criterium. But what proof have you that this
Criterium itself distinguishes truly? You must not return to




THE SKEPTICS.                  271
Sense: that has been already given up; you must rely upon
Reason; and we ask you what proof have you that your Reason
never errs? what proof have you that it is ever correct? A Criterium is wanted for your Criterium; and so on ad infinitum.
The Skeptics maintain, and justly, that because our knowledge
is only the knowledge of Phenomena, and not at all of Noumena,
-because we only know Things as they appear to us, not as
they really are,-all attempt to penetrate the mystery of Existence must be vain; for the attempt can only be made on appearances. But, although absolute Truth is not attainable by man,
although there cannot be a science of Being, there can be a
science of Appearances. The Phenomena, they admit, are true
as Phenomena. What we have to do is therefore to observe and
classify Phenomena; to trace in them the resemblances of coexistence and succession, to trace the connections of cause and
effect; and, having done this, we shall have founded a Science
of Appearances adequate to our wants.
But the age in which the Skeptics lived was not ripe for such
a conception: accordingly, having proved the impossibility of a
science of Being, they supposed that they had established the
impossibility of all Science, and had destroyed all grounds of
certitude. It is worthy of remark that modern Skeptics have
added nothing which is not implied in the principles of the Pyrrhonists. The arguments by which Hume thought he destroyed
all the grounds of certitude are differently stated from those of
Pyrrho, but not differently founded; and they may be answered
in the same way.
The Skeptics had only a negative doctrine; consequently, only
a negative influence. They corrected the tendency of the mind
towards accepting in conclusions as adequate expressions of the
facts; they served to moderate the impetuosity of the speculative spirit; they showed that the pretended Philosophy of the
day was not so firmly fixed as its professors supposed. It is curious, indeed, to have witnessed the gigantic efforts of a Socrates,
a Plato, and an Aristotle, towards the reconstruction of Philos



272                    THE SKEPTICS.
ophy, which the Sophists had brought to ruins-a reconstruction,
too, on different ground-and then to witness the hand of the
iconoclast smiting down that image, to witness the pitiless logic
of the Skeptic undermining that laboriously-constructed edifice,
leaving nothing in its place but another heap of ruins, like that
from which the edifice was built; for, not only did the Skeptics
refute the notion that a knowledge of Appearances could ever
become a knowledge of Existence, not only did they exhibit the
fallacious nature of sensation, and the want of certitude in the
affirmations of Reason, they also attacked and destroyed the main
positions of that Method which was to supply the ground of certitude; they attacked Induction and Definitions.
Of Induction, Sextus, in one brief, pregnant chapter, writes
thus:-" Induction is the conclusion of the Universal from individual things. But this Induction can only be correct in as far
as all the individual things agree with the Universal. This universality must therefore be verified before the Induction can be
made: a single case to the contrary would destroy the truth of
the Induction."*
We will illustrate this by an example. The whiteness of swans
shall be the Induction. Swans are said to be white because all
the individual swans we may have seen are white. Here the
Universal (whiteness) seems induced from the particulars; and it
is true in as far as all particular swans are white. But there are
a few black swans; one of these particular black swans is sufficient to destroy the former Induction. If, therefore, says Sextus,
you are not able to verify the agreement of the universal with
every particular, i. e. if you are not able to prove that there is no
swan not black, you are unable to draw a certain and accurate
Induction. That you cannot make this verification is obvious.
In the next chapter Sextus examines Definitions. He pronounces them perfectly useless. If we know the thing we define,
* Pyrrhon. Hypot. vol. ii. c. xv. p. 94. The edition we use is the Paris folio
of 1621, the first of the Greek text.




THE SKEPTICS.                  273
we do not comprehend it because of the definition, but we impose on it the definition because we know it; and if we are
ignorant of the thing we would define, it is impossible to define it.
Although the Skeptics destroyed the dogmatism of their predecessors, they did not substitute any dogmatism of their own
in its place. The nature of their skepticism is happily characterized by Sextus in his comparison of them with Democritus
and Protagoras. Democritus had insisted on the uncertainty of
sense-knowledge; but he concluded therefrom that objects had
no qualities at all resembling those known to us through sensation. The Skeptics contented themselves with pointing out the
uncertainty, but did not pronounce decisively whether the qualities existed objectively or not.
Protagoras also insisted onthe uncertainty, and declared man
to be the measure of truth. He supposed that there was a constant relation between the transformations of matter and those of
sensation; but these suppositions he affirmed dogmatically; to
the Skeptic they are uncertain.
This general incertitude often betrayed the Skeptics into ludicrous dilemmas, of which many specimens have been preserved.
Thus they said, " We assert nothing-no, not even that we assert
nothing."  But if the reader wishes to see this distinction between a thing seeming and a thing being, ridiculed with a truly
comic gusto, he should turn to Moliere's Mariage Force, act i.
sc. 8. Such follies form no portion of our subject, and we leave
them with some pleasure to direct our attention to more worthy
efforts of human ingenuity.
12*




CHAPTER II.
THE EPICUREANS.
~ I. EPICURUS.
THE Epicureans are condemned in their names. We before
noticed how the meaning attached to the name of Sophist inadvertently gives a bias to every judgment of the Sophist School,
and renders it extremely difficult to conceive the members of that
School otherwise than as shameless rogues. Equally difficult is
it to shake off the influence of association with respect to the
Epicureans; although historians are now pretty well agreed in
believing Epicurus to have been a man of pure and virtuous life,
and one whose doctrines were moderate and really inculcating
abstemiousness.
Epicurus was born 01. 109 (B. c. 342), at Samos, according to
some; at Gargettus, in the vicinity of Athens, according to
others. His parents were poor, his father a teacher of grammar.
At a very early age, he tells us, his philosophical career began:
so early as his thirteenth year. But we must not misunderstand
this statement. He dates his career from those first questionings
which occupy and perplex most young minds, especially those of
any superior capacity. He doubtless refers to that period when,
boy-like, he puzzled his teacher with a question beyond that
teacher's power. Hearing the verse of Hesiod wherein all things
are said to arise from Chaos, Epicurus asked, " And whence came
Chaos?"
"Whence came Chaos 1" Is not this the sort of question to
occupy the active mind of a boy? Is it not by such questions
that we are all led into philosophy? To philosophy he was re



EPICURUS.                   275
ferred for an explanation. The writings of Democritus fell in his
way, and were eagerly studied; the writings of others followed;
and, his vocation being fied, he sought instruction from many
masters. But from all these masters he could gain no solid convictions. They gave him hints; they could not give him Truth;
and working upon the materials they furnished, he produced a
system of his own, by which we presume he justified his claim
to being self-taught.
His early years were agitated and unsettled.  He visited
Athens at eighteen, but remained there only one year. He then
passed to Colophon, Mitylene, and Lampsacus. He returned to
Athens in his six-and-thirtieth year, and there opened a school,
over which he presided till his death, 01. 127 (B. c. 272).
The place he chose for his school was the famous Garden, a
spot pleasantly typical of his doctrine. The Platonists had their
Academic Grove; the Aristotelians walked along the Lyceum;
the Cynics growled in the Cynosarges; the Stoics occupied the
Porch; and the Epicureans had their Garden.
Here, in the tranquil Garden, in the society of his friends, he
passed a peaceful life of speculation and enjoyment. The friendship which existed amongst them is well known. In a time of
general scarcity and famine they contributed to each other's support, showing that the Pythagorean notion of community of
goods was unnecessary amongst friends, who could confide in
each other. At the entrance of the Garden they placed this in~scription: " The hospitable keeper of this mansion, where you
will find pleasure the highest good, will present you liberally
with barley-cakes and water fresh from the spring. The gardens
will not provoke your appetite by artificial dainties, but satisfy
it with natural supplies. Will you not be well entertained?"
The Garden has often been called a sty; and the name of
Epicurean has become the designation of a sensualist. But, in
spite of his numerous assailants, the character of Epicurus has
been rescued from contempt, both by ancient and by modern
critics. Diogenes Laertius, who gives some of the accusations




276                 THE EPICUREANS.
in detail, easily refutes them by an appeal to facts; and the
modern writers have been at no loss to discover the motive of
the ancient calumnies, which mostly proceeded from the Stoics.
A doctrine like that of Epicurus would, at all times, lend itself
to gross misrepresentation; but in an epoch like that in which it
appeared, and contrasted with a doctrine so fiercely opposed to
it as the doctrine of the Stoics, we cannot wonder if the bitterness of opposition translated itself into bitter calumny. It is one
of the commonest results of speculative differences to make us
attribute to our opponent's opinions the consequences which we
deduce from them, as if they were indubitably the consequences
he deduces for himself. Our opinions are conducive to sound
morality; of that we are convinced; and being so convinced, it
is natural for us to believe that contrary opinions must be immoral. Our opponent holds contrary, ergo immoral opinions;
and we proclaim his immorality as an unquestionable fact. In
this, however, there is a slight forgetfulness, namely, that our
opponent occupies exactly similar ground, and what we think of
him, he thinks of us.
The Stoics had an ineffable contempt for the weakness and
effeminacy of the Epicureans. The Epicureans had an ineffable
contempt for the spasmodic rigidity and unnatural exaggeration
of the Stoics. They libelled each other; but the libels against
the Epicureans have met with more general credit than those
against the Stoics, from the more imposing character of the latter, both in their actions and doctrines.
Epicurus is said to have been the most voluminous of all Greek
Philosophers, except Chrysippus; and although none of these
works are extant, yet so many fragments are preserved here and
there, and there is such ample testimony as to his opinions, that
there are few writers of whose doctrine we can speak with greater
certainty; the more so as it does not in itself present any difficulties of comprehension.
Nothing can be more unlike Plato and Aristotle than Epicurus; and this difference may be characterized at the outset by




EPICURUS.                     277
their fundamental difference in the conception of Philosophy,
which Epicurus regarded as the Art of Life, and not the Art of
Truth. Philosophy, he said, was the power (wvspysia) by which
Reason conducted man to happiness. The investigations of Philosophy he despised: they were not only uncertain, but contributed nothing towards happiness; and of course Logic, the instrument of Philosophy, found no favor in his sight. His system
was, therefore, only another form of Skepticism, consequent on
his dissatisfaction with previous systems. Socrates had taught
men to regard their own nature as the great object of investigation; but man does not interrogate his own nature out of simple
curiosity, or for simple erudition: he studies his nature in order
that he may improve it; he learns the extent of his capacities in
order that he may properly direct them. The aim, therefore, of
all such inquiries must be Happiness. And what constitutes
Happiness? Upon this point systems differ: all profess to teach
the road to Happiness, and all point out divergent roads. There
can be little dispute as to what is Happiness, but infinite disputes
as to the way of securing it.* In the Cyrenaic and Cynic
Schools we saw this question leading to very opposite results;
and the battle we are now to see renewed on similar ground between the Epicureans and the Stoics.
Epicurus, like Aristippus, declared that Pleasure constituted
Happiness; all animals instinctively pursue it, and as instinctively avoid Pain. Man should do deliberately that which animals do instinctively. Every Pleasure is in itself good; but, in
comparison with another, it may become an evil. The Philosopher differs from the common man in this: That while they
both seek Pleasure, the former knows how to forego certain enjoyments which will cause pain and vexation hereafter; whereas,
the common man seeks only the immediate enjoyment. The
* At a meeting of Socialists in London, to discuss in a friendly way the
means of reforming the world, M. Pierre Leroux rose and addressed his
brethren thus: " Nous voulons arriver au Paradis, n' est-ce pas? n' est-ce
pas? Eh bie! il ne s'agit que d'y arriver! Voila!"




278                 THE EPICUREANS.
Philosopher's art enables him to foresee what will be the result
of his acts; and, so foreseeing, he will not only avoid those enjoyments which occasion grief, but know how to endure those
pains from which surpassing pleasure will result.
True happiness, then, is not the enjoyment of the moment,
but the enjoyment of the whole life. We must not seek to intensify, but to equalize; not debauchery to-day and satiety tomorrow, but equable enjoyment all the year round. No life can
be pleasant except a virtuous life; and the pleasures of the body,
although not to be despised, are insignificant when compared
with those of the soul. The former are but momentary; the
latter embrace both the past and future. Hence the golden rule
of Temperance.  Epicurus not only insisted on the necessity
of moderation for continued enjoyment, he also slighted, and
somewhat scorned, all exquisite indulgences. He fed moderately
and plainly. Without interdicting luxuries, he saw that Pleasure
was purer and more enduring if luxuries were dispensed with.
This is the ground upon which Cynics and Stoics built their
own exaggerated systems. They also'saw that simplicity was
preferable to luxury; but they pushed their notion too far. Contentedness with a little, Epicurus regarded as a great good; and
he said, wealth consisted not in having great possessions, but in
having small wants. He did not limit man to the fewest possible enjoyments: on the contrary, he wished him in all ways to
multiply them; but he wished him to be able to live upon little,
both as a preventive against ill fortune, and as an enhancement
of rare enjoyments. The man who lives plainly has no fear of
poverty, and is better able to enjoy exquisite pleasures.
Virtue rests upon Free Will and Reason, which are inseparable: since, without Free Will our Reason would be passive, and
without Reason our Free Will would be blind. Every thing,
therefore, in human actions which is virtuous or vicious depends
on man's knowing and willing. Philosophical education consists
in accustoming the Mind to judge accuratety, and the Will to
choose manfully.




EPICURUS.                    279
From this slight outline of his Ethical doctrine may be seen
how readily it furnished arguments both to assailants and to defenders. We may also notice its vagueness and elasticity, which
would enable many minds to adapt it to their virtues or to their
vices. The luxurious would see in it only an exhortation to their
own vices; the temperate would see in it a scientific exposition of
temperance.
Epicureanism, in leading man to a correct appreciation of the
moral end of his existence, in showing him how to be truly happy,
has to combat with many obstructions which hide from him the
real road of life. These obstructions are his illusions, his prejudices, his errors, his ignorance. This ignorance is of two kinds:
first, ignorance of the laws of the external world, which creates
absurd superstitions, and troubles the soul with false fears and
false hopes; hence the necessity of some knowledge of Physics.
The second kind of ignorance is that of the nature of man;
hence the necessity of the Epicurean Logic called Canonic, which
is a collection of rules respecting human reason and its application.
The Epicurean psychology and physics were derived from the
Democritean. The atoms of which the universe is formed are
supposed to be constantly throwing off some of their parts,
rfoppoa'i: and these, in contact with the senses, produce sensation, fx'~djfd;. But Epicurus did not maintain that these ctropoal
were images of the atoms; he believed them to have a certain
resemblance to their atoms, but was unable to point out where,
and in how far this resemblance exists. Every sensation must
be true as a sensation; and, as such, it can neither be proved nor
contradicted; it is aXoyos. The sensations of the insane and
the dreaming are also true; and, although there is a difference
between their sensations and those of sane and waking men, yet
Epicurus confessed himself unable to determine in what the difference consists. Sensations, however, do not alone constitute
knowledge; man has also the faculty of conception, rpoXnm4s,
which arises from the repeated iteration of sensation: it is recol



280                  THE EPICUREANS.
lection of various sensations; or, as Aristotle would say, the general idea gathered from particular sensations. It is from these
conceptions that the general ideas, 6,gal, are formed, and it is in
these general ideas that error resides. A sensation may be considered either in relation to its object or in relation to him who
experiences it; in the latter case it is agreeable or disagreeable,
and renders the sentiments, ra' r&O6, the basis of all morality.
With such a basis, we may readily anticipate the nature of
the superstructure. If agr.eeable and disagreeable sensations are
the origin of all moral phenomena, there can be no other moral
rule than to seek the agreeable and to avoid the disagreeable;
and whatever is pleasant becomes the great object of existence.
The Physics of Epicurus are so similar to the Physics of Democritus that we need not occupy our space with them.*
On reviewing the whole doctrine of Epicurus, we find in it
that skepticism which the imperfect Philosophy of the day necessarily brought to many minds, in many different shapes; and
the consequence of that skepticism was the effort to find a refuge
in Morals, and the attempt to construct Ethics on a philosophic
basis. The attempt failed because the basis was not broad enough;
but the attempt itself is worthy of notice, as characteristic of the
whole Socratic movement; for, although the Socratic Method was
an attempt at reconstructing Philosophy, yet that reconstruction
itself was only attempted with a view to morals. Socrates was
the first to bring Philosophy down from the clouds; he was the
first to make it the basis of Morality, and in one shape or other
all his followers and all the schools that issued from them, kept
this view present to their minds. The Epicureans are therefore
to be regarded as men who ventured on a solution of the great
problem, and failed because they only saw a part of the truth.
* They are expounded by Lucretius, who claims a rebellious originality
for Epicurus which history cannot endorse. I. 67, sqq.




CHAPTER III.
THE STOICS.
~ I. ZENO.
THE Stoics were a large sect, and of its members so many have
been celebrated, that a separate work would be needed to chronicle them all. From Zeno, the founder, down to Brutus and
Marcus Antoninus, the sect embraces many Greek and Roman
worthies, and not a few solemn mountebanks. Some of these we
would willingly introduce; but we are forced to confine ourselves
to one type, and the one we select is Zeno.
He was born at Citium, a small city in the island of Cyprus,
of Phoenician origin, but inhabited by Greeks. The date of his
birth is uncertain. His father was a merchant, in which trade
he himself engaged, until his father, after a voyage to Athens,
brought home some works of Socratic Philosophers; these Zeno
studied with eagerness and rapture, and determined his vocation.
When about thirty, he undertook a voyage, both of interest
and pleasure, to Athens, the great mart both for trade and philosophy. Shipwrecked on the coast, he lost the whole of his
valuable cargo of Phoenician purple; and, thus reduced to poverty, he willingly embraced the doctrine of the Cynics, whose
ostentatious display of poverty had captivated many minds.
There is an anecdote of his having one day read Xenophon's
Memorabilia, in a bookseller's shop, with such delight that he
asked where such men were to be met with. At that moment
Crates the Cynic passed by: the bookseller pointed him out to
Zeno, and bade him follow Crates. He did so; and he became
a disciple. But he could not long remain a disciple. The gross




282                    THE STOICS.
manners of the Cynics, so far removed from true simplicity, and
their speculative incapacity, soon caused him to seek a master
elsewhere. Stilpo, of Megara, became his next instructor; and
from him he learned the art of disputation, which he subsequently practised with such success.
But the Megaric doctrine was too meagre for him. He was
glad to learn from Stilpo; but there were things which Stilpo
could not teach. He turned, therefore, to the expositors of Plato-Xenocrates and Polemo. In the philosophy of Plato there
is, as before remarked, a germ of Stoicism; but there is also
much that contradicts Stoicism, and so, we presume, Zeno grew
discontented with that also.
After twenty years of laborious study in these various schools,
he opened one for himself, wherein to teach the result of all
these inquiries. The spot chosen was the Stoa, or Porch, which
had once been the resort of the Poets, and was decorated with
the pictures of Polygnotus. From this Stoa the school derived
its name.
As a man, Zeno appears deserving of the highest respect.
Although sharing the doctrines of the Cynics, he did not share
their grossness, their insolence, or their affectation. In person he
was tall and slender; and although of a weakly constitution, he
lived to a great age, being rigidly abstemious, feeding mainly
upon figs, bread, and honey. His brow was furrowed with
thought; and this gave a- tinge of severity to his aspect, which
accorded with the austerity of his doctrines. So honored and
respected was he by the Athenians, that they intrusted to him
the keys of the citadel; and when he died they erected to his
memory a statue of brass. His death is thus recorded:-In his
ninety-eighth year, as he was stepping out of his school, he fell
and broke his finger. He was so affected at the consciousness of
his infirmity, that, striking the earth, he exclaimed, " Why am I
thus importuned? Earth, I obey thy summons!" He went home
and strangled himself.
In the history of humanity there are periods when society




ZENO.                       283
seems fast dissolving; when ancient creeds have lost their majesty, and new creeds want disciples; when the onlooker sees the
fabric tottering, beneath which his fellow-men are crowded either
in sullen despair or in blaspheming levity, and, seeing this, he
feels that there is safety still possible, if men will but be bold;
he raises a voice of warning, and a voice of exhortation; he
bids them behold their peril and tremble, behold their salvation
and resolve. He preaches to them a doctrine they have been
unused to hear, or, hearing it, unused to heed; and by the
mere force of his own intense conviction he gathers round him
some believers who are saved. If the social anarchy be not too
widely spread, he saves his country by directing its energies
in a new channel; if the country's doom is scaled, he makes a
gallant effort, though a vain one, and "leaves a spotless name to
after-times."
Such a man was Zeno. Greece was fallen; but hope still remained. A wide-spread disease was fast eating out the vigor
of its life: Skepticism, Indifference, Sensuality, Epicurean softness were only counteracted by the magnificent but vague works
of Plato, or the vast but abstruse system of Aristotle. Greek
civilization was fast falling to decay. A little time, and Rome,
the she-wolfs nursling, would usurp the place which Greece had
once so proudly held-the place of vanguard of European civilization. Rome, the mighty, would take fron the feeble hands of
Greece the trust she was no longer worthy to hold. There was
a presentiment of Rome in Zeno's breast. In him the manly
energy and stern simplicity which were to conquer the world;
in him the deep reverence for moral worth, which was the glory
of Rome, before, intoxicated with success, she sought to ape the
literary and philosophical glory of old Hellas. Zeno the Stoic
had a Roman spirit; and this is the reason why so many noble
Romans became his disciples: he had deciphered the wants of
their spiritual nature.
Alarmed at the skepticism which seemed inevitably following
speculations of a metaphysical kind, Zeno, like Epicurus, fixed




284                   THE STOICS.
his thoughts principally upon Morals. His philosophy boasted
of being eminently practical, and connected with the daily practices of life. But, for this purpose, the philosopher must not
regard pleasure so much as Virtue: nor does Virtue consist in a
life of contemplation and speculation, but in a life of activity;
for what is Virtue?-Virtue is manhood. And what are the
attributes of Man? Are they not obviously the attributes of an
active as well as of a speculative being  and can that be Virtue
which excludes or neglects man's activity? Man, O Plato, and
0 Aristotle, was not made for speculation only; wisdom is not
his only pursuit. Man, O Epicurus, was not made for enjoyment
only; he was made also to do somewhat, and to be somewhat.
Philosophy?-It is a great thing; but it is not all. Pleasure?
-It is a slight thing; and, were it greater, could not embrace
men's entire activity.
The aim, then, of man's existence is neither to be wise nor to
enjoy, but to be virtuous-to realize his manhood. To this aim,
Philosophy is a means, and Pleasure may also be one; but they
are both subordinate. Before we can be taught to lead a virtuous life, we must be taught what Virtue is. Zeno thought,
with Socrates, that Virtue was the knowledge of Good; and that
Vice was nothing but error. If to know the good were tantamount to the pursuit and practice of it, then was the teacher's
task easily defined: he had to explain the nature of human
knowledge, and to explain the relations of man to the universe.
Thus, as with Socrates, does Morality find itself inseparably
connected with Philosophy; and more especially with psychology. A brief outline of this psychology becomes, therefore,
necessary as an introduction to the Stoical Morality.
Zeno utterly rejected the Platonic theory of knowledge, and
accepted, though with some modifications, the Aristotelian theory.
"Reminiscence" and "Ideas" were to him mere words. Ideas
he regarded as the universal notions formed by the mind from a
comparison of particulars. Sense furnished all the materials ot
knowledge; Reason was the plastic instrument whereby these




ZENO.                      285
materials were fashioned. But those who maintain that Sense
furnishes us the materials of knowledge are hampered with this
difficulty: By what process does Sense perceive? What relation is there between Sense and the sensible Thing?  What
proof have we of those sensations being conformable with the
Things?  This difficulty is a serious one, and early occupied
speculators. Indeed, this question may be pronounced the vital
question of all philosophy; upon its solution depends, to a great
extent, the solution of all other questions. Let us state it more
clearly in an illustration.
At the distance of fifty yards you descry a tower; it is round.
What do you mean by saying, It is round? You mean that the
impression made upon your sense of sight is an impression similar to that made by some other objects, such as trees, which
you, and all men; call round. Now, on the supposition that you
never approached nearer that tower, you would always believe it
to be round, because it appeared so. But, as you are enabled to
approach it, and as you then find that the tower is square, and
not round, you begin to examine into this difference.. It appeared
round at that distance; and yet you say it really is square. A
little knowledge of optics seems to explain the difference; but
does not. At fifty yards, you say, it appears round; but it really
is square. At fifty yards, we reply, it appears round, and at one
yard it appears square: it is neither: both round and square are
conceptions of the mind, not attributes of things: they have a
subjective, not an objective existence.
Thus far the ancient skeptics penetrated; but, seeing herein
an utter destruction of all certainty in sense-knowledge, and compelled to admit that Sense was the only source of knowledge,
they declared all knowledge a deceit. The perception of the
real issue whence to escape this dilemma-the recognition of the
uncertainty of sense-knowledge, and the reconciliation of that
theory with the natural wants of the speculative mind-reconciling skepticism with belief, and both with reason, was the work
of after-times.




286                    THE STOICS.
Those who believed that the senses gave true reports of the
Things which affected them, were driven to invent some hypothesis explanatory of the relation subsisting between the object and
the Subject, the Thing and the Sense. We have seen how eidola,
airy Images affluent from Things, were invented to choke up the
gap, and to establish a direct connection between the Subject
and the Object. Zeno, acutely enough, saw that an Image detaching itself in an airy form from the Object, could only represent. the superficies of that Object, even if it represented it correctly. In this way the hypothesis of eidola was shown to be
no more than an hypothesis to explain Appearances; whereas
the real question is not, How do we perceive Appearances? but
how do we perceive Objects?  If we only perceive their superficies, our knowledge is only a knowledge of phenomena, and we
fall into the hands of the Skeptics.
Zeno saw the extent of the difficulty, and tried to obviate it.
Bu? his hypothesis, though more comprehensive, was as completely without foundation. He assumed that Sense could penetrate beneath Appearance, and perceive Substance itself.
As considerable confusion exists on this point, we shall confine ourselves to the testimony of Sextus Empiricus, the most
satisfactory of all. In his book directed against the Logicians,
he tells us, " the Stoics held that there was one criterium of truth
for man, and it was what they called jthe Cataleptic Phantasm"
(<r-v xarahXr7o'jxqv (pavradiav, i. e. the Sensuous Apprehension).
We must first understand what they meant by the Phantasm
or Appearance. It was, they said, an impression on the mind
(Tu5rwagS v        BuXJ,). But from this point commence their differences; for Cleanthus understood, by this impression, an impression similar to that made by the signet-ring upon wax, Trov x2pov
5itrweiv. Chrysippus thought this absurd; for, said he, seeing
that thought conceives many objects at the same time, the soul
must upon that hypothesis receive many impressions of figures.
He thought that Zeno meant by impression nothing more than a
modification (Erspoiw0s5): likening the soul to the air, which




ZENO.                      287
when many voices sound simultaneously, receives simultaneously
the various alterations, but without confounding them. Thus
the Soul unites several perceptions which correspond with their
several objects.
This is extremely ingenious, and the indication of Sensation
as a modification of the Soul, opens a shaft deep down into the
dark region of psychology. But, if it lets in some of the light
of day, it also brings into notice a new obstacle. This soul,
which is modified, does it not also in its turn exercise an influence? If wine be poured into water, it modifies the water;
but the water also modifies the wine. There can be no action
without reaction. If a stone is presented to my sight, it modifies my soul; but does the stone remain unmodified?-No; it
receives from me certain attributes, certain form, color, taste,
weight, etc., which my soul bestows on it, which it does not
possess in itself.
Thus is doubt again spread over the whole question. The soul
modifying the object in sensation, can it rely upon the truth of
the sensation thus produced? Has not the wine become watery,
no less than the water vinous? These consequences, however,
Zeno did not foresee. He was intent upon proving that the soul
really. apprehended objects, not as eidola, not as the wax receives
the impression of a seal, but in absolute truth. Let us continue
to borrow from Sextus Empiticus.
The Phantasm, or Appearance, which causes that Modification
of the Soul which we name Sensation, is also understood by the
Stoics as we understand ideas; and in this general sense, they
said that there were three kinds of Phantasms: those that were
probable, those that were improbable, and those that were
neither one nor the other. The first are those that cause a slight
and equable motion in the soul: such as those which inform us
that it is day. The second.are those which contradict our reason:
such as if one were to-say during the day-time, "Now the sun is
not above the earth;" or, during the night-time, "Now it is day."
The third are those, the truth of which it is impossible to verify;




288                     THE STOICS.
such as this, "The number of the stars is even;" or, "the number
is odd."
Phantasms, when probable, are true or false, or both true and
false at the same time, or neither true nor false. They are true
when they can be truly affirmed of any thing; false if they are
wrongly affirmed, such as when one believes an oar dipped in the
water to be broken, because it appears so. When Orestes, in his
madness, mistook Electra for a Fury, he had a Phantasm both
true and false: true, inasmuch as he saw something, viz., Electra; false, inasmuch as Electra was not a Fury.
Of true Phantasms, some are cataleptic (apprehensive), and
others non-cataleptic. The latter are such as arise from disease
or perturbation of the mind: as, for instance, the innumerable
Phantasms produced in frenzy and hypochondria. The cataleptic Phantasm is that which is impressed by an object which exists, which is a copy of that object, and can be produced by no
other object. Perception is elsewhere said to be a sort of light,
which manifests itself at the same time that it lights up the object from which it is derived.
Zeno distinctly saw the weakness of the theories proposed by
others; he failed however in establishing any better theory in
their place. Sextus Empiricus may well call the Stoical doctrine
vague and undecided. How are we to distinguish the true from
the false in appearances? Above all, how are we to learn whether
an impression exactly coincides with the object  This is the
main problem, and Zeno pretends to solve it by a circular argument. Thus: given the problem, how are we to distinguish the
true impressions from the false impressions? The solution offered
is, by ascertaining which of the impressions coincide with the
real objects: in other words, by distinguishing the true impressions from the false.
Let us continue the exposition — Having a perception of an
object is not knowledge: for knowledge, it is necessary that
reason should assent. Perception comes from without; assent
from within: it is the free exercise of man's reason. Science is




ZENO.                      289
composed of perceptions so solidly established that no argumentation can shake them. Perceptions not thus established only
constitute Opinion.
This is making short work with difficulties, it must be confessed; but the Stoics were eager to oppose something against
the Skepticism which characterized the age; and, in their eagerness to build, they did not sufficiently secure their foundations.
Universal doubt they felt to be impossible. Man must occasionally assent, and that too in a constant and absolute manner.
There are perceptions which carry with them irresistible conviction. There would be no possibility of action unless there were
some certain truth. Where then is conviction to stop? That
all our perceptions are not correct, every one is willing to admit.
But which are exact, and which are inexact? What criterium
have we? The criterium we possess is Evidence. "Nothing
can be clearer than evidence," they said; " and, being so clear,
it needs no definition." This was precisely what it did want;
but the Stoics could not give it.
In truth, the Stoics, combating the Skepticism of their age,
were reduced to the same strait as Reid, Beattie, and Hutcheson,
combating the Skepticism of Hume: reduced to give up Philosophy, and to find refuge in Common-Sense. The battle fought
by the Stoics is very analogous to the battle fought by the
Scotch philosophers, in the ground occupied, in the instruments
employed, in the enemy attacked, and the object to be gained.
They both fought for Morality, which they thought endangered.
We shall subsequently have to consider the Common-Sense
theory: enough if we now call attention to the curious ignoratio
elenchi-the curious misconception of the real force of the enemy,
and the utter helplessness of their own position, which the Common-Sense philosophers displayed. The Skeptics had made an
irresistible onslaught upon the two fortresses of philosophy, Perception and Reason. They showed Perception to be based upon
Appearance, and Appearance to be only Appearance, but not
Certainty. They showed also that Reason was unable to dis13




290                    THE STOICS.
tinguish between Appearance and Certainty, because, in the first
place, it had nothing but Phenomena (Appearances) to build
upon; and, in the second place, because there is no criterium to
apply to Reason itself. Having gained this victory, they proclaimed Philosophy no longer existent. Whereupon the Stoics
valorously rise, and, taking their stand upon Common-Sense, believe they rout the forces of the Skeptics; believe they retake
the lost fortresses by declaring that Perceptions are true as well
as false, and that you may distinguish the true from the false,
by-distinguishing them: and that Reason has its criterium in
Evidence, which requires no criterium, it is so clear. This seems
to us pretty much the same as if the French were to invade
Great Britain, possess themselves of London, Edinburgh, and
Dublin, declare England the subject of France, and patriots were
then to declare that the French were to be driven home again
by a party of volunteers taking their stand upon Hampstead
Heath, displaying the banners of England, and with loud alarums
proclaiming the invaders defeated.
But it is time to consider the Ethical doctrines of the Stoics;
and to do this effectually we must glance at their conception of
the Deity. There are two elements in Nature. The first is vXie
Mpw0r>, or primordial matter; the passive element from which
things are formed. The second is the active element, which
forms things out of matter: Reason, Destiny (slap/^sv)   God.
The divine Reason operating upon matter bestows upon it the
laws which govern it, laws which the Stoics called Xo7yo0 ~sp/arixol, or productive causes. God is the Reason of the world.
With this speculative doctrine it is easy to connect their practical doctrine. Their Ethics are easily to be deduced from their
theology. If Reason is the great creative law, to live conformably with Reason must be the practical moral law. If the universe be subject to a general law, every part of that universe
must also be duly subordinate to it. The consequence is clear:
there is but one formula for Morals, and that is, "Live harmoniously with Nature," ojXooyofsv';-j p@6s1 r5ev.




ZENO.                       291
This is easily said. An anxious disciple might however desire
greater precision, and ask, Is it universal nature, or is it the particular nature of man, that I am to live in unison with? Cleanthes taught the former; Chrysippus the latter; or, we should
rather say, taught that both individual and universal nature
should be understood by the formula. And this appears to have
been the sense in which it was usually interpreted.
The distinctive tendency of the formula cannot be mistaken:
it is to reduce every thing to Reason, which, as it has supremacy
in creation, must also have supremacy in man. This is also the
Platonic conception. It makes Logic the rule of life; and' assumes that there is nothing in man's mind which cannot be
reduced within the limits of Logic; assumes that man is all intellect. It follows, that every thing which interferes with a
purely intellectual existence is to be eliminated as dangerous.
The pleasures and the pains of the body are to be despised: only
the pleasures and the pains of the intellect are worthy to occupy
man. By his passions he is made a slave; by his intellect he is
free. His senses are passive; his intellect is active. It is his
duty therefore to surmount and despise his passions and his
senses, that he may be free, active, virtuous.
We have here the doctrine of the Cynics, somewhat purified,
but fundamentally the same; we have here also the anticipation
of Rome; the forethought of that which was subsequently realized in act. Rome was the fit theatre of Stoicism, because Rome
was peopled with soldiers: these soldiers had their contempt of
death formed in perpetual campaigns. How little the Romans
regarded the life of man their history shows. The gladiatorial
combats, brutal and relentless, must have hardened the minds of
all spectators; and there were no softening influences to counteract them. How different the Greeks! They did not pretend to
despise this beautiful life; they did not affect to be above humanity. Life was precious, and they treasured it: treasured it
not with petty fear, but with noble ingenuousness. They loved
life, and wept on quitting it; and they wept without shame.




292                    THE STOICS.
They loved life, and they said so. When the time came for
them to risk it, or to give it for their country, or their honor,when something they prized higher was to be gained by the sacrifice,-then they died unflinchingly. The tears shed by Achilles
and Ulysses did not unman them: these heroes fought terribly,
as they loved tenderly. Philoctetes, in agony, howls like a wild
beast, because he feels pain, and feels no shame in expressing it.
But these shrieks have not softened him: he is still the same
stern, terrible, implacable Philoctetes.
The Stoics, in their dread of becoming effeminate, became marble. They despised pain; they despised death. To be above
pain was thought manly. They did not see, that, in this respect,
instead of being above Humanity, they sank miserably below it.
If it is a condition of our human organization to be susceptible
of pain, it is only affectation to conceal the expression of that
pain. Could silence stifle pain, it were well; but to stifle the
cry, is not to stifle the feeling; and to have a feeling, yet affect
not to have it, is pitiful. The Savage soon learns that philosophy;
but the civilized man is superior to it. You receive a blow, and
you do not wince? so much of heroism is displayed by a stone.
You are face to face with Death, and you have no regrets? then
you are unworthy of life. Real heroism feels the pain it conquers, and loves the life it surrenders in a noble cause.
As a reaction against effeminacy, Stoicism may be applauded;
as a doctrine it is one-sided. It ends in apathy and egoism.
Apathy, indeed, was considered by the Stoics as the highest condition of humanity; whereas, in truth, it is the lowest.




CHAPTER IV.
THE NEW ACADEMY.
~ I. ARCESILAUS AND CARNEADES.
THE New Academy would solicit our attention, were it only
for the celebrity bestowed on it by Cicero and Horace; but it
has other and higher points of interest than those of literary curiosity. The combat of which it was the theatre was, and is, of
singular importance. The questions connected with it are those
vital questions respecting the origin and certitude of human knowledge, which so long have occupied the ingenuity of thinkers;
and the consequences which flow from either solution of the problem are of the utmost importance.
The Stoics endeavored to establish the certitude of human
knowledge, in order that they might establish the truth of moral principles. They attacked the doctrines of the Skeptics, and
believed they triumphed by bringing forward their own doctrine
of Common-Sense. But the New Academicians had other arguments to offer. They too were Skeptics, although their skepticism differed from that of the Pyrrhonists. The nature of this
difference Sextus Empiricus has noted. " Many persons," says he,
" confound the Philosophy of the Academy with that of the Skeptics. But although the disciples of the New Academy declare
that all things are incomprehensible; yet they are distinguished
from the Pyrrhonists in this very dogmatism: they affirm that
all things are incomprehensible-the Skeptics do not affirm that.
Moreover, the Skeptics consider all perceptions perfectly equal as
to the faithfulness of their testimony; the Academicians distinguish between probable and improbable perceptions: the first




294                THE NEW ACADEMY.
they class under various heads. There are some, they say, which
are merely probable, others which are also confirmed by reflection, others which are subject to no doubt. Assent is of two
kinds: simple assent, which the mind yields without repugnance
as without desire, such as that of a child following its master;
and the assent which follows upon conviction and reflection. The
Skeptics admitted the former kind; the Academicians the latter."
These differences are of no great moment; but in the history
of sects we find the smallest variation invested with a degree of
importance; and we can understand the pertinacity with which
the Academicians distinguished themselves from the Skeptics,
even on such slight grounds as the above.
In treating of the Academicians we are forced to follow the
plan pursued with the Skeptics, namely to consider the doctrines
of the whole sect, rather than to particularize the share of each
individual member. The Middle Academy and the New Academy we thus unite in one; although the ancients.drew a distinction between them, it is difficult for moderns to do so.
Arcesilaus and Carneades, therefore, shall be our types.
Arcesilaus was born at Pitane in the 116th Olympiad (B. c.
316). He was early taught mathematics and rhetoric, became
the pupil of Theophrastus, afterwards of Aristotle, and finally of
Polemo the Platonist. In —this last school he was contemporary
with Zeno, and probably there began that antagonism which was
so remarkable in their subsequent career.  On the death of
Crates, Arcesilaus filled the Academic chair, and filled it with
great ability and success. His fascinating manners won him
general regard. He was learned and sweet-tempered, and generous to a fault. Visiting a sick friend, who, he saw, was suffering
from privation, he slipped, unobserved, a purse of gold underneath the sick man's pillow. When the attendant discovered it,
the sick man said with a smile, "This is one of Arcesilaus's generous frauds." He was of a somewhat luxurious- temper, but he
lived till the age of seventy-five, when he killed himself by hard
drinking.




ARCESILAUS AND CARNEADES.             295
Carneades, the most illustrious of the Academicians, was born
at Cyrene, in Africa, 01. 141, 4 (B. c. 213). He was a pupil of
Diogenes the Stoic, whotaught him the subtleties of disputation.
This made him sometimes exclaim in the course of a debate: " If
I have reasoned rightly, you are wrong; if not, 0 Diogenes, return
me the mina I paid you for my lessons." On leaving Diogenes
he became the pupil of Hegesinus, who then held the Academic
chair; by him he was instructed in the skeptical principles of
the Academy, and on his death he succeeded to his chair. He
also diligently studied the voluminous writings of Chrysippus.
These were of great value to him, exercising his subtlety, and
trying the temper of his own metal. He owed so much to this
opponent that he used to say, " Had there not been a Chrysippus,
I should not be what I am:" a sentiment very easy of explanation. There are two kinds of writers: those who directly instruct
us in sound knowledge, and those who indirectly lead us to the
truth by the very opposition they raise against their views.
Next to exact knowledge, there is nothing so instructive as exact
error: an error clearly stated, and presented in somewhat the
same way as it at first presented itself to the mind which now
upholds it, enables us to see not only that it is an error, but by
what process it was deduced from its premises, and thus is
among the most valuable modes of instruction. It is better than
direct instruction: better, because the learner's mind is called
into full activity, and apprehends the truth for itself, instead of
passively assenting to it.
Carneades was justified in his praise of Chrysippus. He felt
how much he owed to his antagonist. He felt that to him he
owed a clear conception of the Stoical error, and a clear conviction of the truth of the Academic doctrine; and owed also no
inconsiderable portion of that readiness and subtlety which
marked him out amongst his countrymen as a fitting Ambassador to send to Rome.
Carneades in Rome-Skepticism in the Stoic city-presents
an interesting picture. The Romans crowded round him, fas



296               THE NEW ACADEMY.
cinated by his subtlety and eloquence. Before Galba-before
Cato the Censor-he harangued with marvellous unction in
praise of Justice; and the hard brow of the grim Stoic softened;
an approving smile played over those thin firm lips. But the
next day the brilliant orator undertook to exhibit the uncertainty
of all human knowledge; and, as a proof, he refuted all the arguments with which the day before he had supported Justice. He
spoke against Justice as convincingly as he had spoken for it.
The brow of Cato darkened again, and with a keen instinct of
the dangers of such ingenuity operating upon the Roman youth,
he persuaded the Senate to send back the Philosophers to their
own country.
Carneades returned to Athens, and there renewed his contest
with the Stoics. He taught with great applause, and lived to
the advanced age of ninety.
That the Academicians should have embraced Skepticism is
not strange: indeed, as we have said, Skepticism was the inevitable result of the tendencies of the whole epoch; and the only
sect which did not accept it was forced to find a refuge in Common-Sense: that is to say, was forced to find refuge in the abdication of Philosophy, which abdication was in itself a species of
Skepticism. But it may seem strange that the Academy should
derive itself from Plato; it may seem strange that Arcesilaus
should be a continuer and a warm admirer of Plato. The ancients themselves, according to Sextus Empiricus, were divided
amongst each other respecting Plato's real doctrine; some considering him a skeptic, others a dogmatist. We have already
explained the cause of this difference of opinion, and have shown
how very little consistency and precision there is in the ideas of
Plato upon all subjects except Method. Skepticism, therefore,
might very easily result from a study of his writings. But this
is not all. Plato's attack upon the theories of his predecessors,
which were grounded upon sense-knowledge, is constant, triumphant. The dialogue of the Thecetetus, which is devoted to the
subject of Philosophy, is an exposition of the incapacity of sense




ARCESILAUS AND CARNEADES.            297
to furnish materials for Philosophy. All that sense can furnish
the materials for, is Opinion, and Opinion, as he frequently declares, even when it is Right Opinion, never can be Philosophy.
Plato, in short, destroyed all the old foundations upon which
theories had been constructed. He cleared the ground before
commencing his own work. By this means he obviated the attacks of the Sophists, and yet refused to sustain the onus of errors
which his predecessors had accumulated. The Sophists saw the
weakness of the old belief, and attacked it. Having reduced it
to ruins, they declared themselves triumphant. Plato appeared,
and admitted the fact of the old fortress being in ruins, and its
deserving to be so; but he denied that the city of Truth was
taken. "Expend," said he, "your wrath and skill in battering
down such fortresses; I will assist you; for I too declare them
useless. But the real fortress you have not yet approached; it
is situate on far higher ground." Sense-knowledge and Opinion
being thus set aside, the stronghold of Philosophy was the Ideal
theory: in it Plato found refuge from the Sophists. Aristotle
came and destroyed that theory. What then remained? Skepticism.
Arcesilaus admitted, with Plato, the uncertainty of Opinion;
but he also admitted with Aristotle the incorrectness of the Ideal
theory.  He was thus reduced to absolute Skepticism. The
arguments of Plato had quite destroyed the certitude of Opinion;
the arguments of Aristotle had quite destroyed the Ideal theory.
And thus, by refusing to accept one argument of the Platonic
doctrine, Arcesilaus could fiom Plato's works deduce his own
theory of the Incomprehensibility of all things; the acatalepsy.
The doctrine of acatalepsy recalls to us the Stoical doctrine of
catalepsy or Apprehension, to which it is the antithesis. The
Cataleptic Phantasm was the True Perception, according to the
Stoics; and, according to the Academicians, all Perceptions were
acataleptic, i.e. bore no conformity to the objects perceived; or,
if they did bear any conformity thereto, it could never be
known.
13*




298                THE NEW ACADEMY.
Arcesilaus saw the weak point of the Stoical argument. Zeno
pretended that there was a Criterium, which decided between
science and opinion, which decided between true and false perceptions, and this was the Assent which the mind gave to the
truth of certain perceptions: in other words, Common-Sense was
the Criterium. "But," said Arcesilaus, "what is the difference
between the Assent of a wise man, and the Assent of a madman?
-There is no difference but in name." He felt that the criterium
of the Stoics was itself in need of a Criterium.
Chrysippus the Stoic combated Arcesilaus, and was in turn
combated by Carneades. The great question then pending was
this:What Criterium is there of the truth of our knowledge?
The Criterium must reside either in Reason, in Conception, or
in Sensation. It cannot reside in Reason, because Reason itself
is not independent of the other two: it operates upon the materials furnished by them, and is dependent upon them. Our
knowledge is derived from the senses, and every object presented
to the mind must consequently have been originally presented
to the senses: on their accuracy the mind must depend.
Reason cannot therefore contain within itself the desired Criterium. Nor can conception; for the same arguments apply to
it. Nor can the Criterium reside in Sense; because, as all
admit, the senses are deceptive, and there is no perception which
cannot be false. For what is Perception? Our Senses only
inform us of the presence of an object in so far as they are affected
by it. But what is this? Is it not we who are affected-we who
are modified? Yes; and this modification reveals both itself
and the object which causes it. Like Light, which in showing
itself, shows also the objects upon which it is thrown; like light
also, it shows objects in its own colors. Perception is a peculiar
modification of the soul. The whole problem now to solve is
this:
Does every modification of the soul exactly correspond with the
external object which causes that modification?




ARCESILAUS AND CARNEADES.             299
This is a problem presented by the Academicians. They
answered, but they did not solve it; they left to their adversaries
the task of proving the correspondence between the object and
subject. We may here venture to carry out their principles, and
endeavor to solve the problem, as it is one still agitating the
minds of metaphysicians.
In nowise does the Sensation correspond with the object; in
nowise does the modification correspond with the external cause,
except in the relation of cause and effect. The early thinkers
were well aware that, in order to attribute any certainty to sensuous knowledge, we must assume that the Senses transmit us
Copies of things. Democritus, who was the first to see the
necessity of such an hypothesis, suggested that our Ideas were
Eidola, or Images of the Objects, of an extremely airy texture,
which were thrown off by the objects in the shape of effluvia,
and entered the brain by the pores. Those who could not admit
such an explanation substituted the hypothesis of Impressions.
Ask any man, not versed in such inquiries, whether he believes
his perceptions to be copies of objects-whether he believes that
the flower he sees before him exists quite independently of him,
and of every other human being, and exists with the same attributes of shape, fragrance, taste, etc., his answer is sure to be in
the affirmative. He will regard you as a madman if you doubt
it. And yet so early as the epoch of which we are now sketching the history, thinking men had learned in somewise to see
that our Perceptions were not copies of Objects, but were simply
modifications of our minds, caused by the objects. Once admit
this, and sensuous knowledge is forever pronounced not only
uncertain, but absolutely false. Can such a modification be a
copy of the cause which modifies?  As well ask, Is the pain,
occasioned by a burn, a copy of the fire? Is it at all like the
fire?  Does it at all express the essence of fire?  Not in the
least. It only expresses one relation in which we stand to the
fire; one effect upon us which fire will produce. Nevertheless
fire is an Object, and a burn is a sensation. The way in which




300                THE NEW ACADEMY.
we perceive the existence of the Object (fire) is similar to that
in which we perceive the existence of other objects: and that
way is in the modifications they occasion; i. e. in the Sensations.
Let us take another instance. We say that we hear Thunder:
in other words, we have a Perception of the Object called Thunder. Our sensation really is of a sound, which the electrical
phenomena we call Thunder have caused in us, by acting on the
aural nerve. Is our sensation of this sound any copy of the
Phenomena? Does it in any degree express the nature of the
Phenomena? No; it only expresses the sensation we receive
from a certain electrical state of the atmosphere.
In these cases most people will readily acquiesce; for, by a
very natural confusion of ideas, whenever they speak of perceptions, they mostly mean visual perceptions; because with sight
the clearest knowledge is associated; because also the hypothesis
of our perceptions being copies of Things, is founded upon sight.
The same persons who would willingly admit that Pain was not
a copy of the Fire, nor of any thing in the nature of Fire, except
in its effect on our nerves, would protest that the appearance of
Fire to the Eye was the real appearance of the Fire, all Eyes
apart, and quite independent of human vision. Yet if all sentient
beings were at once swept from the face of the earth, the fire
would have no attribute at all resembling Pain; because Pain is
a modification, not of Fire, but of a sentient being. In like
manner, if all sentient beings were at once swept from the face of
the earth, the Fire would have no attributes at all resembling
light and color; because light and color are modifications of the
sentient being, caused by something external, but no more resembling its cause than the pain inflicted by an instrument resembles
that instrument.
Pain and color are modifications of the sentient being. The
question at issue is, Can a modification of a sentient being be a
copy of its cause? The answer is clearly a negative. We may
imagine that when we see an Object, our sensation is a copy of




ARCESILAUS AND CARNEADES.              301
it; because we believe that the Object paints itself upon the
retina; and we liken perception to a mirror, in which things are
reflected. It is extremely difficult to divest ourselves of this
prejudice; but we may be made aware of the fallacy if we attend
to those perceptions which are not visual-to the perceptions of
sound, fragrance, taste, or pain. These are clearly nothing but
modifications of our sentient being, caused by external objects,
but in nowise resembling them. We are all agreed that the heat
is not in the fire, but in us; that sweetness is not in the sugar,
but in us; that fragrance is but the particles which, impinging
on the olfactory nerve, cause a sensation in us. In all beings
similarly constituted these things would have similar effects,
would cause pain, sweetness, and fragrance; but on all other
beings the effects would be different. Fire would burn paper,
but not pain it; sugar would mix with water, but not give it the
sensation of sweetness.
The radical error of those who believe that we perceive things
as they are, consists in mistaking a metaphor for a fact, and
believing that the mind is a mirror in which external objects are
reflected. But, as Bacon finely says, "The human understanding is like an unequal mirror to the rays of things, which, mixing
its own nature with the nature of things, distorts and perverts
them."  We attribute heat to the fire, and color to the flower;
heat and color really being states of our consciousness, occasioned
by the fire and the flower under certain conditions.
Perception is nothing more than a state of the percipient; i. e.
a state of consciousness. This state may be occasioned by some
external cause, and may be as complex as the cause is complex,
but it is still nothing more than a state of consciousness-an
effect produced by an adequate cause. Of every change in our
Sensation we are conscious, and in time we learn to give definite
names and forms to the causes of these changes. But in the fact
of Consciousness there is nothing beyond consciousness. In our
perceptions we are conscious only of the changes which have
taken place within us: we can never transcend the sphere of our




302                THE NEW ACADEMY.
own consciousness; we can never go out of ourselves, and become
aware of the objects which caused those changes. All we can do
is to identify certain external appearances with certain internal
changes, e. g. to identify the appearance we name "fire," with
certain sensations we have known to follow our being placed near
it. Turn the fact of Consciousness how we will, we can see
nothing in it but the change of a sentient being operated by
some external cause. Consciousness is no mirror of the world;
it gives no faithful reflection of things as they are per se; it only
gives a faithful report of its own modification as excited by external things.
The world, apart from our consciousness, i. e. the non-ego qua
non-ego-the world per se-is, in all likelihood, something utterly
different from the world as we know it; for all we know of it is
derived through our consciousness of what its effects are on us,
and our consciousness is obviously only a state of ourselves, not
a copy of external things.
It may be here asked, How do you infer that the world is different from what it appears to us?
The question is pertinent, and may be answered briefly. The
world per se must be different from what it appears to us through
consciousness, because to us it is only known in the relation of
cause and effect. World is the Cause; our Consciousness the
Effect. But the same Cause operating on some other organization
would produce a very different effect. If all animals were blind,
there would be no such thing as light (i. e. light as we know it),
because light is a phenomenon made up out of the operation of
some unknown thing on the retina. If all animals were deaf,
there would be no such thing as sound, because sound is a phenomenon made up out of the operation of some unknown thing
on the tympanum. If all men were without their present nervous system, there would be no such thing as pain, because pain
is a phenomenon made up out of the operation of some external
thing on the specialized nervous system.
Light, color, sound, taste, smell, are all states of Conscious



ARCESILAUS AND CARNEADES.              303
ness; what they are beyond Consciousness, as existences per se,
we cannot know, we cannot imagine, because we can only conceive them as we know them. Light, with its myriad forms and
colors-Sound, with its thousand-fold life-make Nature what
Nature appears to us. But they do not exist as such apart from
our consciousness; they are the investitures with which we
clothe the world. Nature in her insentient solitude is an eternal
Darkness-an eternal Silence.
We conclude, therefore, that the world per se in nowise resembles the World as it appears to us. Perception is an Effect;
and its truth is not the truth of resemblance, but of relation, i. e.
it is the true operation of the world on us, the true operation of
Cause and Effect. But perception is not the true resemblance
of the world: Consciousness is no mirror reflecting external
things.
Let us substitute for the metaphor of a mirror the more abstract expression, " Perception is the Effect of an external Object
acting on a sentient being," and much of the confusion darkening
this matter will be dissipated. An Effect, we know, agrees with
its Cause, but it does not necessarily resemble it. An Effect is no
more a Copy of the Cause than pain is a copy of the application
of fire to a finger: ergo, Perception can never be an accurate
report of what things are per se, but only of what they are in
relation to us.
It has been said that, although no single sense does actually
convey to us a correct impression of any thing, nevertheless we
are enabled to confirm or modify the report of one sense by the
report of another sense, and that the result of the whole activity
of the five senses is a true impression of the external Thing. This
is a curious fallacy: it pretends that a number of false impressions are sufficient to constitute a true one!
The conclusion to be drawn from the foregoing premises is
this: There is no correspondence between the object and the
sensation, except that of Cause and Effect. Sensations are not
Copies of Objects; do not at all resemble them. As we can




304                THE NEW ACADEMY.
only know objects through sensation-i. e. as we can only know
our sensations-we can never ascertain the truth respecting
objects.
This brings us back to the New Academy, the disciples of
which strenuously maintained that Perception, being nothing but
a modification of the Soul, could never reveal the real nature of
things.
Do we then side with the Academicians in proclaiming all
human knowledge deceptive?    No: to them, as to the Pyrrhonists, we answer: You are quite right in affirming that man
cannot transcend the sphere of his own consciousness, cannot
penetrate the real essences of things, cannot know causes, can
only know phenomena. But this affirmation-though it crushes
Metaphysics-though it interdicts the inquiry into noumena, into
essences and causes, as frivolous because futile-does not touch
Science. If all our knowledge is but a knowledge of phenomena,
there can still be a Science of Phenomena adequate to all man's
true wants. If Sensation is but the effect of an External Cause,
we, who can never know that Cause, know it in its relation to us,
i. e. in its Effect. These Effects are as constant as their Causes;
and, consequently, there can be a Science of Effects. Such a
Science is that named Positive Science, the aim of which is to
trace the Co-existences and Successions of Phenomena, i. e. to
trace the relation of Cause and Effect throughout the universe
submitted to our inspection.
But neither the Pyrrhonists nor the Academicians saw this
refuge for the mind; they consequently proclaimed Skepticism
as the final result of inquiry.




CHAPTER V.
SUMMARY OF THE EIGHTH EPOCH.
WE have now brought our narrative to the second crisis in the
history of speculation. The Skepticism which made the Sophists
powerful, and which closed the first period of this history, we
now behold once more usurping the intellects of men, and this
time with far greater power. A Socrates appeared to refute the
Sophists. Who is there to refute and to discredit the Skeptics?
The Skeptics, and all thinkers during the epoch we have just
treated were such, whether they called themselves Epicureans,
Stoics, Pyrlhonists, or New Academicians-the Skeptics, we say,
were in possession of the most formidable arms. From Socrates,
from Plato, and from Aristotle, they had borrowed their best
weapons, and with these had attacked Philosophy, and attacked
it with success.
All the wisdom of the antique world was powerless against the
Skeptics. Speculative belief was reduced to the most uncertain
"probability."  Faith in philosophic Truth was extinct. Faith
in human endeavor that way was gone. Philosophy was impossible.
But there was one peculiarity of the Socratic doctrine which
was preserved even in the midst of skepticism. Socrates had
made Ethics the great object of his inquiries: and all subsequent
thinkers had given it a -degree of attention which before was
unknown. Philosophy contented itself with the Common-Sense
doctrine of the Stoics, and the Probabilities of the Skeptics,
which, however futile as philosophic principles, were efficacious
enough as moral principles. Common-Sense may be a bad basis




306         SUMMARY OF THE EIGHTH EPOCH.
for metaphysical or scientific reasoning; but it is not so bad a
basis for a system of morals.
The protest, therefore, which Skepticism made against all
Philosophy was not so anarchical in its tendency as the protest
made by the Sophists; but it was more energetic, more terrible.
In the wisdom of that age there lay no cure for it. The last cry
of despair seemed to have been wrung from the baffled thinkers,
as they declared their predecessors to have been hopelessly
wrong, and declared also that their error was without a remedy.
It was, indeed, a saddening contemplation. The hopes and
aspirations of so many incomparable minds thus irrevocably
doomed; the struggles of so many men, from Thales, who first
asked himself, Whence do all things proceed? to the elaborate
systematization of the forms of thought which occupied an
Aristotle-the struggles of all these men had ended in Skepticism. Little was to be gleaned from the harvest of their endeavors but arguments against the possibility of that Philosophy
they were so anxious to form. Centuries of thought had not
advanced the mind one step nearer to a solution of the problems
with which, child-like, it began. It began with a child-like
question; it ended with an aged doubt. Not only did it doubt
the solutions of the great problem which others had attempted;
it even doubted the possibility of any solution. It was not the
doubt which begins, but the doubt which ends inquiry: it had
no illusions.
This was the second crisis of Greek Philosophy. Reason thus
assailed could only find a refuge in Faith; and the next period
opens with the attempt to construct a Religious Philosophy.




NINTH EPOCH.
PHILOSOPHY ALLIES ITSELF WITH FAITH: THE ALEXANDRIAN SCHOOLS.
CHAPTER I.
RISE OF NEO-PLATONISM.
~ I. ALEXANDRIA.
PHILOSOPHY no longer found a home in Greece; it had no
longer any worshippers in its native country, and was forced to
seek them elsewhere. A period had arrived when all problems
seemed to have been stated, and none seemed likely to be solved.
Every system which human ingenuity could devise had been
devised by the early thinkers; and not one had been able to
withstand examination. In the early annals of speculation, a
new and decisive advance is made whenever a new question is
asked; to suggest a doubt, is to exercise ingenuity; to ask a
question, is to awaken men to a new view of the subject. But
now all questions had been asked; old questions had been revived under new forms; nothing remained to stimulate inquiry,
nothing to give speculators a hope of success.
Unable to ask new questions, or to offer new answers to those
already asked, the Philosophers readily seized on the only means
which enabled them to gain renown: they travelled. They
carried their doctrines into Egypt and to Rome; and in those
places they were listened to with wonder and delight. Their
old doctrines were novelties to a people who had no doctrines of




308             RISE OF NEO-PLATONISM.
its own; and, from the excessive cost of books in those days,
almost all instruction being oral, the strangers were welcomed
warmly, and the doctrines imported were as novel as if they had
been just invented.
Philosophy, exiled from Greece, was a favored guest in Alexandria and Rome: but in both cases it was a stranger, and could
not be naturalized. In Alexandria, however, it made a brilliant
display; and the men it produced gave it an originality and an
influence which it never possessed in Rome.
Roman Philosophy was but a weak paraphrase of the Grecian;
and we, therefore, give it no place in this history. To speak
Greek, to write Greek, became the fashionable ambition of Rome.
The child was instructed by a Greek slave. Greek Professors
taught Philosophy and Rhetoric to aspiring youths. Athens
had become the necessary "tour" which was to complete a
man's education. It was there that Cicero learned those ideas
which he delighted in setting forth in charming dialogues. It
was there Horace learned that light and careless philosophy,
which shines through the sparkling crystal of his verse. Wandering from the Academy to the Porch, and from the Porch to
the Garden, he became imbued with that skepticism which
checks his poetical enthusiasm; he learned to make a system of
that pensive epicureanism which gives so peculiar a character to
his poems; a character which, with a sort of after-dinner freedom and bonhomie, recommends him to men of the world.
In Rome, Philosophymight tinge the poetry, give weight to oratory, method to jurisprudence, and supply some topics of conversation; but it was no Belief filling the minds of serious men: it took
no root in the national existence; it produced no great Thinkers.
In Alexandria the case was different. There several schools
were formed, and some new elements introduced into the doctrines then existent. Great thinkers-Plotinus, Proclus, Porphyry-made it illustrious; and it had a rival, whose antagonism
alone would confer immortal renown upon it: that rival was
Christianity.




ALEXANDRIA.                    309
In no species of grandeur was the Alexandrian school deficient,
as M. Saisset justly observes:* genius, power, and duration, have
consecrated it. Reanimating, during an epoch of decline, the
fecundity of an aged civilization, it created a whole family of
illustrious names. Plotinus, its real founder, resuscitated Plato;
Proclus gave the world another Aristotle; and, in the person of
Julian the Apostate, it became master of the world. For three
centuries it was a formidable rival to the greatest power that
ever appeared on earth-the power of Christianity; and, if it
succumbed in the struggle, it only fell with the civilization of
which it had been the last rampart.
Alexandria, the centre of gigantic commerce, soon became a
new metropolis of science, rivalling Athens. The Alexandrian
Library is too celebrated to need more than a passing allusion:
to it, and to the men assembled there, we owe the vast labors of
erudition in philosophy and literature which were of such service
to the world. We cannot here enumerate all the men of science
who made it illustrious; enough if we mention Euclid, for Mathematics; Conon and Hipparchus, for Astronomy; Eratosthenes,
for Geography; and Aristarchus, for literary Criticism. Besides
these, there were the Philosophers; and Lucian, the witty Skeptic; and the Poets, Apollonius Rhodius, Callimachus, Lycophron,
Tryphiodorus, and, above all, the sweet idyllic Theocritus.
It is a curious spectacle. Beside the Museum of Alexandria
there rises into formidable importance the Didascalia of the
Christians. In the same city, Philo the Jew, and (Enesidemus
the Pyrrhonist, founded their respective schools. Ammonius
Saccas appears there. Lucian passes through at the same time
that Clemens Alexandrinus is teaching. After. Plotinus has
taught, Arius and Athanasius will also teach. Greek Skepticism, Judaism, Platonism, Christianity-all have their interpreters
within so small a distance from the temple of Serapis!
* Revue des Deux M'ondes, 1844, tome iii. p. 783; an admirable article on
the Alexandrian Schools.




310              RISE OF NEO-PLATONISM.
~ II. PHILo.
Alexandria, as we have seen, was the theatre of various struggles: of these we are to select one, and that one the struggle of
the Neo-Platonists with the Christian Fathers.
Under the name of the Alexandrian School are designated,
loosely enough, all those thinkers who endeavored to find a refuge
firom Skepticism in a new Philosophy, based on altogether new
principles. Now, although these various Thinkers by no means
constitute a School, they constitute a Movement, and they form
an Epoch in the history of Philosophy. We may merely observe that the "Alexandrian School" and the "Neo-Platonists"
are not convertible terms: the former designates a whole movement, the latter designates the most illustrious section of that
movement.
Philo the Jew is the first of these Neo-Platonists. He was
born at Alexandria, a few years before Christ. The influence of
Greek ideas had long been felt in Alexandria, and Philo, commenting on the writings of the Jews, did so in the spirit of one
deeply imbued with Greek thought. His genius was Oriental,
his education Greek; the result was a strange mixture of mysticism and dialectics.* To Plato he owed much: but to the
New Academy, perhaps more. From Carneades he learned to
distrust the truth of all sensuous knowledge, and to deny that
Reason had any criterium of truth.
Thus far he was willing to travel with the Greeks; thus far
had dialectics conducted him. But there was another element
in his mind besides the Greek: there was the Oriental or mystical element. If human knowledge is a delusion, we must seek
for truth in some higher sphere. The Senses may deceive;
Reason may be powerless; but there is still a faculty in man* St. Paul thus comprehensively expresses the national characteristic of
the Jews and Greeks: "The Jews require a sign (i e. a miracle), and the
Greeks seek after wisdom (i. e. philosophy)."-1 Corinth. i. 22.




PHILO.                       311
there is Faith. Real Science is the gift of God: its name is
Faith: its origin is the goodness of God: its cause is Piety.
This conception is not Plato's, yet is nevertheless Platonic.
Plato would never have thus condemned Reason for the sake of
Faith; and yet he, too, thought that the nature of God could
not be known, although his existence could be proved. In this
respect he would have agreed with Philo. But, although Plato
does not speak of Science as the gift of God, he does in one
place so speak of Virtue; and he devotes the whole dialogue of
the Meno to show that Virtue cannot be taught, because it is not
a thing of the understanding, but a gift of God. The reasons
he there employs may easily have suggested to Philo their application to Philosophy.
From this point Philo's Philosophy of course becomes a theology. God is ineffable, incomprehensible: his existence may be
known; his nature can never be known; o 6' pCp ousi' rX vi
xa0Xrair,-og, o'rs tur xard ro SivL mo vov. But to know that he
exists, is in itself the knowledge of his being one, perfect, simple,
immutable, and without attribute. This knowledge is implied in
the simple knowledge of his existence: he cannot be otherwise,
if he exist at all. But to know this, is not to know in what
consists his perfection. We cannot penetrate with our glance
the mystery of his essence. We can only believe.
If however we cannot know God in his essence, we can obtain
some knowledge of his Divinity: we know it in The Word.
This Xoyo —this Word (using the expression in its Scriptural
sense)-fills a curious place in all the mystical systems. God
being incomprehensible, inaccessible, an intermediate existence
was necessary as an interpreter between God and Man, and this
intermediate existence the Mystics called The Word.
The Word, according to Philo, is God's Thought. This
Thought is two-fold: it is X6yoS; vv&Ssreos, the Thought as embracing all Ideas (in the Platonic sense of the term Idea), i. e
Thought as Thought; and it is Xoyos rpoqpopixo;, the Thought realized: Thought become the World.




312              RISE OF NECOPLATONISM.
In these three hypostases of the Deity we see the Trinity of
plotinus foreshadowed. There is, first, God the Father; secondly,
the Son of God, i. e. the X7yos; thirdly, the Son of the Xoyos,
ir e. the World.
This brief outline of Philo's Theology will sufficiently exemplify the two great facts which we are anxious to have understood:-1st, the union of Platonism with Oriental mysticism;
2dly, the entirely new direction given to Philosophy, by uniting
it once more with Religion. It is this direction which characterizes the Movement of the Alexandrian School. Reason had
been shown to be utterly powerless to solve the great questions
of Philosophy then agitated. Various Schools had pursued
various Methods, but all with one result. Skepticism was the
conclusion of every struggle. "And yet," said the Mystics,
" we have an idea of God and of his goodness; we have an ineradicable belief.in his existence, and in the Perfection of his
nature, consequently, in the beneficence of his aims. Yet these
ideas are not innate; were they innate, they would be uniformly
entertained by all men, and amongst all nations. If they are
not innate, whence are they derived? Not from Reason; not
from experience: then from Faith."
Now, Philosophy, conceive it how you will, is entirely the offspring of Reason: it is the endeavor to explain by Reason the
mysteries amidst which we "move, live, and have our being."
Although it is legitimate to say, " Reason is incapable of solving the problems proposed to it," it is not legitimate to add,
" therefore we must call in the aid of Faith." In Philosophy,
Reason must either reign alone, or abdicate. No compromise
is permissible. If there are things between heaven and earth
which are not dreamt of in our Philosophy-which do not
come within the possible sphere of our Philosophy-we may
believe in them, indeed, but we cannot christen that belief
philosophical.
One of two things,-either Reason is capable of solving the
problems, or it is incapable: in the one case its attempt is phi



PHILO.                     313
losophical; in the second case its attempt is futile. Any attempt
to mix up Faith with Reason, in a matter exclusively addressed
to the Reason, must be abortive. We do not say that what Faith
implicitly accepts, Reason may not explicitly justify; but we say,
that to bring Faith to the aid of Reason, is altogether to destroy
the philosophical character of an inquiry. Reason may justify
Faith; but faith must not furnish conclusions for Philosophy.
Directly Reason is abandoned, Philosophy ceases; and every explanation then offered is a theological explanation, and must be
put to altogether different tests from what a philosophical explanation would require.
All speculation must originally have been theological: but in
process of time Reason timidly ventured upon what are called
"natural explanations;" and from the moment that it felt itself
strong enough to be independent, Philosophy was established.
In the early speculations of the Ionians we saw the pure efforts
of Reason to explain mysteries. As Philosophy advanced, it
became more and more evident that the problems attacked by.
the early thinkers were, in truth, so far from being nearer a
solution, that their extreme difficulty was only just becoming
appreciated. The difficulty became more and more apparent,
till at last it was pronounced insuperable: Reason was declared
incompetent. Then the Faith which had so long been set aside
was again called to assist the inquirer. In other words, Philosophy, discovering itself to be powerless, resigned in favor of
Theology.
When, therefore, we say that the direction given to the human
mind by the Alexandrian School, in conjunction with Christianity-the only two spiritual movements which materially influenced the epoch we are speaking of-was a theological direction,
the reader will at once see its immense importance, and will be
prepared to follow us in our exposition of the mystical doctrines
of Plotinus]
14




CHAPTER II.
ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY AND NEOPLATONISM.
~ I. PLOTINUS.
WHILE Christianity was making rapid and enduring progress
in spite of every obstacle; while the Apostles wandered from
city to city, sometimes honored as Evangelists, at other times
insulted and stoned as enemies, the Neo-Platonists were developing the germ deposited by Philo, and not only constructing a
theology, but endeavoring on that theology to found a Church.
Whilst a new religion, Christianity, was daily usurping the souls
of men, these philosophers fondly imagined that an old Religion
could effectually oppose it.
Christianity triumphed without much difficulty. Looking at
it in a purely moral view, its immense superiority is at once
apparent. The Alexandrians exaggerated the vicious tendency
of which we have already seen the fruits in the Cynics and
Stoics-the tendency to despise Humanity. Plotinus blushed
because he had a body: contempt of human personality could
go no further. What was offered in exchange? The ecstatic
perception; the absorption of personality in that of the Deitya Deity inaccessible to knowledge as to love-a Deity which the
soul can only attain by a complete annihilation of its personality.
The attempt of the Neo-Platonists failed, as it deserved to fail;
but it had great talents in its service, and it made great noise in
the world. It had, as M. Saisset remarks, three periods. The
first of these, the least brilliant but the most fruitful, is that of
Ammonius Saccas and Plotinus. A porter of Alexandria becomes




PLOTINUS.                    315
the chief of a School, and men of genius listen to him; amongst
his disciples are Plotinus, Origen, and Longinus. This School is
perfected in obscurity, and receives at last a solid basis by the
development of a metaphysical system. Plotinus, the author of
this system, shortly after lectures at Rome with amazing success.
It is then that the Alexandrian School enters upon its second
period. With Porphyry and Iamblicus it becomes a sort of
Church, and disputes with Christianity the empire of the world.
Christianity had ascended the throne in the person of Constantine; Neo-Platonism dethrones it, and usurps its place in the
person of Julian the Apostate. But now mark the difference.
In losing Constantine, Christianity lost nothing of its real power;
for its power lay in the might of convictions, and not in the support of potentates; its power was a spiritual power, ever active,
ever fruitful. In losing Julian, Neo-Platonism lost its power,
political and religious. The third period commences with that
loss: and the genius of Proclus bestows on it one last gleam of
splendor. In vain did he strive to revive the scientific spirit of
Platonism, as Plotinus had endeavored to revive the religious
spirit of Paganism: his efforts were vigorous, but sterile. Under
Justinian the School of Alexandria became extinct.
Such is the outward history of the School: let us now cast a
glance at the doctrines which were there elaborated. In the
writings of thinkers professedly eclectic, such as were the Alexandrians, it is obvious that the greater portion will be repetitions
and reproductions of former thinkers; and the historian will
therefore neglect such opinions to confine himself to those which
constitute the originality of the School. The originality of the
Alexandrians consists in having employed the Platonic Dialectics
as a guide to Mysticism and Pantheism; in having connected
the doctrine of the East with the dialectics of the Greeks; in
having made Reason the justification of Faith.
There are three essential points to be here examined: their
Dialectics, their theory of the Trinity, and their principle of
Emanation. By their Dialectics they were Platonists; by their




316        ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY) ETC.
theory of the Trinity they were Mystics; by their principle of
Emanation they were Pantheists.
~ II. THE ALEXANDRIAN DIALECTICS.
The nature of the Platonic Dialectics we hope to have already
rendered intelligible; so that in saying Plotinus employed them
we are saved from much needless repetition. But although Dialectics formed the basis of Alexandrian philosophy, they did not,
as with Plato, furnish the grounds of belief. As far as human
philosophy went, Dialectics were efficient; but there were problems which did not come within the sphere of human philosophy, and for these another Method was requisite.
Plotinus agreed with Plato that there could only be a science
of Universals. Every individual thing was but a phenomenon,
passing quickly away, and having no real existence; it could not
therefore be the object of philosophy. But these universalsthese Ideas which are the only real existences-are they not also
subordinate to some higher Existence a Phenomena were subordinate to Noumena; but Noumena themselves were subordinate
to the One Noumenon. In other words, the Sensible world was
but the Appearance of the Ideal World, and the Ideal World in
its turn was but the mode of God's existence.
The question then arises: How do we know any thing of God?
The sensible world we perceive through our senses; the Ideal
World we gain glimpses of through the reminiscence which the
sensible world awakens in us; but how are we to take the last
step-how are we to know the Deity?
I am a finite being; but how can I comprehend the Infinite?
As soon as I comprehend the Infinite, I am Infinite myself; that
is to say, I am no longer myself, no longer that finite being, having a consciousness of his own separate existence.* If, therefore, I attain to a knowledge of the Infinite, it is not by my Rea* TiV;  v ouv r7v  edvaytv airoiV  XoL b/Lou 7raaav; si yap b/ou Ta: av, rTi av rTi
abroV &Stabipoi.-Plotinus, Enn. v. lib. 5. c. 10.




THE ALEXANDRIAN DIALECTICS.            317
son, which is finite and embraces only finite objects, but by some
higher faculty, a faculty altogether impersonal, which identifies
itself with its object.
The identity of Subject and Object —of the thought with the
thing thought of-is the only possible ground of knowledge.
This position, which some of our readers will recognize as the
fundamental position of modern German speculation, is so removed from all ordinary conceptions, that we must digress awhile
in order to explain it. Neo-Platonism is a blank without it.
Knowledge and Being are Identical; to know more is to be
more. This is not, of course, maintaining the absurd proposition
that to know a horse is to be a horse: all we know of that horse
is only what we know of the changes in ourselves occasioned by
some external cause, and identifying our internal change with
that external cause, we call it a horse. Here knowledge and being are identical. We really know nothing of the external cause
(horse), we only know our own state of being; and to say, therefore, that "in our knowledge of the horse we are the horse," is
only saying, in unusual language, that our knowledge is a state
of our being, and nothing more. The discussion in the fourth
Chapter of the foregoing Epoch respecting perception, was an
attempt to prove that knowledge is only a state of our own consciousness, excited by some unknown cause. The cause must
remain unknown, because knowledge is effect, not cause.
An apple is presented to you; you see it, feel it, taste it, smell
it, and are said to know it. What is this knowledge? Simply
a consciousness of the various ways in which the apple affects
you. You are blind and cannot see it: there is one quality less
which it possesses, i. e. one mode less in which it is possible for
you to be affected. You are without the senses of smell and
taste: there are two other deficiencies in your knowledge of the
apple. So that, by taking away your senses, we take away from
the apple each of its qualities: in other words, we take away the
means of your being affected. Your knowledge of the apple is
reduced to nothing. In a similar way, by endowing you with




318         ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY, ETC.
more senses we increase the qualities of the apple; we increase
your knowledge by enlarging your being. Thus are Knowledge
and Being identical; knowledge is a state of Being as knowing.
"If," said Plotinus, "knowledge is the same as the thing
known, the Finite, as Finite, never can know the Infinite, because
it cannot be the Infinite. To attempt, therefore, to know the Infinite by Reason is futile, it can only be known in immediate
presence,'arapouota. The faculty by which the mind divests itself
of its personality is Ecstasy. In this Ecstasy the soul becomes
loosened from its material prison, separated from individual consciousness, and becomes absorbed in the Infinite Intelligence
fiom which it emanated. In this Ecstasy it contemplates real
existence; it identifies itself with that which it contemplates."
The enthusiasm upon which this Ecstasy is founded is not a
faculty which we constantly possess, such as Reason or Perception: it is only a transitory state, at least so long as our personal
existence in this world continues. It is a flash of rapturous light,
in which reminiscence is changed into intuition, because in that
moment the captive soul is given back to its parent, its God.
The bonds which attach the soul to the body are mortal; and
God, our father, pitying us, has made those bonds, from which
we suffer, fragile and delicate, and in his goodness he gives us
certain intervals of respite: Zeus 6Ss ra-?p EXs4ag cGvoUEpvc,
6VTa     V aucrWJv Oa Ssrfa' IfoiwJv rspi a'?rOVOUOvcu, SiSJ&IY dV Vra'aXa 6SV
xpovolg.
The Oriental and mystical character of this conception is worth
remarking; at the same time there is a Platonic element in it,
which may be noticed. Plato, in the Ion, speaks of a chain of
inspiration, which descends from Apollo to poets, who transmit
the inspiration to the rhapsodists; the last links of the chain are
the souls of lovers and philosophers, who, unable to transmit the
divine gift, are nevertheless agitated by it. The Alexandrians
also admit the divine inspiration: not that inspiration which
only warms and exalts the heart, but that inspiration revealing
the Truth which Reason can neither discern nor comprehend.




THE ALEXANDRIAN DIALECTICS.            319
Whether, in ascending through the various sciences and laboriously mounting all the degrees of, Dialectics, we finally arrive at
the summit, and tear away the veil behind which the Deity is
hidden; or, instead of thus slowly mounting, we arrive at the
summit by a sudden spring, by the force of virtue or by the force
of love, the origin of this revelation is the same: the Poet, the
Prophet, and the Philosopher only differ in the point of departure each takes. Dialectics, therefore, though a valuable method,
is not an infallible one for arriving at Ecstasy. Every thing
which purifies the soul and makes it resemble its primal simplicity, is capable of conducting it to Ecstasy. Besides, there are
radical differences in men's natures. Some souls are ravished
with Beauty; and these belong to the Muses. Others are ravished with Unity and Proportion; and these are Philosophers.
Others are more struck with Moral perfections; and these are
the pious and ardent souls who live only in religion.
Thus, then, the passage fiom simple Sensation, or from Reminiscence, to Ecstasy, may be accomplished in three ways. By
Music (in the ancient and comprehensive sense of the term), by
Dialectics, and by Love or Prayer. The result is always the
same,-the victory of the Universal over the Individual.
Such is the answer given by the Alexandrians to that worldold question, How do we know God 8 The Reason of man is incompetent to such knowledge, because Reason is finite, and the
finite cannot embrace the infinite. But, inasmuch as Man has a
knowledge of the Deity, he must have obtained it in some way:
the question is, In what way? This question, which the Christian Fathers were enabled to answer satisfactorily by referring to
Revelation, the Alexandrians could only answer most unsatisfactorily by declaring Ecstasy to be the medium of communication,
because in Ecstasy the soul lost its personality and became absorbed in the Infinite Intelligence.
We may read in this philosophy an instructive lesson respecting the vicious circle in which all such reasonings are condemned
to move:




320         ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY, ETC.
"The one poor finite being in the abyss
Of infinite being twinkling restlessly."
This finite being strives to comprehend that which includes it,
and in the impossible attempt exerts its confident ingenuity.
Conscious that the finite as finite cannot comprehend the infinite,
the Alexandrian hypothesis is at least consistent in making the
finite become, for an instant, infinite. The grounds however
upon which this hypothesis is framed are curious. The axiom
is this:-The finite cannot comprehend the infinite. The problem is this:-How can the finite comprehend the infinite? And
the solution is: The finite must become the infinite.
Absurd as it is, it is the conclusion deduced by a vigorous intellect from premises which seemed indisputable. It is only one
of the absurdities inseparable from the attempted solution of insoluble problems.
~ III. THE ALEXANDRIAN TRINITY.
We have said that the philosophy of the Alexandrians was a
theology; their theology may be said to be concentrated in the
doctrine of the Trinity. Nearly allied to the mystery of the Incarnation, which was inseparable from the mystery of Redemption, the dogma of the Holy Trinity was, as M. Saisset remarks,
the basis of all the Christian metaphysics. The greater part of
the important heresies, Arianism, Sabellianism, Nestorianism,
etc., resulted from differences respecting some portion of this
doctrine. It becomes, therefore, a matter of high historical interest to determine its parentage. Some maintain that the Trinity of the Christians was but an imitation of that of the Alexandrians; others accuse the Alexandrians of being the imitators.
The dispute has been angrily conducted on both sides. It is not
our purpose to meddle with it, as our history steers clear of such
matters; but we think it right to indicate the quarrel.*
* Such of our readers as may desire a compendious statement of the
question are referred to M. Jnles Simon, Histoire de l'Ecole d'Alexandrie,
vol. i. pp. 308-341, and to the article by M. Saisset, in the Revue des Deux
Mondes, before referred to.




THE ALEXANDRIAN TRINITY.              321
The Alexandrian Trinity is as follows:-God is triple, and, at
the same time, one. His nature contains within it three distinct
Hypostases (Substances, i. e. Persons), and these three make one
Being. The first is the Unity: not The One Being, not Being
at all, but simple Unity. The second is the Intelligence, which
is identical with Being. The third is the Universal Soul, cause
of all activity and life.
Such is the formula of the dogma. Let us now see how their
Dialectics conducted them to it. On looking abroad upon the
world, and observing its constant transformations, what is the
first thing that presents itself to our minds as the cause of all
these chanfs? It is Life. The whole world is alive; and, not
only alive, but seemingly participating in a life similar to our
own. On looking deeper, we discover that life itself is but an
effect of some higher cause; and this cause must be the "Universal," which we are seeking to discover. Our logic tells us that
it is Activity-Motion. But with this Motion we cannot proceed far. It soon becomes apparent to us that the myriad ongoings of nature are not merely activities, but intelligent activities.
No hazard rules this world. Intelligence is everywhere visible.
The Cause, then, we have been seeking is at last discovered: it
is an Intelligent Activity. Now, what is this, but that mysterious
force residing within us, directing us, impelling us? What is
this Intelligent Activity but a soul? The soul which impels and
directs us is an image of the Soul which impels and directs the
world. God, therefore, is the eternal Soul, the 4uX%. We have
here the first Hypostasis of the Alexandrians. On a deeper inspection this notion turns out less satisfactory. The dialectician, whose
whole art consists in dividing and subdividing, in order to arrive
at pure unity-who is always unravelling the perplexed web of
speculation, to lay bare at last the unmixed One which had become enveloped in the Many-the dialectician, bred up in the
Schools of Plato and Aristotle, could not rest satisfied with so
complex an entity as an Intelligent Activity. There are at least
two ideas here, and two ideas entirely distinct in nature, viz., In14*




322         ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY, ETC.
telligence/and Motion. Now, although these might be united in
some idea common to both, yet superior to both, neither of them
could be considered as the last term in an analysis. The Intelligence, when analyzed, is itself the. activity of some intelligent
being, of Mind, X7yog.
God, therefore, is Mind, absolute, eternal, immutable.  We
have here the second Hypostasis.  Superior to the Divine Soul,
u4XY r-ouG,raro'S, which is the cause of all activity, and king of
the sensible world, X~op'y2S  T- xvi~s6w, /3fia'sXvs rjv Tryvoecvwv,
we find the Divine Mind, voZs, the magnificence of which we may
faintly conceive by reflecting on the splendors of the sensible
world, with the Gods, Men, Animals, and Plants, which adorn
it: splendors which are but imperfect images of the incomparable
lustre of eternal truth. The Divine Mind embraces all the intelligible Ideas which are without imperfection, without movement.
This is the Age of Gold, of which God is the Saturn. For Saturn,
of whom the Poets have so grandly sung, is the Divine Intelligence; that perfect world which they have described, when
"Ver erat aeternum: placidique tepentibus auris
Mulcebant Zephyri natos sine semine flores.
Mox etiam fruges tellus inarata ferebat;
Nee renovatus ager gravidis canebat aristis.
Flumina jam lactis, jam flunina nectaris ibant;
Flavaque de viridi stillabant ilice mella."*
That golden age is the Intelligible World, the eternal Thought
of eternal Intelligence.
A word or two on this Alexandrian vouS. It is Thought abstracted from all thinking: it does not reason; for to reason is
to acquire a knowledge of something: he who reasons, arrives
at a consequence from his premises, which he did not see in
those premises without effort. But God sees the consequence
*  The flowers unsown in fields and meadows reigned;
And western winds immortal spring maintained.
In following years the bearded corn ensued
From earth unasked; nor was that earth renewed.
From veins of valleys.milk and nectar broke,
And honey sweating from the pores of oak."-DRYDEN's Ovid.




THE ALEXANDRIAN TRINITY.              323
simultaneously with the premises. His knowledge resembles our
knowledge as hieroglyphic writing resembles our written language: that which we discursively develop, he embraces at once.
This vous is at the same time the eternal existence, since all
Ideas are united in it. It is the voio'e voiesws v6r'ds of Aristotle,or, to use the language of Plotinus, is the Sight Seeing, the identity of the act of seeing with the object seen:'tri 7ap a  vorfr g
oppa'c0 op5o0't, afoVp   To I'v,-a conception which will at once be
understood by recurring to our illustration of the identity of
Knowledge and Being, given above.
One would fancy that this was a degree of abstraction to satisfy the most ardent dialectician; to have analyzed thus far, and
to have arrived at pure Thought and pure Existence-the Thought
apart from Thinking and the Existence apart from its modeswould seem the very limit of human ingenuity, the last abstraction possible. But no: the dialectician is not yet contented:
he sees another degree of abstraction still higher, still simpler:
he calls it Unity. God, as Existence and Thought, is God as
conceived by human intelligence: but, although human intelligence is unable to embrace any higher notion of God, yet is there
in human intelligence a hint of its own weakness and an assurance of God's being something ineffable, incomprehensible.
God is not, en derniere analyse, Existence and Thought. What
is Thought? What is its type   The type is evidently human
reason. What does an examination of human reason reveal?
This:-To think is to be aware of some object from which the
thinker distinguishes himself. To think is to have a self-consciousness, to distinguish one's personality from that of all other
objects, to determine the relation of self to not-self. But nothing
is external to God: in him there can be no distinction, no determination, no relation. Therefore God, in his highest hypostasis, cannot think, cannot be thought, but must be something superior to
thought. Hence, the necessity for a third hypostasis, which third
in the order of discovery is first in the order of being: it is Unity,TaO v oVtrXov.




324        ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY, ETC.
The Unity is not Existence, neither is it Intelligence-it is
superior to both: it is superior to all action, to all determination, to all knowledge; for, in the same way as the multiple is
contained in the simple, the many in the one, in the same way is
the simple contained in the unity; and it is impossible to discover the truth of things until we have arrived at this absolute
unity; for, how can we conceive any existing thing except by
unity? What is an individual, an animal, a plant, but that
unity which presides over multiplicity? What even is multiplicity-an army, an assembly, a flock-when not brought under
unity? Unity is omnipresent; it is the bond which unites even
the most complex things. The Unity which is absolute, immutable, infinite, and self-sufficing is not the numerical unit, not the
indivisible point. It is the absolute universal One in its perfect
simplicity.  It is the highest degree of perfection-the ideal
Beauty, the supreme Good, <rp5,rov cdyalov.
God therefore in his absolute state-in his first and highest
Hypostasis-is neither Existence nor Thought, neither moved
nor mutable: he is the simple Unity, or, as Hegel would say,
the Absolute Nothing, the Immanent Negative. Our readers
will perhaps scarcely be patient under this infliction of dialectical subtlety; but we beg them to remember that the absurdities
of genius are often more instructive than the discoveries of common men, and the subtleties and extravagances of the Alexandrians are fraught with lessons.  If rigorous logic conducted
eminent minds to conceptions which appear extravagant and
sterile, they may induce in us a wholesome suspicion of the efficacy of that logic to solve the problems it is occupied with. Nor
is the lessen inapplicable to our age. The present enthusiasm
for German Literature and German Philosophy will of course
turn the attention of many young minds to the speculations in
which Germany is so rife; we are consequently more interested
in Plotinus, because he agitates similar questions and affords very
similar answers. The German Metaphysicians resemble Plotinus
more than Plato, or Aristotle: nor is the reason difficult of dis



THE ALEXANDRIAN TRINITY.              325
covery. Plotifius, coming after all the great thinkers had asked
almost every metaphysical question and given almost every possible answer, was condemned either to skepticism or to accept
any consequences of his dialectics, however extreme. Philosophy
was in this dilemma-either to abdicate, or to be magnificently
tyrannical: it chose to be the latter. Plotinus therefore shrank
from no extravagances: where Reason failed, there he called
upon Faith. The Germans, coming after the secure establishment of Positive Science, found Philosophy in a similar dilemma:
either to declare itself incapable, or to proclaim its despotism
and infallibility: what Logic demonstrated must be absolutely
true.
This faith in logic is remarkable, and may be contrasted with
the Alexandrian faith in Ecstasy. Of the possibility of human
logic not being the standard of truth, the Germans have no suspicion; they are without the Greek skepticism as to the Criterium. They proceed with peaceable dogmatism to tell you that
God is this, or that; to explain how the Nothing becomes the
Existing world, to explain many other inexplicable things; and,
if you stop them with the simple inquiry, How do you know
this? what is your ground of certitude? they smile, allude
blandly to Vernunft, and continue their exposition.
Plotinus was wiser, though less consequent. He said, that
although Dialectics raise us to some conviction of the existence
of God, we cannot speak of his nature otherwise than negatively:
9v da4aps'~si avra rv a spr i roS-ov Xyo'psva. We are forced to admit his existence, though it is not correct to speak even of his
existence. To say that he is superior to Existence and Thought,
is not to define him; it is only to distinguish him from what he
is not. What he is we cannot know; it would be ridiculous to
endeavor to comprehend him. This difference apart, there is
remarkable similarity in the speculations of the Alexandrians
and the modern Germans: a similarity which all will detect who
are capable of detecting identity of thought under diversity of
language.




326        ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY, ETC.
To return to the Alexandrian Trinity, we see in it the Perfect
Principle, the One,'ro'v aokXoUv, which generates, but is ungenerated; the Principle generated by the Perfect, is of all generated things the most perfect: it is therefore Intelligence-vov7.
In the same way as Intelligence is the Word (X6yog) of the One
and the manifestation of its power, so also the Soul is the
Word and manifestation of the Intelligence, olov xc-' X 4u< Xo'y0o
vou. The three Hypostases of the Deity are therefore, 1st, the
Perfect, the Absolute Unity, ro Sv a&'rXouv; 2d, the First Intelligence, q- vouv ~p0T'rg; 3d, the Soul of the world.
This Trinity is very similar to the threefold nature of God in
Spinoza's system. Spinoza says, that God is the infinite Existence, having two infinite Attributes-Extension and Thought.
Now this Existence, which has neither Extension nor Thought,
except as Attributes, although verbally differing from the Absolute Unconditioned, the One, of Plotinus, is, in point of fact,
the same: it is the last abstraction which human logic can
make: it is that of-which nothing can be predicated, and yet
which must be the final predicate of eivery thing: division and
subdivision, however prolonged, stop there, and admit as final
the Unconditioned Unconditional Something; that which Proclus calls the Non-Being, pi'v, although it is not correct to call
it nothing, p&ZGv.
This conception, which it is impossible to state in words without stating gross contradictions, is the result of rigorous logic,
reasoning from false premises. The process is this: I have to
discover that which is at the bottom of the mystery of existence-the great First Cause; and to do this, I must eliminate,
one by one, every thing which does not present itself as self-existing, self-sufficing, as necessarily the first of all things, the
The ancients began their speculations in the same way, but
with less knowledge of the conditions of inquiry. Hence, Water,
Air, Soul, Number, Force, were severally accepted as Principia.
In the time of the Alexandrians something more subtle was




THE ALEXANDRIAN TRINITY.              327
required. They asked the same question, but they asked it
with a full consciousness of the failure of their predecessors.
Even Thought would not satisfy them as a Principium; nor
were they better satisfied with abstract Existence. They said
there is something beyond Thought, something beyond Existence: there is that which thinks, that which exists. This " that,"
this Indeterminate Ineffable, is the Principium. It is self-sufficing, self-existent; nothing can be conceived beyond it. In the
old Indian hypothesis of the world being supported by an elephant, who stood on the back of a tortoise, the tortoise standing
on nothing, we see a rude solution of the same problem: the
mind is forced to arrest itself somewhere, and wherever it arrests itself it is forced to declare, explicitly or implicitly, that it
stops at Nothing; because, as soon as it predicates any thing of
that at which it stops, it is forced to admit something beyond:
if the tortoise stands on the back of some other animal, upon
what does that other animal stand?
Human logic, when employed upon this subject, necessarily
abuts upon Nothing, upon absolute Negation; the terms in
which this conception is clothed may differ, but the conception
remains the same: Plotinns and Hegel shake hands.
In reviewing the history of Greek speculation, from the
"Water" of Thales to the " Absolute Negation" of Plotinus, what
a reflection is forced upon us of the vanity of metaphysics! So
many years of laborious inquiry, so many splendid minds engaged, and, after the lapse of ages, the inquiry remains the
same, the answer only more ingeniously absurd! Was, then,
all this labor vain?  Were those long, laborious years, all
wasted? Were those splendid minds all useless? No: earnest
endeavor is seldom without result. Those centuries of speculation were not useless, they were the education of the human
race. They taught mankind this truth, at least: the Infinite
cannot be known by the finite; and man, as finite, can only
know phenomena. Those labors, so fruitless in their immediate
object, have indirect lessons. The speculations of the Greeks




328        ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITY, ETC.
preserve the same privilege as the glorious products of their art
and literature; they are the models from which the speculations
of posterity are reproductions. The history of modern metaphysical philosophy, is but the narrative of the same struggles
which agitated Greece. The same problems are revived, and the
same answers offered.
~ IV. THE DOCTRINE OF EMANATION.
Metaphysics propounds three questions: Has human knowledge any absolute certainty? What is the nature of God? What
is the origin of the World?
Our review of the various attempts to answer these questions,
has ended in the Alexandrian School, which answered them as
follows: 1st. Human knowledge is necessarily uncertain; but
this difficulty is got over by the hypothesis of an Ecstasy, in
which the soul becomes identified with the Infinite. 2d. The
Nature of God is a triple Unity-three hypostases of the One
Being. 3d. The origin of the world is the law of Emanation.
This third answer is of course implied in the second. God,
as Unity, is not Existence; but he becomes Existence by the
Emanation from his Unity (Intelligence), and by the second emanation from his Intelligence (Soul), and this Soul, in its manifestations, is the World.
Hitherto dualism has been the universal creed of those who
admitted any distinction between the world and its creator,
Jupiter, organizing Chaos; the God of Anaxagoras, whose force
is wasted in creation; the &,psoupyo' of Plato, who conquers and
regulates Matter and Motion; the immovable Thought of Aristotle: all these creeds were dualistic; and, indeed, to escape
dualism was no easy task.
If God is distinct from the World, dualism is at once assumed.
If he is distinct, he must be distinct in Essence. If distinct in
essence, the question of Whence came the world? is not answered; for the world must have existed contemporaneously
with him.




THE DOCTRINE OF EMANATION.             329
Here lies the difficulty: either God made the world, or he did
not. If he made it, whence did he make it? He could not,
said logic, make it out of Nothing; for nothing can come of
Nothing; he must, therefore, have made it out of his own substance. If it is made out of his own substance, then it is identical with him: it must, then, have existed already in him, or he
could not have produced it. But this identification of God with
the world is Pantheism; and begs the question it should answer.
If he did not make it out of his own substance, he must have
made it out of some substance already existing; and thus, also,
the question still remains unanswered.
This problem was solved by the Christians and Alexandrians
in a similar, though apparently different, manner. The Christians said that God created the world out of Nothing by the
mere exercise of his omnipotent will; for to Omnipotence every
thing is possible; one thing is as easy as another. The Alex.
andrians said that the world was distinct from God in act rather
than in essence: it was the manifestation of his will or of his
intelligence.
Thus the world is God; but God is not the world. Without
the necessity of two principles, the distinction is preserved between
the Creator and the Created. God is not confounded with Matter; and yet Philosophy is no longer oppressed with the difficulty of accounting for two eternally existing and eternally distinct
principles.
Plotinus had by his Dialectics discovered the necessity of
Unity as the basis of existence: he had also by the same means
discovered that the Unity could not possibly remain alone: otherwise there would never have been the Many. If the Many implies the One, the One also implies the Many. It is the property
of each principle to engender that which follows it: to engender
it in virtue of an ineffable power which loses nothing of itself.
This power, ineffable, inexhaustible, exercises itself without stopping, from generation to generation, till it attains the limits of
possibility.




330         ANTAGONISM OF CHRISTIANITTY ETC.
By this law, which governs the world, and from which God
himself cannot escape, the totality of existences, which Dialectics
teach us to arrange in a proper hierarchy from God to sensible
Matter, appear to us thus united in one indissoluble chain, since
each being is the necessary product of that which precedes it,
and the necessary producer of that which succeeds it.
If asked why Unity should ever become Multiplicity-why God
should ever manifest himself in the world? the answer is ready:
The One, as conceived by the Eleatics, had long been found incomplete; for a God who had no intelligence could not be perfect: as Aristotle says, a God who does not think is unworthy
of respect. If, therefore, God is Intelligent, he is necessarily active: a force that engenders nothing, can that be a real force?
It was, therefore, in the very nature of God a necessity for him
to create the world: v ri (,pu'sij v rO Qroirosv.
God, therefore, is in his very essence a Creator, %ro5rns. He
is like a Sun pouring forth his rays, without losing any of its
substance: olov bx  eros',,'rv d au'rou 7spiXcatpL4v. All this fluxthis constant change of things, this birth and death-is but the
restless manifestation of a restless force. These manifestations
have no absolute truth, no duration. The individual perishes,
because individual: it is only the universal that endures. The
individual is the finite, the perishable; the universal is the infinite,
immortal. God is the only existence: he is the real existence,
of which we, and other things, are but the transitory phenomena.
And yet timid ignorant man fears death! timid because ignorant.
To die is to live the true life: it is to lose, indeed, sensation, passions, interests, to be free from the conditions of space and time,to lose personality; but it is also to quit this world and to be
born anew in God,-to quit this frail and pitiable individuality,
to be absorbed in the being of the Infinite. To die is to live the
true life. Some faint glimpses of it-some overpowering anticipations of a bliss intolerable to mortal sense, are realized in the
brief moments of Ecstasy, wherein the Soul is absorbed in the
Infinite, although it cannot long remain there. Those moments




THE DOCTRINE OF EMANATION.             331
so exquisite yet so brief are sufficient to reveal to us the divinity,
and to show us that deep imbedded in our personality there is a
ray of the divine source of light, a ray which is always struggling
to disengage itself, and return to its source. To die is to live the
true life: and Plotinus dying, answered, in his agony, to friendly
questions: "I am struggling to liberate the divinity within me."
This mysticism is worth attention, as indicative of the march
of the human mind. In many preceding thinkers we have seen
a very strong tendency towards the desecration of personality.
From Heraclitus to Plotinus there is a gradual advance in this
direction. The Cynics and the Stoics made it a sort of philosophical basis. Plato implicitly, and sometimes explicitly, gave
it his concurrence. The conviction of man's insignificance, and
of the impossibility of his ever in this world ascertaining the
truth, seem to have oppressed philosophers with self-contempt.
To curse the bonds which bound them to ignorance, and to quit a
world in which they were thus bound, were the natural consequences of their doctrines; but, linked mysteriously as we are to
life-even to the life we curse-our doctrines seldom lead to suicide. In default of suicide, nothing remained but Asceticisma moral suicide. As man could not summon courage to quit the
world, he would at least endeavor to lead a life as far removed
from worldly passion and worldly condition as was possible; and
he would welcome death as the only true life.




CHAPTER III.
PROOLUS.
PLOTINUS attempted to unite Philosophy with Religion, attempted to solve by Faith the problems insoluble by Reason; and
the result of such an attempt was necessarily mysticism. But,
although the mystical element is an important one in his doctrine, he did not allow himself to be seduced into all the extravagances which naturally flowed from it. That was reserved for
his successors, Iamblicus in particular, who performed miracles,
and constituted himself High Priest of the Universe.
With Proclus the Alexandrian School made a final effort, and
with him its defeat was entire. He was born at Constantinople,
A. D. 412. He came early to Alexandria, where Olympiodorus
was teaching. He passed onwards to Athens, and from Plutarch
and Syrianus he learnt to comprehend the doctrines of Plato and
Aristotle. Afterwards, becoming initiated into the Theurgical
mysteries, he was soon made a High Priest of the Universe.
The theological tendency is still more visible in Proclus than
in Plotinus. He regarded the Orphic poems and the Chaldean
oracles as divine revelations, and, therefore, as the real source of
philosophy, if properly interpreted; and in this allegorical interpretation consisted his whole system.
"The intelligible forms of ancient poets,
The fair humanities of old religion,
The Power, the Beauty, and.the Majesty,
That had her haunts in dale, or piny mountain,
Or forest by slow stream, or pebbly spring,
Or chasms and wat'ry depths; all these have vanish'd,
They live no longer in the faith of reason!
But still the heart doth need a language, still
Doth the old instinct bring back the old names.
And to yon starry world they now are gone,




PROCLUS.                     333
Spirits or Gods that used to share this earth
With man as with their friend."*
To breathe the breath of life into the nostrils of these defunct
deities, to restore the beautiful Pagan creed, by interpreting its
symbols in a new sense, was the aim of the whole Alexandrian
School.
Proclus placed Faith above Science. It was the only faculty
by which The Good, that is to say, The One, could be apprehended. " The Philosopher," said he, " is not the Priest of one
Religion, but of all Religions;" that is to say, he is to reconcile
all modes of Belief by his interpretations. Reason is the Expositor of Faith. But Proclus made one exception: there was
one Religion which he could not tolerate, which he would not
interpret,-that was the Christian.
With this conception of his mission, it is easy to see that his
method must be eclectic. Accordingly, in making Philosophy
the expositor of Religion, he relied upon the doctrines of his predecessors without pretending to discover new ones for his purpose. Aristotle, whom he called " the Philosopher of the understanding," he regarded as the man whose writings formed the best
introduction to the study of wisdom. In him the student learnt
the use of his Reason; learnt also the forms of thought. After
this preparatory study came the study of Plato, whom he called
the "Philosopher of Reason," the sole guide to the region of
Ideas, that is, of Eternal Truths. The reader will probably recognize here the distinction between Understanding and Reason,
revived by Kant, and so much insisted on by Coleridge and his
followers.
Plato was the idol of Proclus; and the passionate disciple
thought every word of the master an oracle; he discovered every
where some hidden and oracular meaning, interpreting the simplest recitals into sublime allegories. Thus the affection of Socrates for Alcibiades became the slender text for a whole volume
of mystical exposition.
* Coleridge, in his translation of the Piccolomini.




334                    PROCLUS.
It is curious to notice the transformations of philosophy in the
various schools. Socrates interpreted the inscription on the temple at Delphi, " Know thyself," as an exhortation to psychological and ethical study. He looked inwards, and there discovered
certain truths which skepticism could not darken; and he discoursed, says his biographer, on Justice and Injustice, on things
holy and things unholy.
Plato also looked inwards, hoping to find there a basis of philosophy; but his "Know thyself" had a different signification.
Man was to study himself, because, by becoming thoroughly acquainted with his mind, he would become acquainted with the
eternal Ideas of which sense awakened Reminiscence. His selfknowledge was Dialectical, rather than Ethical. The object of
it was the contemplation of eternal Existence, not the regulation
of our worldly acts.
The Alexandrians also interpreted the inscription; but with
them the Socratic conception was completely set aside, and the
Platonic conception carried to its limits. "Know thyself," says
Proclus, in his commentary on Plato's First Alcibiades, "that
you may know the essence from whose source you are derived.
Know the divinity that is within you, that you may know the
divine One of which your soul is but a ray. Know your own
mind, and you will have the key to all knowledge." These are
not the words of Proclus, but they convey the meaning of many
pages of his enthusiastic dialectics.
We are struck in Proclus with the frank and decided manner
in which Metaphysics is assumed to be the only possible science;
we are struck with the naive manner in which the fundamental
error of metaphysical inquiry is laid open to view, and presented
as an absolute truth. In no other ancient system is it stated so
nakedly. If we desired an illustration of the futility of metaphysics we could not find a better than is afforded by Proclus,
who, be it observed, only pushed the premises of others to their
rigorous conclusions.
He teaches that the hierarchy of ideas, in which there is a




PROCLUS.                     335
gradual generation from the most abstract to the most concrete,
exactly corresponds with the hierarchy of existences, in which
there is a constant generation from the most abstract (Unity) to
to the most concrete (phenomena): so that the relations which
these ideas bear to each other, the laws which subordinate one
to the other-in a word, the forms of the nomenclature of human
conceptions-express the real causes, their action, their combinations; in fact, the whole system of the universe.*
This is frank. The objection to the metaphysician has been
that he looks inwards to discover that which lies without him,
hoping, in his own conceptions of that which he is seeking to
know, to find the thing he seeks. We " philosophers of the Understanding" aver that to analyze your mind is to learn the
nature of your mind: nothing else. Proclus boldly assumes
that to know the nature of your own mind is to know the whole
universe. This is at least consistent. But one might reasonably
ask how this knowledge is to be gained? not simply by looking
inwards, or else all philosophers would have gained it; not even
by meditation. How then? Listen:
" Mercury, the Messenger of Jove, reveals to us Jove's paternal
will, and thus teaches us science; and, as the author of all investigation, transmits to us, his disciples, the genius of invention.
The Science which descends into the soul from above is more
perfect than any science obtained by investigation; that which
is excited in us by other men is far less perfect. Invention is the
energy of the soul. The Science which descends from above fills
the soul with the influence of the higher Causes. The Gods announce it to us by their presence and by illuminations, and discover to us the order of the universe."
Of course the Mystic who had revelations from above, dispensed with the ordinary methods of investigation; and here
again we see Proclus consistent, though consistent in absurdity.
* This is also the doctrine of Hegel.




CONCLUSION OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY.
WITH Proclus the Alexandrian School expired; with him
Philosophy ceased. Religion, and Religion only, seemed capable of affording satisfactory answers to the questions which perplexed the human race, and Philosophy was reduced to the
subordinate office which the Alexandrians had consigned to the
Aristotelian Logic. Philosophy became the servant of Religion,
no longer reigning in its own right.
Thus was the circle of endeavor completed. With Thales,
Reason separated itself from Faith; with the Alexandrians, the
two were again united. The centuries between these epochs
were filled with helpless struggles to overcome an insuperable
difficulty.
The difference is great between the childlike question of the
Ionian thinker, and the naive extravagance of the Alexandrian
Mystic: and yet each stands upon the same ground, and looks
out upon the same troubled sea, hoping to detect a shore, ignorant that all philosophy' is an arch where through
Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades
Forever and forever as we move."
But, to the reflective student who thus sees these men, after centuries of endeavor, fixed on the self-same spot, the Alexandrian
straining his eager eyes after the same object as the Ionian, and
neither within the possible range of vision, there is something
which would be unutterably sad, were it not corrected by the
conviction that these men were fixed to one spot, because they
had not discovered the only true pathway, a pathway which those
who came after them securely trod.
Still, the spectacle of human failure, especially on so gigantic




CONCLUSION OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY.          337
a scale, cannot be without some pain. So many hopes thwarted,
so many great intellects wandering in error, are not to be thought
of without sadness. But it bears a lesson which we hope those
who have followed us thus far will not fail to read: a lesson on
the vanity of Philosophy; a lesson which almost amounts to a
demonstration of the impossibility of the human mind ever conmpassing those exalted objects which its speculative ingenuity suggests as worthy of its pursuit. It points to that profound remark
of Auguste Comte, that there exists in all classes of our investigations a constant and necessary harmony between the extent
of our real intellectual wants, and the efficient extent, actual or
future, of our real knowledge.
But these great Thinkers, whose failures we have chronicled,
did not live in vain. They left the great problems where they
found them: but they did not leave Humanity as they found it.
Metaphysics might be still a region of doubt; but the human
mind, in its endeavors to explore that region, had learnt in some
measure to ascertain its weakness and its force. Greek Philosophy was a failure; but Greek Inquiry had immense results.
Methods had been tried and discarded; but great preparations
for the real Method had been made.
Moreover, Ethics had become elevated to the rank of a science.
In the Pagan Religion morality consisted in obeying the particular Gods: to propitiate their favor was the only needful art.
Greek Philosophy opened men's eyes to the importance of human conduct —to the importance of moral principles, which were
to stand in the place of propitiations. The great merit of this
is due to Socrates. He objected to propitiation as impious: he
insisted upon moral conduct as alone guiding man to happiness
here and hereafter.
But the Ethics of the Greeks were at the best narrow and
egoistical.  Morality, however exalted or comprehensive, only
seemed to embrace the individual; it was extremely incomplete
as regards the family; and had scarcely any suspicion of what
we call social relations. No Greek ever attained the sublimity
15




338       CONCLUSION OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY.
of such a point of view. The highest point he could attain was
to conduct himself according to just principles; he never troubled
himself with others. By the introduction of Christianity, Ethics
became Social, as well as Individual.
So far advanced are we in the right direction-so earnestly
are we engaged in the endeavor to perfect Social as well as Individual Ethics-that we are apt to look down upon the progress
of the Greeks as trivial; but it was immense, and in the history
of Humanity must ever occupy an honorable place.
Ancient Philosophy expired with Proclus. Those who came
after him, although styling themselves philosophers, were in
truth Religious Thinkers employing philosophical formulae. No
one endeavored to give a solution of the three great problems:
Whence came the world? What is the nature of God? What
is the nature of human knowledge? Argue, refine, divide, and
subdivide as they would, the Religious Thinkers only used Philosophy as a subsidiary process: for all the great problems, Faith
was their only instrument.
The succeeding Epochs are usually styled the Epochs of Christian Philosophy; yet Christian Philosophy is a misnomer. A
Christian may be also a Philosopher; but to talk of Christian
Philosophy is an abuse of language.  Christian Philosophy
means Christian Metaphysics; and that means the solution of
metaphysical problems upon Christian principles. Now what
are Christian Principles but the Doctrines revealed through Christ;
revealed because inaccessible to Reason; revealed and accepted
by Faith, because Reason is utterly incompetent?
So that metaphysical problems, the attempted solution of
which by Reason constitutes Philosophy, are solved by Faith,
and yet the name of Philosophy is retained! But the very essence of Philosophy consists in reasoning, as the essence of Religion is Faith. There cannot, consequently, be a Religious Philosophy: it is a contradiction in terms.  Philosophy may be
occupied about the same problems as Religion; but it employs
altogether different Methods, and depends on altogether different




CONCLUSION OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY.           339
principles. Religion may, and should, call in Philosophy to its
aid; but in so doing it assigns to Philosophy only the subordinate
office of illustrating, reconciling, or applying its dogmas. This
is not a Religious Philosophy; it is Religion and Philosophy,
the latter stripped of its boasted prerogative of deciding for itself,
and allowed only to employ itself in reconciling the decisions of
Religion and of Reason.
From these remarks it is obvious that our History, being a
narrative of the progress of Philosophy only, will not include
any detailed account of the so-called Christian Philosophy, because that is a subject strictly belonging to the History of Religion.
Once more we are to witness the mighty struggle and the sad
defeat; once more we are to watch the progress and development of that vast but ineffectual attempt which the sublime
audacity of man has for centuries renewed. Great intellects and
great hopes are once more to be reviewed; and the traces noted
which they have left upon that Desert whose only semblance of
vegetation is a mirage,-the Desert without fruit, without flower,
without habitation: arid, trackless, and silent, but vast, awful,
and fascinating. To trace the footsteps of the wanderers-to follow them on their gigantic journeys-to point again the moral of
"Poor Humanity's afflicted will,
Struggling in vain with ruthless destiny,"
to bring home to the convictions of men the humble, useful
truth that
"Wisdom is ofttimes nearer when we stoop,
Than when we soar,"
will be the object of our SECOND PART.








PART II.
MODERN PHILOSOPHY.








TRANSITION PERIOD.
FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
~ I. SCHOLASTICISM.
ALTHOUGH Modern Philosophy, rigorously defined, commences
with Bacon and Descartes, from whom a distinct development is
traceable, such as the purpose of this History requires, we must
not pass from Proclus to Bacon without at least a rapid glance
at the course of speculative activity during the intervening twelve
centuries. Mediaeval Philosophy has been much decried and
much exalted, but very little studied. So vast a subject demands
a patience and erudition few can bring to it. Fortunately for
me, whose knowledge of Scholasticism is limited to a superficial
acquaintance with some of the works of Aquinas, Abelard, and
Averroes, the nature of this History excludes any detailed exnmination of mediaeval speculations. Consulting my own resources
and the reader's interest, I find that the whole career of philosophic inquiry, from Proclus to Bacon, can be presented in three
typical figures: namely, ABELARD, as representing Scholasticism;
ALGAZZALI, as representing Arabian philosophy; and GIORDANO
BRUNO, as representing the philosophic struggle which overthrew
the authority of Aristotle and the Church. These three thinkers
I have studied more or less in their own writings; and the
reader will understand, therefore, that the following sketch is
wholly drawn from second-hand knowledge in all but these three
instances.
With the Alexandrians, Philosophy, as we have seen, became
absorbed in Religion. The Alexandrians were succeeded by the
Christian Fathers, who of course made Philosophy the handmaid




344             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
to Religion-ancilla Theologice. The whole philosophic effort
was to mediate between the dogmas of faith and the demands of
reason. Scholasticism derives its name from the schools opened
by Charlemagne for the prosecution of speculative studies, which
were only prosecuted in those days by the clergy, they alone
having leisure or inclination for such work. Thus did the Monasteries form the cradle of Modern Philosophy.*
As far as we can separate the philosophic from the theological
element, it displays itself in three capital manifestations: 1st, The
debate on Universals; 2d, The influence of the Arabians, especially in their introduction of the works of Aristotle; and 3d,
The rebellion against -Aristotle and all other authority, in the
proclamation of the independence of Reason.
There was no separation at all until the ninth century, when,
in the person of Scotus Erigena, Philosophy timidly claimed its
privilege. And even Scotus Erigena said, " There are not two
studies, one of philosophy and one of religion; true philosophy
is true religion, and true religion is true philosophy." In the
eleventh century appeared Roscellinus, who, in advocating the
philosophic doctrine of Nominalism, not only separated Philosophy from Religion, but placed it in direct antagonism with the
fundamental dogma of the Trinity. To understand this we must
remember that in those days there was a profound and even
servile submission to the double authority of the Church and the
Greek Philosophers,-a submission necessarily resulting from the
teaching of the Fathers, who always combined the two. The
works of Greek Philosophers were, however, but scantily known
through Latin translations and commentaries; but this perhaps
increased the eagerness to know them; and thus all doctrine be* Victor Cousin, Hist. de la Phil ii. 9eme Lecon. The various historians
of Philosophy, especially Ritter and Tennemann, should be consulted; but
the clearest and most readable work known to me is M. Rousselot's Etudes
sur la Philosophie dans le Moyen Age, 3 vols. 8vo. Paris, 1840. 1A. R6musat's
Abelard, 2 vols. Paris, 1845, by its analysis of Abelard's works, gives also a
very good idea of Scholastic speculation.




SCHOLASTICISM.                  345
came, in fact, erudition. To interpret Aristotle was to establish
philosophy. It is a common error to suppose that Aristotle at
once and always reigned despotically over the philosophy of the
Middle Ages. As M. Rousselot* remarks, there were two distinct characters in Aristotle then accepted: there was first the
Logician, whose word was law,-magister dixit,-whose Organon
was the Bible of the schools,-whose authority no one thought
of questioning; and there was also the Metaphysician, who, so
far from receiving the worship offered to the Logician, was persecuted, excommunicated, and burned, because his metaphysical
doctrine was thought to contain the fatal heresy of the unity of
substance.t  It was not until after Abelard, and owing to the
Arabian influence, that Aristotle passed-to use M. RWmusat's
happy phrase-from the consulship to the dictatorship of Philosophy.1
Plato taught Realism. He maintained the existence of Abstract Ideas, as Objects or Substances. Aristotle, on the contrary, taught that Abstract Ideas were nothing but abstractions;
general names, not general things. Early Scholasticism adopted
Realism; and when Roscellinus by subtle argumentation proved,
that genera and species were nothing more than logical constructions, general terms, flatus vocis, without corresponding essences,
it was soon evident that he was in antagonism with the dogma
of the Trinity. "That Universal which you call Trinity cannot
exist; and as the relations which unite these three divine persons
do not exist, the Trinity cannot exist. There is either one God
or three; if there is but one, he exists in a single person; if
there are three, there are three beings separate, distinct."
The consequence of such heresy may be foreseen. Roscellinus
was summoned before the Council of Soissons, and there forced
* Etudes sur la Philos. i. 178.
t Jourdain, in his erudite work, Becherches sur'age et l'origine des Traductions d'Aristote, has placed this condemnation of Aristotle beyond a
doubt.
Abelard, i. 316.
15*




346             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
publicly to recant. He escaped to England, and perished in
exile; but the seed he had sown fructified, and Nominalism afterwards became the reigning doctrine. The amount of verbal
quibbling and idle distinctions employed on this famous question
is only greater than that employed on other questions, because of
its greater importance. No one can form an adequate idea of
the fiivolity and wearisome prolixity of these Schoolmen without
opening one of their books; and even after having done so, it
wilt remain incomprehensible how sane and earnest intellects
could have contented themselves with such grinding of the air
in metaphysic mills, unless we understand the error which misled them. The error was in mistaking logical constructions for
truths, believing ideas to be the correlates of things, so that
whatever was discernible in the mental combination was necessarily true of external facts. The Schoolmen analyzed the elements of speech and thought with the pertinacious eagerness now
employed by chemists in analyzing the elements of bodies. This
error is the fundamental error, principium et fons, of all metaphysical speculation; and with an ill grace do metaphysicians
ridicule the follies of the Schoolmen, who only carried to excess
the metaphysical Method of unverified Deduction. It may be
true that Scholastic philosophy was for the most part a dispute
about words, but it is not for metaphysicians to cast the reproach; and the defenders of Scholasticism have an easy task
when they undertake to show that beneath these verbal disputes
lay the deepest problems of Ontology.
~ II. LIFE OF ABELARD.
The name of Abelard has been immortalized by association
with that of a noble woman. It is because Heloise loved him,
that posterity feels interested in him. M. Michelet indeed thinks
that to Abelard she owes her fame: "without his misfortunes
she would have remained obscure, unheard of;" and in one sense
this is true; but true it also is that, without her love, Abelard
would have long ago ceased to inspire any interest; for his was




LIFE OF ABELARD.                   347
essentially a shallow, selfish nature. His popularity was rapid,
loud, and scandalous. He was fitted for it, lived for it. But
many a greater name has faded from the memories of men;
many a once noisy reputation fails to awaken a single echo in
posterity. Apart from the consecration of passion and misfortune, there is little in his life to excite our sympathy. Viewed
in connection with Heloise he must always interest us; viewed
away from her, he presents the figure of a quick, vivacious, unscrupulous, intensely vain Frenchman. But, in several respects,
he represents the philosophic struggle of the twelfth century; and
in this light we may consider him.
He was born in Brittany in 1079, of a noble family, named
Berenger. The name of Abelard came to him later. His master laughingly noticed his superficial manner of passing over
some studies, filled as he was with others, and said, " When a
dog is well filled, he can do no more than lick the bacon." The
word to lick, in the corrupt Latin of that day, was bajare, and
Bajolardus became the cognomen of this "bacon-licking student"
among his comrades, which he converted into Habelardus, "se
vantant ainsi de posseder ce qu'on l'accusait de ne pouvoir prendre."* In the ancient writers the name is variously spelled, as
Abailardus, Abaielardus, Abaulardus, Abbajalarius, Baalaurdus,
Belardus, and in French as Abeillard, Abayelard, Abalard, Abaulard, Abaalary, Allebart, Abulard, Beillard, Baillard, Balard, and
even Esbaillart; which variations seem to imply that the old
French writers were as accurate in their spelling of proper names
as their descendants are in their use of English and German
names.
Abelard's father joined to his knightly accomplishments a taste
for literature, as literature was then understood; and this taste
* Abelard, par M. Charles de Remusat, Paris 1845, p. 13. This valuable
monograph contains the fullest biography of Abelard and the best analysis
of his works yet published. Indeed, before M. Cousin published the works
of AbeIard, in 1836, every account of the philosophy of this thinker was necessarily meagre and erroneous.




348             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
became so dominant in the mind of the youth, that he renounced
the career of arms altogether for that of learning. Dialectics
was the great science of that day, almost rivalling in importance
the Theology which it served and disturbed by turns. It was
an exercise of intellectual ingenuity, for which this youth manifested surprising aptitude. He travelled through various provinces disputing with all comers, like a knight-errant of philosophy, urged thereto by the goading desire of notoriety. This
love of notoriety was his curse through life. At the age of
twenty he came to Paris, hoping there to find a fitting opportunity of display-an arena for his powers as a disputant. He attended the lectures of William de Champeaux, the most renowned master of disputation, to whom students flocked from
all the cities of Europe. The new pupil soon excited attention.
The beauty of his person, the easy grace of his manner, his marvellous aptitude for learning, and still more marvellous facility of
expression, soon distinguished him from the rest. The master
grew proud of his pupil, loved him through his pride, and
doubtless looked on him as a successor. But it soon became
evident that the pupil, so quick at learning, did not sit there
merely to learn; he was waiting for some good opportunity of
display, waiting to attack his venerable master, whose secret
strength and weakness he had discovered. The opportunity
came; he rose up, and in the midst of all the students provoked
William de Champeaux to discussion, harassed, and finally vanquished him. Rage and astonishment agitated the students;
rage and terror the master. The students were indignant because they clearly saw Abelard's motive.
Abelard dates the origin of all his woes from this occasion,
when he created enmities which pursued him through life; and,
with a sophistication common to such natures, he attributes the
enmities to envy at his ability, instead of to the real,causes,
namely, his inordinate vanity and selfishness. For a time, indeed,
the rupture with his master seemed successful. Although only
two-and-twenty years of age, he established a school of Philos



LIFE OF ABELARD.                  349
ophy at Melun, which became numerously attended, and spread
his name far and wide. Emboldened by success, he removed
his school still nearer to Paris-to Corbeil-in order, as he
frankly tells us, that he might be more importunate to his old
master. But his rival was still powerful, aged in science and
respect. Intense application was necessary, and in the struggle
Abelard's overtasked energies gave way. He was commanded
by the physicians to shut up his school, and retire into the country for repose and fresh air.
In two years he returned to Paris, and saw with delight that
his reputation had not been weakened by absence, but that on the
contrary his scholars were more eager than ever. His old antagonist, William de Champeaux, had renounced the world, and
retired to a cloister, where he opened the school of Saint Victor,
afterwards so celebrated. His great reputation, although suffering from Abelard's attacks, drew crowds. One day, when the
audience was most numerous, he was startled by the appearance
of Abelard among the students, come, as he said, to learn rhetoric. William was troubled, but continued his lecture. Abelard was silent until the question of "Universals" was brought
forward, and then suddenly changing from a disciple to an antagonist, he harassed the old man with such rapidity and unexpectedness of assault, that William confessed himself defeated, and
retracted his opinion. That retractation was the death of his influence. His audience rapidly dwindled. No one would listen
to the minor points of Dialectics from one who confessed himself
beaten on the cardinal point of all. The disciples passed over
to the victor. When the combat is fierce between two lordly
stags, the hinds stand quietly by, watching the issue of the contest, and if their former lord and master, once followed and respected, is worsted, they all without hesitation pass over to the
conqueror, and henceforth follow him. Abelard's school became
acknowledged as pre-eminent; and, as if to give his triumph
greater emphasis, the professor to whom William de Champeaux
had resigned his phair, was either so intimidated by Abelard's




350             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
audacity, or so subjugated by his ability, that he offered his chair
to Abelard, and ranged himself among the disciples.
Abelard was not content even with this victory. Although
undisputed master in Dialectics, he could not hear of any other
teacher without envy. A certain Anselm taught Theology at
Laon with immense success; and this was enough to trouble
Abelard's repose; accordingly to Laon he went, ridiculed Anselm's style, laughed at the puerile admiration of the scholars,
and offered to surpass the master in the explanation of Scripture.
The scholars first laughed, then listened, and admired. Abelard
departed, having excited anarchy in the school, and anguish in
the heart of the old man.
His career, at this period, was brilliant. His reputation had
risen above that of every living man. His eloquence and subtlety charmed hundreds of serious students, who thronged beneath the shadows of the Cathedral in ceaseless disputation,
thinking more of success in dispute than of the truths involved.
M. Guizot estimates these students at not less than five thousand
-of course not all at the same time. Amidst these crowds,
Abelard might be seen moving with imposing haughtiness of
carriage, not without the careless indolence which success had
given; handsome, manly, gallant-looking, the object of incessant
admiration. His songs were sung in the streets, his arguments
were repeated in cloisters. The multitude reverentially made
way for him, as he passed; and from behind their window-curtains peeped the curious eyes of women. His name was carried
to every city in Europe. The Pope sent hearers to him. He
reigned, and he reigned alone.*
It was at this period that the charms and helpless position of
Heloise attracted his vanity and selfishness. He resolved to seduce her; resolved it, as he confesses, after mature deliberation.
He thought she would be an easy victim; and he who had lived
* " Cum jam me solum in mundo superesse philosophum sestimarem." —
Epist. i. p. 9.




LIFE OF ABELARD.                 351
in abhorrence of libertinage-scortorum immunditiam semper abhorrebam-felt that he had now attained such a position that he
might indulge himself with impunity. We are not here attributing hypothetic scoundrelism to Abelard; we are but repeating his own statements. "I thought, too," he adds, "that I
should the more easily gain the girl's consent, knowing as I did
to how great a degree she both possessed learning and loved it."
He tells us how he "sought an opportunity of bringing her into
familiar and daily intercourse with me, and so drawing her the
more easily to consent to my wishes. With this view I made a
proposal to her uncle, through certain of his friends, that he
should receive me as an inmate of his house, which was very near
to my school, on whatever terms of remuneration he chose;
alleging as my reason that I found the care of a household an
impediment to study, and its expense too burdensome." The
uncle, Fulbert, was prompted by avarice, and the prospect of
gaining instruction for his niece, to consent. He committed her
entirely to Abelard's charge, "in order that whenever I should
be at leisure from the school, whether by day or by night, I
might take the trouble of instructing her; and should I find her
negligent, use forcible compulsion. Hereupon I wondered at
the man's excessive simplicity, with no less amazement than if I
had beheld him intrust a lamb to the care of a famishing wolf;
for in thus placing the girl in my hands for me not only to teach,
but to use forcible coercion, what did he do but give full liberty
to my desires, and offer the opportunity, even had it not been
sought, seeing that, should enticement fail, I might use threats
and stripes in order to subdue her?"*
The crude brutality of this confession would induce us to
suppose it was a specimen of that strange illusion which often
makes reflective and analytic minds believe that their enthusiasms
and passions were calculations, had we not sufficient evidence,
throughout Abelard's life, of his intense selfishness and voracious
* See Epist. i.




352              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
vanity. Whatever the motive, the incident is curious; history
has no other such example of passionate devotion filling the mind
of a woman for a dialectician. It was dialectics he taught her;
since he could teach her nothing else. She was a much better
scholar than he; in many respects better read. She was perfect
mistress of Latin, and knew enough Greek and Hebrew to form
the basis of her future proficiency. He knew nothing of Greek
or Hebrew, although all his biographers, except M. Remusat, assumne that he knew them both; M. Michelet, even asserting that
he was the only man who did then know them.* In the study
of arid dialectics, then, must we imagine Abelard and Heloise
thrown together; and, in the daily communion of their minds,
passion ripened, steeped in that vague, dream-like, but intense
delight, produced by the contact of great intelligences; and thus,
as the Spanish translator of her letters says, " buscando siempre
con pretexto del estudio los parages mas retirados"-they sought
in the still air and countenance of delightful studies a solitude
more exquisite than any society. " The books were open before
us," says Abelard, " but we talked more of love than philosophy,
and kisses were more frequent than sentences."t
In spite of the prudential necessity for keeping this intrigue
secret, Abelard's truly French vanity overcame his prudence.
He had written love-songs to Heloise; and with the egotism of
a bad poet and indelicate lover, he was anxious for these songs
to be read by other eyes besides those for whom they were composed; anxious that other men should know his conquest.    His
* He knew a few terms current in the theological literature of the day, but
had he known more, his ostentatious vanity would have exhibited the knowledge on all occasions. He expressly declares, moreover, that he was forced
to read Greek authors in Latin versions. See Cousin's edition of the CEuvres
Inedites, p. 43; also Dialectica, p. 200, where the non-existence of Latin versions is given as the reason of his ignorance of what Aristotle says in his
Physics and Metaphysics.
t Epist. i. p. 11. He adds, with his usual crudity: " Et ssepius ad sinus
quam ad libros reducebantur manus." Madame Guizot excellently indicates
the distinction between his sensual descriptions and the chaster, though
more passionate, language of Heloise: " elle rappelle, mais ne ditaille point."




LIFE OF ABELARD.                   353
songs were soon bandied about the streets. All Paris was in
the secret of his intrigue. That which a delicate lover, out of
delicacy, and a sensible lover, out of prudence, would have hidden from the world, this coxcomb suffered to be profaned by
being bawled from idle and indifferent mouths.*
At length even Fulbert became aware of' what was passing
under his roof. A separation took place; but the lovers continued to meet in secret. Heloise soon found herself pregnant, and
Abelard arranged for her an escape to Brittany, where she resided
with his sister, and gave birth to a son. When Fulbert heard of
her flight, he was frantic with rage. Abelard came cringing to
him, imploring pardon, recalling to him how the greatest men
had been cast down by women, accused himself of treachery, and
offered the reparation of marriage provided it were kept secret;
because his marriage, if made known, would be an obstacle to
his rising in the Church, and the mitre already glimmered before
his ambitious eyes.   Fulbert consented.  But Heloise, with
womanly self-abnegation, would not consent. She would not
rob the world of its greatest luminary. " I should hate this marriage," she exclaimed, "because it would be an opprobrium and
a calamity." She recalled to Abelard various passages in Scripture and ancient writers, in which wives are accursed, pointing
out to him how impossible it would be for him to consecrate
himself to philosophy unless he were free; how could he study
amid the noises of children and domestic troubles of a household  how much more honorable it would be for her to sacrifice
herself to him! She would be his concubine. The more she
humiliated herself for him, the greater would be her claims upon
his love; and thus she would be no obstacle to his advancement,
no impediment to the free development of his genius.
* That this vanity and indelicacy are eminently French, though unhappily
not exclusively French, will be admitted by all who are conversant with the
life and literature of that remarkable people. It had not escaped the piercing gaze and healthy instincts of Moliere, who has an admirable passage on
this national peculiarity: see Arnolphe's monologue, act. iii. scene ii. of
L'Ecoke des Femmes.




354             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
"I call God to witness," she wrote many years afterwards,
"that if Augustus, the emperor of the world, had deemed me
worthy of his hand, and would have given me the universe for a
throne, the name of your concubine would have been more glorious to me than that of his empress: carius mihi et dignius videretur tua dici meretrix quam illins imperatrix."
Gladly would Abelard have profited by this sublime passion;
but he was a coward, and his heart trembled before Fulbert. He
therefore endeavored to answer her arguments; and she, finding
that his resolution was fixed-a resolution which he very characteristically calls a bit of stupidity, meam stultitiam-burst into
tears, and consented to the marriage, which was performed with
all secrecy. Fulbert and his servants, however, in violation of
their oath, divulged the secret. Whereupon Heloise boldly denied
that she was married. The scandal became great; but she persisted in her denials, and Fulbert drove her from the house with
reproaches. Abelard removed her to the nunnery of Argenteuil,
where she assumed the monastic dress, though without taking
the veil. Abelard furtively visited her.* Meanwhile Fulbert's
suspicions were roused, lest this seclusion in the nunnery should
be but the first step to her taking the veil, and so ridding Abelard of all impediment. Those were violent and brutal times, but
the vengeance of Fulbert startled even the Paris of those days
with horror. With his friends and accomplices, he surprised
Abelard sleeping, and there inflicted that atrocious mutilation,
which Origen in a moment of religious frenzy inflicted on himself.
In shame and anguish Abelard sought the refuge of a cloister.
He became a monk. But the intense selfishness of the man
would not permit him to renounce the world without also forcing
Heloise to renounce it. Obedient to his commands, she took the
* He adds " Nosti... quid ibi tecum mea libidinis egerit intemperantia
in quadam etiam parte ipsius refectorii. Nosti id impudentissime tune actum esse in tam reverendo loco et summa Virgini consecrato." —Epist. v.
p. 69.




PHILOSOPHY OF ABELARD.               355
veil; thus once again sacrificing herself to him whom she had
accepted as a husband with unselfish regret, and whom she abandoned in trembling, to devote herself henceforth without hope,
without faith, without love, to her divine husband.
The gates of the convent closed forever on that noble woman
whose story continues one of pure heroism to the last; but we
cannot pause to narrate it here. With her disappearance, the
great interest in Abelard disappears; we shall not therefore detail the various episodes of his subsequent career, taken up for
the most part with quarrels-first with the monks, whose dissoluteness he reproved, next with theologians, whose hatred he
roused by the "heresy" of reasoning. He was condemned publicly to retract; he was persecuted as a heretic; he had ventured
to introduce Rationalism,-or the explanation of the dogmas of
Faith by Reason,-and he suffered, as men always suffer for
novelties of doctrine. He founded the convent of Paraclete, of
which Heloise was the first abbess, and on the 21st of April, 1142,
he expired, aged sixty-three. " II vecut dans l'angoisse et mourut
dans l'humiliation," says M. de Remusat, "mais il eut de la gloire
et il fut aime."
~ III. PHILOSOPHY OF ABELARD.
It would not be difficult to fill a volume with the exposition of
Abelard's philosophy; indeed, in M. de Remusat's work a volume
and a quarter are devoted to the subject without exhausting it.
But the nature of this History, and the necessities of space,
equally force us to be very brief. Abelard's contributions to the
development of speculation may all be reduced to two points:
the question of Universals, and the systematic introduction of
Reason as an independent element in theology, capable not only
of explaining dogmas, but of giving dogmas of its own.
"The nature of genera and species has formed perhaps the
longest and most animated, and certainly the most abstract controversy which has ever agitated the human mind," says M. de
Remusat, who adds, "that it is also one which now seems the




356              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
least likely to have interested men so deeply."  The same will,
probably, one day be said of the question of Immaterialism and
Materialism, a logomachy as great, as animated, and as remote
from all practical results, as that of Universals, but which, from
its supposed relation to religious truths, has been made the great
controversy of the schools. In our day there are few speculators
who do not believe that important religious principles are indissolubly connected with the doctrine of an immaterial principle
superadded to, and in nowise identical with, the brain; and this
in spite of the indisputable fact that the early Christian Fathers
maintained the materiality not only of the soul, but of God himself;* in spite also of the many pious moderns of unimpeachable
orthodoxy who held, and hold, the doctrines stigmatized as Materialism, and who think with Occam: " Experimur enim quod
intelligimus et volumus et nolumus, et similes actus in nobis
habemus; sed quod illa sint e form& immateriali et incorruptibili non experimur, et omnis ratio ad hujus probationem assumpta
assumit aliquod dubium."t
Although, therefore, the intense feeling stirred by the dispute
respecting Universals appears incomprehensible to us, who consider the dispute to have been a logomachy, for the most part;
we may render intelligible to ourselves how such a dispute came
to be so important, by considering the importance now attached
to the dispute respecting an "immaterial principle." Idle or important, it was the dispute of the Middle Ages; and M. Cousin
is guilty of no exaggeration in saying "the whole Scholastic
philosophy issued out of a phrase in Porphyry as interpreted by
Boethius." Here is the passage: " Intentio Porphyrii est in hoc
opere facilem intellectum ad prsedicamenta proeparare, tractando
* Tertullian wrote a work expressly to combat the immaterialism of Plato
and Aristotle. One sentence will suffice to bear out what is said above respecting God: " Quis autem negabit Deum esse corpus, etsi Deus spiritus?"
M. Guizot, in his LeFons sur PHist. de la Civilisation en France, and M. Rousselot's Etudes sur la Philos. dans e Moyen Age, will furnish the reader with
other examples.
f We borrow the passage from Rousselot's Eudes, iii. 256.




PHILOSOPHY OF ABELARD.                357
de quinque rebus vel vocibus, genere scilicet, specie, differentia,
proprio et accidenti; quorum cognitio valet ad praedicamentorum
cognitionem."* In the phrase rebus vel vocibus he was understood to signify that things and words were mutually convertible;
to discourse of one or of the other was indifferent; and the question turned upon this point: Does the word Genus, or the word
Species, represent an actual something, existing externally,-or
is it a mere name which designates a certain collection of individuals? The former opinion was held until Roscellinus attacked
it, and brought forward the heresy of Nominalism with such
force of argument that, although the heresy was condemned, the
logic forced its way; and Abelard, when he attacked the doctrine
of Realism, taught by William de Champeaux, borrowed so much
of the Nominalist argument that until quite recently he has been
called a Nominalist himself. That he was not a pure Nominalist
is now clear; and M. Rousselot has even made out an ingenious
case for him as a Realist. But, in truth, he was entirely neither;
he was something of both; he was a Conceptualist. The peculiarity of his doctrine consists in the distinction of Matter and
Form applied to genus and species. " Every individual," he says
in a very explicit passage of the treatise De Generibus et Speciebus, printed by M. Cousin, " is composed of matter and form, i. e.
Socrates from the matter of Man, and the form of Socratity; so
Plato is of the same matter, namely that of man, but of different
form, namely that of Platonity; and so of all other individual
men. And just as the Socratity which formally constitutes Socrates is nowhere but in Socrates, so the essence of man which
sustains Socratity in Socrates, is nowhere but in Socrates. The
same of all other individuals. By species therefore I mean, not
that essence of man which alone is in Socrates, or in any other
individual, but, the whole collection which is formed of all the
* "The object of Porphyry in this work is to prepare the mind for the
easy understanding of the Predicaments, by treating of the fivet so
wordps namely, genus, species, difference, property, and accident; the
knowredge of which leads to the knowledge of the Predicaments."




358              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
individuals of the same nature. This whole collection, although
essentially multiple, by the Authorities is named one Species, one
Universal, one Nature; just as a nation, although composed of
many persons, is called one. Thus each particular essence of the
collection called Humanity is composed of matter and form,
namely the animal is matter, the form is however not one, but
many, i. e. rationality, morality, bipedality, and all the other substantial attributes.  And that which is said of man, namely that
the part of man which sustains Socratity is not essentially the
part which sustains Platonity, is true also of the Animal.* For
the Animal which in me is the form of Humanity, cannot essentially be elsewhere; but there is in it something not different
from the separate elements of individual animals. Hence, I call
Genus the multitude of animal essences which sustain the individual species of Animal: the multitude diversified by that which
forms Species. For this latter is only composed by a collection
of essences which sustain individual forms; Genus, on the contrary, is composed by a collection of the substantial differences
of different Species.... The particular essence which forms the
Genus Animal, results from a certain matter, essence of body,
and substantial forms, animation and sensibility, which can only
exist essentially there, although they take indifferently the forms
of all species of body. This union of essences produces the universal named Animal Nature."t
This passage will give the reader a taste of Abelard's quality
when he is least tiresome; from it we see clearly enough the kind
of reality which he attributed to general terms, in opposition to
the Nominalists, who taught that terms were only terms; he
said they were terms which expressed conceptions, and these con* We must subjoin the original: " Et sicut de homine dictum est, scilicet
quod illud hominis quod sustinet Socratitatem, illud essentialiter non sustinet Platonitatem, ita de animali. Nam illud animal quod formam humanitatis qune in me est, sustinet, illud essentialiter alibi non est, sed illi non
differens est et singulis materiis singulorum individuorum animalis."
t De Generibus et Speciebus, p. 524.




PHILOSOPHY OF ABELARD.              359
ceptions were based on realities: as when a multitude is conceived under the form of unity, linking together all the actual
resemblances existing between the individuals. This looks so
very like Realism, that M. Rousselot may be pardoned for having
argued at great length the paradoxical thesis of Abelard's being
a Realist; but a closer examination of the treatise from which
we have just cited a long passage, proves that Abelard did not
deceive himself in maintaining the Realist doctrine to be erroneous from his point of view. He maintained that genus and
species were not general essences existing essentially and integrally in the individuals, whose identity admitted of no other
diversity than that of individual modes, or accidents; which was
the doctrine of Realism; for, if this doctrine were true, the subject of these accidents, the substance of these modes being identical, every individual would possess the same substance, and
humanity would only be one man; thus Socrates being at
Athens, humanity would be at Athens; but Plato being at
Thebes, humanity must then either not be at Athens, or Plato
must not be humanity.
Let us quit here the question of Universals, to consider the
second characteristic of Abelard's philosophy. It was he who
gave the form if not the subject-matter of Scholasticism. It was
he who brought Logic as an independent power into the arena
of theological debate; a heresy which drew the terrors of the
Church upon him: Ponit in ccelum os suums et scrutatur alta
Dei, said St. Bernard, writing to the Pope; and the same St.
Bernard let fall the terrible accusation: " transgreditur fines quos
posuerunt patres nostri-he has gone beyond the limits set by
our forefathers!"-in all ages, in all nations, a mark of reprobation.
Supported, as he thought, by thousands of partisans, Abelard
assumed an attitude of offence, almost of disdain. Unconscious
of his real danger, he published the substance of his Lectures in
a work called Introductio ad Theologiam, in which he undertook
to demonstrate by Reason the dogmas of Faith, and promulgated




360              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
the then audacious opinion, that all dogmas should be presented
under a rational form. That this was very far from being acceptable, may be read not only in his condemnation, but also in
the passage of his Dialectica, where he says that his rivals declared it not permissible in a Christian to treat even of Dialectics, because Dialectics was not only incapable of instructing any
one in the faith, but disturbed and destroyed faith by the complication of its arguments.*
This commencement, feeble though it may have been, marks a
new epoch in the development of speculation. The struggle of
Reason against Authority, which began with Abelard, has not
yet terminated.  "My disciples," he says in his Introduction,
" asked me for arguments drawn from philosophy such as reason
demanded, begging me to instruct them that they might understand, and not merely repeat what was taught them; since no
one can believe any thing until he has first understood it; and it
is ridiculous to preach to others what neither teacher nor pupil
understand."
Not content with this revolutionary principle, Abelard further
"transgressed the limits of his forefathers" by the composition of
the treatise Sic et Nron,t the object of which was to cite the passages of Scripture and the Fathers pro and con. upon every important topic: this collocation of contradictory statements given
by the highest possible authorities was meant, as Abelard distinctly informs us, to train the mind to vigorous and healthy
doubt, in fulfilment of the injunction, " Seek, and ye shall find;
knock, and it shall be opened unto you."  "Dubitando enim ad
inquisitionem venimus; inquirendo veritatem percipimus; juxta
quod et Veritas ipsa Qucerite, inquit, invenietis; pulsate, et aperietur vobis."t Whatever his intention may have been, the re* Dialectica, p. 484.
t It is printed in Cousin's edition, but with omissions. The entire work
was published in Germany, 1841, under this title: Petri Abaelardi Sic et
Non; primum integrum ediderunt E. L. Henke et G. S. Lindenkohl.
t Page 17 of the edition just named.




ALGAZZALI.                    361
suit of such a work was clearly foreseen by theological teachers,
who regarded doubt as damnable, and would not tolerate it under
the plausible aspects of intellectual gymnastics, or the love of
seeking for truth. But theologians were unable to arrest the
development of speculation. Doubt began; disputation waxed
stronger; logic played like lambent flame around the most sacred
subjects; Scholasticism entered every city in Europe, and filled
it with subtle disputants.
During the centuries which succeeded, the question of Nominalism was constantly in debate; and besides it many others so
remote, and, to modern apprehensions, so frivolous, that few historians boast of more than superficial acquaintance with mediaeval
philosophy, and few mention it without scorn. To name but
one topic, what does the reader think of a debate, utrum Deus
intelligat omnia alia a se per ideas eorum, an aliter?  What
does he think of men wasting their energies in trying to convince
each other of the true process by which God conceived ideasdiscussing, with ardor and unmisgiving ingenuity, topics which
are necessarily beyond all possible demonstration? Nevertheless,
absurd as such discussions were, they have found, even in modern
times, legitimate successors; and the laborious futility of the
Schoolmen has been rivalled by the laborious futility of the German metaphysicians.
We are not here to follow step by step the long course of mediaeval speculation, but may pass at once to the Arabian Philosophy as illustrated in Algazzali.
~ III. ALGAZZALI.
In our ignorance of Arabian history, it would be presumptuous
to assert that, until the Greeks became known to them, the Arabs
had no philosophy at all of their own; but whatever they may
have had, we are only repeating their own avowal in asserting,
that after their acquaintance with the Grecian systems, all philosophical energy was devoted to the mastery and development
of those systems. The history of their philosophy is divided into
16




362             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
two parts: the first comprising the period of ancient thinkers,
the Greeks; the second comprising the efforts of the Mussulman
schools. The Greek schools were divided into two series, those
which preceded and those which succeeded Aristotle.* In the
first series there is scarcely a name familiar to our ears which
was not familiar to the Arabian philosophers, Orpheus and
Homer included. The Seven Sages are constantly alluded to.
Thales, Anaximenes, Heraclitus, in short all the great thinkers,
are expounded and commented on, not, according to M. Schmblders, with any historical or critical accuracy, but at any rate
sufficiently to show their acquaintance with Greek books. In
the series succeeding Aristotle they are more at home. They
translated every work they could procure, and studied with servile ingenuity to appropriate all the doctrines of the Stagirite.
Thus it is that Arabian Philosophy lies beside the sphere of
European development; although the Arabians played an important part in the development of European culture during the
Middle Ages, and Averroes and Avicenna were long regarded as
magistri, no sooner did Europe possess the originals from which
the Arabs learned, than they neglected these interpreters, and
interpreted for themselves.
The work which will form the basis of the present Section is
one which has the attraction of being entirely original-the history of a mind developing amid Arabian influences, and not the
mere reflex of Grecian thought. It is probably owing to the
originality of this treatise that it was never translated during the
Middle Ages, the translators of those days caring only for Greek
Philosophy; and thus, in spite of the high reputation of Algazzali,
the work was a closed book to all but Arabian scholars, until 1842,
when a learned German reprinted it with a translation into French.t
Algazzali, the Light of Islam and Pillar of the Mosque, who
* Schmolders, Essai sur les Ecoles Philosophiques chez les Arabes, p. 96.
t Essai sur les Ecoles Philosophiques chez les Arabes. Par M. Schmolders.
Paris, 1842. From my notice of this work in the Edinburgh Review, April,
1847, I have incorporated many passages in the present Section.




ALGAZZALI.                    363
under the names of Gazzali, Ghazail, and Algazel is frequently
mentioned by writers on Arabian Philosophy, and was at one
time made familiar to Europe by the attacks of his adversary
Averroes, was born in the city of Tous, A. D. 1508. He was
named Abou Hamed Mohammed, and his father was a dealer in
cotton-thread (gazzdl), from whence he drew his name. Losing
his father in early life, he was confided to the care of a Soufi.
The nearest approach to what is meant by a Soufi, is what we
mean by Mystic. The influence of this Soufi was great. No
sooner had the youth finished his studies, than he was appointed
professor of theology at Bagdad, where his eloquence achieved
such splendid success that all the Imams became his eager partisans. So great was the admiration he inspired, that the Mussulman sometimes said, "If all Islam were destroyed, it would
be but a slight loss, provided AlgazzaIi's work on the' Revivification of the Sciences of Religion' were preserved." It is this
work which M. Schmolders has translated. It bears so remarkable a resemblance to the Discours sur la Methode of Descartes,
that, had any translation of it existed in the days of Descartes,
every one would have cried out against the plagiarism.
Like Descartes, he begins with describing how he had in vain
interrogated every sect for an answer to the mysterious problems
which "disturbed him with a sense of things unknown;" and
how he finally resolved to discard all authority, and detach himself from the opinions which had been instilled into him during
the unsuspecting years of childhood. "I said to myself," he
proceeds, " My aim is simply to know the truth of things; consequently it is indispensable for me to ascertain what is knowledge. Now, it was evident to me that certain knowledge must be
that which explains the object to be known, in such a manner
that no doubt can remain, so that in future all error and conjecture respecting it must be impossible.  Not only would the
understanding then need no efforts to be convinced of certitude,
but security against error is in such close connection with knowledge, that even were an apparent proof of its falsehood to be




364             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
brought forward, it would cause no doubt, because no suspicion
of error would be possible. Thus, when I have acknowledged
ten to be more than three, if any one were to say,'On the contrary, three is more than ten; and to prove the truth of my
assertion, I will change this rod into a serpent:' and if he were
to change it, my conviction of his error would remain unshaken.
His manoeuvre would only produce in me admiration for his
ability. I should not doubt my own knowledge.
"Then was I convinced that knowledge which I did not possess in this manner, and respecting which I had not this certainty, could inspire me with neither confidence nor assurance;
and no knowledge without assurance deserves the name of
knowledge.
"Having examined the state of my own knowledge, I found it
divested of all that could be said to have these qualities, unless
perceptions of the senses and irrefragable principles were to be
considered such. I then said to myself, Now having fallen into
this despair, the only hope remaining of acquiring incontestable
convictions is by the perception of the senses, and by necessary
truths. Their evidence seemed to me indubitable.  I began,
however, to examine the objects of sensation and speculation, to
see if they could possibly admit of doubt. Then doubts crowded
upon me in such numbers that my incertitude became complete.
Whence results the confidence I have in sensible things? The
strongest of all our senses is sight; and yet, looking at a shadow
and perceiving it to be fixed and immovable, we judge it to be
deprived of movement; nevertheless, experience teaches us that,
when we return to the same place an hour after, the shadow is
displaced; for it does not vanish suddenly, but gradually, little
by little, so as never to be at rest. If we look at the stars, they
seem as small as money-pieces; but mathematical proofs convince
us they are larger than the earth. These and other things are
judged by the senses, but rejected by reason as false. I abandoned the senses, therefore, having seen all my confidence in
their truth shaken.




ALGAZZALI.                    365
"Perhaps," said I, " there is no assurance but in the notions of
Reason: that is to say, first principles, e. g. ten is more than
three: the same thing cannot have been created and yet have
existed from all eternity; to exist and not to exist at the same
time is impossible.
"Upon this the senses replied: What assurance have you that
your confidence in Reason is not of the same nature as your
confidence in us? When you relied on us, Reason stepped in
and gave us the lie; had not Reason been there, you would have
continued to rely on us. Well, may there not exist some other
judge superior to Reason, who, if he appeared, would refute the
judgments of Reason in the same way that Reason refuted us?
The non-appearance of such a judge is no proof of his non-existence."
These skeptical arguments Algazzali borrowed from the Grecian skeptics, and having borrowed them, he likewise borrowed
from Grecian mystics, of the Alexandrian school, the means of
escape from skepticism. He looked upon life as a dream.
" I strove in vain to answer the objections. And my difficulties increased when I came to reflect upon sleep. I said to myself, During sleep you give to visions a reality and consistence,
and you have no suspicion of their untruth. On awakening,
you are made aware that they were nothing but visions. What
assurance have you, that all you feel and know when awake, does
actually exist? It is all true as respects your condition at that
moment; but it is, nevertheless, possible that another condition
should present itself, which should be to your awakened state
that which your awakened state now is to your sleep; so that,
in respect to this higher condition, your waking is but sleep."
If such a superior condition be granted, Algazzali asks whether
we can ever attain to participation in it. He suspects that the
Ecstasy described by the Soufis must be the very condition. But
he finds himself philosophically unable to escape the consequences of skepticism: the skeptical arguments could only be
refuted by demonstrations; but demonstrations themselves must




366              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
be founded on first principles; if they are uncertain, no demonstration can be certain.
"I was thus forced to return to the admission of intellectual
notions as the basis of all certitude. This, however, was not by
systematic reasoning and accumulation of proofs, but by aflash
of light which God sent into my soul. For whoever imagines that
truth can only be rendered evident by proofs, places narrow limits
to the wide compassion of the Creator."
Thus we see Algazzali eluding skepticism just as the Alexandrians eluded it, taking refuge in faith. He then cast his eyes on
the various sects of the faithful, whom he ranged under four
classes:
I. The Dogmatists: those who ground their doctrine wholly
upon reason.
II. The Basttnis, or Allegorists: those who receive their doctrine from an Imam, and believe themselves sole possessors of truth.
III. The Philosophers: those who call themselves masters of
Logic and Demonstration.
IV. The Soufis: those who claim an immediate intuition, by
which they perceive the real manifestations of truth as ordinary
men perceive material phenomena.
These schools he resolved thoroughly to question. In the
writings of the Dogmatists he acknowledged that their aim was
realized; but their aim was not his aim: " Their aim," he says,
"is the preservation of the Faith from the alterations introduced
by heretics." But his object was philosophical, not theological;
so he turned from the Dogmatists to the Philosophers, studying
their works with intense ardor, convinced that he could not refute
them until he had thoroughly understood them. He did refute
them, entirely to his satisfaction;* and having done so, turned
to the Soufis, in whose writings he found a doctrine which required the union of action with speculation, in which virtue was
* In the ninth volume of the works of Averroes there is a treatise by Algazzali, Destructio Phiosojphorum, which contains his refutation of the philosophical schools.




ALGAZZLI.                    367
a guide to knowledge. The aim of the Soufis was to free the
mind from earthly considerations, to purify it from all passions,
to leave it only God as an object of meditation. The highest
truths were not to be reached by study, but by transport-by a
transformation of the soul during ecstasy. There is the same
difference between this higher order of truth and ordinary science, as between being healthy and knowing the definition of
health. To reach this state, it was necessary first to purify the
soul from all earthly desires, to extirpate from it all attachment
to the world, and.humbly direct the thoughts to our eternal
home.
"Reflecting on my situation, I found myself bound to this
world by a thousand ties, temptations assailing me on all sides.
I then examined my actions. The best were those relating to
instruction and education; and even there I saw myself given
up to unimportant sciences, all useless in another world. Reflecting on the aim of my teaching, I found it was not pure in the
sight of the Lord. I saw that all my efforts were directed towards the acquisition of glory to myself."
Thus did Philosophy lead him to a speculative Asceticism,
which calamity was shortly afterwards to transform into practical
Asceticism. One day, as he was about to lecture to a throng of
admiring auditors, his tongue refused utterance: he was dumb.
This seemed to him a visitation of God, a rebuke to his vanity,
which deeply afflicted him. He lost his appetite; he was fast sinking; physicians declared his recovery hopeless, unless he could
shake off the sadness which depressed him. He sought refuge in
contemplation of the Deity.
"Having distributed my wealth, I left Bagdad and retired into
Syria, where I remained two years in solitary struggle with my
soul, combating my passions and exercising myself in the purification of my heart, and in preparation for the other world."
He visited Jerusalem, and made a pilgrimage to Mecca, but at
length returned to Bagdad, urged thereto by " private affairs" and
the requests of his children, as he says, but more probably urged




368              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
thereto by his sense of failure, for he confesses not to have reached
the ecstatic stage. Occasional glimpses were all he could attain,
isolated moments of exaltation passing quickly away.
"Nevertheless, I did not despair of finally attaining this state.
Every time that any accident turned me fiom it, I endeavored
quickly to re-enter it. In this condition I remained ten years. In
my solitude there were revelations made to me which it is impossible for me to describe, or even indicate. Enough if, for the
reader's profit, I declare that the conviction was forced upon me
that the Soufis indubitably walked in the true paths of salvation.
Their way of life is the most beautiful, and their morals the
purest that can be conceived."
The first condition of Soufi purification is, that the novice
purge his heart of all that is not God. Prayers are the means.
The object is absorption in the Deity.
"From the very first, Soufis have such astonishing revelations
that they are enabled, while waking, to see visions of angels and
the souls of the prophets; they hear their voices, and receive their
favors. Afterwards a transport exalts them beyond the mere perception of forms, to a degree which exceeds all expression, and concerning which we cannot speak without employing language that
would sound blasphemous. In fact, some have gone so far as to
imagine themselves to be amalgamated with God, others identified
with him, and others to be associated with him.* All these are
sinful."
Algazzali refuses to enter more minutely into this subject; he
contents himself with the assertion that whoso knows not Ecstasy
knows prophetism only by name. And what is Prophetism?
The fourth stage in intellectual development. The first, or infantile stage, is that of pure Sensation; the second, which begins at
the age of seven, is that of Understanding; the third is Reason,
by means of which the intellect perceives the necessary, the possible, the absolute, and all those higher objects which transcend
* How characteristic this is of mysticism in all ages may be seen in the
delightful Hours with the Mystics, by Mr. R. A. Vaughan.




ALGAZZALI.                    369
the Understanding.* After this comes the fourth stage, when
another eye is opened, by which man perceives things hidden from
others-perceives all that will be-perceives things that escape
the perceptions of Reason, as the objects of Reason escape the
Understanding, and as the objects of Understanding escape the
sensitive faculty. This is Prophetism. Algazzali undertakes to
prove the existence of this faculty:
"Doubts respecting Prophetism must refer either to its possibility
or its reality. To prove its possibility it is only necessary to prove
that it belongs to the category of objects which cannot be regarded
as the products of intelligence: such, for example, as Astronomy or
Medicine. For whoso studies these sciences is aware that they
cannot be comprehended except by Divine inspiration, with the
assistance of God, and not by experience. Since there are astronomical indications which only appear once in a thousand years,
how could they be known by experience? From this argument it
is evident that it is very possible to perceive things which the
intelligence cannot conceive. And this is precisely one of the
properties of Prophetism, which has a myriad other properties;
but these others are only perceptible during ecstasy by those who
lead the life of the Soufis."
We are now in a position to judge of Soufism, which was not,
strictly speaking, a Philosophy, nor was it a Religion. No Mussulman, according to M. SchmSlders, ever regarded it as either.
It was simply a rule of life, carried into practice by a body of
men, similar to what in Europe would have been a monastic order.
The aim of Algazzali's treatise was something more than the
mere inculcation of Soufism, it was the endeavor to supply a
philosophical basis for the rule of life; in other words, an attempt
to reconcile Religion with Philosophy, or Philosophy with Religion; precisely analogous to that attempt which constitutes the
whole philosophic activity of Schblasticism. There were two
great epochs in the intellectual development of the Arabians: the
* Kant's three psychological elements, Sinnlichkeit, Verstand, Vernunft,
are here anticipated.
16*




370             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
preaching of Mahomet, and the conquest of Alexandria: the one
gave them a Religion, the other gave them a Philosophy. The
doctrines of the Koran were blended with those of the Neo-Platonists, and the result was that system of speculation known as
Arabian Philosophy; a system different in its details, but similar
in spirit and purpose to that known as Scholasticism, which
blended the doctrines of Christianity with those of Grecian speculators.
~ IV. REVIVAL OF LEARNING.
However similar in spirit, Scholasticism could of course only
accept, from the Arabian Philosophy, that portion which was derived from Greece, since Christianity necessarily replaced the Mahometan element. Europe was indebted to the Arabs for most of
the principal works of Aristotle; and although it has long been
the cue of historians and critics to speak contemptuously of the
Arabian translations-a contempt perfectly impartial, seeing that
the critics could read no Arabic-we are assured by M. Schmilders
that these translations were very careful, and critical. Through
the schools of Cordoba, Seville, Toledo, Valencia, Murcia, and
Almeria, the Greek writers penetrated everywhere.
With the revival of learning, after the fall of Constantinople
came fresh streams of Grecian influence. The works of Plato became generally known; under Marsilio Ficino-to whom we owe
the Latin translation of Plato —a school of Platonists was formed,
which continued to divide, with the school of Aristotle, the supremacy of Europe, under new forms, as before it had divided it
under the form of Realism. The effect of this influx of Grecian
influence, at a period when Philosophy was just emancipating
itself from the absolute authority of the Church, and proclaiming
the divine right of Reason to be heard on all rational topics, was to
transfer the allegiance from the Church to Antiquity. To have
suddenly cast off all authority would have been too violent a
* In many respects our best guide to Plato's meaning where he is most
obscure. It is printed in Bekker's edition.




REVIVAL OF LEARNING.               371
change; and it may on the whole be regarded as fortunate for
human development that Philosophy did so blindly accept the
new authority-one altogether human, yet without deep roots in
the life of the nation, without any external constituted power,
consequently very liable to disunion and disruption, and certain
to give way before the necessary insurgence of Reason insisting
on freedom.
There is something profoundly significant in the principle ot
Authority, when not exercised despotically, and something essentially anarchical in the principle of Liberty of Thought, when not
restrained within due limits. Both Authority and Liberty are
necessary principles, which only in misuse become paralyzing or
destructive. It may be made perfectly clear to the rational mind
that there can be no such thing as " liberty of private judgment"
in Mathematics, Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, or any other
science the truths of which have been established; the person
ignorant of these sciences does, and must, take upon trust the
statements made by those who are authorities; he cannot indulge
his "private judgment" on the matter, without forfeiting the respect of those who hear him. Does this mean that all men are
bound blindly to accept what astronomers and chemists assert?
No; to require such submission of the judgment, is to pass beyond
the principle of Authority, and assume that of Despotism. The
principle of Liberty assures entire freedom to intellectual activity,
warrants the control of Authority, incites men to control it by
submitting its positions to those elementary tests by which it was
itself originally constituted. If I have made a series of experiments
which have led to the disclosure of an important truth, your
liberty of private judgment is mere anarchy if it assert itself in
denying the truth simply out of your own preconceptions; but it
is healthy freedom if it assert itself in denying the truth after
having submitted my authority to its original tests (those experiments, namely, which gave it authority), and after detecting some
error in my experimentation, or some inaccuracy in my induction.
The authoritative statement of Sir Charles Bell, repeated by every




372                FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
other anatomist, respecting the separate functions of the anterior
and posterior columns of the spinal chord, was one which permitted
no liberty of private judgment, but did permit liberty of private
verification; and when M. Brown-Sequard repeated the original
experiments and proved the former conclusions to be erroneous,*
his authoritative statement replaced that of previous anatomists,
and will continue to replace it, until it has undergone a similar
defeat through the process of verification.
If this is a correct view, it will enable us to understand the
long continuance of Aristotle's authority, which coerced the
minds of men as the authority of one confessedly a master in his
art, and one whose positions would not easily be brought to the
test of verification. Hence, as Bayle says, the method employed
was first to prove every thesis by authority, and next by arguments; the proofs by authority were passages of Aristotle: the
arguments went to show that these passages, rightly interpreted,
meant what the thesis meant.
Other causes contributed to foster this reverence for Authority;
only one cause could effectually destroy it, and that was the rise
of positive Science, which by forcing men to verify every step
they took, led them into direct antagonism with the ancients,
and made them choose between the new truth and the old dogma.
As Campanella-one of the reforming thinkers-acutely saw,
"the reforms already made in philosophy must make us expect
its complete change; and whoever denies that the Christian
mind will surpass the Pagan mind, must also deny the existence
of the New World, the planets and the stars, the seas, the animals, the colonies, and the modern sects of the new cosmography."f It does not come within our purpose here to trace
the rise and development of Science; we must therefore pass at
once to Giordano Bruno, whom we have selected as the type of
the philosophical insurgents against the authority of Aristotle
and the Church.
* See lemoires de la Societe de Biologie. 1855.
t Quoted by M. Renouvier, Manuel de Philos. Moderne, p. 7.




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  373
~ V. GIORDANO BRUNO.*
On the 17th of February, 1600, a vast concourse of people was
assembled in the largest open space in Rome, gathered together
by the irresistible sympathy which men always feel with whatever is terrible and tragic in human existence. In the centre
stood a huge pile of fagots; from out its logs and branches rose
a stake. Crowding round the pile were eager and expectant
faces, men of various ages and of various characters, but all for
one moment united in a common feeling of malignant triumph.
Religion was about to be avenged: a heretic was coming to expiate on that spot the crime of open defiance to the dogmas proclaimed by the Church-the crime of teaching that the earth
moved, and that there was an infinity of worlds: the scoundrel!
the villain! the blasphemer! Among the crowd might be seen
monks of every description, especially Dominicans, who were
anxious to witness the punishment of an apostate from their
order; wealthy citizens were jostling ragged beggars,-young
and beauteous women, some of them with infants at their breasts,
were talking with their husbands and fathers,-and playing
about amidst the crowd, in all the heedlessness of childhood,
were a number of boys, squeezing their way, and running up
against scholars pale with study, and bearded soldiers glittering
with steel.
Whom does the crowd await? Giordano Bruno-the poet,
philosopher, and heretic-the teacher of Galileo's heresy-the
friend of Sir Philip Sidney, and open antagonist of Aristotle.
Questions pass rapidly to and fro among the crowd; exultation
is on every face, mingled with intense curiosity. Grave men
moralize on the power of Satan to pervert learning and talent to
evil: Oh, my friends, let us beware!-let us beware of learning!
let us beware of every thing!  Bystanders shake significant
heads. A hush comes over the crowd. The procession solemn* In this Section I have altered and abridged an essay of my own in the
British Quarterly Review.




374             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
ly advances, the soldiers peremptorily clearing the way for it.
"Look, there he is-there, in the centre!  How calm-how
haughty and stubborn!" (women whisper, "How handsome!")
His large eyes are turned towards us, serene, untroubled. His
face is placid, though so pale. They offer him the crucifix; he
turns aside his head-he refuses to kiss it!  "The heretic!"
They show him the image of Him who died upon the cross for
the sake of the living truth-he refuses the symbol! A yell
bursts from the multitude.
They chain him to the stake. He remains silent. Will he
not pray for mercy  Will he not recant? Now the last hour
is arrived-will he die in his obstinacy, when a little hypocrisy
would save him from so much agony? It is even so: he is stubborn, unalterable. They light the fagots; the branches crackle;
the flame ascends; the victim writhes-and now we see no more.
The smoke envelops him; but not a prayer, not a plaint, not a
single cry escapes him. In a little while the wind has scattered
the ashes of Giordano Bruno.
The martyrdom of Bruno has preserved his name from falling
into the same neglect as his writings. Most well-read men remember his name as that of one who, whatever his errors might
have been, perished a victim of intolerance. But the extreme
rarity of his works, aided by some other causes into which it is
needless here to enter, has, until lately, kept even the most curious from forming any acquaintance with them. The rarity of
the writings made them objects of bibliopolic luxury: they were
the black swans of literature. Three hundred florins were paid
for the Spaccio, in Holland, and thirty pounds in England.
Jacobi's mystical friend, Hamann, searched Italy and Germany
in vain for the dialogues De la Causa and De l'[nfinito. But
in 1830, Herr Wagner, after immense toil, brought out his valuable edition of the Italian works, and since then students have
been able to form some idea of the Neapolitan thinker.*
* Opere di Giordano Bruno, Nolano, ora per la prima volta raccolte e pubblicate da Adolfo Wagner. 2 vols., Leipzig, 1850




GIORDANO BRUNO.                   375
Giordano Bruno was born at Nola, in La Terra di Lavoro, a
few miles from Naples, and midway between Vesuvius and the
Mediterranean.* The date of his birth is fixed as 1550-that is
to say, ten years after the death of Copernicus,-whose system
he was to espouse with such ardor,-and ten years before the
birth of our own illustrious Bacon. Tasso well says:
" La terra
Simili a se gli abitator' produce;"
and Bruno was a true Neapolitan child-as ardent as its volcanic
soil, burning atmosphere, and dark thick wine (mangia guerra)
-as capricious as its varied climate. There was a restless energy which fitted him to become the preacher of a new crusade
-urging him to throw a haughty defiance in the face of every
authority in every country,-an energy which closed his wild
adventurous career at the stake lighted by the Inquisition. He
was also distinguished by a rich fancy, a varied humor, and a
chivalrous gallantry, which constantly remind us that the athlete
is an Italian, and an Italian of the sixteenth century. Stern as
was the struggle, he never allowed the grace of his nature to be
vanquished by its vehemence. He went forth as a preacher;
but it was a preacher young, handsome, gay, and worldly-as a
poet, not as a fanatic.
The first thing we hear of him is the adoption of the Doniinican's frock. In spite of his ardent temperament, so full of vigorous life, he shuts himself up in a cloister,-allured, probably, by
the very contrast which such a life offered to his own energetic
character. Bruno in a cloister has but two courses open to him:
either all that affluent energy will rush into some stern fanaticism, and, as in Loyola, find aliment in perpetual self-combat, and
in bending the wills of others to his purposes; or else his restless
spirit of inquiry, stimulated by avidity for glory, will startle and
irritate his superiors. It was not long ere the course was decided.
* For the biographic details I am mainly indebted to the valuable work of
M. Christian Bartholmess, entitled Jordano Bruno, 2 vols., Paris, 1848.




376            FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
He began to doubt the mystery of transubstantiation.  Nay
more: he not only threw doubt upon the dogmas of the Church,
he had also the audacity to attack the pillar of all faith, the great
authority of the age-Aristotle himself.  The natural consequences ensued-he was feared and persecuted. Unable to withstand his opponents, he fled. Casting aside the monkish robe,
which clothed him in what he thought a falsehood, he fled from
Italy at the very moment when Montaigne, having finished the
first part of his immortal Essays, entered it, to pay a visit to the
unhappy Tasso, then raving in an hospital.
Bruno was now an exile, but he was free; and the delight he
felt at his release may be read in several passages of his writings,
especially in the sonnet prefixed to L'Infinito:
"Uscito di prigione angusta e nera,
Ove tanti anni error stretto In' avvinse:
Qua lascio la catena, che mi cinse,
La man di mia nemica invida e fera," etc.
He was thirty years of age when he began his adventurous course
through Europe-to wage single-handed war against much of
the falsehood, folly, and corruption of his epoch. Like his great
prototype, Xenophanes, who wandered over Greece, a rhapsodist
of philosophy, striving to awaken mankind to a recognition of
the Deity whom they degraded by their dogmas, and like his
own unhappy rivals, Campanella and Vanini, Bruno became the
knight-errant of truth, ready to combat all comers in its cause.
His life was a battle without a victory. Persecuted in one country, he fled to another-everywhere sowing the seeds of revolt,
everywhere shaking the dynasty of received opinion. It was a
strange time,-to every earnest man, a sad and almost hopeless
time. The Church was in a pitiable condition-decaying from
within, and attacked from without. The lower clergy were degraded by ignorance, indolence, and sensuality; the prelates, if
more enlightened, were enlightened only as epicures and pedants,
swearing by the Gods of Greece and Rome, and laboriously imitating the sonorous roll of Ciceronian periods. The Reformation




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  377
had startled the world, especially the ecclesiastical world. The
Inquisition was vigilant and cruel; but among its very members
were skeptics. Skepticism, with a polish of hypocrisy, was the
general disease.  It penetrated almost everywhere-from the
cloister to the cardinal's palace. Skepticism, however, is only a
transitory disease. Men must have convictions. Accordingly,
in all ages, we see skepticism stimulating new reforms; and reformers were not wanting in the sixteenth century.  Of the
Lutheran movement it is needless here to speak. The sixteenth
century marks its place in history as the century of revolutions:
it not only broke the chain which bound Europe to Rome, it
also broke the chain which bound philosophy to Scholasticism
and Aristotle. It set human reason free; it proclaimed the liberty of thought and action. In the vanguard of its army, we
see Telesio, Campanella, and Bruno, men who must always excite
our admiration and our gratitude for their cause and for their
courage. They fell fighting for freedom of thought and utterance —the victims of a fanaticism the more odious because it was
not the rigor of belief, but of pretended belief. They fought in
those early days of the great struggle between science and prejudice, when Galileo was a heretic, and when the implacable
severity of dogmatism baptized in blood every new thought born
into the world.
One spirit is common to all these reformers, however various
their doctrines: that spirit is one of unhesitating opposition to
the dominant authority. It is the crisis of the Middle Ages —
the modern era dawns there. In the fifteenth century men were
occupied with the newly awakened treasures of ancient learning:
it was a century of erudition; the past was worshipped at the expense of the present. In art, in philosophy, and in religion, men
sought to restore the splendors of an earlier time. Brunelleschi,
Michael Angelo, Raphael, disdaining the types of Gothic art,
strove to recall once more the classic type. Marsilio Ficino,
Mirandola, Telesio, and Bruno, discarding the subtleties and disputes of Scholasticism, endeavored to reproduce Pythagoras,




378             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
Plato, and Plotinus. In religion, Luther and Calvin, avowedly
rising against Papal corruptions, labored to restore the Church
to its primitive simplicity. Thus the new era seemed retrograde.
It is often so. The recurrence to an earlier time is the preparation for a future. We cannot leap far, leaping fiom the spot
where we stand; we must step backwards a few paces to acquire
momentum.
Giordano Bruno ceaselessly attacked Aristotle. In so doing
he knew that he grappled with the Goliath of the Church. Aristotle was a synonym for reason. An anagram was made of his
name, "Aristoteles: iste sol erat."  His logic and physics, together with the Ptolemaic system of astronomy, were then considered as inseparable portions of the Christian creed. In 1624
-a quarter of a century after Bruno's martyrdom-the Parliament of Paris issued a decree banishing all who publicly maintained theses against Aristotle; and in 1629, at the urgent
remonstrance of the Sorbonne, decreed that to contradict the
principles of Aristotle was to contradict the Church! There is
an anecdote recorded somewhere of a student, who, having detected spots in the sun, communicated his discovery to a worthy
priest: "My son," replied the priest, "I have read Aristotle
many times, and I assure you there is nothing of the kind mentioned by him. Go rest in peace; and be certain that the spots
which you have seen are in your eyes, and not in the sun."
When Ramus solicited the permission of Beza to teach in Geneva, he was told, "the Genovese have decreed once for all, that
neither in logic, nor in any other branch of knowledge, will they
depart from the opinions of Aristotle-ne tantillum quidem ab
Aristotelis sentintid deflectere." It is well known that the Stagirite narrowly escaped being canonized as a Saint. Are you for
or against Aristotle? was the question of philosophy; and the
piquant aspect of this dplo~'osXsosjaXia is the fact that both parties were often ignorant of the real opinions of the Stagirite; attributing to him indeed doctrines the very reverse of what a more
ample knowledge of his writings has shown to have been his.




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  379
Bruno, as we said, took his stand opposite to the Aristotelians.
Pythagoras, Plato, and Plotinus were his teachers. Something
of temperament may have originated this; for Bruno undoubtedly belongs to that class of thinkers in whom logic is but the
handmaid of Imagination and Fancy. To him the Aristotle of
that age was antipathetic. The Aristotelians taught that the
world was finite, and the heavens incorruptible. Bruno declared
the world to be infinite, and subject to an eternal and universal
revolution. The Aristotelians proclaimed the immobility of the
earth: Bruno proclaimed its rotation.  Such open dissidence
could of course only enrage the party in power. It would have
been sufficiently audacious to promulgate such absurdities-horrenda prorsus absurdissima-as the rotation of the earth; but to
defy Aristotle and ridicule his logic, could only proceed from insanity, or impiety. So Bruno had to fly.
To Geneva he first directed his steps. But there the power
which had proved stronger than the partisans of Servetus, was
still dominant. He made his escape to Toulouse; there he
raised a storm among the Aristotelians, such as compelled him
to fly to Paris. Behold him then in Paris, the streets of which
were still slippery with the blood of the Eve of St. Bartholomew.
One expects to see him butchered without mercy; but, by some
good fortune, he obtains the favor of Henry III., who not only
permits him to lecture at the Sorbonne, but offers to admit him
as a salaried professor, if Bruno will but attend Mass. Is it not
strange that at a time when attendance at Mass was so serious a
matter,-when the echoes of that lugubrious cry, la Messe ou la
mort! which had resounded through those narrow murky streets,
must have been still ringing in men's ears,-Bruno, in spite of
his refusal, not only continued to lecture, but became exceedingly popular? Since Abelard had captivated the students of Paris
with his facile eloquence and startling novelties, no teacher had
been so enthusiastically received as Bruno. Young, handsome,
eloquent, and facetious, he charmed by his manner no less than
by his matter. Adopting by turns every form of address-rising




380             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
into the aerial altitudes of imagination, or descending into the
kennel of obscenity and buffoonery —now grave, prophet-like, and
impassioned-now fierce and controversial-now fanciful and
humorous-he threw aside all the monotony of professional
gravity, to speak to them as a man.  He did not on this
occasion venture openly to combat the prejudices and doctrines of the age; that was reserved for his second visit, after
he had learned in England to speak as became a free and earnest man.
To England let us follow him. On the misty banks of our
noble Thames, he was rudely initiated into the brutality of the
English character; but he was amply compensated by his reception at the Court of Elizabeth, where a friendly welcome awaited
all foreigners-especially Italians. Nor was his southern heart
cold to the exquisite beauty and incomparable grace of our women. England was worth visiting; and he had reason to refer
with pride to "questo paese Brittannico a cui doviamo la fedelta
ed amore ospitale." It was in England he published the greater
part of his Italian works. It was here perhaps that the serenest
part of his life was spent. Patronized by the Queen ("l'unica
Diana qual e tra voi, qual che tra gli astri il sole," as he calls
her), he had the glory and the happiness to call Sir Philip Sidney friend.
In the high communion of noble minds, in the interchange of
great thoughts and glorious aspirations, another than Bruno
might have been content to leave the world and all its errors in
peace; but he had that within him which would not suffer him
to be at rest. He could not let the world wag on its way, content to smile on its errors. He had a mission-without the cant
of a mission. He was a soldier, and had his battles to fight. In
the society of Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Fulke Greville, Dyer, Harvey,
and most probably of Antonio Perez and Shakspeare's Florio,
Bruno might have discussed with calmness every question of philosophy,-that is, had he been of an epicurean turn-had he not
been Bruno. As it was, lured by his passion for publicity-by




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  381
his vanity, no less than by his love of truth-he rushed into the
arena,
" Confident as is the falcon's flight."
If we attribute to him motives not altogether pure-if we see as
much ostentation as devotion in this conduct, let it be remembered, that in this life the great aims of humanity are worked
out by human means, wherein the impure and selfish are as much
vital elements as the noble. In the great mechanism there are
numberless trivial wheels, and littleness is often the accessory
spring of some heroic act. This is no concession to the school
of Rochefoucauld. That school makes the great mistake of attributing the splendor of the sun to its spots,-of deriving the
greatness of human nature from its littleness. A selfish impulse
will often mingle with the unselfish impulses which prompt an
heroic act. We have only to reflect on the numerous instances
of selfish impulse unaccompanied by any heroism, to be assured
that if selfishness and disinterestedness may be found conjoined
in the mingled woof of human nature, it in nowise alters the
fact of disinterestedness, it in nowise lessens the worthiness of
heroism. What philosophy is that which sees only vanity in
martyrdom, only love of applause in the daring proclamation of
truth? Gold without dross is not to be found in the earth; but
is it therefore copper?
Let us follow Bruno's course with other feelings than those of
a short-sighted philosophy. It was not very long after his arrival
in England (1583), that Leicester, then Chancellor of Oxford,
gave that splendid fte in honor of the County Palatine Albert
de Lasco, of which the annals of Oxford and the works of Bruno
have preserved some details.  In those days a foreigner was
"lionized" in a more grandiose style than modern Amphitryons
attempt. It was not deemed sufficient to ask the illustrious stranger to " breakfast;" there were no " dinners" given in public, or at
the club. The age of tournaments had passed away; but there
were still the public discussions, which were a sort of passage-ofarms between the knights of intellect. And such a tourney had




382               FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
Leicester prepared in honor of the Pole. Oxford called upon
her doughty men to brighten up their arms,-that is to say, to
shake the dust from their volumes of Aristotle,-and all comers
were challenged. Bruno stepped into the arena. Oxford chose
her best men to combat for Aristotle and Ptolemy. On that
cause her existence seemed to depend.    Her statutes declared
that the Bachelors and Masters of Arts who did not faithfully
follow Aristotle, were liable to a fine of five shillings for every
point of divergence, or for every fault committed against the
Organon. Bruno wittily called Oxford the widow of sound
learning-" la vedova di buone lettere."
The details of this "wit combat" are unknown to us. Bruno
declares that fifteen times did he stop the mouth of his pitiable
adversary, who could only reply by abuse.*   But there is considerableforfanterie about the Neapolitan, and such statements
must be received with caution. That he created a "sensation,"
we have no doubt; but his doctrines were sufficiently startling.
We also find him, on the strength of that success, soliciting permission of the Oxford Senate to profess openly. With his usual
arrogance, he styles himself, in this address, as a "doctor of a
more perfect theology, and professor of a purer wisdom," than
was there taught. Strange as it may appear, permission was
granted; probably because he had the patronage of Elizabeth.
He lectured on cosmology, and on the immortality of the soul:
a doctrine which he maintained, not upon the principles of Aristotle, but upon those of the Neo-Platonists, who regarded this
life as a brief struggle, a sort of agony of death, through which
the soul must pass ere it attains to the splendor of existence in
* " Andate in Oxonia e fatevi raccontar le cose intravenute al Nolano quando pubblicamente disputo con que' dottori in teologia in presenza del Principe Alasco Polacco, et altri de la nobilita inglese! Fatevi dire come si sapea
rispondere a gli argomenti, come resto per quindici sillogismi quindici volte
qual pulcino entro la stoppa quel povero dottor, che come il corifeo de 1' accademia ne puosero avanti in questa grave occasione! Fatevi dire con quanta
incivilita e discortesia procedea quel porco, e con quanta pazienza et umanita
quell' altro, che in fatto mostrava essere Napoletano nato et allevato sotto piu
benigno cielo!"-La Cena de Ie Ceneri: Opp. Ital. ii. 179.




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  383
the eternal and universal life. In the deep unquenchable desire
which is within us to unite ourselves with God, and to quit this
miserable sphere for the glorious regions of eternity, is the written conviction of our future existence. No doubt he preached
this doctrine with stirring eloquence; but it must have sounded
very heterodox in the ears of that wise conclave-styled by
Bruno "a constellation of pedants, whose ignorance, presumption, and rustic rudeness would have exhausted the patience of
Job"-and they soon put an end to his lectures.*
We have already intimated the protection which Elizabeth
accorded him, and which he repaid by adulation, extravagant
enough, but which was then the current style in speaking of
royalty; and it should not be forgotten that this praise of a
Protestant Queen was not among the least of his crimes in the
eyes of his accusers. Still, even Elizabeth could not protect a
heretic; and Bruno's audacious eloquence roused such opposition,
that he was forced to quit England. He returned to Paris, once
more to court the favor of the Quartier Latin. He obtained
permission to open a public disputation on the physics of Aristotle. For three successive days did this dispute continue, in
which the great questions of nature, the universe, and the rotation of the earth, were discussed. Bruno had thrown aside the
veil, and presented his opinions naked to the gaze. His impetuous onslaught upon established opinions, produced the natural
result: he was forced again to fly.
We next find him in Germany, carrying the spirit of innovation into its august universities. In July, 1586, he matriculated
as theologice doctor Romanensis, in the university of Marburg, in
Hesse; but permission to teach philosophy was refused him ob
arduas causas. Whereupon he insulted the Rector in his own
house, created a disturbance, and insisted that his name should
be struck off from the list of members of the University. He
set off for Wiirtemberg. His reception in this centre of Luther* Vide Cena de le Ceneri.




384             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
anism was so gratifying, that he styled Wiirtemberg the Athens
of Germany. " Your justice," he writes to the Senate, " has refused to listen to the insinuations circulated against my character
and my opinions. You have, with admirable impartiality, permitted me to attack with vehemence that philosophy of Aristotle
which you prize so highly." For two years did he teach there
with noisy popularity, yet on the whole with tolerable prudence,
in not speaking against the peculiar views of Lutheranism. He
even undertook a defence of Satan; but whether in that spirit
of pity which moved Burns, or whether in the spirit of buffoonery which delights to play with awful subjects, we have no means
of ascertaining. He did not offend his audience, in whatever
spirit he treated the subject.
Here, then, in Wiirtemberg, with admiring audiences and free
scope for discussion, one might fancy he would be at rest. Why
should he leave so enviable a position? Simply because he was
not a man to rest in ease and quiet. He was possessed with the
spirit of a reformer, and this urged him to carry his doctrines
into other cities. Characteristic of his audacity is the next step
he took. From Wiirtemberg he went to Prague; from the centre of Lutheranism to the centre of Catholicism! In this he had
reckoned too much on his own powers. He met with neither
sympathy nor support in Prague. He then passed on to Helmstadt, where his fame having preceded him, the Duke of Brunswick conferred upon him the honorable charge of educating the
hereditary Duke. Here again, if he had consented to remain
quiet, he might have been what the world calls "successful;"
but he was troubled with convictions-things so impedimental to
success!-and these drew down upon him a sentence of excommunication. He justified himself, indeed, and the sentence was
removed; but he was not suffered to remain in Helmstadt; so
he passed to Frankfort, and there in quiet, brief retirement, published three of his Latin works. Here a blank occurs in his annals. When next we hear of him he is at Padua.
After an absence of ten years, the wanderer returns to Italy.




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  385
In his restless course, he has traversed Switzerland, France, England, and Germany; his hand against every man, and every
man's hand against him. Heretic and innovator, he has irritated
the clergy without securing the protection of philosophers. He
has sought no protection but that of truth. That now he should
choose Padua above all places, must ever excite our astonishment. Padua, where Aristotle reigns supreme! Padua, which
is overshadowed by Venice and the Inquisition! Was he weary
of life, that he thus marched into the camp of his enemy? or
did he rely on the force of his convictions and the vigor of his
eloquence to triumph even in Padua? None can say. He came
-he taught-he fled. Venice received him,-but it was in her
terrible prison. Lovers of coincidences will find a piquant illustration in the fact, that at the very moment when Bruno was
thrown into prison, Galileo opened his course of mathematics at
Padua; and the six years in which Galileo occupied that mathematical chair, were the six years Bruno spent in miserable captivity.
Bruno's arrest was no sooner effected, than intimation of it
was sent to the Grand Inquisitor San Severina, at Rome, who
ordered that the prisoner should be sent to him, under escort, on
the first opportunity. Thomas Morosini presented himself before
the Savi of Venice, and demanded, in the name of his Eminence, that Bruno should be delivered up to him. " That man,"
said he, "is not only a heretic, but an heresiarch. He has written works in which he highly lauds the Queen of England and other
heretical princes. He has written diverse things touching religion,
which are contrary to the faith."  The Savi, for some reason or
other, declined to give up their prisoner, saying the matter was
too important for them to take a sudden resolution. Was this
mercy   Was it cruelty   In effect, it was cruelty; for Bruno
languished six years in the prisons of Venice, and only quitted
them to perish at the stake. Six long years of captivity-worse
than any death. To one so ardent, solitude itself was punishment.
He wanted to be among men, to combat, to argue, to live; and
he was condemned to the fearful solitudes of that prison, without
17




386             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
books, without paper, without friends. Such was the repose which
the weary wanderer found on his native soil.
His prison doors were at length opened, and he was removed
to Rome, there to undergo a tedious and fruitless examination.
Of what use was it to call upon him to retract his opinions?
The attempt to convince him was more rational; but it failed.
The tiresome debate was needlessly prolonged. Finding him
insensible to their threats and to their logic, they brought him,
on the 9th of February, to the palace of San Severino; and
there, in the presence of the cardinals and most illustrious theologians, he was forced to kneel and receive the sentence of excommunication. That sentence passed, he was handed over to
the secular authorities, with a recommendation of a "punishment as merciful as possible, and without effusion of blood"-the
ut quam clementissime et citra, sanguinis effasionem punireturthe atrocious formula for burning alive.
Calm and dignified was the bearing of the victim during the
whole of this scene. It impressed even his persecutors. On
hearing his sentence, one phrase alone disturbed the unalterable
serenity of his demeanor. Raising his head with haughty superiority, he said, "I suspect you pronounce this sentence with
more fear than I receive it." A delay of one week was accorded
to him, in the expectation that fear might force a retractation;
but the week expired, and Bruno remained immovable. He perished at the stake; but he died in the martyr spirit, self-sustained and silent, welcoming death as the appointed passage to
a higher life.
" Fendo i cieli e a 1' infinito m' ergo."
Bruno perished, the victim of intolerance. It is impossible to
read of such a punishment without strong indignation and disgust. There is, indeed, no page in the annals of mankind which
we would more willingly blot out, than those upon which fanaticism has written its bloody history. Frivolous as have often
been the pretexts for shedding blood, none are more abhorrent
to us than those founded upoa religious differences. Surely the




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  387
question of religion is awful enough in itself! Men have the
deepest possible interest in ascertaining the truth of it; and if
they cannot read the problem aright by the light of their own
convictions, will it be made more legible by the light of an autoda-f? Tolerance is still far from being a general virtue; but
what scenes of struggle, of violence, and of persecution, has the
world passed through, before even the present modicum of tolerance could be gained! In the sixteenth century, free thought
was a crime. The wisest men were bitterly intolerant; the
mildest, cruel. Campanella tells us that he was fifty times imprisoned, and seven times put to the torture, for daring to think
otherwise than those in power. It was, indeed, the age of persecution. That which made it so bloody, was the vehemence of
the struggle between the old world and the new-between
thought and established dogma-between science and tradition.
In every part of Europe-in Rome itself-men uprose to utter
their new doctrines, and to shake off the chains which enslaved
human intellect. It was the first great crisis in modern history,
and we read its progress by the bonfires lighted in every town.
The glare of the stake reddened a sky illumined by the fair auroral light of Science.
Did Bruno deserve to die? According to the notions of that
age, he certainly did; though historians have, singularly enough,
puzzled themselves in the search after an adequate motive for so
severe a punishment. He had praised heretical princes; he had
reasoned philosophically on matters of faith-properly the subjects of theology; he had proclaimed liberty of thought, and investigation; he had disputed the infallibility of the Church in
science; he had propagated such heresies as the rotation of the
earth, and the infinity of worlds; he had refused to attend Mass;
he had repeated many buffooneries then circulating, which threw
contempt upon sacred things; finally, he had taught a system
of Pantheism, which was altogether opposed to Christianity.
He had done all this; and whoever knows the sixteenth century,
will see that such an innovator had no chance of.escape. Ac



388             FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
cordingly, the flames (as Scioppius sarcastically wrote in describing the execution to a friend) "carried him to those worlds which
he imagined."
"As men die, so they walk among posterity," is the felicitous
remark of Moncktdn Milnes; and Bruno, like many other men, is
better remembered for his death than for any thing he did while
living. The flames which consumed his body have embalmed
his name. He knew it would be so —" La morte d' un secolo fa
vivo in tutti gli altri."
Considered as a system of philosophy, we cannot hesitate in
saying that Bruno's has only an historical, not an intrinsic value.
Its condemnation is written in the fact of its neglect. But taken
historically, his works are very curious, and still more so when
we read them with a biographical interest; for they not only
illustrate the epoch, but exhibit the man-exhibit his impetuosity, recklessness, vanity, imagination, buffoonery, his thoroughly
Neapolitan character, and his sincere love of truth. Those who
wish to see grave subjects treated with dignity, will object to the
license he allows himself, and will have no tolerance for the bad
taste he so often displays. But we should rather look upon these
works as the rapid productions of a restless athlete-as the improvisations of a full, ardent, but irregular mind, in an age when
taste was less fastidious than it has since become. If Bruno
mingled buffooneries and obscenities with grave and weighty
topics, he therein only follows the general license of that age;
and we must extend to him the same forgiveness as to Bembo,
Ariosto, Tansillo, and the rest. Plato himself is not wholly exempt from the same defect.
In adopting the form of dialogue, Bruno also followed the
taste of his age. It is a form eminently suited to polemical subjects; and all his works were polemical. It enabled him to ridicule by turns the pedants, philosophers, and theologians; and
to enunciate certain doctrines which even his temerity would
have shrunk from, had he not been able to place them in the
mouth of another. He makes his dialogues far more entertain



GIORDANO BRUNO.                       389
ing than works of metaphysics usually are; and this he does by
digressions, by ridicule, by eloquence, and a liberal introduction
of sonnets. Sometimes his very vivacity becomes wearisome.
The reader is stunned and bewildered by the remorseless torrent
of substantives and epithets which pours from his too prolific
pen. There is nobody to rival him, but Rabelais, in this flux of
words.*   His great butts are the clergy, and the philosophers.
He reproaches the former with ignorance, avarice, hypocrisy, and
the desire to stifle inquiry and prolong the reign of ignorance.
The philosophers he reproaches with blind adherence to authority, with stupid reverence for Aristotle and Ptolemy, and with
slavish imitation of antiquity. It should be observed that he
does not so much decry Aristotle, as the idolatry of Aristotle.t
Against the pedantry of that pedantic age he is always hurling
his thunders. " If," says he, in one place, characterizing the
pedant, "he laughs, he calls himself Democritus; if he weeps, it
is with Heraclitus; when he argues, he is Aristotle; when he
combines chimeras, he is Plato; when he stutters, he is Demosthenes." That Bruno's scorn sprang from no misology, -his own
varied erudition proves. But while he studied the ancients to
extract from them such eternal truths as were buried amidst a
mass of error, they, the pedants, only studied how to deck themselves in borrowed plumes.
Turning from manner to matter, -we must assign to Bruno a
place in the history of philosophy, as a successor of the NeoPlatonists, and the precursor of Spinoza, Descartes, Leibnitz, and
* To give the reader a taste of this quality, we will cite a sentence from
the dedicatory epistle to Gli Eroici Furori: " Che spettacolo, o Dio buono!
pii vile e ignobile puo presentarsi ad un occhio di terso sentimento, che un
uomo cogitabundo, afflitto, tormentato, triste, maninconioso, per divenir or
freddo, or caldo, or fervente, or tremante, or pallido, or rosso, or in mina di
perplesso, or in atto di risoluto, un, che spende il miglior intervallo di tempo
destillando 1' elixir del cervello con mettere scritto e sigillar in pubblici monumenti, quelle continue torture, que' gravi tormenti, que' razionali discorsi,
que' fatuosi pensieri, e quelli amarissimi studi, destinati sotto la tirannide
d' una indegna imbecille stolta e sozza sporcaria?" Thus it continues for
some fifty lines more!-Opp. Ital. ii. 299.
t Vide Opp. Ital. ii. 67, where this is explicitly stated.




390              FROMt PROCLUS TO BACON.
Schelling. That Spinoza and Descartes were actually conversant
with the writings of Giordano Bruno, does not distinctly appear.
Yet it is not to be disputed that Bruno anticipated Spinoza
in his conception of the immanence of the Deity, in his famous
natura naturans and natura naturata, and in his pantheistic
theory of evolution. He also anticipated Descartes' famous criterium of truth, viz. that whatever is clear and evident to the
mind, and does not admit of contradiction, must be true; and in
his proclamation of Doubt as opposed to Authority, he thus insists upon Doubt as the starting-point: " Chi vuol perfettamente
giudicare deve saper spogliarsi de la consuetudine di credere, deve' una e 1' altre contradittoria esistimare egualmente possibile, e
dismettere afatto quell' affezione di cui e imbibeto da nativitd."*
Leibnitz was avowedly acquainted with Bruno's works, and derived therefrom his theory of monads. Schelling makes no secret
of his obligations.
There is another merit in Bruno which should not be overlooked, that, namely, of giving a strong impulse to the study of
Nature. Occupied with Syllogisms about entities and quiddities,
the philosophy of the Middle Ages had missed the great truth
that "man is the minister and interpreter of nature."  Philosophy taught that the interpretation could proceed only from
within; that men were to look into their own minds to analyze,
subdivide, and classify their own ideas, instead of looking forth
into Nature, and patiently observing her processes.t Bruno was
one of the first to call men out into the free air. With his poetical instinct, he naturally looked to Nature as the great book for
man to read. He deified Nature; and looked upon the Universe
as the garment of God, as the incarnation of the divine activity.
Let not this be misunderstood, however. If Bruno embraced
* De' Infinito Universo e Mondi: Opp. Ital. ii. 84.
t It is of them Telesio energetically says: " Sed veluti cum Deo de sapientia contendentes decertantesque, mundi ipsius principia et causas ratione inquirere ausi, et qus non invenerant, inventa ea sibi esse existimantes, volentesque, veluti suo arbitratu, mundum affluxere."-De Rerum Naturi in
Proaem.




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  391
the Copernican theory, and combated the general physics of his
day, he is not, on that account, to be mistaken for a man of scientific Method. He espoused the correct view of the earth's
sphericity and rotation; but he did so on the faith of his metaphysical theories, not on rigorous induction.
Bruno's creed was Pantheism. God was the Infinite Intelligence, the Cause of Causes, the Principle of all life and mind;
the great Activity, whose action we name the Universe. But
God did not create the universe; he informed it with life-with
being. He is the universe; but only as the cause is the effect,
sustaining it, causing it, but not limited by it. He is self-existing, yet so essentially active as incessantly to manifest himself as
a Cause. Between the supreme Being and the inferior beings
dependent upon him, there is this distinction: He is absolutely
simple, without parts. He is one whole, identical and universal;
whereas the others are mere individual parts, distinct from the
great Whole. Above and beyond the visible universe there is
an Infinite Invisible,-an immovable, unalterable Identity, which
rules over all diversity. This Being of Beings, this Unity of
Unities, is God: "Deus est monadum  monas, nempe entium
entitas."
Bruno says, that although it is impossible to conceive nature
separated from God, we can conceive God separated from nature.
The infinite Being is the essential centre and substance of the
universe, but he is above the essence and substance of all things:
he is superessentialis, supersubstantialis. Thus we cannot conceive a thought independent of a mind, but we can conceive a
mind apart from any one thought. The universe is a thought
of God's mind-nay more, it is the infinite activity of his mind.
To suppose the world finite is to limit his power. "Wherefore
should we imagine that the Divine activity (la divina efficacia)
is idle? Wherefore should we say that the Divine goodness,
which can communicate itself ad infinitum, and infinitely diffuse
itself, is willing to restrict itself? Why should his infinite capacity be frustrated-defrauded of its possibility to create infinite




392              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
worlds? And why should we deface the excellence of the Divine image, which should rather reflect itself in an infinite mirror,
as his nature is infinite and immense?"*
Bruno admits the existence of only one intelligence, and that
is God. Est Deus in nobis. This intelligence, which is perfect
in God, is less perfect in inferior spirits; still less so in man;
more and more imperfect in the lower gradations of created beings. But all these differences are differences of degree, not of
kind. The inferior order of beings do not understand themselves, but they have a sort of language. In the superior orders
of beings, intelligence arrives at the point of self-consciousnessthey understand themselves, and those below them. Man, who
occupies the middle position in the hierarchy of creation, is capable of contemplating every phasis of life. He sees God above
him-he sees around him traces of the divine activity. These
traces, which attest the immutable order of the universe, constitute
the soul of the world. To collect them, and connect them with
the Being whence they issue, is the noblest function of the human
mind. Bruno further teaches that, in proportion as man labors
in this direction, he discovers that these traces, spread abroad in
nature, do not differ from the ideas which exist in his own mind.f
He thus arrives at the perception of the identity between the
soul of the world, and his own soul, both as reflections of the Divine intelligence. He is thus led to perceive the identity of
Subject and Object, of Thought and Being.
Such is the faint outline of a doctrine, to preach which, Bruno
became a homeless wanderer and a martyr; as he loftily says,
"Con questa filosofia 1' anima mi s' aggrandisce, e mi si magnifica V intelletto."  If not original, this doctrine has at any rate
the merit of poetical grandeur. In it deep thoughts, wrestling
* De l' Infinito: Opp. Ital. ii. 24.
t " ELP.: What is the purpose of the senses?-FIL: Solely to excite the
reason; to indicate the truth, but not to judge of it. Truth is in the sensible object as in a mirror; in the reason, as a matter of argument; in the
intellect, as a principle and conclusion; but in the mind it has its true and
proper form."-De l' Infinito, p. 18.




GIORDANO BRUNO.                      393
with imperfect language, do get some sort of utterance. As a
system, it is more imaginative than logical; but to many minds
it would be all the more acceptable on that account. Coleridge
used to say, and with truth, that imagination was the greatest
faculty of the philosopher; and Bruno said, "Philosophi sunt
quodammodo pictores atque poetae...        Non est philosophus
nisi fingit et pingit."  Little as the dull man of science may be
aware of it, the great faculty of imagination is indispensable even
to his science: it is the great telescope with which we look into
the infinite. But in metaphysics imagination plays a still greater
part: it there reigns as a queen.
The works of Bruno are mostly in Italian, Latin having been
happily reserved by him for the logical treatises. The volumes
which we owe to the honorable diligence and love of philosophy
of Adolph Wagner, open with the comedy, II Candelajo, which
was adapted to the French stage under the title of Boniface le
Pedant, from which Cyrano de Bergerac took his Pedant Joue,
-a piece which in its turn was plundered by Moliere, who, with
charming wit and candor, avows it: "Ces deux scenes (in Cyrano) etaient bonnes; elles m'appartenaient de plein droit; on
reprend son bien partout ou on le trouve."*      According to
* This is, perhaps, the wittiest of all the variations of the " pereant male
qui ante nos nostra dixissent." The Chevalier D'Aceilly's version is worth
citing:
" Dis-je quelque chose assez belle?
L'antiquit6 tout en cervelle
Pretend l'avoir dite avant moi.
C'est une plaisante donzelle!
Que ne venait-elle apres moi?
J'aurais dit la chose avant elle!"
While on this subject, we cannot resist Piron's lines;
"Ils ont dit, il est vrai, presque tout ce qu'on pense.
Leurs ecrits sont des vols qu'ils nons ont faits d'avance.
Mais le remede est simple; il faut faire comme eux,
ls nous ont derobes; derobons nos neveux.
Un demon triomphant m'6elve a cet emploi:
Malheur aux 6crivains qui viendront apres moi!"
La Metromanie.
AL




394             FROM PROCLUS TO BACONo
Charles Nodier, Moliere was indebted to Bruno for several
scenes; but it is difficult to settle questions of plagiarism. Bruno's
comedy is long, full of absurd incidents and Neapolitan buffoonery, and might have suggested a good deal to such a prolific
mind as Moliere's. In it he has exhibited " the amorousness of
one old man named Bonifacio, the sordid avarice of another
named Bartolomeo, and the pedantry, not less sordid, of a third
named Manfurio."  Ladies of vacillating virtue, soldiers, sailors,
and scamps concert together to deceive these three old men, and
wring money fiom their sensuality, their avarice, and their superstition. Bonifacio, desperately in love with Vittoria, is nevertheless alarmed at the enormous expense necessary to make his
addresses acceptable. He had recourse to Scaramure, a reputed
magician, who sells him a wax figure, which he is to melt, and
thus melt the obdurate heart of his fair one. After a succession
of disasters, Bonifacio is seized by pretended police, who force
from him a heavy ransom. Bartolomeo becomes the dupe of
Cencio, an impostor, who sells him a receipt for making gold.
Manfurio, the pedant, is beaten, robbed, and ridiculed throughout. The sensualism and niggardliness of Bonifacio, and the
pedantry of Manfurio, are hit off with true comic spirit; and the
dialogue, though rambling and diffuse, is enlivened by lazzi-not
always the most decent, it is true-and crowded with proverbs.
Dramatic art there is none: the persons come on and talk; they
are succeeded by fresh actors, who, having talked, also retire to
give place to others. The whole play leaves a very confused impression. The hits at alchemy and pedantry were, doubtless,
highly relished in those days.
It is very strange to pass from this comedy to the work which
succeeds it in Wagner's edition, La Cena de le Ceneri. In five
dialogues he combats the hypothesis of the world's immobility;
proclaims the infinity of the universe, and warns us against seeking its centre or circumference. Hle enlarges on the difference
between appearances and reality in celestial phenomena; argues
that our globe is made of the same substance as the other plan



G1IORDANO BRUNO.                     395
ets, and that every thing which is, is living, so that the world
may be likened to a huge animal.*        In this work he also answers his objectors, who bring against his system the authority
of Scripture, exactly in the same way as modern geologists answer the same objection, viz. by declaring that the revelation in
the Bible was a moral not a physical revelation.  It did not pretend to teach science, but, on the contrary, adopted ordinary
notions, and expressed itself in the language intelligible to the
vulgar.t  In this work there are some digressions more than
usually interesting to us, because they refer to the social condition of England during Elizabeth's reign.
The two works, De la CLasa and De 1' Infinito, contain the
most matured and connected exposition of his philosophical opinions.  As our space will not admit of an analysis, we must refer
to that amply given by M. Bartholmess.t     The Spaccio de la
Bestia Trionfante is the most celebrated of all his writings.  It
was translated by Toland, in 1713, who printed only a very few
copies, as if wishing it to fall into the hands of only a few choice
readers.  The very title has been a sad puzzle to the world, and
has led to the strangest suppositions. The "Triumphant Beast,"
which Bruno undertakes to expel, is none other than this: ancient astronomy disfigured the heavens with animals as constellations, and under guise of expelling these, he attacks the great
beast (superstition) whose predominance causes men to believe
that the stars influence human affairs.  In his Cabala del Cavallo Pegaseo, he sarcastically calls the ass " la bestia trionfante
viva," and indites a sonnet in praise of that respectable quadrupec:
* An idea borrowed from Plato, who, in the Timceus, says, OriVrw oUv JS
Kara Xoybv TOV elt6ra &T XiVysuv 7r6PtE rov K6cyov u psov CvXo v'ssPoV To rTj aEXne0~ia
Sta riiv ro O6eoV yevtrOat 7rp6rotav.-p. 26, ed. Bekker. Compare also Politicus,
p. 273. Bruno may have taken this directly from Plato, or he might have
learned it from the work of his countryman, Telesio, De Rerumz Natura.
t "Secondo il senso volgare et ordinario modo di comprendere e parlare."
The whole of the early portion of Dialogue 4 (in which this distinction is
maintained) is worth consulting.-Opere, i. 172 sq.:. Vol. ii. pp. 128-154.




396              FROM PROCLUS TO BACON.
" Oh sant' asinita, sant' ignoranza,
Santa stoltizia, e pia divozione,
Qual sola puoi far 1' anima si buone
Ch' uman ingegno e studio non l'avanza 1" etc.
The Spaccio is an attack upon the superstitions of the day,-a
war against ignorance, and "that orthodoxy without morality,
and without belief, which is the ruin of all justice and virtue."
Morality, Bruno fancifully calls "the astronomy of the heart;"
but did not even Bacon call it "the Georgics of the mind "
The Spaccio is a strange medley of learning, imagination, and
buffoonery; and on the whole, perhaps the most tiresome of all
his writings.  M. Bartholmess, whose admiration for Bruno
greatly exceeds our own, says of it: "The mythology and symbolism of the ancients is there employed with as much tact as
erudition. The fiction that the modern world is still governed
by Jupiter and the court of Olympus, the mixture of reminiscences of chivalry, and the marvels of the middle ages, with the
tales and traditions of antiquity-all those notions which have
given birth to the philosophy of mythology, of religions, and of
history-the Vicos and the Creuzers-this strange medley makes
the Spaccio so interesting. The philosopher there speaks the
noble language of a moralist. As each virtue in its turn appears
to replace the vices which disfigure the heavens, it learns from
Jupiter all it has to do, all it has to avoid: all its attributes are
enumerated and explained, and mostly personified in the allegorical vein; all the dangers and excesses it is to avoid are characterized with the same vigor. Every page reveals a rare talent
for psychological observation, a profound knowledge of the heart,
and of contemporary society. The passions are subtly analyzed
and well painted. That which still more captivates the thoughtful reader is the sustained style of his long fiction, which may be
regarded as a sort of philosophic sermon. Truth and wisdom,
justice and candor, take the place in the future now occupied
by error, folly, and falsehood of every species. In this last respect the Spaccio has sometimes the style of the Apocalypse."
Without impugning the justice of this criticism, we must add,




GIORDANO BRUNO.                  397
that the Spaccio taxes even a bookworm's patience, and ought
to be read with a liberal license in skipping.
Perhaps of all his writings, Gli Eroici Furori is that which
would most interest a modern reader, not curious about the philosophical speculations of the Neapolitan. Its prodigality of sonnets, and its mystic exaltation, carry us at once into the heart of
that epoch of Italian culture when poetry and Plato were the
great studies of earnest men. In it Bruno, avowing himself a
disciple of Petrarch, proclaims a Donna more exalted than Laura,
more adorable than all earthly beauty: that Donna is the imperishable image of Divine Perfection. It is unworthy of a man, he
says, to languish for a woman; to sacrifice to her all those
energies and faculties of a great soul, which might be devoted
to the pursuit of the Divine. Wisdom, which is truth and
beauty in one, is the idol adored by the genuine hero. Love
woman if you will, but remember that you are also a lover of the
Infinite. Truth is the food of every heroic soul; hunting for
Truth the only occupation worthy of a hero.* The reader of
Plato will trace here a favorite image; and was it not Berkeley
who defined Truth as the cry of all, but the game few run down?
* Vide, in particular, the fine passage, Opp. Ital. ii. 406-7.




FIRST EPOCH.
FOUNDATION OF THE INDUCTIVE METHOD.
~ I. THE LIFE OF BACON.
FIANCIS BACON was born on the 22d January, 1561. Mr.
Basil Montagu, the laborious and affectionate (we had almost
said idolatrous) biographer of Bacon, wishes us to believe that
the family was ancient and illustrious; and favors us with rhetorical flourishes about Bacon retiring to the "halls of his ancestors." This is somewhat different from the story of Bacon's
grandfather having kept the sheep of the Abbot of Bury.*
But although we can claim for Bacon no illustrious ancestry,
we must not forget his excellent parentage. His father, Sir
Nicholas, was generally considered as ranking next to the great
Burleigh as a statesman. His mother, Anne, daughter of Sir
Anthony Cooke, "was distinguished both as a linguist and as a
theologian. She corresponded in Greek with Bishop Jewel, and
translated his Apologia from the Latin so correctly, that neither
he nor Bishop Parker could suggest a single alteration."t
His health was very delicate, which made him sedentary and
reflective. Of his youth we know little, but that little displays
* See this question of lineage, and a great many other curious points,
satisfactorily settled in an article on the Lives of Bacon, London Review,
Jan. 1836.
t Edinb. Review, July, 1837, p. 9. This is the brilliant article on Bacon,
by Macaulay, which has excited so much attention. It is reprinted in his
Essays.




THE LIFE OF BACON.               399
the reflective tendency of his mind. At the age of twelve he
discussed the point as to how a juggler could tell the card of
which a man thought: he at first ascribed it to a confederacy
between the juggler and the servants, till he at last discovered
the law of the mind on which the trick depends. We hear also
of his leaving his playfellows to examine the cause of an echo
which he had observed in a vault. At thirteen he was entered
at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he soon felt a profound
contempt for the course of study pursued there, and an inveterate
scorn for Aristotle and his followers. It is said that he there
planned his Novum Organum; but this is highly improbable.
What he did was perhaps to sketch some new scheme of philosophical study, originated by his contempt for that in vogue.
There must however be a wide difference between the sketch
of a boy, prompted by contempt for reigning opinions, and
the wise maturity of his greatest work, the fruit of a life's meditations.
On leaving Cambridge, he visited Paris, Poitiers, and other
parts of France, from whence he was recalled on the sudden
death of his father. " Being returned from travaile," says Dr.
Rowley, " he applyed himself to the study of the Common Law,
which he took upon him to be his profession; in which he obtained to great excellency, though he made that (as himself said)
but as an accessory, and not as his principal study."
In 1590, he sat in Parliament as Member for Middlesex. He
soon became distinguished as an orator and as a debater. We
have the testimony of an admirable judge to assure us that
Bacon's oratory was worthy of his other powers. Ben Jonson
thus writes: " There happened, in my time, one noble speaker,
who was full of gravity in his speaking. His language, where
he could spare or pass by a jest, was nobly censorious. No man
ever spoke more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered
less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of
his speech but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could
not cough or look aside from him without loss. He commanded




400                THE LIFE OF BACON.
when he spoke, and had his judges angry or pleased at his devotion."*
A grave biographical question, namely that of Bacon's political and moral conduct, must be passed over by us without a word
of comment, because the question is too complicated and critical
for any succinct narrative.t  Let us pass on to the year 1616,
when Sir Francis Bacon was sworn of the Privy Council; and
in March, 1617, on the retirement of Lord Brackley, was appointed Keeper of the Great Seal. His administration was any
thing but pure. He was the tool of Buckingham, who was altogether unscrupulous. On his own account, too, he accepted
large presents from persons engaged in Chancery suits. His
enemies reckoned his gains in this way at a hundred thousand
pounds: an immense sum in those days, and probably exaggerated. His works had spread his fame throughout Europe. He
had also been created Baron Verulam; and subsequently Viscount St. Alban's. We have every reason to believe that he
valued this title more highly than that of the author of the Instauratio Magna; but, as Mr. Macaulay remarks, posterity, in
defiance of royal letters-patent, has obstinately refused to degrade
Francis Bacon into Viscount St. Alban's.
In the height of this prosperity a terrible reverse was at hand.
He was accused of corruption, and was impeached. His remorse and dejection of mind were dreadful. "During several
days he remained in his bed, refusing to see any human being.
He passionately told his attendants to leave him-to forget him
-never again to name his name-never to remember that there
had been such a man in the world." The charges against him.,
were such that the King, impotent to save him, advised him to
* Ben Jonson, Underwoods. In the Discoveries, Ben also speaks admiringly and affectionately of him.
t In the former edition, Mr. Macaulay's view of this question was
adopted; but on the eve of the appearance of that long-promised edition of
Bacon's works, in which Mr. Spedding is to give the results of his exhaustive study of this question, it seems desirable not to repeat statements
which may turn out erroneous when all the evidence is produced.




THE LIFE OF BACON.                 401
plead guilty. He did so. The sentence he received was severe:
a fine of forty thousand pounds, and to be imprisoned in the
Tower during the King's pleasure. He was declared incapable
of holding any office in the State, or of sitting in Parliament,
and was banished for life from the verge of the Court.
This sentence was not executed. He was sent, indeed, to the
Tower, but at the end of the second day he was released. His
fine was remitted by the Crown. He was soon allowed to present himself at Court; and in 1624 the rest of his sentence was
remitted. He was at liberty to sit in the House of Lords, and
was summoned to the next Parliament. He did not, however,
attend: age, infirmity, and perhaps shame, prevented him.
In his retirement, he devoted himself to literature; and
amongst other works published his wonderful treatise De Augmentis, which, though only an expansion of his Advancement of
Learning, may nevertheless be regarded as a new work.*
"The great apostle of experimental philosophy," says Mr. Ma.
caulay, "was destined to be its martyr. It had occurred to him
that snow might be used with advantage for the purpose of preventing animal substances from putrefying. On a very cold day,
early in the spring of the year 1626, he alighted from his coach
near Highgate, to try the experiment. He went into a cottage,
bought a fowl, and with his own hands stuffed it with snow.
While thus engaged, he felt a sudden chill, and was so much indisposed, that it was impossible for him to return to Gray's Inn.
After an illness of about a week, he expired on the morning of
Easter-day, 1626. His mind appears to have retained its strength
and liveliness to the end. He did not forget the fowl which had
caused his death. In the last letter that he ever wrote, with fingers which, as he said, could not steadily hold a pen, he did not
omit to mention that the experiment of the snow had succeeded
excellently well."
* " I find, upon comparison, that more than two-thirds of this treatise are
a version, with slight interpolation or omission, from the Advancement of
Learning, the remainder being new matter."-Hallam, History of Literature
of Europe, iii. 169.




402                       BACON.
Bacon, when dying, did not disguise from himself the mournful
fact, that if he had thought profoundly, he had acted unworthily.
Knowing at once his errors and his greatness, he said, "For my
name and memory, I leave it to men's charitable speeches, and
to foreign nations, and to the next age." His confidence was
well placed. Leniently as we cannot but think him to have
been treated by his contemporaries, posterity has been still more
gracious; and the reason is felicitously expressed by Macaulay:
"Turn where we will, the trophies of that mighty intellect are
full in view.  We are judging Manlius in sight of the Capitol."
~ BACON's METHOD.
Bacon is commonly styled the Father of Experimental Philosophy. Was he the first great experimentalist? No. Was he
the most successful experimentalist? No. Was he the discoverer of some of those great laws, the application of which is
the occupation of succeeding generations-was he a Copernicus,
a Galileo, a Kepler, a Torricelli, a Harvey, or a Newton? No.
He owes this title to his Method, as will be understood after the
following sketch, in which we shall follow Professor Playfair's
exposition in his Dissertation on the Progress of Physical Science, prefixed to the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Before laying down the rules of his Method, Bacon proceeds
to enumerate the causes of error-the Idols, as he terms them,
in his figurative language, or false divinities, to which the mind
had so long been accustomed to bow.* He considered this enumeration as the more necessary, that the same idols were likely to
return, even after the reformation of science.
These idols he divides into four classes, viz.:
Idola Tribts......     Idols of the Tribe.
Idola Spects.....     Idols of the Den.
Idola Fori...... Idols of the Forum.
Idola Theatri.....     Idols of the Theatre.
* Mr. Hallam was the first to point out the mistake which all modern
writers have made respecting the meaning of the word Idol, as used by Bacon; which does not mean idal, sbut false appearaxce (soiXov)  See the
passage in Hallam's Lit. of Europe, iii. 194-6




BACON'S METHOD.                  403
1. The Idols of the Tribe are the causes of error founded on
human nature in general. "The mind," he observes, "is not
like a plane mirror, which reflects the images of things exactly
as they are; it is like a mirror of an uneven surface, which combines its own figure with the figures of the objects it represents."
Among the idols of this class, we may reckon the propensity
which there is in all men to find a greater degree of order, simplicity, and regularity, than is actually indicated by observation. Thus, as soon as men perceived the orbits of the planets
to return into themselves, they immediately supposed them to be
perfect circles, and the motion in those circles to be uniform;
and to these hypotheses the astronomers and mathematicians of
all antiquity labored incessantly to reconcile their observations.
The propensity which Bacon has here characterized, may be
called the spirit of system.
2. The Idols of the Den are those which spring from the peculiar character of the individual. Besides the causes of error
common to all mankind, each individual has his own dark cavern, or den, into which the light is imperfectly admitted, and in
the obscurity of which a tutelary idol lurks, at whose shrine the
truth is often sacrificed.
Some minds are best adapted to mark the differences of things,
others to catch at the resemblances of things. Steady and profound understandings are disposed to attend carefully, to proceed
slowly, and to examine the most minute differences; while those
that are sublime and active, are ready to lay hold of the slightest
resemblances. Each of these easily runs into excess; the one
by catching continually at distinctions, the other at affinities.
3. The Idols of the Forum are those which arise out of the
intercourse of society, and those also which arise from language.
Men believe that their thoughts govern their words; but it
also happens, by a certain kind of reaction, that their words frequently govern their thoughts. This is the more pernicious,
that words, being generally the work of the multitude, divide




404                      BACON.
things according to the lines most conspicuous to vulgar apprehensions. Hence, when words are examined, few instances are
found in which, if at all abstract, they convey ideas tolerably
precise and defined.
4. The Idols of the Theatre are the deceptions which have
arisen from the dogmas of different schools.
As many systems as existed, so many representations of imaginary worlds had been brought upon the stage. Hence the
name of Idola Theatri. They do not enter the mind imperceptibly like the other three; a man must labor to acquire them,
and they are often the result of great learning and study.
After these preliminary discussions, Bacon proceeds, in the
Second Book of his Organum, to describe and exemplify the
nature of induction.
The first object must be to prepare a history of the phenomena
to be explained, in all their modifications and varieties. This
history is to comprehend not only all such facts as spontaneously
offer themselves, but all the experiments instituted for the sake of
discovery, or for any of the purposes of the useful arts. It ought
to be composed with great care; the facts accurately related and
distinctly arranged; their authenticity diligently examined;
those that rest on doubtful evidence, though not rejected, yet
noted as uncertain, with the grounds of the judgment so formed.
This last is very necessary, for facts often appear incredible only
because we are ill-informed, and cease to appear marvellous when
our knowledge is further extended. This record of facts is Natural History.
The Natural History being prepared of any class of phenomena, the next object is to discover, by a comparison of the different facts, the cause of these phenomena, or, as Bacon calls it, the
form. The form of any quality in a body is something convertible with that quality; that is, where it exists the quality exists:
thus, if transparency in bodies be the thing inquired after, the
form of it is something found wherever there is transparency.
Thus form differs from cause in this only: we call it form or es



BACON'S METHOD.                  405
sence, when the effect is a permanent quality; we call it cause,
when the effect is a change or an event.
Two other subjects, subordinate toforms, but often essential to
the knowledge of them, are also occasionally subjects of investigation. These are the latent process, latens processus; and the latent schematism, latens schematismus. The former is the secret
and invisible progress by which sensible changes are brought
about, and seems, in Bacon's acceptation, to involve the principle
since called the law of continuity, according to which no change,
however small, can be effected but in time. To know the relation between the time and the change effected in it, would be to
have a perfect knowledge of the latent process. In the firing of
a cannon, for example, the succession of events during the short
interval between the application of the match and the expulsion
of the ball, constitutes a latent process of a very remarkable and
complicated nature, which, however, we can now trace with
some degree of accuracy.
The latent schematism is that invisible structure of bodies on
which so many of their properties depend. When we inquire
into the constitution of crystals, or into the internal structure of
plants, etc., we are examining into the latent schematism.
In order to inquire into the form of any thing by induction,
having brought together all the facts, we are to begin with considering what things are thereby excluded from the number of possible forms. This conclusion is the first part of the process of
induction. Thus, if we are inquiring into the quality which is
the cause of transparency in bodies; from the fact that the diamond is transparent, we immediately exclude rarity or porosity
as well as fluidity from these causes, the diamond being a very
solid and dense body.
Negative instances, or those where theform is wanting, to be
also collected.
That glass when pounded is not transparent, is a negative fact,
when the form of transparency is inquired into; also, that collections of vapors have not transparency. The facts thus col



406                       BACON.
lected, both negative and affirmative, should, for the sake of reference, be reduced to tables.
Bacon exemplifies his Method on the subject of Heat; and
though his collection of facts is imperfect, his method of treating
them is extremely judicious,* and the whole disquisition highly
interesting.
After a great many exclusions have been made, and left but
few principles common to every case, one of these is to be assumed as the cause; and by reasoning from it synthetically, we
are to try if it will account for the phenomena. So necessary
did this exclusive process appear to Bacon, that he says, " It may,
perhaps, be competent to angels or superior intelligences to determine the form or essence directly, by affirmations from the
first consideration of the subject; but it is certainly beyond the
power of man, to whom it is only given to proceed at first by
negatives, and in the last place to end in affirmatives, after the
exclusion of every thing else."
There is, however, great difference in the value of facts. Some
of them show the thing sought for in the highest degree, some
in the lowest; some exhibit it simple and uncombined, in others
it appears confused with a variety of circumstances. Some facts
are easily interpreted, others are very obscure, and are understood
only in consequence of the light thrown on them by the former.
This led Bacon to his consideration of Prerogative Instances, or
the comparative value of facts as means of discovery. He enumerates twenty-seven different species: but we must content ourselves with giving only the most important.
I. Instantice solitarie: which are either examples of the same
quality existing in two bodies otherwise different, or of a quality
differing in two bodies otherwise the same. In the first instance
the bodies differ in all things but one; in the second they agree
in all but one. Thus, if the cause or form of color be inquired
* This is Playfair's judgment; a different opinion will presently be quoted
from John Mill.




BACON'S METHOD.                   407
into, instantice solitarice are found in crystals, prisms, drops of
dew, which occasionally exhibit color, and yet have nothing in
common with the stones, flowers, and metals which possess color
permanently, except the color itself. Hence Bacon concludes
that color is nothing else than a modification of the rays of light,
produced in the first case by the different degrees of incidence;
and second, by the texture or constitution of the surface of bodies.
He may be considered as very fortunate in fixing on these examples, for it was by means of them that Newton afterwards found
out the composition of light.
II. The instantice migrantes exhibit some property of the
body passing from one condition to another, either from less to
greater or from greater to less; arriving nearer perfection in the
first case, or verging towards extinction in the second.
Suppose the thing inquired into were the cause of whiteness
in bodies; an instantia migrans is found in glass, which entire
is colorless, but pulverized becomes white. The same is the case
with water unbroken or dashed into foam.
III. The instantice ostensivce are the facts which show some
particular property in its highest state of power and energy,
when it is either freed fiom impediments which usually counteract it, or is itself of such force as entirely to repress those impediments.
If the weight of air were inquired into, the Torricellian experiment, or the barometer, affords an ostensive instance, where
the circumstance which conceals the weight of the atmosphere
in common cases, namely the pressure of it in all directions, being entirely removed, that weight produces its full effect, and
sustains the whole column. of mercury in the tube.
IV. The instances called analogous or parallel consist of facts
between which a resemblance or analogy is visible in some particulars, notwithstanding great diversity in all the rest. Such
are the telescope and microscope compared to the eye. It was
the experiment of the camera obscura which led to the discovery
of the formation of images of external objects in the bottom of




408                      BACON.
the eye by the action of the crystalline lens, and other humors
of which the eye is formed.
V. Instantice comitatuis: examples of certain qualities which
always accompany one another. Such are flame and heat: flame
being always accompanied by heat, and the same degree of heat
in a given substance being always accompanied with flame.
Hostile instances, or those of perpetual separation, are the reverse of the former. Thus transparency and malleability in solids
are never combined.
VI. The instantia crucis. When in any investigation the understanding is placed in cequilibrio, as it were, between two or
more causes, each of which accounts equally well for the appearances as far as they are known, nothing remains to be done, but
to look out for a fact which can be explained by one of these
causes and not by the other. Such facts perform the office of a
cross, erected at the separation of two roads, to direct the traveller which to take: hence called crucial instances.
The experimentum crucis is of such weight in matters of induction, that in all those branches of science where it cannot be
resorted to (an experiment being out of our power and incapable
of being varied at pleasure) there is often a great want of conclusive evidence.
~ III. THE SPIRIT OF BACON'S METHOD.
We may now resume the question of Bacon's claim to the
title of Father of Experimental Science. That which distinguishes his conception of philosophy from all previous conceptions is the systematization of graduated Verification, as the sole
Method of research.   Others before him, notably Albertus
Magnus, had insisted on some parts of the experimental Method;
his great predecessor and namesake, Roger Bacon, had, in the
Opus Majus, insisted on experience as the truest guide, and had
distributed the causes of error under four heads (Authority, Custom, Vulgar Prejudice, and False Science), but no one had coordinated into a compact body of doctrine all the elements of




THE SPIRIT OF BACON'S METHOD.              409
the Inductive Method; and it is in this co-ordination that Bacon's great merit lies. Roger Bacon had said that "experience
alone gives accurate knowledge. Reasoning concludes, but establishes nothing; even mathematical demonstration gives no complete and certain conviction without this sanction. But this
experimental science is entirely unknown to the many. It has
three grand prerogatives relatively to the other kinds of knowledge. The first is, that experiment proves and verifies by its investigations the highest propositions which the other sciences can
present. The second is, that this method, which alone merits
the name of mistress of speculative knowledge, can alone attain
to those sublime truths which other sciences cannot reach; in
experimental truths the mind must not seek for the reason of
things before the testimony of facts, nor reject those facts because
it cannot justify them by argument.  The third prerogative is
so peculiar to this method that it is independent of its relations
with the others: it consists in two points, namely, in the knowledge of the future, the present, and the past, and in the admirable operations in which it surpasses judicial astrology."* Many
-from Socrates downwards-had insisted on Induction; but the
Induction they conceived was that which Bacon calls inductio
per enumerationem simplicem, and which consists in "ascribing
the character of general truths to all propositions which are true
in every instance that we happen to know of:" an induction
perpetually made in the loose latitude of common talk, and in
the less pardonable laxity of common literature. It is the natural
and instinctive action of the mind, and is thus distinguished from
the circumspect Method of Science. The real merit of Bacon's
conception was his accurate detection of this natural source of
* This passage, translated from M. Rousselot's Etudes, iii. 189, is not properly Bacon's, but an abstract of the doctrines developed and exemplified in
the sixth part of the Opus Majus, pp. 445-477 of the London edition, 1733.
The four causes of error are mentioned in p. 2 of the same edition: " Fragilis et indignse auctoritatis exemplum, consuetudinis diuturnitas, vulgi sensus
imperiti, et proprise ignorantise occultatio cum ostentatione sapientice apparentis."
18




410                      BACON.
error, and his insistance on the wider and more circumspect
Method of Verification.
He did not content himself with telling men to make observations and experiments: he told them how observations and experiments ought to be made. He did not content himself with
stating the proper mode of investigation to be that of Induction founded upon facts: he distinguished proper from improper inductions-the "interrogation" from the "anticipation" of
Nature.
He did this, and he did more. His Method may be said to
have two parts: the one, that precise system of rules we have
just quoted; the other, that wise and pre-eminently scientific
spirit which breathes through his works. The latter is expressed
in wise and weighty aphorisms which form perpetual texts for
philosophic writers, and reveal the magnificence and profundity
of his intellect. It is in these he shows how completely he saw
through the false methods of his day, and how justly he is entitled the Father of Positive Science.
These aphorisms form, as we have said, perpetual texts. They
are quoted on all occasions when Method is treated of. We
cannot however resist quoting a half-dozen of them here, because
of their exceeding value, and of their fitness as illustrations of
his greatness:
I. Man, the minister and interpreter of Nature, can act and
understand in as far as he has, either in fact or in thought, observed the order of Nature; more he can neither know nor do.
II. The real cause and root of almost all the evils in science
is this: that, falsely magnifying and extolling the powers of the
mind, we seek not its real helps.
III. There are two ways of searching after and discovering
truth: the one, from sense and particulars, rises directly to the
most general axioms, and resting upon these principles, and their
unshaken truth, finds out intermediate axioms, and this is the
method in use; but the other raises axioms from sense and particulars by a continued and gradual ascent, till at last it arrives




THE SPIRIT OF BACON'S METHOD.             411
at the most general axioms, which is the true way, but hitherto
untried.
IV. The understanding, when left to itself, takes the first of
these ways; for the mind delights in springing up to the most
general axioms, that it may find rest; but after a short stay there,
it disdains experience, and these mischiefs are at length increased
by logic, for the ostentation of disputes.
V. The natural human reasoning we, for the sake of clearness,
call the anticipation of nature, as being a rash and hasty thing;
and the reason duly exercised upon objects, we call the interpretation of nature.
VI. It is false to assert that human sense is the measure of
things, since all perceptions, both of sense and mind, are with
relation to man, and not with relation to the universe;* but the
human understanding is like an unequal mirror to the rays of
things, which, mixing its own nature with the nature of things,
distorts and perverts them.
We need only consider these half-dozen aphorisms to see the
positive tendency of his speculations; and the greater the attention we bestow on his writings, the more is this fact pressed on
our notice.  His mind was antipathetic to all metaphysics.
Neither the ingenuities of logicians, nor the passionate earnestness of theologians, in that age of logicians and theologians,
could lure him from his path. " He lived in an age," says Mr.
Macaulay, "in which disputes on the most subtle points of divinity excited an intense interest throughout Europe, and nowhere more than in England. He was placed in the very thick
of the conflict. He was in power at the time of the Synod of
Dort; and must for months have been daily deafened with talk
about election, reprobation, and final perseverance; yet we do
not remember a line in his works from which it can be inferred
that he was either a Calvinist or an Arminian. While the world
* This is Dr. Shaw's translation. The original is, " sunt ex analogia hominis, non ex analogia universi," which is intelligible and expressive enough.
but difficult to render.




412                      BACON.
was resounding with the noise of a disputatious theology and a
disputatious philosophy, the Baconian School, like Allworthy
seated between Thwackum and Square, preserved a calm neutrality, half scornful, half benevolent, and, content with adding to
the sum of practical good, left the war of words to those who
liked it."
It may not at once be apparent how eminently scientific a
spirit is shown in Bacon's separation of Science from Theology;
but a slight reflection will convince us that, at such an epoch,
such a conception was wonderful. The persecution of Galileo
by the Church, and his recantation, were fresh in every one's
memory; they suffice to show that Religion was still considered
the arbiter of Philosophy and Science; nor is this notion yet extinct. The objections raised against the geologists still operate
as a powerful obstacle to the universal acceptation of the science;
and similar objections constantly obstruct our scientific progress
in other departments. This tendency is frequently deplored;
perhaps it might be checked in some degree if it were shown to
violate a fundamental canon of all sound philosophy, a canon
which may be thus expressed: No speculation should be controlled by an order of conceptions not essentially presupposed by
it. For example, every one feels the absurdity of controlling
Poetry by Mathematics; because Poetry in no sense presupposes
Mathematics, and derives no assistance from them; but Physics
can be controlled by Mathematics, because in Physics there is
an essential dependence on Mathematics. We cannot control a
chemical speculation by any physiological laws; but conversely
we can, and do, control physiological speculations by chemical
laws. The canon, thus expounded, is readily applied to the old
disputes between Religion and Science. Theology belongs to a
totally different order of conceptions from that of Science. Its
aims are different, its methods are different, its proofs are different. Only in so far as Theology comes into the circle of other
sciences, can it be legitimately controlled by them; for instance,
when Theology rests any claims on historical evidence, then, and




THE SPIRIT OF BACON'S METHOD.            413
to that extent, must it be controlled by historical criticism; when
it rests any claim on scientific evidence, then and to that extent,
must it submit to scientific control; just as Poetry, if dealing at
all with Mathematical problems, must do so correctly, or submit
to the criticism of mathematicians. But when the Church declares against Galileo; when the perhaps well-meaning but certainly unwise declaimers of the present day oppose Geology on
theological grounds, the error is of the same nature as that of a
poet who should assail Mathematics on poetical grounds. There
can be no fair disputes between Theology and Science. Each
pursues its own path; the one may push aside the other; they
cannot argue, for they have no common ground. In Theology
there may be disputes, as between Catholic and Protestant,
Lutheran and Zuinglian, Presbyterian and Quaker, because all
proceed from the same starting-point, all invoke the same evidence; and in Science there may be disputes, as between Chemists, Geologists, and Physiologists, because, all employing the same
methods, the same kind of evidence, there is common ground for
them to fight on. But what a dissonance of words, expressive
of no less dissonance in ideas, in the phrases " Lutheran Botany"
and "Presbyterian Optics," "Catholic Chemistry" and "Evangelical Anatomy!" Yet it is clear that if Theology is to interfere with and control the speculations of Science, the various
theological sects may also control it according to their various
views. We therefore see in Bacon's rigorous separation of the
two disparate paths of inquiry a profoundly philosophical tendency. He took another and far greater step when he emphatically proclaimed that Physics was " the mother of all the sciences."
That this was greatly in advance of his age may be gathered
from the fact of its to this day remaining a heresy; the notion of
ethics and politics having the same methods, and being susceptible of the same treatment as physics, is by the majority looked
upon as fanciful, if not absurd.
Speaking of the causes of errors in preceding philosophers,
Bacon says, "A second cause of very great moment is, that




414                      BACON.
through all those ages wherein men of genius and learning principally or even moderately flourished, the smallest part of human
industry has been spent upon natural philosophy, though this
ought to be esteemed as the great mother of the sciences; for all
the rest, if torn from this root, may perhaps be polished and
formed for use, but can receive little increase....
"But let none expect any great promotion of the sciences,
especially in their effective part, unless natural philosophy be
drawn out to particular sciences; and again, unless these particular sciences be brought back again to natural philosophy. From
this defect it is that astronomy, optics, music, many mechanical
arts, and what seems stranger, even moral and civil philosophy
and logic, rise but little above their foundations, and only skim
over the varieties and surfaces of things, viz. because after these
particular sciences are formed and divided off, they are no longer
nourished by natural philosophy, which might give them strength
and increase; and therefore no wonder if the sciences thrive not,
when separated from their roots."*
It was in consequence of his having so profoundly penetrated
the very nature of science that Bacon was able " to lay down the
rules for the conduct of experimental inquiries, before any such
inquiries had yet been instituted. The power and compass of a
mind which could form such a plan beforehand, and trace not
merely the outline, but many of the most minute ramifications of
sciences which did not yet exist, must be an object of admiration
to all succeeding ages."t
In his separation of Science from Metaphysics and Theology,
and in his conception of Physics as the mother of all the sciences,
we see the eminently positive spirit of his works; and this makes
him so entirely a modern. He was indeed thoroughly opposed
to antiquity, and epigrammatically exposed the fallacy of undue
reverence. "The opinion which men entertain of antiquity is a
very idle thing," said he, " and almost incongruous to the word;
* Novum Organum, i. Aph. 79, 80.     t Playfair.




THE SPIRIT OF BACON'S METHOD.             4:1
for the old-age and length of days of the world should in reality
be accounted antiquity, and ought to be attributed to our own
times, not to the youth of the world which it enjoyed among the
ancients; for that age, though with respect to us it be ancient
and greater, yet with regard to the world it was new and less."*
He bore testimony to the genius of several of the ancients,
while he declared that their genius availed them nothing, because wrongly employed; adding, in his usual happy style, "a
cripple in the right way may beat a racer in the wrong one.
Nay, the fleeter the racer is, who has once missed his way, the
farther he leaves it behind." " We have an example," he says,
" in Aristotle, who corrupted natural philosophy with Logic,...
being all along more solicitous how men might defend themselves by answers, and advance something that should be positive
in words, than to come at the inward truth of nature.... It
is true his books of animals, problems, and other pieces, make
frequent use of experiments; but then he first pronounced without their assistance, and did not duly consult experience in forming his degrees and axioms; but after he had passed judgment
according to his own humor, he winds experience round, and
leads her captive to his own opinions...  Another great reason
of the slow progress of the sciences is this: that it is impossible
to proceed well in a course where the end is not rightly fixed
and defined. Now, the true and genuine end of the sciences is
no other than to enrich human life with new inventions and new
powers.... Fruits and discoveries of works are as the vouchers
and securities for the truth of philosophies. But from the philosophies of the Greeks, and their descents through particular
sciences, now for the space of so many years scarce a single experiment can be produced tending to accommodate or improve
* It is a point of some interest to ascertain from whom Bacon got the
aphorism he frequently quotes: " Antiquity the youth of the world." The
idea is in Seneca, and is thus expressed by Roger Bacon: " Quanto juniores
tanto perspicaciores, quia juniores, posteriores successione temporuln, ingrediuntur labores priorum."-Opus Majus, pars i. cap. 6, p. 9.




416                      BACON.
the state of man, that may be justly attributed to the speculations
and doctrines of their philosophy.... Therefore, since the end
of the sciences has not hitherto been well defined by any one,
we need not wonder if men have erred and wandered in the
things subservient to the proper end. Again, if this end had
been rightly proposed, yet men have chosen a very wrong and
impassable way to proceed in. And it may strike any one with
astonishment who duly considers it, that no mortal should hitherto have taken care to open and prepare a way for the human understanding, from sense and a well-conducted experience; but that
all things should be left either to the darkness of tradition, the
giddy agitation and whirlwind of argument, or else to the uncertain waves of accident, or a vague and uninformed experience.
Let any one soberly consider what the way is which men have
accustomed themselves to, in the inquiry and discovery of any
thing, and he will doubtless find that the manner of invention
most commonly used is simple and unartful: or on no other
than this, viz. when a person goes upon an inquiry, in the first
place he searches out and peruses what has been said upon it by
others; in the next place adds his own thoughts thereto; and
lastly, with great struggle of the mind, solicits and invokes, as
it were, his own spirit to deliver him oracles; which is a method
entirely destitute of foundation, and rolls wholly upon opinions.
Others may call in the assistance of logic; but this is wholly a
nominal assistance, for logic does not discover the principles and
capital axioms upon which arts are built, but only such as seem
agreeable thereto; and when men are curious and earnest with
it, to procure proofs, and discover principles or first axioms, it
refers them to faith, or puts them off with this trite and common
answer-that every artist must believe in his own art."
Dugald Stewart* well says, "that the idea of the object of physical science (which may be justly regarded as the groundwork
* In the excellent Chapter on Induction, Philos. of Mind, vol. ii. ch. iv.
sect. 1.




THE SPIRIT OF BACON'S METHOD.           417
of Bacon's Novum Organurn) differs essentially from what was
entertained by the ancients, according to whom'Philosophy is
the science of causes.'  If indeed by causes they had meant
merely the constant forerunners or antecedents of events, the definition would have coincided nearly with the statement which
I have given. But it is evident that by causes they meant such
antecedents as were necessarily connected with the effects, and
from the knowledge of which the effects might be foreseen and
demonstrated. And it was owing to this confusion of the proper
objects of Physics and Metaphysics that, neglecting the observation of facts exposed to the examination of their senses, they
vainly attempted, by synthetical reasoning, to deduce, as necessary consequences from their supposed causes, the phenomena
and laws of nature."
Dugald Stewart also quotes Aristotle's express declaration,
that to know the physical cause is also to know the efficient cause;
and observes, that from this disposition to confound efficient with
physical causes, may be traced the greater part of the theories
recorded in the history of philosophy. It is this which has given
rise to the attempts, both in ancient and modern times, to account for all the phenomena of moving bodies by impulse; and
it is this, also, which has suggested the simpler expedient of explaining them by the agency of minds united with the particles
of matter. To this last class of theories may also be referred the
explanations of physical phenomena by such causes as sympathies, antipathies, nature's horror of a vacuum, etc., and other
phrases borrowed by analogy from the attributes of animated
beings.
It was Bacon's constant endeavor, as it has been the cause of
his enduring fame, to teach men the real object of Science, and
the scope of their faculties, and to furnish them with a proper
Method whereon these faculties might be successfully employed.
He thus not only stands clearly out in history as the exponent
of the long-agitated antagonism to all the ancient and scholastic
thinkers, but also as the exponent of the rapidly increasing ten18*




418                      BACON.
dency towards positive science. He is essentially modern. All
his predecessors, even in their boldest attacks upon ancient
philosophy, were themselves closely allied to the spirit of that
which they opposed. Ramus is the child of Aristotle, though
he raised his hand against his father. But Bacon was modern
in culture, in object, and in method. He attacked the ancient
philosophy without having thoroughly understood it: he attacked
it, because he saw that a method which conducted great intelligences to such absurd conclusions as those then in vogue, must
necessarily be false.
"Whence can arise," he asks, "such vagueness and sterility
in all the physical systems which have hitherto existed in the
world? It is not, certainly, from any thing in nature itself; for
the steadiness and regularity of the laws by which it is governed,
clearly mark them out as objects of precise and certain knowledge.
"Neither can it arise from any want of ability in those who
have pursued such inquiries, many of whom have been men of
the highest talent and genius of the ages in which they lived;
and it can therefore arise fiom nothing else but the perverseness
and insufficiency of the methods which have been pursued. Men
have sought to make a world from their own conceptions, and to
draw from their own minds all the materials which they employed; but if, instead of doing so, they had consulted experience and observation, they would have had facts, and not opinions, to reason about, and might have ultimately arrived at the
knowledge of the laws which govern the material world.
"As things are at present conducted, a sudden transition is
made from sensible objects and particular facts to general propositions, which are accounted principles, and round which, as round
so many fixed polls, disputation and argument continually revolve. From the propositions thus hastily assumed, all things
are derived by a process compendious and precipitate, ill suited to
discovery, but wonderfully accommodated to debate.
"The way that promises success is the reverse of this. It requires that we should generalize slowly, going from particular




WIAS BACON'S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?          419
things to those that are but one step more general; fiom those
to others of still greater extent, and so on to such as are universal.
By such means we may hope to arrive at principles, not vague
and obscure, but luminous and well-defined, such as Nature herself will not refuse to acknowledge."
In this pregnant passage he has clearly enough pointed out
the position which his philosophy was to occupy. "Many other
philosophers," as Professor Macvey Napier remarks, "both ancient and modern, had referred to observation and experiment in
a cursory way, as furnishing the materials of physical knowledge; but no one before him had attempted to systematize the
true method of discovery; or to prove that the inductive is the
only method by which the genuine office of philosophy can be
exercised, and its genuine ends accomplished. It has sometimes
been stated that Galileo was, at least, in an equal degree with
Bacon, the father of the Inductive Logic; but it would be more
correct to say that his discoveries furnished some fortunate illustrations of its principles. To explain these principles was no
object of his; nor does he manifest any great anxiety to recommend their adoption with a view to the general improvement of
science. The Aristotelian disputant, in his celebrated Dialogues,
is made frequently to appeal to observation and experiment; but
the interlocutor, through whom Galileo himself speaks, nowhere
takes occasion to distinguish between the flimsy inductions of
the Stagirite, in regard to the objects in dispute, and those which
he himself had instituted, or to hint at the very different complexion which philosophy must assume, according as the one
kind or the other is resorted to."*
~ IV. WAS THE METHOD NEW AND USEFUL 
Bacon's Method, and the scientific spirit which animates his
works, have been indicated in the foregoing pages. His philosophical importance is to be measured by that Method and that
* On the Scope and Influence of the Philos. Writings of Bacon: Trans. of
the Royal Society of Edinburgh, 1818.




420                      BACON.
spirit; not by any scientific discoveries. A mind so richly stored
could not fail to illustrate his writings with manifold graces of
style, and with pregnant aphorisms. Accordingly, his Method
having been established, and been superseded, having done its
work, nothing remains for our profit but these very graces and
aphorisms. The great reformer may excite our admiration, historically; his Method excites no admiration for its present intrinsic value. We have a more perfect Method; the processes
of scientific investigation are better understood; but we are never
in communion with his vast and penetrating intellect without
acknowledging his greatness; for his remarks are often as applicable now as they were when first written. Hence the frequency
of quotations from Bacon; and these quotations, as Dr. Whewell
observes, are more frequently made by metaphysical, ethical, and
even theological writers, than they are by the authors of works
on Physics. For the present generation, then, whatever the value
of Bacon's works, Bacon's Method is useless. Some modern writers have asserted that it was always useless; and this assertion
has been supported by arguments so plausible, that they demand
attention.
The objections made to Bacon's Method are of three kinds.
1st. It was nothing new; 2d. It was useless as a guide to investigation; 3d. It was already latent in the scientific spirit then
abroad, and must have been elicited by some one, sooner or
later.
"It was nothing new."  This is a very frequent objection, and
is urged by the Count Joseph de Maistre and Mr. Macaulay.
The former has written a long chapter to prove that Bacon's Induction is nothing more than the Induction of Aristotle; and
Mr. Macaulay, who adopts the same opinion, devotes several vivacious pages to show that everybody unconsciously practices this
inductive Method. M. de Maistre's Examen de la Philosophie de
Bacon is a vehement attack, written with the celebrated author's
usual vivacity, but with more than his usual arrogance and vehemence. As there are many things in Bacon hasty, inexact, or




WAS BACON'S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?           421
partaking of the prejudices and errors of his age, his antagonist
is at no loss to find matter for ridicule; but when he treats of
Bacon's Method and Spirit as contemptible puerilities, he only excites a smile in the dispassionate reader. His arguments against
Bacon's Method are, first, that Aristotle had analyzed it before
him; secondly, that Induction is only one form of the Syllogism.
It is true that Aristotle told us what Induction was; but it is
not true that he analyzed it, as Bacon has done; nor did he ever
pronounce it to be the Method of inquiry: on the contrary, it
only served him as one of the means of ascertaining truth, and
was not so important in his eyes as the Syllogism. Bacon asserts
Induction to be the only Method; and has no words too strong
to express his scorn of the Syllogism, "which may catch the assent, but lets the things slip through." Dugald Stewart observes
that we might as well declare that the ancients had anticipated
Newton because they too used the word " attraction," as that Aristotle anticipated Bacon because he too speaks of " Induction."*
This is, however, going too far the other way. In our Chapter
on the Stagirite we have indicated the relation in which the two
conceptions stand to each other.
M. de Maistre says that Induction and Syllogism are the same.
"At bottom, what is Induction? Aristotle clearly saw it: It is
a syllogism without the middle term —a'~ri is o Iroo-roS ~v\Xooy'jos
s   P cp1r- xai diaJi'ou rporao0'sc. (Anal. Prior. ii. 12.)  What
does it signify whether I say, Every simple being is indestructible
by nature; now my soul is a simple being, therefore, etc.; or
whether I say directly, My soul is simple, it is therefore indestructible. In either case it is the syllogism which is virtually
in the induction, as it is in the enthymeme."
Now it is quite true that every induction may be thrown into
the form of a syllogism by supplying the major premise; and
it is this which led Archbishop Whately to conclude that Induction itself is but a peculiar case, of ratiocination, and that the
universal type of all reasoning is the syllogism. We cannot but
* Philos. of Mind, vol. ii. ch. iv. sect. 2.




422                      BACON.
agree with John Mill in holding precisely the reverse opinion,
and believing that ratiocination itself is resolvable into Induction.* Be this as it may, M. de Maistre has afforded us an illustration of the difference between Aristotle and Bacon in the very
passage quoted.
If every induction can be thrown into the form of a syllogism,
by supplying the major premise, it is in the way this major
premise is established that we must seek the real difference between the Syllogistic and Inductive Methods: and that difference
is the difference between a priori and a posteriori. Every one
who has read Bacon, knows that his scorn for the Syllogism is
not scorn for it as aform of ratiocination, but as a means of investigation. He objects to our proceeding to deduce from an
axiom not accurately and inductively obtained, consequences
which may very well be contained in the axiom, although having no relation to the truth of things. " The axioms in use, being derived from slender experience and a few obvious particulars, are generally applied in a corresponding manner; no wonder they lead not to new particulars."t  Again:' Syllogism
consists of propositions, propositions of words, and words are
the signs of notions; therefore, if our notions, the basis of all,
are confused, and over-hastily taken from things, nothing that is
built upon them can be firm; whence our only hope rests upon
genuine Induction."'
Nothing can be more explicit. Bacon very well knew the difference between his Method and that of the Aristotelians; and
he very well expressed this difference. To turn round upon him
and say all Induction is itself but Syllogism, is mere evasion.
He was not giving a logical analysis of the mind: he was warning men against long-standing errors, and pointing out to them
the path of truth.
Mr. Macaulay's arguments are of a different stamp. To us
they are only ingenious and plausible; yet so ingenious and so
* See Sy8tem of Logic, vol. i. pp. 372-8.
t Novum Organun, Aph. 25.; Ibid., Aph. 14.




WAS BACON S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?          423
plausible as to gain many followers. They are mostly true as
far as they go, but do not appear to us to go to the real point.
We shall select the main parts of his opposition:
"The inductive method has been practised ever since the beginning of the world, by every human being. It is constantly
practised by the most ignorant clown, who by this method is led
to the conclusion, that if he sows barley he shall not reap wheat.
A plain man finds his stomach out of order. He never heard of
Lord Bacon's name; but he proceeds in the strictest conformity
with the rules laid down in the second book of the Novum  Organum, and satisfies himself that mince-pies have done the mischief.'I ate mince-pies on Monday and Wednesday, and was
kept awake by indigestion all night.' This is the comparentia
ad intellectum instantiarum convenientium.'I did not eat any on
Tuesday and Friday, and I was quite well.' This is the comparentia
instantiarum in proximo quce natura data privantur.'I ate
very sparingly of them on Sunday, and was very slightly indisposed in the evening. But on Christmas-day I almost dined on
them, and was so ill that I was in some danger.' This is the
comparentia instantiarum secundum magis et minus.' It cannot
be the brandy which I took with them; for I have drunk brandy
for years, without being the worse for it.' This is the reectio
naturarum. We might easily proceed, but we have already sufficiently explained our meaning."
The answer to this is, that Induction being the process of all
reasoning, of course so long as men have reasoned they have
reasoned inductively. But there is simple and incautious Induction, and there is cautious methodical Induction,-instinct and
science; in ordinary cases, men pursue the induction per enumerationem simpnlicem; in scientific investigations they must pursue a very different method; and at the time Bacon wrote, almost all philosophical and scientific speculations were vitiated by
the incorrect method.
" Those who object to the importance of Bacon's precepts in
philosophy," says Mr. Hallam, "that mankind have practised




424                      BACON.
many of them immemorially, are rather confirming their utility
than taking off much from their originality, in any fair sense of
the term. Every logical method is built on the common faculties of human nature, which have been exercised since the creation, in discerning-better or worse-truth from falsehood, and
inferring the unknown from the known. That men might have
done this more correctly, is manifest from the quantity of error
into which, from want of reasoning well on what came before
them, they have habitually fallen. In experimental philosophy,
to which the more special rules of Lord Bacon are generally referred, there was a notorious want of that very process of reasoning which he supplied."*  "Nothing can be more certain," as
Professor Napier observes, "than that Bacon rests the whole
hopes of his philosophy on the novelty of his logical precepts;
and that he uniformly represents the ancient philosophers, particularly Aristotle, as having been wholly regardless of the inductive method in their physical inquiries. Bacon does not indeed say that the ancient philosophers never employed themselves
in observing Nature; but he maintains that there is a wide aifference between observation, as it was employed by them, and
the art of observing for the purposes of philosophical discovery."t
Men in Bacon's time reasoned like the facetious judge in Mr.
Macaulay's anecdote, "who was in the habit of jocosely propounding, after dinner, a theory, that the cause of the prevalence
of Jacobinism was the practice of bearing three names. He
quoted, on the one side, Charles James Fox, Richard Brinsley
Sheridan, John Horne Tooke, John Philpot Curran, Samuel
Taylor Coleridge, Theobald Wolfe Tone. These were instantice
convenientes. He then proceeded to cite instances absentice in
proximo-William Pitt, John Scott, William Wyndham, Samuel
Horsley, Henry Dundas, Edmund Burke. He might have gone
* Hist. of Lit. of Europe, iii. 182.
t Dissertation on the Scope and Influence of Bacon's Writings, p. 13. See,
also, a passage to the same effect in Herschel's Discourse, pp. 113, 114, which
we do not quote, because the work is in everybody's hands.




WAS BACON'S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?          425
on to instances secundum magis et minus. The practice of giving children three names has been for some time a growing practice, and Jacobinism has also been growing. The practice of
giving children three names is more common in America than
in England. In England we have still a King and a House of
Lords; but the Americans are Republicans. The rejectiones are
obvious. Burke and Wolfe Tone were both Irishmen; therefore
the being an Irishman is not the cause. In this way our inductive philosopher arrives at what Bacon calls the vintage, and
pronounces that having three names is the cause of Jacobinism."
This is a very good theory for a jocular one; but we are surprised to find so acute a writer as Mr. Macaulay speaking of it in
the terms he does: " Here is an induction corresponding with
Bacon's analysis, and ending in a monstrous absurdity.  In
what then does this induction differ from the induction which
leads us to the conclusion that the presence of the sun is the
cause of our having more light by day than by night? The
difference evidently is, not in the kind of instances, but in the
number of instances; that is to say, the difference is not in that
part of the process for which Bacon has given precise rules, but
in a circumstance for which no precise rule can possibly be given.
If the learned author of the theory about Jacobinism had enlarged either of the tables a little, his system would have been
destroyed. The names of Tom Paine and William Windham
Grenville would have been sufficient to do the work."
We especially dissent from the clause printed in italics, which
seems to us at variance with all sound Induction. It is precisely
the kind of instances adduced in the theory, which makes the
theory absurd. The whole theory is a gross example of " causation inferred from casual conjunction, without any presumption
arising from known properties of the supposed agent: which is
the characteristic of empiricism." Although in this theory there
has been a certain superficial elimination employed, yet that elimination is obviously too incomplete for any satisfactory result.
Mr. Macaulay subsequently asks, What number of instances is




426                       BACON.
sufficient to justify belief? After how many experiments would
Jenner have been justified in believing vaccination to be a safeguard against the smallpox? We answer that the number of
instances depends on the kind of instances, and on the theory
which presides over their collection. In proportion as the facts
adduced are complex, must the theory which would explain
them be consistent with all other known truths, before the facts
themselves can have any significance.
Bacon's originality is in no way affected by proving that all
men at all times, when they reasoned correctly, reasoned inductively. Moreover, in Bacon's particular department, men had
notoriously pursued a wrong Method.*  They were not aware of
the necessity, which he declared there was in all investigations,
to proceed upon a graduated and successive Induction. Bacon
first made them aware of this; and, as Dr. Whewell says, "the
truly remarkable circumstance is to find this recommendation of
a continuous advance from observation, by limited steps, through
successive gradations of generality, given at a time when speculative men in general had only just begun to perceive that they
must begin their course from experience in some way or other.... In catching sight of this principle, and in ascribing to it
its due importance, Bacon's sagacity, so far as I am aware,
wrought unassisted and unrivalled."t
The second question now presents itself. Was the method
useful as a guide in investigation? Many persons have declared
it to be useless. Mr. Macaulay is of the same opinion. He says,
with great truth, "By stimulating men to the discovery of new
truth, Bacon stimulated them to employ the inductive method* And this in spite of the warning so emphatically given three centuries
before Francis Bacon, by his great namesake Roger Bacon: " Sine experientia nihil sufficienter sciri potest. Duo enim sunt modi cognoscendi, scilicet
per argumentum et experimentunm. Argumentum concludit et facit nos concludere queestionem, sed non certificat neque removet dubitationem, ut
quiescat animus in intuitu veritatis, nisi earn inveniat via experientiae."Opus Majus, pars vi. cap. i.
t P7i1los. of Induotive Sciences, ii. 895, 396.




WAS BACON'  METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?        427
the only method by which truth can be discovered. By stimulating men to the discovery of useful truth, he furnished them
with a motive to perform the inductive process well and carefully. His predecessors had been anticipators of Nature. They
had been content with first principles, at which they had arrived by the most scanty and slovenly induction. And why was
this? It was, we conceive, because their philosophy proposed
to itself no practical end, because it was merely an exercise of
the mind. A man who wants to contrive a new machine, or a
new medicine, has a strong motive to observe patiently and accurately, and to try experiment after experiment; but a man
who merely wants a theme for disputation, or declamation, has
no such motive."
Now in this passage, as it seems to us, the very merit we are
claiming for Bacon is conceded. We are told that Bacon stimulated men to employ the Inductive Method-the only method by
which new truth could be discovered. Who pointed out the futility of anticipating Nature?-Bacon. Who exposed the "scanty
and slovenly induction" of the Schoollen?-Bacon. His merit
is not simply that of stimulating men to the discovery of new
lands, but of also affording them chart and compass wherewith to
discover the new lands. There were several eminent men, his
predecessors and contemporaries, who all rose up against the ancient systems, and stimulated men to the discovery of useful truth;
but these men, although all of them constantly insisted upon observation and experiment, had no glimpse, or only a very partial
and confused glimpse, of the Inductive Method. So that when
Mr. Macaulay says, " It was not by furnishing philosophers with
rules for performing the inductive process well, but by furnishing
them with a motive for performing it well, that he conferred so
vast a benefit on society," we believe he is contradicted, on all
sides, by history. The motive had been given by many-indeed,
one may say that it was a tendency of the age; the rules had
been devised by no one but himself. These rules, it is true, were
far from perfect; but they constitute the beginning, and form the




428                      BACON.
basis of the more perfect structure which successors have erected.
Mr. Macaulay's argument receives its force solely from what we
cannot but regard as his misconception of the Baconian Induction.
That Induction he declares to be daily performed by every man;
but this is confounding ordinary Induction with scientific Induction. It is confounding a simple inference, with a long and complicated process of inference. It is confounding what Bacon incessantly and emphatically distinguishes, viz. Induction with the
Inductive Method; ahd this confusion has probably influenced
him in the selection of his illustrations. None of the things he
has named require a complicated process of reasoning for their
discovery. If a man wants to make a shoe, he needs inductions,
but is certainly in no need of the Inductive Method; if he wants
to discover a law of Nature, the Inductive Method is indispensable. Mr. Macaulay will not maintain that the ordinary man, who
wishes to find out a law of Nature, proceeds in his inquiry by a
graduated and successive Induction from particulars to generals,
and from generals to those which are still more general; and this
without "anticipation" of Nature-without rash and hasty leaping from one particular to some extreme generality. In fact,
although Induction, as the type of reasoning, must be carried
on by every reasoning animal, yet so far is the Inductive Method
from being the ordinary process of ordinary men, that we know
of scarcely any process so contrary to the natural bias of the
mind. Bacon has more than once alluded to this bias, which
makes us judge hastily, and on the slenderest evidence. Indeed, the Inductive Method requires a constant and watchful
repression of our natural tendency to " anticipate," and endeavor,
by a short cut, to abridge the long journey which conducts us to
the Truth.
But while we think Mr. Macaulay underrates the importance of
the inductive rules, we quite agree with him that Bacon overrated
their importance. " Our method of discovery in science," so runs
one of his aphorisms, "is of such a nature that there is not much
left to acuteness and strength of genius, but all degrees of genius




WAS BACON'S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?           429
and intellect are brought nearly to the same level.'* This is contradicted by every two men engaging in scientific pursuits. In
proportion to the effectiveness of the instrument, will the original
superiority make itself more manifest. Place axes in the hands of
two men commissioned to make a clearing in the forest, and the
stronger man will be at a greater advantage than he was before.
Moreover the Method, however excellent when followed, cannot
force men to follow it: the natural bias of the mind is against it.
Mr. Macaulay therefore is perfectly right in preferring the spirit
of Bacon's Method to the rules given in the second book of the
Organum.
There is however another reason why the spirit is preferable to
the rules; and that reason is the incompleteness of those rules.
The radical defect of Bacon's method lies in its being inductive,
and not also deductive. He was so deeply impressed with a sense
of the insufficiency of the Deductive Method alone, which he saw
his contemporaries pursuing, and which he knew to be the cause
of the failure of his predecessors, that he bestowed all his attention
on the Inductive Method. His want of mathematical knowledge
had also no small share in this error. Although however it may
be justly said that he did not sufficiently exemplify the Deductive
Method, it is not correct to say that he entirely neglected it.
Those who assert this, forget that the second part of the Novum
Organum was never completed. In the second part it was his
intention to treat of Deduction, as is plain from the following passage: " The indications for the interpretation of Nature include two
general parts. The first relates to the raising of Axioms from experience; and the second, to the deducing or deriving of new
experiments from Axioms (de ducendis aut derivandis experimentis novis ab axiomatibus)."t We here see that he comprehended the two-fold nature of the method; but inasmuch as he
did not publish the second part of his Organum, we may admit
the remark of Professor Playfair, that "in a very extensive depart* Novum Organum, i. Aph. 61.        t Ibid., ii. Aph. 10.




430                      BACON.
ment of physical science, it cannot be doubted that investigation
has been carried on, not perhaps more easily, but with a less frequent appeal to experience, than the rules of the Novum Organum
would seem to require. In all physical inquiries where mathematical reasoning has been employed, after a few principles have
been established by experience, a vast multitude of truths, equally
certain with the principles themselves, have been deduced from
them by the mere application of geometry and algebra.... The
strict method of Bacon is therefore only necessary where the
thing to be explained is new, and where we have no knowledge,
or next to none, of the powers employed."*
His deficiency in mathematical knowledge caused him to overlook the equal importance of Deduction and Induction:-" Bacon
has judiciously remarked, that the axiomata media of every science principally constitute its value. The lowest generalizations,
until explained by and resolved into the middle principles, of
which they are the consequences, have only the imperfect accuracy of empirical laws; while the most general laws are too general, and include too few circumstances to give sufficient indication of what happens in individual cases, where the circumstances are almost always immensely numerous.  In the importance
therefore which Bacon assigns, in every science, to the middle
principles, it is impossible not to agree with him. But I conceive him to have been radically wrong in his doctrine respecting
the mode in which these axiomata media should be arrived at;
although there is no one proposition in his works for which he
has been so extravagantly eulogized. He enunciates, as a universal rule, that induction should proceed from the lowest to the
middle principles, and from those to the highest, never reversing
that order, and consequently leaving no room for the discovery
of new principles by way of deduction at all. It is not to be
conceived that a man of Bacon's sagacity could have fallen into
this mistake, if there had existed in his time, among the sciences
* Dissertation, pp. 58, 61.




WAS BACON'S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?          431
which treat of successive phenomena, one single deductive science, such as mechanics, astronomy, optics, acoustics, etc., now
are. In those sciences, it is evident that the higher and middle
principles are by no means derived from the lowest, but the reverse. In some of them, the very highest generalizations were
those earliest ascertained with any scientific exactness; as, for
example (in mechanics), the laws of motion. Those general
laws had not indeed at first the acknowledged universality which
they acquired after having been successfully employed to explain
many classes of phenomena to which they were not originally
seen to be applicable; as when the laws of motion were employed in conjunction with other laws to explain deductively the
celestial phenomena. Still the fact remains, that the propositions which were afterwards recognized as the most general
truths of the science, were, of all its accurate generalizations,
those earliest arrived at.
" Bacon's greatest merit therefore cannot consist, as we are so
often told that it did, in exploding the vicious method pursued
by the ancients, of flying to the highest generalizations for it,
and deducing the middle principles fiom them, since this is
neither a vicious nor an exploded method, but the universally
accredited method of modern science, and that to which it owes
its greatest triumphs. The error of ancient speculation did not
consist in making the largest generalizations first, but in making
them without the aid or warrant of rigorous inductive methods,
and applying them deductively without the needful use of that
important part of the deductive method termed verification."*
This passage certainly lays bare the weakness of Bacon's
Method; and does so, we believe, for the first time, But we
cannot entirely concur in the concluding paragraph. Although
Bacon did not perhaps see the real importance of the Deductive
Method, he did see the futility of the Deductive Method employed before his time; and he saw moreover that the cause lay
* Mill's System of Logic, ii. 524-6.




432                      BACON.
in the want of "verification"-in the want of " the aid or warrant of rigorous inductive methods:" this we must think his
greatest merit, as we think his imperfect conception of the Deductive Method his greatest imperfection.
There is also another potent reason why the merely Inductive
Method should not have contributed to any great discoveries;
and we must again borrow from the System of Logic the passage
wherein this is exhibited:
"It has excited the surprise of philosophers that the detailed
system of inductive logic has been turned to so little direct use
by subsequent inquirers,-having neither continued, except in a
few of its generalities, to be recognized as a theory, nor having
conducted, in practice, to any great scientific results. But this,
though not unfiequently remarked, has scarcely received any
plausible explanation; and some indeed have preferred to assert
that all rules of induction are useless, rather than suppose that
Bacon's rules are grounded upon an insufficient analysis of the
inductive process. Such however will be seen to be the fact, as
soon as it is considered that Bacon entirely overlooked plurality
of causes. All his rules tacitly imply the assumption, so contrary to all we know of Nature, that a phenomenon cannot have
more than one cause."*
In another passage, too long for extract, the same author points
out a capital error in Bacon's view of the inductive philosophy,
viz. his supposition that the principle of elimination-that great
logical instrument which he had the immense merit of first
bringing into use-was applicable in the same sense, and in the
same unqualified manner, to the investigation of co-existences, as
to that of the successions of phenomena.
In conclusion, it may be said that Bacon's conception of a
scientific Method was magnificent, as far as it went; but in consequence of certain deficiencies, owing principally to the want of
any established science as a model, the Method he laid down was
* System of Logic, ii. 373.         t Ibid., ii. 127 et seq.




WAS BACON'S METHOD NEW AND USEFUL?          433
only indirectly useful. If it did not produce great discoveries, it
certainly did exercise an important influence on the minds of
those who were afterwards to make great discoveries. " The
way to prove that Bacon's writings were powerful agents in the
advancement of physical knowledge," says Professor Napier, " is
to prove that they produced these effects (viz. the overthrow of
existing methods-stimulus given to experimental inquiry-and
ingenious views and principles requisite for such inquiry); and
the proof that such effects were actually produced by them, must
necessarily be derived from the testimony of those who early experienced, or became otherwise acquainted with, their operation."
And the greater part of his instructive Essay is devoted to this
proof. The proofs are numerous and decisive, gathered not only
from the English and French writers, but also from Italian and
German.
And now the last question presents itself, Was not Bacon's
Method latent in the scientific spirit of the age? Yes; just as
much as the invention of the steam-engine was latent in the
knowledge and tendencies of the age of Watt. What does invention mean more than the finding what others are still seeking? were it not hidden somewhere, no one could find it. Let
no one therefore endeavor to rob a great man of his fame by declaring that the thing found was lying ready to be found, and
would have sooner or later been found by some one. Yes, by
some one who had eyes to see what his fellow-men could not
see: by some other great man. How was it that Bacon's immediate predecessors and contemporaries did not detect this
latent method? It was lying there as open for inspection to
them as to him. Why did he alone find it? Because he alone
was competent to find it.
It is very true that in his day, and previously, great discoveries had been made; and as they only could be made upon a true
Method, the Method was implied in them. But this is no argument against Bacon's originality. " Principles of evidence," says
Mr. Mill, "and theories of method, are not to be constructed a
19




434                      BACON.
priori. The laws of our rational faculty, like those of every
other natural agency, are only learnt by seeing the agent at
work. The earlier achievements of science were made without
the conscious observance of any scientific method; and we should
never have known by what process truth is to be ascertained if
we had not previously ascertained truths." And if we consider
for a moment the extreme paucity of ascertained truths in science
at the time Bacon wrote, it will enhance our admiration of his
marvellous sagacity, to see him do so much with such poor materials; as Playfair says, "the history of human knowledge points
out nobody of whom it can be said that, placed in the situation
of Bacon, he would have done what Bacon did,-no man whose
prophetic genius would enable him to delineate a system of
science which had not yet begun to exist."
Bacon is a great subject, and one as attractive as great; but
our object here has been solely to exhibit his Method, and to
indicate its historical position. We have done nothing but point
out the grounds upon which his fame, as the father of Experimental Philosophy, is built. His Method alone engaged us, because by it alone he claims a place in this history. We have
not dwelt upon his errors; neither have we dwelt upon the wondrous and manifold excellences of that mind which Mr. Macaulay
has so felicitously compared to the tent the fairy Peribanou gave
to Prince Ahmed:-" Fold it, and it seemed the toy for the hand
of lady: spread it, and the armies of powerful Sultans might repose beneath its shade."




SECOND EPOCH.
FOUNDATION OF THE DEDUCTIVE METHOD.
CHAPTER I.
DESCARTES.
~ I. LIFE OF DESCARTES.
JUST at the close of the sixteenth century, 1596, there was
born in Touraine, of Breton parents, a feeble sickly child, named
Rene Descartes Duperron. A few days after his birth, a disease
of the lungs carried off his mother. The sickly child grew to
be.a sickly boy; and, till the age of twenty, his life was always
despaired of.
That boy was one the world could ill afford to lose. Few who
saw him creeping on the path, which his companions galloped
along like young colts, would have supposed that the boy, whose
short dry cough and paleness seemed to announce an early grave,
was shortly to become one of the world's illustrious leaders, whose
works would continue, centuries after their appearance, to be
studied, quoted, and criticised. His masters loved him. He was
a pupil of promise; and in his eighth year had gained the title of
the Young Philosopher, from his avidity to learn, and his constant questioning.
His education was confided to the Jesuits. This astonishing
body has many evils laid to its door, but no one can refuse to it
the praise of having been ever ready to see and apply the value




436                    DESCARTES.
of education. In the college of La Fleche the young Descartes
was instructed in mathematics, physics, logic, rhetoric, and the
ancient languages. He was an apt pupil; learned quickly, and
was never tired of learning.
Was the food supplied by the Jesuits nutritious  M. Thomas
remarks, "There is an education for the ordinary man; for the
man of genius there is no education but what he gives himself;
the second generally consists in destroying the first."  And so it
was with Descartes, who, on leaving La Fleche, declared that
he had derived no other benefit from his studies than that of a
conviction of his utter ignorance, and a profound contempt for
the systems of philosophy in vogue. The incompetence of philosophers to solve the problems they occupied themselves with,
-the anarchy which reigned in the scientific world, where no
two thinkers could agree upon fundamental points,-the extravagance of the conclusions to which some accepted premises led,
determinedhim to seek no more to slake his thirst attheir fountains.
"And that is why, as soon as my age permitted me to quit
my preceptors," he says, " I entirely gave up the study of letters;
and resolving to seek no other science than that which I could
find in myself, or else in the great book of the world, I employed
the remainder of my youth in travel, in seeing courts and camps,
in frequenting people of diverse humors and conditions, in collecting various experiences, and above all in endeavoring to draw
some profitable reflection from what I saw. For it seemed to
me that I should meet with more truth in the reasonings which
each man makes in his own affairs, and which if wrong would
be speedily punished by failure, than in those reasonings which
the philosopher makes in his study, upon speculations which produce no effect, and which are of no consequence to him, except
perhaps that he will be more vain of them the more remote they
are from common sense, because he would then have been forced to
employ more ingenuity and subtlety to render them plausible."*
* Discours de la Mthode, p. 6 of the convenient edition of M. Jules Simon. Paris, 1844.




LIFE OF DESCARTES.                437
For many years he led a roving, unsettled life; now serving
in the army, now making a tour; now studying mathematics in
solitude, now conversing with scientific men. One constant purpose gave unity to those various pursuits. He was elaborating
his answers to the questions which perplexed him; he was preparing his Method.
When only three-and-twenty he conceived the design of a
reformation in philosophy. He was at that time residing in his
winter-quarters at Neuburg, on the Danube. His travels soon
afterwards commenced, and at the age of thirty-three he retired
into Holland, there in silence and solitude to arrange his thoughts
into a consistent whole. He remained there eight years; and
so completely did he shut himself from the world, that he concealed from his friends the very place of his residence.
When the results of his meditative solitude were given to the
world, in the shape of his celebrated Discourse on Method, and
his Meditations (to which he invented replies), the sensation produced was immense. It was evident to all men that an original
and powerful thinker had arisen; and although of course this
originality could not but rouse much opposition, from the very
fact of being original, yet Descartes gained the day. His name
became European. His controversies were European quarrels.
Charles I., of England, invited him over, with the promise of a
liberal appointment; and the invitation would probably have
been accepted, had not the civil war broken out. He afterwards
received a flattering invitation from Christina of Sweden, who
had read some of his works with great satisfaction, and wished
to learn from himself the principles of his philosophy. He accepted it, and arrived in Stockholm in 1649. His reception was
most gratifying; and the Queen was so pleased with him as earnestly to beg him to remain with her, and give his assistance
towards the establishment of an academy of sciences. But the
delicate frame of Descartes was ill fitted for the severity of the
climate, and a cold, caught in one of his -norning visits to Christina, produced inflammation of the lungs, which put an end to




438                    DESCARTES.
his existence. Christina wept for him, had him interred in the
cemetery for foreigners, and placed a long eulogium upon his
tomb. His remains were subsequently (1666) carried from
Sweden into France, and buried with great ceremony in St.
Genevieve du Mont.
Descartes was a great thinker; but having said this, we have
almost exhausted the praise we can bestow upon him as a man.
In disposition he was timid to servility. When promulgating
his proofs of the existence of the Deity, he was in evident alarm
lest the Church should see something objectionable in them. He
had also written an astronomical treatise; but hearing of the
fate of Galileo, he refrained from publishing, and always used
some chicane in speaking of the world's movement. IIe was
not a brave man; nor was he an affectionate man. But he was
even-tempered, placid, and studious not to give offence.  In
these, as in so many other points, he resembles his illustrious
rival, Francis Bacon; but his name has descended spotless to
posterity, while Bacon's has descended darkened with more spots
than time can efface. It would be hard to say how much difference of position had to do with this difference of moral purity.
Had Bacon lived in his study, we should have only praises for
his name.
~ II. THE METHOD OF DESCARTES.
There have been disputes as to Bacon's claim to the title of
Father of Experimental Science; but no one disputes the claim
of Descartes to the title of Father of Modern Philosophy. Ontology and Psychology are still pursued upon his Method; and
his speculations are still proudly referred to, by most Continental
thinkers, as perfect, or almost perfect, examples of that Method.
In his Dedication of the Meditations to the Sorbonne, he says:
"I have always thought that the two questions, of the existence
of God, and the nature of the soul, were the chief of those
which ought to be demonstrated rather by philosophy than by
theology; for although it is sufficient for us, the faithful, to be



THE METHOD OF DESCARTES.             439
lieve in God, and that the soul does not perish with the body, it
certainly does not seem possible ever to persuade the infidels to
any religion, nor hardly to any moral virtue, unless we first prove
to them these two things by natural reason." Extraordinary
language, which shows how completely Philosophy had gained
complete independence.
But if Philosophy is to be independent,-if reason is to walk
alone, in what direction must she walk? Having relinquished
the aid of the Church, there were but two courses open: the
one, to tread once more in the path of the ancients, and to endeavor by the ancient Methods to attain the truth; or else to
open a new path, to invent a new Method. The former was
barely possible. The spirit of the age was deeply imbued with
a feeling of opposition against the ancient Methods; and Descartes himself had been painfully perplexed by the universal anarchy and uncertainty which prevailed. The second course was
therefore chosen.
Uncertainty was the disease of the epoch. Skepticism was
wide-spread, and even the most confident dogmatism could offer
no criterium of certitude. This want of a criterium we saw
leading, in Greece, to Skepticism, Epicureanism, Stoicism, the
New Academy, and finally leading the Alexandrians into the
province of faith, to escape from the dilemma. The question of
a criterium had long been the vital question of philosophy.
Descartes could get no answer to it from the Doctors of his day.
Unable to find firm ground in any of the prevalent systems; distracted by doubts; mistrusting the conclusions of his own understanding; mistrusting the evidences of his senses, he determined to make a tabula rasa, and reconstruct his knowledge.
He resolved to examine the premises of every conclusion, and to
believe nothing but upon the clearest evidence of reason; evidence
so convincing that he could not by any effort refuse to assent
to it.
He has given us the detailed history of his doubts. He has
told us how he found that he could plausibly enough doubt of




440                     DESCARTES.
every thing, except of his own existence. He pushed his skepticism to the verge of self-annihilation. There he stopped: there,
in Self, in his Consciousness, he found at last an irresistible Fact,
an irreversible Certainty.
Firm ground was discovered. He could doubt the existence
of the external world, and treat it as a phantasm; he could
doubt the existence of God, and treat the belief as a superstition;
but of the existence of his thinking, doubting mind, no sort of
doubt was possible. He, the doubter, existed, if nothing else existed. The existence that was revealed in his own Consciousness
was the primary fact, the first indubitable certainty. Hence his
famous Cogito, ergo Sum: I think, therefore I am.
It is somewhat curious, and, as an illustration of the frivolous
verbal disputes of philosophers, not a little instructive, that this
celebrated Cogito, ergo Sum should have been frequently attacked
for its logical imperfection. It has been objected, from Gassendi
downwards, that to say, " I think, therefore I am," is a begging
of the question, since existence has to be proved identical with
thought. Certainly, if Descartes had intended to prove his own
existence by reasoning, he would have been guilty of the petitio
principii Gassendi attributes to him; viz. that the major premise, "that which thinks exists," is assumed, not proved. But he
did not intend this. What was his object? He has told us that
it was to find a starting-point from which to reason,-to find an
irreversible certainty. And where did he find this? In his own
Consciousness. Doubt as I may, I cannot doubt of my own existence, because my very doubt reveals to me a something which
doubts. You may call this an assumption, if you will: I point
out the fact as one above and beyond all logic; which logic can
neither prove nor disprove; but which must always remain an
irreversible certainty, and as such a fitting basis of philosophy.*
I exist. No doubt can darken such a truth; no sophism can
confute this clear principle. This is a certainty, if there be none
* See his replies to the third and fifth series of Objections, affixed to his
Meditations.




THE METHOD OF DESCARTES.               441
other. This is the basis of all science. It is in vain to ask for a
proof of that which is self-evident and irresistible. I exist. The
consciousness of my existence is to me the assurance of my existence.
Had Descartes done no more than point out this fact, he would
have no claim to notice here; and we are surprised to find many
writers looking upon this Cogito, ergo Sum, as constituting the
great idea in his system. Surely it is only a statement of universal experience-an epigrammatic form given to the commonsense view of the matter. Any clown would have told him that
the assurance of his existence was his consciousness of it; but
the clown would not have stated it so well. He would have
said: I know I exist, because Ifeel that I exist.
Descartes therefore made no discovery in pointing out this fact
as an irresistible certainty. The part it plays in his system is
only that of a starting-point. It makes Consciousness the basis
of all truth; there is none other possible.  Interrogate Consciousness, and its clear replies will be Science. Here we have
a new basis and a new philosophy introduced. It was indeed
but another shape of the old formula, " Know thyself," so differently interpreted by Thales, Socrates, and the Alexandrians:
but it gave that formula a precise signification, a thing it had
before always wanted. Of little use could it be to tell man to
know himself. How is he to know himself? By looking inwards?   We all do that.   By examining the nature of his
thoughts? That had been done without success. By examining
the process of his thoughts? That too had been accomplished,
and the logic of Aristotle was the result.
The formula needed a precise interpretation; and that interpretation Descartes gave. Consciousness, said he, is the basis of
all knowledge; it is the only ground of absolute certainty.
Whatever it distinctly proclaims must be true. The process,
then, is simple: examine your Consciousness, and its clear replies. Hence the vital portion of his system lies in this axiom,
all clear ideas are true: whatever is clearly and distinctly con
190"




442                     DESCARTES.
ceived is true. This axiom he calls the foundation of all science,
the rule and measure of truth.*
The next step to be taken was to determine the rules for the
proper detection of these ideas; and these rules he has laid
down as follows:
I. Never to accept any thing as true, but what is evidently so;
to admit nothing but what so clearly and distinctly presents
itself as true that there can be no reason to doubt it.
II. To divide every question into as many separate questions
as possible; that each part being more easily conceived, the
whole may be more intelligible.-(Analysis.)
III. To conduct the examination with order, beginning by that
of objects the most simple, and therefore the easiest to be known,
and ascending little by little up to knowledge of the most complex.-(Synthesis.)
IV. To make such exact calculations, and such circumspections, as to be confident that nothing essential has been omitted.
Consciousness being the ground of all certainty, every thing
of which you are clearly and distinctly conscious must be true;
every thing which you clearly and distinctly conceive exists, if
the idea of it involves existence.
In the four rules, and in this view of Consciousness, we have
only half of Descartes' system: the psychological half. It was
owing, we believe, to the exclusive consideration of this half that
Dugald Stewart was led (in controverting Condorcet's assertion
that Descartes had done more than either Galileo or Bacon towards experimental philosophy) to say that Condorcet would
have been nearer the truth if he had pointed him ou(as the
Father of the Experimental Philosophy of the Mind. Perhaps
the title is just; but Condorcet's praise, though exaggerated, was
not without good foundation.
* "Hac igitur detecta veritate simul etiam invenit omnium scientiarum
fundarnentum: ac etiam omnium aliarum veritatum mensuram ac regulam;
scilicet, quicquid tam cdare ac distincte percipitur quhn istud verum est."Princip. Phil. p. 4.




THE METHOD OF DESCARTES.               443
There is, in truth, another half of Descartes' system; equally
important, or nearly so: we mean the Mathematical or Deductive Method. His eminence as a mathematician is universally
recognized. He was the first to make the grand discovery of the
application of Algebra to Geometry; and he made this at the
age of twenty-three.  The discovery that geometrical curves
might be expressed by algebraical numbers, though highly important in the history of mathematics, only interests us here by
leading us to trace his philosophical development. We see him
deeply engrossed in mathematics; we see him awakening to the
conviction that mathematics were capable of a still further simplification, and of a far more extended application. Struck as he
was with a certitude of mathematical reasoning, he began applying the principles of mathematical reasoning to the subject of
metaphysics. His great object was, amidst the skepticism and
anarchy of his contemporaries, to found a system which should
be solid and convincing. He first wished to find a basis of certitude-a starting-point: this he found in Consciousness. He
next wished to find a method of certitude: this he found in
mathematics.
"Those long chains of reasoning," he tells us, " all simple and
easy, which geometers use to arrive at their most difficult demonstrations, suggested to me that all things which came within
human knowledge must follow each other in a similar chain;
and that provided we abstain from admitting any thing as true
which is not so, and that we always preserve in them the order
necessary to deduce one from the other, there can be none so
remote to which we cannot finally attain, nor so obscure but that
we may discover them."* From these glimpses of the twofold
nature of Descartes' Method, it will be easy to see into his whole
system. The psychological and mathematical Methods are inseparable, Consciousness being the only ground of certitude,
mathematics the only method of certitude.
* Discours de la Maethode, p. 12.




444                      DESCARTES.
We may say therefore that the Deductive Method was now
completely constituted.  The whole operation of philosophy
henceforth consisted in deducing consequences. The premises
had been found; the conclusions alone were wanting. This was
held to be true of physics no less than of psychology. Thus, in
his Principia, he announces his intention of giving a short account of the principal phenomena of the world, not that he may
use them as reasons to prove any thing; for he adds, " we desire
to deduce effects from causes, not causes from efects, but only in
order that out of the innumerable effects which we learn to be
capable of resulting from the same causes, we may determine our
minds to consider some rather than others."*
Such being the Method of Descartes, our readers will hear
with surprise that some French writers have declared it to be
the same Method as that laid down by Bacon; and this surprise
will be heightened on learning that M. Victor Cousin is one of
those writers. IIe says, " Let us now see what our Descartes has
done. He has established in France the same Method that. England has endeavored to attribute exclusively to Bacon; and he
has established it with less grandeur of imagination in style, but
with the superior precision which must always characterize one
who, not content with laying down rules, puts them himself in
practice, and gives the example with the precept."t  M. Cousin
then quotes the four rules we quoted from Descartes; and seeing
in them Analysis and Synthesis, which he believes constitutes
the sole Method of Bacon, declares that the two Methods are
one. Such a statement requires no refutation; nor indeed would
* Principia Philos. pars iii. p. 51. The phrase, " cupimus enim rationes
effectuumi a causil, non autem e contrario causarum ab effectibus deducere,"
may be said to express the nature of his method, as opposed to the method
of Bacon. When M. Jules Simon said, " The commencement of philosophy
for Descartes is Doubt; that alone is all his entire method-cela seul est toute
sa Methode" (Introduction prefixed to his edition of Descartes, p. 3), he mistakes, as it seems to us, the whole purpose of Descartes' artificial skepticism:
besides, how can a Doubt be a Method?
t Hist. de la Philos. leqon iii. p. 91, ed. Bruxelles, 1840.




THE METHOD OF DESCARTES.             445
it have been noticed, did it not afford an illustration of the loose
way in which the term Method is employed by many writers.
Bacon was the reverse side of the medal of Descartes. Bacon's
deficiencies lay in that department where Descartes was greatest
-in mathematics. Hence Bacon's over-valuation of Induction,
and neglect of Deduction; hence also Descartes' over-valuation
of Deduction, and neglect of Induction. Both cultivated Physics; but Bacon made it the basis of all the sciences; Descartes
made it a mere illustration of his principles. The one argued
from effects to causes-from the known to the unknown; the
other deduced effects fiom causes-explaining phenomena by
noumena-explaining that which presented itself to the senses
by that which was intuitively known. Both separated religion
fiom philosophy; but Bacon declared the problems of religion
and ontology insoluble by reason, and therefore beyond the province of science; Descartes declared them soluble only by reason,
and that it was the first object of philosophy to solve them.
Besides these and other points of difference, there were also
several points of resemblance, owing to the resemblance of their
positions as reformers. They both overvalued their Methods,
which they declare will enable all men to philosophize with equal
justness. " It is not so essential to have a fine understanding,"
says Descartes, " as to apply it rightly. Those who walk slowly
make greater progress, if they always follow the right road, than
those who run swiftly, but run on a wrong one." This is precisely the thought of Bacon: "A cripple in the right path will
beat a racer in the wrong one." But both these thinkers assume
that the racer will choose the wrong path: whereas, if their
Methods are adopted, the finer understanding must always surpass the duller in the discovery of truth.
Before quitting this subject, we must remark on the essentially
metaphysical nature and tendency of the Method of Descartes,
even when employed on Physics; and for this purpose we cannot do better than borrow the admirable language of Fontenell(
in his parallel between Descartes and Newton. "Tous deux geo



446                    DESCARTES.
metres excellents ont vu la n6cessite de transporter la g6ometrie
dans la physique... Mais l'un, prenant un vol hardi, a voulu
se placer a la source de tout, se rendre maitre des premiers principes par quelques idees claires et fondamentales, pour n'avoir
plus qu'a descendre aux ph6nomenes de la nature comme i des
consequences necessaires; l'autre, plus timide ou plus modeste,
a commence sa marche par s'appuyer sur les phenomenes pour
remonter aux principes inconnus, resolu de les admettre, quels
que les put donner l'enchainement des consequences. L'un part
de ce qu'il entend nettement pour trouver la cause de ce qu'il
voit; l'autre part de ce qu'il voit pour en trouver la cause, soit
claire, soit obscure."
~ III. APPLICATION OF THE METHOD.
To prove the existence of God was the first application of Descartes' Method; not, as some say, to prove his own existence; for
that neither admitted of logical proof nor of disproof: it was a primary fact. Interrogating his Consciousness, he found that he had
the idea of God,-understanding, by God, a substance infinite, eternal, immutable, independent, omniscient, omnipotent. This, to him,
was as certain a truth as the truth of his own existence. I exist:
not only do I exist, but exist as a miserably imperfect, finite
being, subject to change-greatly ignorant, and incapable of creating any thing. In this, my Consciousness, I find by my finitude that I am not the All; by my imperfection, that I am not
perfect. Yet an infinite and perfect being must exist, because
infinity and perfection are implied, as correlatives, in my ideas of
imperfection and finitude. God therefore exists: his existence is
clearly proclaimed in my Consciousness, and can no more be a
matter of doubt, when fairly considered, than my own existence.
The conception of an infinite being proves his real existence;
for if there is not really such a being, I must have made the
conception; but if I could make it, I can also unmake it, which
evidently is not true; therefore there must be, externally to myself, an archetype from which the conception was derived.




APPLICATION OF THE METHOD.             447
"The ambiguity in this case," it has been remarked,* "is the
pronoun I, by which in one place is to be understood my will,
in another the laws of my nature. If the conception, existing as
it does in my mind, had no original without, the conclusion would
unquestionably follow that I had made it-that is, the laws of
my nature must have spontaneously evolved it; but that my will
made it, would not follow. Now, when Descartes afterwards adds
that I cannot unmake the conception, he means that I cannot
get rid of it by an act of my will, which is true, but is not the
proposition required. That what some of the laws of my nature
have produced, other laws, or the same laws in other circumstances, might not subsequently efface, he would have found it difficult to establish."
His second demonstration is the weakest of the three. Indeed,
it is the only one not irrefragable, upon his principles. The
third demonstration is peculiarly Cartesian, and may be thrown
into this syllogism:
All that we clearly and distinctly conceive as contained in
any thing, is true of that thing.
Now we conceive, clearly and distinctly, that the existence
of God is contained in the idea we have of him.
Ergo,
God exists.
Having demonstrated the existence of God, he had to prove
the distinction between body and soul. This, to him, was easy.
The fundamental attribute of Substance must be extension, because we can abstract from Substance all the qualities except extension. The fundamental attribute of Mind is thought, because
by this attribute Mind is revealed to itself. Now, according to
one of his logical axioms, two substances are really distinct when
their ideas are complete, and in no way imply each other. The
ideas, therefore, of extension and thought being distinct, it follows that Substance and Mind are distinct in essence.
We need not pursue our analysis of his metaphysical notions
* Mill's System of Logic, ii. 44i.




448                    DESCARTES.
further. We only stop to remark on the nature of his demonstrations of God and the soul. It is, and was, usual to prove the
existence of God fiom what is called the "evidence of design."
Descartes neither started from design, nor fiom motion, which
must have a mover: he started from the a priori ideas of perfection and infinity; his proof was in the clearness of his idea
of God. His Method was that of definition and deduction. To
define the idea of God, and hence to construct the world-not
to contemplate the world, and thence infer the existence of God
-was the route he pursued. Is it not eminently the procedure
of a mathematician? and of a mathematician who has taken
Consciousness as his starting-point?
Descartes' speculations are beautiful exemplifications of his
Method; and he follows that Method, even when it leads him to
the wildest conclusions. His physical speculations are sometimes admirable (he made important discoveries in optics), but
mostly fanciful. The famous theory of vortices deserves a mention here, as an example of his Method.
He begins by banishing the notion of a vacuum, not, as his
contemporaries said, because Nature has a horror of vacuum, but
because the essence of Substance being extension, wherever there
is extension there is Substance; consequently empty space is a
chimera. The substance which fills all space must be assumed
as divided into equal angular parts. Why must this be assumed?
Because it is the most simple, therefore the most natural supposition. This substance being set in motion, the parts are ground
into a spherical form; and the corners thus rubbed off, like
filings or sawdust, form a second or more subtle kind of substance.
There is, besides, a kind of substance, coarser and less fitted for
motion. The first kind makes luminous bodies, such as the sun
and fixed stars; the second makes the transparent substance of
the skies; the third kind is the material of opake bodies, such
as earth, planets, etc. We may also assume that the motions of
these parts take the form of revolving circular currents, or vortices. By this means the matter will be collected to the centre




APPLICATION OF THE METHOD.             449
of each vortex, while the second or subtle matter surrounds it,
and by its centrifugal effort constitutes light. The planets are
carried round the sun by the motion of this vortex, each planet
being at such a distance from the sun as to be in a part of the
vortex suitable to its solidity and mobility. The motions are
prevented from being exactly circular and regular by various
causes. For instance, a vortex may be pressed into an oval
shape by contiguous vortices.*
Descartes, in his physics, adopted a method which permitted
him to set aside the qualities and the substantial forms (which
others were seeking), and to consider only the relations of number, figure, and motion. In a word, he saw in physics only
mathematical problems. This was premature. Science, in its
infancy, cannot be carried on by the deductive Method alone:
such a process is reserved for its maturity.
But this deductive Method, though premature, was puissant.
Science is forced to employ it, and Bacon's greatest error was in
not sufficiently acknowledging it. Hence we may partly account
for the curious fact that Bacon, with his cautious Method, made
no discoveries, while Descartes, with his premature Method, made
important discoveries. Of course the greater physical knowledge
of Descartes, and the greater attention bestowed by him upon
physics, had something to do with this; but his Method also assisted him, precisely because his discoveries were of a kind to
which the mathematical method was strictly applicable.
That Descartes had read Bacon there is no doubt. He has
himself praised Bacon's works as leaving nothing to be desired
on the subject of experience; but he perceived Bacon's deficiency,
and declared that we are "liable to collect many superfluous experiences of particulars, and not only superfluous, but false," if
we have not ascertained the truth before we make these expe* We have followed Dr. Whewell's exposition of this theory, as given by
him, Hist. of Ind. Sciences, ii. p. 184. The curious reader will do well,
however, to turn to Descartes' own exposition in the Principia Phsiosophie,
where it is illustrated by diagrams.




450                    DESCARTES.
riences. In other words, experiment should be the verification
of an a priori conception; whereas Bacon teaches us to form
our conceptions from experiment.
We have said enough to make the Method of Descartes appreciable. His position is that of founder of the Deductive Method
on the basis of Consciousness. His scholars may be divided into
the mathematical cultivators of Physics, and the deductive cultivators of Philosophy. By the first he was speedily surpassed,
and his influence on them can only be regarded as an impulsion.
By the second he was continued: his principles were unhesitatingly accepted, and only developed in a somewhat different
manner.
His philosophical Method subsists in the present day. It is
the Method implicitly or explicitly adopted by most metaphysicians in their speculations upon ontological subjects. Is it a
good Method? The question is of the highest importance: we
will endeavor to answer it.
~ IV. Is THE METHOD TRUE?
In the Dedicatory Epistle prefixed to his Meditations, Descartes declares that his demonstrations of the existence of God,
etc, "equal, or even surpass, in certitude the demonstrations of
geometry." Upon what does he found this belief? He founds
it upon the very nature of certitude. Consciousness is the basis
of all certitude. Whatever I am distinctly conscious of, I must
be certain of; all the ideas which I find in my Consciousness, as
distinctly conceived, must be true. The belief I have in my
existence is derived from the fact of my Consciousness: I think,
therefore I exist. Now as soon as I conceive a truth with distinctness, I am irresistibly led to believe in it; and if that belief
is so firm that I can never have any reason to doubt that which
I believe, I have all the certitude that can be desired.
Further: we have no knowledge whatever of any thing external
to us except through the medium of ideas. The consequence is,




IS THE METHOD TRUE?                 451
says Descartes, that whatever we find in the ideas must necessarily
be in the external things.
It is only in our minds that we can seek whether things exist,
or not. There cannot be more reality in an effect than in a
cause. The external thing, being the cause of the idea, must
therefore possess as much reality as the idea, and vice versd. So
that whatever we conceive as existent, exists.
This is the basis on which Descartes' system is erected; if this
basis be rotten, the superstructure must fall.  If the root is
vitiated, the tree will bear no fruit. No thinker, except Spinoza,
has so clearly, so fiankly stated his criterium.  Let us then accept the challenge which it offers, since an opportunity is now
afforded of bringing together in a narrow field the defenders and
antagonists of philosophy.
If Descartes is wrong-if Consciousness is not the ultimate
ground of Certitude, embracing both objective and subjectiveif ideas are not the internal copies of external things-then must
Philosophy be content to relinquish all claim to certitude, and
find refuge again in Faith.
And Descartes is wrong. The very Consciousness to which
he appeals, convicts him. There is this fallacy in his system:
Consciousness is the ultimate ground of certitude, for me; if I
am conscious that I exist, I cannot doubt that I exist; if I am
conscious of pain, I must be in pain. This is self-evident. But
what ground of certitude can my Consciousness afford respecting
things which are not me?  How does the principle of certitude
apply? How far does it extend? It can only extend to things
which relate to me. I am conscious of all that passes within
myself; but I am not conscious of what passes in not-self: all
that I can possibly know of the not-self is in its effects upon me.
Consciousness is therefore "cabin'd, cribb'd, confined" to me,
and to what passes within me; so far does the principle of certitude extend, and no farther. Any other ideas we may have,
any knowledge we may have respecting not-self, can only be
founded on inferences. Thus, I burn myself in the fire: I




452                     DESCARTES.
am conscious of the sensation; I have certain and immediate
knowledge of that. But I can only be certain that a change has
taken place in my consciousness; when from that change I infer
the existence of an external object (the fire), my inference may
be correct, but I have obviously shifted my ground; Consciousness-my principle of certitude-forsakes me here: I go out of
myself to infer the existence of something which is not-self. My
knowledge of the sensation was immediate, indubitable. My
knowledge of the object is mediate, uncertain.
Directly therefore we leave the ground of Consciousness for
that of inference, avenues of doubt are opened. Other inferences
can be brought to bear upon any one inference to illustrate or to
refute it. The mathematical certainty which Descartes attributed
to these inferences becomes a great uncertainty. He says we
only know things through the medium of ideas. We will accept
the proposition as unquestionable. But then he also says that,
in consequence of this, whatever we find in the ideas must necessarily be true of the things. The reason is, that as ideas are
caused in us by objects, and as every effect must have as much
reality as the cause-the effect being equal to the cause-so must
ideas have the same reality as things. But this is a double fallacy. In the first place, an effect is not equal to its cause; it is
a mere consequent of an antecedent, having no such relation as
equality whatever. In the second place, the use of the term
" reality" is ambiguous. Unquestionably an effect really exists;
but reality of existence does not imply similarity of modes of
existence. The burn occasioned by a fire is as real as the fire;
but it in no way resembles the fire.
So when Descartes says that what is true of ideas must be true
of things, he assumes that the mind is apassive recipient-a mirror, in which things reflect themselves. This is altogether fallacious; the mind is an active co-operator in all sensation-sensation is a -onsciousness of changes operated in ourselves, not a
consciousness of the objects causing those changes. In truth, so
far from our being able to apprehend the nature of things ex



IS THE METHOD TRUE?                453
ternal to us, there is an impenetrable screen forever placed before
our eyes, and that impenetrable screen is the very Consciousness
upon which Descartes relies. When placed in contact with external objects, they operate upon us; their operations we know,
themselves we cannot know; precisely because our knowledge of
them  is mediate, and the medium is our Consciousness. Into
whatever regions we wander, we carry with,.s this Consciousness, by means of which, indeed, we know, but all we know, is
-ourselves.
Knowledge is composed of Ideas. Ideas are the joint product
of mind on the one hand, and of external causes on the other;
or rather we may say that Ideas are the products of mind excited
by external causes. Upon what principles of inference (since we
are here on the ground of inference) can you infer that the ideas
excited are copies of the exciting causes-that the ideas excited
apprehend the whole nature of the causes  The cause of the
fallacy is in that very strong disposition to give objectivity to a
law of the mind; in consequence of which we often hear people
declare that something they are asserting is " involved in the
idea."
There is one mode of escape left for those who believe in the
validity of ontological speculations: namely, to assert the existence of Innate Ideas, or-as the theory is generally stated in
modern times-of Necessary Truths independent of all experience. If the idea of God, for example, be innate in us, it is no
longer a matter of inference, but of Consciousness; and on such
an hypothesis Descartes is correct in believing that the certainty
of this idea equals the certainty of geometry.
But some maintain that he did not assert the existence of Innate Ideas, though, from its having been a doctrine maintained
by his followers, it is usually attributed to him. Dugald Stewart
quotes the following passage from Descartes in reply to his adversaries, who accused him of holding the tenet of Innate Ideas:
-"When I said that the idea of God is innate in us, I never
meant more than this, that Nature has endowed us with a facul



454                    DESCARTES.
ty by which we may know God; but I have never either said or
thought that such ideas had an actual existence, or even that
they were a species distinct from the faculty of thinking....
Although the idea of God is so imprinted on our minds that
every person has within himself the faculty of knowing Him, it
does not follow that there may not have been various individuals
who have passed through life without making this idea a distinct
object of apprehension; and, in truth, they who think they have
an idea of a plurality of Gods have no idea of God whatever."
From this it would appear that he did not hold the doctrine
of Innate Ideas. But we must venture to dissent from the conelusion drawn by Dugald Stewart on the strength of such a passage; against that passage we will bring another equally explicit
(we could bring fifty, if necessary), which asserts the existence
of Innate Ideas. " By the word idea," he says, " I understand all
that can be in our thoughts; and I distinguish three sorts of
ideas:-adventitious, like the common idea of the sun; framed
by the mind, such as that which astronomical reasoning gives of
the sun; and innate, as the idea of God, mind, body, a triangle,
and generally all those which represent true, immutable, and eternal
essences."*  This last explanation is distinct; and it is all that
the serious antagonists of Innate Ideas have ever combated. If
Descartes, when pressed by objections, gave different explanations, we may attribute that to the want of a steady conception
of the vital importance of Innate Ideas in his system. The fact
remains that Innate Ideas form the necessary groundwork of the
Cartesian doctrine.
Although the theory of Innate Ideas may, in its Cartesian
form, be said to be exploded, it does really continue to be upheld,
under a new form. A conviction of the paramount necessity of
some such groundwork for metaphysical speculation has led to
the modern theory of Necessary Truths. This plausible theory
has been adopted by Dr. Whewell in his Philosophy of the In* Lettres de Descartes, liv.




IS THE METHOD TRUE?                     455
ductive Sciences; but his arguments have been completely
shattered by John Mill on the one hand, and by Sir John Herschel on the other.*
The basis of all modern ontological speculations lies in the assumption that we have ideas independent of experience. Experience
can only tell us of ourselves, or of phenomena; of noumena it
can tell us nothing. That we have no ideas independent of experience has been clearly enough established in the best schools
of psychology; but the existence of metaphysical speculation
proves that the contrary opinion still finds numerous upholders.t
The fundamental question then of modern Philosophy was
this: Have we any Ideas independent of Experience?      And the
attempt to solve it will occupy the greater portion of our history.
Before entering upon it we must exhibit the Method of Descartes,
pushed to its ultimate conclusions in Spinoza.1
* System of Logic, book ii. ch. v.; and Quarterly Review, June, 1841; indeed, Dr. Whewell's arguments had been anticipated and refuted by Locke
long before. See Essay, book iv. ch. 6, 7.
t See the question discussed further on: Epoch VIII. ~ v.
I The best modern works on Descartes, apart from regular Histories of
Philosophy, are M. Francisque Boullier's Histoire et Critique de la Revolution
Cartesienne, Paris, 1842; M. Ch. Renouvier's Manuel de la Philos. Moderne,
Paris, 1841; and Feuerbach's Geschichte der neuern Philosophie, Leipzig, 1847,
The best edition of Descartes' works is that by Victor Cousin, in eleven vols.,
8vo., Paris, 1826. M. Jules Simon has also published a cheap and convenient edition, in one volume, of the Discourse on Method, the Meditations, and
the Treatise on the Passions, Paris, 1844. Both of these have been excellently translated into English (Edinburgh, 185a).




CHAPTER II.
SPINOZA.
~ I. SPINOZA's LIFE.
EARLY in the seventeenth century, on a fair evening of summer, a little Jewish boy was playing with his sisters on the Burgwall of Amsterdam, close to the Portuguese synagogue. His
face was mild and ingenious; his eyes were small, but bright,
quick, and penetrative; and the dark hair floated in luxuriant
curls over his neck and shoulders. Noticeable, perhaps, for his
beauty and joyousness, the little boy played amongst the active
citizens of that active town. The Dutch then occupied the
thoughtful attention of all Europe. After having first conquered
for themselves firm footing on this earth, by rescuing their country from the sea, they had thrown off the oppressive yoke of
Spain; and had now conquered for themselves a freedom from a
far greater tyranny, the tyranny of thought.
Amsterdam was noisy with the creaking of cordage, the bawling of sailors, and the busy trafficking of traders. The Zuyder
Zee was crowded with vessels laden with precious stores from all
quarters of the globe. The canals which ramify that city, like
a great arterial system, were blocked up with boats and barges:
the whole scene was vivid with the greatness and the littleness
of commerce. Heedless of all this turmoil, as unheeded in itheedless of all those higher mysteries of existence, the solution
of which was hereafter to be the endeavor of his life-untouched
by any of those strange questions which a restless spirit cannot
answer, but which it refuses to have answered by others-heedless of every thing but his game, the little boy played merrily
with his sisters. That boy was Benedict Spinoza.




SPINOZA'S LIFE.                 457
It is a pleasant thing to think of Spinoza as a boy, playing
at boyish games. He has for so long been the bugbear of theologians and timid thinkers; he has for so long been looked upon
as a monster, an atheist, and (to add to the horror), a Jewish
atheist; and looked upon, even by those who were not so aghast
at the consequences of his system, as nothing more than a frigid
logician, that we dwell with singular pleasure on any more human
aspect of his character. We hope, ere we have done, to convince the reader that this rigorous logician was a wise, virtuous,
and affectionate man.
His parents were honest merchants of Amsterdam, who had
settled there in company with a number of their brethren, on
escaping the persecution to which all Jews were subject in Spain.
The young Baruch* was at first destined to commerce; but his
passion for study, and the precocity of his intellect, made his
parents alter their resolution in favor of a rabbinical education:
a resolution warranted by sickliness of constitution, which had
increased his love of study. The sickly child is mostly thoughtful: he is thrown upon himself and his own resources; he suffers, and asks himself the cause of his pains, asks himself
whether the world suffers like him; whether he is one with nature, and subject to the same laws, or whether he is apart from
it, and regulated by distinct laws. From these he rises to the
awful questions-Why? Whence     and Whither 
The education of the Jews was almost exclusively religious,
the Old Testament and the Talmud forming their principal studies. Spinoza entered into them with a fanatical zeal, which,
backed as it was by remarkable penetration and subtlety, won
the admiration of the Chief Rabbin, Saul Levi Morteira, who became his guide and instructor. Great indeed were the hopes entertained of this youth, who at fourteen rivalled almost all the
doctors in the exactitude and extent of his biblical knowledge.
* Baruch was Spinoza's Hebrew name, which he himself translated into
Latin as Benedictus; from which some have erroneously supposed that he
embraced Christianity, whereas he only renounced Judaism.
20




458                      SPINOZA.
But these hopes were turned to fears, when they saw that young
and pertinacious spirit pursue his undaunted inquiries into whatever region they conducted him, and found him putting difficulties to them which they, Rabbins and philosophers, were unable
to solve.
Spinoza was to be deterred neither by threats nor by sophistications. He found in the Old Testament no mention of the doctrine of immortality: there was complete silence on the point.*
He made no secret of his opinions; and two of his schoolfellows, irritated at his intellectual superiority, or else anxious to
curry favor with the Rabbins, reported his heresy with the usual
fertility of exaggeration. Summoned to appear before the Synagogue, he obeyed with a gay carelessness, conscious of his innocence. His judges, finding him obstinate in his opinions, threatened him  with excommunication: he answered with a sneer.
Morteira, informed of the danger, hastened to confront his rebellious pupil; but Spinoza remained as untouched by his rhetoric as he was unconvinced by his arguments. Enraged at this
failure, Morteira took a higher tone, and threatened him with
excommunication, unless he at once retracted. His pupil was
irritated, and replied in sarcasms. The Rabbin then impetuously
broke up the assembly, and vowed "only to return with the
thunderbolt in his hand."
In anticipation of the threatened excommunication, Spinoza
wisely withdrew himself from the Synagogue-a step which
profoundly mortified his enemies, as he thereby rendered futile all
intimidations which had been employed against him, particularly
the otherwise terrible excommunication; for what terror could
such a sentence inspire in one who voluntarily absented himself
from the society which pretended to exclude him?
Dreading his ability, and the force of his example, the Synagogue made him an offer of an annual pension of a thousand
* On this silence Warburton endeavored to establish the divinity of the
Legation of Moses; and Bishop Sherlock has exerted considerable ingenuity
in explaining the discrepancy which skeptics had seized hold of as an argument in their favor.




SPINOZA'S LIFE.                  459
florins, if he would only consent to be silent, and assist fiom time
to time at their ceremonies. Spinoza, indignant at such an attempt to palter with his conscience, refused it with scorn. One
evening, as he was coming out of the theatre, where he had
been relaxing his overtasked mind, he was startled by the fierce
expression of a dark face, thrust eagerly before his. The glare
of bloodthirsty fanaticism arrested him; a knife gleamed in the
air, and he had barely time to parry the blow. It fell upon his
chest, but, fortunately deadened in its force, only tore his coat.
The assassin escaped. Spinoza walked home thoughtful.*
The day of excommunication at length arrived; and a vast
concourse of Jews assembled to witness the awful ceremony. It
began by the solemn and silent lighting of a quantity of black
wax candles, and by opening the tabernacle wherein were deposited the Books of the Law of Moses. Thus were the dim imaginations of the faithful prepared for all the horror of the scene. Morteira, the ancient friend and master, now the fiercest enemy of the
condemned, was to order the execution of the sentence. He
stood there, pained, but implacable; the people fixed their eager
eyes upon him. High above, the chanter rose and chanted forth,
in loud, lugubrious tones, the words of execration; while from
the opposite side another mingled with these curses the thrilling
sounds of the trumpet; and now the black candles were reversed,
and were made to melt, drop by drop, into a huge tub filled with
blood. This spectacle-a symbol of the most terrible faithmade the whole assembly shudder; and when the final Anathema Maranatha! were uttered, and the lights all suddenly immerced in the blood, a cry of religious horror and execration
burst from all; and in that solemn darkness, and to those solemn
curses, they shouted Amen, Amen!
Thus was the young truth-seeker expelled from his commu* Some of the biographers contradict Bayle's statement of the assassination being attempted as Spinoza was leaving the theatre, and declare that he
was coming from the Synagogue; but they forget that he had entirely renounced going there, and this was the probable motive of the assassin.




460                     SPINOZA.
nily. his friends and relations forbidden to hold intercourse with
him. Like the young and energetic Shelley, who afterwards imitated him, he found himself an outcast in this busy world, with
no other guides through its perplexing labyrinths than sincerity
and self-dependence. Two or three new friends soon presented
themselves; men who warred against their religion as he had
warred against his own; and a bond of sympathy was forged
out of a common injustice. Here again we trace a resemblance
to Shelley, who, discountenanced by his relations, sought amongst
a few skeptical friends to supply the affections he was thus deprived of. Like Spinoza, he too had only sisters, with whom he
had been brought up. No doubt, in both cases, the consciousness of sincerity, and the pride of martyrdom, were great sustainments in this combat with society. They are always so; and
it is well that they are so, or the battle would never be fought;
but they never entirely replace the affections. Shut out from
our family, we may seek a brotherhood of apostasy; but these
new and precarious intellectual sympathies are small compensation for the loss of the emotional sympathies, with all their links
of association, and all their memories of childhood.
Spinoza must have felt this, and, to fill the void of his yearning heart, he sought the daughter of his friend and master, Van
den Ende, as his wife.
This Van den Ende had some influence on Spinoza's life. He
was a physician in Amsterdam, who conducted a philological
seminary with such success, that all the wealthy citizens sent him
their sons; but it was afterwards asserted, that to every dose of
Latin he added a grain of atheism. He undertook to instruct
Spinoza in Latin, and to give him board and lodging, on condition that he should subsequently aid him in instructing his scholars. This Spinoza accepted with joy; for although master of
the Hebrew, German, Spanish, Portuguese (and of course Dutch)
languages, he had long felt the urgent necessity of Latin.
Van den Ende had a daughter; her personal charms were
equivocal, but she was thoroughly versed in Latin, and was an




SPINOZA'S LIFE.                461
accomplished musician. The task of teaching young Benedict
generally fell to her: and as a consequence the pupil soon became in love with the tutor. We often picture this courtship as
a sort of odd reverse of Abelard and Heloise. Spinoza we fancy
not inattentive to the instruction, but the more in love with it
coming from so soft a mouth: not inattentive, yet not wholly absorbed. He watches her hand as it moves along the page, and
longs to sqeeze it. While " looking out" in the dictionary, their
hands touch-and he is thrilled; but the word is found, nevertheless. The lesson ended, he ventures on a timid compliment,
which she receives with a kind smile; but the smile is lost,
for the bashful philosopher has his eyes on the ground; when
he raises them, it is to see her trip away to household duties, or
to another pupil: and he looks after her sighing. But, alas for
maidenly discernment! our female Abelard was more captivated
by the showy attractions of a certain Kerkering, a young Hamburg merchant, who had also taken lessons in Latin and love
from the fair teacher; and who, having backed his pretensions
by the more potent seductions of pearl necklaces, rings, etc.,
quite cast poor Benedict into the shade, who then turned from
love to philosophy.
His progess in Latin had, however, been considerable; he
read it with facility, and found it invaluable in his philosophical
studies, especially as the works of Descartes now fell into his
hands: these he studied with intense avidity, feeling that a new
world was therein revealed. The laws of the ancient Jewish
doctors expressly enjoin the necessity of learning some mechanical art, as well as the study of the law. It was not enough,
they said, to be a scholar-the means of subsistence must also
be learned. Spinoza had accordingly, while belonging to the
Synagogue, learnt the art of polishing glasses for telescopes, microscopes, etc., in which he arrived at such proficiency that Leibnitz, writing to him, mentioned, "Among the honorable things
which fame has acquainted me with respecting you, I learn with
no small interest that you are a clever optician." By polishing




462                      SPINOZA.
glasses he gained a subsistence-humble, it is true, but equal to
his wants. To this he joined, by way of relaxation, the study of
design, and soon became very expert. Col6rus had a portfolio
of portraits of several distinguished men, sketched by him; and
one among them was a portrait of himself, in the dress of Masaniello.*
In his eight-and-twentieth year Spinoza left his natal city of
Amsterdam, and resolving to devote his life to study, retired to
Rhynsburg, near Leyden, where, still pursuing his trade as a
glass-polisher, he devoted every spare hour to philosophy. The
fruits of his solitude were the Abridgment of the Meditations of
Descartes, with an Appendix, in which he first disclosed the
principal points of his own system. This is a very interesting
work. It contains the most accurate and comprehensible account of Descartes ever written; and the Appendix is curious, as
containing the germ of the Ethica. It made a profound sensation; and when, the following year, he removed to Woorburg
a small village near the Hague, his reputation attracted to him
a great concourse of visitors. Many enmities were excited
amongst the disciples of Descartes, by the exposition of the weak
points of their master's system; and Spinoza had to suffer their
rude attacks in consequence. But the attention of all thinking
men was fixed upon him; and the clearness and precision of his
work won him admiration. So many new friendships did he
form, that he at last yielded to the numerous solicitations that
he should come and live entirely at the Hague. It was not the
learned alone who sought his friendship; men of rank in public
affairs were also numbered amongst them. Of the latter we may
mention the celebrated Jan de Witt, who loved Spinoza, and
profited by his advice in many an emergency. The great Cond6
also, during the invasion of Holland by the French, sent to de* "Your enemies'have not failed to assert that by that you pretended to
show that you would create in a little while the same uproar in Christianity
that Masaniello created in Naples." —Renoontre de Baykt avec Spinoza dans'autre Monde. 1711.




SPINOZA'S LIFE.                463
sire Spinoza to come and see him. The Philosopher obeyed, but
the Prince was prevented from keeping his appointment-to his
own loss. This journey was very near proving fatal to Spinoza.
The populace having learned that he had been in communication
with the enemy, began to suspect him of being a spy. His landlord, alarmed at these reports, warned him of them; he feared,
he said, that the populace would attack the house. "Fear nothing," replied Spinoza, calmly; "it is easy for me to justify myself, and there are persons enough who know the object of my
journey; but whatever may arrive, as soon as the people assemble
before your door, I will go out and meet them, even though I
should share the fate of De Witt."  The same calm courage
which made him proclaim the truth, now made him ready to
confront the infuriated populace. Fortunately all passed off in
peace, and he was left to his studies. Karl Ludwig, anxious to
secure so illustrious a thinker, offered him the vacant chair of
Philosophy at Heidelberg, which, however, Spinoza could not
accept, conscious that the philosophy he would teach was too
closely allied to theology not to trench on its dogmas; and the
Elector had expressly stipulated that he should teach nothing
which could prejudice the established religion. He therefore
begged to decline it, as his public duties would interfere with his
private meditations. Yet it was both a lucrative and honorable
post he refused; but a philosophical contempt for worldly honors
was amongst his characteristics.
It is invigorating to contemplate Spinoza's life. Dependent
on his own manual exertions for his daily bread, limited in his
wants, and declining all pecuniary assistance so liberally offered
by his friends, he was always at ease, cheerful, and occupied.
There is an heroic firmness traceable in every act of his life;
there is a perpetual sense of man's independence, worthy all imitation. He refuses to accept the belief of another man-he will
believe for himself; he sees mysteries around him, awful, inexplicable; but he will accept of no man's explanation. God has
given him a foul, and with that he will solve the problem, or




464                      SPINOZA.
remain without a solution. He leaves the Synagogue; he leaves
Descartes; he thinks for himself. In a far subordinate sphere
he will also assert his independence. Having but the most miserable pittance, and with the purses of his friends open to him,
he preferred limiting his desires to accepting their bounties. He
preferred working and gaining his own subsistence, so long as it
was to be gained. This was no crotchet, neither was it ignoble
calculation.  The friends were sincere, their offers were sincere:
he knew it, but thanked them, and declined. The heritage,
which on his father's death fell to his lot, he resigned to his sisters. The large property which his friend Simon de Vries had
announced his intention of leaving him, he would not consent to
accept, but made Simon alter his will in favor of his brother, at
Schiedam. The pension offered him if he would dedicate his
next work to Louis XIV., he refused, "having no intention of
dedicating any thing to that monarch." He was indebted to no
one but to God; who had given him talents, and energy to make
those talents available, not to let them and him rot in idleness, or
in ignoble dependence, while all the world had to toil.*
Yet it was a hard, griping poverty that he endured. On looking over his papers after his death, they found accounts of his
expenditure. One day he ate nothing but a soupe au lait, with
a little butter, which cost about three halfpence, and a pot of
beer, which cost three farthings more. Another day he lived on
a basin of gruel, with some butter and raisins, which cost him
twopence halfpenny; "And," says the pastor Colerus, "although
often invited to dinner, he preferred the scanty meal that he
found at home, to dining sumptuously at the expense of another."
This was the man who was, by his contemporaries, branded with
the names of Atheist and Epicurean; and who has borne these
* It was in a man's own energy that he saw the germ of worth and greatness, and wisely ridiculed the notion of patronage in this noteworthy passage: " Governments should never found academies, for they serve more to
oppress than to encourage genius. The unique method of making the arts
and sciences flourish, is to allow every individual to teach what he thinks, at
his own risk and peril." —Tact. Polit. c. 8, ~ 49.




SPINOZA'S LIFE.                 465
names forever after through all Europe, excepting only Germany.
While on the one hand no man was perhaps ever more tilled
with religion (so that Novalis could call him a " God-intoxicated
man"), on the other hand his Epicureanism, at twopence-halfpenny sterling per diem, stands a legible charge against him.
The publication of his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus was an
event of some importance, both in the history of philosophy and
of Spinoza. The state of men's minds at that period was not
favorable to the reception of any great philosophical system;
and Spinoza found himself obliged to prepare the way for his
future doctrines, by examining the nature of that ecclesiastical
power which could excite at will such violent perturbation in
the State, and by examining also the foundations on which that
power reposed. This great question still agitates mankind; and
it is as curious as instructive to observe that the late orthodox
and estimable Dr. Arnold taught a doctrine precisely similar to
that taught by the heretical and persecuted Spinoza.*
Times were troubled. Holland, it is true, was reposing on
her laurels, won in the long and desperate struggle against
Spain. Having freed herself from a foreign yoke, she had, one
would fancy, little now to do but to complete her canals, extend
her commerce, and enjoy her peace. But this land of political
freedom-this ark of refuge for the persecuted of all nationsthe republic whose banner was freedom, and in whose cities European freethinkers published their works-was disturbed by
theological faction. The persecuted Jews might flock from
Spain and Portugal, the synagogue might rear itself beside the
church; the Protestants of France and Belgium were welcome
as brothers and citizens; but, arrived there, the fugitives might
witness, even there, the implacable war of party. Toleration
was afforded to political freethinking, and to the diversities of
religion; but, within the pale of the State religion, malice and
all uncharitableness were daily witnessed. There the Gomarists
* Compare Arnold, Introductory Lectures on Modern Ristory: Appendix
to the first Lecture..




466                      SPINOZA.
and Arminians disputed concerning the infallibility of their doctrines, and cloaked their political ambition under evangelical
protestations.*
This was the state of things on the appearance of the Tractatus. Spinoza, seeing the deplorable dissensions of the theologians, endeavored to make evident the necessity of a State
religion, which, without absolutely imposing, or interfering with,
private creeds, should regulate all outward observances. Because,
as it is the office of the State to watch over all that concerns
the common welfare, so should it watch over the Church, and
direct it according to the general wish. But two things perfectly distinct must not here be confounded, viz. liberty of
observance and liberty of thought. The latter is independent of
all civil power; but the former must be subject to it, for the
sake of the public tranquillity.
Although this portion of the Tractatus could not have met
with general approbation, yet it would scarcely have raised
violent dissensions, had Spinoza confined himself to such speculation; but, anticipating the rationalism of modern Germans, he
undertook a criticism of the Bible, and attacked the institution
of priesthood as injurious to the general welfare. It is curious
to notice Spinoza's anticipation of the Hegelian Christology,
which, in the hands of Strauss, Feuerbach, and Bruno Bauer,
has made so much noise in the theological world:-" I tell you,"
says Spinoza, in his letter to Oldenburg, " that it is not necessary
for your salvation that you should believe in Christ according to
the flesh; but of that eternal son of God, i. e. eternal wisdom of
God, which is manifested in all things, but mostly in the human
mind, and most of all in Jesus Christ, a very different conception must be formed."-"Dico ad salutem non esse omnino
necesse, Christum, secundum carnem noscere, sed de aeterno illo
filio Dei, hoc est, Dei aetern& sapientia, qus sese in omnibus
rebus, et maxime in mente humana et omnium     maxime in
* Saintes, Bistoire de la Vie de Spinoza, p. 68.




SPINOZA'S LIFE.                 467
Christo Jesu manifestavit, longe aliter sentiendum."* The consequences were as might have been expected: the book was at
once condemned, and forbidden to be received in almost every
country. This, as usual, only gave a greater stimulus to curiosity, and the sensation the work produced may be judged of
by the quantity of "refutations" which appeared. Many were
the artifices used to introduce it into the various countries. An
edition was published at Leyden, under this title: Dan. Hensii
Operum Historicorum collectio prima. Edit. II., priori editione
multo emendatior et auctior; accedunt qucedam hactenus inedita.
This was reprinted at Amsterdam as Henriquez de Villacorta,.f. Dr. a Cubiculo Philippi IV., Caroli II., Archiatri Opera
chirurqica omnia, sub auspiciis potentissimi Hispaniarum Regis.
This absurd title was adopted to pass it into Spain. Another
edition in French, called La Clef du Sanctuaire, was published
at Leyden in 1678, and in Amsterdam as Traite des Ceremonies
des Juifs, and again as Reflexions curieuses d'un Esprit desinteresse.
Spinoza's devotion to study, with its concurrent abstemiousness and want of exercise, soon undermined his constitution;
but he never complained. He suffered that, as he had suffered
every thing else-in silence. Once, only, a hint escapes him.
"If my life be continued," he writes to a friend respecting a
promise to explain certain matters. No plaint-no regretmerely a condition put upon a promise. He was a calm, brave
man; he could confront disease and death, as he had confronted
poverty and persecution. Bravery of the highest kind distinguished him through life, and it was not likely to fail him on
the quitting it; and yet beneath that calm, cold stoicism, there
was a childlike gayety springing from a warm and sympathizing
heart. His character was made up of generous simplicity and
heroic forbearance. He could spare somewhat from even his
scanty pittance to relieve the wretched. He taught the learned
* Opera Post/huma, p. 450.




468                     SPINOZA.
world the doctrines he had elaborated with endless toil; but he
taught children to be regular in their attendance on divine service. He would question his host and hostess, on their return
from church, respecting the sermon they had heard, and the
benefit they had derived. He had no unwise proselytism which
would destroy convictions in minds unfitted to receive others.
One day his hostess asked him if he believed that she would be
saved by her religion. He answered, " Your religion is a good
one-you ought not to seek another, nor doubt that yours will
procure your salvation, provided you add to your piety the
tranquil virtues of domestic life."  Words full of wisdom, springing from an affectionate and experienced mind.
So lived the Jew, Spinoza. So he developed his own nature,
and assisted the development in others. Given up to philosophy,
he found in it " the true medicine of the soul " of which Cicero
speaks.* His only relaxations were his pipe, receiving visitors,
chatting to the people of his house, and watching spiders'fight.
This last amusement would make the tears roll down his cheeks
with laughter.
The commencement of the year 1677.found him near his end.
The phthisis, which he had suffered fiom.for twenty years, now
alarmingly increased. On Sunday, the 22d February, he insisted
on his kind host and hostess leaving him, and attending divine
service, as he would not permit his illness to obstruct their devotions. They obeyed. On their return he talked with them
about the sermon, and ate some broth with a good appetite.
After dinner his friends returned to church, leaving the physician
with him. When they came home they learned, with sorrow
and surprise, that he had expired about three o'clock, in the
presence of the physician, who seized what money there was on
the table, together with a silver-handled knife, and left the body
without further care. So died, in his Torty-fifth year, in the full
vigor and maturity of his intellect, Benedict Spinoza. "Offer
* Cicero s  iiusi. i.. Compare also the fine saying of Giordano Bruno
(p. 398).




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.                469
up with me a lock of hair to the manes of the holy but repudiated Spinoza!" exclaims the pious Schleiermacher. "The great
spirit of the world penetrated him; the Infinite was his beginning
and his end; the universe his only and eternal love. He was
filled with religion and religious feeling; and therefore it is that
he stands alone, unapproachable; the master in his art, but
elevated above the profane world, without adherents, and without even citizenship."*
~ II. SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.
The system of Spinoza, which has excited so much odium, is
but the logical development of the system of Descartes which has
excited so much admiration. Curious! The demonstration of
the existence of God was one of Descartes' proudest laurels; the
demonstration of the existence of God-and of no other existence being possible-condemned Spinoza to almost universal
execration.
Dugald Stewart, generally one of the most candid of men, evidently shared the common prejudice with respect to Spinoza.
He refuses therefore to admit that Spinoza, whom he dislikes,
held opinions at all similar to those of Descartes, whom he admires. " It was in little else," says he, " than his physical principles that he agreed with Descartes; for no two philosophers
ever differed more widely in their metaphysical and theological
tenets.  Fontenelle characterizes his system  as Cartesianism
pushed to extravagance."  This is far from correct.  Spinoza
differed with Descartes on a few points, and agreed with him on
most; the differences were only those of a more rigorous logical
development of the principles both maintained.
It was at an important era in Spinoza's life that the writings
of Descartes fell in his way. He was then striving to solve for
himself the inexplicable riddle of the universe. He had studied
with the learned Morteira; but though wise in all the wisdom
* Schleiermacher, Rede iiber die Religion, p. 47.




470                     SPINOZA.
of the Jews, he was still at an immeasurable distance from the
desired solution. Descartes captivated him by the boldness of
his logic, and by the independent nature of his Method, whereby
truth was sought in the inner world of man, not in the outward
world, nor in the records of authority. He studied Descartes
with avidity; but he soon found that there also the riddle remained unsolved. He found the fact of his own existence somewhat superfluously established; but the far greater existence in
which his own was included-of which the great All was but a
varied manifestation-of this he found no demonstration. Cogito,
ergo sum, is irresistible.  Cogito, ergo Deus est, is no basis for
philosophy.
Spinoza therefore asked himself-What is the noumenon which
lies beneath all phenomena? We see everywhere transformations perishable and perishing; yet there must be something beneath, which is imperishable, immutable; what is it? We see
a wondrous universe peopled with wondrous beings, yet none of
these beings exist per se, but per aliud: they are not the authors
of their own existence; they do not rest upon their own reality,
but on a greater reality-on that of the rT' v xca; rTo rav. What
is this reality?
The question, Spinoza thought, could not be answered by the
idea of Perfection. No: the great reality of all existence is Substance. Not Substance in the gross and popular sense of " body"
or "matter," but the substans-that which is standing under all
phenomena, supporting and giving them reality.  What is a
phenomenon? An appearance, a thing perceived: a state of
the perceiving mind. But what originates this perceptionwhat changes the mind from its prior to its present state? Something, external and extrinsic, changes it. What is this something?  What it is, in itself, we can never know: because to
know it would bring it under the forms and conditions of the
mind, i. e. would constitute it a phenomenon:-unknown, therefore, but not denied-this ens-this something, is; and this,
which Kant calls noumenon, Spinoza calls Substance.




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.              471
All philosophy, as all existence, must start from one principle,
which must be the ground of all. What is this commencement
-this dpx? Perfection, replies Descartes. No, says Spinoza,
Perfection is an attribute of something prior to it. Substance is
the ppX;. Descartes, in common with most philosophers, had
assumed a duality: he had assumed a God, and a world created
by God. Substance, to him, was by no means the primal fact of
all existence; on the contrary, he maintained that both Extension and Thought were Substances; in other words, that mind
and matter were distinct independent Substances, different in
essence, and united only by God. Spinoza affirmed that both
Extension and Thought were nothing more than Attributes; and
by a subtle synthesis he reduced the duality of Descartes to
an all-embracing unity, and thus arrived at a conception of
the One.
The absolute Existence-the Substance-(call it what you
will) is God. From Him all individual concrete existences arise.
All that exists, exists in and by God; and can only thus be conceived. Here then the mystery of the world begins to unfold
itself to the patient thinker; he recognizes God as the fountain
of life; he sees in the universe nothing but the manifestation of
God; the finite rests upon the bosom of the infinite; the inconceivable variety resolves itself into unity. There is but one reality, and that is God.
Such was Spinoza's solution of the problem: upon this he felt
he could repose in peace, and upon this only. To live with God
-to know God with perfect knowledge, was the highest point
of human development and happiness; and to this he consecrated his life. Taking the words of St. Paul, " In Him we live,
move, and have our being," as his motto, he undertook to trace
the relations of the world to God and to man, and those of man
to society.
Spinoza agreed with Descartes in these three vital positions:
-I. The basis of all certitude is Consciousness. II. Whatever
is clearly perceived in Consciousness must therefore be necessari



472                      SPINOZA.
ly true; and distinct ideas are true ideas, true expressions of objective existences. III. Consequently metaphysical problems are
susceptible of mathematical demonstration.
The only novelty in Spinoza's Method is, that it is a further
development of the Method of Descartes. Descartes thought
that the mathematical Method was capable of being applied to
metaphysics, but he did not apply it; Spinoza did apply it.
This may seem a trifling addition: in reality it was the source
of all the differences between Spinoza and his teacher. Descartes' principles will inevitably lead to Spinoza's system, if those
principles are rigorously carried out. But Descartes never attempted the rigorous deduction of those consequences, which
Spinoza, using the mathematical method, calmly and inflexibly
deduced. Those who rebel at the conclusions drawn, must impugn the premises from which they are drawn; for the system
of Spinoza is neither more nor less than a demonstration.
To this demonstration we are about to lead our readers, and
only beg of them a little steady attention and a little patient
thought, convinced that they will then have little difficulty in
finding their way. We shall translate some portions of the
Ethica with the utmost care, because we think it every way advisable that the reader should have Spinoza's own mode of statement, and thereby be enabled to watch his manner of deducing
his conclusions from his premises. The work opens with eight
DEFINITIONS.
1. By a thing which is its own Cause I understand a thing,
the essence of which involves existence; or the nature of
which can only be considered as existent.*
II. A thing finite is that which can be limited (terminari potest) by another thing of the same nature, e. g. body is said
* This is an important definition, as it gets rid of the verbal perplexity
hitherto felt relative to an "endless chain of causes." The doubter might
always ask the cause of the first cause in the series; but here, by identifying cause and existence, Spinoza annihilates the difficulty.




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.               473
to be finite because it can always be conceived as larger.
So thought is limited by other thoughts. But body does
not limit thought, nor thought limit body.
III. By Substance I understand that which exists in itself, and
is conceived per se: in other words, the conception of
which does not require the conception of any thing else
antecedent to it.
IV. By Attribute I understand that which the mind perceives
as constituting the very essence of Substance.
V. By Modes I understand the accidents (affectiones) of Substance; or that which is in something else, through which
also it is conceived.
VI. By God I understand the Being absolutely infinite, i. e. the
Substance consisting of infinite Attributes, each of which
expresses an infinite and eternal essence.
Explanation: I say absolutely infinite, but not infinite suo
genere; for to whatever is infinite only suo genere, we can
deny infinite Attributes; but that which is absolutely infinite includes in its essence every thing which implies essence, and involves no negation.
VII. That thing is said to be free which exists by the sole necessity of its nature, and by itself alone is determined to
action. But that thing is necessary, or rather constrained,
which owes its existence to another, and acts according to
certain and determinate causes.
VIII. By Eternity I understand Existence itself, in as far as it is
conceived necessarily to follow from the sole definition of
an eternal thing.
These are the Definitions: they need not long be dwelt on,
although frequently referred to by him; above all, no objection
ought to be raised against them, as unusual or untrue, for they
are the meanings of various terms in constant use with Spinoza,
and he has a right to use them as he pleases, provided he does
not afterwards depart from this use, which he is careful not to
do. We now come to the seven axioms.




474                     SPINOZA.
AXIOMS.
I. Every thing which is, is in itself, or in some other thing.
II. That which cannot be conceived through another (per aliud)
must be conceived through itself (per se).
III. From a given determinate cause the effect necessarily follows; and vice versa, if no determinate cause be given, no
effect can follow.
IV. The knowledge of an effect depends on the knowledge of
the cause, and implies it.
V. Things that have nothing in common with each other cannot be understood by means of each other, i. e. the conception of one does not involve the conception of the other.
VI. A true idea must agree with its object (idea vera debet cum
suo ideato convenire.)
VII. Whatever can be clearly conceived as non-existent, does
not, in its essence, involve existence.
These axioms at once command assent, if we except the
fourth, which, because the wording is ambiguous, has been
sometimes thought absurd; but the truth is, that the opposite
conceptions now prevalent respecting cause and effect prevent a
real appreciation of this axiom. Mr. Hallam goes so far as to
say, "It seems to be in this fourth axiom, and in the proposition
grounded upon it, that the fundamental fallacy lurks. The relation between a cause and effect is surely something perfectly different from our perfect comprehension of it, or indeed from our
having any knowledge of it at all; much less can the contrary
assertion be deemed axiomatic."* There is a want of subtlety
in this criticism, as well as a want of comprehension of Spinoza's
doctrines; and we wonder it never suggested itself to Mr. Hallam
that the modern notions of cause and effect do not correspond
with the Spinozistic notions. In the above axiom  it is not
meant that there are no effects manifested to us of which we
* Introduction to Literature of Europe, iv. 246.




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.              475
do not also know the causes-it is not meant that a man receiving a blow in the dark is not aware of that blow (effect),
though ignorant of the immediate cause. What is meant is,
that a complete and comprehensive knowledge of the effect is
only to be obtained through a complete and comprehensive
knowledge of the cause. If you would know the effect in its
totality-in itself-you must know also the cause in its totality.
This is obvious: for what is an effect?-an effect is a cause realized: it is the natura naturans conceived as natura naturata.
We call the antecedent, Cause, and the sequent, Effect; but
these are merely relative designations: the sequence itself is
antecedent to some subsequent change, and the former antecedent was once only a sequent to its cause; and so on. Causation is change; when the change is completed, we name the
result effect. It is only a matter of naming. But inciting this
change, causing it, as we say, there is some power (cause) in
nature; to know this effect therefore-that is, not merely to
have a relative conception of our own condition consequent on
it, but to comprehend this power, this reality, to penetrate its
mystery, to see it in its totality, we must know what the effect
is, and how it is; we must know its point of departure, and its
point of destination; in a word, we must transcend the knowledge
of phenomena, and acquire that of nounmena. In a popular sense
we are said to know effects, but to be ignorant of causes.
Truly, we are ignorant of both-and equally ignorant. A
knowledge of sequences we have, and of nothing more. The
vital power determining these sequences we name, but cannot
know; we may call it attraction, heat, electricity, polarization,
etc., but, having named, we have not explained it.
This is what Spinoza implicitly teaches; and had Mr. Hallam
attended only to what the very next axiom proclaims, namely,
that things have nothing in common with each other, cannot be
understood by means of each other, i. e. the conception of one
not involving the conception of the other-he would have understood Spinoza's meaning; for, if effect be different from cause,




476                        SPINOZA.
then its conception does not involve the conception of cause;
but if it be the same as cause, then does the one conception involve that of the other; ergo, the more complete the knowledge
of the one, the more complete the knowledge of the other.
The reader will bear this in mind when studying Spinoza.
We will now proceed to the
PROPOSITIONS.
PROP. I. Substance is prior in nature to its accidents.
Demonstration. Per Definitions 3 and 5.
PROP. II. Two Substances, having different Attributes, have
nothing in common with each other.
Demonst. This follows from Def. 3; for each Substance must be
conceived in itself and through itself; in other words, the
conception of one does not involve the conception of the
other.
PROP. III. Of things which have nothing in common, one cannot be the cause of the other.*
Demonst. If they have nothing in common, then (per Axiom 5)
they cannot be conceived by means of each other; ergo
(per Axiom 4) one cannot be the cause of the other.
Q. E. D.
PROP. IV. Two or more distinct things are distinguished among
themselves either through the diversity of their Attributes,
or through the diversity of their Modes.
Demonst. Every thing which is, is in itself or in some other
thing (per Axiom 1); that is (per Def. 3 and 5), there is
* This fallacy has been one of the most influential corrupters of philosophical speculation. For many years it was undisputed; and most metaphysicians still adhere to it. See Mill's System of Logic, ii. 876-386. The
assertion is that only like can act upon like. This was the assumption of
Anaxagoras, and the groundwork of his system. If the assumption be correct, his system is true. But although it is true that like produces (causes)
like, it is also as true that like produces unlike: thus fire produces pain when
applied to our bodies, explosion when applied to gunpowder, charcoal when
applied to wood; all these effects are unlike the cause. Spinoza's position
is logical; those who have since upheld the fallacy have not that excuse.




SPINOZA S DOCTRINE.                477
nothing out of ourselves (extia intellectum) but Substance
and its Modes. There is nothing out of ourselves whereby
things can be distinguished amongst one another, except
Substances, or (which is the same thing, per Def. 4*) their
Attributes and Modes.
PROP. V. It is impossible that there should be two or more
Substances of the same nature, or of the same Attribute.
Demonst. If there are many different Substances, they must be
distinguished by the diversity of their Attributes, or of their
Modes (per Prop. 4). If only by the diversity of their
Attributes, it is thereby conceded that there is nevertheless
only one Substance of the same Attributes; but if by the
diversity of their Modes, it follows that Substance being
prior in nature to its Modes, it must be considered independently of them; that is (per Def. 3 and 6), cannot be
conceived as distinguished fiom another; that is (per Prop.
4), there cannot be many Substances, but only one Substance. Q. E. D.
PROP. VI. One Substance cannot be created by another Substance.
Demonst. There cannot be two Substances with the same Attributes (per Prop. 5); i. e. (per Prop. 2), having any thing
in common with each other; and therefore (per Prop. 3)
one cannot be the cause of the other.
Corollary. Hence it follows that Substance cannot be created by
any thing else. For there is nothing in existence except
Substance and its Modes (per Axiom 1, and Def. 3 and 5);
now this Substance, not being created by another, is selfcaused.
Corollary 2. This proposition is more easily to be demonstrated
by the absurdity of its contradiction;-for if Substance can
* In the original, by a slip of the pen, Axiom 4 is referred to instead of
Def. 4; and Auerbach has followed the error in his translation. We notice
it because the reference to Axiom 4 is meaningless, and apt to puzzle the
student.




478                      SPINOZA.
be created by any thing else, the conception of it would depend on the conception of the cause (per Axiom 4 *), and
hence (per Def. 3) it would not be Substance.
PROP. VII. It pertains to the nature of Substance to exist.
Demonst. Substance cannot be created by any thing else (per
Coroll. Prop. 6), and is therefore the cause of itself; i.e.
(per Def. 1) its essence necessarily involves existence; or
it pertains to the nature of Substance to exist. Q. E. D.
PROP. VIII. All Substance is necessarily infinite.
Demonst. There exists but one Substance of the same Attribute;
and it must either exist as infinite or as finite. But not as
finite, for (per Def. 2) as finite it must be limited by another
Substance of the same nature, and in that case there would
be two Substances of the same Attribute, which (per Prop.
5) is absurd. Substance therefore is infinite. Q. E. D.
Scholiumn.-I do not doubt that to all who judge confusedly
of things, and are not wont to inquire into first causes, it will be
difficult to understand the demonstration of Prop. 7, because
they do not sufficiently distinguish between the modifications of
Substance, and Substance itself, and are ignorant of the manner
in which things are produced. Hence it follows, that seeing
natural things have a commencement, they attribute a commencement to Substances; for he who knows not the true causes of
things, confounds all things, and sees no reason why trees should
not talk like men; or why men should not be formed from
stones as well as from seeds; or why all forms cannot be changed
into all other forms. So, also, those who confound the divine
nature with the human, naturally attribute human affections to
God, especially as they are ignorant how these affections are
produced in the mind. But if men attended to the nature of
Substance, they would not in the least doubt the truth of Prop.
7; nay, this proposition would be an axiom to all, and would be
numbered among common notions. For by Substance they
* Here the potency and significance of Axiom 4 begins to unfold itself.




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.                 479
would understand that which exists in itself, and is conceived
through itself; i. e. the knowledge of which does not require the
knowledge of any thing antecedent to it.* But by modification
they would understand that which is in another thing, the conception of which is formed through the conception of the thing
in which it is, or to which it belongs: we can therefore have
correct ideas of non-existent modifications, because, although
out of the understanding they have no reality, yet their essence
is so comprehended in that of another, that they can be conceived through this other. The truth of Substance (out of the
understanding) lies nowhere but in itself, because it is conceived
per se. If therefore any one says that he has a distinct and
clear idea of Substance, and yet doubts whether such a Substance exist, this is as much as to say that he has a true idea,
and nevertheless doubts whether it be not false (as a little attention sufficiently manifests); or, if any man affirms Substance to
be created, he at the same time affirms that a true idea has become false; than which nothing can be more absurd. Hence
it is necessarily confessed that the existence of Substance, as
well as its essence, is an eternal truth. And hence we must
conclude that there is only one Substance possessing the same
Attribute; a position which requires here a fuller development.
I note therefore1. That the correct definition of a thing includes and expresses
nothing but the nature of the thing defined. From which it
follows2. That no definition includes or expresses a distinct number
of individuals, because it expresses nothing but the nature of the
thing defined; e.g. the definition of a triangle expresses no more
than the nature of a triangle, and not any fixed number of
triangles.
* The reader will bear in mind the result of Descartes' philosophy, if he
would fully seize Spinoza's meaning and the basis on which it reposes.
Descartes, as we saw, could find nothing indubitable but existence. Existence was the primal fact of all philosophy, self-evident and indisputable.




480                      SPINOZA.
3. There must necessarily be a distinct cause for the existence
of every existing thing.
4. This cause, by reason of which any thing exists, must be
either contained in the nature and definition of the existing thing
(viz. that it pertains to its nature to exist), or else must lie beyond
it-must be something different fiom it.
From these positions it follows, that if a certain number of individuals exist, there must necessarily be a cause why that number,
and not a larger or smaller number: e. g. if in the world twenty
men exist (whom, for greater perspicuity, I suppose to exist at
once, no more having previously existed), it will not be sufficient
to show the reason why twenty men exist, to point to human
nature as the cause, but it will further be necessary to show cause
why only twenty men exist, because (per note 3) a cause must be
given for the existence of every thing. This cause however (per
notes 2 and 3) cannot be contained in human nature itself,
because the true definition of man does not involve the number
twenty. Hence (per note 4) the cause why twenty men exist,
and why each individual exists, must lie beyond each of them;
and therefore must we absolutely conclude that every thing, the
nature of which admits of many individuals, must necessarily
have an external cause. As therefore it pertains to the nature
of Substance to exist, so must its definition include a necessary
existence, and consequently from its sole definition we must conclude its existence. But, as from its definition, as already shown
in notes 2 and 3, it is not possible to conclude the existence of
many Substances, ergo it necessarily follows that only one Substance of the same nature can exist."
Here we may pause in our translation, before we penetrate too
far in this geometrical exposition of Spinoza's theology. Enough
has already been given to exhibit the rigor and precision with
which the consequences are deduced step by step,each proposition being evolved from those which preceded it; and he who
wishes to follow the system in detail must open the Ethics for
himself, abridgment being impossible. To complete our expo



SPINOZA S DOCTRINE.               481
sition of the doctrine, we shall merely state in a few sentences
the principal positions:
There is but one infinite Substance, and that is God. Whatever is, is in God; and without Him, nothing can be conceived.
He is the universal Being of which all things are the manifestations. He is the sole Substance; every thing else is a Mode; yet,
without Substance, Mode cannot exist. God, viewed under the
attributes of Infinite Substance, is the natura naturans,-viewed
as a manifestation, as the Modes under which his attributes
appear, he is the natura naturata. He is the cause of all things,
and that immanently, but not transiently. HIe has two infinite
attributes-Extension and Thought. Extension is visible Thought,
and Thought is invisible Extension: they are the Objective and
Subjective of which God is the Identity. Every thing is a mode
of God's attribute of Extension; every thought, wish, or feeling,
a mode of his attribute of Thought. That Extension and Thought
are not Substances, as Descartes maintained, is obvious fiom this:
that they are not conceived per se, but per aliud. Something is
extended: what is? Not the Extension itself, but something
prior to it, viz. Substance. Substance is uncreated, but creates
by the internal necessity of its nature. There may be many
existing things, but only one existence; many forms, but only
one Substance. God is the " idea immanens "-the One and All.
Such is a brief outline of the fundamental doctrine of Spinoza;
and now we ask the reader, can he reconcile the fact of this
being a most religious philosophy, with the other fact of its
having been almost universally branded with Atheism? Is this
intelligible?  Yes; three causes present themselves at once.
1. The readiness with which that term of obloquy has been applied to opponents, from time immemorial-to Socrates as to
Gottlieb Fichte. 2. The obscurity of polemical vision, and the
rashness of party judgment. 3. The use of the ambiguous word
Substance, whereby God was confounded with the material world.
This last point is the most important, and deserves attention.
To say "God is the infinite substance," does look, at first sight,
21




482                        SPINOZA.
like the atheism of the D'Holbach School; but no one could
ever have read twenty pages of Spinoza without perceiving this
to be a misunderstanding; for he expressly teaches that God is
not corporeal, but that body is a Mode of Extension.*     No:
God is not the material universe, but the universe is one aspect
of his infinite Attribute of Extension: he is the identity of the
natura naturans and the natura naturata.t
It is a mere verbal resemblance, therefore, this, of Spinozism
to Atheism; but the history of philosophy shows too many
instances of verbal analogies and ambiguities becoming sources
of grave error, to astonish any reader.
Next to the inevitable misapprehensions created by Spinoza's
use of the word Substance, we must rank among the sources of
his ill repute the misapprehensions created by his doctrine of
Final Causes. Although Bacon energetically reprobated the
pursuit of Final Causes-those "barren virgins," as he characteristically styled them-pointing out the productive error of all
such pursuit; and although the advance and extension of science
has gradually more and more displaced this pursuit, it is still
followed by minds of splendid reach and attainment, as the surest
principle of research in some departments. But although the
error has the countenance of men whom we cannot speak of
* Dugald Stewart somewhat naively remarks that " in no part of Spinoza's
works has he avowed himself an Atheist" (he would have been very much
astonished at the charge); " but it will not be disputed by those who comprehend the drift of his reasonings, that, in point of practical tendency, Atheism
and Spinozism are one and the same." It may be so; yet nothing can warrant the accusation of Atheism, merely because Spinoza's doctrines may
have the same practical tendency as that of Atheism. Spinoza did not deny
the existence of God; he denied the existence of the world: he was consequently an Acosmist, not an Atheist. If the practical tendency of these two
opposite systems really is the same, Spinoza could not help it.
t " Natura naturans et natura naturata in identitate Deus est." It must
be borne in mind that identity does not (as in common usage) mean sameness, but the root from which spring two opposite stems, and in which they
have a common life. Man, for instance, is the identity of soul and body;
water is the identity of oxygen and hydrogen. Great mistakes are constantly being made, owing to overlooking this distinction of vulgar and
philosophical terms.




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.              483
without respect, the fact itself that only in those departments of
inquiry, wherein imperfect knowledge still permits the Metaphysical Method to exercise its perverting influence, are Final
Causes ever appealed to, is significant, we'think, of the nature of
the error. While no Astronomer, no Physicist, no Chemist
reasons teleologically, there are many Biologists who proclaim
teleology to be a luminous guide. Cuvier declared that to it he
owed his discoveries; Owen declares that it has often aided him.
We cannot here pause to discuss the validity of final causes, but
the reader will probably be glad to have Spinoza's remarkable
analysis, which he throws into an Appendix at the end of the
book De Deo:
" Men do all things for the sake of an end, namely the good,
or useful, which they desire. Hence it comes that they always
seek to know only the final causes of things which have taken
place, and when they have heard these they are satisfied, not
having within themselves any cause for further doubt. But if
they are unable to learn these final causes from some one else,
nothing remains to them but to turn in upon themselves, and to
reflect on the ends by which they are themselves wont to be
determined to similar actions; and thus they necessarily judge
of the mind of another by their own. Further, as within themselves and out of themselves they discover many means which
are highly conducive to the pursuit of their own advantage,for example, eyes to see with, teeth to masticate with, vegetables
and animals for food, the sun to give them light, the sea to
nourish fish, etc.,-so they come to consider all natural things
as means for their benefit: and because they are aware that these
things have been found, and not prepared by them, they have
been led to believe that some one else has adapted these means
to their use. For after considering things in the light of means,
they could not believe these things to have made themselves,
but arguing from their own practice of preparing means for their
use, they must conclude that there is some ruler or rulers of
nature endowed with human freedom, who have provided all




484                     SPINOZA.
these things for them, and have made them all for the use of
men. Moreover, since they have never heard any thing of the
mind of those rulers, they must necessarily judge of this mind
also by their own; and hence they have argued that the Gods
direct all things for the advantage of man, in order that they
may subdue him to themselves, and be held in the highest honor
by him. Hence each has devised, according to his character, a
different mode of worshipping God, in order that God might love
him more than others, and might direct all nature to the advantage of his blind cupidity and insatiable avarice. Thus this
prejudice has converted itself into superstition, and has struck
deep root into men's minds; and this has been the cause why
men in general have eagerly striven to explain the final causes of
all things. But while they have sought to show that Nature
does nothing in vain (i. e. which is not fit for the use of men),
they seem to me to have shown nothing else than that Nature
and the Gods are as foolish as men. And observe, I pray you,
to what a point this opinion has brought them. Together with
the many useful things in Nature, they necessarily found not a
few injurious things, namely, tempests, earthquakes, diseases, etc.;
these they supposed happened because the Gods were angry on
account of offences committed against them by men, or because
of faults incurred in their worship; and although experience every
day protests, and shows by infinite examples that benefits and
injuries happen indifferently to pious and ungodly persons, they
do not therefore renounce their inveterate prejudice. For it was
easier to them to class these phenomena among other things, the
cause of which was unknown to them, and thus retain their
present and innate condition of ignorance, than to destroy all the
fabric of their belief, and excogitate a new one."
We cannot pursue the argument further, because in the subsequent positions Spinoza refers to propositions proved in the
Ethics;! what has been given will however suffice to show how
clearly and emphatically he described the anthropomorphic tendency of judging Infinite by Finite wisdom. With it we conclude




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.              485
the exposition of Spinoza's theology-one of the most extraordinary efforts of speculative faculty which history has revealed to
us. We have witnessed the mathematical rigor with which it
is developed; we have followed him step by step, dragged onwards by his irresistible logic; and yet the final impression left
on our minds is, that the system has a logical but not a vital truth.
We shrink back from the consequences whither it so irresistibly
leads us; we gaze over the abyss to the edge of which we have
been dragged, and seeing naught but chaos and despair, we refuse to build our temple there. We retrace our steps with hurried earnestness, to see if no false route has been taken; we
examine every one of his positions, to see if there be not some
secret error, parent of all other errors. Arrived at the startingpoint, we are forced to confess that we see no error-that each
conclusion is but the development of antecedent positions; and
yet, in spite of this, the mind refuses to accept the conclusions.
This, then, is the state of the inquirer: he sees a vast chain of
reasoning carried on with the strictest rigor. He has not been
dazzled by rhetoric nor confused by illustrations. There has
been no artful appeal to his prejudices or passions; he has been
treated as a reasoning being, and has no more been able to doubt
the positions, after once assenting to the definitions and axioms,
than he is able to doubt the positions of Euclid. And yet we
again say that the conclusions are repugned, refused; they are
not the truth the inquirer has been seeking; they are no expressions of the thousand-fold life, the enigma of which he has been
endeavoring to solve.
Unable to see where this discrepancy lies, he turns with impatience to the works of others, and seeks in criticisms and refutations an outlet from his difficulty. But-and it is a curious
point in the history of philosophy-he finds that this bold and
extraordinary thinker has never been refuted by any one meeting
him on his own ground. Men have taken up separate propositions, and having wrenched them from their connection with the
whole system, have easily shown them to be quite at variance




486                       SPINOZA.
with-the systems of the refuters. This is easy work.* On the
other hand, the inquirer finds that the great metaphysicians of
Germany adopt Spinoza's fundamental positions, differing with
him only on points of detail or of language. In their works the
consequences do not look so appalling, because they are set forth
in lofty terms and ambiguous eloquence; but the difference is
only verbal. Is there, then, no alternative? Must I accept
Spinoza's system, repugnant as it is? Such is the inquirer's perplexity.
To release him from this perplexity will perhaps be possible,
although only possible, we believe, by arguments which cut away
the root of all metaphysical knowledge whatever. If Spinoza is
in error, the error must be initial, for we have just admitted that
it does not lie in any illogical deduction. And initial the error
is. The method brings it into distinctness. The application of
Geometry to Metaphysics is the process most repulsive to metaphysicians, because it best serves to elucidate the nullity of their
attempts. Geometry is purely deductive; from a few definitions
and axioms the whole series of consequences is evolved. Metaphysics also is purely deductive; from a few definitions and
axioms it constructs a universe. M. Damiron, in his very able
YMmoire, denies that the geometrical method can be applied to
Metaphysics, because our intelligence cannot form notions so clear
and necessary respecting substance, cause, time, good and evil, as
respecting points, lines, and surfaces; and whenever such clear
notions have been attempted it has only been by sacrificing something of the reality, by the consideration of one aspect to the exclusion of the other.t This is perfectly true if applied to meta* This is the way Bayle answers Spinoza; yet his answer has been pronounced by Dugald Stewart "one of the most elaborate and acute refutations which has yet appeared." Mr. Stewart's dislike of the consequences
he believed inseparable from Spinozism has here, we think, biased his judgment. Bayle's attempt at a refutation is now pretty generally considered to
be pitiable. Jacobi declares Spinozism to be unanswerable by those who
simply reason on the problem: faith alone can solve it otherwise.
Mt fMmoire sur Spinoza, 19, 20.




SPINOZA'S DOCTRINE.                487
physicians in general; but is certainly not true as applied to
Spinoza, whose notions of substance, cause, etc. are not less clear
than his notions of lines and surfaces,-a point we shall insist on
presently. Meanwhile let us ask, why can we not form notions
of cause, substance, and the rest, equalling in clearness our notions of lines and surfaces? The answer to this question dooms
metaphysics to eternal uncertainty: It is because Geometry never
quits the sphere of its first assumption, that its axioms retain
their necessary clearness, and its consequences their necessary
truth. It begins with lines and surfaces, with lines and surfaces
it ends; it is a purely subjective and deductive science. Its
truths, when objectively applied, include no other elements than
those originally given; when from ideal lines and the relations
of those lines we pass to real lines and relations, we are still
strictly within the sphere of lines and their relations; and the
mightiest geometry can tell us nothing whatever of any other
property of substance; it is powerless before any relations except
those of surfaces. If Metaphysics could thus remain within the
sphere of its original assumption, it also might rival geometry in
precision; but Metaphysics unhappily starts from the subjective
sphere, and immediately passes on to the objective, pretending
to include in its circle far more than is given in the original subjective datum, pretending indeed to disclose the whole nature of
substance, cause, time, and space, and not merely certain relations
among our ideas of these. When, for example, Spinoza passes
from his ideal distinction of cause and effect to real applications,
as when he proves that God must act according to the laws of
His own nature, yet without constraint, nothing determining Him
save His own perfection, it is evident that by this Spinoza believes the purely subjective definition he has framed expresses
the whole truth of objective reality; he pretends to know the
nature of God, and to know it through the notions he has framed
of cause and effect. The error here is a great, though not so
potent, as if a mathematician were to deduce the chemical properties of a salt from the properties of right angles. To select




488                     SPINOZA.
another example, the fifth proposition, on which so much of
Spinoza's system depends: "It is impossible that there should
be two or more Substances of the same nature, or of the same
Attribute." This is subjectively true; as true as a proposition
in Euclid; that is to say, it is perfectly coherent with all that
Spinoza teaches of Substance and Attribute; but if we pass from
his subjective circle out into the great world of reality-if we
disregard his definition, and look only at actual substances before
us-say two minerals-we then fail to detect any proof of his
subjective definition necessarily or even probably according with
objective fact, since we perceive the definition to be framed from
his ideas, and not founded on objective reality.
The mathematician deduces conclusions from purely subjective
distinctions, and these conclusions are found to correspond with
objective fact, to nearly the whole extent of what was originally
assumed; namely the relations of surfaces, and no further. The
metaphysician deduces conclusions equally subjective, and it may
be that such conclusions will apply to objective fact (as when it
is said "nothing can be and not be at the same moment"); but
the moment he transcends the circle of subjective distinction, as
when he speaks of Cause, Time, Space, and Substance, his ideas
are necessarily indistinct, because he cannot know these things:
he can only frame logical conclusions respecting them, and these
logical conclusions at every step need verification.
This, of course, the metaphysician will deny. He believes in
the validity of reason. He maintains the perfect competence of
human intellect to know and discourse on Cause, Time, Space,
and Substance; but he has not the same clear argument Spinoza
had, on which to ground this belief. And here we are face to
face with the radical assumption which constitutes the initial
error and logical perfection of Spinoza's system. He holds and
expressly teaches that the subjective idea is the actual image or
complete expression of the objective fact. "Hoc est, id quod in
intellectu objective continetur debet necessario in natura dari."
The order and connection of ideas is precisely the order and




SPINOZA S DOCTRINE.                489
connection of things. In the Scholium to Prop. VIII. we have
seen him maintaining that the correct definition of a thing expresses the nature of a thing, and nothing but its nature: which
is true in one sense; for unless it express the nature of the
thing, the definition must be incorrect: but false in another and
more important sense; for every definition we can frame only
expresses our conceptions of the nature of the thing: and thus
we may define the nature of the inhabitants of the moon, and
adhere to our definitions with the utmost logical rigor, yet all the
while be utterly removed from any real knowledge of those inhabitants. The position is logically deducible from Spinoza's
conception of the relation between Thought and Extension as the
two Attributes of Substance; but it is a position which is emphatically contradicted by all sound psychology. Nevertheless, without it Metaphysics has no basis. Unless clear ideas are to be
accepted as the truths of things, and unless every idea, which is
distinctly conceived by the mind, has its ideate, or object,-metaphysicians are without plausible pretence.
Having thus signalized the fundamental position of Spinoza's
doctrine, it is there, if anywhere, that we shall be able to show
his fundamental error. On the truth or falsehood of this one
assumption, must Spinozism stand or fall; and we have formerly
endeavored to show that the assumption is false. Those who
agree in the reasonings we adduced may escape Spinozism, but
they escape it by denying the possibility of all Philosophy.
This consideration, that the mind is not a passive mirror reflecting the nature of things, but the partial creator of its own
forms-that in perception there is nothing but certain changes
in the percipient-this consideration, we say, is the destruction
of the very basis of metaphysics, for it expressly teaches that the
subjective idea is not the correlate of the objective fact: and
only upon the belief that our ideas are the perfect and adequate
images of external things can any metaphysical speculation rest.
Misled by the nature of geometry, which draws its truths from
the mind as the spider draws the web from its bosom, Descartes
210




490                      SPINOZA.
assumed that metaphysical truths could be attained in the same
way. This was a confusion of reasoning, yet Spinoza, Leibnitz,
and their successors, followed him unhesitatingly. Spinoza, however, had read Bacon's denouncement of this a priori Method,
though evidently unprepared to see the truth of the protest. It
is curious to read his criticism of Bacon: he looks on it as that
writer's great error to have mistaken the knowledge of the first
cause and origin of things. "On the nature of mind," he says,
"Bacon speaks very confusedly; and while he proves nothing,
judges much. For in the first place he supposes that the human
intellect, besides the deceptions of the senses, is subject to the
deceptions of its own nature, and that it conceives every thing
according to the analogies of its own nature, and not according
to the analogies of the universe; so that it is like an unequal
mirror to the rays of things, which mixes the conditions of its
own nature with those of external things."*
We look upon Spinoza's aberration as remarkable, however,
because he had also seen that in some sense the subjective was
not the absolute expression of the objective; as is proved by his
celebrated argument for the destruction of final causes, wherein
he showed that order was a thing of the imagination, as were
also right and wrong, useful and hurtful-these being merely
such in relation to us. Still more striking is his anticipation of
Kant in this passage: "Ex quibus clare videre est, mensuram,
tempus, et numerum, nihil esse proeter cogitandi, seu potius imaginandi modos;" which should have led him to suspect that
the same law of mental forms was also applicable to all other
subjects.
We have pointed out the initial error, let us now refer to the
logical perfection of Spinoza's system. M. Damiron argues
against the application of the geometric method, on the ground
* " Nam primo supponit quod intellectus humanns, prseter fallaciam sensuum, sua sola natura fallitur, omniaque fingit ex analogia suse naturee, et non
ex analogia universi; adeo ut sit instar speculi inaequalis ad radias rerum,
qui suam naturam nature rerum immiscet." —Epist. ii., Opera, p. 398.




SPINOZA S DOCTRINE.                491
of the imperfect conceptions men form of metaphysical objects;
but this, as already hinted, cannot be said of Spinoza's conceptions; they are as perfect and as clear as his conceptions of geometry; whether they are as accurate and comprehensive as
they are clear, is another question. Spinoza would maintain
them to be so; and he would be justified on his principles; justified, indeed, on all logical principles of metaphysics. Did we
not see that the perfection of Mathematics was owing to its never
transcending the sphere of its first assumption, never including
other elements than those included in its definitions and axioms?
Precisely this may also be said of Spinozism: its original assumption is, that every clear idea expresses the actual nature of
the object; and hence whatever conclusions are logically evolved
from clear ideas, will be found objectively represented in the external world. Whether the mathematician works a problem in
his mind with ideal surfaces; or actually juxtaposes substances
and points out their relations of surface, the truths deduced are
equally valid; in the same way, whenever a Spinozist works out
a problem with ideal elements, he is doing no more-on his assumption-than if he had the objective elements before him, and
could visibly disclose their relations. Hence the full justification
of Spinoza's employment of the geometrical method. And his
employment of it, while exciting the admiration of all posterity
for the gigantic power of thought disclosed, has had the further
advantage of bringing within the narrowest possible field, the
whole question of the possibility of Metaphysical certitude.
We must not, however, longer linger with this great and good
man, and his works.* A brave and simple man, earnestly meditatipg on the deepest subjects that can occupy the human race,
he produced a system which will ever remain as one of the most
astounding efforts of abstract speculation-a system that has
been decried, for nearly two centuries, as the most iniquitous and
blasphemous of human invention; and which has now, within
the last sixty years, become the acknowledged parent of a whole
nation's philosophy, ranking among its admirers some of the




492                         SPINOZAo
most pious and illustrious intellects of the age.     The ribald
atheist turns out, on nearer acquaintance, to be a "God-intoxicated man."   The blasphemous Jew becomes a pious, virtuous,
and creative thinker. The dissolute heretic becomes a childlike,
simple, self-denying, and heroic philosopher.  We look into his
works with calm earnestness, and read there another curious page
of human history: the majestic struggle with the mysteries of existence has failed, as it always must fail; but the struggle demands
our warmest approbation, and the man our ardent sympathy.
Spinoza stands out from    the dim past like a tall beacon, whose
shadow is thrown athwart the sea, and whose light will serve to
warn the wanderers from    the shoals and rocks on which hundreds of their brethren have perished.*
* Spinoza's works have been ably edited by Prof. Paulus, and better, recently by Bruder, in three volumes, 12mno. The edition we use is the quarto, which appeared shortly after his death: B. D. S. Opera Posthzsma, 1677.
A very close and literal German translation in five small volumes, by Berthold
Auerbach, was published in 1841. M. Emile Saisset published one more
paraphrastic in French. We are aware of scarcely any thing in English,
critical or explanatory, except the account given in Mr. Hallam's Introduction
to the Literature of Europe, and the articles Spinozca and Spinozism in the
Penny (yclopcedica, and Spinoza's Life and Works in the Westminster Review, May, 1843 (the three last by the present writer).
Since the first edition of this History, there have appeared two remarkable
articles by Mr. Froude,-one on Spinoza's Life, in the Oxford and Cambridge
Review, Oct., 1847, and one on his doctrine, Westminster Review, July, 1854.
An analysis of the Tractatus appeared in the British Quarterly a few years
ago; and a translation of the 2ractatus Politicus by William Maccall, 1855.
Besides historians of philosophy the following writers may be consulted:
Sigwart, Der Spinozismus historisch und philosophisc/ erdiutert; 1terder,
Gott, einige Gesprdche iiber Spinoza's System; Damiron, Mmnoire sur Spinoza
et sa Doctrine (in the Jlemoires de g1Acadenie).




CHAPTER III.
FIRST CRISIS IN MODERN PHILOSOPHY.
THE doctrine of Spinoza was of great importance, if only because it brought about the first crisis in modern Philosophy.
His doctrine was so clearly stated, and so rigorously deduced
from admitted premises, that he brought Philosophy into this
dilemma:
Either my premises are correct, and we must admit that
every clear and distinct idea is absolutely true; true, not only
subjectively, but objectively;-If so, my system is true;
Or my premises are false; the voice of Consciousness is not
the voice of truth; and if so, then is my system false, but all
Philosophy is impossible: since the only ground of Certitudeour Consciousness-is pronounced unstable, our only means of
knowing the truth is pronounced fallacious.
Spinozism or Skepticism? choose between them, for you have
no other choice.
Mankind refused however to make a choice. If the principles which Descartes had established could have no other result
than Spinozism, it was worth while inquiring whether those
principles themselves might not be modified.
The ground of discussion was shifted: psychology took the
place of ontology. It was Descartes' theory of knowledge
which led to Spinozism; that theory therefore must be examined: that theory henceforth becomes the great subject of discussion. Before deciding upon the merits of any system which
embraced the great questions of Creation, the Deity, Immortality, etc., men saw that it was necessary to decide upon the
competence of the human mind to solve such problems.




494       FIRST CRISIS IN MODERN PHILOSOPHY.
All knowledge must be obtained either through experience, or
independent of experience. Knowledge dependent on experience
must necessarily be merely knowledge of phenomena. All are
agreed that experience can only be experience of ourselves as
modified by objects. All are agreed that to know things per se
-noumena-we must know them through some other channel
than experience.
Have we, or have we not, that other channel? This is the
problem. Before we can dogmatize upon ontological subjects,
we must settle this question:
Can we transcend the sphere of our Consciousness and know
things per se?
And this question further resolves itself into-Have we ideas
independent of experience?
To answer this question was the great object of succeeding
philosophers. The fact that modern philosophy, until Fichte,
was almost exclusively occupied with Psychology has been constantly noticed; but the reason why Psychology assumed this
importance, the reason why it took the place of all the higher
subjects of speculation, has not, we believe, been distinctly
stated. Men have contented themselves with the fact that
Psychology occupied little of the attention of antiquity, still
less of the attention of the Middle Ages; and only in modern
times has it been the real ground on which the contests of the
schools have been carried on. Psychology was the result of a
tendency similar to that which in science produced the Inductive
Method. In both cases a necessity had arisen for a new course
of investigation; it had become evident that men had begun at
the wrong end, and that before a proper answer could be given
to any of the questions agitated, it was necessary first to settle
the limits and conditions of inquiry, the limits and conditions of
the inquiring faculties. Thus Consciousness became the basis
of Philosophy; to make that basis broad and firm, to ascertain
its nature and capacity, became the first object of speculation.




THIRD EPOCH.
PHILOSOPHY REDUCED TO A QUESTION OF PSYCHOLOGY.
CHAPTER I.
HOBBES.
PERHAPS no writer except Spinoza has ever been so uniformly
depreciated as Hobbes. From his first appearance until the
present day he has been a by-word of contempt with the
majority of writers; and even by those who have been liberal
enough to acknowledge merit in an adversary, he has been
treated as a dangerous and shallow thinker. The first person
who saw his importance as a political thinker, and had the
courage to proclaim it, was, we believe, James Mill. But as
long as political and social theories continue to be judged of
by their supposed consequences, so long will Hobbes be denied a
fair hearing. He has roused the odium theologicum. It will be
long ere that will be appeased.
Faults he had, unquestionably; short-comings, incomplete
views; and-as all error is dangerous in proportion to its plausibility-we will say that he was guilty of dangerous errors.
Let the faults be noted, but not overstrained; the short-comings
and incomplete views, enlarged and corrected; the errors calmly
examined and refuted. We shall be gainers by it; but by inconsiderate contempt, by vilifying, no good result can be obtained. Impartial minds will always rank Hobbes amongst the
greatest writers England has produced. He is profound, and he




496                     HOBBES.
is clear; weighty, strong, and sparkling. His style, as mere
style, is in its way as fine as any thing in English: it has the
clearness as well as the solidity and brilliancy of crystal. Nor
is the matter unworthy of the form. It is original, in the sense
of having been passed through the alembic of his own brain,
even when formerly the property of others. Although little of
it would now appear novel, it was novel when he produced it.
Haughty, dogmatic, overbearing in manner, he loved Truth, and
never hesitated to proclaim her. "Harm I can do none," he
says, in the opening of the Leviathan, "though I err no less
than they (i. e. previous writers), for I shall leave men but as
they are, in doubt and dispute; but intending not to take
any principle upon trust, but only to put men in mind of what
they know already, or may know by their experience, I hope to
err less; and when I do, it must proceed from too hasty concluding, which I will endeavor as much as I can to avoid."*
In this passage we see Locke anticipated. It proclaims that
Psychology is a science of observation; that if we would understand the conditions and operations of our minds, we must
patiently look inwards and see what passes there. All the reasoning and subtle disputation in the world will not advance us
one step, unless we first get a firm basis on fact. " Man," he
says elsewhere, with his usual causticity, "has the exclusive
privilege of forming general theorems. But this privilege is
alloyed by another, that is, by the privilege of absurdity, to
which no living creature is subject but man only. And of men
those are of all most subject to it, that profess Philosophy." And
the cause of this large endowment of the privilege to Philosophers we may read in another passage, where he attributes the
difficulty men have in receiving Truth, to their minds being prepossessed by false opinions-they having prejudged the question.
The passage is as follows:-" When men have once acquiesced
in untrue opinions, and registered them as authenticated records
* Works, edited by Sir W. Molesworth, iv. 1.




HOBBES.                     497
in their minds, it is no less impossible to speak intelligibly to
such men than to write legibly on a paper already scribbled
over."
Hobbes's position in the History of Philosophy is easily assigned. On the question of the origin of our knowledge he
takes a decided stand upon Experience: he is the precursor of
modern Materialism:
" Concerning the thoughts of man I will consider them first
singly, and afterwards in a train or dependence upon one another.
Singly they are every one a representation or appearance of
some quality or other accident of a body without us, which is
commonly called an object. Which object worketh on the eyes,
ears, and other parts of a man's body; and by diversity of working, produceth diversity of appearances.
" The original of them all is that which we call Sense, for there
is no conception in a man's mind which hath not at first, totally
or by parts, been begotten upon the organs of sense. The rest
are derived from that original."*
We have here stated, in the broadest manner, the principle
of Materialism. It is in direct antagonism to the doctrine of
Descartes that there are innate ideas; in direct antagonism to
the old doctrine of the spirituality of Mind. Theoretically this
principle may be insignificant; historically it is important.
Hobbes's language is plain enough, but we will still further
quote from him, to obviate any doubt as to his meaning.
"According to the two principal parts of man, I divide his
faculties into two sorts-faculties of the body, and faculties of
the mind.
" Since the minute and distinct anatomy of the powers of the
body is nothing necessary to the present purpose, I will only sum
them up in these three heads, —power nutritive, power generative, and power motive.
* Leviathan, ch. 1. In the following exposition we shall sometimes cite
from the Leviathan, and sometimes from the Human Nature. This genera'
reference will enable us to dispense with iterated bfot-notes.




498                       HOBBES.
" Of the powers of the mind there be two sorts-cognitive, imaginative, or conceptive and motive.
"For the understanding of what I mean by the power cognitive, we must remember and acknowledge that there be in our
minds continually certain images or conceptions of the things
without us. This imagery and representation of the qualities of
the things without, is that which we call our conception, imagination, ideas, notice, or knowledge of them; and the faculty, or
power by which we are capable of such knowledge, is that I
here call cognitive power, or conceptive, the power of knowing or
conceiving."
The mind is thus wholly constructed out of sense. Nor must
we be deceived by tle words faculty and power, as if they meant
any activity of the mind-as if they implied that the mind cooperated with sense. The last sentence of the foregoing passage
is sufficient to clear up this point. He elsewhere says: —  All
the qualities called seasible are, in the object that causeth them,
but so many several motions of the matter by which it presseth
on our organs diversely. Neither dn us that are pressed are they
any thing else,but divers motions; for motion produceth nothing
but motion."
Hobbes, therefore, and not Locke, is the precursor of that
school of Psychology which flourished in the eighteenth century
(principally in France),:and which made every operation of the
mind proceed out of transformed sensations; which ended, logically enough, in saying that to think is to feel-penser c'est
sentir.
It is to Hobbes that the merit is due of a discovery which,
though so familiar to us now as ito appear self-evident, was yet
in truth a most important discovery, and was adopted by Descartes in his Meditations*-it is that -our sensations do not correspond with any external qualities; that what are called sen* Descartes may possibly have discovered it for himself; but the priority
of publication is at any rate due to Hobbes-a fact first noticed, we believe,
by Mr. Hallam: Literature of Eusrope, iii. 271.




HOBBES.                      499
sible qualities are nothing but modifications of the sentient
being:
"Because the image in vision, consisting of color and shape,
is the knowledge we have of the qualities of the object of that
sense; it is no hard matter for a man to fall into this opinion
that the same color and shape are the very qualities themselves;
and for the same cause that sound and noise are the qualities of
the bell or of the air. And this opinion hath been so long received that the contrary must needs appear a great paradox;
and yet the introduction of species visible and intelligible (which
is necessary for the maintenance of that opinion) passing to and
fro from the object is worse than any paradox, as being a plain
impossibility. I shall therefore endeavor to make plain these
points:
" That the subject wherein color and image are inherent, is not
the object or thing seen.
"That there is nothing without us (really) which we call an
image or color.
"That the said image or color is but an apparition unto us of
the motion, agitation, or alteration which the object worketh in the
brain, or spirits, or some internal substance of the head.
"That as in vision, so also in conceptions that arise from the
other senses, the subject of their inference is not the object, but
the sentient."
This important principle, which Carneades among the ancients
alone seems to have suspected, Hobbes has very clearly and conclusively illustrated.
Sense furnishes us with conceptions; but as there are other
operations of the mind besides the conceptive, it remains to be
seen how sense can also be the original of them.
And first, of Imagination. Mr. Hallam has noticed the acuteness and originality which often characterize Hobbes's remarks;
and he instances the opening of the chapter on Imagination in
the Leviathan. It is worth quoting:-" That when a thing lies
still, unless somewhat else stir it, it will lie still forever, is a truth




500                     HOBBES.
no one doubts of. But that when a thing is in motion it will
eternally be in motion, unless somewhat else stay it, though the
reason be the same, namely that nothing can change itself, is not
so easily assented to. For men measure not only other men but
all other things by themselves; and, because they find themselves subject after motion to pain and lassitude, think every
thing else grows weary of motion, and seeks repose of its own
accord; little considering whether it be not some other motion
wherein that desire of rest, they find in themselves, consisteth."
Imagination Hobbes defines as a "conception remaining and by
little and little decaying from and after the act of sense."...
"Imagination, therefore, is but decaying sense." The reader must
not here understand by imagination any thing more than the retaining of an image of the object, after the object is removed. It
is the term used by Hobbes to express what James Mill happily
called Ideation.  Sense, Sensation; ideas, Ideation.  Iobbes
says, sense, Sensation; images, Imagination.
The materialism of Hobbes's theory does not consist merely in
his language (as is the case with some philosophers-Locke, for
instance); it lies at the very root of the theory. Thus, he says,
we have sensations and we have images-ideas. Whence those
images? " When a body is once in motion it movetll, unless
something hinder it, eternally; and whatsoever hindereth it, cannot in an instant, but in time and by degrees, quite extinguish
it; and as we see in the water, though the wind cease, the waves
give not over rolling for a long time after: so also it happeneth
in that motion which is made in the internal parts of man; then,
when he sees, dreams, etc. For after the object is removed, or
the eye shut, we still retain an image of the thing seen, though
more obscure than when we see it.... The decay of sense in
men waking is not the decay of the motion made in sense, but
an obscuring of it, in such manner as the light of. the sun obscureth the light of the stars; which stars do no less exercise
their virtue, by which they are visible, in the day than in the
night. But because amongst many strokes which our eyes, ears,




HOBBES.                      501
and other organs receive from external bodies, the predominant
only is sensible; therefore the light of the sun being predominant, we are not affected with the action of the stars." This illustration is very happy; but it only serves to bring out into
stronger relief the materialism of the theory. He has told us
what Imagination is; let us now learn what is Memory. "This
decaying sense, when we would express the thing itself, I mean
fancy itself, we call imagination, as I have said before; but when
we would express the decay, and signify that the sense is fading,
old, and past, it is called memory. So that imagination and
memory are but one thing, which for divers considerations hath
divers names." Mr. Hallam objects to this, and says that it is
very evident that imagination and memory are distinguished by
something more than their names. Truly, by us; but not by
Hobbes; he evidently uses the word imagination in a more generical sense than we use it: he means by it Ideation. Thus he
calls dreams " the imagination of them that sleep." It is that
state of the mind which remains when the objects which agitated
it by sensations are removed: the mind is then not so agitated,
but neither is it calm; and he compares that state to the gentle
rolling of the waves after the wind hath ceased.
Let this be distinctly borne in mind: Hobbes sees nothing in
the intellect but what was previously in the sense. Sensations,
and the traces which they leave (i. e. images), form the simple
elements of all knowledge; the various commixtures of these elements form the various intellectual faculties. We may now open
at the third chapter of the Leviathan. In it he propounded, as
something quite simple and obvious, the very important law of
association of ideas.* He states it with great clearness and
thorough mastery, though he evidently was quite unaware of its
extensive application.
" When a man thinketh," he says, " on any thing whatsoever,
his next thought after is not altogether so casual as it seems to
* See Sir W. Hamilton's Dissertation affixed to Reid's Works, p. 898, for
a history of this law of association.




502                     HOBBES.
be. Not every thought to every thought succeeds indifferently.
But as we have no imagination whereof we have not formerly
had sense in whole or in parts, so we have no transition from
one imagination to another whereof we never had the like before
in our senses. The reason whereof is this: all fancies (i. e. images) are motions within us, relicts of those made in sense; and
those motions that immediately succeed one another in the sense
continue also together after the sense; insomuch as the former
coming again to take place and be predominant, the latter followeth by coherence of the matter moved, in such manner as
water upon a plain table is drawn which way any one part of it
is guided by the finger."
The materialism here is distinct enough. He continues, in
excellent style: "This train of thoughts, or mental discourse, is
of two sorts. The first is unguided, without design, and inconstant, wherein there is no passionate thought to govern and direct those that follow to itself, as the end and scope of some
desire or other passion; in which case the thoughts are said to
wander, and seem impertinent one to another, as in a dream.
Such are commonly the thoughts of men that are not only without company, but also without care of any thing; though even
then their thoughts are as busy as at other times, but without
harmony; as the sound which a lute out of tune would yield to
any man; or in tune, to one that could not play. And yet in
this wild ranging of the mind, a man may ofttimes perceive the
way of it, and the dependence of one thought upon another.
For in a discourse of our present civil war, what would seem more
impertinent than to ask, as one did, what was the value of a
Roman penny? Yet the coherence to me was manifest enough.
For the thought of the war introduced the thought of delivering
up the King to his enemies; the thought of that brought in the
thought of the delivering up of Christ; and that again the
thought of the thirty pence, which was the price of that treason;
and thence easily followed that malicious question, and all this
in a moment of time; for thought is quick."




HOBBES.                         503
"For thought is quick."    This is the simple pregnant comment, justly deemed sufficient. It is no purpose of this history
to dwell upon literary merits; "but the style," as Buffon says,
"is the man,"* and occasionally we are forced to notice it. The
plain direct remark with which Hobbes concludes the above
passage, would, in the hands of many moderns, have run somewhat thus: "How wonderful is thought! how mighty! how
mysterious! In its lightning speed it traverses all space, and
makes the past present." Hobbes, with a few simple, direct
words, produces a greater impression than would all the swelling
pomp of a passage bristling with notes of exclamation. This is
the secret of his style. It is also the characteristic of his speculations.  Whatever faults they may have, they have no vagueness,
no pretended profundity. As much of the truth as he has
clearly seen he clearly exhibits: what he has not seen he does
not pretend to see.
One important deduction from his principles he has drawn:
" Whatsoever we imagine is finite. Therefore there is no idea,
no conception of any thing we call infinite.  No man can have
in his mind an image of infinite magnitude, nor conceive infinite
swiftness, infinite time, or infinite power. When we say that
any thing is infinite, we signify only that we are not able to conceive the ends and bounds of the thing named, having no conception of the thing, but of our own inability. And therefore
the name of God is used not to make us conceive him, for he is
incomprehensible, and his greatness and power are inconceivable,
but that we may honor him. Also, because whatsoever we con*I leave this passage as it originally stood, for the sake of correcting a
universal error. I have since detected it to be an error by the simple process of reading Buffon's actual words, which some French writer misquoted
from memory, and which thousands have repeated without misgiving, although the phrase is an absurdity. The phrase occurs in Buffon's Discours
de Reception a l'Acaderie, where speaking of style as that alone capable of
conferring immortality on works, because the matter was prepared by preceding ages, and must soon become common property, whereas style remains a part of the man himself; he adds, " Ces choses sont hors de l'homme;
le style est de l'homme meme." There is immense difference between saying
le style c'est V'homme, and le style est de l'hommw.




504                      HOBBES.
ceive has been perceived first by sense, either all at once or by
parts, a man can have no thought representing any thing not subject to Sense."
This is frank, but is it true? On Hobbes's principles it is irresistible. His error lies in assuming that all our thoughts must
be images. So far is this from being true, that not even all our
sensations are capable of forming images. What images are
given by the sensations of heat or cold, of music or of taste?
Every man's consciousness will assure him that thoughts are
not always images. It will also assure him that he has the idea,
notion, conception, figment (or whatever name he may give the
thought) of Infinity. If he attempts to form an image of it,
that image will of course be finite: it would not otherwise be an
image. But he can think of it; he can reason of it. It is a
thought. It is in his mind; though how it got there may be a
question. The incompleteness of Hobbes's psychology lies in
the inability to answer this question. If the maxim he adopts
be true, nihil est in intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu, the
question is insoluble; or rather the question itself is a practical
refutation of the maxim.
We insist upon Hobbes's materialism, the better to prepare the
reader for a correct appreciation of Locke, one of the most
misrepresented of plain writers. Hobbes, in the sixth chapter
of his Human Nature, has very carefully defined what he means
by knowledge. "There is a story somewhere," he says, " of one
that pretends to have been miraculously cured of blindness,
wherewith he was born, by St. Alban or other saints, at the
town of St. Albans; and that the Duke of Gloucester being
there, to be satisfied of the truth of the miracle, asked the man,
What color is this? who, by answering it was green, discovered
himself, and was punished for a counterfeit: for though by his
sight newly received he might distinguish between green and
red and all other colors, as well as any that should interrogate
him, yet he could not possibly know, at first sight, which of them
was called green, or red, or by any other name.




HOBBES.                     505
"By this we may understand there be two kinds of knowledge, whereof the one is nothing else but sense, or knowledge
original, and remembrance of the same; the other is called
science, or knowledge of the truth of propositions, and how things
are called, and is derived from understanding. Both of these
sorts are but experience; the former being the experience of the
effects of things that work upon us from without; and the latter
experience men have from the proper use of names in language:
and all experience being, as I have said, but remembrance, all
knowledge is remembrance."
The only ambiguity possible in the above passage is that which
might arise from the use of the word understanding. This he
elsewhere defines as follows:
"When a man, upon the hearing of any speech, hath those
thoughts which the words of that speech in their connection
were ordained and constituted to signify, then he is said to understand it; understanding being nothing else but conception
formed by speech."
We must content ourselves with merely alluding to his admirable observations on language, and with quoting, for the hundredth time, his weighty aphorism, "Words are wise men's counters; they do but reckon by them; but they are the money of
fools."
No attempt is here made to do full justice to Hobbes; no
notice can be taken of the speculations which made him famous.
Our object has been fulfilled if we have made clear to the reader
the position Hobbes occupies in modern psychological speculation.
22




CHAPTER II.
LOCKE.
~ I. LIFE OF LOCKE.
JOHN LOCKE, one of the wisest of Englishmen, was born at
Urington, in Somersetshire, on the 29th of August, 1632. Little
is known of his family, except that his father had served in the
Parliamentary wars; a fact not without significance in connection
with the steady love of liberty manifested by the son.
His education began at Westminster, where he stayed till he
was nineteen or twenty. He was then sent to Oxford. That
University was distinguished then, as it has ever been, by its
attachment to whatever is old: the Past is its model; the Past
has its affection. That there is much good in this veneration for
the Past, a few will gainsay. Nevertheless, a University which
piqued itself on being behind the age, was scarcely the fit place
for an original thinker. Locke was ill at ease there. The philosophy upheld there was Scholasticism. On such food a mind
like his could not nourish itself.  Like his great predecessor
Bacon, he imbibed a profound contempt for the University
studies, and in after-life regretted that so much of his time
should have been wasted on such profitless pursuits. So deeply
convinced was he of the vicious method of college education,
that he ran into the other extreme, and thought self-education
the best. There is a mixture of truth and error in this notion.
It is true that all great men have been mainly self-taught; all
that is most valuable a man must learn for himself, must work
out for himself. The error of Locke's position is the assumption
that all men will educate themselves if left to themselves. The
fact is, the majority have to be educated by force. For those




LIFE OF LOCKE.                 507
who, if left to themselves, would never educate themselves, colleges and schools are indispensable.
Locke's notion of an educated man is very characteristic of
him. Writing to Lord Peterborough, he says, "Your Lordship
would have your son's tutor a thorough scholar, and I think it
not much matter whether he be any scholar or no: if he but
understand Latin well and have a general scheme of the sciences,
I think that enough. But I would have him well-bred and
well-tempered."
Disgusted with the disputes which usurped the title of Philosophy, Locke principally devoted himself to Medicine while at
Oxford. His proficiency is attested by two very different persons, and in two very different ways. Dr. Sydenharn, in the
Dedication of his Observations on the History and Cure of
Acute Diseases, boasts of the approbation bestowed on his
Method by Mr. John Locke, " who examined it to the bottom;
and who, if we consider his genius and penetrating and exact
judgment, has scarce any superior, and few equals now living."
The second testimony is that afforded by Lord Shaftesbury,
when Locke first met him. The Earl was suffering from an
abscess in the chest. No one could discover the nature of his
disorder. Locke at once divined it. The Earl followed his advice, submitted to an operation, and was saved. A close intimacy sprang up between them. Locke accompanied him to
London, and resided principally in his house.
His attention was thus turned to politics. His visits to Holland delighted him. " The blessings which the people there enjoyed under a government peculiarly favorable to civil and
religious liberty, amply compensated, in his view, for what their
uninviting territory wanted in scenery and climate."* He also
visited France and Germany, making the acquaintance of several
distinguished men.
In 1670 he planned his Essay concerning Human Understand* Dugald Stewart.




508                        LOCKE.
ing. This he did not complete till 1687. In 1675 the delicate
state of his health obliged him to travel, and he repaired to the
south of France, where he met Lord Pembroke. To him the
Essay is dedicated.  He returned in 1679, and resumed his
studies at Oxford. But his friendship for Shaftesbury, and the
liberal opinions he was known to hold, drew upon him the displeasure of the Court. He was deprived of his studentship by
a very arbitrary act.*  Nor did persecution stop there. He was
soon forced to quit England, and find refuge at the Hague.
There also the anger of the king pursued him, and he was
obliged to retreat further into Holland. It was there he published his celebrated Letter on Toleration.
He did not return to England till after the Revolution. Then
there was security and welcome.   He was pressed to accept a
high diplomatic office in Germany, but the state of his health
prevented him. In 1690 the first edition of his Essay appeared.
He had indeed already (1688) published an abridgment of it in
Leclerc's Bibliotheque Universelle.  The success of this Essay
was immense; and Warburton's assertion to the contrary falls
to the ground on the mere statement of the number of editions
which the work rapidly went through. Six editions within fourteen years,t and in times when books sold more slowly than they
sell now, is evidence enough.
The publication of his Essay roused great opposition. He
soon got involved in the discussions with Stillingfleet, Bishop of
Worcester. He was soon after engaged in the political discussions of the day, and published his Treatise on Government. It
was about this time that he became acquainted with Sir Isaac
* See Macaulay, History of England, i. 545-6.
t The writer of the article Locke, in the Ency. Brit., says that the fourth
edition appeared in 1700. Victor Cousin repeats the statement, and adds
that a fifth edition was preparing when death overtook the author; this
fifth edition appearing in 1705. We know not on what authority these
writers speak; but that they are in error may be seen by turning to Locke's
Epistle to the Reader, the last paragraph of which announces that the edition
then issued by Locke himself is the sixth.




SPIRIT OF LOCXCES WRITINGS.            509
Newton; and a portion of their very interesting correspondence
has been given by Lord King in his Life of Locke.
Locke's health, though always delicate, had not been disturbed
by any imprudences, so that he reached the age of seventy-two
-a good ripe age for one who had studied and thought. He
expired in the arms of his friend, Lady Masham, on the 28th of
October, 1704.
~ II. ON THE SPIRIT OF LOCKE's WRITINGS.
It has for many years been the fashion to decry Locke. Indirect sneers at his "superficiality" abound in the writings of
those who, because their thought is so muddy that they cannot
see its shallow bottom, fancy they are profound. Locke's "materialism " is also a favorite subject of condolence with these
writers; and they assert that his principles " lead to atheism."
Lead whom?
Another mode of undervaluing Locke is to assert that he only
borrowed and popularized the ideas originated by Hobbes. The
late Mr. Hazlitt-an acute thinker, and a metaphysician, but a
wilful reckless writer-deliberately asserted that Locke owed
every thing to Hobbes. Dr. Whewell repeats the charge, though
in a more qualified manner. He says, "Hobbes had already
promulgated the main doctrines, which Locke afterwards urged,
on the subject of the origin and nature of our knowledge."
Again, " Locke owed his authority mainly to the intellectual
circumstances of the time. Although a writer of great merit,
he by no means possesses such metaphysical acuteness, or such
philosophical largeness of view, or such a 5charm of writing, as
to give him the high place he has held in the literature of
Europe."
That Locke did not borrow his ideas from Hobbes will be very
apparent in our exposition of Locke; but meanwhile we may
quote the testimony of Sir James Mackintosh, one of the best
read of our philosophers, and one intimately acquainted with
both these thinkers:



510                      LOCKE.
" Locke and Hobbes agree chiefly on those points in which,
except the Cartesians, all the speculators of their age were agreed.
They differ on the most momentous questions-the sources of
knowledge, the power of abstraction, the nature of the will; on
the two last of which subjects, Locke, by his very failures themselves, evinces a strong repugnance to the doctrine of Hobbes.
They differ not only in their premises and many of their conclusions, but in their manner of philosophizing itself. Locke
had no prejudice which could lead him to imbibe doctrines from
the enemy of liberty and religion. His style, with all its faults,
is that of a man who thinks for himself; and an original style
is not usually the vehicle of borrowed opinions." *
To this passage we will add another from a still more distinguished judge:
"Few among the great names in philosophy have met with a
harder measure of justice from the present generation than
Locke, the unquestioned founder of the analytic philosophy of
mind, but whose doctrines were first caricatured, then, when the
reaction arrived, cast off by the prevailing school even with contumely, and who is now regarded by one of the conflicting partiesin philosophy as an apostle of heresy and sophistry; while
among those who still adhere to the standard which he raised,
there has been a disposition in later times to sacrifice his reputation in favor of Hobbes-a great writer and a great thinker
for his time, but inferior to Locke not only in sober judgment,
but even in profundity and original genius. Locke, the most
candid of philosophers, and one whose speculations bear on every
subject the strongest mark of having been wrought out from
the materials of his own mind, has been mistaken for an unworthy plagiarist, while Hobbes has been extolled as having anticipated many of his leading doctrines. He did not anticipate
many of them, and the present is an instance in what manner
it was generally done. [The writer is speaking of Locke's refu* Edinburgh Review for Oetober, 1821, p. 242.




SPIRIT OF LOCKE'S WRITINGS.            511
tation of Essences.] They both rejected the scholastic doctrine
of Essences, but Locke understood and explained what these
supposed essences were. Hobbes, instead of explaining the distinction between essential and accidental properties, and between
essential and accidental propositions, jumped over it, and gave a
definition which suits, at most, only essential propositions, and
scarcely those, as the definition of Proposition in general."*
Dugald Stewart indeed says, "that it must appear evident
Locke had diligently studied the writings of Hobbes;" but Sir
J. Mackintosh, as quoted above, has explained why Locke appears
to have studied Hobbes; and Stewart is far from implying that
Locke therefore gained his principal ideas from Hobbes. Indeed he has an admirable note in which he points out how
completely Locke's own was the important principle of Reflection. "This was not merely a step beyond Hobbes, but the
correction of an error which lies at the very root of Hobbes's
system."t
That Locke never read Hobbes may seem incredible, but is,
we are convinced, the truth. It is one among many examples
of how few were the books he had read. He never alludes to
Hobbes in any way that can be interpreted into having read him.
Twice only, we believe, does he allude to him, and then so distantly, and with such impropriety, as to be almost convincing
with respect to his ignorance. The first time is in his Reply to
the Bishop of Worcester, in which he absurdly classes Hobbes
and Spinoza together. He says, "I am not so well read in
Hobbes and Spinoza as to be able to say what were their
opinions on this matter, but possibly there be those who will
think your Lordship's authority of more use than those justly
decried writers." The form of expression, "I am not so well
read," etc., is obviously equivalent to-I have never read those
justly decried writers. His second allusion is simply this:* Mill's System of Logic, i. 150.
t Dissertation on the Progress of Metaph. Philosophy, p. 235 (Hamilton's
ed.). The note is very long and curious.




512                      LOCKE.
"A Hobbist would probably say."  We cannot at present lay
our hands on the passage, but it refers to some moral question.
The above is only negative evidence. Something like positive
evidence however is the fact that Hobbes's doctrine of Association
of Ideas-a principle as simple of apprehension as it is important-was completely unknown to Locke, who, in the fourth or
fifth edition, added the chapter on association as it now stands.
Moreover, Locke's statement of the law is by no means so satisfactory as that by Hobbes: he had not so thoroughly mastered
it; yet had he read it in Hobbes, he would assuredly have improved on it. That he did not at first introduce it into his work
is a strong presumption that he had not then read Hobbes, because the law is so simple and so evident, when stated, that it
must produce instantaneous conviction.
It is strange that any man should have read Locke, and questioned his originality. There is scarcely a writer we could name
whose works bear such an indisputable impress of his having
"raised himself above the almsbasket, and not content to live
lazily on scraps of begged opinions, set his own thoughts to work
to find and follow truth." It is still more strange that any man
should have read Locke and questioned his power. That patient
sagacity which, above all things, distinguishes a philosopher, is
more remarkable in Locke than almost aly writer. He was also
largely endowed with good sense; a quality, Gibbon remarks,
which is rarer than genius. In these two qualities, and in his
homely racy masculine style, we see the type of the English
mind, when at its best. The plain directness of his manner, his
earnestness without fanaticism, his hearty honest love of truth,
and the depth and pertinence of his thoughts, are qualities which,
though they do not dazzle the reader, yet win his love and respect.
In that volume, you have the honest thoughts of a great honest
Englishman. It is the product of a manly mind: clear, truthful,
direct. No vague formulas-no rhetorical flights-no base flattery of base prejudices-no assumption of oracular wisdom-no
word-jugglery. There are so many writers who cover their




SPIRIT OF LOCKERS WRITINGS.          513
vanity with a veil of words, who seem profound because they are
obscure, that a plainness like Locke's deceives the careless reader,
who is led to suppose that what is there so plain must have been
obvious.
Locke, though a patient, cautious thinker, was any thing but a
timid thinker; and it does great honor to his sagacity, that at
a time when all scientific men were exclaiming against the danger
of hypotheses, believing that the extravagant errors of Schoolmen
and alchemists were owing to their use of hypotheses-a time
when the great Newton himself could be led into the unphilosophical boast hypotheses non fingo, our wise Locke should
exactly appreciate them at their true value. Hie says,"Not that we may not, to explain any phenomena of nature,
make use of any probable hypotheses whatsoever. Hypotheses,
if they are well made, are at least great helps to memory, and
often direct us to new discoveries. But we should not take them
up too hastily (which the mind that would always penetrate into
the causes of things, and have principles to rest on, is very apt
to do) till we have very well exanined particulars, and made
several experiments in that thing which we would explain by
our hypothesis, and see whether it will agree to them all;
whether our principles will carry us quite through, and not be as
inconsistent with one phenomenon of nature as they seem to
accommodate and explain another; and, at least, that we take
care that the name of principles deceive us not nor impose on us,
by making us receive that for an unquestionable truth which is
really at best but a very doubtful conjecture: such as are most
(I had almost said all) of the hypotheses in natural philosophy."
Locke did not seek to dazzle; he sought Truth, and wished all
men to accompany him in the search. He would exchange his
opinions with ease when he fancied that he saw their error. He
readily retracted ideas which he had published in an immature
form; "thinking himself," as he says, "more concerned to quit
and renounce any opinion of my own than oppose that of another,
when truth appears against it."  He had a just and incurable
22*




514                      LOCKE.
suspicion of all "great volumes swollen with ambiguous words."
He knew how much jugglery goes on with words; some of it
conscious, some of it unconscious, but all pernicious. "Vague
and insignificant forms of speech and abuse of language have for
so long passed for mysteries of science; and hard and misapplied
words, with little or no meaning, have, by prescription, such a
right to be mistaken for deep learning and height of speculation,
that it will not be easy to persuade either those who speak, or
those who hear them, that they are but the covers of ignorance
and hindrance of true knowledge. To break in upon this sanctuary of vanity and ignorance will be, I suppose, some service to
the human understanding."
Locke had an analytical mind. He desired to understand and
to explain things, not to write rhetorically about them. There
were mysteries enough which he was contented to let alone; he
knew that human faculties were limited, and reverentially submitted to ignorance on all things beyond his reach. But though
he bowed down before that which was essentially mysterious, he
was anxious not to allow that which was essentially cognizable
to be enveloped in mystery. Let that which is a mystery remain
undisturbed: let that which is not necessarily a mystery be
brought into the light of day. Know the limits of your understanding-beyond those limits it is madness to attempt to penetrate; within those limits it is folly to let in darkness and
mystery, to be incessantly wondering and always assuming that
matters cannot be so plain as they appear, and that something
lying deeper courts our attention.
To minds otherwise constituted-to men who love to dwell in
the vague regions of speculation, and are only at ease in an intellectual twilight-Locke is naturally a disagreeable teacher. He
flatters none of their prejudices; he falls in with none of their
tendencies. Mistaking obscurity for depth, they accuse him of
being superficial. The owls declare the eagle is blind. They
want the twilight; he
" Wantons in the smile of Jove.'




LOCKE'S METHOD.                 515
They sneer at his " shallowness." So frequent are the sneers and
off-hand charges against him, that I, who had read him in my
youth with delight, began to suspect that my admiration had
been rash. The proverb says, "Throw hut mud enough, some
will be sure to stick." It was so with Locke. Reqterated depreciation had somewhat defaced his image in my mind. The
time came however when, for the purposes of this history, I had
to read the Essay on Human Understanding once more, carefully, pen in hand. The image of John Locke was again revived
within me; this time in more than its former splendor. His
modesty, honesty, truthfulness, and directness I had never doubted; but now the vigor and originality of his mind, the raciness
of his colloquial style, the patient analysis by which he has laid
open to us such vast tracts of thought, and above all, the manliness of his truly practical understanding, are so strongly impressed
upon me, that I feel satisfied the best answer tp his critics is to
say, "Read him."  From communion with such a mind as his,
nothing but good can result. He suggests as much as he teaches;
and it has been well said, "that we cannot speak of his Essay
without the deepest reverence; whether we consider the era
which it constitutes in philosophy, the intrinsic value (even at
the present day) of its thoughts, or the noble devotion to truth,
the beautiful and touching earnestness and simplicity which he
not only manifests in himself, but has the power, beyond almost
any writer, of infusing into his reader."
~ III. LOCKE'S METHOD.
"It may be said that Locke created the science of Metaphysics," says D'Alembert, " in somewhat the same way as Newton created Physics.... To understand the soul, its ideas and
its affections, he did not study books; they would have misdirected him; he was content to descend within himself, and after
having, so to speak, contemplated himself a long while, he presented in his Essay the mirror in which he had seen himself.




516                      LOCKE.
In one word, he reduced Metaphysics to that which it ought to
be, viz. the experimental physics of the mind."*
This is great praise, and from high authority, but we suspect
that it can only be received with some qualification. Locke made
no grand discovery which changed the face of science. He was
not even the first to turn his glance inwards. Descartes and
Hobbes had been before him.
Yet Locke had his Method; a Method peculiarly his own.
Others before him had cast a hasty glance inwards, and dogmatized upon what they saw. He was the first to watch patiently
the operations of his mind, that, watching, he might surprise the
evanescent thoughts, and steal from them the secret of their combinations. He is the founder of Modern Psychology. By him
the questions of Philosophy are boldly and scientifically reduced
to the primary question of the limits of human understanding.
By him is begun the history of the development and combination
of our thoughts. Others had contented themselves with the
thoughts as they found them; Locke sedulously inquired into
the origin of all our thoughts.
M. Victor Cousin, who, as a rhetorician, is in constant antagonism to the clear and analytical Locke, makes it an especial
grievance that Locke and his school have considered the question respecting the origin of ideas as fundamental. " It is from
Locke," he continues, "that has been borrowed the custom of
referring to savages and children, upon whom observation is so
difficult; for the one class we must trust to the reports of travellers, often prejudiced and ignorant of the language of the country
visited; for the other class (children), we are reduced to very
equivocal signs."f
We cannot see how Locke should avoid referring to savages
and children, if he wanted to collect facts concerning the origin
of ideas; it is a practice inseparable from the psychological
*" En un mot, il reduisit la metaphysique a ce qu'elle doit Btre, en effet,
la physique exp6rimentale de l'ame."'-Discours Prelim. de l'Encyclopedie.
t Histoire de la Philos. 17 lemon.




LOCKE'S METHOD.                 517
Method. Perhaps no source of error has been more abundant
than the obstinacy with which men have in all times looked
upon their indissoluble associations as irresistible truths-as
primary and universal truths. A little analysis-a little observation of minds removed from the influences which fostered those
associations, would prove that those associations were not universal truths, but simply associations. It is because men have
analyzed the mind in its cultivated condition, that they have
been led to false results; had they compared their analysis with
that of an uncultivated mind, they might have gained some insight. The objection against Locke's practice could only proceed from men who study psychology without previous acquaintance with physiology-which, though they do not know it, is
the same as studying functions without any knowledge of the
organs. Locke was the first who systematically sought in the
history of the development of the mind for answers to many of
the fundamental questions of psychology, and he has been blamed
for this, in the same spirit as that which dictated the sneers of
John Hunter's professional contemporaries; because that admirable anatomist sought in comparative anatomy for elucidation of
many anatomical problems. Now-a-days no well-informed student
is ignorant of the fact that Comparative Physiology, and Embryology, are our surest guides in all biological questions, simply
because we therein see the problems gradually removed from
many of the complexities which frustrate our research in the
higher and more completely developed organisms. Locke saw
clearly enough that the philosophers were accustomed to consider their minds as types of the human mind; whereas their
minds, being filled with false notions and warped by prejudices,
could in nowise be taken as types; for even granting that the
majority of their notions were true, yet these true notions were
not portions of the furniture of universal minds. He sought for
illustrations from such minds as had not been so warped.
His object was "to inquire into the original, certainty, and
extent of human knowledge." He was led to this by a conver



518                      LOCKE.
sation with some friends, in which, disputes growing warm, " after we had puzzled ourselves awhile, without coming any nearer
a resolution of those doubts which perplexed us, it came into my
thoughts that we took a wrong course; and that before we set
ourselves upon inquiries of that nature, it was necessary to examine our own abilities, and see what objects our understandings
were or were not fitted to deal with."
The plan he himself laid down is as follows:
" First, I shall inquire into the original of those ideas, notions,
or whatever else you please to call them, which a man observes
and is conscious to himself he has in his mind; and the ways
whereby the understanding comes to be furnished with them.
"Secondly, I shall endeavor to show what knowledge the understanding hath by those ideas; and the certainty, evidence,
and extent of it.
"Thirdly, I shall make some inquiry into the nature and
grounds of faith or opinion; whereby I mean that assent which
we give to any proposition as true, of whose truth we have yet
no certain knowledge; and we shall have occasion to examine
the reasons and degrees of assent."
We may here see decisively settled the question so often raised
respecting the importance of Locke's Inquiry into Innate Ideas.
"For Locke and his school," says M. Cousin, justly, "the study
of understanding is the study of Ideas; hence the recent celebrated name of Ideology for the designation of the science of
mind." Indeed, as we have shown, the origin of Ideas was the
most important of all questions; upon it rested the whole problem of Philosophy.
According to the origin of our Ideas may we assign to them
their validity. If they are of human growth and development,
they will necessarily partake of human limitations. As Pascal
well says, "Si l'homme commenroit par s'etudier lui-meme, il
verroit combien il est incapable de passer outre.  Comment
pourroit-il se faire qu'une partie connut le tout?"
Locke has given us a few indications of the state of opinion




LOCKE'S METHOD.                  519
respecting Innate Ideas, which it is worth while collecting. "I
have been told that a short epitome of this treatise, which was
printed in 1688, was condemned by some without reading, because innate ideas were denied in it, they too hastily concluding
that if innate ideas were not supposed, there would be little left
either of the notion or proof of spirits." Recapitulating the contents of the chapter devoted to the refutation of innate ideas, he
says, "I know not how absurd this may seem to the masters of
demonstration, and probably it will hardly down with anybody
at first hearing." And elsewhere: "What censure doubting
thus of innate principles may deserve from men, who will be apt
to call it pulling up the old foundations of knowledge and certainty, I cannot tell; I persuade myself at least that the way I
have pursued, being conformable to truth, lays those foundations
surer."
Locke's Method was purely psychological; although he had
been a student of medicine, he never indulges in any physiological speculations, such as his successors, Hartley and Darwin, delighted in. Ideas, and ideas only, solicited his analysis. Dugald
Stewart has remarked, that in the Essay there is not a single
passage savoring of the anatomical theatre or of the chemical
laboratory.
We have already spoken of the positivism of Bacon; that of
Locke shall now speak for itself in his own words:-" If by this
inquiry into the nature of the understanding I can discover the
powers thereof, how far they reach, to what things they are in
any degree proportionate, and where they fail us, I suppose it
may be of use to prevail with the busy mind of man to be more
cautious in meddling with the things exceeding its comprehension, to stop when it is at the utmost extent of its tether, and sit
down in a quiet ignorance of those things which upon examination
are found to be beyond the reach of our capacities. We should
not then perhaps be so forward, out of an affectation of universal
knowledge, to raise questions and perplex ourselves and others
about things to which our understandings are not suited, and of




520                      LOCKE.
which we cannot frame in our minds any clear or distinct perceptions, or whereof (as it has perhaps too often happened) we
have not any notions at all. Men have reason to be well satisfied with what God has thought fit for them, since he has given
them, as St. Peter says, ar&vvrca epo' Syhv xadi Euf/3iav, whatsoever
is necessary for the convenience of life and the information of
virtue; and has put within the reach of their discovery the comfortable provision for this life, and the way that leads to a better.
How short soever their knowledge may be of a universal or perfect comprehension of whatever is, it yet secures their great concernments, that they have light enough to lead them to the
knowledge of their Maker and the sight of their own duties.
Men may find matter sufficient to busy their heads and employ
their hands with variety, delight, and satisfaction, if they will
not boldly quarrel with their own constitutions, and throw away
the blessings their hands are filled with because they are not big
enough to grasp every thing.
" We shall not have much reason to complain of the narrowness
of our minds, if we will but employ them about what may be of
use to us, for of that they are very capable; and it will be an
unpardonable as well as childish peevishness, if we undervalue
the advantages of our knowledge, and neglect to improve it to
the ends for which it was given us, because there are some things
set out of reach of it. It will be no excuse to an idle and untoward servant who would not attend his business by candlelight,
to plead that he had not broad sunshine. The candle that is set
up within us shines bright enough for all our purposes.
"When we know our own strength we shall the better know
what to undertake with hopes of success;* and when we have
well surveyed the powers of our minds, and made some estimate
what we may expect from them, we shall not be inclined either
to sit still, and not set our thoughts on work at all, despairing of
* " The real cause and root of almost all the evils in science is this: that
falsely magnifying and extolling the powers of the mind, we seek not its
true helps."-Bacon.




LOCKE'S METHOD.                 521
knowing any thing; or, on the other side, question every thing,
and disclaim all knowledge because some things are not to be
understood. It is of great use to the sailor to know the length
of his line, though he cannot with it fathom all the depths of the
ocean. It is well he knows that it is long enough to reach the
bottom at such places as are necessary to direct his voyage, and
caution him against running upon any shoals that may ruin
him.... This was that which gave the first rise to this Essay
concerning the Understanding; for I thought that the first step
towards satisfying several inquiries the mind of man was very
apt to run into, was to take a survey of our own understandings,
and to see to what things they were adapted. Till that was done
I suspected we began at the wrong end, and in vain sought for
satisfaction in a quiet and sure possession of truths that most
concerned us, whilst we let loose our thoughts into the vast
ocean of being; as if that boundless extent were the natural and
undoubted possession of our understandings, wherein there is
nothing exempt from its decisions, or that escaped its comprehension. Thus men extending their inquiries beyond their capacities, and letting their thoughts wander into those depths where
they can find no sure footing, it is no wonder that they raise
questions and multiply disputes, which, never coming to any clear
resolution, are proper only to continue and increase their doubts,
and to confirm them at last in perfect skepticism."
The decisive manner in which Locke separates himself from
the ontologists is not only historically noteworthy, but is also
noticeable as giving the tone to his subsequent speculations.
We have admired the Portico; let us enter the Temple.
~ TV. THE ORIGIN OF OUR IDEAS.
Hobbes had said, with Gassendi, that all our ideas are derived
from sensations; nihil est intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu.
Locke, who is called a mere popularizer of Hobbes, said that there
were two sources, not one source, and these two were SENSATION




522                     LOCKE.
and REFLECTION. Separating himself decisively from the upholders of the doctrine of innate ideas-of truths independent of
experience,-he declared that all our knowledge is founded on
experience, and from experience it ultimately derives itself.
Separating himself no less decisively from the Gassendists, who
saw no source of ideas but Sensation, he declared that although
SENSATION was the great source of most of our ideas, yet there
was "another fountain from  which experience furnisheth the
understanding with ideas;" and this source, "though it be not
sense, as having nothing to do with external objects, yet it is very
like it, and might properly enough be called internal sense:" this
he calls REFLECTION.
After Dugald Stewart's ample exposure of the wide-spread
error that Locke was the chief of the so-called Sensational School,
we need spend little time in inquiring whether Locke did or did
not teach that all knowledge was referable to sensation. The
passages which contradict the vulgar error respecting Locke's
doctrine are numerous and decisive. Dugald Stewart has selected several; but perhaps the one we have quoted above will
be considered sufficiently explicit. Reflection, he says, "though
it be not sense," may yet analogically be considered as an internal sense. To prevent all misconception, however, we will as a
decisive example refer to his proof of the existence of God, which
he sums up by saying, "It is plain to me that we have a more
certain knowledge of the existence of a God than of any thing
our senses have not immediately discovered to us. Nay, I presume I may say that we may more certainly know that there is
a God, than that there is any thing else without us." (Book IV.
ch. x.) Locke made the senses the source of all our sensuous
knowledge; our ideal knowledge (so to speak) he derived from
Reflection.
Historians have not accorded due praise to Locke for the important advance he made towards a solution of the great question
on the origin of knowledge. While Leibnitz has been lauded to
the skies for having expressed Locke's doctrine in an epigram,




THE ORIGIN OF OUR IDEAS.              523
Locke has not only been robbed of his due, but has been sacrificed to his rival. It is commonly said, "Locke reduced all our
knowledge to Sensation: Leibnitz came and accepted the old
adage of nihil est in intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu, but
he accepted it as only half the truth; and therefore added, nisi
ipse intellectus."  Now, firstly, Locke did not accept the adage
as the whole truth; he said that Reflection was a second source
of ideas. Secondly, Dugald Stewart has remarked that the
addition which Leibnitz made when he said there is nothing in
the intellect which was not previously in the sense, except the
intellect itself, expresses no more than the doctrine of Locke, who
says, "External objects furnish the mind with ideas of sensible
qualities; and the mind furnishes the understanding with the
ideas of its own operations." Thirdly, although the phrase is
epigrammatic, and thereby has had such success in the world as
epigrams usually have, it will not bear scrutiny: few epigrams
will. Except as a verbal jingle, how trivial is the expressionthe intellect in the intellect! Suppose a man to say, " I have no
money in my purse, except my purse itself," he would scarcely
be les, absurd. For when the Schoolmen said, " nothing was in
the intellect which was not previously in the sense," they did not
mean that the intellect was the same as the sense; they meant
that the intellect was furnished with no ideas, notions, or conceptions which had not been furnished them by sense; they meant
that the senses were the inlets to the soul.
Dr. Whewell approves of the epigram; and alluding to Mr.
Sharpe's objection to it, viz. that we cannot say the intellect is
in the intellect, he says, "This remark is obviously fiivolous; for
the faculties of the understanding (which are what the argument
against the Sensational School requires us to reserve) may be
said to be in the understanding with as much justice as we may
assert that there are in it the impressions derived from sense."
We submit that the "faculties" of the understanding are not
"all that must be reserved for the argument against the Sensational School" (if the Lockeists be meant, and to them only did




524                        LOCKE.
Leibnitz address himself), for the simple reason that the faculties
never were denied.* Opponents have attributed such a notion
to Locke's school; no member of that school ever proposed it.
The question never was, Have we an Understanding, and has
that Understanding certain Faculties?  No; the question simply
was- What is the origin of our Ideas: are they partly innate
and partly acquired, or are they wholly acquired, and if so, is
Sense the sole inlet? To this plain question some replied plainly,
"Sense is the origin of all our ideas." Locke replied, "Sense
and Reflection are the sources of all our ideas." Leibnitz replied, " There is nothing in the intellect which was not previously
in the sense; except the intellect itself:" which latter remark is
altogether beside the question. And yet this remark has called
forth many pages of laudatory declamation; pages in which
Locke is cast into the background, and charged with having
overlooked the important fact that man has an intellect as well
as senses. This notion, once started, continued its triumphant
course.  Men are for the most part like sheep, who always follow
the bell-wether: what one boldly asserts, another echoes boldly;
a third transmits it to a fourth, and the assertion becomes consolidated into a traditional judgment. Some one more serious,
or more independent than the rest, looks into the matter, sees
an error, exposes it; but tradition rolls on its unimpeded course.
I do not expect to shake the traditional error respecting Locke;
I was bound, however, to signalize it. Locke does not derive all
our knowledge from   sensation; Leibnitz has not made any addition by his too famous nisi ipse intellectus.t
By Sensation, Locke understands the simple operation of exter* Locke often speaks of the operations of the mind as proceeding from
powers intrinsical and proper to itself. He says also: "Thus the first capacity
of human intellect is, that the mind is fitted to receive the impressions made
on it; either through the senses by outward objects, or by its own operations
when it reflects on them."-Essay, b. ii. c. i. ~ 24.
t Leibnitz himself says, when making tire distinction, "Cela s'accorde
assez avec votre auteur de 1'Essai, que cherche une bonne partie des Id6es
dans la reflexion de l'esprit sur sa propre nature." —Y7ouveaux Essais, ii. c. i.




THE ORIGIN OF OUR IDEAS.              525
nal objects through the senses. The mind is herein wholly passive. The senses, therefore, may be said to furnish the mind
with one portion of its materials. By Reflection he understands
that internal sense, by means of which the mind observes its own
operations. This furnishes the second and last portion of the
materials out of which the mind frames knowledge. " If it shall
be demanded," he says,'(when a man begins to have any ideas,
I think the true answer is, when he first has any sensation.) For
since there appear not to be any ideas in the mind before the
senses have conveyed any in, I conceive that ideas in the understanding are coeval with sensation."  This is making a decisive
stand against the upholders of innate ideas; but it is a very rude
and incomplete view.
Deeply considered, not only are ideas not coeval with sensations, but sensations themselves are not coeval with the operation of external objects on our organs. Our senses have to be
educated, i. e. to be drawn out, developed. We have to learn to
see, to hear, and to touch. Light strikes on the infant retina,
waves of air pulsate on the infant tympanum: but these as yet
produce neither sight nor hearing: they are only the preparations for sight and hearing. Many hundred repetitions are
necessary before what we call a sensation (i. e. a distinct feeling
corresponding to that which the object will always produce upon
the developed sense) can be produced. Many sensations are
necessary to produce a perception: a perception is a cluster of
sensations with an ideal element added.  On the educated
Sense objects act so as instantaneously to produce what we call
their sensations; on the uneducated Sense they act only so as to
produce a vague impression, which becomes more and more definite by repetition.*
Plato finely compares the soul to a book, of which the senses
* See this growth of sensation treated in detail in Beneke's Lehrbuch
der Psychologie. See also the chapters on Hartley and Darwin further on.




526                       LOCKE.
are the scribes.* Accepting this comparison, writing is only possible after a series of tentatives; the hand must practise, before it
can steady itself sufficiently to trace letters; so also must the
senses learn by repetition to trace intelligible figures on the
tabula rasa of the mind.
Locke continues his account of the origin of all our knowledge
thus: "In time the mind comes to reflect on its own operations
about the ideas got by sensation, and thereby stores itself with a
new set of ideas, which I call ideas of reflection. These are the
impressions which are made on our senses by outward objects
that are extrinsical to the mind, and its own operations proceeding from powers intrinsical and proper to itself; which when
reflected on by itself, becoming also objects of its contemplation,
are, as I have said, the original of all knowledge. Thus the first
capacity of the human intellect is, that the mind is fitted to receive the impressions made on it; either through the senses by
outward objects, or by its own operations when it reflects on
them. This is the first step that a man makes towards the discovery of and the groundwork whereon to build all those notions
which ever he shall have naturally in this world. All those
sublime thoughts which tower above the clouds, and reach as
high as heaven itself, take their rise and footing here: in all that
good extent wherein the mind wanders, in those remote speculations it may seem to be elevated with, it stirs not one jot
beyond those ideas which sense or reflection have offered for its
contemplation."
The close of this passage is an answer to the ontologists; not
one, however, which they will accept. They deny that sensation
and reflection are the only sources of materials. But we will
continue to hear Locke: "When the understanding is once
stored with these simple ideas, it has the power to repeat, compare, and unite them, even to an almost infinite variety, and so
* Phimleb, p. 192. Plato's words are not given in the text, but the
sense is.




ELEMENTS OF IDEALISM AND SKEPTICISM IN LOCKE. 527
can make at pleasure new complex ideas. But it is not in the
power of the most exalted wit, or enlarged understanding, by
any quickness or variety of thought, to invent or frame one new
simple idea in the mind not taken in by the ways aforementioned."
This is very explicit-and, we believe, very true. If true,
what becomes of Philosophy?
~ V. ELEMENTS OF IDEALISM AND SKEPTICISM IN LOCKE.
The passage last quoted naturally leads us to consider Locke's
position in the great debate carried on respecting our knowledge
of things per se.
Can we know things as they are? Descartes and his followers
suppose that we can: their criterion is the clearness and distinctness of ideas. Locke admirably said, "Distinct ideas of the
several sorts of bodies that fall under the examination of our
senses, perhaps we may have; but adequate ideas I suspect we
have not of any one amongst them." Our ideas, however clear,
are never adequate; they are subjective. But Locke only went
half-way towards the conception of knowledge as purely subjective. He did not think that all our ideas were images, copies
of external objects; but he expressly taught that our ideas of
what he calls primary qualities, are resemblances of what really
exist in bodies; adding, that "the ideas produced in us by secondary qualities have no resemblance of them at all. There is
nothing like our ideas existing in the bodies themselves. They
are, in the bodies we denominate from them, only a power to
produce those sensations in us."
It is remarkable that the last sentence did not lead him to the
conclusion that all the qualities which we perceive in bodies are
but the powers to produce sensations in us; and that it is we
who attribute to the causes of these sensations aform analogous
to their effects. He himself warned us "that so we may not
think (as perhaps usually is done) that they (ideas) are exactly
the images and resemblances of something inherent in the subject;
most of those of sensation being in the mind no more the like



528                      LOCKE.
ness of something existing without us, than the names that stand
for them are likenesses of our ideas, which yet upon hearing they
are apt to excite in us." And elsewhere, "It being no more impossible to conceive that God should annex such ideas to such
motions (i. e. the motions of objects affecting the senses) with
which they have ro similitude, than that he should annex the
idea of pain to the motion of a piece of steel dividing our flesh,
with which that idea hath no resemblance."
From these passages it will be seen how clearly Locke understood the subjective nature of one portion of our knowledge.
Hle did not carry out the application of his principles to primary
qualities, owing, perhaps, to inveterate association having too
firmly established the contrary in his mind. Every one is willing
to admit that color, light, heat, perfume, taste, etc., are not qualities in the bodies which produce in us those effects, but simply
conditions of our sensibility, when placed in certain relations with
certain bodies. But few are willing to admit-indeed only philosophers (accustomed as they are to undo their constant associations) can conceive the primary qualities, viz. extension, solidity,
motion, and number, to be otherwise than real qualities of bodies
-copies of which are impressed upon us by the relation in which
we stand to the bodies. And yet these qualities are no less subjective than the former. They do not belong at all to bodies,
except as powers to produce in us the sensations. They are demonstrably as much the effects produced in us by objects, as the
secondary qualities are; and the latter every one admits to be
the effects, and not copies. Wherein lies the difference? wherein
the difficulty of conceiving primary qualities not to belong to
bodies? In this: the primary qualities are the invariable conditions of sensation. The secondary qualities are the variable conditions. We can have no perception of a body that is not extended, that is not solid (or the reverse), that is not simple or
complex (number), that is not in motion or rest. These are invariable conditions. But this body is not necessarily of any
particular color, taste, scent, heat, or smoothness; it may be color



ELEMENTS OF IDEALISM AND SKEPTICISM IN LOCKE.     529
less, tasteless, scentless. These secondary qualities are all variable. Consequently the one set, being invariable, have occasioned
indissoluble associations in our minds, so that it is not only impossible for us to imagine a body,. without at the same time imagining it as endowed with these primary qualities; but also we
are irresistibly led to believe that the bodies we perceive do certainly possess those qualities quite independently of us. Hence
it has been said that the Creator himself could not make a body
without extension: for such a body is impossible. The phrase
should be, "such a body it is impossible for us to conceive." But
our indissoluble associations are no standards of reality.
That we cannot conceive body without extension is true; but
that, because we cannot conceive it, the contrary must be false,
is preposterous. All our assertion in this matter can amount to
is, that knowledge must be subordinate to the conditions of our
nature. These conditions are not conditions of things, but of
our organizations. If we had been so constituted as that all
bodies should affect us with a sensible degree of warmth, we
should have been irresistibly led to conclude that warmth was a
quality inherent in body; but because warmth varies with different bodies and at different times, there is no indissoluble association formed. And so of the rest.
To return to Locke: he has very well stated the nature of
our knowledge of external things, though he excepts primary
qualities. "It is evident," he says, "that the bulk, figure, and
motion of several bodies about us, produce in us several sensations, as of colors, sounds, tastes, smells, pleasure and pain,
etc. These mechanical affections of bodies having no affinity at
all with those ideas they produce in us (there being no conceivable connection between any impulse of any sort of body
and any perception of a color or smell which we find in our
minds) we can have no distinct knowledge of such operations beyond our experience; and can reason about them no otherwise
than as the effects produced by an infinitely wise Agent, which
perfectly surpass our comprehensions."
23




530                     LOCKE.
He shortly after says, " The things that, as far as our observation reaches, we constantly find to proceed regularly, we may
conclude do act by a law set them; but yet by a law that we
know not: whereby, though causes work steadily, and effects
constantly flow from them, yet their connections and dependencies
being not discoverable in our ideas, we can have but an experimental knowledge of them."  Here we have Hume's doctrine of
Causation anticipated.
To prove the subjective nature of our knowledge is but one
step towards the great question. The second step, which it is
vulgarly supposed was only taken by Berkeley and Hume, was
also taken by Locke. Hear him: " Since the mind in all its
thoughts and reasonings hath no other immediate object but its
own ideas, which it alone does or can contemplate, it is evident
that our knowledge is only conversant about them. Knowledge,
then, seems to me nothing but the perception of the connection
and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy, of any one of
our ideas."
This is the great stronghold of Idealism  and Skepticism.
Locke foresaw the use which would be made of it; and he
stated the problem with remarkable precision. "It is evident
that the mind knows not things immediately, but only by the
intervention of ideas it has of them. Our knowledge therefore
is real, only so far as there is a conformity between our ideas and
the reality of things. But what shall be here the criterion?
How shall the mind, when it perceives nothing but its own ideas,
know that they agree with the things themselves?"
Thus has he stated the problem which was solved by Idealism
on the one hand, and by Skepticism on the other. Let us see
how he will solve it. There are two sorts of ideas, he says, the
simple and the complex; or, to use more modern language, perceptions and conceptions. The first "must necessarily be the
product of things operating on the mind in a natural way, and
producing those perceptions which by the wisdom and will of
our Maker they are ordained and adapted to. From whence it




ELEMENTS OF IDEALISM AND SKEPTICISM IN LOCKE. 531
follows that simple ideas are not fictions of our fancies, but the
natural and regular productions of things without us really operating upon us; and so carry with them all the conformity which
is intended, or which our state requires: for they represent
things to us under those appearances which they are fitted to
produce in us."
This leaves the question of Idealism unanswered, though it
cuts the Gordian knot of Skepticism. It is a plain and explicit
avowal of the subjectivity of our knowledge; of the impossibility of our ever transcending the sphere of our consciousness
and penetrating into the essences of things. Complex ideas
being made out of simple ideas, we need not examine their pretensions to infallibility. All human certainty is therefore only a
relative certainty. Ideas may be true for us, without being at
all true when considered absolutely. Such is Locke's position.
He stands upon a ledge of rock between two yawning abysses.
He will stand there, and proceed no further. Why should he
move when he knows that a single step will precipitate him
into some fathomless gulf? No; he is content with his ledge
of rock. " The notice we have by our senses," he says, "of the
existence of things without us, though it be not altogether so
certain as our intuitive knowledge or the deductions of our reason, employed about the clear, abstract ideas of our own minds;
yet it is an assurance that deserves the name of knowledge. If
we persuade ourselves that our faculties act and inform us right
concerning the existence of those objects that affect them, it
cannot pass for an ill-grounded confidence; for I think nobody
can in earnest be so skeptical as to be uncertain of the existence
of those which he sees and feels. At least he that can doubt
so far (whatever he may have with his own thoughts) will never
have any controversy with me, since he can never be sure I
say any thing contrary to his own opinions. As to myself, I
think God has given me assurance enough as to the existence of
things without me; since by their different application I can
produce in myself both pleasure and pain, which is one great




532                      LOCKE.
concernment of my present state. We cannot act by any thing
but our faculties; nor talk of knowledge but by the help of
those faculties which are fitted to apprehend even what knowledge is."
Again, anticipating the objection that " all we see, hear, feel,
and taste, think and do, during our whole being, is but the
series and deluding appearances of a long dream, and therefore
our knowledge of any thing be questioned; I must desire him to
consider that if all be a dream, then he doth but dream that
makes the question; and so it is not much matter that a waking
man should answer him. But yet, if he pleases, he may dream that
I make him this answer, That the certainty of things existing in
in rerum naturd, when we have the testimony of our senses for it.
is not only as great as our frame can attain to, but as our condition needs." This leaves Idealism unanswered; but it pronounces Skepticism to be frivolous: "for our faculties," he continues, "being not suited to the full extent of being, nor to a perfect, clear, comprehensive knowledge of things free from all doubt
and scruple, but to the preservation of us, in whom they are,
and accommodated to the use of life; they serve our purpose
well enough, if they will but give us certain notice of those
things which are convenient or inconvenient to us."
That this is very good common-sense every one will admit.
But it is no answer to Skepticism. Huume, as we shall see hereafter, proclaimed the very same opinions: but the difference between him and Locke was, that he knew such opinions had no
influence whatever upon the philosophical question, but simply
upon the practical affairs of life; whereas Locke, contenting
himself with the practical, disdained to answer the philosophical
question.*
We may sum up the contents of this Section by saying that
Locke distinctly enough foresaw the Idealistic and Skeptical
* Dr. Reid conjectures that "Locke had a glimpse of the system which
Berkeley afterwards advanced, though he thought proper to suppress it
within his own breast.'> Not to suppress, but to disdain it.




LOCKErS CRITICS.                533
arguments which might be drawn from his principles. He did not
draw them, because he thought them frivolous. Aware that all
human certitude could only be relative certitude-that human
knowledge could never embrace the nature of things, but only
the nature of their effects on us-he was content with that
amount of truth, and "sat down in quiet ignorance of those
things which are beyond the reach of our capacities." The
grand aim of the Essay was to prove that all knowledge is
founded on experience. That proved, he was aware that Experience never could be other than relative-it could only be our
Experience of things; and our Experience could be no absolute
standard; it could only be a standard for us.
~ VI. LOCKE'S CRITICS.
We cannot leave the great Englishman without adverting to
the tone adopted by many of his critics. This tone has been
any thing but considerate. The sincerest and least dogmatic of
thinkers has, for the most part, met with insincere and shallow
criticism.
That men should misrepresent Spinoza, Hobbes, or Hume, is
intelligible enough; men are frightened, and in their terror exaggerate and distort what they see. That they should misrepresent Kant, Fichte, or Hegel, is also intelligible; the remoteness of the speculations, and the difficulty of the language, are
sufficient excuses. But that they should misrepresent Locke is
wholly inexcusable. He was neither an audacious speculator,
nor a cloudy writer. His fault was that he spoke plainly and
honestly. He sought the truth; he did not wish to mystify any
one. He endeavored to explain the Chemistry of the Mind (if
the metaphor be permissible), renouncing the vague, futile
dreams of Alchemy. All those men who still seek to penetrate
impenetrable mysteries, and refuse to acknowledge the limits of
man's intelligence, treat Locke with the same superb disdain as
the ambitious alchemists treated the early chemists. The tone
in which most modern Frenchmen and Germans speak of Locke




534                       LOCKE.
is painful; the tone in which many Englishmen speak of him is
disgraceful. To point out any error is honorable; but to accuse him of errors which are not to be found in his work, to
interpret his language according to your views, and then accuse
him of inconsistency and superficiality; to speak of him with
superciliousness, as if he were some respectable but short-sighted
gentleman dabbling with philosophy, and not one of the great
benefactors of mankind, deserves the severest reprobation.*
There is no excuse for not understanding Locke. If his language be occasionally loose and wavering, his meaning is always
to be gathered from the context. He had not the lucidity of
Descartes or Hobbes; but he was most anxious to make himself
intelligible, and to this end he varied his expressions, and stated
his meaning in a variety of forms. He must not be taken literally. No single passage is to be relied on, unless it be also
borne out by the whole tenor of his speculations. Any person
merely " dipping into" the Essay, will find passages which seem
very contradictory; any person carefully reading it through will
find all clear and coherent.
The most considerable of Locke's modern critics is Victor
Cousin. He has undertaken an examination and refutation of
all Locke's important positions. The eminence of his name and
the popular style of his lectures have given great importance to
his criticism; but if we are to speak out our opinion frankly, we
must characterize this criticism as very unfair, and extremely
shallow. We cannot here examine his examination: a volume
would not suffice to expose all his errors. Let one example of
his unfairness, and one of his shallowness, suffice.
Speaking of the principle of reflection, he says: "In the first
place, remark that Locke here evidently confounds reflection
with consciousness. Reflection, strictly speaking, is doubtless a
faculty analogous to consciousness, but distinct fiom it, and which
* On this point, consult Dr. Vaughan's vigorous defence of Locke against
his critics in the Essays on History, Philosophy, etc.




LOCKE'S CRITICS.                535
more particularly belongs to philosophers, whereas consciousness
belongs to every man."
We answer, that in the first place, so far from its being evident that Locke confounds reflection with consciousness, his
whole Essay proves the contrary. In the second place, M.
Cousin, using the word reflection in a peculiar sense (viz. as tantamount to speculation), forces that sense upon Locke, and thus
makes the contradiction! If M. Cousin had interpreted Locke
fairly, he could never have thus "caught him on the hip."
It is quite true that in the passage quoted by M. Cousin, the
faculty of reflection is limited to the operations of the mind; but,
as we said, to pin Locke down to any one passage is unfair; and
his whole Essay proves, in spite of some ill-worded definitions,
that by reflection he meant very much what is usually meant by
it, viz. the activity of the mind in combining the materials it receives through sense, and becoming thus a source of ideas.
This leads us to the second example. M. Cousin wishing to
prove, against Locke, that we have ideas from some other source
besides sensation and reflection, instances the idea of space, and
examines how it was possible to obtain that idea through sensation and reflection. That the idea of pure space could not have
been obtained through the senses he seems to think is satisfactorily proved by proving that the idea has nothing sensuous in
it; that it could not have been obtained through reflection,
because it has nothing to do with the operations of our understanding, is equally evident to him. Hence, as both sources fail,
he pronounces Locke's account of the origin of our knowledge
"incomplete and vicious."
This argument, which extends to several pages, is deemed by
M. Cousin triumphant. Locke indeed says that "we get the idea
of space both by our sight and touch." Any honest inquirer
would never quibble upon this-would never suppose Locke
meant to say that space is a sensation. He would understand that
Locke meant to say, " the idea of space is an abstraction: the
primary materials are obtained through our touch and sight."




536                     LOCKE.
Locke did not anticipate any quibbling objection, so did not
guard against it; but in his explanation of our idea of substance
he has given an analogous case; although his antagonists have
also frequently objected that the idea of substance never could
have been obtained through sense. It has been thought an irresistible argument against Locke's theory: the very fact that we
have an idea of substance is supposed to be sufficient proof of
some other source of knowledge than sensation and reflection.
This is an example of how carelessly Locke has been read. He
expressly tells us, in more places than one, that the idea of substance (and by idea he does not here mean image, but a thought)
is an inference grounded upon our experience of external things.
True it is that we perceive nothing but phenomena, but our
minds are so constituted that we are forced to suppose these
phenomena have substances lying underneath them.
"If any one will examine himself," he says, " concerning his
notion of pure substance in general, he will find he has no other
idea of it at all, but only a supposition of he knows not what
support of such qualities which are capable of producing simple
ideas in us, which qualities are commonly called accidents. If
any one should be asked what is the subject wherein color or
weight inheres, he would have nothing to say but the solid extended parts; and if he were demanded what is it that solidity
and extension inhere in, he would not be in a much better case
than the Indian who, saying that the world was supported by a
great elephant, was asked what the elephant rested on, to which
his answer was, A great tortoise; but being again pressed to
know what gave support to the great broad-backed tortoise, replied, Something, he knew not what."
The same course of argument will apply to space. Space is
an idea suggested by place, which is surely one derived from the
senses; but M. Cousin declaims away at a great rate, and brings
forward many arguments and illustrations, all utterly trivial, to
show that the idea of space could never have been a sensation.
A little more attention in reading the author he attacks would




LOCKES CRITICS.                537
have saved him all this trouble. Locke never for an instant
supposed that the idea of space could have been a sensation: on
the fact that it could not, he grounds his position that the idea
is vague, and is a mere "supposition."
The German critics we may pass over in silence. The whole
tenor of their speculations unfits them for judging Locke. But
let us hear an Englishman, who is also an historian:-" We need
not spend much time in pointing out the inconsistencies into
which Locke fell," says Dr. Whewell, " as all must fall into inconsistencies who recognize no source of knowledge except the
senses." Let us remark, in the first place, that it is surely a
questionable procedure thus to pass over so great a man as
Locke, whose influence has been so general and lasting, and
whose "inconsistencies" it behooved Dr. Whewell, more than
most men, to refute, inasmuch as Locke's principles refute his
whole philosophy. Secondly, it is a misrepresentation to assert
Locke's having recognized " no source of knowledge except the
senses."  On reconsideration he must admit that Locke did
recognize another source. "Thus he maintains," continues Dr.
Whewell, "that our idea of space is derived from the senses of
sight and touch-our idea of solidity from the touch alone.
Our notion of substance is an unknown support of unknown
qualities, and is illustrated by the Indian fable of the tortoise
which supports the elephant which supports the world."
Space we have already considered in answering M. Cousin.
As to solidity, if the idea be not derived fiom the sensation, from
whence is it derived? And as to substance, we must here again
notice a misrepresentation of Locke, who does not define it as
" an unknown support of unknown qualities," but as an unknown
support of known qualities: from our knowledge of the qualities
we infer the existence of some substratum in which they inhere.
We are, with respect to substance, somewhat in the condition of
a blind man, who, whenever he moved in a certain direction,
should receive a blow from some revolving wheel. Although
unable to see the wheel, and so understand the cause of the pain
23 >




538                     LOCKE.
he received, he would not hesitate to attribute that cause to
something without him. All he could ever know, unassisted,
would be the fact of his being struck when he moved in a certain direction; he could have no other knowledge of the wheel,
yet he would be quite certain that there was something besides his
pain, and that unknown something would stand to him in a relation somewhat similar to that in which the unknown support
of known accidents of bodies stands to us. This is Locke's
meaning.
( Our notion of power or cause," continues the historian, "is
in like manner got from the senses; and yet, though these ideas
are thus mere fragments of our experience, Locke does not hesitate to ascribe to them necessity and universality when they
occur in propositions. Thus he maintains the necessary truth of
geometrical properties; he asserts that the resistance arising from
solidity is absolutely insurmountable; he conceives that nothing
short of Omnipotence can annihilate a particle of matter; and
he has no misgivings in arguing upon the axiom that every
thing must have a cause. He does not perceive that upon his
own account of the origin of our knowledge, we can have no
right to make any of these assertions. If our knowledge of the
truths which concern the external world were wholly derived
from experience, all that we could venture to say would be, that
geometrical properties of figures are true asfar as we have tried
them; that we have seen no example of a solid body being reduced to occupy less space by pressure, or of a material substance
annihilated by natural means; and that, wherever we have examined, we have found that every change has had a cause."
This is only one among many instances of Dr. Whewell's want
of accurate interpretation of Locke. The fallacy on which his
argument rests, we shall examine at some length when we come
to treat of Kant. Meanwhile let the following passage prove
that he has misconceived Locke, who certainly did not hesitate
to ascribe necessity and universality to certain ideas when they
"occur in propositions," but who very clearly explained the na



LOCKE'S CRITICS.                 539
ture of this necessity in a masterly passage: "There is one sort
of propositions concerning the existence of any thing answerable
to such an idea; as having the idea of an elephant, phoenix, motion, or angle, in my mind, the first and natural inquiry is,
whether such a thing does anywhere exist. And this knowledge
is only of particulars. No existence of any thing without us,
except God, can certainly be known further than our senses inform us.
" There is another sort of propositions, wherein is expressed
the agreement or disagreement of our abstract ideas and their
dependence on one another. Such propositions may be universal
and certain. So, having the idea of God and of myself, of fear
and obedience, I cannot but be sure that God is to be feared and
obeyed by me: and this proposition will be certain concerning
man in general, if I have made an abstract idea of such species
whereof I am one particular. But yet this proposition, how certain soever, that men ought to fear and obey God, proves not to
me the existence of men in the world, but will be true of all
such creatures wherever they do exist: which certainty of such
general propositions depends on the agreement or disagreement
to be discovered in those abstract ideas. In the former case our
knowledge is the consequence of the existence of things producing ideas in our minds by our senses; in the latter, knowledge is the consequence of the ideas (be they what they will)
that are in our minds producing their general certain propositions.
"Many of these are called ceternce veritates; and all of them
indeed are so; not from being written in the minds of all men,
or that they were any of them propositions in any one's mind
till he, having got the abstract ideas, joined or separated them
by affirmation or negation. But wheresoever we can suppose
such a creature as man is, endowed with such faculties, and
thereby furnished with such ideas as we have, we must conclude
he must needs, when he applies his thoughts to the consideration
of his ideas, know the truth of certain propositions that will arise




540                      LOCKE.
fiom the agreement or disagreement which he will perceive in
his own ideas. Such propositions therefore are called eternal
truths, not because they are eternal propositions actually formed
and antecedent to the understanding that makes them; nor because they are imprinted on the mind from any patterns that
are anywhere of them out of the mind and existed before; but
because being once made about abstract ideas so as to be true,
they will, whenever they can be supposed to be made again at
any time by a mind having those ideas, always actually be true."*
This passage is sufficient to exonerate him from the charge of
inconsistency; sufficient also, we believe, to show the error of
Dr. Whewell's own conception of the necessity of certain truths.
The foregoing are samples of the style in which the great master of Psychology is spoken of by his most modern critics. Let
them be sufficient warning to the reader of what he is to expect
from the partisans of the reaction against Locke, and his followers; and stimulate him to the careful study of that author who
" professes no more than to lay down, candidly and freely, his
own conjectures concerning a subject lying somewhat in the
dark, without any other design than an unbiased inquiry after
truth."
Book iv. ch. xi. ~~ 13, 14.




CHAPTER III.
LEIBNITZ.
LEIBNITZ was the first and last of Locke's great critics. He
had studied the Essay on the Human Understanding, though he
could not accept its principles. His arguments have formed the
staple of objection against Locke; and from him they come with
peculiar force, because they are parts of his system.
Leibnitz has a great reputation in philosophy and mathematics; but the nature of this work forbids our entering into any
detailed examination of his claims, inasmuch as he introduced no
new ideas, no new extension of old methods. All that can here
be done is to indicate the line of opposition which he took with
respect to Locke's theory of the origin of Knowledge.
At first he answered Locke in a few paragraphs of a somewhat
supercilious tone. He evidently looked upon the Essay as not
destined to achieve any influential reputation.*  This opinion he
lived to alter; and in his Nouveauzx Essais sur l'Entendement
Humain, he brought all his forces to bear upon the subject; he
grappled with the Essay, and disputed the ground with it inch
by inch. This remarkable work was not published till many
years after his death, and is not included in M. Dutens' edition.
Dugald Stewart was not aware of its existence; and this fact will
explain a passage in his Dissertation, where he says that Leibnitz always speaks coldly of Locke's Essay. Leibnitz does so in
his earlier works; but in the New Essays he treats his great adversary with due respect; and in the Preface, speaks of him with
eulogy. "The Essay concerning Human Understanding, writ* See Reflexioas sur l Essai de M. Locke, in the Recueil of Desmaizeaux,
vol. ii.




542                     LEIBNITZ.
ten by an illustrious Englishman, being one of the finest and
most esteemed works of our time, I have resolved to make some
comments on it.... Thus I shall procure a favorable introduction for my thoughts by placing them in such good company....It is true that I am often of a different opinion; but so far
from detracting on that account from the merit of this celebrated
writer, that I do him justice in making known in what and
wherefore I differ from him, when I judge it necessary to prevent his authority from prevailing over reason on some important
points. In fact, although the author of the Essay says a thousand things which I must applaud, yet our systems greatly differ.
His has greater affinity to that of Aristotle,-mine, to that of
Plato." This is the spirit in which the Homeric heroes regard
their adversaries; an interchange of admiration for each other's
prowess does not deaden one of their blows, but it makes the
combat more dignified.
Leibnitz belonged to the Cartesians; but he also mingled with
the doctrines of Descartes certain ideas which he had gathered
from his commerce with antiquity. Plato, and Democritus especially, influenced him. To a mind thus furnished, the doctrines
of Locke must needs have been unwelcome; indeed they could
not be expected to gain admission. Moreover, as F. Schlegel
well observed, every man is born either a Platonist or an Aristotelian." Leibnitz and Locke were examples of this antagonism: "Our differences," says Leibnitz, "are important. The
question between us is whether the soul in itself is entirely empty,
like tablets upon which nothing has been written (tabula rasa),
according to Aristotle and the author of the Essay; and whether
all that is there traced comes wholly from the senses and experience; or whether the soul originally contains the principles of
several notions and doctrines, which the external objects only
awaken on occasions, as I believe with Plato."
* Coleridge used to pass off this aphorism as his own. It is to be found
however in Schlegel's Geschichte der Literatur.




LEIBNITZ.                    543
The nature of the problem is well stated here; and Leibnitz
sides with Plato in his solution of it. The main arguments by
which he supports his view are those so often since repeated of
the Universality and Necessity of certain truths, and of the incapacity of experience to furnish us with any thing beyond a
knowledge of individual cases. " For if any event can be foreseen
before it has been tried, it is manifest that we contribute something for our own parts." Ergo, mere experience, it is argued,
does not constitute all our knowledge. "The senses, although
necessary for all actual knowledge, are not sufficient to give us all
of it; since the senses never can give but examples, that is to say
particular or individual truths. But all the examples which confirm a general truth, however numerous, do not suffice to establish
the universal necessity of that truth; for it does not follow that
that which has once occurred will always occur in the same way."
Leibnitz continues: " Whence it appears that necessary truths,
such as we find in mathematics, and particularly in arithmetic
and geometry, must have principles of which the proof does not
depend upon examples, nor consequently upon the senses, although without the senses one would never have thought of
them. So also logic, metaphysics, and morals are full of such
truths, and consequently their proofs can only come from those
internal principles which are called innate."
Locke would perfectly have agreed with these premises, but
the conclusion he would rightly have rejected. That the senses
alone could not furnish us with any general truth, he taught as
expressly as Leibnitz did; but this in no way affects his system,
for he did not build his system upon the senses alone.
Leibnitz however seems to have been misled by Locke's language in the first definition of Reflection; for he says, "Perhaps
the opinions of our able author are not so far from mine as
they appear to be. For after having employed the whole of his
first book against innate knowledge taken in a certain sense, he
acknowledges in the beginning of the second that there are
ideas which do not originate from the senses, but arise from Re



544                     LEIBNITZ.
flection. Now reflection is nothing but attention to that which
passes within us; and the senses do not convey to us what we
already possess within ourselves. Can it then be denied that
there is much innate in the mind."
The passage in italics is a curious instance of how the mind,
preoccupied with its own opinions, sees them reflected in the
expressions of others. Leibnitz here assumes the very point at
issue; assumes that the mind has innate ideas which the senses
cannot convey to it; and this assumption he supposes to be
contained in Locke's words. Locke taught precisely the contrary. "The mind is itself innate," continues Leibnitz-(to
which we reiterate our objection: innate in what?  In itself?
or in us? To say that it is innate in itself is a quibble; that it
is innate in us is a displacement of the question: no one ever
doubted that the mind of man was born in man-born with
man; the question was, Are there any ideas born with the
mind, or are all ideas acquired by the mind?)  "The mind is
itself innate, and there are included in it substance, duration,
change, action, perception, pleasure, and a thousand other objects of our intellectual ideas.... I have used the comparison
of a block of marble which has certain veins in it, rather than
a plain piece of marble such as the philosophers call tabula rasa;
because if the soul resembled tablets unwritten on, truths would
be in us like the figure of Hercules in the block of marble,
when that marble may receive indifferently one figure or another.
But if there are veins in the marble which mark the figure of
Hercules rather than any other figure, that marble would be
more determinate, and the figure of Hercules would in some
way be innate, although labor would be necessary to discover
the veins, and to free them from their envelopment of marble.
Thus are ideas and truths innate in us."
This is an ingenious statement of the theory: unfortunately
for it, the very existence of these veins in the marble is an assumption, and an assumption not made for the facilitating of
inquiry, but simply for the proof of the theory assumed; it is




LEIBNITZ.                   545
an hypothesis framed for the sake of explaining-what?-the
hypotheses itself! Ideas are first assumed to be innate; to
prove this assumption, another assumption-the existence of
innate ideas-is made; and the theory is complete.
The real force of Leibnitz's theory lies in his distinction between contingent and necessary truths, and in his position that
experience alone could never furnish us with necessary truths.
The examination of this we must delay till we come to Kant.
A brief view of the celebrated scheme of Pre-established Harmony will be all that is necessary to complete what we have
here to say of Leibnitz. It was in those days an axiom universally admitted that "Like could only act upon Like." The
question then arose: how does body act upon mind; how does
mind act upon body? The two were utterly unlike: how
could they act upon each other? In other words: h9w is Perception possible? All the ordinary explanations of Perception
were miserable failures. If the mind perceives copies of things,
how are these copies transmitted? Effluvia, eidola, images, motions
in spirits, etc., were not only hypotheses, but hypotheses which
bore no examination: they did not get rid of the difficulty of
two unlike substances acting upon each other.
Leibnitz borrowed this hypothesis from Spinoza-whom, by
the way, he always abuses: The human mind and the human
body are two independent but corresponding machines. They
are so adjusted that they are like two unconnected clocks constructed so that at the same instant one should strike the hour
and the other point it. "I cannot help coming to this notion,"
he says, " that God created the soul in such a manner at first,
that it should represent within itself all the simultaneous changes
in the body; and that he has made the body also in such a
manner as that it must of itself do what the soul wills: so that
the laws which make the thoughts of the soul follow each other
in regular succession, must produce images which shall be coincident with the impressions made by external objects upon our
organs of sense; while the laws by which the motions of the




546          SUMMARY OF THE THIRD EPOCH.
body follow each other are likewise so coincident with the
thoughts of the soul as to give to our volitions and actions the
very same appearance as if the latter were really the natural
and the necessary consequences of the former."*
This hypothesis has been much ridiculed by those unaware of
the difficulties it was framed to explain. It is so repugnant however to all ordinary views, that it gained few, if any, adherents.
CHAPTER IV.
SUMMARY OF THE THIRD EPOCH.
THE result of the speculations we have been considering-speculations begun by Gassendi and Hobbes, and further developed
by Locke-was to settle, for a long while, the dispute respecting
Experience, and to give therefore a new direction to inquiry.
It was considered as established,-lst. That we could have no
knowledge not derived from experience.  2d. That experience
was of two kinds, viz. of external objects and of internal operations; therefore there were two distinct sources-sensation and
reflection. 3d. That all knowledge could only consist in the
agreement or disagreement of our ideas. 4th. Finally, that we
could never know things in themselves, but only things as they
affect us; in other words, we could only know our ideas.
To this had Locke brought Philosophy. Rightly interpreted,
it was a denial of all Philosophy-a demonstration of its impossibility; but this interpretation Locke did not put upon his
doctripes. That remained for Hume. Locke's system produced
three distinct systems: Berkeley's Idealism, Hume's Skepticism,
and Condillac's Sensationalism.
* The best edition of Leibnitz's works is that by Erdmann-Leibnitii
Opera Philosophica: Berlin, 1839. The Nouveaux Essais are there for the
second time published (the first was in Raspe's edition, Leipzig, 1765); and
they have been since republished in a cheap and convenient form by M.
Jacques: Paris, 1845.




FOURTH EPOCH.
THE SUBJECTIVE NATURE OF KNOWLEDGE LEADS TO
IDEALISM.
CHAPTER I.
BERKELEY.
~ I. LIFE OF BERKELEY.
THERE are few men of whom England has better reason to be
proud than of George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne. To extraordinary merits as a writer and thinker, he united the most exquisite purity and generosity of character; and it is still a
moot-point whether he was greater in head or heart.
He was born on the 12th of March, 1684, at Kilkrin, in the
county of Kilkenny; and educated at Trinity College, Dublin,
where, in 1707, he was admitted as a Fellow. In 1709, he published his New Theory of Vision, which made an epoch in
Science; and the year after, his Principles of Human Knowledge,
which made an epoch in Metaphysics. After this he came to
London, where he was received with open arms. "Ancient
learning, exact science, polished society, modern literature, and
the fine arts, contributed to adorn and enrich the mind of this
accomplished man. All his contemporaries agreed with the
Satirist in ascribing' To Berkeley every virtue under heaven.'
Adverse factions and hostile wits concurred only in loving, admiring, and contributing to advance him. The severe sense of




548                    BERKELEY.
Swift endured his visions; the modest Addison endeavored to
reconcile Clarke to his ambitious speculations. His character
converted the satire of Pope into fervid praise. Even the discerning, fastidious, and turbulent Atterbury said, after an interview with him, So much learning, so much knowledge, so much
innocence, and such humility, I did not think had been the portion of any but angels, till I saw this gentleman.' "*
His acquaintance with the wits led to his contributing to the
Guardian. He became chaplain and afterwards secretary to the
Earl of Peterborough, whom he accompanied on his embassy to
Sicily. He subsequently, made the tour of Europe with Mr.
Ashe, and at Paris met Malebranche, with whom he had an animated discussion on the ideal theory. In 1724 he was made
Dean of Derry. This was worth eleven hundred pounds a year
to him; but he resigned it in order to dedicate his life to the
conversion of the North American savages, stipulating only with
the Government for a salary of one hundred pounds a year. On
this romantic and generous expedition he was accompanied by
his young wife. He set sail for Rhode Island, carrying with him
a valuable library of books, and the bulk of his property. But,
to the shame of the Government, be it said, the promises made
him were not fulfilled, and after seven years of single-handed
endeavor, he was forced to return to England, having spent the
greater part of his fortune in vain.
He was made Bishop of Cloyne in 1.734. When he wished
to resign, the King would not permit him; and being keenly
alive to the evils of non-residence, he made an arrangement before leaving Cloyne, whereby he settled ~200 a year, during his
absence, on the poor. In 1752, he removed to Oxford, where,
in 1753, he was suddenly seized, while reading, with palsy of the
heart, and died almost instantaneously.
Of his numerous writings we cannot here speak; two only
belong to our subject: the Principles of Knowledge, and the
* Sir J. Mackintosh.




LIFE OF BERKELEY.                549
Dialogues of Hylas and Philonous.' We hope to remove some
of the errors and prejudices with which his name is incrusted.
We hope to show that, even in what are called his wildest moods,
Berkeley was a plain, sincere, deep-thinking man, not a sophist,
playing with paradoxes to display his skill.
~ II. BERKELEY AND COMMON SENSE.
All the world has heard of Berkeley's Idealism; and innumerable "coxcombs " have vanquished it " with a grin."*  Ridicule
has not been sparing. Argument has not been wanting. Idealism has been laughed at, written at, talked at, shrieked at. That
it has been understood is not so apparent. In reading the criticisms upon his theory it is quite ludicrous to notice the constant
iteration of trivial objections, which, trivial as they are, Berkeley
had already anticipated. In fact the critics misunderstood him,
and then reproached him for inconsistency-inconsistency, not
with his principles, but with theirs. They forced a meaning upon
his words which he had expressly rejected; and then triumphed
over him because he did not pursue their principles to the extravagances which would have resulted from them.
When Berkeley denied the existence of matter, he meant by
"matter" that unknown substratum, the existence of which
Locke had declared to be a necessary inference from our knowledge of qualities, but the nature of which must ever be altogether
hidden from us. Philosophers had assumed the existence of
Substance, i. e. of a noumenon lying underneath all phenomenaa substratum supporting all qualities-a something in which all
accidents inhere. This unknown Substance, Berkeley rejects. It
is a mere abstraction, he says. If it is unknown, unknowable,
it is a figment, and I will none of it; for it is a figment worse
than useless; it is pernicious, as the basis of all atheism. If by
matter you understand that which is seen, felt, tasted, and touched, then I say matter exists: I am as firm a believer in its exist* "And coxcombs vanquish Berkeley with a grin."-Pope.




550                    BERKELEY.
ence as any one can be, and herein I agree with the vulgar. If,
on the contrary, you understand by matter that occult substratum
which is not seen, not felt, not tasted, and not touched-that of
which the senses do not, cannot, inform you-then I say I believe
not in the existence of matter, and herein I differ from the philosophers and agree with the vulgar.
" I am not for changing things into ideas," he says, " but rather
ideas into things; since those immediate objects of perception,
which, according to you (Berkeley might have said according to
all philosophers) are only appearances of things, I take to be the
real things themselves.
" Hylas. Things! you may pretend what you please; but it
is certain you leave us nothing but the empty forms of things,
the outside of which only strikes the senses.
" Philonous. What you call the empty forms and outside of
things seem to me the very things themselves.....  We both
therefore agree in this, that we perceive only sensible forms; but
herein we differ: you will have them to be empty appearances;
I, real beings. In short, you do not trust your senses; I do."
Berkeley is always accused of having propounded a theory
which contradicts the evidence of the senses. That a man who
thus disregards the senses must be out of his own, was a ready
answer; ridicule was not slow in retort; declamation gave itself
elbow-room, and exhibited itself in a triumphant attitude. It
was easy to declare that "the man who seriously entertains this
belief, though in other respects he may be a very good man, as
a man may be who believes he is made of glass; yet surely he
hath a soft place in his understanding, and hath been hurt by
much thinking."*
Unfortunately for the critics, Berkeley did not contradict the
evidence of the senses; did not propound a theory at variance
in this point with the ordinary belief of mankind. His peculiarity is, that he confined himself exclusively to the evidence of
* Reid, Inquiry.




BERKELEY AND COMMON SENSE.              551
the senses. What the senses informed him of, that, and that
only, would he accept. He held fast to the facts of consciousness; he placed himself resolutely in the centre of the instinctive
belief of mankind: there he took his stand, leaving to philosophers the region of supposition, inference, and of occult substances.
The reproach made to him is really the reproach he made to
philosophers, namely, that they would not trust to the evidence
of their senses; that over and above what the senses told them,
they imagined an occult something of which the senses gave no
indication. " Now it was against this metaphysical phantom of
the brain," says an acute critic, "this crotchet-world of philosophers, and against it alone, that all the attacks of Berkeley were
directed. The doctrine that the realities of things were not made
for man, and that he must rest satisfied with mere appearances,
was regarded, and rightly, by him, as the parent of skepticism
with all her desolating train. He saw, that philosophy, in giving
up the reality immediately within her grasp, in favor of a reality
supposed to be less delusive, which lay beyond the limits of experience, resembled the dog in the fable, who, carrying a piece
of meat across a river, let the substance slip from his jaws, whiles
with foolish greed he snatched at the shadow in the stream.
The dog lost his dinner, and philosophy let go her secure hold
upon truth. He therefore sided with the vulgar, who recognize
no distinction between the reality and the appearance of objects,
and, repudiating the baseless hypothesis of a world existing unknown and unperceived, he resolutely maintained that what are
called the sensible shows of things are in truth the very things
themselves."*
True it is that, owing to the ambiguities of language, Berkeley's theory does seem to run counter to the ordinary belief of
mankind, because by Matter men commonly understand the
* Blackwood's Mag., June, 1842, p. 814, art. Berkeley and Idealism: understood to have been written by Professor Ferrier.




552                    BERKELEY.
Seen, the Tasted, the Touched, etc.; therefore when the existence of matter is denied, people naturally suppose that the existence of the Seen, the Tasted, and the Touched is denied, never
suspecting that Matter, in its philosophical sense, is the not seen,
not tasted, not touched. Berkeley has not,'it must be confessed,
sufficiently guarded against-all ambiguity. Thus he says in one
of the opening sections of his Principles of Human Knowledge,
that " it is indeed an opinion strangely prevailing amongst men
that houses, mountains, rivers, and, in a word, all sensible objects,
have an existence, natural or real, distinct from their being perceived by the understanding." This is striking a false keynote. It rouses the reader to oppose a coming paradox. Yet
Berkeley foresaw and answered the objections which Wimpey,
Beattie, Reid, and others brought forward. He was not giving
utterance to a caprice; he was not spinning an ingenious
theory, knowing all the while that it was no more than an ingenuity. He was an earnest thinker, patient in the search after truth.
Anxious therefore that his speculations should not be regarded
as mere dialectical displays, he endeavored on various occasions
to guard himself from misapprehension.
"I do not argue against the existence of any one thing that
we can apprehend either by sensation or reflection. That the
things I see with my eyes and touch with my hands do exist,
really exist, I make not the least question. The only thing
whose existence I deny is that which philosophers call Matter, or
corporeal substance. And in doing this there is no damage
done to the rest of mankind, who, I dare say, will never miss
it....
" If any man thinks we detract from the reality or existence of
things, he is very far from understanding what has been premised in the plainest terms I could think of.... It will be
urged that thus much at least is true, viz. that we take away all
corporeal substances. To this my answer is, that if the word
substance be taken in the vulgar sense for a combination of sensible qualities, such as extension, solidity, weight, etc., this we




BERKELEY AND COMMON SENSE.                  553
cannot be accused of taking avay.* But if it be taken in the
philosophic sense, for the support of accidents or qualities
without the mind; then, indeed, I acknowledge that we take it
away, if one may be said to take away that which never had
any existence, not even in the imagination.t But say what we
can, some perhaps may be apt to reply, he will still believe his
senses, and never suffer any arguments, however plausible, to
prevail over the certainty of them. Be it so: assert the evidence of sense as high as you please, we are willing to do the
same.   That what I see, hear, and feel, doth exist, i.e. is perceived by me, I no more doubt than I do of my own being; but
I do not see how the testimony of sense can be alleged as a proof
of any thing which is not perceived by sense.":
After reading these passages (and more of a similar cast
might be quoted), in what terms shall we speak of the works
written to refute Idealism? Where was the acuteness of the
Reids and Beatties, when they tauntingly asked why Berkeley
did not run his head against a post, did not walk over precipices, etc., as, in accordance with his theory, no pain, no broken
limbs could result?~ Where was philosophical acumen, when
writers could imagine they refuted Berkeley by an appeal to
common sense-when they contrasted the instinctive beliefs of
mankind with the speculative paradoxes of a philosopher, who
* An answer to Dr. Johnson's peremptory refutation of Berkeley, viz.
kicking a stone; as if Berkeley ever denied that what we call stones existed I
t This is not well said. That substance was imagined to exist (as a supportof accidents) Berkeley's argument supposes: it is against such an imaginary existence he directs his attacks. Perhaps he means that no image of
substance could be formed in the mind; which no one disputes.. Principles of Human Knowledge, sections 35, 86, 37, 40.
~ "But what is the consequence? I resolve not to believe my senses? I
break my head against a post that comes in my way; I step into a dirty
kennel; and after twenty such wise and rational actions I am taken up and
clapt into a madhouse. Now I confess I had rather make one of those credulous fools whom nature imposes upon, than of those wise and rational philosophers who resolve to withhold assent at all this expense."-Reid's
Inquiry, ch. 4, ~ 20. This one passage is as good as a hundred.
24




554:                   BERKELEY.
expressly took his stand beside common sense against philosophers?
Men trained in metaphysical speculations may find it difficult
to conceive the non-existence of an invisible unknowable substratum; but that the bulk of mankind find it almost impossible
to conceive any such substratum, is a fact which the slightest
inquiry will verify. We remember a discussion which lasted an
entire evening, in which by no power of illustration, by no force
of argument, could the idea of this substance, apart from its
sensible qualities, be rendered conceivable to our antagonist.
Berkeley therefore, in denying the existence of matter, sided
with common sense. He thought, with the vulgar, that matter
was that of which his senses informed him; not an occult something of which he could have no information. The table he
saw before him certainly existed: it was hard, polished, colored,
of a certain figure, and cost some guineas. But there was no
phantom table lying underneath the apparent table-there was
no invisible substance supporting that table. What he perceived was a table, and nothing more; what he perceived it to
be, he would believe it to be, and nothing more. His startingpoint was thus what the plain dictates of his senses, and the
senses of all men, furnished.
~ III. IDEALISM.
The first step which a philosopher takes in any inquiry is a
departure from Common Sense. Reflecting upon what his
senses convey to him, he seeks an explanation of phenomena:
and it is in proportion to the care with which he analyzes the
facts to be explained, that he is usually supposed to be free
from the mere extravagances of speculation. And yet Berkeley's rigorous analysis of the facts of consciousness has obtained
for him the reputation of being one of the most extravagant of
speculators!
This is the problem: our senses inform us of the existence of




IDEALISM.                     555
certain sensible qualities, such as extension, color, solidity, etc.
But our reason tells us that these qualities must be qualities of
something: they cannot exist as mere extension, color, etc.:
there must be something extended, colored, etc. What is that
something? The solution given by the philosophers was uniformly this: what that substance is we can never know, because
it lies beyond our apprehension; but we are forced to admit it,
as a support to the qualities which we do apprehend, as a substance in which sensible qualities inhere. So that, deeply considered, the only reason for inferring the existence of Matter is
the necessity for some synthesis of attributes.
Now, what did Berkeley? With very subtle perception of
the difficulties of the problem, he boldly solved it by making the
synthesis a mental one. Thus was matter wholly got rid of; it
had no longer the excuse of being an inference.
The nature of human knowledge is the first objeet of his inquiry. " It is said that the faculties we have are few, and those
designed by nature for the support and pleasure of life, and not
to penetrate into the inward essence and constitution of things.
Besides, the mind of man, being finite, when it treats of things
which partake of infinity, it is not to be wondered at if it run
into absurdities and contradictions, out of which it is impossible
it should ever extricate itself, it being of the nature of infinite
not to be comprehended by that which is finite."
This is plainly enough launched at Locke; but the worthy
Bishop has no such disposition " to sit down in quiet ignorance."
He suspects that "we may be too partial in placing the fault
originally in our faculties, and not rather in the wrong use we
make of them." He believes that God is too bountiful not to have
placed knowledge within our reach, of which he has given us the
desire. Berkeley here forgets the lesson man was taught in Paradise, where the Tree of Knowledge was placed within his reach,
but the fruits thereof forbidden him. " Upon the whole," continues Berkeley, "I am inclined to think that the far greater
part, if not all the difficulties which have hitherto amused philoso



556                    BERKELEY.
phers and blocked up the way to knowledge, are entirely owing
to themselves. That we have first raised a dust, and then complain we cannot see."
The pretension on which all philosophy is founded is here
openly proclaimed. The consequences of Locke's doctrine are
rejected; the premises are retained. Berkeley's account of the
origin of knowledge is the same as Locke's, only somewhat
more explicitly defined. " It is evident to any one who takes a
survey of the objects of human knowledge that they are either
ideas actually imprinted on the senses, or else such as are perceived by attending to the passions and operations of the mind;
or, lastly, ideas formed by help of memory and imagination,
either compounding, dividing, or barely representing those originally perceived in the aforesaid ways."
Remark, firstly, that the objects of knowledge are said to be
ideas. This has a paradoxical air to those unaccustomed to
metaphysics, yet it is the simple expression of the facts of consciousness. All that the mind can be conversant about is obviously its ideas: we are conscious of nothing but the changes
that take place in our minds. Whether these ideas are the
copies or representatives of any things-whether changes in our
state are to be attributed to any external cause: this is a question
of philosophy, a question which common sense makes no scruple of
begging. You see before you a flower, and you assume that an
external thing resembling that flower exists, and that your sensation is produced by it, as a reflection in a mirror is produced by
an object out of the mirror. But dive deeper into consciousness;
interrogate yourself, and you will find that the comparison of the
mirror is an assumption made only to explain the facts of consciousness, not given in those facts. Moreover, granting the assumption, you will then make the mind immediately conversant
with its ideas only; for assuming that objects reflect themselves
in the mirror, the mirror- tself knows only the reflections: these
it knows immediately; the objects it knows mediately, i.e.
through the reflections. Thus is Berkeley keeping rigorously to




IDEALISM.                    557
the facts of consciousness when he says that the " objects of
knowledge are ideas."
Secondly, remark on Berkeley's use of the word idea, which
stands both for sensation and idea. We cannot but regard this
confusion of language as the cause of no little misapprehension
of his doctrines. It is well therefore to warn the reader thereof.
Now to consequences. "That neither our thoughts, nor passions, nor the ideas formed by our imagination, exist without the
mind, is what everybody will allow; and to me it is no less evident that the various sensations or ideas imprinted on the sense,
however blended or combined together (that is, whatever objects
they compose), cannot exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving
them.... The table I write on, I say exists, i. e. I see it and feel it,
and if I were out of my study I should say it existed; meaning
thereby that if I was in my study I might perceive it, or that
some other spirit actually does perceive it. As to what is said
about the existence of unthinking things, without any relation to
their being perceived, that is to me perfectly unintelligible.
Their esse is percipi; nor is it possible they should have any
existence out of the minds or thinking things which perceive
them."
It is in this last paragraph that the kernel of his system lies.
He had identified objects with ideas: having done so, it was easy
to prove that objects could not exist without a perceiving mind
in which to exist as ideas. "For what are the objects but the
things which we perceive by sense?" Realism assents: objects
are what we perceive. "And what, I pray you," continues
Berkeley, "do we perceive besides our own ideas or sensations v"
Realism hesitates; certainly the mirror has nothing immediately
present to it, besides the reflections. "And is it not plainly repugnant," triumphantly continues Idealism, "that any one of
these ideas, or any combination of them, should exist unperceived?"  Reaism has no answer to offer. It is in a dilemma
from which there is apparently no escape.
The supposition of the existence of matter is founded on the




558                     BERKELEY.
doctrine of abstract ideas (against which Berkeley wages war).
"For can there be a nicer strain of abstraction than to distinguish the existence of sensible objects from their being perceived,
so as to conceive them existing unperceived? Light and colors,
heat and cold, extension and figures-in a word, the things we
see and feel-what are they but so many sensations, notions,
ideas, or impressions on the sense; and is it not impossible to
separate, even in thought, any of these from perception? For my
part, I might as easily divide a thing from itself. I may indeeddivide in my thoughts, or conceive apart from each other, those
things which perhaps I never perceived by sense so divided.
Thus I imagine the trunk of the human body without the limbs,
or conceive the smell of a rose without thinking of the rose itself.
So far I will not deny that I can abstract, if that be properly
called abstraction which extends only to the conceiving separately such objects as it is impossible may really exist, or be actually perceived asunder; but my conceiving or imagining power
does not extend beyond the possibility of real existence or perception. Hence, as it is impossible for me to see or feel any
thing without an actual sensation of that thing, so it is impossible for me to conceive in my thoughts any sensible thing or object distinct from the sensation or perception of it. In truth, the
object and the sensation are the same thing, and cannot therefore be abstracted from one another....
"In a word, all the choir of heaven and furniture of earthall those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the worldhave not any subsistence without a mind: their esse is to be perceived or known; and consequently, so long as they are not actually perceived by me, or do not exist in my mind, or that of
any other created spirit, they must either have no existence at
all, or else subsist in the mind of some eternal spirit...
"Though we hold indeed the objects of sense to be nothing
else but ideas which cannot exist unperceived, fet we may not
hence conclude they have no existence except only while they
are perceived by us, since there may be some other spirit that




IDEALISM.                    559
perceives them, though we do not. Whenever bodies are said to
have no existence without the mind, I would not be understood to
mean this or that particular mind, but all-minds whatsoever. It
does not therefore follow that bodies are annihilated and created
every moment, or exist not at all during the intervals between
our perception of them....
"I am content to put the whole upon this issue: if you can
but conceive it possible for one extended movable substance, or
in general for any one idea, or any thing like an idea, to exist
otherwise than in a mind perceiving it, I shall readily give up
the cause; I shall grant you its existence, though you cannot
either give me a reason why you believe it exists, or assign any
use to it when it is supposed to exist. I say the bare possibility
of your opinion being true, shall pass for an argument that it
is so.
" But, say you, surely there is nothing easier than for me to
imagine trees in a park, or books in a closet, and nobody by to
perceive them. I answer, you may so: there is no difficulty in
it. But what is all this, I beseech you, more than framing in
your mind certain ideas which you call books and trees, and at
the same time omitting to frame the idea of any one perceiving
them?
"But do not you yourself perceive or think of them all the
while? This therefore is nothing to the purpose: it only shows
you have the power of imagining or framing ideas in your mind,
but it does not show that you can conceive it possible the objects
of your thought may exist without the mind. To make out this,
it is necessary that you conceive them existing unperceived or
unthought of, which is a manifest repugnancy. When we do
our utmost to conceive the existence of external bodies, we are all
the while only contemplating our own ideas."*
The last very remarkable passage must have been overlooked
* The foregoing passages are all taken from the Principles of Human
Knowledge, sections 5, 6, 6, 22 and 23.




560                     BERKELEY.
by the critic before mentioned, otherwise he would not have said
that the "knot which Berkeley loosened, but which he certainly
di4d not explicitly untie," was to be resolved, for the first time,
by the arguments he there brings forward. Berkeley had untied
the knot, explicitly, satisfactorily; and that too in the same way
as his critic.*
The distinction between primary and secondary qualities,
Berkeley easily refutes, and shows that the same arguments
which make the secondary qualities to be only affections of the
mind may be applied to the primary qualities.
Having battered down almost every objection, trivial or serious, that could be offered, Idealism iterates its fundamental principle:-All our knowledge of objects is a knowledge of ideas;
objects and ideas are the same. Ergo, nothing exists but what
is perceived.
Realism espies a loophole. These ideas, with which we admit
the mind to be solely conversant, are but the ideas (images) of
certain things: these things exist independently of being perceived, though their ideas cannot. Berkeley foresaw this also.
"But, say you, though the ideas themselves do not exist without
the mind, yet there may be things like them whereof they are
copies or resemblances, which things exist without the mind in
an unthinking substance. I answer, an idea can be like nothing
but an idea; a color or figure can be like nothing but another
color or figure. Again, I ask whether those supposed originals
or external things, of which our ideas are the pictures or representations, be themselves perceivable or no? If they are, then
they are ideas, and we have gained our point; but if you say
they are not, I appeal to any one whether it be sense to assert a
color is like something which is invisible; hard or soft, like something which is intangible?" (Sect. 8.)
Realism is without a shadow of an answer. The philosophers
are powerless against a theory so defended. No wonder that
* See the article in Blackwood, p. 817, et seq.




IDEALISM.                    561
Idealism should have been pronounced irrefutable; the weapons
were not forged, or, at any rate, were not in the armory of philosophy, which could successfully assail a fortress built on such a
position. Dr. Reid's attempt we shall examine by and by.
As far as the simple facts of Consciousness extend, the analysis
given by Berkeley is unimpeachable, unless we deny that Consciousness is immediately affected by sensations, and assert that
it is immediately affected by external objects; but no metaphysician ever took up this position, for it would lead him to maintain
that Consciousness is nothing but these very sensations, which
are produced in the organism by the action of external influences; and this would be getting rid of the substratum  Mind,
in order to rescue the substratum Matter. No metaphysician
therefore ever did or could, logically, object to Berkeley's fundamental position; but only tried to elude it, or make it open into
other issues.
Given, however, the facts, there comes the question of inferences. It has been well said by Mr. Herbert Spencer that the
denial of an external world " consists of a series of dependent
propositions, no one of which possesses greater certainty than
the single proposition to be disproved "* If the grounds of our
belief in an external world are questionable, what better grounds
have we for the belief that the external world is a mere subjective phenomenon?
We are to settle whether it is a more plausible hypothesis that
ideas are proximately produced in f by the mere Will of the
Creator, whose will is effectuated by certain laws; or whether the
ideas are proximately produced in us by external objects, which
exist quite independently of,. This question, remember, is one
which admits of no proof. It is not a question of fact, but of
plausibility. It is not to be decided by common sense, but by
analogical reasoning. Our knowledge extends no further than
our ideas. Our inferences can be nothing more than inferences.
* Prniiples of Psychology, p. 36,
2A:,','




562                     BERKELEY.
Berkeley has far better reasons for his inference than his critics
imagine. He could not see the force of the argument which
made Matter a necessary postulate. That we could have sensations and ideas without the presence of objects, is manifest from
the fact that we do often have them so, in dreams and frenzies.
If, therefore, matter is not always necessary for the production
of ideas-if ideas can be sometimes produced without the presence of external objects-the pretended necessity, which alone
forms the argument for the existence of matter, is done away with.
"But though," he says, " we might possibly have all our sensations without bodies, yet perhaps it may be thought easier to
conceive and explain the manner of their production by supposing external bodies in their likeness rather than otherwise, and
so it might at least be probable there are such things as bodies.
that excite ideas in our minds. But neither can this be said, for,
though we give the Materialists their external bodies, they, by,
their own confession, are never nearer the knowing how our ideas.
are produced, since they own themselves unable to comprehend'
in what manner body can act upon spirit, or how it is possible it
should imprint an idea in the mind."
We have here the difficulty stated, which most Dualists
(those who maintain the existence of spirit and matter as distinct substances) have not been sufficiently alive to; and one
which gave rise to Leibnitz's theory of pre-established harmony,
and to Malebranche's theory of our seeing all things in God.
This difficulty is indeed insuperable. It is easy to talk of the
spirit being a mirror in which. the universe reflects itself. Try
for an instant to imagine a substance, such as matter, reflecting
itself in, or acting upon, another substance having no one property in common with it. You cannot. Nor is this all: you
cannot even imagine two substances so distinct as matter and
spirit are defined to be.
Berkeley then is right in triumphing over Realism and Dual
ism. Right in saying, that if he were to accord them the existence of matter, they could make no use of it. The subject would




IDEALISM.                    563
remain as dark as before: matter throws no light on it. He
maintains that our ideas are produced in us in conformity with
the laws of Nature. These laws have been ordained by God.
To suppose that matter is the mere occasional cause-the vehicle
through which the laws of Nature operate-is gratuitous. The
agency of the Creator is more simple and direct. He had no
need of creating first laws, and afterwards matter, through which
these laws should come into effect. He created the laws alone;
they act upon us as they were destined to act, and without the
superfluous aid of matter, which is a mere go-between.
Now, as an inference-as a scientific hypothesis-few thoroughly acquainted with the question, and with the data on which
it was founded, can, we think, deny that this of Berkeley is many
degrees superior to the hypothesis of Dualism. While philosophers teach that there are two distinct eternal substances, which
they name Spirit and Matter, Berkeley teaches that there is only
one substance, viz. Spirit. With this one substance he can construct the world. According, therefore, to the fundamental rule
in philosophy, that "Entities or existences are not to be multiplied unless upon necessity" (entia non sunt multiplicanda prceter necessitatem), the introduction of a second substance, viz.
matter, is superfluous, or worse. Of the existence of matter we
have no proof whatever: it is a mere inference; it is inferred,
in order to explain the phenomena: and what phenomena?
those of perception-i. e. the phenomena of the thinking substance.
If, then, Berkeley is more rigorous in his analysis of facts, and
more ingenious and plausible in his hypothesis, than his antagonists suppose, shall we pronounce his Idealism satisfactory and
true?
Hume said of it, that it admitted of no answer, but produced
no conviction. And we have met with no final refutation of it.
Yet, inasmuch as it is the irresistible belief of mankind that objects are not dependent either upon our perception of them, or
upon the perception of any other mind, for their existence-that




564                      BERKELEY.
objects exist per se, and would continue to exist if all minds were
annihilated-Berkeley's theory never can produce conviction.
Reid, therefore, was right in standing by this universal and irresistible belief. He was egregiously wrong, however, in supposing
that he answered Berkeley by an appeal to this irresistible belief.
It does not follow that a belief which is irresistible must be true.
This maxim, so loudly proclaimed by the Scotch school,* is refuted by several well-known facts in philosophy.  Thus-to take
the most striking example-the belief that the sun revolved round
the earth, was for many centuries irresistible, and false. Why may
not Berkeley have been a metaphysical Copernicus, who, by rigorous demonstration, proved the believe of mankind in the existence of matter to be irresistible and false?  Reid has no answer
to give.  He can merely say, "I side with the vulgar;" but he
might have given the same answer to Copernicus. Many illustrious men (Bacon among them) ridiculed the Copernican theory;
but all the dogmatism, ridicule, and common sense in the world
could not affect that theory. Why, we repeat, may not Berkeley
have been a metaphysical Copernicus?
To prove that he was not, you must prove his reasoning defective; to prove this, you must show wherein his error lies, and
not wherein his theory is at variance with your belief. All that
your irresistible belief amounts to, is that of a strong, a very
strong, presumption against the truth of that which opposes it.
Reid, in accepting this presumption as a proof, was in the right
so long as Berkeley's reasoning was not strong enough to over* Especially by Dr. Brown, who says that the " skeptical argument for the
non-existence of an external world, as a mere play of reasoning, admits of
no reply." The only reply he makes is, that the belief is irresistible. Hume
had already admitted that the belief was irresistible; the whole scope of his
philosophy was to prove it both irresistible andfalse. How absurd, then, to
appeal to the belief! Kant truly observes, in the Preface to his Iiitik, "' Admitting Idealism to be as dangerous as it really is, it would still remain a
shame to philosophy and reason to be forced to ground the existence of an
external world. on the (mere) evidence of belief." The more so as the fact
of belief had never been questioned. The question was, Is the belief well
grounded?




IDEALISM.                     565
come it; but singularly wrong in supposing that the presumption
was a refutation.
Berkeley's main position is, that the objects of knowledge are
ideas, and nothing but ideas. The position is incontrovertible.
The conclusion therefore, all human knowledge can only be the
knowledge of ideas, and of nothing but ideas, is equally incontestable. Not less so the second conclusion: objects being identified
with ideas, and we having no idea of an object but as it is perceived, the ESSE of objects to us is PERCIPI.
In admitting all this, what do we admit? Simply that human
knowledge is not the " measure of all things." Objects to us can
never be more than ideas; but are we the final measure of all
existence? It was the dogma of the Sophist that Man is the
measure of all things. It should not be the dogma of the sober
thinker. Because we can only know objects as ideas, is it a
proper conclusion that objects only exist as ideas?  For this
conclusion to be rigorous, we must have some proof of our knowledge being the absolute standard of truth, instead of the standard of the relation things bear to our intellect.
The Idealist will say, " If you cannot know any thing beyond
your ideas, why do you infer that there is any thing?-A question not easily answered. He will moreover say, "I defy you
to conceive any thing existing unperceived. Attempt to imagine
the existence of matter when mind is absent. You cannot, for
in the very act of imagining it, you include an ideal percipient.
The trees and mountains you imagine to exist away from any
perceiving mind, what are they but the-very ideas of your mind,.
which you transport to some place where you are not? In fact,
to separate existence from perception is radically impossible. It
is God's synthesis, and man cannot undo it."*
To this we answer, it is very true that, inasmuch as our knowledge of objects is identical with our ideas, we can never, by any
* See this argued in a masterly manner by the critic in Blackwood before
quoted.




566                      BERKELEY.
freak of thought, imagine an object apart from  the conditions
under which we know it. We are forced by the laws of our nature to invest objects with the forms in which we perceive them.*
We cannot therefore conceive any thing which has not been
subject to the laws of our nature, because in the very act of conception those laws come into play. But is it not a very different proposition to say, "I cannot conceive things otherwise than
according to the laws of my nature," and to say, "I cannot conceive things otherwise, consequently they cannot exist otherwise?"
The Idealist here assumes that knowledge is absolute, not relative-that man is the measure of all things.
Perception is the identity (in the metaphysical sense of the
word) of the ego and the non-ego-the tertium quid of two united forces; as water is the identity of oxygen and hydrogen.
The ego can never have any knowledge of the non-ego, in which
it (the ego) is not indissolubly bound up; as oxygen never can
unite with hydrogen to form water, without merging itself and
the hydrogen in a tertium quid. Let us suppose the oxygen
endowed with a consciousness of its changes. It would attribute
the change not to hydrogen, which is necessarily hidden from it,
but to water, the only form under which hydrogen is known to
it. In its consciousness it would find the state named water (perception), which would be very unlike its own state (the ego);
and it would suppose that this state, so unlike its own, was a representation of that which caused it. We say then, that although
the hydrogen can only exist for the oxygen (in the above case)
in the identity of both as water, this is no proof that hydrogen
* "When in perception," says Schelling, "I represent an object, oj'ect
and representation are one and the same. And simply in this our inability to
discriminate the object from the representation during the act, lies the conviction which the common sense of manjTd has of the reality of external
things, although these become' know  to it only through the representations." (Ideen zu einer Philos. dher.tur, Einleitung, p. xix., quoted by Sir
W. Hamilton.) This is indisputable, bpt it is only saying that our knowledge of things is subject to the conditions of knowledge. Because we cannot
discriminate between the object and the representation, it is no proof that
there is no distinction between them.




IDEALISM.                    567
does not exist under some other relations to other forces. In like
manner, although the non-ego cannot exist in relation to mind
otherwise than in the identity of the two (perception); this is
no sort of proof that it does not exist in relation to other beings
under quite different conditions.
In conclusion, we admit, with the Idealists, that all our knowledge of objects consists in our ideas. But we cannot admit that
all existence is limited by our knowledge, merely on the ground
that when we would conceive any thing existing, we are forced
to conceive it in accordance with the laws of our conceptive faculties. We admit, with the Idealists, that all our knowledge is
subjective. But we do not admit that what is true subjectively, is
true objectively. We believe in the existence of an external
world quite independent of any percipient; not because such is
the obvious and universal belief, but because the arguments by
which Idealism would controvert it are vitiated by the assumption of knowledge being a criterion of all existences. Idealism
agrees with Realism in placing reliance on the evidence of sense;
it argues however that inasmuch as our knowledge is confined to
ideas, we have no right to assume any thing beyond ideas. Yet
it also is forced to assume something as the cause of ideas: this
cause it calls the Will of the Creator; and this is an assumption.
The real dispute therefore should be concentrated on this point:
Which assumption is more consonant with our irresistible belief,
-the assumption of an external matter unlike our sensations,
yet the cause of them; or the assumption of a providential
scheme, in which our sensations are the effects of the operation
of Divine laws, and in which matter plays no part? The answer
cannot be dubious. The former assumption, as more consonant
with universal belief, must be accepted.
Berkeley, we believe, failed as a metaphysical Copernicus, because the assumption which he opposed to the universal belief
was less consonant with that belief than the assumption it was
meant to replace. Iad Copernicus not started an hypothesis
which, however contradictory to the senses, nevertheless afforded




568                    BERKELEY.
a much better explanation of celestial phenomena than was possible on the old hypothesis, he would not have been listened to.
Berkeley's assumption, if conceded, carries him no deeper than
the old assumption. Idealism explains nothing. To accept it
would be to renounce a universal belief for a mere hypothesis.
But that Berkeley was a deep and remarkable thinker must be
readily conceded; and he failed, as the greatest Philosophers of
all times have failed, not because he was weak, but because Philosophy was impossible.
Those who have followed the course of this History with attention to its moral (so to speak) will not fail to observe how
Berkeley's Idealism is at bottom but the much decried system of
Spinoza, who taught that there was but one essence in the universe, and that one was Substance. Berkeley also taught that
there was but one, and that one was Thought. Now call this
One what you will, the result is the same: speculatively or practically. You may have certain degrading associations attached
to the idea of substance; or certain exalted associations attached
to that of spirit. But what difference can your associations make
with respect to the real nature of things?
One great result of Berkeley's labors was the lesson he taught
of the vanity of ontological speculations. He paved the way to
that skepticism which, gulf-like, yawns as the terminal road of
all consistent Metaphysics.




FIFTH EPOCH.
THE ARGUMENTS OF IDEALISM CARRIED OUT INTO
SKEPTICISM.
CHAPTER I.
HUME.
~ I. LIFE OF IIUME.
MR. BURTON'S ample and excellent biography* would furnish
us with materials for a pleasant memoir, could we here afford
the requisite space; but we must content ourselves with referring the reader to that work, and with merely recording the
principal dates and events of an uneventful life.
David Hume was born at Edinburgh, 26th April, 1711; the
youngest child of a poor laird of good blood. He was an orphan
before his education was completed. His guardians first thought
of the profession of law, but, owing to his repugnance, he was
absolved from that career, and was placed in a Bristol countinghouse, where he did not remain long. On coming of age he
found himself in possession of a small property, too small for
honorable subsistence in England, but large enough for France,
and to Rheims he went; from thence to La Fleche, where the
Jesuits' college and library were great attractions to the studious
youth; and there he passed several years in solitary study.
* The Life and Correspondence of David Hume, from the Papers bequeathed
to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. By John Hill Burton. 2 vols.




570                      HUME.
A great ambition moved him: he was to accomplish for moral
science a revolution analogous to that which Bacon had effected
in physical science. His Treatise on Human Nature, which appeared in 1737, and which fell still-born from the press, was announced as an attempt to introduce the experimental method
into reasonings on moral science. We need scarcely point out
the profound misconception of the Experimental Method here
implied; nor is it necessary to show at any length that there
was no novelty whatever in Hume's attempt to test psychology
by experience.
In 1741 appeared the first part of his immortal Essays; and
in 1747 he accompanied General St. Clair, as secretary, in the
embassy to Vienna and Turin. In 1752 he published his Political Discourses and the Inquiry concerning the Principles of
Morals. The appointment of Librarian to the Faculty of Advocates in Edinburgh-the salary of which he generously gave
to the poor poet Blacklock-placed at his disposal a fine collection of books; and this suggested the undertaking which has
long been held his greatest title to fame-the History of England, the first volume of which appeared in 1754.
For the literary historian there are two piquant episodes in the
life of Hume. The first is the ovation given to the philosopher
in Paris, whither he had accompanied the Marquis of Hertford;
the second is his friendship and quarrel with Rousseau. We
cannot pause to dwell on either.
Hume died in the spring of 1776, leaving a name imperishable in our literature, although it is a name attached to opinions
which have roused, and will continue to rouse, the most vehement opposition. It should never be forgotten, moreover, that,
in spite of Hume's opinions, so wise and good a man as Adam
Smith could publicly write of him, "Upon the whole, I have
always considered him, both during his lifetime and since his
death, as approaching as nearly to the idea of a perfectly wise
and virtuous man, as perhaps the nature of human frailty will
permit."




HUME'S SKEPTICISM.                571
~ II. HUME'S SKEPTICISM.
The marvellous acuteness and subtlety of Hume have never
been denied; and his influence upon speculation has been aided
as much by the alarm his doctrines excited, as by the ingenuity
with which they were upheld. If Berkeley met with no refuters, Hume could meet with none. Antagonists have generally
been compelled to admit that the skeptical reasoning was unanswerable.
Locke had shown that all our knowledge was dependent upon
experience. Berkeley had shown that we had no experience of
an external world independent of perception; nor could we have
any such experience. He pronounced matter to be a figment,
Hume took up the line where Berkeley had cast it, and flung it
once more into the deep sea, endeavoring to fathom the mysteries of being. Probing deeper in the direction Berkeley had
taken, he found that not only was Matter a figment, Mind was a
figment also. If the occult substratum, which men had inferred
to explain material phenomena, could be denied, because not
founded on experience; so also, said Hume, must we deny the
occult substratum (mind) which men have inferred to explain
mental phenomena. All that we have any experience of, is impressions and ideas. The substance of which these are supposed
to be impressions, is occult-is a mere inference; the substance
in which these impressions are supposed to be, is equally occult
-is a mere inference. Matter is but a collection of impressions.
Mind is but a succession of impressions and ideas.*
Thus was Berkeley's dogmatic Idealism converted into Skepticism. Hume, speaking of Berkeley, says, "-Most of the writings of that very ingenious philosopher form the best lessons of
skepticism which are to be found either among the ancient or
* Locke had already shown that we are as ignorant of spirit as of substance. We know mind only in its manifestation; we cannot know it per se
as a substratum. Hume's argument therefore had a firm foundation in philosophy. He only concluded from admitted premises.




572                      HUME.
modern philosophers, Bayle not excepted. He professes, however, in his title-page (and undoubtedly with great truth) to
have composed his book against the Skeptics, as well as against
the Atheists and Free-thinkers. But that all his arguments,
though otherwise intended, are in reality merely skeptical, appears fiom this, that they admit of no answer, and produce no
conviction."
Remark, also, that Hume's skepticism, though it reduces philosophy to a singular dilemma, viz. that of either refuting the
skeptical arguments, or of declaring itself and its pretensions to
be vain and baseless, nevertheless affects in no other way the ordinary judgments or actions of mankind. Much stupid ridicule
and frivolous objection have been, and probably will continue to
be, brought against Hume. Reid, from whom one might have
expected something better, is surprised at Hume's pretending to
construct a science upon human nature, " when the intention of
the whole work is to show that there is neither human nature
nor science in the world. It may, perhaps, be unreasonable to
complain of this conduct in an author who neither believes his
own existence nor that of his reader; and therefore could not
mean to disappoint him, or laugh at his credulity. Yet I cannot imagine that the author of the Treatise on Human Nature
is so skeptical as to plead this apology. He believed, against his
principles, that he shqild be read, and that he should retain his
personal identity, till,'he reaped the honor and reputation justly
due to his metaphysical acumen." Ile continues further in this
strain, dragging in the old error about Pyrrho having inconsistently been roused to anger by his cook, "who probably had
not roasted his dinner to his mind;" and compares this forgetfulness to Hume's every " now and then relapsing into the faith of
the vulgar."*
If this was meant for banter, it was very poor banter; if for
argument, it was pitiable. But if such arguments appeared
* Inquiry, Introd. i. ~ 5.




HUME'S SKEPTICISM.                573
valid to a thinker of Reid's reputation, it is reasonable to suppose that inferior men may also receive them  as conclusive.
Hume shall, therefore, be allowed to speak for himself; and he
shall speak in the language of that very Treatise on Human
Nature to which Reid alludes:
" Should it be here asked me whether I sincerely assent to this
argument which I seem to take such pains to inculcate, and
whether I be really one of those skeptics who hold that all is
uncertain, and that our judgrment is not in any thing possessed
of any measures of truth and falsehood, I should reply that this
question is entirely superfluous, and that neither I nor any other
person was ever sincerely and constantly of that opinion. Nature, by an absolute and uncontrollable necessity, has determined
us to judge as well as to breathe and feel; nor can we any more
forbear viewing certain objects in a stronger and fuller light
upon account of their customary connection with a present impression, than we can hinder ourselves from thinking as long as
we are awake, or seeing the surrounding bodies when we turn
our eyes towards them in broad sunshine. Whoever has taken
the pains to refute the cavils of this total skepticism, has really disputed without an antagonist, and endeavored by arguments to
establish a faculty which lVature has antecedently implanted rn
the mind and rendered unavoidable.
"My intention, then, in displaying so carefully the arguments
of that fantastic sect, is only to make the Reader sensible of the
truth of my hypothesis, that all our reasonings concerning causes
and effects, are derived from nothing but custom; and that belief is more properly an act of the sensitive than of the cogitative
part of our natures..... If belief were a simple act of the
thought, without any peculiar manner of conception, or the addition of force and vivacity, it must infallibly destroy itself, and
in every case terminate in a total suspense of judgment. But
as experience will sufficiently convince any one, that although he
finds no error in my arguments, yet he still continues to believe
and think and reason as usual, he may safely conclude that his




574                     HIUME.
reasoning and belief is some sensation or peculiar manner of conception, which'tis impossible for mere ideas and reflections to
destroy."*
It has always struck us as an illustration of the great want of
candor displayed by Hume's opponents, that they never quoted
this very significant and explicit passage; indeed, we never remember to have seen the passage quoted by any one. Let us
ask, what does the foregoing declaration amount to, if not to the
boasted "common-sense view," that our belief in the existence of
matter is instinctive, fundamental? Does not Dr. Brown's admission that the skeptical argument is unanswerable as a mere
play of reasoning, concede all that Hume requires? Does not
Dr. Brown's conclusion, that we are thrown upon "irresistible
belief" as our only refuge against skepticism, equally accord
with Hume's explicit declaration that we do believe and cannot
help believing, though we can give no reason for the belief?
"Thus the skeptic," Hume adds a little further on, "still continues to reason and believe, even though he asserts that he cannot defend his reason by reason; and by the same rule he must
assent to the principle concerning the existence of body, though
he cannot pretend by any arguments of philosophy to maintain
its veracity. Nature has not left this to his choice, and has
doubtless esteemed it an affair of too great importance to be
trusted to our uncertain reasonings and speculations. We may
well ask, what causes induce us to believe in the existence of body?
but'tis in vain to ask whether there be body or not? that is a
point which we must take for granted in all our reasonings."
After this let no more be said about Hume's practical inconsequences. Locke before him had clearly enough seen and signalized the impotence of the attempt to penetrate beyond phenomena, and had, with his usual calm wisdom, counselled men to
"sit down in quiet ignorance." He knew the task was hopeless;
he knew, also, that it was trivial. God has given us the means
* Human Nature, part iv. ~ i. p. 250.




HUME'S SKEPTICISMo                  575
of knowing all that directly concerns us, a certainty which suffices for all our wants. With that, reasonable men will be content. If they seek more, they seek the impossible; if they push
their speculations deeper, they end in skepticism. It was the
philosophical mission of Hume (to adopt a phrase in vogue) to
show how inevitably all such speculations, if consistent, ended in
skepticism.
" Men," he says, " are carried by a natural instinct or prepossession to repose faith in their senses. When they follow this
blind and powerful instinct of nature, they always suppose the
very images presented to the senses to be the external objects,
and never entertain any suspicion that the one are nothing but
representatives of the other. But this universal and primary
opinion of all men is soon destroyed by the slightest philosophy,
which teaches us that nothing can ever be present to the mind
but an image or perception.  So far, then, we are necessitated by
reasoning to contradict the primary instincts of Nature, and to
embrace a new system with regard to the evidence of our senses.
But here philosophy finds herself extremely embarrassed, when
she would obviate the cavils and objections of the skeptics. She
can no longer plead the infallible and irresistible instinct of nature, for that led us to quite a different system, which is acknowledged fallible, and even erroneous; and to justify this pretended philosophical system by a chain of clear and convincing
argument, or even any appearance of argument, exceeds the
power of all human capacity.
"Do you follow the instinct and propensities of nature in assenting to the veracity of the senses? But these lead you to
believe that the very perception or sensible image is the external
object-(Idealism).
" Do you disclaim this principle in order to embrace a more
rational opinion, that the perceptions are only representations of
something external? You here depart from your natural propensities and more obvious sentiments; and yet are not able to
satisfy your reason, which can never find any convincing argu



576                       HUME.
ment from experience to prove that the perceptions are connected
with external objects"-(Skepticism).
This is the dilemma to which Philosophy is reduced: out of
it there is no escape; and Hurme deserves the gratitude of mankind for having brought philosophy to this pass. Mankind, however, has paid him with reprobation. As the wlole course ofr
this History has been occupied in tracing the inevitable result of
all Philosophy to be precisely this much abused skepticism, our
readers will be prepared for a different appreciation of Hume.
Let us, therefore, endeavor to define the nature of this skepticism,
which has caused such great alarm. Skepticism, meaning doubt,
and being fiequently used to signify religious doubt, has alarming associations attached to it. To call a man a skeptic is to call
him  a heretic. And, unfortunately for Hume's philosophical
reputation, he was a skepgtis in religion as well as in philosophy,
and mankind have consequently identified the former with the
latter.
Now, philosophical skepticism can only mean a doubt as to
the possibility of Philosophy;-in other words, a doubt only on
one particular subject. If I accept the consequences to which
the doctrine of Hume leads me, am. I forced to suspend my
judgment, and to pronounce all subjects uncertain? or am I only
to pronounce some subjects uncertain? The latter is clearly the
only opinion I can entertain.  What then are the questions on
which I must be content to remain in darkness? Locke, no less
than Hume, has told us: All which relate to Philosophy-which
pretend to discuss the nature and essences of things.
This skepticism, the reader must acknowledge, has nothing
very alarming in it, except to Philosophy. It is maintained by
the vast majority of thinking men-some from conviction, others
fiom a vague sense of the futility of ontological speculation.
Only the bad passions roused in discussion could pretend to confound it with heresy. This Skepticism indicates the boundaries
of inquiry. It leads us fiom impossible attempts to fly, to instruct us how securely we may run. It destroys Philosophy




HUME'S THEORY OF CAUSATION.             577
only to direct all our energies towards positive Science. In the
words of Goethe, "Let us not attempt to demonstrate what cannot be demonstrated! Sooner or later we shall otherwise make
our miserable deficiencies more glaring to posterity by our socalled works of knowledge."
Hume was a skeptic; and, consequently, early in life ceased
devoting his marvellous acuteness to any of the questions agitated in the schools. His Essays and his History were excellent
products of this change of direction; and although he did devote
a portion of the Essays to philosophy, yet it was but a portion,
and one which gave a more popular and elegant exposition of
the principles of his first work.
~ III. HUME's THEORY OF CAUSATION.
It is customary to speak of "Hume's theory of Causation,"
and to bestow no inconsiderable acrimony upon him on its account. But, in the first place, the theory is not peculiarly his;
in the second place, his application of it to the question of Miracles, which has excited so much vehement controversy, reduces
itself to "this very plain and harmless proposition, that whatever is contradictory to a comete induction is incredible. That
such a maxim as this should be either accounted a dangerous
heresy, or mistaken for a recondite truth, speaks ill for the state
of philosophical speculation on such subjects."*
The theory may be thus briefly stated. All our experience of
causation is simply that of a constant succession. An antecedent followed by a sequent-one event followed by another:
this is all that we experience. We attribute indeed to the antecedent, a power of producing or causing the sequent; but we
can have no experience of such a power. If we believe that the
fire which has burned us will burn us again, we believe this from
habit or custom.; not from having perceived any power in the
* Mill's System of Logic, vo. ii. p. 183.
25




578                      HUME.
fire. We believe the future will resemble the past, because custom has taught us to rely upon such a resemblance. "When
we look about us towards external objects, and consider the
operation of causes, we are never able in a single instance to
discover any power or necessary connection-any quality which
binds the effect to the cause, and renders the one an infallible
consequence to the other. We only find that the one does actually in fact follow the other. The impulse of one billiard-ball
is attended with motion in the second. This is the whole that
appears to the outward senses. The mind feels no sentiment or
inward impression from this succession of objects; consequently
there is not, in any single instance of cause and effect, any thing
which can suggest the idea of power or necessary connection."*
This is the whole of his theory. His, explanation of our belief
in power, or necessary connection, is that it is a matter of habit.
I know not whether Hume ever read Glanvill's Scepsis Scientifica. The title was one to attract him. At any rate, Glanvill
had clearly enough stated Hume's theory, e. g. "All knowledge
of causes is deductive; for we know of none by simple intuition,
but through the mediation of their effects. So that we cannot
conclude any thing to be the cause of another but from its continually accompanying it; for the causality itself is insensible."
Malebranche had also anticipated it; and so had Hobbes. The
language indeed of the latter is so similar to the language employed by Hume, that I agree with Dugald Stewart in believing
Hume to have borrowed it from Hobbes. "What we call experience," says Hobbes, "is nothing else but remembrance of
what antecedents have been followed by what consequents....
No man can have in his mind a conception of the future, for the
future is not yet; but of our conceptions of the past we make a
future, or rather call past future relatively. Thus, after a man
has been accustomed to see like antecedents followed by like
consequents, whensoever he seeth the like come to pass to any
* Essays, sect. vii.




HUME'S THEORY OF CAUSATION.             579
thing he had seen before, he looks there shall follow it the same
that followed then."
This theory of Causation has been hotly debated, partly because of the " consequences" which some have seen, with alarm,
to be deducible from it (for opinions are judged of more by their
supposed consequences than by their presumed truth); partly
also because Hume has not stated it with the clearness which
prevents misunderstanding. It is only to the latter point we can
here attend.
When Hume asserts that experience gives no intimation of
any connection between two events, but only of their invariable
conjunction,-when he says that the mind cannot perceive a
causal nexus, but only an invariableness of antecedence and sequence, he is contradicted, or seems to be, by the consciousness
of his readers. They declare that, over and above the fact of
sequence, there is always an intimation of power given in every
causation, and this it is which distinguishes causal from casual
sequence,-connection from mere conjunction. The fire burns
paper because there is some power in the fire to effect this
change. Mere antecedence, even if invariable, cannot be sufficient, or else day would be the cause of night, the flash of lightning would be the cause of the thunder-peal. Swallows fly close
to the earth some little while before the rain falls; but no one
supposes the flight of the swallows causes the fall of the rain.
In every case of causation there must be an element of power-a
pacity of producing the observed change —a nexus of some kind,
over and above the mere juxtaposition of bodies. If diamond
will cut glass, it has a power to do so; the sharpest knife is without this power.
So reason Hume's antagonists.  Nor do I think they are
finally answered by resolving the idea of power into mere invariableness of antecedent and sequent; for they may reply that the
" invariableness" itself is deduced from the idea of power; we believe the fire will invariably burn the paper because it has the
power to do so, because there is a real nexus between fire and




580                      HUME.
the combustion of paper; only on such a belief can our expectation of the future resembling the past be securely founded.
The ordinary belief of mankind in the existence of something
more than mere antecedence and consequence, is therefore a fact.
This fact Hume and others omit. Because they cannot perceive
the power, they declare that we have no belief in it. Hume insists upon the impossibility of our perceiving power-of our perceiving any necessary connection between two events. But, say
those who oppose this theory, " Although we cannot perceive the
power, we are forced to believe in it; and this belief is not a matter of custom, but is given in the very facts of consciousness.
We perceive that some power is at work producing effects; the
precise nature of this power, indeed, we cannot perceive, because
we never can know things per se. When a spark ignites gunpowder, we perceive a power in the spark to ignite gunpowder:
what that power is, we know not; we only know its effects. But
our ignorance is equally great of the gunpowder: what it is we
know not; we only know its appearances to us. It might as
well be said that we believe in the gunpowder from custom
(since we really know nothing of it per se), as that we believe in
the power of the spark to ignite gunpowder from custom, since
we really know nothing of power per se. We know nothing
per se."
I have marshalled the arguments, with as much force as I
could muster, into so small a field, in order to bring into appreciable distinctness the source of the opposition to Hume's theory
on the part of many who have no doctrinal distrust towards it.
Before attempting an elucidation of the difficulty, it will be needful to consider the grounds of our belief in causation. As it is a
fact that all men believe in some power involved in every causal
act, we have to ask, Is that belief well founded?
Two schools at once present themselves. The one (that of
Hume) declares that the belief has no good grounds; it is a
matter of custom. If I believe the sun will rise to-morrow, it is
because it has always risen. If I believe that fire will burn in




HUME'S THEORY OF CAUSATION.             581
future, it is because it has always burned. From habit I expect
the future will resemble the past: I have no proof of it.
The other school declares that this belief in causation " is an
intuitive conviction that the future will resemble the past." This
is the language of Reid and Stewart. Dr. Whewell would have
us admit the belief as a fundamental idea-a necessary truth independent of and superior to all experience.
Both explanations we take to be very incompetent. Custom
or habit can essentially have nothing whatever to do with it, because our belief is as strong from a single instance as from a
thousand. " When many uniform instances appear," says Hume,
"and the same object is always followed by the same event, we
then begin to entertain the notion of cause and connection. We
then feel a new sentiment, to wit, a customary connection in the
thought between one object and its usual attendant; and this
sentiment is the original of that idea which we seek for." This
is manifestly wrong. A single instance of one billiard-ball moving another, suffices to originate the " sentiment," without further
repetition. Nor is there more truth in the assertion that the belief depends on " conviction of the future resembling the past;"
this explanation assumes that the general idea precedes the particular idea. If we believe that similar effects will follow whenever the same causes are in operation-if we believe that fire will
burn, or that the sun will rise to-morrow-we are simply believing
in our experience, and nothing more. We cannot help believing
in our experience; that is irresistible: but in this belief, the idea
of either past or future does not enter. I do not believe that
fire will burn because I believe that the future will resemble the
past, but simply because my experience of fire is that it burnsthat it has the power to burn. Take a simple illustration, trivial,
if you will, but illustrative:-A child is presented with a bit of
sugar: the sugar is white, of a certain shape, and is solid; his
experience of the sugar is confined to these properties: he puts
it in his mouth; it is sweet, pleasant: his experience is extended; the sugar he now believes (knows) to be sweet and pleasant,




582                          HUME.
as well as white and solid.* Thus far experience is not transcended. Some days later, another piece of sugar is given him.
Is it now necessary for him to have any "intuitive conviction
that the future will resemble the past"-any fundamental idea
independent of experience-to make him believe that if he puts
the sugar in his mouth it will taste sweet? Not in the least:
he believes it is sweet, because he knows it is sweet —because
his experience of sugar is that it is sweet. By no effort could
he divest himself of the idea of its sweetness, because sweetness
forms an integral part of his idea of the sugar. So we may say
of the sun's rising: it is part and parcel of our idea of the
sun. So of one billiard-ball putting a second in motion: our
experience of billiard-balls is that they put each other in motion.
Custom has primarily nothing to do with the belief. If we
had only one experience of fire-if we saw it only once applied
to a combustible substance-we should believe that it would
burn, because our idea of fire would be the idea of a thing which
burns. Custom has however, secondarily, some influence in correcting the tendency to attribute properties to things. Thus, a
child sees a friend who gives him an apple. The next time the
friend comes he is asked for an apple, because the idea of this
friend is of a man who, amongst other properties, has that of
giving apples. No apple is given, and this idea is destroyed.
Similarly, when all our experience of things is confirmatory of
our first experience, we may say that habit or custom induces us
to attribute certain effects to certain causes. When our subsequent experience contradicts our first experience, we cease to attribute those effects to those causes which we first experienced;
* It will perhaps seem strange that we should select sweetness as an example of causation. We selected it for its simplicity. No one will deny
that the taste of sweetness is as much an effect caused by the sugar as pain
is an effect caused by fire. But people are apt to overlook that causation is
the result of the properties of one body acting upon the properties of another. They would call sweetness a quality in sugar: but the motion of a
billiard-ball they say is caused by another ball.




HUIME'S THEORY OF CAUSATION.            583
this is only saying that our subsequent experience has destroyed
or altered the idea we formed at first.
Remark how much confusion is spread over this subject by
the inconsiderate introduction of the word belief. It is incorrect to say that a man believes that fire will burn him if he puts
his finger in it; he knows it. He will believe that it has burned
some one else-he will believe in a proposition you make about
fire, because belief is the assent to propositions: but to talk of
his believing that sugar will be sweet, when he knows it is sweet,
when he cannot think of it otherwise than as sweet; or that fire
will burn when he knows it burns, is as improper as to say that
he believes himself cold when he is cold.
Only from this improper use of the word belief could the
theory of fundamental ideas, or of "an intuitive conviction that
the future will resemble the past," have stood its ground for a
moment. If the proposition " Fire will burn paper" were put to
any one, he would unquestionably believe it, because he has no
other knowledge of the fire under those circumstances. The
proposition is as evident to him as that two and two make four.
Although, therefore, he may be said to believe in the proposition,
"Fire will burn paper," he cannot properly be said to act upon
belief when he attempts to light paper: he acts upon his knowledge. Metaphysicians argue as if the belief in the immediate
result of an action were a belief in some implied proposition about
the course of nature. It is really a reliance upon experience;
nothing more.
It is necessary to distinguish between belief in existence, and
belief in propositions. It is inaccurate to say a man believes in
his own existence, as if that were similar to his belief in a proposition. But though a man cannot believe in his own existence,
simply because it is impossible for him to conceive himself as
non-existent, he may believe that he will exist eternally, because
that is a proposition, the converse of which is conceivable and
maintainable.
The primordial act of all thinking whatever, is, as I have ex



584                        HUME.
plained in the Introduction to this History, the making present
to the mind of what is absent fiom the sense; and this, which
connects all intellectual phenomena into one class, renders the
accurate demarcation of them sometimes impossible, so insensibly does the one pass into the other. Thus when I say, " I see
it has rained," because the wet streets make me infer that the
wetness was caused by rain, my assertion is grounded on a mental re-presentation of the absent occurrence, precisely analogous
to that which takes place when I infer the sweetness of the sugar
before me, or perceive that the flower in Julia's hair is a rose, or
believe that the paper she holds close to the candle will infallibly
ignite if paper and flame come in contact. In each case the inference, perception, or belief, is the re-presentation of facts formerly present in my experience of rain, sugar, roses, and candles.
Whenever I forget any of the attendant facts, i. e. fail to make
them present, I can only form an incomplete conception of the
thing about which I reason, or infer. Bad logic is imperfect representation. In proportion to the complexity of a proposition
will be the liability to error, because of the liability to suffer
some of the attendant facts to drop out of sight. Thus the proposition "Fire will burn'paper" is so simple, and accordant with
daily experience, that assent to it is instantaneous; but the proposition " Human life may extend over two centuries" is one implying so many facts which cannot be made present to the mind,
because not lying within familiar experience, that instead of assent it produces denial, or at least doubt, which is suspension of
belief, which again is the confessed inability to make all the facts
present to the mind. That " two and two make four" is the immediate and irresistible conclusion of every educated man; nevertheless, this very man would pause before assenting to the proposition "Eight times three hundred and ninety-six, make three
thousand one hundred and sixty-eight," because he would have
to make present to his mind the successive steps of the calculation, and this would demand an effort, great in proportion to his
want of familiarity with calculations.




HUME'S THEORY OF CAUSATION.             585
In spite of this identity of belief and perception, it is necessary
for the perspicuity of discussion to discriminate the two, and I
propose therefore to restrict the term belief to the assent to propositions, and demarcate it from those direct inferences which
are made in the presence of objects and have reference to them.
I would say, we believe in the proposition "Fire burns," but
know the fact that the paper about to be thrust into flame will
ignite. Such a discrimination of terms will be found useful in
discussing causation. We shall thus see in what respect assent
to a proposition, complex in its elements, differs from the " practical belief" of mankind in particular facts-we shall separate
the belief of the philosopher in the proposition "Every effect
must have a cause," from the belief of the child that the fire,
which yesterday burned paper, will burn it to-day. Both beliefs
are grounded on and limited by experience; but the experience
of the philosopher is distinguished from that of the child by its
greater accumulation of analogous facts. The "necessity" and
(" universality" which, according to Kant and Dr. Whewell, distinguish the philosophical conception, and raise it above experience, will be considered hereafter. For the present it is enough
if we have reduced belief in causation (or in power) to experience
of a direct kind, not separable from any other intellectual act,
but allied to all other acts in being the mental re-presentation of
phenomena formerly present in experience. And this will help
us, perhaps, to reconcile the combatants who quarrel over the
idea of "power" in causation.
Thus while it will be admitted by the one party that between
two events, named respectively cause and effect, no nexus is perceived by us, over and above the mere fact of antecedence and
sequence; and that therefore Hume is right in saying-we only
perceive this antecedence, and do not perceive the causal link;
on the other hand it must be maintained, that between those
two events there is a specific relation, a something which makes
the one succeed the other, causing this particular effect rather
than another; and this subtle link it is which is the nexus con25.




586                        HUME.
tended for; this relation it is which distinguishes a casual act
from one of accidental sequence. There must be a peculiar relation, or property, existing between oxygen and metals, otherwise
metals never could be oxidized. The oxidation of iron is an
effect like the ignition of paper; but it is an effect producible
only through a specific relation or cause. To say that we cannot know this cause, cannot perceive this relation, and that
antecedence and sequence are all that we can perceive, is only
saying that we cannot penetrate beyond phenomena and their
successions; but this is no more a ground for the denial of a
causal nexus, than it is for the denial of an external world.
All things necessarily stand related to all other things: sometimes these relations- are obtruded on our notice, because they
pass from relations of coexistence into relations of succession, and
we name them causes and effects; at other times they remain in
the background of unremarked coexistence, and our unsolicited
attention overlooks them; we do not then name them cause and
effect. The carbonate of lime, which I see before me as marble,
suggests to me in its inaction, no conception of power, or causation, because my attention is not solicited by any successive relations; yet, if I had witnessed the action of the carbonic acid
on the lime, which originally caused the two substances to unite
and form marble, the passage from one state to another would
have suggested the idea of some power at work. It is clear that
there must be relations existing between the carbonic acid and
the lime, which cause the two to remain united, as we see them
in marble. We do not see these relations-we do not, therefore,
see the cause-but we know the cause must be in operation all
the while, although, in consequence of no changes taking place,
we are not solicited to observe the operation. Hence it is that
only successive phenomena are named causal; and hence is it
that Hume was right in saying that en derniere analyse, invariableness of antecedence and sequence is all that experience tells
us of causation; although he did not, I think, state his position
clearly, nor discern its real basis.




HUME'S THEORY OF CAUSATION.            587
This conception of causation, as the direct relation between
any two phenomena, whether coexistent or successive, accords
with the fact that what is called the effect is itself but the union
of two causes-the oxygen and the metal co-operate to form an
oxide; the group of facts which we designate as the antecedent,
combines with the group of facts called the sequent; as when we
say that " Henry I. died of eating lampreys;" by which we mean,
that in a certain condition of his organism the introduction of
lampreys was the antecedent to a whole series of sequences terminating in death; although we are perfectly aware that the
salmon was not the " cause," but only one integer in the sum of
causes. The difficulty in fixing upon a true cause is this very
complexity of relations: only when we can be said to know all
the elements of a group, can we isolate one to estimate its influence.
I have endeavored to reconcile the two contending parties on
this perplexing question, and for all further discussion must refer
to John Mill's chapter in his System of Logic, where, however,
there is a passage which seems to me quite contrary to the doctrine he upholds. I allude to his strictures on the dogma cessante
caus& cessat et efectus. " A coup de soleil gives a man a brainfever: will the fever go off as soon as he is moved out of the
sunshine? A sword is run through his body: must the sword
remain in his body in order that he may continue dead "*
Surely this argument is tenable only by those who confound a
cause with the whole group of conditions which precede, and the
effect with the whole group of conditions which succeed; and
is not tenable by those who hold that cause and effect are simply
antecedent and sequent. The solar rays striking on the man's
head produce a disturbance in the circulation, which in its turn
becomes the antecedent to a congestion of the blood-vessels in the
brain, which becomes a brain-fever; instead of one succession of
cause and effect, we have here a series of such successions; and
* Vol. i. p. 413.




,588                     HUME.
if we could analyze the various stages of the sun-stroke, we
should find that each effect did cease on the cessation of the
cause; indeed, if an effect be nothing but the sequent of an antecedent-and not the product of some creative power in the
cause-it must depend for its existence on the presence of the
antecedent.
Hume's theory of causation set Kant speculating on the constituent elements of cognition; but before we follow out the development of Philosophy in that direction, it will be necessary to
trace the further development of Locke's influence in other directions.




SIXTH EPOCH.
THE ORIGIN OF KNOWLEDGE REFERRED TO SENSATION BY
THE CONFUSION OF THOUGHT WITH FEELING: THE SENSATIONAL SCHOOL
CHAPTER I.
CONDILLAC.
~ I. LIFE OF CONDILLAC.
ETIENNE DE CONDILLAC was born at Grenoble, in 1715. His
life was passed mainly in study, and was not varied by any of
those incidents which give interest and romance to biography.
He published his first work, Essai sur' Origine des Connoissances
Humaines, in 1746. Three years after, his Traite des Systemes.
His other works followed rapidly; and established for him such
a reputation, that he was appointed tutor to the Prince of Parma,
and for whose instruction he wrote the Cours d'Etudes. In
1768 the capricious doors of the Academie Francaise were
opened to him; but once elected a member, he never after attended any of its sittings. He published his Logique in his old
age, and left behind him his Langue des Calculs. He died in
1780.
~ II. CONDILLAC'S SYSTEM.
We have seen how Idealism and skepticism grew out of the
doctrines respecting the origin of knowledge. We have now to
see the growth of the "Sensational School."
The success which Locke met with in France is well known.




590                    CONDILLAC.
For a whole century the countrymen of Descartes extolled the
English philosopher, little suspecting how that philosopher would
have disclaimed their homage, could he have witnessed it. Condillac is the acknowledged representative of Locke in France.
When his first work, entitled Essai sur' Origine des Connoissances Humaines, appeared, he had no notion of simplifying
Locke by reducing all Knowledge to Sensation. He was a
modest Lockeist, and laid down as the fundamental principle,
that "sensations and the operations of the mind are the materials of all our knowledge-materials which reflection sets in action by seeking their combinations and relations." (Chap. i. ~ 5.)
In 1754 appeared his celebrated work, the Traite des Sensations. In it he quits Locke's principle for that of Gassendi and
Hobbes. "The chief object of this work," he says, "is to show
how all our knowledge and all outrfaculties are derived from the
senses; or, to speak more accurately, from sensations." The inclusion of " our faculties," as well as our ideas, in this sensuoeus
origin, is, however, due entirely to Condillac. Hobbes never
thought of such a " simplification." The divergence from Locke
is obvious: instead of the two sources of ideas, recognized in the
Essay on Human Understanding, it assumes one source onlySensation; instead of mind, with certain elementary faculties, it
assumes one elementary faculty-that of Sensibility-out of
which all the faculties are evolved by the action of external objects on the senses. Nor was this a mere slip of Condillac's pen:
the error is radical; it constitutes the peculiarity of his system.
Speaking of various philosophers, and quoting, with praise, the
maxim attributed to Aristotle, that "Nothing is in the intellect
which was not previously in the senses," he adds, "Immediately
after Aristotle comes Locke; for the other philosophers who have
written on this subject are not worthy of mention. This Englishman has certainly thrown great light on the subject, but he
has left some obscurity.... All the faculties of the soul appeared to him to be innate qualities, and he never suspected they
might be derived from sensation itself."




CONDILLAC'S SYSTEM.                591
Certainly, Locke never suspected any thing of the kind, and
would loudly have repudiated it, had any one suggested such a
simplification of the psychological problem. He might have
asked Condillac, why is it no Ape having the five senses of Man
has ever yet been educated as a Man? and if faculties are nothing but sensations, why are the faculties of the Ape so remarkably inferior, when the senses, some of them at least, are so
remarkably superior to those of Man? We find, on the one
hand, animals having senses like those of man, but not having
the faculties of man; we find, on the other hand, men deficient
in certain senses-sight, hearing, taste, or smell-who, so far
from being deficient in mental faculties, are remarkable for their
high endowments: a striking example of which is the case of
Laura Bridgman, born blind, deaf, and dumb. Nay, among men
having all the senses in activity, we find the greatest disparities
in mental faculty; and we do not find that the men whose senses are the most susceptible and active, are the men whose intellectual faculties are the most developed; which is strange, if the
faculties are nothing but sensations. How does Condillac explain the familiar fact of Idiots being in full possession of their
senses? When he makes his famous Statue grow into an Intelligence, by the gradual evolution of one sense after the other, it
never occurs to him that he tacitly admits the presence of the
very mind which is said to be evolved; since in the absence of
that mind the senses will not elevate the statue one inch above
idiocy.
Had Condillac been surveying the animal series, and endeavoring to trace the gradual development of Sensibility throughout
that series, he might have maintained, with some philosophical
cogency, that the various faculties were the derivative products
of sensation. But he had no such conception. He looked upon
the mind as a ttbuasa,s a blank page on which sensations wrote
certain characters; and instead of regarding the mind in the
light of an organism, the food of which was furnished by the
senses, he regarded it as a simple granary, in which the grain, on




592                     CONDILLAC.
entering, "transformed itself" into bread, oNn, and baker. He'thought the senses created the faculties and were the faculties.
He might as well have said that exercise creates the faculty of
running. The child cannot run till he has exercised his limbs;
but the exercise does not give him the limbs, it only calls them
into action.
Condillac is right in saying that we are not born with the
mental faculties developed (a point to be touched upon hereafter), but he is wrong in saying that these faculties are only
sensations. And when he endeavored to construct the mind and
its faculties out of transformed sensations, he never once suspected that the faculty of transformation-that which transforms
-could not be itself a sensation. It is very easy to imagine
transformed sensations; but the sensations do not, we presume,
transform themselves. What is it that transforms them? The
mind? Not so. The mind is the aggregate of our mental
states, faculties, etc.; the mind is made up of " transformed sensations," and cannot, therefore, be the transforming power. We
return to the charge, and demand, What is it which transforms? Condillac has no answer. All he can say is, what he
says over and over again, that our faculties are transformed sensations. Hear him:
"Locke distinguishes two sources of ideas, sense and reflection.
It would be more exact to recognize but one; first, because reflection is, in its principle, nothing but sensation itself; secondly,
because it is less a source of ideas than a canal through which
they flow from sense.
"This inexactitude, slight as it may seem, has thrown much
obscurity over his system. He contents himself with recognizing
that the soul perceives, thinks, doubts, believes, reasons, wills,
reflects; that we are convinced of the existence of these operations, because we find them in ourselves, and they contribute to
the progress of our knowledge; but he did not perceive the necessity of discovering their origin and the principle of their generation-he did not suspect that they might only be acquired




CONDILLACS SYSTEM.                   593
habits; he seems to' have regarded them as innate, and he says
only that they may be perfected by exercise."*
This is far enough from Locke,t who would have been amazed
to hear that "judgment, reflection, the passions, in a word, all
the faculties of the mind, are nothing but sensation which transforms itself differently (qui se transforme diff6remment)."
As it is curious to see how sensation transforms itself into these
faculties, we will translate Condillac's account.  "If a multitude
of sensations operate at the same time with the same degree of
vivacity, or nearly so, man is then only an animal that feels; experience suffices to convince us that then the multitude of impressions takes away all activity from the mind. But let only
one sensation subsist, or without entirely dismissing the others,
let us only diminish their force; the mind is at once occupied
more particularly with the sensation which preserves its vivacity,
and that sensation becomes attention, without its being necessary
for us to suppose any thing else in the mind. If a new sensation
acquire greater vivacity than the former, it will become in its
turn attention. But the greater the force which the former had,
the deeper the impression made on us, and the longer it is preserved.  Experience proves this. Our capacity of sensation is
therefore divided into the sensation we have had, and the sensation which we now have; we perceive them both at once, but
we perceive them differently: the one seems as past, the other
as present. The name of sensation designates the impression
actually made upon our senses; and it takes that of memory
when it presents itself to us as a sensation which has formerly
been felt. Memory, therefore, is only the transformed sensation.
When there is double attention, there is comparison; for to be
* Extrait raissonne du Traite des Sensations: (Euvres de Condillac (1803),
iv. 18.
t It would be idle to refute here the vulgar notion that Condillac perfected
Locke's principles; or, as M. Cousin absurdly says, that Locke's Essay was
the rough sketch (ebauche) of which the TraitM des Sensations is the perfected picture; such a notion can be entertained only by those who blindly
accept traditionary judgments. The brief exposition we shall give of Condillac is a sufficient answer to all such assertions.




594                     CONDILLAC.
attentive to two ideas or to compare them, is the same thing.
But we cannot compare them without perceiving some difference
or some resemblance between them: to perceive such relations,
is to judge. The acts of comparing and judging are therefore
only attention; it is thus that sensation becomes successively attention, comparison, judgment."
The other faculties are explained in a similar way, but we
need quote no more. That such a system should ever have attained the favor it did, is a striking example of the facility with
which men may be misled by an artful use of words.
Condillac said that science is only a well-constructed language
(une langue bien faite); so much did he rely upon precision in
words. Nor is this inexplicable in a man who fancied he had reduced the analysis of mind to its simplest elements by merely
naming them differently. It is, however, as absurd to call ideas
sensations because the ideas were originated by sensations, as it
would be to call reasoning observation, because reasoning is
founded on observation. The only excuse for the error is in the
common, but false, supposition that ideas are faint impressions.
They are not impressions at all. Condillac says that an idea is
a remembered sensation, and this remembrance is only a lesser
degree of vivacity in the sensation. We answer that the idea is
nothing of the kind; so far from being the sensation in a lesser
degree, it is not the sensation at all; it is altogether different
from the sensation. Although every man who has experienced
toothache, can have a very distinct idea of it (in other words, lie
can think of, and talk of toothache), we defy him to detect in
his idea any repetition of the sensation. Nor is this wonderful;
sensation is the product of a distinct parl of the nervous system,
the senses; ideas are the product of another distinct part of
the nervous system, the cerebrum: sensation is feeling, thought
is thinking. To suppose feeling and thinking are the same (although both may come under the term feeling, by giving the
word some new general signification), is an absurdity reserved
for the Sensational School, the last and not the least illustrious




CONDILLAC S SYSTEM.                595
of whom, M. Destutt de Tracy, consolidated it into an aphorism:
penser c'est sentir.
The ambiguities of language have in this case been assisted
by the nature of our sensations. Thus all our visual ideas, inasmuch as they assume shape, do seem like faint sensations; the
reason is, that although it is a very different thing to look at the
sun and to think of it, yet in thinking, our idea corresponds, in
some measure, with our sensation: the idea is of a round, yellow,
luminous body, and is not improperly called an image of the sun.
If it is an image of the sun, we easily conclude that it is a faint
copy of our sensation. But in the case of other senses, there is
no difficulty in detecting the error. When we say that we can
recall the sensation of hunger, we verbally confound our power of
thinking a thing, with our power of feeling it. There is, in truth,
a generic distinction between Thought and Sensation, which it
is fatal to overlook; nor could it have been overlooked but for
the introduction and adoption of that much-abused word " idea,"
instead of thought.
I do not believe we can recover any sensation at all, but only
the ideal effect of the sensation. Mr. Bain, who of all psychologists, as it appears to me, has approached nearest to the truth,
here remarks, that the " exact tone of feeling, the precise inward
sensation due to a state of hunger, is almost irrecoverable and
unimaginable in a state of comfortable repletion." I believe it
to be utterly irrecoverable. "But," he adds, " the uneasy movements, the fretful tones, the language of complaint, are all easy
to recall; they belong to the more intellectual part of the system; and by these we can recover some portion of the total fact,
which is also just about as much as we can communicate to a
second person. The digestive state for the time being, rules the
tone of sensation so effectually, that we cannot, by any effort,
restore the currents due to an entirely opposite state; we can
only recover the more revivable accompaniments."* The reason
* The Senses and the Inielect, p. 337.




596                     CONDILLAC.
of this I take to be simply the impossibility of displacing a sensation (e. g. that of repletion) by an idea. The sensation of hunger was due to a peculiar stimulus of the nervous system; so
long as that stimulus was present, the sensation was present;
when another stimulus replaced it, another sensation succeeded,
and in the presence of that stimulus no other sensation is recoverable. The "revivable accompaniments" were not sensations,
but the sequences of sensations, ideal elements. When Mr. Bain
contrasts the sense of sight with the sense of hunger, and says
" that we can recover a picture or vision of fancy almost as exactly as we saw it, though not so strongly," and thinks that this
gives to the sense of sight its " intellectual character," he appears
to me to overlook the generic distinction between Sensation and
Thought, a distinction which Condillac and his school systematically set aside. " We can repossess ourselves," he adds, " of the
exact scene as it lay to the eye; in fact the sensation itself is the
most retainable part of the whole." I cannot but think that, if
Mr. Bain will reconsider this statement, he will admit that the
sensation itself is precisely the part which is not retainable, not
recoverable; for although the image of the landscape beheld in
memory is like the actual scene which we gazed upon-or, in
more accurate language, although we are similarly affected by
the remembrance as by the original stimulus-yet a psychologist
of Mr. Bain's rank does not need to be told that the landscape
in perception is constituted by a variety of intellectual inferences
-all its relations of space, form, solidity, etc., being purely intellectual elements, and these only are the elements present in
the remembrance, the actual sensations not being present at all.
What therefore is recoverable, is the purely intellectual part of
the whole; what is irrecoverable, the sensational; precisely as
in the case of hunger: we can recall the effects of hunger, even
when quietly digesting dinner, but we cannot recall the sensation
of hunger.
The point in dispute is so important, and is so intimately
bound up with the whole doctrine of the Sensational School,




CONDILLAC'S SYSTEM.               597
forming indeed the battle-ground of all psychological doctrine,
that we must consider it with more than a passing attention.
The confusion of Sensation with Ideation, or Thought, is Condillac's systematic error; but it is an error from which few, if
any writers, even of the spiritualist schools, have been free. Explicitly, or implicitly, these two phenomena have been regarded
as two aspects of the same thing. The rigorous demarcation of
Sensation as one process, from Ideation as another process,each dependent on its separate nervous centre,-will be found in
no psychological treatise. Nevertheless, Comparative Anatomy
has succeeded in demonstrating the independence of the organs
of Sense, and the Brain-proper; although no one has yet succeeded in detecting the true relations which connect these independent centres, and make them act together. We know that
the brain is as much an addition to the organs of Sense as these
organs are additions to the nervous system of the simpler animals. Low down in the animal scale we can detect no trace at
all of a nervous system; ascending a few steps, we detect a simple ganglion with its prolongations; ascending higher, we detect
a more complex arrangement of ganglia, and rudimentary organs
of Sense; ascending still higher and higher, we detect more
complex organs of Sense, and a rudimentary Brain; till at last
we arrive at man, with his complex organs and his complex
Brain.  But so independent is the Brain, that even in the
human species cases occur of " anencephalous monsters," that
is to say, children born without any Brain whatever; and
these children breathe, suck, cry, and struggle, like other
children.
Further, it is ascertained that the function of this Brain (or
Cerebrum) is Thought-or, as James Mill, with a nice sense of
utility, proposed to call it, Ideation. Granting this, we grant
that the functions Sensation and Ideation are as independent as
the organs of which they are the functions; and although Ideation is organically connected with Sensation, yet not more so
than muscular motion is connected with Sensation. Neither the




598                      CONDILLAC.
anatomical nor the psychological connections of the two have
been accurately discriminated, but the broad fact of their independence suffices for my present argument; which is merely to
establish the position that the organs of Sense are competent
to Sensation, without the addition of a Brain; and that the
Brain, although constantly set into action by the organs of
Sense, is in itself a separate centre, and the seat of specific
actions.*
It is customary to speak of the organs of Sense as if they were
simple organs; we must not therefore innovate in this matter,
although we find it needful to remind the reader that each special sense is really the function of a complex apparatus of organs.
The apparatus of Sight, for example, may be separated into at'
least three parts:-1st, for the reception of impressions of light;
2d, for the transmission of those impressions; 3d, for the sensation.  Of these the last need only here be specially considered,
and may be called the Sensational Centre.t   In this centre the
external stimulus becomes a sensation; from this centre the sensation is generally (not always) propagated to the cerebrum,
which in turn may propagate the influence to the centre of muscular motion, or elsewhere.
Every sense, whether it be one of the five special senses, or of
the so-called " organic senses" (such as those of the alimentary
canal or of muscular activity), has its own special centre, or sensorium; but there seems to be no ground for assuming, with
Unzer and Prochaska, the existence of any one general sensorium, to which these all converge; and I shall speak therefore of
the Sensational Centres as the seats of sensations derived from
* See this point illustrated in detail by Unzer and Prochaska, in their
treatises translated for the Ray Society by Dr. Laycock.
f I would call it sensory ganglion, if that did not presuppose the existence
of a distinct ganglion, anatomically separable in the higher animals, as it is
in those lower animals which have nothing but sensory ganglia. At present,
however, science does not warrant such a statement otherwise than as an
hypothesis. Besides, I include the spinal chord among the general Sensational Centres. Compare Prochaska, p. 430.




CONDILLAC'S SYSTEM.                599
the stimuli which act on the organs of sense. Considered as
Sensational Centres, they are perfectly independent of the Brain;
they may and do act without implicating the Brain, for they will
act when the Brain is absent: a bird deprived of its cerebrum
manifests unequivocal symptoms of being sensitive to light, sound,
etc. But in the normal state of the organism these centres are
intimately connected with the Brain; and the stimuli which
affect them directly, indirectly affect the Brain. Light, impinging on the retina, determines a change in the optic Sensational
Centre; this change is usually propagated to the cerebrum; and
as the first change was a sensation, so is the second an idea: this
idea may excite other ideas, or it may be so faint in its influence
as to be almost immediately absorbed, and then we are said to
be "scarcely conscious" of the sensation-meaning that we
thought very little about it: an example of which is the little
attention we pay to the clock striking when we are engaged in
study, if the fact is indifferent to us; we hear it, but think not
of it the next moment; if on the other hand the striking of the
clock is not indifferent to us, the various thoughts which it
awakens make us eminently " conscious of the sensation." In
the heat of battle, a sword passes through a man's arm, and
nevertheless the wound is followed by no pain or " consciousness;" the stimulus which under ordinary circumstances would
have been propagated from a Sensational Centre, and thence
radiating to the cerebrum, would have roused up manifold ideas,
namely, of consequences, what was necessary to be done, etc., is
prevented from so radiating, and is not carried beyond the Sensational Centre.
Not only can we have sensations without being conscious of
them-i. e. without thinking about them; we can also think with
perfect freedom when all the Sensational Centres (except those
of organic life) are unaffected by any stimulus, i. e. when we have
no sensations. We do so when awake in bed during the stillness
of night: the senses are in repose, the Brain is active.
Thus is the independence of Ideation and Sensation proved




600                    CONDILLAC.
psychologically and anatomically; and with this proof we destroy the basis of Condillac's doctrine. But even on purely
metaphysical grounds we may reject his theory of the origin of
knowledge. It rests on two positions;-the first is the reduction
of all knowledge to sensation; the second is the dogma of our
faculties not being innate. The first is the doctrine of Gassendi
and Hobbes. It is thus stated by Diderot, one of Condillac's
most celebrated pupils:-" Every idea must necessarily, when
brought to its state of ultimate decomposition, resolve itself into
a sensible representation or picture; and since every thing in
our understanding has been introduced there by the channel of
sensation, whatever proceeds out of the understanding is either
chimerical or must be able, in returning by the same road, to reestablish itself according to its sensible archetype. Hence an
important rule in philosophy, That every expression which cannot find an external and a sensible object to which it can thus
establish its affinity, is destitute of signification.""
Those who maintain sensuous experience to be the basis of all
knowledge, will of course assent to the position that every one
of our ideas can be decomposed into sensuous elements; but
ideas themselves are not sensations, they are formed from sensations, and are not sensible pictures. The least experience is sufficient to convince us that we have many ideas;which cannot be
reduced to any sensible picture whatever; or, to prevent any of
the ambiguity which belongs to the word " idea," let us rather
say we have many thoughts which cannot be reduced to any
sensible picture. We can think of a sound without any power
of forming a picture of sound; we can think of virtue or goodness, of patriotism or scoundrelism, without being able to form
mental pictures of these ideas.
Now for the second point: Condillac, we believe, was the first
to catch a glimpse of the important truth that our faculties are
not innate-are not even connate; but he bungled in attempting
* Quoted by Dugald Stewart, Philosophical Essays, p. 166.




CONDILLAO S SYSTEM.                601
to trace the genesis of these faculties. That men are not born
with the powers of reasoning, remembering, imagining, is a proposition which will meet with very little credit at first. A little
experience and reflection however show us that as the child certainly cannot reason, remember, or imagine, these being faculties
subsequently and slowly developed, we must conclude that the
mental faculties are only potentially in the new-born child. The
baby can no more reason than he can talk. He learns to do
both; and, before he can learn them, the powers of his mind no
less than the muscles of his vocal organs must grow, be developed, and strengthened by exercise. Man is no more born with
reason than an acorn is born an oak. The grown man has reason, as every oak has branches and foliage. But the infant and
the acorn, though they contain that within them which, under
fitting circumstances, will be developed into reason in the one,
and foliage in the other, cannot be said to have as yet either
reason or foliage.
This is an important discovery, and yet one which is apparently obvious, and obtruded upon our experience by the daily
observation of children. Condillac has the merit of having first
seen it; but he saw it very imperfectly, and failed altogether to
make any good use of it. As an example: He who told us
that our faculties were not innate, but were "acquired habits,"
tells us, when he comes to the genesis of those faculties, that
they spring into existence at once-are born full-grown-the
acorn suddenly leaps into an oak. Thus his famous statue has
Memory, Judgment, Desire, etc., as soon as it has Sensations.
This is enough to show that if Condillac discovered an important
fact, he only stumbled over it, and knew not its significance.*
Let us hope that, if England is to produce any new system of
Psychology, this most important point will not be overlooked:
the growth and development of our faculties is as much a part
* The only person who, to our knowledge, has made any use of this fact,
is Dr. Beneke, who has made it the basis of his whole philosophy. See his
NTue Psycholoyie, also the Lehibuc]i der Psychologie (Berlin, 1845).
26




602                    CONDILLAC.
of Psychology, as the growth and development of our organs is
a part of Biology.*'Condillac has made but a poor figure in our pages; let us
hasten to add, that although his fundamental positions are erroneous, his works display considerable merits both in manner and
matter. Many valuable remarks, and some good analyses, may
be found in his writings; and the style is admirably clear. He
departed so widely fiom Locke, that it seems strange he should
ever have been considered as a disciple. But we have express
testimony to the fact that he was Locke's disciple; and if we
consider for a moment the great stress which Locke always placed
upon the sensuous origin of our knowledge-that being the point
he wished to bring prominently forward, because his precursors
had neglected it-we shall easily conceive how Condillac might
have been more impressed with that part of the system than
with the other, which Locke had rather indicated than developed.
Moreover it was Locke's object to prove the mind to be a tabula
rasa, in order to disprove innate ideas. This once being granted,
it was easy to fall into the error of Condillac's " simplification."
Condillac was clear, but much of his clearness was owing to
his shallowness; much of the simplicity was owing to meagreness. He tried to construct Psychology upon no firmer basis
than that adopted by the metaphysicians whom he opposed.
Analysis of mental operations and merely verbal distinctions had
been powerless in the hands of his precursors, nor were they
powerful in his. In many subordinate matters he improved on
them; some of his analyses were better; many of his verbal distinctions were useful; but he had no true psychological Method,
and could found no desirable system. The idea of connecting
Psychology with Biology had not yet been distinctly conceived.
Although the brain was universally held to be the "organ" of
the mind, the mind was, by the strangest of oversights, not re* Since this was written Mr. Herbet Spencer has expounded the development of the faculties in his very remarkable Principles of Psychology
(1855).




HARTLEY'S LIFE.                    603
garded as the function of that organ;* consequently no one
thought of connecting the study of the mind with the study of
the nervous system; no one thought of a physiological basis as
indispensable to psychological science. We shall see hereafter
what attempts have been made in this direction. The first step
may be said to have been taken by Hartley.
CHAPTER II.
HARTLEY.
~ I. LIFE OF HARTLEY.
DAVID HARTLEY, the son of a Yorkshire clergyman, was born
on the 30th of August, 1705. He went to Cambridge at fifteen,
and became a Fellow of Jesus College. Originally destined for
the Church, he had scruples about signing the Thirty-nine Articles, and gave up the Church for Medicine, which he subsequently
practised with great success.
When only twenty-five years of age he conceived the design
and commenced the execution of his celebrated Observations on
Man, his Frame, his Duty, and his Expectations, led thereto, as
he tells us in the Preface, by hearing that "the Rev. Mr. Gay
had asserted the possibility of deducing all our intellectual
pleasures and pains from association." Mr. Gay published his
views in a dissertation prefixed to Law's translation of King On
the Origin of Evil; but although Hartley acknowledges having
* I may here enter a brief caveat against the conclusion that I holdb the
"mind to be the function of the brain." This is no place to argue so wide
a question; and I content myself with saying, that in the crude form in
which that opinion is frequently presented, I do not agree. Ideation I hold
to be one function of the brain; but Mind is something more general than
this special function of Ideation; and the brain has other functions besides
Ideation, other functions than any usually called mental.




604                     HARTLEY.
derived the suggestion from Gay, it is clear to all readers of his
work, that he had thoroughly mastered, and made his own, the
principle of Association as the primary law of intellectual combination. Hartley did not publish his Observations till 1748,
eighteen years after the scheme was first laid. The year before,
according to Dr. Parr, he published a small treatise as a precursor to this work. "You will be astonished to hear," Dr. Parr
writes to Dugald Stewart,* " that in this book, instead of the
Doctrine of Necessity, Hartley openly declares for the indifference
of the will, as maintained by Archbishop King."  And the reader
will be astonished to hear that Hartley does no such thing!
Dugald Stewart, who had not seen the work referred to, remarks
that "it is curious that, in the course of a year, Hartley's opinions on so very essential a point should have undergone a complete change;" still more curious, however, that Dr. Parr should
have read the work and discovered in it such a mare's-nest. The
tract in question is reprinted in the volume of Metaphysical
Tracts by English Philosophers of the Eighteenth Century. Preparedfor the Press by the late Rev. Samuel Parr, D.D. London,
1837-a volume precious to metaphysical students, because it contains Collier's Clavis Universalis and Specimen of True Philosophy.
If the reader will turn to the third of these tracts, Conjecturcequcedam de Sensu, Motu, et Idearum Generatione, without date,
he will find that it is nothing more nor less than an abstract, in
Latin, of the first part of Hartley's Observations; and that the
question of Free-will is nowhere opened in it. I can only suppose that Dr. Parr, unacquainted with physiological speculations,
was misled by the admirable discussion of automatic and voluntary actions (pp. 31-35), into the notion that Hartley there espoused the doctrine of free-will; but I am surprised that Sir W.
Hamilton should have allowed the error to pass uncorrected in
his edition of Stewart's Dissertation.
Hartley died on the 25th of August, 1757, aged fifty-two, and
* Stewart's Dissertation, part ii. p. 355 of Hamilton's edition.




HARTLEY'S SYSTEM.                605
left a name so distinguished for piety and goodness, that it in a
great measure shielded his doctrines from the reprobation they
have often incurred when promulgated by others.
~ II. HARTLEY'S SYSTEM.
Combining a suggestion thrown out by Newton at the end of his
Principia, and in the questions annexed to his Optics, respecting
vibrations of an ether as the cause of sensation, with the doctrine
of Locke respecting Association of Ideas, Hartley produced a
system of Psychology, which is historically curious as the first
attempt to explain psychological phenomena on physiological
principles. If not worth much as a contribution to Philosophy,
it is very noticeable as an effort to connect intellectual with physical phenomena; and, however subsequent writers may have ridiculed, not without excuse, the vibrations and vibratiuncles which
Hartley substituted for the old metaphysical conceptions, it
is certain that his attempt to explain the phenomena physiologically, has very much influenced the thoughts of succeeding
speculators.
"Man," he says, "consists of two parts, body and mind."
Does he mean by this to proclaim the existence of a distinct,
immaterial entity superadded to the body? According to the
terms of his definition, on the first page of his work, this seems
to be his intention; for he defines it as "that substance, agent,
principle, etc., to which we refer the sensations, ideas, pleasures,
pains, and voluntary motions." Yet the whole system of vibrations seems to imply the contrary; and at the close of the first
part of his work, he declares that he holds himself aloof from
the question altogether. He will not deny the immateriality of
mind: "On the contrary, I see clearly, and acknowledge readily,
that matter and motion, however subtly divided, yield nothing
more than matter and motion still. But then neither would I
affirm that this consideration affords a proof of the soul's immateriality."  He thinks, with Locke, that it is quite possible the
Creator should have endowed matter with sensation; but he will




606                     HARTLEY.
not undertake to affirm it as a truth.  "It is sufficient for me
that there is a certain connection, of one kind or other, between
the sensations of the soul, and the motions excited in the medullary substance of the brain."*  A more rigorous logic would
have forced him into a more decided opinion; for this question
of the soul's immateriality is one vitally affecting the system of
vibrations; and his adversaries have had little difficulty in showing the insufficiency of "vibrations" to explain the phenomena
of an immaterial mind. Between the immaterial principle and
these material vibrations, there is an impassable gulf; let the
other vibrate never so rhythmically, it always remains " vibrating
ether," it cannot become " sensation," " thought;" nor does Hartley bridge over the gulf by the assumption of an " infinitesimal
elementary body intermediate between the soul and the gross
body," to which, and from which, the vibrations of the nerves
are communicated; the radical difficulty remains the same.
It may be objected, perhaps, that those who point out the defect in Hartley's hypothesis are themselves open to a similar
charge, since they assume an immaterial principle to be effected
by a material change, and assume the mind to be in connection
with the body, following its alterations. But there is this difference between them and Hartley: they do not pretend to explain
how mind is affected by body; he does. They accept, as an ultimate fact, what he attempts to elucidate; and it is his elucidation which they refuse to acknowledge.
And we must agree with them in rejecting the hypothesis
which Hartley proposes; for it is not only incompetent to explain the phenomena, but it is also one of those ingenuities incapable of really serving the purpose of a good hypothesis, because
in itself wholly incapable of verification.
His first proposition is that " The white medullary substance
of the brain, spinal marrow, and the nerves proceeding from
* Compare also Scholium to Prop. 5 (vol. i. p. 83) and Conjecturce qumdam
de Sensu, etc., p. 41.




HARTLEY S SYSTEM.                 607
them, is the immediate instrument of sensation and motion."
Modern physiologists maintain precisely the reverse of this, declaring the gray matter to be the specific seat of sensation and
intelligence. I may say, in passing, that both these positions
seem to me erroneous in their exclusiveness; and that the white
as well as the gray substance must be present, just as the zinc
and copper plates must both be present in the galvanic battery.
Hartley continues: "External objects impressed upon the
senses occasion, first in the nerves on which they are impressed,
and then in the brain, Vibrations of the small-or, as any one
may say, infinitesimal-medullary particles. These Vibrations
are motions backwards and forwards, of the same kind as the
oscillation of pendulums, and the tremblings of the particles of
sounding bodies. They must be conceived to be exceedingly
short and small, so as not to have the least efficacy to disturb or
move the whole bodies of the nerves or brain. For that the
nerves themselves should vibrate like musical strings is highly
absurd."
It appears from a passage in the Contemplation de la Nature
of the Genevese naturalist, Charles Bonnet, who published, almost contemporaneously with Hartley, a doctrine almost indistinguishable from Hartley's, that certain physiologists had already
entertained the idea of sensation being the result of a nervous
oscillation. "Ils vouloient faire osciller les nerfs pour rendre
raison des sensations; et les nerfs ne peuvent pas osciller. Ils
sont mous, et nullement elastiques."*  Not the nerves, but the
elastic ether which penetrates the nerves, is the seat of these oscillations, according to Hartley and Bonnet.
The greatest defect of this hypothesis is that it explains nothing, while seeming to explain every thing. Sensation remains
as mysterious as before. If we call sensations by the new name
of vibrations, we have done nothing but change the name; and
if we say sensations are vibrations, or are produced by them,
then the onus of proof rests.on our shoulders.
* Partie vii. ch. i.




608                     HARTLEY.
While acknowledging the defect of Hartley's system, let us
not forget its excellence. If the doctrine of Association was not
first applied by him, it was by him first made a physiologicopsychological basis. He not only applied it to the explanation
of mental phenomena; he applied it, and with great ingenuity,
to those physiological phenomena which still interest and perplex philosophers, namely the voluntary and involuntary actions.
His twenty-first proposition, and the elucidations which follow,
deserve to be read, even in the present day; and the following
passage fiom the abstract published in Parr's Tracts, is, in its
pregnant brevity, worth quoting here. "Discentes pulsare instrumenta musica, primo movent digitos actione voluntaria, connectentes interea Ideas, imperiaque Animoe, hos motus lente
excitantia, cum aspectu characterum musicorum. Continuato hoc
processu, accedunt indies, propius propiusque ad se invicem,
motus digitorum, et impressiones characterum, et tandem, Ideis
et imperils Animae in infinitum quasi diminutis, coalescunt. Fidicen igitur peritus chordas digitis percurrit citissime, et ordine
justo, ex mero aspectu characterum musicorum, animo interim
alienis cognitationibus intento; atque proinde characteres musici
idem. illi prsestant officium, ac Sensationes impresswe recens natis,
in motibus eorum automaticis. Migrant itaque ope Associationis
tam Motus voluntarii in automaticos, quam automatici in voluntarios."*
So little dependent is the psychological doctrine of Association
on the physiological doctrine of Vibrations, that Priestley, in his
Abridgment of Hartley, omits the latter hypothesis altogether.
The principle of Association passed into the Scotch school; and
Hartley thus historically forms the transition to Reid and his
followers, who studiously avoided any thing like a physiological
explanation of mental phenomena. Before passing to Reid, however, it will be well to glance at Darwin.
* Conjecturae, p. 84.




CHAPTER        III.
DARWIN.
ALTHOUGH even more neglected than Hartley by the present
generation, Darwin, once so celebrated, deserves mention here
as one of the psychologists who aimed at establishing the physiological basis of mental phenomena.
Erasmus Darwin was born at EIton, near Newark, on the 12th
December, 1731. After studying at St. John's College, Cambridge, and taking his degree of Doctor of Medicine at Edinburgh, he established himself as a physician in Lichfield, married twice, had three sons, and died in the seventieth year of his
age, 18th April, 1802. As a poet, his Botanic Garden (1781)
by its tawdry splendor gained him a tawdry reputation; as a
philosopher his Zoonomia; or, Laws of Organic Life (2 vols.
4to, 1794-6), gained him a reputation equally noisy and fleeting.
Although couched in different Ianguage, Darwin's theory is
substantially the same as Hartley's; instead of " vibrations" he
substitutes " sensorial motions." By the sensorium Darwin means
"not only the medullary part of the brain, spinal marrow, nerves,
organs of sense, and of the muscles; but also at the same time
that living principle, or spirit of animation, which resides throughout the body without being cognizable to our senses, except by
its effects."  The changes which occasionally take place in the
sensorium, as during the exertions of volition, or the sensations
of pleasure or pain, are termed sensorial rmotions.*
The medullary substance, he thinks,, passes along the nerves
and mingles with the muscular fibres. The "organs of sense
consist in like manner of moving fibres enveloped in the medullary substance."  The word idea has various meanings, he says,
*-ZSooomia, vol. i. p, 10.
2,6,',:  




610                       DARWIN.
and to give it precision he defines it as " a contraction or motion, or configuration of the fibres which constitute the immediate organ of sense. Synonymous with the word idea we shall
sometimes use the words sensual motion, in contradistinction to
muscular motion."
He then undertakes to prove the existence of these sensual
motions, and deduces firom this proof the fact that as we advance
in life all the parts of our bodies become rigid, and are consequently less susceptible of new habits of motion, though they
retain those already established.  Hence only the young can
learn; hence the aged forget the events of yesterday and remember those of infancy.*
" If our recollection, or imagination, be not a repetition of
animal movements, I ask, in my turn, What is it?  You tell me
it consists of images or pictures of things.  Where is this extensive canvas hung up? or where the numerous receptacles in
which these are deposited? or to what else in the animal system have they any similitude? That pleasing picture of objects,
represented in miniature on the retina of the eye, seems to have
given rise to this illusive oratory! It was forgot that this representation belongs rather to the laws of light than to those of
life; and may with equal elegance be seen in the camera obscura as in the eye; and that the picture vanishes forever when
the object is withdrawn."t
Had Darwin left us only the passage just cited, we should
have credited him with a profounder insight into Psychology
than any of his contemporaries, and the majority of his successors, exhibit; and although the perusal of Zoonomia must convince every one that Darwin's system is built up of absurd hypotheses, Darwin deserves a place in history for that one admirable
conception of psychology as subordinate to the laws of life. So
* Zoonomia, vol. i. p. 27.
t Ibid., p. 29. In Bain's Senses and the Intellect, p. 60 sq., the reader will
find the old theory of a sensoriumr, or chamber of images, which Darwin
here pushes aside, satisfactorily refuted from the physiological point of view.




DARWIN.                      611
little has this conception been appreciated, that not only are systems of Psychology constructed in serene indifference to Physiology, but many of the questions agitated in mental Physiology
are hopelessly entangled because men will not, or cannot, discriminate between problems of Physics and problems of Physiology; between phenomena regulated by laws of inorganic matter, and phenomena regulated by laws of organic matter. Thus
the questions, Why with two eyes do we see objects single? and,
Why do we not see objects inverted, since their images are inverted on the retina? have puzzled thousands; and not one of
the attempted solutions has recognized the important fact that
the problems are psychological, not optical nor anatomical, consequently cannot be settled by optics or anatomy; angles of
incidence, and discussation of optic nerves, have nothing to do
with the phenomena the moment after the Sensational Centre
has been affected. We might as well attempt to deduce the assimilation of sugar from the angles of its crystals, or from the
sand-like disposition of its grains, as to deduce the perception
of an object from the laws of optics: the crystals and grains of
sugar must first be destroyed, and the sugar made soluble, before
it can be assimilated; the retinal images must, in like manner,
first be transformed in the Sensational Centre before they can,
through the sensational centre, affect the cerebrum.
That this is no gratuitous hypothesis of mine, but expresses
the actual process of perception, in as far as that process has
been ascertained, may perhaps be made clear from the following
considerations. When I say that the perception of a visual object is a psychological act, not in any way explicable by the laws
of optics, or by any investigation of the anatomical structure of
the optic apparatus, I ground that assertion on certain authoritative facts; for example, I take up the vexed question of our perceiving an object as single, although two images are formed on
the two retinas; and instead of endeavoring to explain it by delicate anatomy of the retina, or the decussating fibres of the optic
nerves, I at once remove it from that circle of discussion by class



612                     DARWIN.
ing it with phenomena precisely analogous. We see objects
single with two eyes; true, but we also hear sounds as single
with two ears, we smell odors as single with two nostrils, we feel
objects as single with five fingers. How is it that no physiologist has reflected on the bearing of these facts? If the ordinary
explanations of optical perception are correct, why do not auditory and olfactory nerves decussate?-Why do not the waves of
sound affect similar points of the tympanum-and so the whole
mystery be cleared up? No sooner is attention called to the
fact of single hearing and single smelling, with two auditory and
two olfactory nerves, than we at once cease to regard single
vision with two optic nerves as any thing special, and we try if
a psychological explanation will not avail. I believe the explanation to be very simple. We cannot have two precisely similar sensations at precisely the same instant; the simultaneousness
of the two sensations renders them indistinguishable. Two sounds
of precisely the same pitch and intensity, succeeding each other
by an appreciable interval, will be heard as two sounds; but if
they succeed each other so rapidly that the interval is inappreciable, no distinction will be felt, and the two will be heard as
one, because heard simultaneously. As I am forced to be very
brief here, the reader will not expect any development of this
theory, but will pass with me to the consideration of other psychological aspects of perception.
The fact of our being able to see an image reflected on the
retina of an animal, and of our being able to explain on optical
principles the formation of that image, has very much misled
physiologists in their efforts to comprehend sensation; they have
naturally imagined that in vision we see the retinal image;
whereas, unless I am altogether mistaken, we see nothing of the
kind-we are affected by that retinal image, as in hearing we are
affected by a wave of air, but do not perceive the wave; or as in
smelling we are affected by the action of volatile substances on
the olfactory nerve, but do not perceive the substances. We
only perceive the changes effected in us by these agents.




DARWIN.                      613
The various Sensational Centres (see p. 598) are variously
affected by the same stimuli: electricity giving to the gustatory
nerve the stimulus of savorous bodies, to the auditory nerve the
stimulus of sonorous vibrations, to the optic nerve the stimulus
of luminous bodies, to the tactile nerves the stimulus of touch.
Pressure on the eye causes luminous spots to be seen; we seem
to see fire-flies.  The pressure of over-distended blood-vessels
produces spectral illusions, and we see daggers in the air as
vividly as any at our sides. Unhappy students well know the
" singing in the ears" produced by over-study. Nor is this all:
narcotics introduced into the blood excite in each Sensational
Centre the specific sensation normally excited by its external
stimuli; giving the appearance of luminous spots to the eyes, of
singing in the ears to the auditory nerves, and of "creeping sensations" to the nerves of touch.
The reason of this is that each Sensational Centre has its specific manner of being affected, no matter what the specific nature
of the thing affecting it. While only certain things affect it sensationally, all those which do affect it, do so in a specific manner.
Light, for instance, affects the optic centre, but produces no appreciable effect on the auditory, gustatory, or tactile centres;
nevertheless the optic centre may be affected by pressure, by
narcotics, or by electricity, precisely in the same way as by
light. The vibrations of a tuning-fork, which affect the auditory
centre as sound, affect the tactile centre as "tickling," not
" sound."
From these indubitable facts it is not difficult to elicit a conclusion, namely, that sensation depends on the Sensational Centre
and not on the external stimulus, that stimulus being only the
cause of the sensational change. Whether the retina be directly
affected by rays of light issuing from an object, or the optic centre be affected by the pressure of congested blood-vessels, in each
case we see, in each case the optic centre is affected in that specific manner in which alone it is capable of being affected. Consequently inasmuch as the visual sensation depends on the optic




614                     DARWIN.
centre being affected, and does not depend on the formation of
an image on the retina, we have no alternative but to admit that
the retinal affection is transformed by the Sensational Centre, and
there the impression first becomes a sensation.
It may be added as confirmation of the foregoing doctrine respecting the centre as the seat of sensation, that Muller has cited
examples of luminous spectra being excited by internal causes
after the complete destruction of the retina; and " Luicke relates
the case of a patient who, after the extirpation of the eye for fungoid disease, perceived all kinds of luminous appearances independently of external objects."*
When therefore it is asked, Why do we see objects erect,
when they throw inverted images on the retina? the answer is,
Because we do not see the retinal image at all; we see, or are
affected by, the object; and our perception of the erectness of
that object does not depend on vision, but on our conceptions of
space and the relations of space-which are not given in the
visual sensation, but are ideal conceptions: conceptions which
are acquired in a complicated series of inferences, according to
most philosophers; which are "forms of thought," according to
Kant; but which are by no school held to be immediate elements of sensation.
We thus return to the position that in every act of consciousness the impression on the nerve becomes transformed into a
sensation only in the Sensational Centre; and the old theories
of " eidola," "images," " impressions," are seen to be untenable.
Just as the crystals of sugar have to be decomposed, and the
sugar transformed into glucose, the glucose transformed into
lactic acid, before sugar can be assimilable in the organism, so
have the retinal images to be decomposed in the optic centre before a visual sensation can be produced. Attempt a more direct
process, and failure is inevitable: cane-sugar injected into the
veins is expelled in the urine as a foreign substance, not assimila* Muller, Physiology, Eng. Trans. i. 1072.




DARWIN.                     615
ble; and, in like manner, the most dexterous adjustment of rays
of light falling immediately on the optic ganglion, not transmitted thereto by the optic nerve, would produce no visual sensation.
Does not this demonstrate the purely subjective nature of all
our knowledge, and the necessary admixture of the ideal element
in all perception? It also demonstrates the futility of the theory
adopted by Hartley and Darwin, which attempts to explain mental phenomena by "vibrations" and "motions."  Motion can
only be motion, it cannot be the specific phenomena we name
sensation. To call sensations and ideas by the vague name of
motions, is to violate the conditions of philosophic language, and
to mislead those who accept it into the belief that an explanation
has been given in the change of term. That Darwin was by it
misled into absurdity will be apparent in the following attempt
to explain perception:
" No one will deny," he says, "that the medulla of the brain
and nerves has a certain figure; which, as it is diffused through
nearly the whole of the body, must have nearly the figure of
that body. Now it follows that the spirit of animation, or living
principle, as it occupies this medulla and no other part, has also
the same figure as the medulla... which is nearly the figure
of the body. When the idea of solidity is excited, a part of the
extensive organ of touch is compressed by some external body,
and this part of the sensorium so compressed exactly resembles
in figure the figure of the body that compressed it. Hence
when we acquire the idea of solidity we acquire at the same time
the idea of figure; and this idea of figure, or motion of a part
of the organ of touch, exactly resembles in its figure the figure
of the body that occasions it; and thus exactly acquaints us with
this property of the external world."*
He is thus brought back to the old conception of the mind
being " impressed" by the exact forms of objects as wax is impressed by a seal. As he proceeds he gets more and more ab* Zoonomia, pp. 111-2.




616                      DARWIN.
surd. Thus he says, although " there may exist beings in the
universe that have not the property of solidity; that is, which
can possess any part of space at the same time that it is occupied
by other bodies; yet there may be other beings that can assume
this property of solidity or disrobe themselves of it occasionally, as
we are taught of spirits and of angels; and it would seem that
the spirit of animation must be endued with this property, otherwise how could it occasionally give motion to the limbs of animals? or be itself stimulated into motion by the obtrusions of
surrounding bodies, as of light or odor "*  He is led to this by
the Spinozistic axiom, that." no two things can influence or affect
each other which have not some property common to both of
them," which axiom destroys the possibility of spirit acting on
body. Hartley, as we saw, tried to get over this difficulty by
assuming the existence of a substance intermediate between body
and spirit. Darwin finds it easy to assume that the spirit has
the power of putting on or putting off the properties of matter
just as it pleases.  "Hence the spirit of animation at the time
it communicates or receives motion from solid bodies must itself
possess some property of solidity. And at the time it receives
other kinds of motion from light, it must possess that property
which light possesses to communicate that motion named Visibility. In like manner it possesses Saporosity, Odorosity, Tangibility, and Audibility."+
This is enough to show how little Darwin understood the real
value of his luminous idea respecting Psychology based on the
laws of life; enough also to make every one understand how
philosophers rebelled against such " materialism" as issued from
the explanation of mental phenomena by "sensory motions."
Before finally quitting the Zoonomia we must pause a moment
over the explanation of our feeling for Beauty. He describes the
sensations of the babe when "( soon after it is born into this cold
world it is applied to its mother's warm bosom," and the agree* Zoonomia, p. 114.              t Aid. i. 115.




DARWIN.                       617
able influences which thus grow up in the mind associated with
the form of the bosom   "which the infant embraces with its
hands, presses with its lips, and watches with its eyes; and thus
acquires more accurate ideas of the form than of the odor, and
flavor, or warmth, which it perceives by its other senses. And
hence in our maturer years, when any object of vision is presented
to us, which, by its waving or spiral lines, bears any similitude
to the form of the female bosom,-whether it be found in a
landscape with soft gradations of rising and descending surface,
or in the.form of some antique vases, or in the works of the
pencil or chisel,-we feel a general glow of delight which seems
to influence all our senses; and if the object be not too large,
we experience an attraction to embrace it with our arms, and
to salute it with our lips, as we did in our early infancy the bosom
of our mother."*
One of the happiest illustrations of ridicule being the test of
truth, is the reply of Sheridan to this theory of Beauty. " I suppose," said he, "that the child brought up by hand, would feel
all these emotions at the sight'of a wooden spoon!"
Zoonomia, i. 145.




SEVENTH EPOCH.
SECOND CRISIS: IDEALISM, SKEPTICISM, AND SENSATIONALISM PRODUCING THE REACTION OF COMMON SENSE.
CHAPTER I.
REID.
DUGALD STEWART opens his Account of the Life and Writings
of Thomas Reid with remarking that the life was " uncommonly
barren of those incidents which furnish materials for biography;"
and as our space is scanty, we will content ourselves with a bare
enumeration of such facts as may be useful for reference. Thomas
Reid was born in 1710, at Strachan in Kincardineshire. He
was educated at Marischal College, Aberdeen. In 1752 he occupied the chair of Moral Philosophy in Aberdeen. In 1764 appeared his Inquiry into the Human Mlind on the Principles of
Common Sense. "In 1763* the Inquiry received a still more
substantial testimony of approbation from the University of
Glasgow," in the offer of the chair of Moral Philosophy, vacant
by the resignation of Adam Smith. In 1780 Reid resigned his
office, and passed the remaining years of his life in retirement
and study. In 1785 appeared his Essays on the Intellectual
Powers. He died in Glasgow in 1796, having survived four of
his children.
* We follow Stewart; but there must be some error here. If the Inquiry
was not published till 1764, Reid could not in 1763 have been offered the
chair at Glasgow as a " testimony of approbation."




REID.                       619
Reid's philosophy made a great stir at first, but has for some
years past been sinking into merited neglect. The appeal to
Common Sense as arbiter in Philosophy, is now pretty well understood to be on a par with Dr. Johnson's kicking a stone as a
refutation of Berkeley. Indeed Dugald Stewart himself was fully
alive to the inconsequence of such an argument, and endeavored
to shield his master by saying that the phrases "Common Sense"
and " Instinct" were unhappily chosen. Unfortunately they were
not mere phrases with Reid; they were principles. It is impossible to read the Inquiry and not see that Reid took his stand
upon Common Sense;* and Beattie and Oswald, his immediate
disciples, are still more open to the charge.
It would carry us to great lengths if we were to examine all
the questionable tenets contained in the Philosophr of Common
Sense. We cannot however pass the supposed triumph over
Locke, who said that personal identity consists in Consciousness;
"that is," continues Reid, "if you are conscious you did such a
thing a twelvemonth ago, this consciousness of what is past can
signify nothing else but the remembrance that I did it; so
Locke's principle must be, that Identity consists in remembrance;
and, consequently, a man must lose his personal identity with
regard to every thing he forgets." Here Locke is altogether
misstated. Consciousness does not resolve itself into any single
act of memory, as Reid would here have us believe, nor can personal identity be limited to any one act. I have the consciousness of a certain mental state, therewith is connected the remembrance of some anterior state, which was also connected
with an anterior state, and so on. The chain is made up of
many links, and although some of these may be out of sight, not
one is broken. I am connected with my boyhood by a regular
series of transmitted acts of consciousness. I may have forgotten
* "I despise Philosophy, and renounce its guidance: let my soul dwell
with Common Sense." (Inquiry, ch. i. ~ 8.) Let it be observed in passing,
that by Reid's disciples the Inquiry is always regarded as his best work;
the Essays were written in old age.




620                       REID.
a thousand things, but I have not forgotten myself: if one act
performed yesterday is forgotten to-day, all are not forgotten;
and to remember one, however indistinctly, is sufficient to keep
up the continuity of consciousness. Let those who fancy the
sentiment of personal identity does not consist in the consciousness of personal identity, show us in what it does consist.
We come now to Reid's great achievement, that upon which
he declared his philosophical fame to rest: the refutation of
Berkeley and Hume by the refutation of the Ideal theory. This
he considered as his contribution to philosophy; this has been
made the monument of his glory. It appears to us, after a long
acquaintance with his writings, and a careful perusal of what his
critics and admirers have advanced, that his sole merit in this
respect is that of having called attention to some abuses of language, and to some examples of metaphors mistaken for facts.
How much confusion the word "idea" has always created need
scarcely be alluded to; and any, attempt to destroy the acceptation of the word as tantamount to image, must be welcomed as
salutary. So far let us be grateful to Reid. Locke's use of the
word "idea" as signifying " a thought" instead of an "image,"
has misled thousands. But whatever abuses may have crept in
with the use of the word idea, it seems to us quite clear that
Berkeley and Hume are not to be refuted by refuting the hypothesis of ideas, as Reid and his school suppose.
Let us, to avoid useless discussion, take it for granted that
philosophers did adopt the theory of ideas which Reid combats;
let us also grant that Reid 4has overturned that theory. What
advance is made towards a solution of the problem? Not one
step. The dilemma into which Hume threw Philosophy remains
the same as ever. As I cannot transcend the sphere of my Consciousness, I can never know things except as they act upon me
-as they affect my Consciousness. In other words, a knowledge
of an external world otherwise than as it appears to my Sense,
which transforms and distorts it, is impossible.
This proposition may be said to form the ground of Skepti



REID.                      621
cism. Now, we ask, how is that proposition affected by overthrowing the ideal theory?  What does it signify whether the
"affections of my consciousness" be regarded as "images" or
not? They do not remain less purely subjective which ever way
we regard them. They are changes in me. The main position
of Skepticism is precisely this subjectivity of knowledge. Because we cannot transcend consciousness, we can never know
things per se. Reid acknowledges that we cannot know things
per se; but he says that we must believe in them, because in
what we do know their existence is suggested. This is exactly
the opinion of Locke; nay more, it is the doctrine of Hume: for
he says that we do believe in an external world, though we have
no good reason for doing so. Sir J. Mackintosh relates, that he
once observed to Dr. Thomas Brown that he thought Reid and
Hume differed more in words than opinions: Brown answered,
"Yes, Reid bawled, out we must believe in an outward world;
but added, in a whisper, we can give no reason for our belief.
Hume cries out we can give no reason for such a notion; and
whispers, I own we cannot get rid of it."
Reid ought to have seen that his refutation of the ideal theory
left Idealism and Skepticism untouched:* for either doctrine it
matters little how the knowledge be acquired, so that it be entirely subjective. The argument brought forward by Dugald
Stewart-that the belief in the existence of an external world
is one of the Fundamental Laws of Human Belief-is more philosophical; but when he says that Berkeley's Idealism was owing
to the unhappy and unphilosophical attempt of Descartes to
prove the existence of the world, he forgets that Idealism was
known in the ancient schools long before any one thought of
proving the existence of matter. Moreover, although Stewart's
formula is not open to the same objections as Reid's, yet it leaves
the vital question untouched.
No one doubts that we believe in the existence of an external
* In fact, Malebranche's Idealism, which is very similar to Berkeley's, is
founded on a theory of Perception almost identical with Reid's.




622                       REID.
world. Idealism never questions the fact. The only doubt is,
whether that belief be objectively as well as subjectively true.
To say that the belief in objective existence is a Fundamental
Law, is simply saying that we are so constituted that we are
forced to attribute external reality to our sensations. As well
say we are so constituted that fire applied to our bodies will give
us pain. We are so constituted. What then?   Does this advance us one step? Not one. We have still to seek some proof
of the laws of our constitution being the measure of the laws of
other existences-still to seek how what is true of the subjective
must necessarily be true of the objective.
Thus, granting to Stewart all he claims, we see that he does
not attain to the heart of the question; and, strictly speaking,
he does not touch Berkeley at all; he only touches Hume.
For what answer can it be to Berkeley, to say that our Belief in
matter is a Fundamental Law, not to be questioned? Berkeley
would reply: "Exactly; I said as much. I said that men believed their senses, and believed that what they saw was out of
them. This is the law of human nature: God has so ordained
it. But that which men do not believe, is the existence of an
occult substance, an imaginary world lying underneath all appearances. You do not mean to assert that the belief in this substance is a Fundamental Law? If you do, you must be mad."
Stewart's answer is thus shown to be quite beside the mark.
Reid constantly declares that no reason can be given for our
belief; it must be referred to an original instinctive principle of
our constitution, implanted in us for that express purpose. If
this be so, we ask, upon what pretence does Reid claim the
merit of having refuted Idealism and Skepticism by refuting the
ideal hypothesis?  If instinct and not reason is to settle the
question, then has the ideal hypothesis nothing to do with it; if
the refutation of the ideal hypothesis sufficed, then has instinct
nothing to do with it. "To talk of Dr. Reid," said the Quarterly, in its review of Stewart's Second Dissertation, "as if his
writings had opposed a barrier to the prevalence of Skeptical




REID.                       623
philosophy, is an evident mistake. Dr. Reid successfully refuted
the principles by which Berkeley and Hume endeavored to
establish their conclusions; but the conclusions themselves he
himself adopted as the very premises from which he reasons.
The impossibility of proving the existence of a material world
from'reason, or experience, or instruction, or habit, or any other
principle hitherto known to philosophers,' is the argument and
the only argument by which he endeavors to force upon us his
theory of instinctive principles."
It appears, then, that inasmuch as Reid declares instinct to be
the only principle upon which we can found our belief in an external world, his argument against Berkeley is trebly vicious.
First, because the belief was never questioned; secondly, because
although we must act according to our instincts, such a necessity is no proof that our beliefs are true; thirdly, because if instinct, and not reason, is to be the arbiter, the attack on the
ideal hypothesis is utterly beside the question.
Thus we see that, granting to Reid the glory he claims of
having destroyed the ideal hypothesis, he has only destroyed an
outpost, fancying it to be the fortress. A few words on his own
theory of perception may not be out of place here.
He justly enough declared the ideal hypothesis to be gratuitous. We have no reason for supposing that the mind perceives
images of things instead of the things themselves. But he overlooks, or rather denies, the fact that we perceive things mediately; he says we perceive them immediately. His explanations
are contradictory and confused, but he repeats the assertion so
often, that there can be no doubt he meant to say we perceive
things immediately: the mind stands face to face with the thing,
and perceives it immediately, without any medium of ideas,
images, eidola, or the like. In this we believe him utterly in the
wrong; his battle against " ideas" carried him too far. It is one
thing to say that we are affected by the things, and not by images
of things; and another thing to say that we perceive things immediately. The former is correct; the latter is in direct contra



624                      REID.
diction with all we know of perception; and Reid constantly
contradicts himself on the point.
"When I attend," he says, "as carefully as I can to what
passes in my mind, it appears evident that the very thing I saw
yesterday, and the fragrance I smelled, are now the immediate
objects of my mind when I remember it.... Upon the strictest
attention, memory appears to me to have the things that are
past, and not present ideas for its objects."
This is his position against the ideal hypothesis, which assumes that nothing is perceived but what is in the mind which
perceives it; that we do not really perceive things which are
external, but only certain images and pictures of them imprinted
on the mind. The position is untenable. The very thing, the
rose, of which he thinks, is not an immediate object at all: it is
elsewhere. The fragrance cannot even be recalled; that is to
say, cannot befelt again, but only thought. All we can remember is the fact of having been affected by the rose in a certain
manner: that affection we call fragrance; we cannot recall the
affection. Reid could hardly, therefore, have meant what his
words literally express. Perhaps he meant, that when we think
of the rose and the fiagrance, the object of which we think is
the rose, not an idea of the rose. But what a truism! He
says, that "in memory the things that are past, and not present
ideas, are the objects of the mind." This is either a needless
truism or a falsism. Let us alter the sentence thus-" In menory the things thought of are not themselves present to the mind,
but the thoughts only are present to it."  Reid would not dispute this-could not dispute it: yet it is only a more guarded
statement of the ideal hypothesis; it substitutes "thoughts" for
"ideas." He was misled by the ambiguity of the word " object,"
which he uses as if meaning simply what the mind is thinking
of; and of course the mind thinks of the thing, and not of the
idea. But the ideal hypothesis takes " object" to be that which
is immediately present to-face to face-with the mind, viz., an
idea, or thought; and of course the mind thinks by its thoughts:




REID.                      625
it may think about the thing, but it is through the medium of
thought.
The difference is this:-The Idealist says, that when things
affect us, our sensations are what we perceive, and not the things
producing those sensations. Reid says, we feel our sensations,
but therewith also we perceive the things. The Idealist further
says, that when we think of things, the immediate object face to
face with the mind is not a thing but an idea (thought). Reid
says the object is the very thing: which is either an absurdity,
or else does not differ from the ideal hypothesis.
We are quite ready to admit that the pretended separation
of thoughts from thinking, and the making thoughts "objects,"
is vicious; and therefore Reid's language is perhaps less objectionable. But we must confess that we see no other advantage
he gains over his adversaries. He does not pretend that our
sensations are at all like their causes; nay, he fancies that he
destroys the ideal hypothesis by insisting on the want of resemblance between matter and our sensations. He says, over and
over again, that the external world is in no respect like our sensations of it. " Indeed, no man can conceive any sensation to
resemble any known quality ofbodies. Nor can any man show,
by any good argument, that all our sensations might not have
been as they are, though no body, nor quality of body, had ever
existed."* This granted, the question arises, How do you know
any thing of the external world? Reid answers, "It is owing to
an original instinct implanted in us for that purpose." Push the
question further, drive him into a corner, and bid him tell you
what that instinct enables you to know of matter, and he will
answer, "In sensation there is suggested to us a cause of that
sensation in the quality of a body capable of producing it. This
is Locke's view.
The great point in Reid's theory is, that with our sensations
are joined perceptions. "The senses have a double province," he
* Inquiryo, oh. v. 2.
27




626                       REID.
says; "they furnish us with a variety of sensations, some pleasant, others painful, and others indifferent; at the same time they
give us a conception, and an invincible belief of the existence of
external objects. This conception and belief, which nature produces by means of the senses, we call perception."*  This, upon
which so much stress is laid that philosophers are said to have
been always in error because they overlooked it, we regard as a
remarkable instance of Reid's want of subtlety. Neither Berkeley nor IIume denied the fact of our belief in the externality of
the causes of sensations: Berkeley denied that these causes had
an occult substratum; Hume denied that any reason could be
given for our belief in their externality. What force then has
" Perception 2" It is nothing more than that " belief," according to Reid; though to call perception a belief is, to say the
least, a somewhat inaccurate use of language. But grant all he
wishes, and you grant that with our sensations there is an accompanying belief in the existence of an external cause of those
sensations. Berkeley would answer, "Very true; but that cause
is not unthinking matter."  Hume would answer, " Very true;
but we)can give no reason for our belief; we can know nothing
of the cause."  Reid can only retort, "Perception is belief:" a
retort which has been deemed satisfactory by his school; which
really is only an abuse of language; and which moreover has
the further disadvantage of being available only as an argument
against Hume; for against Berkeley it is powerless. If perception is belief, and we perceive an external world, Hume may be
answered when he says we have no grounds for our belief. But
Berkeley is not answered. He says that we do believe in an external world; but that world is not a world of unthinking matter-it is a world of divine agency. Reid would not pretend
that in sensation or perception we can distinguish the nature of
the causes which affect us; he constantly tells us that we cannot know what those causes are, but only that there are causes.
* Essays on Intellectual Powers, ii. ch. xvii.




REID.                      627
As long as the noumenal world is removed from our inspection,
so long must Berkeley remain unrefuted by any theory of perception. The error of his system, as we endeavored to show, is
in the gratuitousness of his assumption with respect to the immediate agency of the Deity.
Reid says, that if we grant Berkeley's premise-viz. " we can
have no conception of any material thing which is not like some
sensation in our minds"-then are the conclusions of Idealism
and Skepticism unanswerable. This premise therefore he disputes. Now attend to his challenge:-" This I would therefore
humbly propose, as an experimentum crucis, by which the ideal
system must stand or fall; and it brings the matter to a short
issue: Extension, figure, and motion may, any one or all of them,
be taken for the subject of this experiment. Either they are
ideas of sensation, or they are not. If any one of them can be
shown to be an idea of sensation, or to have the least resemblance
to any sensation, I lay my hand upon my mouth and give up all
pretence to reconcile reason to common sense in this matter,
and must suffer the ideal skepticism to triumph."* It was not
till after repeated perusals that we caught the significance of
this passage; and are not quite positive that we have understood
it now. To admit it to have any force at all, we must understand
"ideas of sensation" as " images of sensation."  Certainly, extension is no copy of any one sensation. But if Reid means to say
that the idea of extension is not the result of complex sensations
which a body excites in us-if he means to say that the idea
of extension is not an abstract idea by which we express a certain property of bodies, a property known to us only through sensation-then must we cease all dispute, and leave him in possession of his wonderful discovery.
Reid's theory of perception may be thus stated:-External
objects occasion certain sensations in us; with these sensations
we perceive the existence of certain qualities capable of producing
* Inquiry, ch. v. ~ 7.




628                       REID.
them: these he distinguishes into primary and secondary. The
primary, he says, we perceive immediately; the second, mediately.
And this is the theory by which, with the aid of an " original
instinct" (some instincts then are acquired?), he is supposed to
have refuted Idealism. Any one may see that Berkeley might
readily have relinquished his ideal hypothesis, and accepted
Reid's, with perfect security for Idealism. The "unknown
causes," which Reid calls "qualities," Berkeley calls "divine
laws."  The difference is merely nominal.
This much with respect to Idealism. With respect to Hume,
the theory is almost as harmless. Hume would say, "All that
is given in sensation is sensation; your "perception" (which you
call belief) of qualities amounts to nothing more than a supposition-a necessary one, I admit; but I have always said that
our belief in external causes of sensation was an irresistible prejudice; and my argument is, that we have nothing but the prejudice as a proof-reason, we have none."
Finally, with respect to Locke, it will in the first place be seen
that Reid's solution is neither more nor less than that given by
Locke; in the second place, the boasted refutation of the ideal
hypothesis is always supposed by Reid's school to be a refutation
of Locke's view of the origin of knowledge; and this is a very
great mistake. Because Berkeley and Hume pushed Locke's
system to conclusions from which he wisely shrank, it has been
generally supposed that his account of the origin of our knowledge is indissolubly bound up with the ideal hypothesis, by it to
stand or fall. This probably is the meaning of the vulgar error
that Locke's view of knowledge leads to atheism. It led to
Hume.    In disproof of Reid's supposition we answer, firstly,
Idealism is not indissolubly bound up with the ideal hypothesis,
although Berkeley may have adopted that hypothesis; secondly,
Locke's system is altogether independent of the hypothesis, and
in his Review of the doctrines of Malebranche he very distinctly
and emphatically denies it. The force of this observation will
better be appreciated when it is remembered that although




REID.                         629
Locke's language is notoriously unguarded and wavering, all his
reasonings are founded on the use of the word " ideas" as synonymous with " notions" or thoughts."
In conclusion, although we think it has been shown that the
Common-Sense Philosophy egregiously      failed  in answering
Berkeley and Hume, it was not without service by directing the
attention of mankind more exclusively to Psychology. The
phrases so complacently used by Dugald Stewart to express the
nature of his inquiries, namely "inductive metaphysics" and
" experimental philosophy of the mind," are perhaps objectionable; but few will deny the value of his Elements, and of Brown's
Lectures, works so popular as to need no further mention here.
The Analysis of the Mind, by the late James Mill, which may
be regarded as the development of Hartley's doctrine, stripped
of its physical hypothesis, is less known; but it is a work of
great value, and would long ago have been as popular had it
been written in a more engaging manner. No one interested in
these inquiries should omit studying it.*
The philosophy of the Scotch School was a protest against
Skepticism. It failed; but another protest was made in Germany, and on philosophical principles. That also failed, but in
another way; and the attempt was altogether more worthy of
Philosophy. The reader foresees that we allude to Kant.
* Since the first edition of this work, Sir W. Hamilton has published an
edition of Reid, illustrated and enriched by notes and dissertations of incomparable erudition and acuteness. Respecting the interpretation Sir William
gives to Reid's doctrines, I will only say that he has shown what a subtle
mind can read into the philosophy of common sense; but he has not in the
least produced the conviction in me of Reid's having meant what the illustrious successor supposed him to have meant. At the same time I will add
that the limits of my work having restricted me to the consideration of Reid's
contributions to Philosophy (in the narrow sense of the term), I have not
done justice to his many excellent qualities as a teacher. His works are well
worthy of diligent study, and their spirit is eminently scientific.




EIGHTH EPOCH.
RECURRENCE TO THE FUNDAMENTAL QUESTION RESPECTING
THE ORIGIN OF KNOWLEDGE.
CHAPTER I.
KANT.
~ I. LIFE OF KANT.
IMMANUEL KANT was born at Konigsberg, in Prussia, 22d
April, 1724. His family was originally Scotch, a circumstance
which, when taken in conjunction with his philosophical connection with Hume, has some little interest. His father was a
saddler, a man of tried integrity. His mother was somewhat
severe, but upright, speaking the truth, and exacting it. Kant
was early bred in a love of truth, and had before him such examples of moral worth as must materially have contributed to
form his own inflexible principles.
Madame de Stael has remarked, that there is scarcely another
example, except in Grecian history, of a life so rigorously philosophical as that of Kant. He lived to a great age, and never
once quitted the snows of murky Konigsberg. There he passed
a calm and happy existence, meditating, professing, and writing.
He had mastered all the sciences; he had studied languages,
and cultivated literature. He lived and died a type of the German Professor: he rose, smoked, drank his coffee, wrote, lectured, took his daily walk always at precisely the same hour.
The cathedral clock, it was said, was not more punctual in its
movements than Immanuel Kant.*
* He mentions having once been kept two or three days from his promenade by reading Rousseau's Emile, which had just appeared.




LIFE OF KANT.                   631
He was early sent to the University. There he began and
there he ended his career. Mathematics and physics principally
occupied his attention at first; and the success with which he
pursued these studies soon manifested itself in various publications. He predicted the existence of the planet Uranus; and
Herschel himself, after discovering it, admitted Kant's having
first announced it.
But none of these publications attracted much attention till
the renown of his Critique of Pure Reason had made every
thing produced by him a matter of interest. Nor did the
Critique itself attract notice at first. The novelty of its views,
the repulsiveness of its terminology and style, for some time obscured its real value. This value was at length discovered and
made known. Al Germany rang with praises of the new philosophy. Almost every "chair" was filled by a Kantist. Numberless books, and not a few pamphlets, came rapidly from the
press, either attacking or defending the principles of the Critical
Philosophy.  Kant had likened himself to Copernicus. The
disciples likened him both to Copernicus and Newton; for he
had not only changed the whole science of Metaphysics, as
Copernicus had changed the science of Astronomy, but had also
consummated the science he originated.
The Critique was, he tells us, the product of twelve years'
meditation. It was written in less than five months. These
two facts sufficiently explain the defects of its composition. In
his long meditations he had elaborated his system, divided and
subdivided it, and completed its heavy and useless terminology.
In the rapidity of composition he had no time for the graces of
style, nor for that all-important clearness of structure which (depending as it does upon the due gradation of the parts, and upon
the clearness with which the parts themselves are conceived)
may be regarded as the great desideratum of a philosophical
style.
But in spite of these defects-defects which would have been
pardoned by no public but a German public-the Critique be



632                       KANT.
came celebrated, and its author had to endure the penalty of
celebrity.  He was pestered with numerous calls of curious
strangers, who would not leave Konigsberg without having seen
him. To the curious were added the admiring. Enthusiastic
scholars undertook long journeys to see their great master.
Professor Reuss one day walked into his study, saying brusquely
that "he had travelled a hundred and sixty miles to see and
speak with Kant."  The visits became so numerous, that in the
latter part of his life he contented himself with merely showing
himself at the door of his study for a few minutes.
Kant never spoke of his own system, and from his house the
subject was entirely banished. He scarcely read any of the attacks on his works: he had enough of Philosophy in his study
and lecture-room, and was glad to escape from it to the topics of
the day.
He died on the 12th of February, 1804, in the eightieth year
of his age, retaining his powers almost to the last. He latterly,
during his illness, talked much of his approaching end. " I do
not fear death," he said, "for I know how to die. I assure you
that if I knew this night was to be my last, I would raise my
hands and say,'God be praised' The case would be far different if I had ever caused the misery of any of his creatures."
For a picture of Kant's daily habits, and many interesting
traits of his character, the reader will do well to look at De
Quincey's "Last Days of Immanuel Kant," in the third volume
of his Miscellanies. I cannot find space for such details; nor
for more than a passing mention of Kant's relation to Swedenborg, of which such unjustifiable use is often made by the admirers of the latter, who proclaim, with emphasis, that Kant
testified to the truth of Swedenborg's clairvoyance. He did
nothing of the kind. In his Letter on Swedenborg* he narrates
two of the reported cases of Swedenborg's clairvoyance, and says
* Keine Anthropologische Schriften (Theil vii. p. 5, of Rosenkrantz and
Schubert's ed.).




KANT'S HISTORICAL POSITION.               633
he knows not how to disprove them, they being supported by
such respectable testimony; but he nowhere testifies to them
himself; and in the Anthropologie, ~~ 35 and 37,* his energetic
contempt for Swedenborgianism and all other Schwirmerei is
unequivocally expressed.
~ II. KANT'S HISTORICAL POSITION.
There is a notion, somewhat widely spread through England,
that Kant was a "dreamer." He is regarded as a sort of Mystic;
and the epithet "transcendental" is made to express the superb
contempt which common sense feels for the vagaries of philosophers. The "dreams of the Kantian philosophy," and "transcendental nonsense," are phrases which, once popular, now less
so, are still occasionally to be met with in quarters where one
little expects to find them.
We are bound to say that, whatever the errors of Kantism,
"dreaminess" or "mysticism" are the last qualities to be predicated of it. If its terminology render it somewhat obscure and
repulsive, no sooner is the language comprehended, than all obscurity falls away, and a system of philosophy is revealed, which
for rigor, clearness, and, above all, intelligibility, surpasses by
many degrees systems hitherto considered easy enough of comprehension.
Convinced that the system of Kant is plainly intelligible, and
finding that neither Kant himself, nor the generality of his expositors, have succeeded in overcoming the repulsiveness of neologisms and a cumbrous terminology,t our task must obviously
* Kleine Anthropologische Schriften, zweite Abtheil. p. 89 sq.
t Since this was written, we have read the work of Victor Cousin, Lecons
sur Kant, vol. i. Paris, 1842. (Translated into English by Mr. Henderson,
London, 1854.) It is not only one of the best expositions we have seen; it
is also the most intelligible. The chapter on Kant in M. Barchou de Penhoen's useful work, Histoire de la Philos. Allemande depuis Leibnitz jusqu'a
Begel, 2 vols. Paris, 1836, may also be read with advantage; though incomplete, it is intelligible. Also Morell's History of Speculative Philos. in the
Nineteenth Century. Readers of German will do well to read Chalybaus's
Historische Entwickelung der Speculativen Philos. von Kant bis Ilegel (Dres270




634                        KANT.
be to give an exposition of the system, as far as possible, in ordinary philosophical language; and, by exhibiting the historical
position which it occupies, connect with it speculations already
familiar to the reader.
From Spinoza to Kant the great question had been this:Have we, or have we not, any Ideas which can be called necessarily, absolutely true? A question which resolved itself into this:
Have we, or have we not, any Ideas independent of Experience?
The answer given by the majority of thinkers was, that we
had no ideas independent of Experience; and Hume had shown
that Experience itself was utterly incompetent to assure us of
any truth not simply relative.
Experience irresistibly led to Skepticism. The dilemma, therefore, which we signalized in the First Crisis of modern Philosophy, again presented itself: Spinozism  or Skepticism?   The
labors of so many thinkers had only brought the question round
to its starting-point. But Spinozism was alarming-Skepticism
scarcely less so. Before submitting to be gored by either horn
of the dilemma, men looked about to see if there was no escape
possible. A temporary refuge was found by the Scotch School
in Common Sense, and by Kant in Criticism.
Kant called his system the Critical Philosophy. His object
was to examine into the nature of this Experience which led to
Skepticism. While men were agreed that Experience was the
source of all knowledge, Kant asked himself, What is this Experience?-What are its Elements 
The problem he set himself to solve was but a new aspect of
den, 1843). (It has been twice translated into English: by Mr. Tulk and by
Mr. Edersheim.) Michelet's Geschichte der letzten Systeme der Philos. in
Deutschland von Kant bis Hegel (Berlin, 1887), is a learned and valuable
work, but can be read only by the initiated. More generally useful than
any of these is the Hist. de la Philos. Allemande depuis Kant jusqu'a Hege4
by J. Wilm, Paris, 1856. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason has been translated by Mr. Meiklejohn (Bohn's Philosophical Library, 1855) with so much
accuracy and ability that the translation may be read with entire confidence;
which can rarely be said of translations from the German.




KANT'S HISTORICAL POSITION.             635
the problem of Locke's Essay.  On this deep and intricate question of human knowledge two opposite parties had been formed
-the one declaring that all our knowledge was given in Experience, and that all the materials were derived from Sensation,
and Reflection upon those materials; the other declaring that
Sensation only furnished a portion of our Experience. This second party maintained that there were Elements of knowledge
which not only were never derived from Sensation, but which
absolutely transcended all sensation. Such, for instance, is the
idea of Substance. Experience only informs us of qualities: to
these qualities we add a substratum which we call Substance;
and this idea of a substratum, which we are compelled to add,
Locke himself confesses we never gained through any sensation
of matter.  Other ideas, such as Causality, Infinity, Eternity,
etc., are also independent of Experience: eryo, says this school,
antecedent to it.
In the course of inquiry, the untenableness of the theory of
innate ideas had become apparent.   Descartes himself, when
closely pressed by his adversaries, gave it up. Still the fact of
our possessing ideas apparently not derivable from experience,
remained; and this fact was to be explained. To explain it,
Leibnitz asserted that although all knowledge begins with Sensation, it is not all derived from Sensation; the mind furnishes its
quota; and what it furnishes has the character of universality,
necessity, consequently of truth, stamped on it. This doctrine,
slightly modified, is popularly known as the doctrine of " original
instincts"-of " Fundamental Laws of Belief."
Kant also recognized the fact insisted on by the adversaries
of the Sensational School; and this fact he set himself carefully
to examine. His first object was therefore a Criticism of the
operations of the mind.
Kant considered that his conception of a purely critical philosophy was entirely original.*  No one before him had thought
* And Sir W. Hamilton repeats the statement: Discussions, p. 15.




636                       KANT.
of thus subjecting Reason itself to a thoroughly critical investigation, in order to reach answers to such questions as: Are't
priori synthetic judgments possible? Is a science of Metaphysics possible? Certainly no one had isolated the a p9riori elements of knowledge from those given in Experience, as Kant
isolated them, to build a system thereon; but the whole tendency of speculative development since Hobbes, had been, as
we have seen, towards the investigation of the grounds of certitude.
On interrogating his Consciousness, Kant found that neither
of the two ordinary explanations would account for the phenolmena: the abstract Ideas we have, such as Time, Space, Causality, etc., could not be resolved into Experience alone: nor, on
the other hand, although a priori, could they be supposed ab7
solutely independent of: Experience, since they are, as it were,
only theforms (necessary conditions) of our Experience.
There are not two sources of Knowledge, said he: on the one
"side, external objects, and on the other, human understanding.
Knowledge has but one source, and that is the union of object
and subject. Thus, water is the union of oxygen and hydrogen;
but you cannot say that water has two causes, oxygen and hydrogen; it has only one cause, namely, the union of the two.
In this conception the existence of two distinct factors is assumed. " That all our knowledge begins with Experience," he
says, "there can be no doubt. For how is it possible that the
faculty of cognition should be awakened into exercise otherwise
than by means of objects which affect our senses, and partly of
themselves produce representations (Vorstellungen), partly rouse
our powers of understanding into activity, to compare, to connect, or to separate these, and so to convert the raw material of
our sensuous impressions into a knowledge of objects which is
called Experience? In respect of time, therefore, no knowledge
of ours is antecedent to Experience, but begins with it., But
although all our knowledge begins with Experience, it by no
means follows that all arises out of Experience. For, on the con



KANT'S HISTORICAL POSITION.            637
trary, it is quite possible that our empirical knowledge (Erfahrungserkenntniss) is a compound of that which we receive through
impressions, and that which the faculty of cognition supplies
from itself (sensuous impressions giving merely the occasion), an
addition which we cannot distinguish from the original element
given by sense, till long practice has made us attentive to and
skilful in separating it. It is therefore a question which requires
close investigation, and is not to be answered at first sightwhether there exists a knowledge altogether independent of Experience, and even of all sensuous impressions."*
To investigate this is the purpose of Criticism.
The whole world is to us a series of Phenomena. Are these
Appearances the production of the Mind to which they appear;
or are they the pure presentation of the things themselves?
Idealism or Realism? Neither; yet both. The Mind and the
object co-operating produce the Appearance or sensuous impression. In their union Perception is effectuated.
The Mind has certain materials furnished it, and on these
materials it imposes certain forms or conditions of its own. These,
forms alone make perception possible, since they constitute the.
modes of the mind's operation. If we had only sensations-that
is, supposing objects acted upon us, and we did not also act upon
them-thc result would be no more than that of the wind playing on the Ilian harp; Experience would be impossible. To
make Experience possible, the mind must grasp objects in a synthesis of the objects and the forms of the perceptive power.
Kant's Criticism was directed against Locke on the one hand,
in establishing that we have ideas independent of Experience;
and against Hume on the other, in establishing that these ideas
have a character of universality, necessity, and irresistibility.
But-and the point is important-his Criticism proved that
these ideas, although universal and certain, could not be called
absolutely true: they were only subjectively true. This was fall* Kritik, Einleitung (Translation, p. 1).




638                       KANT.
ing back into, Hume's position; since although Hume called belief in causality the effect' of habit, and Kant called it a law of
the mind, yet both agreed in denying to it any objective truth;
both agreed that a knowledge of things per se was impossible.
We regard the result of Kant's investigation of the elements
of Thought as nothing less than a scientific basis for Skepticism.
He likens his philosophical refoir to the,reform introduced into
Astronomy by Copernicus.*  Finding the labors of men unsatisfactory, Copernicus bethought him that perhaps success might
crown his efforts if he shifted his ground, if, instead of assuming
that the sun turned round the earth, he were to assume that the
earth turned round the sun. So Kant says, that the ordinary
assumption of our knowledge following the order of external objects seemed to him better if reversed, and if we were to assume
that the objects obeyed the laws of our mental constitution. And
he calls his system critical, because it is founded on an examination of our cognitive faculties. Both the name and the comparison appear to us erroneous. An examination of the cognitive
faculties was, as we have often said, the great topic of philosophical speculation, and although the exainination of Kant
differed somewhat from every other in result, it in nowise differed in method. Copernicus positively changed the point of view.
Kant did nothing of the kind: his attempt to deduce the laws of
the phenomenal world from the laws of mindl was little more
than the attempt of Descartes to deduce the world from Consciousness; it is the same as the attempts of Leibnitz and Berkeley in method; and the result is very much the result obtained
by Hume, namely, that we can know nothing but our own ideas,
we can never know things per se. Kant, after analyzing the
operations of the mind, discovered indeed certain principles of
certitude; but he admitted that those principles could not be
applied to things beyond the Mind; and that all within the
sphere of our cognition was no more than phenomenal. He re* See the oelebrated second Preface to the Kritik.




KANT'S HISTORICAL POSITION.           639
views his investigation, and then, declaring that he has gone the
round of the domain of human Understanding and measured it
exactly, he is still forced to admit that that domain is only an
island. Nature has assigned to it invariable limits. It is the
empire of Truth; but it is surrounded by a stormy and illimitable sea, upon which we discover nothing but illusions. There,
on that sea, the navigator, deceived by masses of ice which appear and. disappear successively before him, believing that at
every moment he is about to discover land, wanders without repose, guided only by one hope; he is the plaything of the stormy
waves, always forming new plans, always preparing himself for
new experiences, which he cannot renounce, and yet which he
can never obtain.*
To the Skeptic Kant says, " No: experience is not a deceit;
human Understanding has its fixed laws, and those laws are true."
To the Dogmatist he says, " But this Understanding can never
know Things per se. It is occupied solely with its own Ideas.
It perceives'only the Appearances of Things. How would it be
possible to know Noumena? By stripping them of the forms
which our Sensibility and Understanding have impressed upon
them (i. e. by making them cease to be Appearances). But to
strip them of these forms, we must annihilate Consciousness-we
must substitute for our Sensibility and Understanding, a faculty,
or faculties, capable of perceiving Things per se. This, it is obvious, we cannot do. Our only means of communication with
objects are precisely this Sensibility and this Understanding,
which give to objects the forms under which we know them."
To the Dogmatist, therefore, Kant's reply is virtually the same
as Hume's. He proves that the Understanding, from the very
nature of its constitution, cannot know Things per se.  The
question then arises, Have we any other Faculty capable of
knowing Things per se? The answer is decisive, We have no
such Faculty.
* Krtik, b. i. cap. iii.




640                       KANT.
The difference between Hume and Kant, when deeply considered, is this: Hume said that the Understanding was treacherous, and, as such, it rendered Philosophy impossible. Kant
said that the Understanding was not treacherous, but limited \
it was to be trusted as far as it went, but it could not go far
enough; it was so circumscribed, that Philosophy was impossible.
This difference, slight as it may appear, led to important differences in the application of Kant's principles. The mendacity
of Consciousness maintained by Hume, led him to utter Skepticism in Philosophy and in Religion, as subjects on which reason
could not pronounce. The veracity of Consciousness (as far as
it went) maintained by Kant, was a firm and certain basis, though
a limited one, on which to build Religion and Morals, as we shall
see hereafter. Kant's critics do not in general appear to be aware
of the consequences resulting from his exposition of the veracity
of the Understanding. Yet, as the battle was confessedly between
him and Hume, it might have been suspected that he would not
have left the field entirely to his antagonist.
The reader is, we trust, now prepared to follow with interest
the leading points of Kant's analysis of the mind. In giving an
indication of the result of that analysis, before giving the analysis itself, we hope to have so far interested the reader, that he
will read the analysis with sharpened attention; seeing whither
dry details are leading, he will not deem them dry.
And first of the famous question: How are synthetic judgments, a priori, possible? This is the nut Kant has to crack with
Hume. But first let us understand Kant's language; He divides
all our judgments into two classes, analytic and synthetic. The
analytic judgment is, as it were, but a writing out of our experience. When we say that a triangle is a figure with three sides,
or that a body is extended, we are judging analytically; i. e. we
are adding nothing to our conception of body or triangle, we are
only analyzing it. The synthetic judgment, on the contrary, is
when we predicate some attribute of a thing, the conception of




KANT S HISTORICAL POSITION.            641
which does not involve that attribute: such as that a straight
line is the shortest road between two points.
There are two classes of synthetic judgments: those a, posteriori and those ia priori. The former result from experience:
e. g. gold is ductile. We must absolutely know that gold is
ductile, before we can predicate ductility of gold.  But the
a priori judgmelnts are independent of experience: e. g. a straight
line is the shortest road between two points; which experience
may confirm, but which is recognized as true, independent of
experience; above all, it has a character of universality which
experience could not bestow; for though experience may show
us how a straight line is, in many instances, the shortest road
between two points, it cannot prove that there is, absolutely, no
shorter road in any case.
Hume declared that our experience of Cause and Effect was
simply an experience of antecedence and sequence; and that our
attributing a cause to any effect was a mere matter of habit.
True, replied Kant, in the fact of antecedence and sequence,
causation is not given; but inasmuch as causation is irresistibly
believed in, the idea must have some source. If it is not given
in the things observed, then must we seek it in the observer. In
this fact of causation what have we? We have first antecedence
and sequence; we have next an attribute of causation predicated
of them. The first is given in our experience; the second is
not given in our experience, but is independent of it. This second is therefore an a priori synthetic judgment. " It must either
have an'a priori basis in the understanding, or be rejected as a
chimera. For it demands that something, A, should be of such
a nature that something else, B, should follow from it necessarily,
and according to an absolutely universal law. We may certainly
collect from phenomena a law, according to which this or that
usually happens, but the element of necessity is not to be found
in it. Hence it is evident, that to the synthesis of cause and
effect belongs a dignity which is utterly wanting in any empirical synthesis; for it is no mere mechanical synthesis, by means




642                      KANT.
of addition, but a dynamical one; that is to say, the effect is not
to be cogitated as merely annexed to the cause, but as posited by
and through the cause, and resulting from it."* This, therefore,
is an a priori judgment. By means of such judgments we are
not only able to say that one thing is the cause of another, but
also we are enabled to make this wide generalization: Every effect must have a cause. Here, as in the proposition of a straight
line being the shortest road between two points, we have an idea
not given in experience, and an idea, the universality of which,
experience could never verify.
We are thus led to assert that the Mind does add something
to sense-experience; and that what it adds is not only independent of experience, but has the further character of certititude and universality, which experience can never claim. The
certainty of experience is always limited; it never can have
the character of universality, however rich it may be; for after
a thousand years it may be proved erroneous. Thus, it was universally believed that all crows were black: a wide experience
had established it-yet white crows were found; and experience
was forced to acknowledge it had been in error. So with the
motion of the sun, once universally believed, because founded
upon experience..That which islo be held as irresistibly true,
which shall be universally and necessarily maintained by all
men, cannot have its origin in Experience, but in the constitution
of the Mind. Hence the truth of Mathematics; not, as is so often
said, because it is an abstraction of Forms and Relations, but
because it is founded on the necessary laws of our mental constitution.
In these synthetic judgments, a priori, there is a ground of
Certitude. The veracity of human reason reposes on that Certitude. Although therefore, says Kant, we can never know
whether our conceptions of things, per se, are adequate, we can
know what conceptions all men must form of them; although
* lHtik, b. i c. ii. ~ 9 (Transl., p. 76).




KANT'S HISTORICAL POSITION.            643
we cannot know if our knowledge has any objective truth, we
can be certain of its subjective truth.
A principle of Certitude having been found, nothing further
was necessary for its confirmation than to ascertain in how far
this principle could be the basis of a science. Kant showed
that it formed the basis of all science. People do not dispute,
said he, respecting Mathematics or Logic, or the higher branches
of Physics; and if they do dispute, they end by agreeing. But
in Metaphysics, disputes are endless. Why is this? Simply
because Logic, Mathematics, and the higher branches of Physics
are Sciences of Generalities; they do not occupy themselves
with variable and contingent, but with the invariable and universal properties. Logic is composed of rules which are reducible to certain self-evident propositions. These propositions, reduced to their principles, are nothing more than the laws of the
human mind. These laws are invariable because human nature
is invariable. Mathematics is, in the same way, the study of
certain invariable properties, which do not exist in nature, but
which are conceptions of the mind, upon data furnished by nature, abstraction being made of all that is variable and uncertain
in those data: e. g. the essential properties of an equilateral triangle, abstraction being made of any body which is triangular,
and only the properties themselves being considered.
In physics, since the time of Galileo, men have seen that they
are judges, not the passive disciples, of nature. They propose an
a priori problem; and, to solve this problem, they investigate
nature, they make experiments, and these experiments are directed by reason. It is reason that they follow, even when operating on nature; it is the principle of that reason which they
seek in nature, and it is only in becoming rational that physics
become a science. Again we find science reposing on the laws
of the mind!
Thus, the laws which form the basis of logic, mathematics,
and physics, are nothing less than the laws of the human mind.
It is, therefore, in the nature of the human mind that the certi



644                       KANT.
tude of all the sciences is to be found; and the principles of
this certitude are universality and necessity.
Psychology thus becomes the groundwork of all Philosophy;
to Kant's Psychology we now address ourselves.
~ III. KANT'S PSYCHOLOGY.
It has been shown that experience does not furnish the whole
of our knowledge;
That what it does furnish has the character of contingency
and variability;
That the mind also furnishes an element, which element is an
inseparable condition of all knowledge; without it knowledge
could not be;
That this element has the character of universality and necessity.
And that the principle of all certitude is precisely this universality and necessity.
It now remains for us to examine the nature of the mind, and
to trace the distinctive characters of each element of knowledge,
the objective and the subjective. Instead of saying, with the
Sensatfonal School, All our knowledge is derived from the senses,
Kant said, Half of all our knowledge is derived from the senses:
and the half which has another origin, is indissolubly blund zup
with theformer half. Thus, instead of saying with the Cartesians, that, besides the ideas acquired through the sense, we have
also certain ideas which are innate, and irrespective of sense;
Kant said all our ideas have a double origin, and this twofold
co-operation of object and subject is indispensable to all knowledge.
Let us clearly understand Kant's object. He calls his great
work the Critique of the Pure Reason. It is an examination of
the mind, with a view to detect its a priori principles. He calls
these pure because they are a priori, because they are above and
beyond experience. Having demonstrated that the mind has
some pure principles-has some ideas which were never given in
experience, and must therefore be a priori-he was led to inquire




KANT'S PSYCHOLOGY.                 645
how many the mind possessed. In his Critique therefore we
are only to look for the exposition of a priori principles. He
does not trouble himself with investigating the nature of perception; he contents himself with the fact that we have sensations,
and with the fact that we have ideas whose origin is not sensuous.
The Non-ego and the Ego, the objective world and the subjective mind, being placed face to face, the two co-operate to
produce knowledge. We are however here only concerned with
the subject. What do we discover in it? First, a Sensibilitya power of being affected by objects; this is what Kant calls
the Receptivity of the mind: it is entirely passive. By it the
representations of objects (i. e. sensations) are received. Secondly, an understanding ( Verstand)-a faculty of knowing objects
by means of the representations furnished by our Sensibility:
this is an active faculty; in antithesis to Sensibility, it is a
Spontaneity.
But our Sensibility, although passive, has its laws or conditions; and, to discover these conditions, we must separate that
which is diverse and multiple in our sensations from that which
remains invariably the same. The objects are numerous and
various; the subject remains invariable. Kant calls the multiple and diverse element by the name of material; the invariable
element by the name of form. If therefore we would discover
the primary conditions of our Sensibility, we must discover the
invariable elements in all sensations.
There are two invariable elements-Space and Time. They
are the forms of our Sensibility. Space is the form of our Sensibility, as external; Time the form both as internal and external.
Analyze sensations of external things as you will, you can
never divest them of the form of Space. You cannot conceive
bodies without Space; but you can conceive Space without
bodies. If all matter were annihilated, you must still conceive
Space to exist. Space therefore is the indispensable condition
of sensation: the form of external Sensibility. It is not given




646                       KANT.
in the materials of sensation; since you may conceive the objects
annihilated, but cannot conceive the annihilation of Space. Not
being given in the material, it must therefore constitute the form.
Similar reasoning proves that Time is also the form of our
Sensibility, considered both as internal and as external. We
cannot conceive things as existing, except as existing in Time;
but we can conceive Time as existing, though all things were
annihilated. Things subjected to our Sensibility are subjected
to it in succession; that is the form of our Sensibility.
Such then are the two indispensable conditions of all sensation-the two forms with which we invest all the varied materials presented to us. It is evident that these two ideas of Space
and Time cannot have been given in the materials, consequently
are not deducible from experience; ergo, they are za priori, or,
as Kant calls them, pure intuitions.
Having settled this point, he enters into his celebrated examination of the question, Have Space and Time any objective
reality?
We need not reproduce his arguments, which however may
be studied as fine dialectical exercises, but content ourselves with
giving the result. That result is easily foreseen: If Space and
Time are the forms of our Sensibility, and are not given in experience, not given in the materials presented, we may at once
assume that they have no existence out of our Sensibility. Kant's
reduction of Space and Time to formal elements of thought
without corresponding objective reality, has been refuted by
Herbert Spencer,* who has shown that the experience-hypothesis better explains the genesis of these conceptions. I must not
venture to interrupt the exposition of Kant by any quotations,
but will add my own conviction that Space and Time are
objective realities in the sense that solidity, color, etc., are
objective realities; in other words, although, as we conceive
them, they are purely subjective, and do not exist externally as
* Principles of Psychology, pp. 52-58.




KANT'S PSYCHOLOGYT                 647
the Space and Time which exist in us, nevertheless some external
reality there is, corresponding to our subjective state; precisely
as there must be some corresponding objects of solidity, color,
etc., otherwise the conceptions of solidity, color, etc., would
never have been formed.
Returning now to the exposition, we must follow  Kant's
analysis of the forms of the Understanding.  The forms of Sensibility being those of Space and Time, we must pass onwards to
the higher operations of the mind. The function of the Understanding is to judge. It is eminently an active faculty; and by
it the perceptions furnished through our Sensibility are elevated
into conceptions (Begriffe). If we had only Sensibility, we
should have sensations, but no knowledge. It is to the Understanding that we are indebted for knowledge. And how are we
indebted to it? Thus:-the variety of our sensations is reduced
to unity —they are linked together and made to interpret each
other by the understanding., A sensation in itself can be nothing but a sensation: many sensations can be nothing but many
sensations, they can never alone constitute conceptions. But
one sensation linked to another by some connecting faculty-the
diversity of many sensations reduced to unity-the resemblances,
existing amidst the diversity, detected and united together-is
the process of forming a conception, and this is the process of
the Understanding, by means of imagination, memory, and consciousness.
Our senses, in contact with the external world, are affected by
objects in a certain determinate manner. The result Kant calls
a representation (Vorstellung) in reference to the object represented; an intuition (Anschauung) in reference to the affection
itself. These intuitions are moulded by the Understanding into
conceptions; the sensation is converted into a thought.
The Understanding is related to Sensibility in the same way
as Sensibility is related to external things. It imposes certain
forms on the materials furnished it by Sensibility, in the same
way as Sensibility imposed the forms of space and time upon




648                       KANT.
objects presented to it. These forms of the Understanding are
the laws of its operation.
To discover these forms we must ask ourselves, What is the
function of the Understanding?-Judgment. How many classes
of judgments are there? In other words, What are the invariable conditions of every possible judgment?-They are four:
quantity, quality, relation, modality. Under one of these heads,
every judgment may be classed.
A subdivision of each of these classes follows:-1. In judging
of any thing under the form of quantity, we judge of it as unity
or as plurality; or, uniting these two, we judge of it as totality.
2. So of quality: it may be reality, negation, or limitation. 3.
Relation may be that of substance and accident, cause and effect.
or action and reaction. 4. Modality may be that of possibility,
existence, or necessity.
Such are Kant's famous Categories. They are little better
than those of Aristotle, which we before declared to be useless.
For although the object of Kant was different from that of Aristotle, as Sir W. Hamilton points out;* the result was nothing
but a cumbrous machinery incompetent to aid our investigations,
although very seductive to the lovers of verbal distinctions.
In those Categories Kant finds the pure forms of the Understanding. They render thought possible; they are the invariable conditions of all conception; they are the investitures bestowed by the understanding on the materials furnished by sense.
By the Categories, he declares he has answered the second
half of the question, How are synthetic judgments, a priori, possible   The synthetic judgments of the Categories are all a
priori. But we have not yet exhausted the faculties of the
mind. CSensibility has given us intuitions (perceptions), Understanding has given us conceptions, but there is sill another
faculty-the crowning faculty of Reason (Vernunft), the pure
forms of which we have to seek,
* Discussions, p. 25.




KANTIS PSYCHOLOGY.                 649
Understanding is defined, the faculty of judging (Verm6gen
der Urtheile); Reason is the faculty of ratiocination-of drawing conclusions from given premises (Vermogen der Schiisse).
Reason reduces the variety of conceptions to their utmost unity.
It proceeds from  generality to generality till it reaches the
unconditional.  Every conception must be reduced to some
general idea, that idea again reduced to some still more general
idea, and so on till we arrive at an ultimate and unconditional
principle, such as God.
Reason not only reduces particulars to a general, it also deduces the particular from the general: thus, when I say, " Peter
is mortal," I deduce this particular proposition from the general
proposition, "All men are mortal;" and this deduction is evidently independent of experience, since Peter being now alive, I
can have no experience to the contrary. These two processes
of reducing a particular to some general, and of deducing some
particular from a general, constitute ratiocination.
Reason has three pure forms; or, as Kant calls them, borrowing the term from Plato, ideas. These are wholly independent
of experience; they are above Sensibility-above the Understanding; their domain is Reason, their function that of giving
unity and coherence to our conceptions.
The Understanding can form certain general conceptions,
such as man, animal,.tree; but these general conceptions themselves are subordinate to a still more general idea, embracing all
these general conceptions, in the same way as the conception of
man embraces several particulars of bone, blood, muscle, etc.
The idea is that of the universe.
In the same way all the modifications of the thinking being —
all the sensations, thoughts, and passions-require to be embraced in some general idea, as the ultimate ground and possibility for these modifications, as the noumenon of these phenomena. This idea is that of an ego-of a personality-of a
soul, in short.
Having thus reduced all the varieties of the ego to an uncon28




650                       KANT.
ditional unity, viz., soul, and having also reduced all the varieties
of the non-ego to an unconditional unity, viz., the world, his task
would seem completed; yet, on looking deeper, he finds that
these two ideas presuppose a third-a unity still higher, the
source of both the world and of the ego-viz., God.
God, the soul, and the world, are therefore the three ideas of
reason, the laws of its operation, the pure forms of its existence.
They are to it what Space and Time are to Sensibility, and what
the categories are to Understanding.
But these ideas are simply regulative: they operate on conceptions as the Understanding operates upon sensations; they
are discursive, not intuitive; they are never face to face with
their objects: hence Reason is powerless when employed on
matters beyond the sphere of Understanding; it can draw nothing but false, deceptive conclusions. If it attempts to operate
beyond its sphere-if it attempts to solve the question raised respecting God and the world-it falls into endless contradictions.
"While we regard as conclusive Kant's analysis of Time and
Space into conditions of thought," says Sir W. Hamilton, "we
cannot help viewing his deduction of the Categories of the Understanding and the Ideas of speculative Reason as the work of
a great but perverse ingenuity;" and we, who do not even regard
the analysis of Space and Time as conclusive, may echo this
judgment with greater emphasis.
~ IV. CONSEQUENCES OF KANT'S PSYCHOLOGY.
We have given briefly the leading points in Kant's analysis
of the mind. We have now to trace the consequences of that
analysis.
The great question at issue was: Have we, or have we not, any
ideas which are absolutely, objectively true? Before this could
be answered, it was necessary to answer this other question:
Have we, or have we not, any ideas independent of experience?
Because if we have. not such ideas, we can never pretend to
solve the first question: our experience can only be of that




CONSEQUENCES OF KANT'S PSYCHOLOGY.          651
which is relative, contingent, subjective; and to solve the question, we must be in possession of absolute, necessary, objective
truth.
Kant answered the second question affirmatively. Iis Critique
was a laborious demonstration of the existence of ideas not derived from experience, and in no way resolvable into experience.
But he answered the first question negatively. He declared that
our ideas are essentially subjective, and cannot therefore have
objective truth. He did not deny the existence of an external
world; on the contrary, he affirmed it, but he denied that we
can know it: he affirmed that it was essentially unknowable.
The world exists,-that is to say, the noumena of the various
phenomena which we perceive, exist. The world is not known
to us as it is per se, but as it is to us-as it is in our knowledge
of it. It appears to us; only the appearance therefore can be
known; the world must ever remain unknown, because, before
being known, it must appear to us, i. e. come under the conditions of our Sensibility, and be invested with the forms of Space
and Time, and come under the conditions of our Understanding,
and be invested with the categorical forms.
Suppose object and subject face to face. Before the subject
can be affected by the object-that is to say, before a sensation
is possible-the object must be modified in the sensation by the
forms of our Sensibility: here is one alteration. Then before
sensation can become thought, it must be subjected to the categories of the Understanding: here is another alteration.*
Now, to know the object per se-i. e. divested of the modifications it undergoes in the subject-is obviously impossible; for
it is the subject itself which knows, and the subject knows only
under the conditions which produce these modifications.
Knowledge, in its very constitution, implies a purely subjective, ergo, relative character. To attempt to transcend the sphere
* Compare what was said on the transformation of impressions into sensations, pp. 611, 8q.




652                       KANT.
of the subjective is vain and hopeless; nor is it wise to deplore
that we are " cabin'd, cribb'd, confined" within that sphere fiom
which we never can escape. As well might the bird, when feeling the resistance of the air, wish that it were in vacuo, thinking
that there it might fly with perfect ease. Let us therefore content ourselves with our own kingdom, instead of crossing perilous seas in search of kingdoms inaccessible to man. Let us
learn our weakness.*
FIRST RESULT.-A knowledge of things per se (Dinge an sich)
is impossible, so long as knowledge remains composed as at
present; consequently Ontology, as a science, is impossible.
But, it may be asked, if we never knew noumena (Dinge an
sich), how do we know that they exist? Their existence is a
necessary postulate. Although we can only know the appearances of things, we are forced to conclude that the things exist.
Thus, in the case of a rainbow, we discover that it is only the
appearance of certain drops of water: these drops of water again,
although owing their shape, color, etc., to us, nevertheless exist.
They do not exist as drops of water, because drops of water are
but phenomena; but there is an unknown something which,
when affecting our Sensibility, appears to us as drops of water.
Of this unknown something we can affirm nothing, except that
it necessarily exists because it affects us. We are conscious of
being affected. We are conscious also that that which affects us
must be something different from ourselves. This the law of
causation reveals to us.
A phenomenon, inasmuch as it is an appearance, presupposes
a noumenon-a thing which appears, —'ut this noumenon, which
is a necessary postulate, is only a negation to us. It can never
be positively known; it can only be known under the conditions
of sense and understanding, ergo, as a phenomenon.
SECOND RESULT.-The existence of an external world is a
necessary postulate, but its existence is only logically affirmed.
* Compare Kant's fine passage at the close of the Eineitung.




CONSEQUENCES OF KANT S PHILOSOPHY.         653
From the foregoing it appears that we are unable to know any
thing respecting things per se; consequently we can never
predicate of our knowledge that it has objective truth.
But our knowledge being purely subjective and relative, can
we have no certainty?-are we to embrace skepticism? No.
THIRD RESULT.-Our knowledge, though relative, is certain.
We have ideas independent of experience; and these ideas have
the character of universality and necessity. Although we are
not entitled to conclude that our subjective knowledge is completely true as an expression of the objective fact, yet we are
forced to conclude that within its own sphere it is true.
FOURTH REsuLT.-The veracity of consciousness is established.
FIFTH RESULT.-With the veracity of consciousness, is established the certainty of morals.
It is here we see the importance of Kant's analysis of the
mind. Those who reproach him with having ended, like Hume,
in skepticism, can only have attended to his Critique of the Pure
Reason, which certainly does, as we said before, furnish a scientific basis for skepticism. It proves that our knowledge is relative; that we cannot assume things external to us to be as we
conceive them: in a word, that Ontology is impossible.
So far Kant goes with Hume. This is the goal they both attain. This is the limit they agree to set to the powers of the
mind. But the different views they took of the nature of mind
led to the difference we before noted respecting the certainty of
knowledge. Kant having shown that consciousness, as far as it
extended, was veracious; and having shown that in consciousness certain elements were given which were not derived from
experience, but which were necessarily true; it followed that
whatever was found in consciousness independent of experience,
was to be trusted without dispute.
If in consciousness I find the ideas of God, the world, and
virtue, I cannot escape believing in God, the world, and virtue.
This belief of mine is, I admit, practical, not theoretical; it is
founded on a certainty, not on a demonstration; it is an ultimate




654                      KANT.
fact, from which I cannot escape-it is not a conclusion deduced
by reason.
The attempt to demonstrate the existence of God is an impossible attempt. Reason is utterly incompetent to the task. The
attempt to penetrate the essence of things-to know things per
se-to know noumena-is also an impossible attempt.    And
yet that God exists, that the world exists, are irresistible convictions.
There is another certitude, therefore, besides that derived from
demonstration, and this is moral certitude, which is grounded
upon belief. I cannot say, "It is morally certain that God exists," but I must say, " I am morally certain that God exists."
Here then is the basis for a Critique of the Practical Reason,
an investigation into the Reason, no longer as purely theoretical,
but as practical. Man is a being who acts as well as knows.
This activity must have some principle, and that principle is
freedom of will.
As in the theoretical part of Kant's system we saw the supersensual and unconditioned presupposed as existent (under the
name of things per se), but not susceptible of being known or
specified; so in this practical part of the system we find the
principle of freedom altogether abstract and indeterminate. It
realizes itself in acts.
In the very constitution of his conscience, man discovers the
existence of certain rules which he is imperatively forced to impose upon his actions; in the same way as he is forced by the
constitution of his reason to impose certain laws upon the materials furnished him from without. These moral laws have likewise the character of universality and necessity. The idea of
virtue never could be acquired in experience, since all we know
of virtuous actions falls short of this ideal which we are compelled to uphold as a type.  The inalterable idea of justice is
likewise found, a priori, in the conscience of men. This, indeed,
has been denied by some philosophers; but all a priori truths
have been denied by them. They cite the cruel customs of some




KANTIS FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.           655
savage races as proofs that the idea of justice is not universal.*
Thus, some tribes are known to kill their old men when grown
too feeble; and they test their strength by making these old men
hold on to the branch of a tree, which is violently shaken, and
those that fall are pronounced too weak to live. But even here,
in spite of the atrocity, we see the fundamental ideas of justice.
Why should they not abandon these aged men to all the horrors
of famine and disease? and why put them  to a test? Look
where you will, the varied customs of the various nations peopling the earth will show you different notions of what is just
and what is unjust; but the a priori idea of justice-the moral
law from which no conscience can be free-that you will find
omnipresent.
We regret that our space will not permit us to enter further
into Kant's system of morality, and his noble vindication of the
great idea of duty. But enough has been said to show the dependence of his Critique of the Practical Reason upon the principles of his Critique of the Pure Reason; a dependence which
some hasty critics have pronounced an unphilosophical compromise.
~ V. EXAMINATION OF KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.
Kant's system presents three important points for our consideration:
1. It assigns a limit to the powers of reason, and clearly marks
out the domain of scientific inquiry. In this it is skeptical, and
furnishes skepticism with terrible weapons.
2. It proclaims thatUknowledge has another origin besides experience  and that the ideas thus acquired are necessarily true.
In this the veracity of consciousness is established, and skepticism is defeated.
3. It founds upon this veracity of consciousness a system of
morals; the belief in a future state, and in the existence of God.
* Kant alludes to Locke.




656                       KANT.
In the course of our exposition we abstained from criticism;
certain that it would lead us far beyond our limits to venture on
an examination of any but the fundamental principles. The
three points above mentioned will, if closely examined, be found
to present only one calling for discussion here, and that one is
the second.
For the admission contained in the first-viz. that we are unable to know things in themselves-gives up Philosophy as a
matter beyond the reach of human intelligence. Skepticism is
made the only result of ontological speculation. But we are
guarded against such a conclusion entering deeply into practical
life, by the demonstration of our having ideas independent of experience. This is the second point. Were this second point to
fall to the ground, nothing but skepticism could remain. With
the second point must stand or fall the third.
The second point, therefore, becomes the central and vital
point of Kant's system, and must engage our whole attention.
All such subsidiary criticism as is current in Germany and
France, respecting the impossibility of separating the objective
from the subjective elements of a knowledge which is confessedly
both subject and object in one, may be safely set aside. Let the
possibility be granted; the vital question is not connected with
it. The same may be said of the illogicality of Kant's assuming
for the practical reason that which he denies to the pure reason.
The vital point in his system is, we repeat, the question as to
whether we have ideas independent of experience. This is allimportant.
And what gives it its importance? The conviction, that if
we are sent into this world with certain connate principles of
truth, those principles cannot be false; that if, for example, the
principle of causality is one which is antecedent to all experience,
and is inseparable from the mind, we are forced to pronounce it
an ultimate truth.
Let us meditate on this question. As Kant confessedly was
led to his own system by the speculations of Hume on causation,




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.            657
and as that is the most important of all the a priori ideas with
which the mind is supposed to be furnished, we will content ourselves with examining it. If that be found dependent on experience, all the a priori ideas must be likewise given up. This is
the nut we have to crack; its kernel is the kernel of the whole
question. Let us first consider these Necessary Truths, as Dr.
Whewell calls a priori ideas.
That two parallel lines can never meet, is a Necessary Truth.
That is to say, it necessarily follows from the definition of a
straight line. To call it, however, an a priori truth, a truth independent of experience, seems to us a very imperfect analysis
of the mind's operations. An attempt is made to prove that the
idea could never have beeh gained through experience, because
it commands universal assent, and because experience itself could
never give it necessity. Dr. Whewell's argument is, that let us
follow two parallel lines out as far as we can, we are still unable
to follow them to infinity: and, for all our experience can tell
us to the contrary, these lines may possibly begin to approach
immediately beyond the farthest point to which we have followed
them, and so finally meet. Now what ground have we for believing that this possibility is not the fact  In other words,
how do we know the axiom to be absolutely true? Clearly not
from experience, says Dr. Whewell, following Kant.
We answer, Yes; clearlyfrom experience. For our experience
of two parallel lines is precisely this: they cannot inclose space.
Dr. Whewell says that, for all our experience can tell us to the
contrary, the lines may possibly begin to approach each other at
some distant point; and he would correct this imperfect experience by a priori truth. The case is; precisely the reverse. The
tendency of the mind unquestionably is, to fancy that the two
lines will meet at some point; it is experience which corrects this
tendency. There are many analogies in nature to suggest the
meeting of the two lines. It is only our reflective experience
which can furnish us with the proof which Dr. Whewell refers
to ideas independent of all experience. What proof have we
280




658                      KANT.
that two parallel lines cannot inclose space?  Why this: as
soon as they assume the property of inclosing space, they lose the
property ofparallelism-they are no longer straight lines, but bent
lines. In carrying out imaginatively the two parallel lines into
infinity, we have a tendency to make them approach; we can
only correct this by a recurrence to our experience of straight
lines: we must call up a distinct image of a straight line, and
then we see that two such lines cannot inclose space.
The whole difficulty lies in the clearness or obscurity with
which the mind makes present to itself past experience. " Refrain fiom rendering your terms into ideas," says Herbert Spencer, "and you may reach any conclusion whatever. The whole
is equal to its part, is a proposition that may be quite comfortably entertained so long as neither wholes nor parts are imagined."' But no sooner do we make present to our minds the
meaning of parallel lines, than in that very act we make present
the impossibility of their meeting, and only as the idea of these
lines becomes wavering, does the idea of their meeting become
possible.
"Necessary truths," says Dr. Whewell, "are those in which
we not only learn that the proposition is true, but see that it must
be true; in which the negation is not only false, but impossible;
in which we cannot, even by an effort of the, imagination, or in
a supposition, conceive the reverse of that which is asserted.
That there are such truths, cannot be doubted.  We may take,
for example, all relations of Number. Three and two make five.
We cannot conceive it otherwise. We cannot by any fieak of
thought imagine that three and two make seven."
That Dr. Whewell cannot by any freak of thought now imagine three and two to make seven, is very likely; but that he
could never imagine this, is untrue. If he had been asked the
question before he had learned to reckon, he would have imagined seven quite as easily as five: that is to say, he would not
* PrinciplEs of Psychology, p. 49.




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.          659
have known the relation of three and two. Children have no
intuitions of numbers: they learn them as they learn other
things. "The apples and the marbles," says Herschel, "are put
in requisition, and through the multitude of gingerbread-nuts
their ideas acquire clearness, precision, and generality." But
though, from its simplicity, the calculation of three added to
two, is with a grown man an instantaneous act; yet if you ask
him suddenly how many are twice 365, he cannot answer till he
has reckoned. He might, certainly, by a very easy "freak of
thought" (i. e. by an erroneous calculation), imagine the sumtotal to be 720; and although when he repeats his calculation,
he may discover the error, and declare 730 to be the sum-total,
and say, "It is a Necessary Truth that 365 added to 365 make
730," we should not in the least dispute the necessity of the
truth, but presume that he himself would not dispute that he
had arrived at it through experience, namely, through his knowledge of the relations of numbers, a knowledge which he remembers to have laboriously acquired when a boy at school.
The foregoing remarks having, we trust, established that the
truths of Geometry and Arithmetic, which form one class of the
so-called Necessary Truths, are not obtained a priori, independently of Experience, we pass on to the other class, which we
would call Truth of Generalization.
Our example shall be that chosen by Kant: "Every effect
must have a cause." This is not a mere writing out of our conceptions: it is not a mere explanation, in different terms, of what
we mean. It is a wide generalization. Experience can only be
experience of individual causes and effects; and although in our
conception of an effect the conception of a cause is certainly involved, and in so far the judgment may be supposed an analytic
judgment, yet if we look closer, the ambiguity will disappear.
The word effect implies as a correlative the word cause. But
the Thing we see before us does not imply the existence of some
other Thing which caused it; and our judgment that it must
have had an antecedent cause, is purely synthetic.




660                       KANT.
When we assert that every effect must have a cause, we assert
that which no experience can have warranted. Is the idea therefore acquired through some other channel? No; and the upholders of the doctrines of Innate Ideas, Fundamental Laws of
Belief, Categories of the Understanding, and Necessary Truths,
appear to us to labor under a confusion of thought which a very
little well-directed analysis might have cleared up. The confusion is this:-Our experience is obviously incapable of guaranteeing the truth of any universal and necessary idea. But to
assume therefore that the idea is independent of experience, is to
forget that what experience may not guarantee, it may suggest;
and the universality and necessity of our ideas, is nothing more
nor less than the suggestions of the understanding, which by the
law of its operation generalizes from particulars, and converts
them into universals. We will presently explain this more fully;
let us now hear Kant, who distinguishes a pure cognition from
an empirical cognition by this mark of necessity and universality.
"Experience no doubt teaches us that this or that object is constituted in such and such a manner, but not that it could not
possibly exist otherwise."... "Empirical universality is only
an arbitrary extension of the validity from that which may be
predicated of a proposition valid in most cases to that which is
asserted of a proposition which holds good in all. When, on the
contrary, strict universality characterizes a judgment, it necessarily indicates another peculiar source of knowledge, namely, a
faculty of cognition a priori. Necessity and strict universality,
therefore, are infallible tests for distinguishing pure fiom empirical knowledge, and are inseparably connected with each other."*
And elsewhere: " If we thought to free ourselves from the labor
of these investigations by saying,'Experience is constantly offering us examples of the relation of cause and effect in phenomena,
and presents us with abundant opportunity of abstracting the
conception of cause, and so at the same time of corroborating the
* Eineitung, ~ ii. (Transl. p. 8).




KANTIS FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.            661
objective validity of this conception"-we should in this case be
overlooking the fact that the conception of cause cannot arise in
this way at all; that on the contrary it must either have a basis
in the Understanding, or be rejected as a mere chimera. For
this conception demands that something (A) should be of such a
nature that something else (B) should follow from it necessarily,
and according to an absolutely universal law. We may certainly collect from phenomena a law, according to which this or that
usually happens, but the element of necessity is not to be found
in it. Hence it is evident that to the synthesis of cause and
effect belongs a dignity which is utterly wanting in any empirical synthesis."*
Referring to what was said in discussing Hume's theory of
causation, we may pass on to Dr. Whewell's re-statement of
Kant's' views:
"That this idea of cause is not derived fiom experience, we
prove (as in former cases) by this consideration: that we can
make assertions, involving this idea, which are rigorously necessary and universal; whereas knowledge derived from experience
can only be true as far as experience goes, and can never contain
in itself any evidence whatever of its necessity. We assert that
"every Event must have a Cause:" and this proposition we
know to be true, not only probably and generally and as far as
we can see; but we cannot suppose it to be false in any single
instance. We are as certain of it as we are of the truths of
arithmetic and geometry. We cannot doubt that it must apply
to all events, past, present, and to come, in every part of the
universe, just as truly as to those occurrences which we have
ourselves observed.  What causes produce what effects;-what
is the cause of any particular event; what will be the effect of
any peculiar process; these are points on which experience
may enlighten us. But that every event must have some cause,
Experience cannot prove any more than she can disprove. She
* Transcendental. Logik, ~ 9 (Transl. p. 76).




662                       KANT.
can add nothing to the evidence of the truth, however often she
may exemplify it. This doctrine then cannot have been acquired
by her teaching: and the Idea of Cause which the doctrine involves, and on which it depends, cannot have come into our
minds from the region of observation."*
There is one minor point in this argument which we must notice first. Dr. Whewell says that the proposition "Every event
must have a cause" cannot possibly be false in any one instance.
We think there is one, which he himself would admit; but to
make it clear, we must substitute an equivalent for "event."
The abstract formula of causation is this: " Every existence presupposes some Cause of its existence: ex nihilo nihil fit."  And
this formula is employed against the atheists, to prove that the
world could not have made itself out of Nothing, ergo it must
have had a Cause. Now the obvious answer has often been
given, namely, that the Cause itself must have had a Cause, and
so on ad infinitum. Nevertheless, as reason repugns such an
argument, and as it declares that somewhere the chain of causes
and effects must stop, in that very declaration it falsifies the
formula of causation-" Every existence must have a cause."
Let not this be thought quibbling; it is only an exposure of
the weakness of the theory of causation. If that theory be correct-if the formula is a necessary Truth, objectively as well as
subjectively, the argument against atheism falls to the ground.
For, would the atheist argue, this is the dilemma: either the
chain of causes and effects must be extended to infinity; or you
must stop somewhere, and declare that the ultimate Existence
has no cause. In the first case you fall into unlimited skepticism; in the second you fall into atheism, because the world is
an Existence of which we are assured: why, then, is not it the
ultimate Existence? You have no right to assume any prior
cause; if you must stop somewhere, it is more rational to stop
there.
* Philos. Ind. etc., vol. i. p. 159.




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.             663
This dilemma admits of but one escape-hole, namely, the denial
of the formula " Every existence presupposes a cause" being any
thing more than a psychological law. Curiously enough, the
only loophole is in the doctrine maintained by David Hume-a
doctrine for so many years supposed to be the inlet of theological skepticism!
Our belief in the formula " Every event must have a cause" is
founded entirely on experience: is, indeed, nothing more than
our experience generalized.
To prove this, we will consider a single case of causation. A
child burns his finger in the candle; he then believes that a
candle will always burn his fingers. Now we are asked how it
is that the child is led to believe that the candle will always
burn his finger; and the answer usually afforded is, that "' he is
irresistibly led to believe in the uniformity of nature;" in other
words, the idea of causality is a fundamental idea.
We answer, The child believes the candle will burn, because
the experience he has of a candle is precisely this experience of
its burning properties. Before he had burnt his finger, his experience of a candle was simply of a bright thing which set
paper alight. Having now extended his experience, the candle is
to him a bright thing which sets paper alight, and which causes
pain to his finger when placed in contact with it.*
According to the well-known law of association, the flame of a
candle, and pain to the finger applied to it, are united, and form
one experience. This particular act of causation is therefore
nothing but a simple experience to the child; and for the perfection of this experience it is in nowise needful to assume that
the child has any belief in the " connection of events," or in the
"uniformity of the laws of Nature." No fundamental idea is
necessary for the particular belief.t Is it then necessary for the
* See p. 486 sq., where the argument is stated more fully.
t This is denied by the thinkers whom we are now combating: they
assume that the fundamental idea is necessary; but this is a mere assump



664                       KANT.
belief in the general proposition-" Every effect must have a
cause 2"
When Kant and the Kantists say that no particular act of
causation can be inferred a priori (such, for example, as that fire
will melt the solid wax); but that nevertheless causality itself
can be inferred a priori, i. e. we are constrained to believe that
something will follow the application of fire to the wax, and this
a priori judgment is independent of experience,-they seem to
me to fall into the error of confounding the general with the
particular. No general proposition is possible except as an expression of particular propositions; and all particular propositions are the expression of particular experiences. "That all
lions are carnivorous" is only intelligible as a general proposition
after one or more lions have been recognized as carnivorous;
that "every effect must have a cause" is only conceivable after
many particular experiences of causes and effects. No particular
act of causation can be inferred a priori, because for each particular inference we need the basis of particular experience; but
general causation seems possible to be inferred a priori, because
in the full-statured mind general causation has a basis of general
experience. I must know that fire does melt wax, before I can
infer that it will melt wax; but I can infer that fire will do
something to wax, after my general experience of fire is, that it
has always done something to bodies. This general inference is
founded on and limited by general experience, in the same way
as particular inferences are founded on particular experience.
The uncultured mind will be as powerless to deduce the general
inference, as the cultured mind is, to deduce the particular inference, a priori; and so true is this, that only philosophical
thinkers are capable of steadily believing in that causality which
Dr. Whewell designates as a fundamental idea.
Thus, belief in particular laws of causation is no more than
belief in our experience; and if we are asked why we believe
tion made for the purpose of saving their theory, an assumption of the very
point at issue.




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.          665
that our future experience will resemble the past, we answer, because we have no other possible belief of things than that which
is formed by experience: we cannot possibly believe the candle
as not burning us in future, because our experience of a candle
has been, that it does burn, and our beliefs cannot transcend the
experience which made them.
As to the belief in universal causation, we may prove in various ways that it is the result of a mere act of generalization; and
this very act itself is strictly limited by experience: that is to
say, we are led by the laws of our mind to judge of the unknown
according to the known. Thus, having found every event which
has come under our cognizance produced by some cause, we conclude that every possible event must have a cause. We judge
of the unknown by the known. Familiar illustrations of this
generalizing tendency are those rash judgments formed of nations and of classes, and founded on the experience of a single
fact. Thus we once heard it gravely asserted, that "all French
babies had long noses." The person asserting it had seen a
French baby with a long nose. Now the only conception of a
French baby in this person's mind was that of a baby with a
long nose. That was the type according to which all unseen,
unknown babies were judged. Not being a very reflective person, he could not divest himself of his conception, and he could
not believe that his conception was not true of all French babies.
Had he never seen other French babies, he would perhaps have
died in the belief that they all had long noses; unless some
better-informed person had corrected this conception by his
larger experience. So, if we had only the experience of one fact
of causation, we should always believe in that fact-we should
always believe that all candles would burn. To make many
similar experiences of the conjunction of cause and effect, is not
only to have many beliefs in particular acts of causation, it is
also to collect materials for a wide generalization, and from these
known conjunctions to pronounce that formula of universal conjunction applied to unknown and yet unborn events.




666                       XANT.
This latter process, however, is performed by few. All believe
irresistibly in particular acts of causation. Few believe in universal causation; and those few not till after considerable reflection. Philosophers, indeed, assure us that this belief is universal; that it is an instinct; a law of the mind; a Fundamental
Idea. If philosophers would take the trouble to inquire amongst
intelligent people, they would find that, so far from the belief in
question being instinctive and irresistible, the great majority
have no consciousness at all of such an instinct-the belief never
having once presented itself to their minds-the proposition requiring a great deal of explanation and argument before it can
be received; and amongst those persons many would absolutely
refuse to admit the truth of the proposition. Those who live
only amongst philosophers will doubt this. We can, however,
declare that it has more than once come within our experience.
We have argued with a student of chemistry, whom we found
it impossible to convince that the law "Every event has some
cause" is universal.'He not only could conceive it to be otherwise in the moon; but he looked upon our argument as an unwarrantable assumption. The mystery of this was, that he had
never read any metaphysics, and had but mediocre powers of
ratiocination. What shall we say to an instinctive belief, which,
unlike all other instinctive beliefs, does not spontaneously present
itself to our consciousness; and when presented, is with the utmost difficulty accepted; and accepted only by some? Compare this with any other instinctive belief-that in the existence
of an external world, for instance-and see what characters the
two have in common. Ask a boor if he believe in the existence
of the world, and he will think you mad to ask him. Ask an
ordinary man if he believe that every effect must have a cause,
and the chances are that he will tell you he does not know; you
will find it difficult to make him understand the necessity.
Nay, to leave ordinary men, and to confine ourselves to philosophers, amongst them we shall find that, with respect to one
class of phenomena, more than one-half of the thinking world




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.           667
is firmly convinced that every effect does not imply a cause: the
class of phenomena referred to are those of human volitions.. All
those who espouse the doctrine of Freedom of the Will declare
that all our volitions are self-caused,-that is to say, our volitions
are not caused by any thing external to themselves, not determined by any prior fact.
If, then, speculative men can be led to believe that one large
class of phenomena is not amenable to the law of cause and effect, what becomes of the universality of causation? And if
speculative men can conceive the laws of cause and effect to be
absent from some phenomena, and ordinary men do not conceive these laws to be universally applicable, what becomes
of the necessity? And if the mass of mankind require a considerable quantity of argument and explanation to make them
understand the proposition, what becomes of the instinctive
belief?
It is argued that a belief in a particular act of causation is
only possible on the assumption of a fundamantal idea of causality inherent in the mind; that, although a child may never have
had the formula "Every effect must have a cause" presented to
his mind, nevertheless this formula is implicitly in his mind,
otherwise ht would have no reason for believing in the particular act; it must exist as a fundamental idea. We might as
rationally argue that a child cannot have an idea of a man without previously having a fundamental idea of humanity.
The fallacy lies in this: the fundamental idea of causality is a
generalization. Now, of course, the general includes the particulars; but, though it includes, yet it does not precede them, and
the error is in supposing that it must and does precede them. A
boy, as Locke says, knows that his whole body is larger than his
finger; but he knows this from his perceptions of the two, not
from any knowledge of the axiom that the " whole is greater
than a part." Dr. Whewell would say that he could not have
such knowledge unless he had the fundamental idea; whereas,
we side with Locke in asserting that the mind in such cases




668                       KANT.
never begins with generalities, but ends with them; and to say,
that because the general axiom implies the particular instance,
or that the particular instance implies the general axiom, therefore the axiom is independent of experience, is to cheat one's self
with words.
The belief in causation is belief founded upon the experience
of particular acts of causation.
The irresistible tendency we have to anticipate that the future
course of events will resemble the past, is simply that we have
experience only of the past, and, as we cannot transcend our experience, we cannot conceive things really existing otherwise
than as we have known them. From this we draw a conclusion
strikingly at variance with the doctrine maintained by Kant and
Dr. Whewell. We say, that the very fact of our being compelled to judge of the unknown by the known-of our irresistibly anticipating that the future course of events will resemble
the past-of our incapacity to believe that the same effects
should not follow from the same causes-this very fact is a
triumphant proof of our having no ideas not acquired through
experience. If we had a priori ideas, these, as independent of,
and superior to, all experience, would enable us to judge the unknown according to some other standard than that of the known.
But no other standard is possible for us. We cannot by any
effort believe that things will not always have the properties we
have experienced in them; as long as they continue to exist, we
must believe them to exist as we know them.
Although belief in particular acts of causation is irresistible
and universal, yet belief in the general proposition " Every effect
must have a cause" is neither irresistible nor universal, but is
entertained only by a small portion of mankind. Consequently
the theory of a priori ideas independent of all experience, receives no support from the idea of Causality.
In a "Letter to the Author of the Prolegomena Logica," Dr.
Whewell has restated his views, to meet the objections of his
critics; and as this is the latest development of the Kantian




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.            669
doctrine which I have seen, it may not be uninstructive to consider it.
Dr. Whewell's main positions are, that Necessary Truths, or
Fundamental Ideas, are independent of experience, and are intuitions, which are seen not only to be true, but necessarily true,
because their contraries are inconceivable. The only condition
presupposed is, that the Ideas be clearly conceived. He says:
"I lay stress on the condition that the Ideas must be clearly and
distinctly possessed. The Idea of Space must be quite clear, in
the mind, or else the Axioms of Geometry will not be seen to be
true: there will be no intuition of their truth; and for a mind
in such a state, there can be no Science of Geometry. A man
may have a confused and perplexed, or a vacant and inert state
of mind, in which it is not clearly apparent to him, that two
straight lines cannot inclose a space. But this is not a frequent
case. The Idea of Space is much more commonly clear in the
minds of men than the other Ideas on which science depends, as
Force or Substance. It is much more common to find minds in
which these latter Ideas are not so clear and distinct as to make
the Axioms of Mechanics or of Chemistry self-evident. Indeed,
the examples of a state of mind in which the Ideas of Force or
of Substance are so clear as to be made the basis of science, are
comparatively few. They are the examples of minds scientifically cultivated, at least to some extent. Hence, though the
Axioms of Mechanics or of Chemistry may be, in their own nature, as evident as those of Geometry, they are not evident to so
many persons, nor at so early a period of intellectual or scientific
culture. And this being the case, it is not surprising that some
persons should doubt whether these Axioms are evident at all;
I should think that it is an error to assert that there exist, in
such sciences as Mechanics or Chemistry, Fundamental Ideas fit
to be classed with Space, as being, like it, the origin of Axioms."
Aware that many of these intuitive ideas are so far from being
universally acknowledged that many persons can conceive the
contraries, he adds:




670                       KANT.
"This difficulty has been strongly urged by Mr. Mill, as supporting his view, that all knowledge of truth is derived from experience. And in order that the opposite doctrine, which I have
advocated, may not labor under any disadvantages which really
do not belong to it, I must explain, that I do not by any means
assert that those truths which I regard as necessary, are all
equally evident to common thinkers, or evident to persons in all
stages of intellectual development. I may even say, that some
of those truths which I regard as necessary, and the necessity of
which I believe the human mind to be capable of seeing, by due
preparation and thought, are still such, that this amount of preparation and thought is rare and peculiar; and I will willingly
grant, that to attain to and preserve such a clearness and subtlety
of mind as this intuition requires, is a task of no ordinary diffculty and labor."
What, it may be asked, is all this preparation, and labor, but
experience? If these Fundamental Ideas are "Intuitions" which
cannot be given by experience, but are above and beyond it,
how is all this experience needed before these Necessary Truths
can be seen to be true?    Dr. Whewell is ready with his
answer:
"That some steady thought, and even some progress in the
construction of Science, is needed in order to see the necessity
of the Axioms thus introduced, is true, and is repeatedly asserted
and illustrated in the History of the Sciences. The necessity of
such Axioms is seen, but it is not seen at first. It becomes
clearer and clearer to each person, and clear to one person after
another, as the human mind dwells more and more steadily on
the several subjects of speculation.  There are scientific truths
which are seen by intuition, but this intuition is progressive. This
is the remark which I wish to make, in answer to those of my
critics who have objected that truths which I have propounded
as Axioms, are not evident to all."
That this is no answer at all, but is virtually a concession of
the very point in dispute, will be seen by an attentive perusal of




KANTIS FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.            671
the following passage, wherein he brings his new form of the
doctrine into greater distinctness:
"An able writer in the Edinburgh Review (No. 193, p. 29)
has, in like manner, said,'Dr. Whewell seems to us to have gone
much too far in reducing to necessary truths what assuredly the
generality of mankind will not feel to be so.' It is a fact which
I do not at all contest, that the generality of mankind will not
feel the Axioms of Chemistry, or even of Mechanics, to be necessary truths. But I had said, not that the generality of mankind would feel this necessity, but (in a passage just before quoted
by the Reviewer) that the mind, under certain circumstances,
attains a point of view from which it can pronounce mechanical
(and other)fundamental truths to be necessary in their nature,
though disclosed to us by experience and observation."
If these truths, said to be intuitive and independent of experience, are by Dr. Whewell confessed to be "disclosed by experience," there can be but one point of separation between him
and his critics; and, if I have understood him aright, that point
is the character of "necessity," which, in common with Kant, he
ascribes to these truths. The fundamental ideas, when seen, are
seen to be not only true, but necessarily true; and in this necessity lies their distinctive characteristic.
I conceive that no such distinction whatever can be made out
between truths which are necessary and truths which are contingent. All truth is necessary truth. Although all opinions are
by no means of one character, some being evident, some probable, some very uncertain; yet all truths are true. That "fire
burns" is a truth as " necessary" as that two parallel lines cannot
inclose space. That sulphur has a greater affinity for iron
than for lead, is a truth as "necessary" as that the whole is
greater than a part. That iron-rust is owing to the action of
oxygen, is as "necessary" a truth as that two and two make
four. It is our knowledge which is contingent, not the truth
itself. We may be in error when we believe the fact of sulphur's greater affinity for iron than for lead; in matters so ill



672                        KANT.
understood as chemical actions, error is very conceivable, and
our supposed truth may turn out a misconception; but if the relation be truly stated, the truth is as " necessary" as that two and
two make four.   The whole question, therefore, that can be
raised, is: Is the asserted relation true? and not, Is the truth
necessary?
To make this clearer, let us, instead of the proposition "two
and two make four," substitute " seventy-two and one hundred
and forty make two hundred and twelve." In the one case error
is impossible; by no fieak of thought can we conceive two and
two as making five; the truth is perceived directly, and the inconceivability of the contrary is confessed. In the latter case
error is very possible; unless a careful calculation be made, the
mind may fall into error, i. e. conceive the contrary of what is
true. But in each case the truth expressed is the relation of
numbers, which we ascertain by experience. So also the proposition "fire burns" is a necessary truth, the contrary to which
is as inconceivable as the contrary of "two parallel lines can
never inclose space." For although we can imagine it " possible"
that fire, under some circumstances, should not burn, we can
only imagine it by mentally substituting for fire some other thing
called by that name, just as we can only imagine parallel lines
inclosing space by mentally bending the lines, and making them
other than parallel.
Truths are nothing but perceived relations; some of these relations are so simple, are so universally presented to our experience, that we cannot conceive them to be otherwise; and thus
no freak of thought will enable us to conceive fire not burning,
two and two making five, or parallel lines inclosing space; while
other relations are so complicated, or so unfamiliar, that we very
easily conceive the possibility of their being otherwise. The
oxidation of substances is so familiar to the chemist, that he cannot conceive what to the general public is very conceivable; the
relations of lines and surfaces are so familiar to the geometer,
that he cannot conceive the contrary of Euclid's propositions:




KANT'S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.            673
to him they are irresistible truths; but he can remember the
time when they were by no means irresistible. Dr. Whewell
explains this difference by the difference in the clearness with
which the geometer "possesses the Idea of Space," a clearness
only to be obtained through great labor and training of the mind;
and we think no philosopher ever propounded any other explanation, certainly no philosopher belonging to the school which
derives all our ideas from experience.
The distinction, then, between the so-called Necessary and
Contingent Truths, is not that the former are independent of experience, and are truths seen to be necessarily true, while the latter
are seen to be contingently true, the contraries being conceivable. All truths are seen to be necessarily true, if they are seen
to be true at all; and the character of contingency is not applicable to the relations expressed in certain formulas, but solely to
the modes in which we got at those formulas: the contingency
of " seventy-two and one hundred and forty making two hundred
and twelve," is the liability of our miscalculating; and the proposition is a contingent one until we have so checked our calculation as to be certain we have ascertained the true relations.
Thus it is held that all animals with incisor teeth are carnivorous;
we have ascertained it by our universal experience of carnivorous
animals; but, strong as the presumption is that the relation is
true, we are forced to consider it a contingent truth, because
there is a possibility of our experience some day detecting an
exception; just as exceptions have been detected to the general
relation between comparative length of the intestine in herbivorous, and shortness of it in carnivorous, animals. but we never
call the proposition " a whole is greater than its part" a contingent truth, because no extension of experience could alter relations so simple and so universal; we cannot call "fire burns paper" a contingent truth, because no extension of experience can
alter relations so simple: if, by way of exception, a case of incombustible paper be exhibited, we know that the original proposition meant ordinary paper, and not paper of different prop29




674                       KANT.
erties. We cannot call the truth " sugar is sweet" contingent, because any extension of our experience which made us acquainted
with sugar not sweet, would bring forward some other kind of thing
than that which we designate by the name of sugar. We cannot call the truth "iron is heavy" contingent. We can call no
truths contingent except those which express relations either
complicated or unfamiliar; simplicity of relation implying directness of perception, and universality of experience coercing
the mind into uniformity of expectation.  The Fundamental
Ideas which Dr. Whewell distinguishes as Necessary Truths, are
nothing more than ideas fiamed in our minds by the uniformity
of our experience. And thus we return to the old position, that
experience, and experience alone, is the source of all ideas.
If the foregoing arguments are valid, what becomes of Kant's
system?  We are forced to conclude, that inasmuch as his
stronghold-the existence of d priori ideas-cannot sustain attack, the entrance of the enemy Skepticism is inevitable. Kant
was not a skeptic; but he deceived himself in supposing that his
system was any safeguard from Skepticism.
The veracity of Consciousness, which he had so laboriously
striven to establish, and on which his Practical Reason was
based, is only a relative, subjective veracity. Experience is the
only basis of Knowledge; and Experience leads to Skepticism.




NINTH EPOCH.
ONTOLOGY RE-ASSERTS ITS CLAIM.-THE DEMONSTRATION
OF THE SUBJECTIVITY ONCE MORE LEADS TO IDEALISM.
CHAPTER I.
FICHTE.
~ I. LIFE OF FICHTE.
JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE was born at Rammenau, a village
lying between Bischofswerda and Pulsniz, in Upper Lusatia, on
the 19th May, 1762.*
His childhood, of which many touching anecdotes are related,
was signalized by extraordinary intellectual capacity and great
moral energy. He was a precocious child, and long before he
was old enough to be sent to school he learned many things
from his father, who taught him to read, and taught him the
pious songs and proverbs which formed his own simple stock of
erudition. With these various studies was mixed an enchanting
element-the stories of his early wanderings in Saxony and
Franconia, stories to which young Johann listened with nevertiring eagerness. It was probably the vague longings which
these recitals inspired, that made him wander into the fields,
quitting his companions, boisterous in mirth, to roam away and
enjoy the luxury of solitude, there to give vent to the indul* See the biography by Fichte's son-Fichte's Leben und titerarischer
Briefwechsel, 2 vols., 1836.




676                       FICHTE.
gence of those unspeakable longings. This pale and meditative
child is at ease in solitude. He stands for hours, gazing in the
far distance, or in mournful yearning at the silent sky overarching him. The sun goes down, and the boy returns home
melancholy with the twilight. He does this so constantly that
neighbors remark it; comment on it; and, in after-years, when
that boy has become a renowned man, they recur to it with sudden pleasure, not forgetting also that they had "always said
there was sdmething remarkable in the boy."
Fichte's progress was so rapid that he was soon intrusted with
the office of reading family prayers; and his father cherished
the hope of one day seeing him a clergyman. An event curious
in itself, and very important in its influence on his subsequent
career, soon occurred, which favored that hope, and went far to
realize it. But before we relate it we must give a touching
anecdote, which exhibits Fichte's heroic self-command in a very
interesting light.*
The first book which fell into his hands after the Bible and
Catechism, was the renowned history of Siegfried the Horned,
and it seized so powerfully on his imagination, that he lost all
pleasure in any other employment, became careless and neglectful, and, for the first time in his life, was punished. Then, in
the spirit of the injunction which tells us to cut off our right
hand if it cause us to offend, Fichte resolved to sacrifice the beloved book, and, taking it in his hand, walked slowly to a stream
flowing past the house, with the intention of throwing it in. Long
he lingered on the bank, ere he could muster courage for this first
self-conquest of his life; but at length, summoning all his resolution, he flung it into the water. His fortitude gave way as he
saw the treasure, too dearly loved, floating away forever, and he
burst into a passionate flood of tears. Just at this moment the
father arrived on this spot, and the weeping child told what he
* For both anecdotes we are indebted to a very interesting article on
Fichte which appeared in the Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 71. We have
abridged the passages; otherwise the narrative is unaltered.




LIFE OF FICHTE.                 677
had done; but either from timidity or incapacity to explain his
feelings, was silent as to his true motive. Irritated at this treatment of his present, Fichte's father inflicted upon him an unusually severe punishment, and this occurrence formed a fitting
prelude to his after-life, in which he was so often misunderstood,
and the actions springing from the purest convictions of duty,
were exactly those for which he had most to suffer. When a
sufficient time had elapsed for the offence to be in some measure
forgotten, the father brought home another of these seducing
books; but Fichte dreaded being again exposed to the tempta.
tion, and begged that it might rather be given to some of the
other children.
It was about this time that the other event before alluded to
occurred. The clergyman of the village, who had taken a fancy
to Gottlieb and often assisted in his instruction, happened one
day to ask him how much he thought he could remember of the
sermon of the preceding day. Fichte made the attempt, and, to
the astonishment of the pastor, succeeded in giving a very tolerable account of the course of argument, as well as of the texts
quoted in its illustration. The circumstance was mentioned to
the Count von Hoffmansegg, the lord of the village, and one day
another nobleman, the Baron von Mittiz, who was on a visit at
the castle, happening to express his regret at having been too
late for the sermon on the Sunday morning, he was told, half in
jest, that it was of little consequence, for that there was a boy in
the village who could repeat it all from memory. Little Gottlieb was sent for, and soon arrived in a clean smock-frock and
bearing a large nosegay, such as his mother was accustomed to
send to the castle occasionally as a token of respect. He answered the first questions put to him with his accustomed quiet
simplicity; but when asked to repeat as much as he could recollect of the morning's sermon, his voice and manner became more
animated, and, as he proceeded, entirely forgetting the presence
of the formidable company, he became so fervid and abundant
in his eloquence, that the Count thought it necessary to interrupt




678                      FICHTE.
him, lest the playful tone of the circle should be destroyed by
the serious subjects of the sermon. The young preacher had
however made some impression on his auditory; the Baron
made inquiries concerning him, and the clergyman, wishing for
nothing more than an opportunity to serve his favorite, gave such
an account that the Baron determined to undertake the charge
of his education. He departed, carrying his protege with him,
to his castle of Siebeneichen, in Saxony, near Meissen, on the
Elbe; and the heart of the poor village boy sank, as he beheld
the gloomy grandeur of the baronial hall, and the dark oak forests by which it was surrounded. His first sorrow, his severest
trial, had come in the shape of what a misjudging world might
regard as a singular piece of good fortune, and so deep a dejection fell on him, as seriously to endanger his health. His patron
here manifested the really kindly spirit by which he had been
actuated; he entered into the feelings of the child, and removed
him from the lordly mansion to the abode of a country clergyman in the neighborhood, who was passionately fond of children,
and had none of his own. Under the truly paternal care of this
excellent man, Fichte passed some of the happiest years of his
life, and to its latest day looked back to them with tenderness
and gratitude. The affectionate care of this amiable couple, who
shared with him every little domestic pleasure, and treated him
in every respect as if he had been indeed their son, was always
remembered by him with the liveliest sensibility, and certainly
exercised a most favorable influence on his character.
In this family, Fichte received his first instruction in the languages of antiquity, in which, however, he was left much to his
own efforts, seldom receiving what might be called a regular lesson. This plan, though it undoubtedly invigorated and sharpened
his faculties, left him imperfectly acquainted with grammar, and
retarded, in some measure, his subsequent progress at Schulpforte. His kind preceptor soon perceived the inefficiency of his
own attainments for advancing the progress of so promising a
pupil, and urged his patron to obtain for Fichte what appeared




LIFE OF FICHTE.                  679
to him the advantages of a high school. IHe was accordingly
sent, first to Meissen, and afterwards to the seminary at Schulpforte.
There the system of fagging existed in full force, and with its
usual consequences, tyranny on the one side, dissimulation and
cunning on the other. Even Fichte, whose native strength of
character in some measure guarded him from evil influences that
might have been fatal to a mind of a feebler order, confesses that
his life at Schulpforte was any thing but favorable to his integrity. He found himself gradually reconciled to the necessity of
ruling his conduct by the opinion of the little community around
him, and compelled to practice occasionally the same artifices as
others, if he would not with all his talents and industry be always left behind.
Into this microcosm of contending forces the boy of thirteen,
nurtured amidst lonely hills and silent forests, now found himself
thrown. The monastic gloom of the buildings contrasted, at
first, most painfully with the joyous freedom of fields and woods,
where he had been accustomed to wander at will; but still more
painfully, the solitude of the moral desert. Shy and shrinking
within himself he stood, and the tears which furnished only subjects of mockery to his companions, were forced back, or taught
to flow only in secret. Here, however, he learned the useful lesson of self-reliance, so well, though so bitterly taught by want of
sympathy in those around us, and from this time to the close of
his life it was never forgotten. It was natural that the idea of
escape should occur to a boy thus circumstanced, but the dread
of being retaken and brought back in disgrace to Schulpforte,
occasioned hesitation. While brooding over this project, it happened that he met with a copy of Robinson Crusoe, and his enthusiasm, the enthusiasm of thirteen, was kindled into a blaze.
The desert should be his dwelling-place! On some far-off island
of the ocean, beyond the reach of men and the students of
Schulpforte, he would pass golden days of freedom and happiness. It was a common boyish notion, but the manner in which




680                      FICHTE.
it was carried into execution, shows traces of the character of the
individual. Nothing could have been easier than for him to
have taken his departure unperceived on one of the days when
the scholars were allowed to go to the playground; but he
scorned to steal away in secret; he would have this step appear
as the result of necessity and deliberate determination.  He
therefore made a formal declaration to his superior, a lad who
had made a cruel and oppressive use of the brief authority intrusted him, that he would no longer endure the treatment he
received, but would leave the place at the first opportunity. As
may be supposed, the announcement was received with sneers
and laughter, and Fichte now considered himself in all honor
free to fulfil his resolution. It was easy to find an opportunity,
and accordingly, having taken the precaution to study his proposed route on the map, he set off, and trudged on stoutly on
the road to Naumberg. As he walked, however, he bethought
himself of a saying of his beloved old pastor, that one should
never begin an important undertaking without a prayer for Divine assistance; he turned, therefore, and kneeling down on a
green hillock by the roadside, implored, in the innocent sincerity
of his heart, the blessing of Heaven on his wanderings. As he
prayed, it occurred to the new Robinson that his disappearance
must occasion grief to his parents, and his joy in his wild scheme
was gone in a moment. "Never, perhaps, to see his parents
again!" This terrible thought suddenly presented itself with
such force that he resolved to retrace his steps, and meet all the
punishments that might be in store for him, "that he might
look once more on the face of his mother."
On his return, he met those who had been sent in pursuit of
him; for as soon as he had been missed, the " Obergesell" had
given information of what had passed between them. When
carried before the Rector, Fichte immediately confessed that he
had intended to escape, and at the same time related the whole
story with such straightforward simplicity and openness, that the
Rector became interested for him, and not only remitted his




LIFE OF FICHTE.                  681
punishment, but chose for him, among the elder lads, another
master, who treated him with the greatest kindness, and to whom
he became warmly attached.
Fichte had become a Candidatus Theologise when his patron
died, and with him died all hopes of being a clergyman. His
prospects were gloomy in the extreme; but he was relieved from
anxiety by being offered the situation of private tutor in a family
in Switzerland. He soon after made acquaintance with Lavater
and some other literary men. He also formed an attachment,
which was to last him through life, with a niece of Klopstock.
Fichte's tutorship was remarkable. The parents of his pupils,
although neither perfectly comprehending his plans, nor approving of that part which they did comprehend, were nevertheless
such admirers of his moral character-they stood in such respectful awe of him-that they were induced to submit their own
conduct with respect to their children to his judgment. We
presume that all well-meaning tutors occasionally make suggestions to parents respecting certain points in their conduct towards the children; but Fichte's plan is, we fancy, quite unexampled in the history of such relations. He kept a journal which
he laid before them every week, and in which he had noted the
faults of conduct of which they had been guilty. This lets us
into the secret of Fichte's firm and truthful character, as much
as any thing we know about him. It was from such a soil that
we might expect to find growing the moral doctrines which afterwards made his name illustrious. But this domestic censorship could not last long; it lasted for two years; and that it
should have lasted so long is, as has been remarked, strong evidence of the respect in which his character was held. But it
was irksome, insupportable, and ended at length in mutual dissatisfaction. He was forced to seek some other mode of subsistence. He went to Leipzig, where he gave private lessons in
Greek and Philosophy, and became acquainted with the writings
of Kant. This was an important event to him. Hear in what
terms he speaks of it:
290




682                     FIOHTE.
"I have been living, for the last four or five months, in Leipzig, the happiest life I can remember. I came here with my
head full of grand projects, which all burst one after another,
like so many soap-bubbles, without leaving me so much as the
froth. At first this troubled me a little, and, half in despair, I
took a step which I ought to have taken long before. Since I
could not alter what was without me, I resolved to try to alter
what was within. I threw myself into Philosophy-the Kantian,
videlicet-and here I found the true antidote for all my evils,
and joy enough into the bargain. The influence which this philosophy, particularly the ethical part of it (which, however, is
unintelligible without a previous study of the Kritik der reinen
Vernunft) has had upon my whole system of thought, the revolution which it has effected in my mind, is not to be described.
To you especially I owe the declaration, that I now believe, with
my whole heart, in free will, and that I see that under this supposition alone can duty, virtue, and morality have any existence.
From the opposite proposition, of the necessity of all human
actions, must flow the most injurious consequences to society;
and it may, in fact, be in part the source of the corrupt morals
of the higher classes which we hear so much of. Should any
one adopting it remain virtuous, we must look for the cause of
his purity elsewhere than in the innocuousness of the doctrine.
With many it is their want of logical consequence in their actions.
"I am furthermore well convinced, that this life is not the land
of enjoyment, but of labor and toil, and that every joy is granted
to us but to strengthen us for further exertion; that the management of our own fate is by no means required of us, but only selfculture. I trouble myself, therefore, not at all concerning the
things that are without; I endeavor not to appear, but to be.
And to this, perhaps, I owe the deep tranquillity I enjoy; my
external position, however, is well enough suited to such a frame
of mind. I am no man's master, and no man's slave. As to
prospects, I have none at all, for the constitution of the church
here does not suit me, nor, to say the truth, that of the people




LIFE OF FICHTE.                 683
either. As long as I can maintain my present independence I
shall certainly do so. I have been for some time working at an
explanatory abridgment of Kant's Kritik der Urtheilskraft (Critical Inquiry into the Faculty of Judgment), but I am afraid I
shall be obliged to come before the public in a very immature
state, to prevent being forestalled by a hundred vamped-up publications. Should the child ever make its appearance, I will send
it to you."*
It was in consequence of his admiration of Kant, that, after
several ineffectual attempts to settle himself he went to K1soningsberg. Instead of a letter of introduction, Fichte presented Kant
with a work, written in eight days, and which bore the title of
A Critique of every possible Revelation. Kant at once recognized
his peer, and received him warmly. But Kant himself, though
celebrated, was neither rich nor influential. Fichte's affairs were
desperate. We have his own confession in the fragment of a
journal which he kept at the time.
" 28th August.-I yesterday began to revise my Critique. In
the course of my meditation some new and excellent ideas were
excogitated, which convinced me that my work was superficial.
I endeavored to carry out my investigation to-day; but my imagination led me so far away, that I could do nothing. I have
reckoned my finances, and find that I have just enough to subsist on for a fortnight. It is true this is not the first time in my
life that I have found myself in such an embarrassment, but I
was then in my own country; besides, in growing older, one's
sense of honor becomes more delicate, and distress is more and
more of a hardship.... I have not been able to make any resolution. I certainly shall not speak on the subject to M. Borowsky, to whom Kant has given me an introduction. If I speak
to any one, it shall be to Kant himself.
"1st Sept.-I have made a resolution which I must commf* It was never printed; probably because, as he here anticipates, he was
forestalled.




684                     FICHTE.
nicate to Kant. A situation as tutor, however reluctantly I
might accept it, does not even offer itself; while, on the other
hand, the incertitude in which I am placed does not allow me to
work. I must return home. I can perhaps borrow from Kant
the small sum necessary for my journey. I went to him to-day
for that purpose, but my courage failed me; I resolved to write
to him.
" 2d Sept.-I finished my letter to Kant, and sent it.
"3d Sept.-Received an invitation to dinner from Kant. He
received me with his usual cordiality; but informed me that it
would be quite out of his power to accede to my request for another fortnight. Such amiable frankness!
" I have done nothing lately; but I shall set myself to work,
and leave the rest to Providence.
" 6th Sept.-Dined with Kant, who proposed that I should
sell the MS. of my Critique to Hartung the bookseller.'It is
admirably written,' said he, when I told him I was going to rewrite it. Is that true? It is Kant who says so.
" 12th Sept.-I wanted to work to-day; but could do nothing. How will this end? What will become of me a week
hence? Then all my money will be gone."
These extracts will not be read without emotion. They paint
a curious picture in the life of our philosopher: a life which was
little more than a perpetual and energetic combat.
The Critique was published anonymously, and gained immense
applause; partly, no doubt, because it was generally mistaken
for the production of Kant himself. The celebrity he acquired
when the authorship was disclosed, was the means of procuring
him the chair of Philosophy at Jena, the offer of which was made
him towards the end of 1793.
Jena was then the leading University of Germany; and
Fichte might flatter himself that at length he had a settled position, in which he might calmly develop his scientific views.
But his was a Fighter's destiny. Even here, at Jena, he found
himself soon opposing and opposed. His endeavors to instil a




LIFE OF FICHTE.                 685
higher moral feeling into the students-his anxiety for their better culture-only brought on him the accusation of endeavoring
to undermine the religious institutions of his country; and his
speculative views brought on him the charge of atheism.
Atheism is a grave charge, and yet how lightly made! The
history of opinion abounds in instances of this levity; yet scarcely ever was a charge more groundless in appearance than that
against Fichte, whose system was atheistic only in superficial appearance. Nevertheless the cry was raised, and he had to battle
against it. It is understood that the Government would have
been willing to overlook the publication of the work which
raised this cry, if Fichte had made any sort of explanatory modification; but he would not hear of it, tendered his resignation,
and soon afterwards found an asylum in Prussia, where he occupied the Chair at Erlangen, and afterwards at Berlin. From
his career at Berlin we will select one incident typical of his
character.
The students are assembled in crowds to hear their favorite
professor, who is to lecture that day upon duty,-on that duty
whose ideal grandeur his impassioned eloquence has revealed to
them. Fichte arrives, calm and modest. He lectures with his
usual dignified calmness, rising into fiery bursts of eloquence, but
governed by the same marvellous rigor of logic as before. He
leads them to the present state of affairs. On this topic he grows
still more animated; the rolling of drums without frequently
drowning his voice, and giving him fresh spirit. He points to
the bleeding wounds of his country; he warms with hatred
against oppressors; and enforces it as the duty of every one to
lend his single arm to save his country.
"This course of lectures," he exclaims, "will be suspended till
the end of the campaign. We will resume them in a free country, or die in the attempt to recover her freedom." Loud shouts
respondent ring through the hall; clapping of hands and stamping of feet make answer to the rolling drums without; every
German heart there present is moved, as at the sound of a




686                      FICHTE.
trumpet.  Fichte descends; passes through the crowd; and
places himself in the ranks of a corps of volunteers then departing for the army. It is the commencement of the memorable
compaign of 1813.
In another year he was no more; he fell, not by a French
bullet, but by the fever caught while tending his loved wife, who
herself had fallen a victim to her attendance on unknown sufferers. On the 28th of January, 1814, aged fifty-two, this noble
Fichte expired.
There are few characters which inspire more admiration than
that of Fichte; we must all admire "that cold, colossal, adamantine spirit standing erect and clear, like a Cato Major among
degenerate men; fit to have been the teacher of the Stoa, and
to have discoursed of beauty and virtue in the groves of Academe! So robust an intellect, a soul so calm, so lofty, massive,
and immovable has not mingled in philosophical discussion since
the time of Luther. For the man rises before us amid contradiction and debate like a granite mountain amid clouds and
winds. Ridicule of the best that could be commanded has been
already tried against him; but it could not avail. What was
the wit of a thousand wits to him? The cry of a thousand choughs
assaulting that old cliff of granite; seen from the summit, these,
as they winged the midway air, showed scarce so gross as beetles, and their cry was seldom even audible. Fichte's opinions
may be true or false; but his character as a thinker can be
slightly valued only by those who know it ill; and as a man approved by action and suffering, in his life and in his death, he
ranks with a class of men who were common only in better ages
than ours."*
~ II. FICHTE'S HISTORICAL POSITION.
Kant's Criticism, although really leaving skepticism in possession of the field, was nevertheless believed to have indicated a
* Carlyle.




FICHTE'S HISTORICAL POSITION.          687
new domain, in which a refuge might be found. The thought
soon suggested itself that on this domain an indestructible temple might be erected. Kant had driven the piles deep down into
the earth-a secure foundation was made; but Kant had declined building.
Jacobi, for one, saw in the principles of " criticism" a path on
which he could travel. He maintained, that just as Sense was,
according to Kant, a faculty whereby we perceived material
things, so also was Reason a sense, a faculty, whereby we perceive the supersensual.
It was indeed soon evident that men would not content themselves with the mere negation to which Kant had reduced our
knowledge of things per se. It was the positive part of his system they accepted and endeavored to extend.  This attempt
forms the matter of all the subsequent history of German Philosophy till Hegel. We will briefly state the nature of the discussions which the result of Kant's system had rendered imperative.
Kant had postulated the existence of an object as the necessary correlate to a subject. Knowledge was both objective and
subjective; but inasmuch as it was thus inseparably twofold it
could never penetrate the essence of things-it could never know
the object-it could only know phenomena. Hence the problem was:
What is the relation of object and subject?
To solve this, it was necessary to penetrate the essence of
things, to apprehend noumena. All the efforts of men were
therefore to be directed towards this absolute science.  The
ground of all certitude being in the a priori ideas, an attempt
was made to construct a priori the whole system of human
knowledge.
The Ego was the necessary basis of the new edifice. Consciousness, as alone certain, was proclaimed the ground upon which absolute science must rest.
Fichte's position is here clearly marked out. His sole object




688                      FICHTE.
was to construct a science out of consciousness, and thereon to
found a system of morals.
Let us at the outset request the reader to give no heed to any
of the witticisms which he may hear, or which may suggest
themselves to him on a hasty consideration of Fichte's opinions.
That the opinions are not those of ordinary thinkers, we admit;
that they are repugnant to all " common sense," we must also
admit; that they are false, we believe: but we also believe
them to have been laborious products of an earnest mind, the
consequences of admitted premises, drawn with singular audacity
and subtlety, and no mere caprices of ingenious speculation-no
paradoxes of an acute but trifling mind.
It was within him that he found a lamp to light him on his
path. Deep in the recesses of his soul, beneath all understanding, superior to all logical knowledge, there lay a faculty by
which truth, absolute truth, might be known.
"I have found the organ," he says in his Bestimmung des
Menschen, "by which to apprehend all reality. It is not the
understanding; for all knowledge supposes some higher knowledge on which it rests, and of this ascent there is no end. It is
Faith, voluntarily reposing on views naturally presenting themselves to us, because through these views alone we can fulfil our
destiny, which sees our knowledge, and pronounces that'it is
good,' and raises it to certainty and conviction. It is no knowledge, but a resolution of the will to admit this knowledge.
This is no mere verbal distinction, but a true and deep one,
pregnant with the most important consequences. Let me forever hold fast by it. All my conviction is but faith, and it proceeds from the will and not from the understanding; from the
will also, and not from the understanding, must all the true culture proceed. Let the first only be firmly directed towards the
Good, the latter will of itself apprehend the True. Should the
latter be exercised and developed while the former remains
neglected, nothing can come of it but a facility in vain and endless sophistical subtleties refining away into the absolutely void




FICHTE'S HISTORICAL POSITION.           689
inane. I know that every seeming truth, born of thought alone,
and not ultimately resting on faith, is false and spurious; for
knowledge, purely and simply such, when carried to its utmost
consequences, leads to the conviction that we can know nothing!
Such knowledge never finds any thing in the conclusions, which
it has not previously placed in the premises by faith; and even
then its conclusions are not always correct..... Every human
creature born into the world has unconsciously seized on the
reality which exists for him alone through this intuitive faith.
If in mere knowledge-in mere perception and reflection-we
can discover no ground for regarding our mental presentations
as more than mere pictures, why do we all nevertheless regard
them as more, and imagine for them a basis, a substratum independent of all modifications? If we all possess the capacity and
the instinct to go beyond this natural view of things, why do so
few of us follow this instinct, or exercise this capacity?-nay,
why do we even resist with a sort of bitterness when we are
urged towards this path  What holds us imprisoned in these
natural boundaries?  Not inferences of our reason; for there
are none which could do this. It is our deep interest in reality
that does this-in the good that we are to produce-in the common and the sensuous that we are to enjoy. From this interest
can no one who lives detach himself, and just as little from the
faith which forces itself upon him simultaneously with his existence. We are all born in faith, and he who is blind follows
blindly the irresistible attraction. He who sees follows by sight,
and believes because he will believe."*
Here the limit set by Kant is overleaped: a knowledge of
realities is affirmed. But it is not enough to affirm such a
knowledge; we must prove it. To prove this is the mission of
Philosophy.
Fichte, who thought himself a true Kantist, although Kant
very distinctly and publicly repudiated him, declared that the
* We adopt the translation of Mrs. Percy Sinnett: Destination of Man,
London, 1846.




690                      FIOHTE.
materials for a science had been discovered by Kant; nothing
more was needed than a systematic co-ordination of these materials: and this task he undertook in his famous Doctrine of
Science (Wissenschaftslehre). In this he endeavored to construct a priori all knowledge.
~ III. BASIS OF FICHTE'S SYSTEM.
We are supposed to perceive external objects through the
ideas which these objects excite in us. But this assumption is
not warranted by the facts of consciousness. What is the fundamental fact?  It is that I have in my mind a certain idea.
This, and this only, is primitively given. When we leave this
fact in quest of an explanation, we are forced to admit either
that this idea is spontaneously evolved by me; or else some notme-something different from  myself-has excited it in me.
Idealism or Dualism? choose between them.
Kant, unwilling to embrace idealism, and unable to conceive
how the Ego spontaneously evolved within itself ideas of that
which it regarded as different from itself, postulated the existence of a Non-Ego, but declared that we knew nothing of it.
In this he followed Locke, and the majority of philosophers.
Truly, said Fichte, we know nothing of it; we can only know
that which passes within ourselves. Only so much as we are
conscious of can we know; but in consciousness there is no object given, there is only an idea given. Are we forced by the
very laws of our reason to suppose that there is Non-Ego existing?-are we forced to assume that these ideas are images of
something out of us and independent of us? To what does this
dilemma bring us   Simply to this: that the very assumption,
here called a necessary consequence of our mental constitutionthis Non-Ego, which must be postulated, is, after all, nothing but
a postulate of our reason; is therefore a product of the Ego. It
is the Ego which thus creates the necessity for a Non-Ego; it is
the Ego which thus, answering to the necessity, creates the NonEgo wanted.. Ideas, and nothing but ideas, are given in the




BASIS OF FICHTE S SYSTEM.             691
primitive fact of consciousness. These are the products of the
activity of the Ego; and not, as is so commonly asserted, the
products of the passivity of the Ego. The soul is no passive
mirror reflecting images. It is an active principle creating them.
The soul is no lifeless receptivity. Were it not brimming over
with life and activity, perception would be impossible. One
stone does not perceive another. A mould does not perceive the
liquid that is poured into it.
Consciousness is in its very essence an activity. Well, then,
if in its activity it produces images, and if by the laws of its
nature it is forced to assume that these images have some substratum, what is this assumption but another form of the soul's
activity? If the Ego is conscious of its changes, and yet is
forced to attribute these changes to some external cause, what is
this very act of assuming an external cause but the pure act of
the Ego?-another change in the consciousness?
You admit that we cannot know Substance; all our knowledge is limited to accidents-to phenomena. But, you say, you
are forced to assume a Substance as the basis of these accidents
-a noumenon as that whereby phenomena are possible; and
yet you cannot know this noumenon. Fichte answers: If you
cannot know it, your assumption, as the mere product of your
reason, is nothing more nor less than another form of the activity
of the Ego. It is you who assume; and you assume what you
call Substance. Substance is nothing but the synthesis of accidents. And it is a mental synthesis.
Thus Fichte founded Idealism upon the basis of consciousness,
which was the admitted basis of all certitude; and he not only
founded idealism, but reduced the Ego to an activity, and all
knowledge to an act.
The activity of the Ego is of course an assumption, but it is
the only assumption necessary for the construction of a science.
That once admitted, the existence of the Non-Ego, as a product
of the Ego, follows as a necessary consequence.
Every one will admit that A = A; or that A is A. This is




692                     FICHTE.
an axiom which is known intuitively, and has no need of proof.
It is the proposition of absolute identity (Satz der.Identitdt). It
is absolutely true. In admitting this to be absolutely true, we
ascribe to the mind a faculty of knowing absolute truth.
But in saying A equals A, we do not affirm the existence of A;
we only affirm that if A exist, then it must equal A. And the
axiom teaches us not that A exists; but there is a necessary relation between a certain if and then; and this necessary relation
we will call X. But this relation, this X, is only in the Ego,
comes onlyfrom the Ego. It is the Ego that judges in the preceding axiom that A= A; and it judges by means of X.
To reduce this to language a little less scholastic, we may say
that, in every judgment which the mind makes, the act of judging is an act of the Ego.
But as the X is wholly in the Ego, so therefore is A in the
Ego, and is posited by the Ego. And by this we see that there
is something in the Ego which is forever one and the same, and
that is the X. Hence the formula, " I am I: Ego = Ego."
We come here to the Cogito, ergo sum, of Descartes, as the
basis of all certitude. The Ego posits itself, and is by means of
this very self-positing. When I say "I am," I affirm, in consciousness, my existence;. and this affirmation of my consciousness is the condition of my existence. The Ego is therefore at
one and the same time both the activity and the product of activity; precisely as thought is both the thinking activity, and
the product thought.
We will, for the present, spare the reader any further infliction of such logical abstractions. He will catch in the foregoing
a glimpse of Fichte's method, and be in some way able to estimate the strength of the basis on which idealism reposes.
The great point Fichte has endeavored to establish is the
identity of being and thought-of existence and consciousnessof object and subject. And he establishes this by means of the
Ego considered as essentially an activity.
Hence the conclusion drawn in the practical part of his phi



BASIS OF FICHTE'S SYSTEM.              693
losophy, that the true destination of man is not thought, but
action, which is thought realized. "I am free," he says. That
is the revelation of consciousness. "I am free; and it is not
merely my action, but the free determination of my will to obey
the voice of conscience, that decides all my worth. More brightly does the everlasting world now rise before me; and the fundamental laws of its order are more clearly revealed to my mental sight. My will alone, lying hid in the obscure depths of my
soul, is the first link in a chain of consequences stretching
through the invisible realms of spirit, as in this terrestrial world
the action itself, a certain movement communicated to matter, is
the first link in a material chain of cause and effect, encircling
the whole system. The will is the efficient cause, the living
principle of the world of spirit, as motion is of the world of
sense. I stand between two worlds, the one visible, in which the
act alone avails, and the intention matters not at all; the other
invisible and incomprehensible, acted on only by the will. In
both these worlds I am an effective force. The Divine life, as
alone the finite mind can conceive it, is self-forming, self-representing will, clothed, to the mortal eye, with multitudinous sensuous forms, flowing through me and through the whole immeasurable universe, here streaming through my veins and
muscles,-there, pouring its abundance into the tree, the flower,
the grass. The dead, heavy mass of inert matter, which did but
fill up nature, has disappeared, and, in its stead, there rushes by
the bright, everlasting flood of life and power, fiom its Infinite
Source.
" The Eternal Will is the Creator of the world, as he is the
Creator of the finite reason. Those who will insist that the
world must have been created out of a mass of inert matter,
which must always remain inert and lifeless, like a vessel made
by human hands, know neither the world nor Him. The Infinite Reason alone exists in himself-the finite in him; in our
minds alone has he created a world, or at least that by and
through which it becomes unfolded to us. In his light we be



694                     FICHTE.
hold the light, and all that it reveals. Great, living Will!
whom no words can name, and no conception embrace! well
may I lift my thoughts to thee, for I can think only in thee. In
thee, the Incomprehensible, does my own existence, and that of
the world, become comprehensible to me; all the problems of
being are solved, and the most perfect harmony reigns. I veil
my face before thee and lay my finger on my lips."
~ IV. FICHTE'S IDEALISM.
The ground-principle of Fichte's idealism having been given,
we have now to see how he avoids the natural objections which
rise against such a doctrine. But first let us notice how this
deification of personality was at once the most natural product
of such a mind as Fichte's, and the best adapted to the spirit of
the age which produced it. His doctrine was an inspiration of
that ardent and exalted spirit which stirred the heart of Germany, and made the campaign of 1813 an epoch in history.
Germany then, as now, was most deficient in energetic will. It
had armies, and these armies were headed by experienced generals. But among them there was scarcely another beyond the
impetuous Bliicher, who had steadfast will. They were beaten
and beaten. At length they were roused. A series of insults
had roused them. They rose to fight for fatherland; and in
their ranks was Fichte, who by deed as well as doctrine sought
to convince them that in Will lay man's divinity.
The question being, What is the relation of Object and Subject? and Fichte's solution being Object and Subject are identical, it followed from his position that inasmuch as an Object and
a Subject-a Non-Ego and an Ego-were given in knowledge,
and the distinction between them by all men supposed to be
real, the origin of this distinction must arise in one of two ways:
either the Ego must posit the Non-Ego, wilfully and consciously
(in which case mankind would never suppose the distinction to
be a real distinction); or else the Ego must cause the Non-Ego
to be, and must do so necessarily and unconsciously.




FICHTE'S IDEALISM.                  695
How does Fichte solve the problem? He assumes that the
existence of the very Ego itself is determined* by the Non-Ego;
and in this way: To be, and to be conscious, are the same. The
existence of the Ego depends upon its consciousness. But to be
conscious of Self is at the same time to be conscious of Not-Self;
the correlates Self and Not-Self are given in the same act of consciousness. But how is it that we attribute reality to Not-Self?
Just as we attribute reality to Self, namely, by an act of Consciousness. Not-Self is given in Consciousness as a reality, and
therefore we cannot suppose it to be a phantom.
We may pause here to remark how all the witticisms against
Idealism fall to the ground. The wits assume that when it is
said the World is produced by the Ego, this World must be held
as a phantom. Now nobody ever believed that external objects
had no reality; the only possible doubt is as to whether they
have any reality independent of mind.
In consciousness we have a twofold fact, namely, the fact of
Self, and the fact of Not-Self, indissolubly given in one. We
conclude therefore that Consciousness-that the Ego-is partly
self-determined, and partly determined by not-self. Let us suppose the entire reality of the Ego (that is, in its identity of Subject and Object) represented by the number ten. The Ego,
conscious of five of its parts-or, to speak with Fichte-positing
five, does by that very act posit five parts negatively in itself.
But how is it that the Ego can posit a negation in itself?  It
does so by the very act of Consciousness; in the act of separating five from ten, the five remaining are left passive. The
negation is therefore the passivity of the Ego. This seems to
lead to the contradiction that the Ego, which was defined as an
Activity, is at the same time active and passive. The solution
* The German word bestimmen, which we are forced to translate "to determine," is of immense use to the metaphysicians; we would gladly have
substituted some other equivalent, could we have found one to represent
the meaning better. To determine, in philosophy, does not mean (as in ordinary language), to resolve, but to render definite. Chaos, when determined, is the created world.




696                       FICHTE.
of this difficulty is that it is Activity which determines Passivity,
and reciprocally.  Let us suppose the absolute reality as a
Sphere; this is entirely in the Ego, and has a certain quantity.
Every quantity less than this totality, will, of necessity, be negation, passivity. In order that a less quantity should be compared with the totality and so opposed to it, it is necessary there
should be some relation between them; and this is in the idea
of divisibility. In the absolute totality, as such, there are no
parts; but this totality may be compared with parts and distinguished from it. Passivity is therefore a determinate quantity
of Activity, a quantity compared with the totality. In regard to
the Ego as absolute, the Ego as limited is passive; in the relation of Ego as limited to the Non-Ego, the Ego is active and the
Non-Ego passive. And thus are activity and passivity reciprocally determined.
The result of this and much more reasoning, is the hypothesis
that when mankind attribute to objects a real existence they are
correct; but they are incorrect in supposing that the Object is
independent of the Subject: it is identical with the Subject. The
common-sense belief is therefore correct enough. It is when we
would rise above this belief, and endeavor to philosophize, that
we fall into error. All the philosophers have erred, not in assuming the reality of objects, but in assuming the reality of two
distinct, disparate existences, Matter and Mind; whereas we have
seen that there is only one existence, having the twofold aspect
of Object and Subject.
Nor is the distinction unimportant. If Dualism be accepted,
we have no refuge from Skepticism. If we are to believe that
Dinge an sich exist-that Matter exists independently of Mind,
exists per se-then are we doomed to admit only a knowledge of
phenomona as possible. The things in themselves we can never
know; we can only know their effects upon us. Our knowledge
is relative, and never can embrace the absolute truth.
But if Idealism be accepted, the ordinary belief of men is not
only respected but confirmed; for this belief is that we do know




FICHTE S IDEALISM.                697
things in themselves, and that the things we know do exist. The
Dualist forces you to admit that you cannot know things in
themselves; and that your belief in their existence is merely the
postulate of your Reason, and is not immediately given in the
facts of Consciousness. The Idealist, on the contrary, gives you
an immediate knowledge of things in themselves, consequently
opens to you the domain of absolute Truth. He only differs
from you in saying that these things, which you immediately
know, are part and parcel of yourself; and it is because you and
they are indissolubly united, that immediate knowledge is possible.
"But," says Realism, " I know that objects are altogether independent of me. I did not create them. I found them there,
out of me. The proof of this is that if, after looking at a tree, I
turn away, or shut my eyes, the image of the tree is annihilated,
but the tree itself remains."
" No," answers Idealism, " the tree itself does not remain: for
the tree is but a phenomenon, or collection of phenomena;-the
tree is a Perception, and all perceptions are subjective. You
suppose that every one must admit that our perceptions are different from their objects. But are they different? that is precisely the question at issue; and you assume it. Let us be
cautious. What is an object-a tree for instance? Tell me,
what does your Consciousness inform you of? Let me hear
the fact, the whole fact, and no inference from the fact. Is not
the object (tree) one and the same as your perception (tree)? Is
not the tree a mere name for your perception?  oes not your
Consciousness distinctly tell you that the Form, Color, Solidity,
and Smell of the Tree are in you-are affections of your Subject?"
"I admit that," replies Realism; " but although these are in
me, they are caused by something out of me. Consciousness tells
me that very plainly."
"Does it so? I tell you that Consciousness has no such
power. It can tell you of its own changes; it cannot trans830




698                       FICHTE.
cend itself to tell you any thing about that which causes its
changes."
"But I am irresistibly compelled to believe," says Realism,
"that there are things which exist out of me; and this belief, because irresistible, is true."
"' Stop! you run on too fast," replies Idealism; "your belief is
not what you describe it. You are not irresistibly compelled to
believe that things exist, which said things lie underneath all
their appearances, and must ever remain unknown. This is no
instinctive belief; it is a philosophic inference. Your belief
simply is, that certain things, colored, odorous, extended, sapid,
and solid, exist; and so they do. But you infer that they exist
out of you?   Rash inference.   Have you not admitted that
color, odor, taste, extension, etc., are but modifications of your
sentient being; and if they exist in you, how can they exist out
of you?   They do not: they seem to do so by a law of the
mind which gives objectivity to our sensations."*
"Try your utmost to conceive an object as any thing more
than a synthesis of perceptions. You cannot. You may infer,
indeed, that a substratum for all phenomena exists, although unknown, unknowable. But on what is your inference grounded?
On the impossibility of conceiving the existence of qualitiesextension, color, etc.-apart from some substance of which they
are qualities. This impossibility is a figment. The qualities
have no need of an objective substratum, because they have a
subjective substratum: they are the modifications of a sensitive
subject; and the synthesis of these modifications is the only substratum of which they stand in need. This may be proved in
another way. The qualities of objects, it is universally admitted,
are but modifications of the subject: these qualities are attributed to external objects; they are dependent upon the subject
* The difference between Berkeley and Fichte is apparent here. The
former said that the objects did exist independent of the Ego, but did not
exist independent of the universal Mind. Fichte's Idealism was Egoism;
Berkeley's was a theological Idealism.




APPLICATION OF FICHTE S IDEALISM.             699
for their existence; and yet, to account for their existence, it is
asserted that some unknown external something must exist as a
substance in which they must inhere. Now, it is apparent that,
inasmuch as these qualities are subjective and dependent upon
the subject for their existence, there can be no necessity for an
object in which they must inhere." Thus may Idealism defend
itself against Realism.
We have made ourselves the advocates of Fichte's principles,
but the reader will not mistake us for disciples of Fichte. In
the exposition of his system we have, for obvious reasons, generally avoided his own manner, which is too abstract to be
followed without difficulty, and we have endeavored to state his
ideas in our own way. To exhibit Fichte's Idealism is, strictly
speaking, all that our plan imposes on us; but although his philosophical doctrines are all founded upon it, and although it was
the doctrine which made an epoch in German Philosophy, consequently the doctrine which entitles him to a place in this History, nevertheless we should be doing him injustice and misleading our readers, if we did not give some glimpse of his moral
system. The Idealism, as Idealism, seems little better than an
ingenious paradox: only when we see it applied can we regard
it as serious.*
~ V. APPLICATION OF FICHTE'S IDEALISM.
The Ego is essentially an Activity; consequently free. But
this free activity would lose itself in infinity, and would remain
without consciousness-in fact, without existence-did it not
* Those who are curious to see what he himself makes of his system, are
referred to his Wissenschaftslehre (of which a French translation by M. Paul
Grimblot exists, under the title of Doctrine de la Science), or, as a more popular exposition, to his Bestimmung des fMenschen, a French translation of which
has been published by M. Barchou de Penhoen, under the title Destination
de l'Homme, which, from the character and learning of the translator, is, we
have no doubt, an excellent version. An English translation has also been
made by Mrs. Percy Sinnett, which can be recommended. Fichte's work,
The Nature of the Scholar, has also recently appeared, by Mr. W. Smith,
who has also translated the Characteristics of the Present Age.




700                      FICHTE.
encounter some resistance. In the effort to vanquish this resistance, it exerts its will, becomes conscious of something not itself,
and thereby becomes conscious of itself. But resistance limits
freedom, and as an Activity the Ego is essentially free-it is
irresistibly impelled to enjoy perfect freedom. This expansive
force, which impels the Ego to realize itself by complete development, and thereby assimilating the Non-Ego-this force, in as
far as it is not realized, is the aim of man's existence-it is his duty.
Here a difference from the ordinary schools of morality begins
to show itself. Duty is not a moral obligation which we are free to
acknowledge or reject; it is a pulse beating in the very heart of
man-a power inseparable from his constitution; and according
to its fulfilment is the man complete.
The world does not exist because we imagine it, but because
we believe it. Let all reality be swept away by skepticism-we
are not affected. Man is impelled by his very nature to realize
his existence by his acts. Our destination is not thought, but
action. Man is not born to brood over his thoughts, but to manifest them-to give them existence. There is a moral world
within; our mission is to transport it without. By this we create the world. For what is the condition of existence?-what
determines Thought to be? Simply that it should realize itself
as an object. The Ego as simple Subject does not exist; it has
only a potentiality of existence. To exist, it must realize itself
and become Subject-Object.
Mark the consequence: Knowing that we carry within us the
moral world, and that upon ourselves alone depends the attainment of so sublime an object as the manifestation of this world,
it is to ourselves alone that we must direct our attention. This
realization of the world, what is it but the complete development
of ourselves? If we would be, therefore-if we would enjoy the
realities of existence, we must develop ourselves in the attempt
to incessantly realize the beautiful, the useful, and the good.
Man is commanded to be moral by the imperious necessity of
his own nature. To be virtuous is not to obey some external




APPLICATION OF FICHTE'S IDEALISM.             701
law, but to fulfil an internal law: this obedience is not slavery,
but freedom; it is not sacrificing one particle of freedom to any
other power, but wholly and truly realizing the power within us
of being free.
Life is a combat. The free spirit of man, inasmuch as it is
finite, is limited, imperfect; but it incessantly struggles to subjugate that which opposes it-it tends incessantly towards infinity. Defeated in his hopes, he is sometimes discouraged, but
this lasts not long. There is a well-spring of energy forever
vital in the heart of man; an ideal is forever shining before
him, and that he must attain.
Man knows himself to be free; knows also that his fellowmen are free; and therefore the duty of each is to treat the
others as beings who have the same aim as himself. Individual
liberty is therefore the principle of all government: from it
Fichte deduces his political system.
And what says Fichte respecting God? He was, as we know,
accused of atheism. Let us hear his real opinions. In his answer to that charge we have an abstruse, but at the same time
positive, exposition of his views.* God created the world out of
an inert mass of matter; and from the evidence of design in this
created world we infer an intelligent designer. This is the common view; but Fichte could not accept it. In the first place,
what we call the World is but the incarnation of our Duty
(unsere Welt ist das versinnlichte Material unserer Pflicht). It
is the objective existence of the Ego: we are, so to speak, the
creators of it. Such a statement looks very like atheism, especially when Fichte's system is not clearly apprehended: it is,
however, at the worst, only Acosmism.
Nor could Fichte accept the evidence of Design, because Design is a mere conclusion of the understanding, applicable only
to finite, transient things, wholly inapplicable to the infinite:
Design itself is but a subjective notion.t
* Gerichtlcehe Verantwortungsschriften gegen die Ankltae des Atheismus.
t Ibid., p. 48.




702                      FICHTE.
"God," says Fichte, "must be believed in, not inferred. Faith
is the ground of all conviction, scientific or moral. Why do
you believe in the existence of the world? it is nothing more
than the incarnation of that which you carry within you, yet
you believe in it. In the same way God exists in your Consciousness, and you believe in him. He is the Moral Order
(moralische Ordnung) of the world: as such we can know him,
and only as such. For if we attempt to attribute to him Intelligence or Personality, we at once necessarily fall into anthropomorphism. God is infinite: therefore beyond the reach of our
science, which can only embrace the finite, but not beyond our
faith."*
By our efforts to fulfil our Duty, and thus to realize the Good
and Beautiful, we are tending towards God, we live in some measure the life of God. True religion is therefore the realization
of universal reason. If we were all perfectly free, we should be
one; for there is but one Liberty. If we had all the same convictions, the law of each would be the law of all, since all would
have but one Will. To this we aspire; to this Humanity is
tending.
The germ of mysticism which lies in this doctrine was fully
developed by some of Fichte's successors, although he himself
had particularly guarded against such an interpretation, and distinguishes himself from the mystics.
Let us now pass to Fichte's Philosophy of History.
The historian only accomplishes half of the required task.
He narrates the events of an epoch, in their order of occurrence,
and in the form of their occurrence; but he cannot be assured
that he has not omitted some of these events, or that he has
given them their due position and significance. The philosopher
must complete this incomplete method. He must form some
idea bf the epoch-an Idea a priori, independent of experience.
He must then exhibit this Idea always dominant throughout the
* Sittenlehre, pp. 189, 194.




APPLICATION OF FICHTE'S IDEALISM.         703
epoch-and manifesting itself in all the multiplicity of facts,
which are but its incarnation. What is the world but an incarnation of the Ego? What is an epoch but an incarnation of an
Idea 
Every epoch has therefore its pre-existent Idea. And this
Idea will be determined by the Ideas of the epochs which have
preceded it; and will determine those which succeed it. Hence
we conclude that the evolutions of Ideas-or the History of the
World-is accomplished on a certain plan. The philosopher
must conceive this plan in its totality, that he may from it
deduce the Ideas of the principal epochs in the history of Humanity, not only as past, but as future.
The question first to be settled is this: What is the groundplan of the world? or, in other words, according to Fichte,
What is the fundamental Idea which Humanity has to realize?
The answer is: The Idea of Duty. This, in its concrete expression, is: To fix the relations of man to man in such order
that the perfect liberty of each be compatible with the liberty of
the whole.
History may thus be divided into two principal epochs. The
one, in which man has not established the social relations on the
basis of reason. The other, in which he has established them,
and knows that he has done so.
That Humanity exists but for the successive and constant
realization of the dictates of reason is easily proved. But sometimes Humanity has knowledge of what it performs, and why it
performs it; sometimes it obeys but a blind impulse. In this
second case, that is to say, in the first epochs of the terrestrial
existence of Humanity, Reason, although not manifesting itself
distinctly, consciously, nevertheless exists. It manifests itself as
an instinct, and appears under the form of a natural law; it
manifests itself in the intelligence only as a vague and obscure
sentiment. Reason, on the contrary, no sooner manifests itself
as Reason, than it is gifted with consciousness of itself and its
acts. This constitutes the second epoch.




704                      FICHTE.
But Humanity does not pass at once from the first to the
second epoch. At first Reason only manifests itself in a few
men, the Great Men of their age, who thereby acquire authority.
They are the instructors of their age; their mission is to elevate
the mass up to themselves. Thus Instinct diminishes, and Reason supervenes. Science appears. Morality becomes a science.
The relations of man to man become more and more fixed in
accordance with the dictates of reason.
The entire life of Humanity has five periods. I. The domination of Instinct over Reason: this is the primitive age. II. The
general Instinct gives place to an external dominant Authority:
this is the age of doctrines unable to convince, and employing
force to produce a blind belief, claiming unlimited obedience:
this is the period in which Evil arises. III. The Authority,
dominant in the preceding epoch, but constantly attacked by
Reason, becomes weak and wavering: this is the epoch of skepticism and licentiousness. IV. Reason becomes conscious of itself; truth makes itself known; the science of Reason develops
itself: this is the beginning of that perfection which Humanity
is destined to attain. V. The science of Reason is applied;
Humanity fashions itself after the ideal standard of Reason:
this is the epoch of Art, the last term in the history of our
species.
This brief outline of Fichte's system will be sufficient to assign
him his place in the long line of European thinkers who have
worked, with such perseverance, the glittering mine of Metaphysics; and sufficient also, we trust, not only to stimulate the
curiosity of such readers whose studies lie in that direction, but
also to furnish them with a general view capable of rendering
the details intelligible.




LIFE OF SCHELLING.               705
CHAPTER II.
SCHELLING.
~ I. LIFE OF SCHELLING.
FREDERICK WILLIAM JOSEPH SCHELLING was born in Leonberg, in Wirtemberg, 27th of January, 1775.  At the University in Tiibingen he first knew Hegel, and their friendship
was enduring and productive. At Leipzig he studied Medicine
and Philosophy; in the latter he became the pupil of Fichte.
He afterwards filled Fichte's vacant chair at Jena, where he
lectured with immense success. In 1807 he was made a member of the Munich Academy of Sciences. And in Bavaria,
honored, rewarded, and ennobled, he remained till 1842, when
the King of Prussia seduced him to Berlin; and there, in the
chair once held by Hegel, he opened a series of lectures, in
which he was to give the fruit of a life's meditation.
His appearance at Berlin was the signal for violent polemics.
The Hegelians were all up in arms. Pamphlets, full of personalities and dialectics, were launched against Schelling, apparently without much effect. His foes at length grew weary of
screaming; and he continued quietly to lecture. In 1845, the
writer of this work had the gratification net only of hearing
him lecture on Mythology to large audiences, but also of hearing
him in the expansiveness of private conversation pour forth his
stores of varied knowledge. His intellectual vigor was such,
that although seventy summers had whitened his hair, he seemed
to have still a long lease of life; and indeed he continued nine
years longer to inspire the respect of all who knew him. He
died on the 20th August, 1854.
300




706                    SCHELLING.
~ II. SCHELLING'S DOCTRINES.
Schelling is often styled the German Plato. In such parallels
there is always some truth amidst much error. Schelling's works
unquestionably exhibit great power of vivid imagination conjoined with subtle dialectics; if on this ground he is to be styled
a Plato, then are there hundreds to share that title with him.
His doctrines have little resemblance to those of his supposed
prototype. Curiously enough, his head was marvellously like
that of Socrates; not so ugly, but still very like it in general
character.
Schelling may be regarded as having been the systematizer of
a tendency, always manifesting itself, but then in full vigor in
Germany-the tendency towards Pantheism. This tendency is
not merely the offspring of Mysticism. It may be recognized in
the clear Goethe, no less than in the mystical Novalis. In some
way or other, Pantheism seems the natural issue of almost every
Philosophy of Religion, when rigorously carried out; but Germany, above all European countries, has, both in poetry and
speculation, the most constantly reproduced it. Her poets, her
artists, her musicians, and her thinkers, have been more or less
Pantheists. Schelling's attempt, therefore, to give Pantheism a
scientific basis, could not but meet with hearty approbation.
We may here once more notice the similarity, in historical
position, of the modern German speculations to those of the
Alexandrian Schools. In both, the incapacity of Reason to
solve the problems of Philosophy is openly proclaimed; in both,
some higher faculty is called in to solve them. Plotinus called
this faculty Ecstasy.  Schelling called it the Intellectual Intuition. The Ecstasy was not supposed to be a faculty possessed
by all men, and at all times; it was only possessed by the few,
and by them but sometimes. The Intellectual Intuition was not
supposed to be a faculty common to all men; on the contrary, it
was held as the endowment only of a few of the privileged: it
was the faculty for philosophizing. Schelling expresses his dis



SCHELLING S DOCTRINES.             707
dain for those who talk about not comprehending the highest
truths of Philosophy. "Really," he exclaims, "one sees not
wherefore Philosophy should pay any attention whatever to Incapacity. It is better rather that we should isolate Philosophy
from all the ordinary routes, and keep it so separated from ordinary knowledge, that none of these routes should lead to it.
Philosophy commences where ordinary knowledge terminates."*
The highest truths of science cannot be proved, they must be
apprehended; for those who cannot apprehend them there is
nothing but pity; argument is useless.
After this, were we to call Schelling the German Plotinus, we
should perhaps be nearer the truth than in calling him the German Plato. But it was for the sake of no such idle parallel
that we compared the fundamental positions of each. Our object was to " point a moral," and to show how the same forms
of error reappear in history, and how the labors of so many
centuries have not advanced the human mind in this direction
one single step.
The first point to be established is the nature of Schelling's
improvement upon Fichte: the relation in which the two doctrines stand to each other.
Fichte's Idealism was purely subjective Idealism. The Object
had indeed reality, but was solely dependent upon the Subject.
Endeavor as we might, we could never separate the Object from
the Subject, we could never conceive a possible mode of existence without being forced to identify with it a Subject. Indeed
the very conception itself is but an act of the Subject. Admitting that we are forced by the laws of our mental constitution to
postulate an unknown something, a Noumenon, as the substance
in which all phenomena inhere, what, after all, is this postulate?
It is an act of the Mind; it is wholly subjective; the necessity
for the postulate is a mental necessity. The Non-Ego therefore
is the product of the Ego.
* Neue Zeitschrift.fiir Spcutative Physik, ii. 84.




708                     SCHELLING.
There is subtle reasoning in the above; nay more, it contains
a principle which is irrefutable: the principle of the identity of
Object and Subject in knowledge.* This Schelling adopted.
Nevertheless, in spite of such an admission, the nullity of the external world was too violent and repulsive a conclusion to be
long maintained; and it was necessary to see if the principle of
identity might not be preserved, without forcing such a conclusion.
The existence of the objective world is as firmly believed in as
the existence of the subjective: they are, indeed, both given in
the same act. We cannot be conscious of our own existence
without at the same time inseparably connecting it with some
other existence from which we distinguished ourselves. So in
like manner we cannot be aware of the existence of any thing
out of ourselves without at the same time inseparably connecting
with it a consciousness of ourselves. Hence we conclude that
both exist; not indeed separately, not independently of each
other, but identified in some higher power. Fichte said that the
Non-Ego was created by the Ego. Schelling said that the two
were equally real, and that both were identified in the Absolute.
Knowledge must be knowledge of something. Hence Knowledge implies the correlate of Being. Knowledge without an
Object known, is but an empty form. But Knowledge and Being are correlates; they are not separable; they are identified.
It is as impossible to conceive an Object known without a Subject knowing, as it is to conceive a Subject knowing without an
Object known.*
Nature is Spirit visible; Spirit is invisible Nature:t the absolute Ideal is at the same time the absolute Real.
* This is the stronghold of Idealism, and we consider it impregnable, so
long as men reason on the implied assumption, that whatever is true in
human knowledge is equally true (i. e. actually so co-ordinated) in fact;
that as things appear to us so they are per se. And yet without this assumption Philosophy is impossible.
t Our readers will recognize here a favorite saying of Coleridge, many




SCHELLING'S DOCTRINES.              709
Hence Philosophy has two primary problems to solve. In
the Transcendental Philosophy the problem is to construct Nature from Intelligence-the Object from the Subject. In the
Philosophy of Nature the problem is to construct Intelligence
from Nature-the Subject from the Object.* And how are we
to construct one from the other 8 Fichte has taught us to do so
by the principle of the identity of. Subject and Object, whereby
the productivity and the product are in constant opposition, yet
always one. The productivity (Thdtigkeit) is the activity in act;
it is the force which develops itself into all things. The product is the activity arrested and solidified into a fact; but it is
always ready to pass again into activity. And thus the world
is but a balancing of contending powers within the sphere of the
Absolute.
In what, then, does Schelling differ from Fichte, since both
assert that the product (Object) is but the arrested activity of
the Ego? In this: the Ego in Fichte's system is a finite Egoit is the human soul. The Ego in Schelling's system is the Absolute-the Infinite-the All, which Spinoza called Substance;
and this Absolute manifests itself in two forms: in the form of
the Ego and in the form of the Non-Ego-as Nature and as
Mind.
The Ego produces the Non-Ego, but not by its own force, not
out of its own nature; it is the universal Nature which works
within us and which produces from out of us; it is universal
Nature which here in us is conscious of itself. The souls of men
are but the innumerable individual eyes with which the Infinite
World-Spirit beholds himself.
What is the Ego? It is one and the same with the act which
renders it an Object to itself. When I say " myself"-when I
form a conception of my Ego, what is that but the Ego making
of whose remarks, now become famous, are almost verbatim from Schelling
and the two Schlegels.
* System des Transcendentalen Idealismus, p. 7.




710                     SCHELLING.
itself an Object? Consciousness therefore may be defined the
objectivity of the Ego. Very well; now apply this to the Absolute. He, too, must be conscious of himself, and for that he
must realize himself objectively.  We can now understand
Schelling when he says, " The blind and unconscious products
of Nature are nothing but unsuccessful attempts of Nature to
make itself an Object (sich selbst zu reflectiren); the so-called
dead Nature is but an unripe Intelligence. The acme of its
efforts-that is, for Nature completely to objectize itself-is attained through the highest and ultimate degree of reflection in
Man-or what we call Reason. Here Nature returns into itself,
and reveals its identity with that which in us is known as the
Object and Subject."*
The function of Reason is elsewhere more distinctly described
as the total indifierence-point of the subjective and objective.
The Absolute he represents by the symbol of the magnet. Thus,
as it is the same principle which divides itself in the magnet into
the north and south poles, the centre of which is the indifferencepoint, so in like manner does the Absolute divide itself into the
Real and Ideal, and holds itself in this separation as absolute indifference.t And as in the magnet every point is itself a magnet,
having a North pole, a South pole, and a point of indifference,
so also in the Universe, the individual varieties are but varieties
of the eternal One. Man is a microcosm.
Reason is the indifference-point. Whoso rises to it, rises to
the reality of things (zum wahren Ansich), which reality is precisely in the indifference of Object and Subject. The basis of
Philosophy is therefore the basis of Reason; its knowledge is a
knowledge of things as they are, i. e. as they are in Reason.:
The spirit of Plotinus revives in these expressions. We have
in them the whole key-stone of the Alexandrian School. The
* System des Transcendentalen Idealismus, p. 5.
t Hence Schelling's philosophy is often styled the Indifference Philosophy.
t Zeitschriftfiir Speculative Physik, vol. ii. heft 2.




SCHELLING'S DOCTRINES.                711
Intellectual Intuition by which we are to embrace the Absolute,
is, as before remarked, but another form of the Alexandrian
Ecstasy. Schelling was well aware that the Absolute, the Infinite as such, could not be known under the conditions of finity,
cannot be known in personal consciousness. How, then, can it
be known? By some higher faculty which discerns the identity
of Object and Subject-which perceives the Absolute as Absolute, where all difference is lost in indifference.
There are three divisions in Schelling's system: the philosophy
of Nature, the transcendental philosophy, and the philosophy of
the Absolute.
His speculations with respect to Nature have met with considerable applause in Germany. Ingenious they certainly are, but
vitiated in Method; incapable of verification. Those who are
curious to see what he makes of Nature are referred to his Zeitschriftfiur speculative Physik, and his Ideen zu einer Philosophie
der Natur. The following examples will serve to indicate the
character of his speculations.*
Subject and Object being identical, the absolute Identity is the
absolute totality named Universe. There can be no difference
except a quantitative difference; and this is only conceivable
with respect to individual existences. For the absolute Identity
is quantitative indifference both of Object and Subject, and is
only under this form. If we could behold all that is, and behold
it in its totality, we should see a perfect quantitative equality. It
is only in the scission of the Individual from the Infinite that
quantitative difference takes place. This difference of Object and
Subject is the ground of all finity; and, on the other hand, quantitative indifference of the two is Infinity.
That which determines any difference is a Power (Potenz),
and the Absolute is the Identity of all Powers (aller Potenzen).
* The reader must not complain if he do not understand what follows:
intelligibility is not the characteristic of German speculation; and we are
here only translating Schelling's words, without undertaking to enlighten
their darkness.




712                     SCHELLING.
All matter is originally liquid; weight is the power through
which the Attractive and Expansive force, as the immanent
ground of the reality of Matter, operates. Weight is the first
Potenz. The second Potenz is Light-an inward intuition of
Nature, as weight is the outward intuition. Identity with Light
is Transparency. Heat does not pertain to the nature of Light,
but is simply a modus existendi of Light. Newton's speculations
upon Light are treated with disdain, as a system built upon illogical conclusions, a system self-contradictory, and leading to
infinite absurdities. Nevertheless this absurd system has led
men to many discoveries: it is the basis of a gradually advancing science; while the views of Schelling lead to nothing except disputation. So with his explanation of Electricity: let us
suppose it exact, and we must still acknowledge it to be useless.
It admits of no verification; admits of no application. It is utterly sterile.
There are, indeed, general ideas in his Natur-philosophie,
which not only approach the conceptions of positive science, but
have given a powerful stimulus to many scientific intellects. The
general law of polarity, for example, which he makes* the law of
universal nature, is seen illustrated in physics and chemistry; although the presumed relation between heat and oxygen, which
he makes the basis of all atomic changes, no chemist will nowadays accept. When, in the second part of this treatise, he theorizes on organic life, the result is similar-namely, some general
ideas which seem luminous are enforced by particular ideas certainly false. He maintains that vegetation and life are the products of chemical action: the first consisting in a continual deoxidation, the second in a continual oxidation; as soon as this
chemical action ceases, death supervenes, for living beings exist
only in the moment of becoming.t  He only expresses the universally accepted idea of life when he makes it depend on the
incessant disturbance and re-establishment of an equilibrium,: or,
* Von der Weltseele, p. 25, sq.  1 Ibid., p. 181.  $ Ibid., p. 284.




SCHELLING S DOCTRINES.              713
as De Blainville defines it, "a continual movement of decomposition and recomposition."
All the functions of Life are but the individualizations of one
common principle; and all the series of living beings are but
the individualizations of one common Life: this is the Weltseele,
or anima mundi. The same idea had been expressed by Goethe,
and has since been presented, under various forms, by Oken and
many German naturalists, The idea of a dynamic progression
in Nature, is also the fundamental idea in Hegel's philosophy.
Schelling, in his Jahrbucher der Medicin, says that Science is
only valuable in as far as it is speculative; and by speculation
he means the contemplation of God as He exists. Reason, inasmuch as it affirms God, cannot affirm any thing else, and annihilates itself at the same time as an individual existence, as any
thing out of God. Thought (das'Denken) is not my Thought;
and Being is not my Being; for every thing belongs to God or
the All. There is no such thing as a Reason which we have;
but only a Reason that has us. If nothing exists out of God,
then must the knowledge of God be only the infinite knowledge
which God has of himself in the eternal Self-affirmation. God
is not the highest, but the only One. He is not to be viewed as
the summit or the end, but as the centre, as the All in All.
Consequently there is no such thing as a being lifted up to the
knowledge of God; but the knowledge is immediate recognition.
If we divest Schelling's speculations of their dialectical forms,
we shall arrive at the following results:
Idealism is one-sided. Beside the Subject there must exist an
Object: the two are identical in a third, which is the Absolute.
This Absolute is neither Ideal nor Real-neither Mind nor Nature-but both. This Absolute is God. He is the All in All;
the eternal source of all existence. He realizes himself under
one form, as an objectivity; and under a second form as a subjectivity. He becomes conscious of himself in man: and this
man, under the highest form of his existence, manifests Reason,
and by this Reason God knows himself. Such are the conclu



714                    SCHELLING.
sions to which Schelling's philosophy leads us. And now, we
ask, in what does this philosophy differ from Spinozism?
The Absolute, which Schelling assumes as the indifferencepoint of Subject and Object, is but the,rp&wrov dyacov and primal
Nothing, which forms the first Hypostasis of the Alexandrian
Trinity. The Absolute, as the Identity of Subject and Object,
being neither and yet both, is but the Substance of Spinoza,
whose attributes are Extension and Thought.
With Spinoza also he agreed in giving only a phenomenal reality to the Object and Subject. With Spinoza he agreed in
admitting but one existence-the Absolute.
But, although agreeing with Spinoza in his fundamental positions, he differed with him in Method, and in the applications of
those positions. In both differences the superiority, as it seems
to me, is incontestably due to Spinoza.
Spinoza deduced his system very logically from one fundamental assumption, viz. that whatever was true of ideas was
true of objects. This assumption itself was not altogether arbitrary. It was grounded upon the principle of certitude, which
Descartes had brought forward as the only principle which was
irrefragable. Whatever was found to be distinct and a priori in
Consciousness, was irresistibly true. Philosophy was therefore
deductive; and Spinoza deduced his system from the principles
laid down by Descartes.
Schelling's Method was very different. Aware that human
knowledge was necessarily finite, he could not accept Spinoza's
Method, because that would have given him only a knowledge
of the finite, the conditioned; and such knowledge, it was admitted, led to skepticism. He was forced to assume another
faculty of knowing the truth, and this was the Intellectual Intuition. Reason which could know the Absolute, was only possible
by transcending. Consciousness and sinking into the Absolute.
As Knowledge and Being were Identical, to know the Infinite,
we must be the Infinite, i. e. must lose our individuality in the
universal.




LIFE OF HEGEL.                  715
Consciousness, then, which had for so long formed the basis
of all Philosophy, was thrown over by Schelling, as incompetent
to solve any of its problems. Consciousness was no ground of
certitude. Reason was the organ of Philosophy, and Reason was
impersonal. The Identity of Being and Knowing took the
place of Consciousness, and became the basis of all speculation.
We shall see to what it led in Hegel.
Our notice e Schelling has necessarily been brief, not because
he merited no greater space, but because to have entered into
details with any satisfaction, would have carried us far beyond
our limits. His works are not only numerous, but differ considerably in their views. All we have endeavored to represent is
the ideas which he produced as developments of Fichte, and
which served Hegel as a basis.*
CHAPTER III.
HEGEL.
~ I. LIFE OF HEGEL.
GEORGE FREDERICK WILLIAM HEGEL was born at Stuttgard,
the 27th of August, 1770. He received that classical education
which distinguished the Wirtembergian students beyond all
others; and in his eighteenth year he went to Tubingen, to pursue his theological and philosophical studies. He was there a
fellow-student with Schelling, for whom he contracted great esteem. The two young thinkers communicated to each other
their thoughts, and discussed their favorite systems. In after* A French translation of Schelling's most important work, under the
title of Systnme de l'Idealisme transcendental, by P. Grimblot, the translator
of Fichte, has appeared; also a version of Bruno; ou, Les Principes des
Choses.




716                      HEGEL.
life, when opposition had sundered these ties, Hegel never spoke
of this part of their connection without emotion. In his twentieth year he had to give up all his plans for a professorship, and
was content (hunger impelling) to accept the place of a private
tutor, first in Switzerland, and subsequently in Frankfort.
Early in 1801 his father died; and the small property he inherited enabled him to relinquish his tutorship, and to move to
Jena, where he published his dissertation De Orbitis Planetarum.
This work was directed against the Newtonian system of Astronomy. It was an application of Schelling's Philosophy of Nature; and in it Newton was treated with that scorn which Hegel
never failed to heap upon Empirics, i. e. those who trusted more
to experience than to logic. In the same year he published his
Difference between Fichte and Schelling, in which he sided with
the doctrines of his friend, whom he joined in editing the Critical Journal of Philosophy. It is in the second volume of this
Journal that we meet with his celebrated essay Glauben und
Wissen (Faith and Knowledge), in which Kant, Jacobi, and
Fichte are criticised.
At Jena he enjoyed the society of Goethe and Schiller. The
former, with his usual sagacity, detected the philosophical genius
which as yet lay undeveloped in Hegel; of which more may be
read in Goethe and Schiller's Correspondence. Hegel, on the
other hand, was to the last one of Goethe's stanchest admirers;
and many a gleam of lustre is shed over the pages of the philosopher by the frequent quotations of the poet.
At the University of Jena, Hegel then held the post of Privatdocent; but his lectures had only four listeners. These four, however, were all remarkable men: Gabler, Troxler, Lachmann, and
Zellmann. On Schelling's quitting Jena, Hegel filled his chair;
but filled it only for one year. Here he published his Phdnomenologie des Geistes. He finished writing this work on the night
of the ever-memorable battle of Jena. While the artillery was
roaring under the walls, the philosopher was deep in his work,
unconscious of all that was going on. He continued writing, as




NEGEL S METHOD.                  717
Archimedes at the siege of Syracuse continued his scientific researches. The next morning, manuscript in hand, he steps into
the streets, proceeding to his publisher's, firmly convinced that
the interests of mankind are bound up with that mass of writing
which he hugs so tenderly. The course of his reverie is somewhat violently interrupted; bearded and gesticulating French
soldiers arrest the philosopher, and significantly enough inform
him that, for the present, the interests of men lie elsewhere than
in manuscripts. In spite of French soldiers, however, the work
in due'time saw the light, and was welcomed by the philosophical
world as a new system-or rather as a new modification of Schelling's system. The editorship of the Bamberg newspaper'was
then offered him, and he quitted Jena. He did not long remain
at Bamberg; for in the autumn of 1808 we find him Rector of
the Gymnasium College at Niirnberg. He shortly after married
Fraulein von Tucher, with whom he passed a happy life, and
who bore him two sons. In 1816 he was called to the chair
of Heidelberg, and published in 1817 his Encyclopddie der Philos.
Wissenschaften, which contains an outline of his system. This
work so exalted his reputation that in 1818 he was called to the
chair of Berlin, then the most important in Germany. He
there lectured for thirteen years, and formed a school, of which it
is sufficient to name its members Gans, Rosenkranz, Michelet,
Werder, Marheinecke, and Hotho.
Hegel was seized with cholera in 1831, and after a short illness expired, in the sixty-second year of his age, on the 24th of
November, the anniversary of the death of Leibnitz.
~ II. HEGEL'S METHOD.
Schelling's doctrines were never systematically co-ordinated.
He was subtle, ardent, and audacious; but he disregarded precision; and stood in striking contradiction to his predecessors,
Kant and Fichte, in the absence of logical forms.
The effect of his teaching was felt more in the department of
the philosophy of nature than elsewhere. Crowds of disciples,




718                       HEGEL.
some of them, as Oken and Steffens, illustrious disciples, attempted the application of his principles; and after a vast quantity of
ingenious but sterile generalization, it was found that these principles led to no satisfactory conclusion.
Schelling's ideas were, however, very generally accepted in the
philosophical world at the time Hegel appeared. These ideas
were thought to be genuine intuitions of the truth; the only drawback was their want of systematic co-ordination.  They were
inspirations of the truth; and demonstrations were needed. The
position Hegel was to occupy became therefore very clear.
Either he must destroy those ideas and bring forward others; or
he must accept them, and, in accepting, systematize them. This
latter was no easy task, and this was the task he chose. In the
course of his labors he deviated somewhat from Schelling, because
the rigorous conclusions of his logic made such deviations necessary; but these are, after all, nothing but modifications of Schelling's ideas; very often nothing but different expressions for the
same ideas.
What then constitutes Hegel's glory? What is the nature of
his contribution to philosophy, and what has placed him on so high
a pedestal of renown? It is nothing less than the invention of
a new Method.*
The invention of a method has always been considered the
greatest effort of philosophical genius, and the most deserving of
the historian's attention. A method is a path of transit. Whoso discovers a path whereon mankind may travel in quest of truth,
has done more towards the discovery of truth than thousands of
men merely speculating. What had the observation and speculation of centuries done for astronomy before the right path was
found? And if a method could be found for philosophy-if a
path of transitsfrom the phenomenal to the noumenal world could
be found-should we notthen be quickly in possession of the truth 
* This is the claim put up by his disciple, Michelet, Gesch. der Systeme der
Philos. ii. 604-5; who declares Hegel's method to be all that can properly be
called his own. Comp. Hegel's Vermischte Schriften, ii. 479.




HEGEL'S METHOD.                   719
A Method is all-important. The one invented by Descartes
seemed promising; but it led to Malebranche and Spinoza. The
one invented by Locke had obvious excellences; but it was a
path of transit to Berkeley and Hume. That of Kant led to
Fichte and Skepticism.
Curious to consider! In the modern as in the ancient world,
the inevitable results of a philosophical Method are Idealism and
Skepticism. One class of minds is led to Idealism or Mysticism;
another class is led to Skepticism. But as both these conclusions
are repugnant to the ordinary conclusions of mankind, they are
rejected, and the Method which led to them is also rejected. A
new one is found; hopes beat high; truth is about to be discovered; the search is active, and the result-always the same-repugnant Idealism or Skepticism. Thus struggling and baffled,
hoping and dispirited, has Humanity forever renewed the conflict, without once gaining a victory. Sisyphus rolls up the
heavy stone, which no sooner reaches a certain point than down
it rolls to the bottom, and all the labor is to begin again.
We have already traced the efforts of many noble minds; we
have seen the stone laboriously rolled upwards, and seen it swiftly roll down again. We have seen Methods discovered; we have
followed adventurous spirits as they rushed forward to conquest;
and seen the discouragement, the despair which possessed them,
as they found their paths leading only to a yawning gulf of
Skepticism, or a baseless cloud-land of Idealism. We have now
to witness this spectacle once more. We have to see whither
Hegel's Method can conduct us.
And what is this Method which Hegel discovered? Accepting
as indisputable the identity of Object and Subject, he was forced
also to accept the position, that whatever was true of the thought
was true of the thing. In other words, Mind and Matter being
identical, Ideas and Objects were correlates, and equally true.
This was the position upon which Descartes stood; the position
upon which Spinoza stood. Schelling and Hegel arrived at this
position by a different route, but they also took their stand upon it.




720                       HEGEL.
Now, it is evident that such a position is exposed to attacks on
all sides; to none more so than the contradictions which rise up
from within it. If whatever is true of Ideas is true also of Objects,
a thousand absurdities bristle up. Thus, as Kant said, there is
considerable difference between thinking we possess a hundred
dollars, and possessing them. Hegel's answer is delicious: he
declares that "Philosophy does not concern itself with such
things as a hundred dollars!" (daran ist philosophisch nichts zu
erkennen.) Philosophy directs its thoughts only towards that
which is necessary and eternal.
Very well: let such miserable illustrations as that of dollars
be banished from discourse; let us concern ourselves only with
what is necessary and eternal; let us confine ourselves to abstractions. Are there no contradictions here between Thoughts and
Realities? For example, we have the Thought of Non-existence:
does therefore this Non-existence which is our Thought also
possess an objective being? Is there a Non-existence?
We have chosen this idle question, because Hegel himself has
forced us to it. He boldly says, that the Non-existence-the
Nothing-exists, because it is a Thought (das Nichts ist; denn
es ist ein Gedanke). It is not, however, merely a Thought, but
it is the same Thought as that of a pure Being (Seyn), viz. an
entirely unconditioned Thought.
In this, coupled with his famous axiom, that "Being and NonBeing are the same" (Seyn und Nichts ist dasselbe), we have
two of the curious results to which his Method led him. It was
the Method of Descartes, founded upon Descartes' principle of
the truth of ideas being equivalent to the truth of things; but
inasmuch as this met with strong opposition from various sides,
Hegel resolved to give it a deeper, firmer basis, a basis that went
underneath these contradictions. The basis was his principle of
the identity of contraries.
Two contraries are commonly supposed to exclude each other
reciprocally: Existence excludes Non-Existence. This notion
Hegel pronounces to be false. Every thing is contradictory in




HEGEL'S METHOD.                    721
itself: contradiction forms its essence: its identity consists in
being the union of two contraries. Thus Being (Seyn) considered absolutely-considered as unconditioned-that is to say, as
Being in the abstract, apart from any individual thing, is the
same as Nothing. Existence is therefore identical with its negation. But to conclude that there is not Existence, would be
false; for the abstract Nothing (Nichts) is at the same time the
abstract Being. We must therefore unite these two contraries,
and in so doing we arrive at a middle term-the realization* of
the two in one, and this is conditioned Existence-it is the world.
Here is another example. In pure light —that is, light without
color or shadow-we should be totally unable to see any thing.
Absolute clearness is therefore identical with absolute obscuritywith its negation, in fact; but neither clearness nor obscurity
are complete alone: by uniting them we have clearness mingled
with obscurity; that is to say, we have Light properly so called.
Hegel thus seized the bull by the horns. Instead of allowing
himself to be worsted by the arguments derived from the contradictions to which the identity of Existence and Knowledge
was exposed, he at once met the difficulty by declaring that the
identity of contraries was the very condition of all existence;
without a contrary nothing could come into being. This was
logical audacity which astounded his countrymen, and they have
proclaimed this feat worthy of immortal glory. A new light
seemed to be thrown upon the world: a new aspect was given
to all existences. Being was at the same time Non-Being; Subject was at the same time Object; and Object was Subject:
Force was at the same time Impotence; Light was also Darkness, and Darkness was also Light.
"Nothing in this world is single;
All things, by a law divine,
In one another's being mingle."
The merit of this discovery, whatever may be its value, is
* The original word is werden-the becoming. It is much used in German
speculation to express the transition from Non-beingto Being.
31




722                     HEGEL.
considerably diminished when we remember how distinctly it
was enunciated in ancient Greece. Heraclitus had told us how
"All is, and is not; for though it comes into being, yet it forthwith ceases to be." Empedocles had told us how there was
" Nothing but a mingling and then a separation of the mingled."
Indeed the constant flux and reflux of life, the many changes,
and the compound nature of all things, must early have led
men to such a view. Hegel himself admits that all the positions maintained by Heraclitus have been by him developed
in his Logic. What then was wanting to Heraclitus-what
is the great merit of Hegel? A perception of the logical
law of the identity of contraries. To this Hegel has the sole
claim.
Here, then, is the foundation-stone of Hegel's system.  He
adopts the principle of the identity of Subject and Object. This
principle being pronounced false, because it leads to manifest
contradictions, Hegel replies that the principle is true; and that
it must lead to contradictions, because the identity of contraries
is the condition of all existence.
Such is the Method which admiring disciples extol as the
greatest effort of Philosophy, as the crown of all previous speculations; and even in France it has been in some quarters accepted as a revelation.
The law being given, we may now give the process. Let us
take any one Idea (and with Hegel an Idea is a reality, an Object, not simply a modification of the Subject); this Idea, by its
inherent activity, tends to develop that which is within it. This
development operates a division of the Idea into two parts-a
positive and a negative. Instead of one Idea we have therefore
two, which reciprocally exclude each other. The Idea, therefore,
by the very act of development, only conduces to its own negation. But the process does not stop there. The negation itself
must be negatived. By this negation of its negation, the Idea
returns to its primitive force. But it is no longer the same. It
has developed all that it contained. It has absorbed its contrary.




ABSOLUTE IDEALISM.                723
Thus the negation of the negation, by suppressing the negation,
at the same time preserves it.*
We may, by way of anticipation, observe that Hegel's notion of
God becoming conscious of Himself in Philosophy, and thereby attaining His highest development, is founded on the above process.
God as pure Being can only pass into reality through a negation; in Philosophy He negatives this negation, and thus becomes
a positive affirmation.
~ III. ABSOLUTE IDEALISM.
We have seen Hegel's Method. Whether that be a path of
transit to the domain of truth, or only to the cloud-land of mysticism and the bogs of absurdity, our readers will very soon
decide. Meanwhile we must further detail Hegel's opinions; we
must see whither his Method did lead him.
As every thing contains within itself a contradiction, and as
the identity of the two constitutes its essence, so we may say
that Schelling's conception of the identity of Subject and Object was not altogether exact. He assumed the reality of both
of these poles of the magnet; and the identity he called the
point of indifference between them. These two extremities were
always separate, though identified.  Hegel declared that the
essence of all relation-that which is true and positive in every
relation-is not the two terms related, but the relation itself.
This is the basis of Absolute Idealism.
It may be thus illustrated. I see a tree. Psychologists tell
me that there are three things implied in this one fact of vision,
viz. a tree, an image of that tree, and a mind which apprehends
that image. Fichte tells me that it is I alone who exist: the
tree and the image of the tree are but one thing, and that is a
modification of my mind. This is Subjective Idealism. Schelling tells me that both the tree and my Ego are existences
* This play upon words is assisted by the German aufheben, which means
"to suppress" as well as "to preserve." See Ott, Heegel et la Philos. Allemande, p. 80.




724                       HEGEL.
equally real or ideal, but they are nothing less than manifestations of the Absolute. This is Objective Idealism. But, according to Hegel, all these explanations are false. The only thing
really existing (in this one fact of vision) is the Idea-the relation. The Ego and the Tree are but two terms of the relation,
and owe their reality to it. This is Absolute Idealism.
Of the three forms of Idealism, this is surely the most preposterous; and that any sane man-not to speak of a man so
eminent as Hegel-should for an instant believe in the correctness of the logic which "brought him to this pass"-that he
should not at once reject the premises from which such conclusions followed-must ever remain a wonder to all sober thinkers
-must ever remain a striking illustration of the unbounded confidence in bad logic which distinguishes metaphysicians" Gens ratione ferox, et mentem pasta chimseris."
Truly, a race mad with logic, and feeding the mind with chimeras.
What does this Absolute Idealism bring us to? It brings us
to a world of mere " relations." The Spinozistic notion of " Substance" was too gross. To speak of Substance, was to speak only
of one term of a relation. The Universe is but the Universe of
Ideas, which are at once both Objective and Subjective, their essence consisting in the relation they bear to each other, in the
identity of their contradiction.
Remark, also, that this Absolute Idealism is nothing but
Hume's Skepticism, in a dogmatical form. Hume denied the
existence of Mind and Matter, and said there was nothing but
Ideas. Hegel denies the existence of both Object and Subject,
and says there is nothing but the "relations" of the two. He
blames Kant for having spoken of Things as if they were only
appearances to us (Erscheinungen fir uns) while their real nature (Ansich) was inaccessible. The real relation, he says, is
this: that the Things we know are not only appearances to us,
but are in themselves mere appearances (sondern an sich blosse
Erscheinungen). The real Objectivity is this; that our Thoughts




ABSOLUTE IDEALISM.'25
are not.only Thoughts, but at the same time are the reality of
Things.*
This is the Philosophy-not a Philosophy, remember-not a
system which may take its place amongst other systems. No,
it is the Philosophy par excellence. We have Hegel's word for
it;t we have the confirmation of that word by many ardent disciples. True it is, that some of the young Hegelians, when reproached with the constant changes they introduce, reply that it
belongs to the nature of Philosophy to change. But these are
inconsiderate, rash young men. Mature and sober thinkers (of
Hegel's school) declare that, although some improvements are
possible in detail, yet on the whole Hegel has given the Philosophy to the world.
And this philosophy is not a system of doctrines whereby man
is to guide himself. It is something far greater. It is the contemplation of the self-development of the Absolute. Hegel congratulates mankind upon the fact of a new epoch having dawned.
"It appears," says he, "that the World-Spirit ( Weltgeist) has at
last succeeded in freeing himself from all encumbrances, and is
able to conceive himself as Absolute Intelligence (sich als absoluten Geist zu erfassen).....    For he is this only in as
far as he knows himself to be the Absolute Intelligence: and
this he knows only in Science; and this knowledge alone constitutes his true existence."t
Such pretensions would be laughable, were they not so painful
to contemplate. To think not only of one man, and that one
remarkable for the subtlety of his intellect, a subtlety which was
its bane, together with many other men-some hundred or so,
all rising above the ordinary level of ability-one and all cultivating, as the occupation of their lives, a science with such
pretensions, and with such a Method as that of the identity of
* "Dass die Gedanken nicht bloss unsere Gedanken, sondern zugleich das
Ansich der Dinge und des Gegenstiindlichen iiberhaupt sind."-Encyclopiidie,
p. 89; see also p. 97. The whole of this Introduction to the Encyclopadie is
worth consulting.
t Gesch. der Philos. iii. 690.  t Ibid. iii. 689.




726                      HEGEL.
contraries! The delusions daily to be seen are those of ignorance, and only depend upon ignorance. But the delusions of
Metaphysics are the delusions of an ambitious intelligence which
"o'erleaps itself." Men such as Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel,
for example, belong incontestably to a high order of intelligences;
yet we have seen to what their reasonings brought them; we
have seen what absurdities they could accept, believing they had
found the truth. Hegel especially impresses you with a sense of
his wonderful power. His works we have always found very
suggestive; his ideas, if repugnant to what we regard as the
truth, are yet so coherent, so systematically developed, so obviously coming from matured meditation, that we have always
risen from the perusal with a sense of the author's greatness.
We allude especially to his Lectures on.Esthetics, his History
of Philosophy, his Philosophy of History, and his Philosophy
of Religion.
As for the system itself, we may leave to all readers to decide
whether it be worthy of any attention, except as an illustration of
the devious errors of speculation. A system which begins with
assuming that Being and Non-Being are the same, because Being
in the abstract must be conceived as the Unconditioned, and so
must Non-Being, therefore both, as unconditioned, are the same;
a system which proceeds upon the identity of contraries as the
method of Philosophy; a system in which Thought is the same as
the Thing, and the Thing is the same as the Thought; a system
in which the only real positive existence is that of simple Relation,
the two terms of which are Mind and Matter;-this system, were it
wholly true, leaves all the questions for which science is useful as
a light, just as much in the dark as ever, and is therefore unworthy the attention of earnest men working for the benefit of
mankind.
Not only is it useless; it is worse, it is pernicious. The facility
with which men can throw all questions into the systematic obscurity of metaphysics, has long been the bane of German Literature and Thought. In England and France we have been




HEGEL'S LOGIC.                  727
saved from perpetuating the frivolous discussions of the Schoolmen, mainly because we have retained their nomenclature and
terminology, and are warned by these from off scholastic ground;
but the Germans, having invented a new philosophical language,
do not perceive that the new terms disguise old errors; they fail
to recognize in Irrlicht the familiar face of Ignis fatuus.
~ IV. HEGEL'S LOGIC.
Philosophy being the contemplation of the self-development of
the Absolute, or, as Hegel sometimes calls it, the representation
of the Idea (Darstellung der Idee), it first must be settled in what
directions this development takes place.
The process is this. Every thing must be first considered
per se (an sich); next in its negation, or some other thing (Anderseyn). These are the two terms-the contraries; but they
must be identified in some third, or they cannot exist: this third
is the Relation of the two (the Anundfirsichseyn). This is the
affirmation which is founded on the negation of a negation: it is
therefore positive, real.
The Absolute, which is both Thought and Being, must be considered in this triple order, and philosophy falls into three parts:
I. LoGIC, the science of the Idee* an und fir sich.
II. NATURE-PrILOSOPHY, as the science of the Idee in its Anderseyn.
III. PHILOSOPHY OF INTELLIGENCE, as the Idee which has returned from its Anderseyn to itself.
Logic, in this system, has a very different meaning from that
usually given to the word. It is, indeed, equally, with the common logic, an examination of the forms of Thought; but it is
more:-it is an examination of Things, no less than of Thoughts.
As Object and Subject are declared identical, and whatever is
true of the Thought is equally true of the Thing, since the
* The Idee is but another term for the Absolute. We shall use it, rather than
Idea, because the English word cannot be employed without creating unnecessary confusion.




728                      HEGEL.
Thought is the thing, Logic, of course, takes the place of the
ancient Logic, and, at the same time, of Metaphysics. It is the
generation of all abstract ideas. Consequently it contains the
whole system of Science; and the other parts are but the application of this Logic.
Hegel's Logic is contained in three stout volumes of dry hard
scholasticism. It is a representation of the Idee, in its process
of pure thought, free from all contact with objects. It is wholly
abstract. It begins with pure Being. This pure Being, in virtue of its purity, is unconditioned; but that which has no conditions has no existence: it is a pure abstraction. Now a pure abstraction is also the Nothing (das Nichts): it also has no conditions; its unconditionalness makes its nothingness. The first
proposition in Logic is, therefore, " Being and Non-Being are the
same."
Hegel admits the proposition to be somewhat paradoxical, and
is fully aware of its openness to ridicule; but he is not a man
to be scared by a paradox, to be shaken by a sarcasm. He is
aware that stupid common-sense will ask, "whether it is the
same if my house, my property, the air I breathe, this town, sun,
the law, mind, or God, exist or not." Certainly, a very pertinent
question: how does he answer it    "In such examples," he
says, "particular ends-utility, for instance-are understood, and
then it is asked if it is indifferent to me whether these useful
things exist or not? But, in truth, Philosophy is precisely the
doctrine which is to free man from innumerable finite aims and
ends, and to make him so indifferent to them that it is really all
the same whether such things exist or not."  Here we trace the
Alexandrian influence; except that Plotinus would never have had
the audacity to say that Philosophy was to make us indifferent
whether God existed or not; and it must have been a slip of the
pen which made Hegel include God in the examples: a slip of
the pen, or else the "rigor of his pitiless logic," of which his disciples talk.  "Pitiless" indeed!-more intrepid absurdity it
would be difficult to find.




HEGELrS LOGIC.                  729
Remark, also, the evasive nature of his reply. Common-sense
suggests to him a plain direct question, not without interest. This
question, plain as it is, goes to the bottom of his system. He
evades it by answering, that Philosophy has nothing to do with
the interests of men. Very true; his system has nothing to do
with them. But the question put was not, " Has Philosophy to
concern itself with the interests of mankind l"  The question put
was, " If, as you say, Being and Non-Being are the same, is it the
same thing to have a house and not to have it?" Hegel might
have given a better answer even upon his own principles.
To return, however. The first proposition has given us the two
contraries; there must be an identity-a relation-to give them
positive reality. As pure Being, and as pure Non-Being, they have
no reality; they are mere potentialities. Unite them, and you
have the Becoming (Werden), and that is reality. Analyze this
idea of Becoming, and you will find that it contains precisely
these two elements,-a Non-Being from which it is evolving,
and a Being which is evolved.
Now these two elements, which reciprocally contradict each
other, which incessantly tend to absorb each other, are only
maintained in their reality by means of the relation in which they
are to each other;-that is, the point of the magnet which keeps
the poles asunder, and by keeping them asunder prevents their
annihilating each other. The Becoming is the first concrete
Thought we can have, the first conception; Being and Non-Being are pure abstractions.
A question naturally suggests itself as to how Being and NonBeing pass from Abstractions into Realities. The only answer
Hegel gives us is, that they become Realities: but this is answering
us with the very question itself. We want to know how they become. In themselves, as pure Abstractions, they have no reality;
and although two negatives make an affirmative in language, it
is not so evident how they can accomplish this in fact. The
question is of course insoluble; and those Hegelians whom we
questioned on the point, unanimously declared it to be one of
310




730                      HEGEL.
those truths (very numerous in their system) which can be comprehended, but not proved.
Let us grant the Becoming. It is the identity of Being and
Non-Being; and as such it is Being as determined, conditioned.
All determination (Bestimmung) is Negation.* Therefore, in
order that Being should become, it must suffer first a negation;
the Ansichseyn must also be Anderseyn, and the relation of the
two is total reality, the Anundfiirsichseyn.
Quality is the first negation: it is the reality of a thing.
That which constitutes Quality is the negation which is the condition of its Being. Blue, for example, is blue only because it is
the negation of red, green, purple, etc.; a meadow is a meadow
only because it is not a vineyard, a park, a ploughed field, etc.
Being, having suffered a Negation, is determined as Quality,it is Something, and no longer an Abstraction. But this something is limited by its very condition; and this limit, this negation, is external to it: hence Something implies Some-other-thing.
There is a This and a That. Now the Something and the
Some-other-thing, the This and the That, are the same thing.
This is a tree; That is a house. If I go to the house, it will
then be the This, and the tree will be That.  Let the tree
be the Something, and the house the Some-other-thing, and the
same change of terms may take place. This proves that the two
are identical. The something carries its opposite (other-thing)
within itself; it is constantly becoming the other-thing. Clearly
showing that the only positive reality is the Relation which
always subsists throughout the changes of the terms.
This, it must be owned, looks like the insanity of Logic. It is
not, however, unexampled in Hegel's works. In his Phinomenologie des Geistes, he tells us that perception gives us the ideas
of Now, Here, This, etc. And what is the Now? At noon I say,
" Now it is day."  Twelve hours afterwards I say, "Now it is
night." My first affirmation is therefore false as to the second,
* This, as many other ideas, is borrowed from Spinoza, in whose system it
has real significance. In Hegel's it is a mere play upon words.




HEGEL'S LOGIC.                  731
my second false as to the first: which proves that the Now is a
general idea; and as such a real existence, independent of all
particulai Nows.
Our readers are by this time probably quite weary of this frivolous Logic; we shall spare them any further details. If they
wish further to learn about Quantities, Identities, Diversities, etc.,
they must consult the original.
Those who are utter strangers to German speculation will
wonder, perhaps, how it is possible for such verbal quibbles to
be accepted as Philosophy. But, in the first place, Philosophy
itself, in all its highest speculations, is but a more or less ingenious playing upon words. From Thales to Hegel, verbal distinctions have always formed the ground of Philosophy, and must
ever do so as long as we are unable to penetrate the essence of
things. In the second place, Hegel's Logic is a work requiring
prodigious effort of thought to understand: so difficult and ambiguous is the language, and so obscure the meaning. Now,
when a man has once made this effort, and succeeded, he is very
apt to overvalue the result of all that labor, and to believe what
he has found, to be a genuine truth. Thirdly, Hegel is very
consistent; consistent in audacity, in absurdity. If the student
yields assent to the premises, he is sure to be dragged irresistibly
to the conclusions. Fourthly, the reader must not suppose that
the absurdities of Hegel's system are so apparent in his works as
in our exposition. We have exerted ourselves to the utmost to
preserve the real significance of his speculations; but we have
also endeavored to bring them into the clear light of day. Any
thing except a verbal translation would reveal some aspects of
the absurdity, by the very fact of bringing it out of the obscurity
with which the German terminology veils it. The mountain
looming through a fog turns out to be a miserable hut as soon
as the fog is scattered; and so the boasted system of Absolute
Idealism turns out to be only a play upon words, as soon as it
is dragged from out the misty terminology in which it is enshrouded.




732                      HEGEL.
~ V. APPLICATION OF THE METHOD TO NATURE AND HISTORY,
RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY.
Having exhibited the various evolutions of the Idee as pure
Thought, Hegel undertakes to exhibit its objective evolutions in
the domain of Nature.
In the former attempt he had only to deal with abstractions;
and it was no such difficult matter to exhibit the " genesis of
ideas"-the dependence of one formula upon another. Verbal
distinctions were sufficient there. But verbal distinctions, audacious logic, and obscure terminology avail nothing in attacking
the problems presented to us by Nature; and in endeavoring to
give scientific solutions, Nature is not to be coerced. Aware of
the difficulties-seeing instinctively that the varieties of Nature
could not be reduced to the same simplicity as the varieties of
the Idee-as Thought had been reduced in his Logic-Hegel asserted that the determinations of the Idee in its exteriority could
not follow the same march as the determinations of the Idee as
Thought. Instead of generating each other reciprocally, as in
the Logic, these determinations in Nature have no other connection than that of coexistence; sometimes indeed they appear
isolated.
When we look abroad upon Nature, we observe an endless
variety of transformations. At first these seem without order;
on looking deeper, we find that there is a regular series of development from the lowest to the highest. These transformations
are the struggles of the Idee to manifest itself objectively. Nature
is a dumb Intelligence striving to articulate. At first she mumbles;
with succeeding efforts she articulates; at last she speaks.
Every modification which the Idee undergoes in the sphere of
pure Thought it endeavors to express in the sphere of Nature.
And thus an object is elevated in the scale of creation in so far
as it resumes within itself a greater number of qualities: inorganic matter is succeeded by organic, and amongst organized




APPLICATION OF HEGEL'S METHOD.           733
beings there is a graduated scale from the plant up to man. In
man the Idee assumes its highest grade. In Reason it becomes
conscious of itself, and thereby attains real and positive existence
-the highest point of development. Nature is divine in principle (an sich), but it is a mistake to suppose it divine as it exists.
By the Pantheists Nature is made one with God, and God one
with Nature. In truth, Nature is but the exteriority (Aeusserlichkeit) of God: it is the passage of the Idee through imperfection (Abfall der Idee). Observe moreover that Nature is not
only external in relation to the Idee, and to the subjective existence of the Idee, namely Intelligence; but exteriority constitutes
the condition in virtue of which Nature is Nature (sondern die
Aeusserlichkeit macht die Bestimmung aus, in welcher sie als
Natur ist).
The Philosophy of Nature is divided into three sectionsMechanics, Physics, and Physiology. Into the details, we are
happy to say, our plan forbids us to enter; or we should have
many striking illustrations of the futility of that Method which
pretends to construct the scheme of the world a priori. Experimental philosophers-Newton especially-are treated with consistent contempt. Hegel is not a timid speculator; he recoils
from no consequence; he bows down to no name; he is impressed by no fact, however great. That Newton's speculations
should be no better than drivel, and his " discoveries" no better
than illusions, were natural consequences of Hegel's fundamental
theories. That all Europe had been steadily persevering in applying Newton's principles, and extending his discoveries,-that
Science was making gigantic strides, hourly improving man's
mastery over Nature, hourly improving the condition of mankind,-this fact, however great it might appear to others, when
coupled with the other fact, that upon the ontological Method
no discoveries had yet been made, and none seemed likely to be
made-appeared to Hegel as unworthy of a philosopher's notice.
The interests of mankind were vulgar considerations, for which




734                        HEGEL.
there would always be abundant vulgar minds. The philosopher
had other objects.
The third and last part of Hegel's system is the Philosophy of
Intelligence. Therein the Idee returns from Nature to itself, and
returns through a consciousness of itself.
Subjectively the Idee first manifests itself as a Soul; it then
returns upon itself, and becomes Consciousness; and finally renders itself an Object to itself, and then it is Reason.
Objectively the Idee manifests itself as Will, and realizes itself
in History and in Law.
The Subjective and Objective manifestations being thus
marked out, we have now to see in what manner the identity of
the two will manifest itself. The identity of the Objective and
Subjective is the Idee as Intelligence, having consciousness of
itself in individuals, and realizing itself as Art, as Religion, and
as Philosophy.
The " Lectures on the Philosophy of History,"* edited by the
late accomplished Professor Gans, is one of the pleasantest books
on the subject we ever read. The following ideas will be sufficient to give an indication of its method.
History is the development of the Idee objectively-the process by which it attains to a consciousness of itself by explaining
itself.t  The condition of Intelligence is to know itself; but it
can know itself only after having passed through the three
phases of the method, namely, affirmation, negation, and negation of negation, as the return to consciousness endowed with
reality. It is owing to these phases that the human race is perfectible.
States, Nations, and Individuals represent the determinate
moments of this development. Each of these moments manifests
* Werke, vol. ix.
t History is a sort of Theodicea; the merit of originality, however, which
Hegel claims (Einleitung, p. 20), is due to Vico, from whom he has largely
borrowed; Vico expressly calls his New Science a Civil Theology of Divine
Providence. See La Science Nouvelle, livre i. ch. iv.




APPLICATION OF HEGEL'S METHOD.            735
itself in the constitution, in the manners, in the creeds, in the
whole social state of any one nation. For this nation it is what
we call the spirit of the age: it is the only-possible truth, and
by its light all things are seen. But.with reference to the absolute Idee all these particular manifestations are nothing but
moments of transition-instruments by which the transition to
another higher moment is prepared. Great men are the incarnations of the spirit of the age.
It is not every nation that constitutes itself into a state: to do
that, it must pass from a family to a horde, from a horde to a
tribe, and from a tribe to a state. This is the formal realization
of'the Idee.
But the Idee must have a theatre on which to develop itself.
The Earth is that theatre; and as it is the product of the Idee
(according to the Naturphilosophie), we have the curious phenomenon of an actor playing upon a stage-that stage being himself! But the Earth, as the geographical basis of History, has
three great divisions:-1. The mountainous regions.  2. The
plains and valleys. 3. The coasts and mouths of rivers. The
first represents the primitive condition of mankind; the second
the more advanced condition, when society begins to be formed;
the third, when, by means of river-communication, the activity
of the human race is allowed free development in all directions,
particularly of commerce. This is another of the ideas of Vico,*
and is in contradiction to all history.
The great moments of History are four. 1. In the East we
have the predominance of substantiality; the Idee does not
know its freedom. The rights of men are unknown because the
East knows only that one is free. This is the childhood of the
World. 2. In Greece we have the predominance of Individuality. The Idee knows that it is free, but only under certain
forms, that is to say, only some are free. Mind is still mixed
with Matter, and finds its expression therein; this expression is
* La Science Nouevde, livre i. ch. ii. ~ 97.




736                      HEGEL.
Beauty. This is the youthhood of the World. 3. In Rome we
have opposition between the Objective and Subjective: the political universality and individual freedom both developed, yet
not united. This is the Manhood of the World. 4. In the Teutonic Nations we have the unity of the contradiction-the Idee
knowing itself; and instead of supposing, like Greece and Rome,
that some only are free, it knows that all men are free. This is
the old-age of the World; but although the old-age of body is
weakness, the old-age of Mind is ripeness. The first form  of
government which we see in History is Despotism; the second is
Democracy and Aristocracy; the third is Monarchy.*
On reading over this meagre analysis, the ingenious speculations of the original will scarcely be recognized. Such is the
art with which Hegel clothes his ideas in the garb of Philosophy,
that though aware that he is writing fiction, not history, and
giving us perversions of notorious facts as the laws of historical
development-telling us that the Spirit of the World manifests
himself under such and such phases, when it is apparent to all
that, granting the theory of this World-Spirit's development, the
phases were not such as Hegel declares them to have been; —although we are aware of all this, yet is the book so ingenious
and amusing, that it seems almost unfair to reduce it to such a
caput mortuum as our analysis. Nevertheless the principles of
his philosophy of History are those we have given above. The
application of those principles to the explication of the various
events of History, is still more ingenious.
Hegel's Philosophy of Religion has in the last few years been
the subject of bitter disputes. The schisms of the young Hegelians-the doctrines of Strauss, Feuerbach, Bruno, Bauer, and
others-being all deduced, or pretended to be deduced, from
Hegel's system, much angry discussion has taken place as to the
real significance of that system. When doctors thus disagree,
we shall not presume to decide. We will leave the matter to
* Philosophie der Gesichte, p. 128.




APPLICATION OF HEGEL'S METHOD.             737
theologians; and for the present only notice Hegel's fundamental
ideas.
It is often a matter of wonder to see how Hegel's Method is
applied to all subjects, and how his theory of life can be brought
to explain every product of life. This is doubtless a great logical
merit; and it inspires disciples with boundless confidence. Few,
however, we suspect, have approached the subject of Religion
without some misgivings as to the applicability of the Method
to explain it. Probably the triumph is great when the applicability is shown to be as perfect here as elsewhere. Of this our
readers shall judge.
Hegel, of course, accepts the Trinity; his whole system is
Trinitarian. God the Father is the eternal Idee an undfiir sich:
that is to say, the Idee'as an unconditioned Abstraction. God the
Son, engendered by the Father, is the Idee as Andersseyn: that
is to say, as a conditioned Reality. The separation has taken
place which, by means of a negation, gives the Abstraction real
existence. God the Holy Ghost is the Identity of the two; the
negation of the negation and perfect totality of existence. He is
the Consciousness of himself as Spirit: this is the condition of
his existence.
God the Father was before the World, and created it. That
is to say, he existed an sich, as the pure Idee, before he assumed
any reality. He created the World, because it is the essence of
his being to create (es gehort zu seinem Seyn, Wesen, Schopfer
zu seyn). Did he not create, then would his own existence be
incomplete.
The vulgar notion of theologians is that God created the world
by an act; but Hegel says that the creation is not an act, but an
eternal moment-not a thing done, but a thing perpetually doing;
God did not create the world, he is eternally creating it. Attached
also to this vulgar notion, is another less precisely but more
commonly entertained; namely, that God, having created the
world by an act of his will, lets it develop itself with no interference of his; as Goethe somewhere ridicules it, he "sits aloft




738                      HEGEL.
seeing the world go." This was not the doctrine of St. Paul,
whose pregnant words are, " In Him we live, and move, and have
our being." We live in God, not out of him, not simply by him.
And this is what Hegel means when he denies that the creation
was a single act. Creation was, and is, and ever will be. Creation is the reality of God: it is God passing into activity, but
neither suspended nor exhausted in the act.
This is all we can here give of his Philosophy of Religion;
were we to venture further, we should only get ourselves entangled in the thorny labyrinth of theological problems. Let us
pass, therefore, to his History of Philosophy, which, according
to him, is the history of the development of the Idee as intelligence. This development of thought is nothing more than the
various transitions which constitute the moments of the absolute
Method. All these moments are represented in history; so that
the History of Philosophy is the reproduction of the Logic under
the forms of intelligence. The succession of these moments
gives to each period a particular philosophy; but these various
philosophies are, in truth, only parts of the one philosophy.
This looks like the Eclecticism of Victor Cousin; and indeed
Cousin's system is but an awkward imitation of Hegel: but the
Frenchman has either misunderstood, or has modified, the views
of his master.
Historically speaking, there have been, according to Hegel,
but two philosophies-that of Greece and that of Germany. The
Greeks conceived Thought under the form of the Idee; the moderns have conceived it under the form of Spirit. The Greeks
of Alexandria arrived at unity; but their unity was only ideal,
it existed objectively in thought. The subjective aspect was
wanting: the totality knew itself not as subjective and objective.
This is the triumph of modern philosophy.
The moments have been briefly these:-1. With Thales and
the Eleatics, the Idee was conceived as pure Being-the One.
2. With Plato it was conceived as Universal, Essence, Thought.
3. With Aristotle as Conception (Begriff). 4. With the Stoics,




APPLICATION OF HEGEL'S METHOD.           739
Epicureans, and Skeptics, as subjective Conception. 5. With
the Alexandrians as the totality of Thought. 6. With Descartes
as the Self-Consciousness. 7. With Fichte as the Absolute, or
Ego. 8. With Schelling as the Identity of Subject and Object.
We close here our exposition of Hegel's tenets; an exposition
which we have been forced to give more in his own words than
we could have wished; but the planawe adopted with respect to
Kant and Fichte would not have been so easy (we doubt if it be
possible) with respect to Hegel, whose language must be learned,
for the majority of his distinctions are only verbal. In Kant
and Fichte the thoughts were to be grappled with; in -Hegel the
form is every thing.
We have only touched upon essential points. Those desirous
of more intimate acquaintance with the system, are referred to
the admirable edition of his complete works, published by his disciples, in twelve volumes, octavo. If this voluminousness be somewhat too alarming, we can recommend the abridgment by Franz
and Hillert (Hegel's Philosophie in wortlichen Auszigen, Berlin,
1843), where the whole system is given in Hegel's own words, and
only his illustrations and minute details are omitted. Michelet's
work is useful mainly for its bibliography. He indicates the various directions taken by Hegel's disciples. Chalybaus is popular,
but touches only on a few points. Barchou de Penhoen evidently
knows Hegel only at second-hand, and is not to be trusted. Dr.
Ott's work is ill written, but is very useful as an introduction to
the study of the works themselves, and has been very useful to
us in our exposition. No work of Hegel's has been translated
into English;* and only his Esthetik into French, and that is
more an analysis, we believe, than a translation. The Philosophy of History has been translated into Italian.
* Since this was written, a part of the Logic has appeared under this
title: The Subjective Logic of Begel, translated by H. Sloman and J. Wallon,
1855. To the list of works mentioned above should be added Wilm's admirable Hist. de la Philos. Allemande, by far the best work on the subject
known to me.




TENTH EPOCH.
PSYCHOLOGY SEEKING ITS BASIS IN PHYSIOLOGY.
CHAPTER I.
CABANIS.
WHILE Ontology was reasserting its claim in Germany, with
such results as we have seen, Philosophy in England and France
relinquished its lofty claims, and contented itself with the endeavor to construct a Psychology. The writings of Reid, Stewart, Brown, James Mill, and their disciples, valuable in many
respects, are all deficient in Method, all without a firm basis. The
attempt of Hartley and Darwin to connect Psychology with
Physiology, we have seen was premature. It nevertheless pointed out the true direction. If Psychology is to be studied as a
Science, it must be studied according to rigorously scientific principles; if, on the contrary, it is to be studied as a branch of
Metaphysics, then indeed the Scotch school, and every other
unscientific school, may justly complain of the encroachment of
Physiology on their domain.
The history of the rise of psychological Method remains to be
written. It began with Hobbes and Locke. They opposed the
reigning doctrine of innate ideas. They analyzed Thought as
the product of Experience. Hobbes, as was natural in the first
vehemence of the swing of reaction against spiritualism, recognizes nothing in the mind but sensations in all their varieties;




CABANIS.                    741
the mind, he said, is moved by external motion, that is all.
Locke, on deeper meditation, saw that there was something more
than this; he saw, dimly it is true, yet never overlooking it altogether, that the mind co-operated. Not only Sense, but Reflection
on the materials given through Sense, furnished, he said, the
complex thoughts of man. Thus he proclaimed Experience the
source of knowledge. The mind of the child was like a sheet of
blank paper, on which Experience wrote its various records. In
Locke, we see the initial steps of the Physiological Method; and
as he was himself an anatomist, there is nothing surprising in
his having been led by his study of man's structure to some conclusions respecting man's mind. He directed that attention to
Sense which metaphysicians had been in the habit of directing
to ideas and verbal subtleties; and by so doing, took an important step towards the confrontation of speculation with fact; and
initiated the still more important idea of a constant relation between organ and function. He also was led to study the growth
of mind; and hence his frequent reference to savages.and children, which distresses Victor Cousin, who is often as terrified at
a fact as at a ghost.
Great as Locke's services were, there was a radical vice in his
system which prevented its acceptance. He began the Physiological Method, but he only began it. The Experience-hypothesis would not suffice to explain all phenomena (at least not as
that hypothesis was then understood); there were forms of
thought neither reducible to Sense and Reflection, nor to individual Experience.  He drew illustrations from children and
savages; but he neither did this systematically, nor did he extend the Comparative Method to animals. The prejudices of that
age forbade it. The ignorance of that age made it impossible.
Comparative Physiology is no older than Goethe, and Comparative Psychology is only now glimmering in the minds of men as
a possibility. If men formerly thought they could understand
man's body by dissecting it, and did not need the light thrown
thereon by the dissection of animals; they were still less likely




742                      CABANIS.
to seek psychical illustrations in animals, denying, as they did,
that animals had minds.
The school of Locke, therefore, although regarding Mind as a
property of Matter, consequently directing attention to the human organism, trying to understand the mechanism of sensation,
and thus dealing with tangible realities instead of with impalpable and ever-shifting entities, was really incompetent to solve the
problems it had set itself, because its Method was imperfect, and
its knowledge incomplete. The good effect of its labors was positive; the evil, negative. Following out this positive tendency,
we see Hartley and Darwin advancing still nearer to a true
Method;-by a bold hypothesis, making the phenomena dependent on vibrations in the nerves; thus leading to a still more
precise and definite consideration of the organism.
These were, however, tentatives guided by no distinct conception of the necessary relation between organ and function; and
the Physiological Method, truly so called, must be first sought in
Cabanis.
Pierre Jean Georges Cabanis was born 5th of June, 1757, at
Conac, near Brives. He became a physician, and established
himself at Auteuil, where, in the house of Madame Helvetius, he
cultivated the acquaintance of Turgot, D'Holbach, Franklin,
Condillac, Diderot, and D'Alembert. To these let us add Condorcet and Mirabeau, both of whom he attended in their last
hours. He died on the 6th of May, 1808. He wrote several
works, but one only has survived in the memories of philosophic
readers: Rapports du Physique et du Moral de l'Homme.*
A disciple of Condillac, he nevertheless saw, more distinctly
than any man before him, one radical vice of Condillac's system,
namely, the limitation of mental phenomena to sensations, and
* This work originally appeared as a series of Mumoires read before the
Institute (1798-99). It was published as a separate book in 1802, under the
title Traite du Physique et du Moral de l'Homme; which title is also borne by
the second edition of 1805. Not until 1815, and after the death of Cabanis,
was the word Rapports substituted for Traite.




CABANIS.                     743
the non-recognition of connate instincts. If sensation were the
admitted source of all mental phenomena (and Cabanis rightly
extended these phenomena beyond "ideas"), it became the duty
of philosophers to examine the nature of sensation itself. "No
one," he says, " had clearly explained in what the act of sensibility consists. Does it always presuppose consciousness and distinct perception? and must we refer to some other property of
the living body all those unperceived impressions and movements
in which volition has no part?" To put this question was to inaugurate a new study. It became necessary to examine whether
all mental phenomena were not reducible to the fundamental
laws of sensibility. " All the while that the Intellect is judging
and the Will is desiring or rejecting, many other functions are
going on, all more or less necessary to the preservation of life.
Have these diverse operations any influence, the one on the
other? And is it possible from the consideration of different
physical and moral states, which are observed simultaneously, to
seize the relations which connect the most striking phenomena,
with such precision as to be certain that in the other less obvious cases, if the connection is less easily detected, it is so simply
because the indications are too fugitive?"
This conception of a possible Psychology is in itself enough to
mark forever the place of Cabanis in the History of Philosophy.
It establishes Psychology as one branch of the great science of
Life. It connects the operations of intelligence and volition with
the origin of all vital movements. It makes Life and Mind correlatives. This was a revival of the great truth clearly recognized by Aristotle, from whom it descended to the Schoolmen.
"Impossibile est," says Aquinas, very emphatically, "in uno
homine esse plures animas per essentiam differentes, sed una tantumr est anima intellectiva, quse vegetativse et sensitivse et intellectivse officiis fungitur."  The division of Life and Mind as
two distinct entities was introduced by the Italians of the Renaissance, adopted by Bacon, and once more rejected by Stahl, who
returned to the Aristotelian conception. With the fall of Stahl's




744                       CABANIS.
doctrine, the separation of Mind from Life again became the
dictum of the schools, until Cabanis; no one since Cabanis
seems to have been thoroughly impressed with the unity of the
two till Mr. Herbert Spencer presented it as the basis of psychological induction.* The consequences were immediate: if Mind
was to be studied as one aspect of Life, it could only be efficiently studied on that inductive and experimental Method which had
reached the certain truths of positive science: "Les principes
fondamentaux seraient 6galement solides; elles se formeraient
egalement par l'6tude s6vere et par la composition des faits;
elles s'etendraient par les m6mes methodes de raisonnement."
Cabanis warns his readers that they will find nothing of what is
called Metaphysics in his book; they will only find physiological
researches, mais dirigees vers l'stude particuliere d'un ordre de
fonctions.
In the purely physiological direction, indeed, Cabanis had
many predecessors, from Willis in the middle of the seventeenth
century, to Prochaska, who preceded Cabanis by one year only.t
The nervous system had of course been studied by physiologists,
and this study led them to psychological theories; but although
we may find elsewhere, especially in Unzer and Prochaska,
sounder views of the physiology of the nervous system, we find
nowhere so clear and large a conception of the physiological
psychology.
" Subject to the action of external bodies," says Cabanis, " man
finds in the impressions these bodies make on his organs at once
his knowledge and the causes of his continued existence; for to
live is to feel; and in that admirable chain of phenomena which
constitute his existence, every want depends on the development
* Spencer, Princi7pes of Psychology, 1855.
t Lehrsatze aus der Physiologie des Menschen, 1797. Curiously enough the
second and third editions of this work were exactly contemporaneous with
the second and third editions of Cabanis, 1802 and 1805 (counting the publication in the Memoires de l'Institut as one edition). It is not to be supposed
that Cabanis knew of Prochaska's existence; nor is there more than a general resemblance in their physiological conclusions.




CABANIS.                     745
of some faculty; every faculty by its very development satisfies
some want, and the faculties grow by exercise as the wants extend with the facility of satisfying them. By the continual action
of external bodies on the senses of man, results the most remarkable part of his existence. But is it true that the nervous centres only receive and combine the impressions which reach them
from these bodies? Is it true that no image or idea is formed
in the brain, and that no determination of the sensitive organ
takes place, other than by virtue of these same impressions on
the senses strictly so called 2"*
This question cuts away the very root of Condillac's system.
Cabanis had no difficulty in showing that Condillac's limitation of
our mental phenomena to the action of the special senses, was a
contradiction of familiar experience, e. g. the manifold influence
exercised by the age, sex, temperament, and the visceral sensations generally. A survey of the human organism, compared with
that of animals, conducted him to the following conclusions:
"The faculty of feeling and of spontaneous movement, forms
the character of animal nature.
"The faculty of feeling consists in the property possessed by
the nervous system of being warned by the impressions produced
on its different parts, and notably on its extremities. These impressions are internal or external.
" External impressions, when perception is distinct, are called
sensations.
"Internal impressions are very often vague and confused, and
the animal is then only warned by their effects, and does not
clearly distinguish their connection with the causes.
"The former result from the application of external objects to
the organs of sense; and on them ideas depend.
"The latter result from the development of the regular functions, or from the maladies to which each organ is subject; and
from these issue those determinations which bear the name of
instincts.
* Deuxieme Memoire, ~ ii.
32




746                     CABANIS.
"Feeling and movement are linked together. Every movement is determined by an impression, and the nerves, as the organs of feeling, animate and direct the motor organs.
"In feeling, the nervous organ reacts on itself. In movement
it reacts on other parts, to which it communicates the contractile
faculty, the simple and fecund principle of all animal movement.
"Finally, the vital functions can exercise themselves by the
influence of some nervous ramifications, isolated from the system: the instinctive faculties can develop themselves, even when
the brain is almost wholly destroyed, and when it seems wholly
inactive.
"But for the formation of thoughts it is necessary that the
brain should exist, and be in a healthy condition: it is the special organ of thought."*
He justly repudiates any attempt to explain sensibility, which
must be accepted as a general property of organized beings, in
the same way that attraction is accepted as a general property of
masses. No general fact admits of explanation. It can only be
subordinated to some other fact, and be explained by it, on the
supposition that it is not general. Accepting sensibility, therefore, as an ultimate fact in the organic world, he detects its phenomena running through all those called vital and all those called
mental.
" It is something," he says, " to have established that all ideas
and all moral phenomena are the results of impressions received
by the different organs; and I think a still wider step is taken
when we have shown that these impressions have appreciable
differences, and that we can distinguish them by their seat and
the character of their products, although they all act and react
on each other, on account of the rapid and continual communications with the sensitive organ."f The object of his treatise is
to examine the relations existing between the moral and physical
conditions, how the sensations are modified by modifications in
* Deuxieme Memoire, ~ viii.         t Ibid., ~ v.




CABANIS.                     747
the organs, how ideas, instincts, passions are developed and modified by the influences of age, sex, temperament, maladies, etc.
It is not, therefore, a treatise on Psychology, but contributions
towards a science of Psychology, and as such may still be read
with advantage, although the science of the present day rejects
many of its physiological details. He foresaw that this would be
so. "Le lecteur s'apercevra bientot que nous entrons ici dans
une carriere toute nouvelle. Je n'ai pas la pretention de l'avoir
parcouru jusqu'au bout; mais des hommes plus habiles et plus
heureux acheveront ce que trop souvent je n'ai pu que tenter."
As a specimen of inductive Psychology, we must not pass over
in silence his experimental proof of instinct being developed by
certain organic conditions. He takes one of the most marvellous
of instincts, that of maternal love, and having analyzed its physiological conditions, he says "In my province, and some of the
neighboring provinces, when there is a deficiency of sitting Hens,
a singular practice is customary.. We take a capon, pluck off
the feathers from the abdomen, rub it with nettles and vinegar,
and in this state of local irritation place the capon on the eggs.
At first he remains there to soothe the pain; soon there is established within him a series of unaccustomed but agreeable impressions, which attach him to these eggs during the whole
period of incubation; and the effect is to produce in him a sort
of factitious maternal love, which endures, like that of the hen,
as long as the chickens have need of aid and protection. The
cock is not thus to be modified; he has an instinct which
carries him elsewhere."
The novelty of the conception which Cabanis put forth, and
the interest attached to many of his illustrations, made his work
very popular; but its influence was only indirect.  The ignorance which almost all psychologists continued to display, not
only of Physiology, but of the necessity of a physiological
Method, together with the alarm excited by the accusation of
" materialism," aided as it was by the reaction, mainly political,
but soon extending itself to philosophical questions, which con



748                      CABANIS.
demned the labors of the eighteenth century, left Cabanis with
few adherents and no continuers. In elaborate works the brain
was still designated as the "organ of the mind," but the mind
was passionately declared not to be the function of the brain;
the profounder views of Cabanis, which regarded Mind as one
aspect of Life, were replaced by the old metaphysical conceptions of le 3Moi —the Ego-the immaterial' Entity playing upon
the brain as a musician plays upon an instrument.* Instinct
was no longer regarded as determined by the organism, changing with its changes, rendered abortive by mutilations, and rendered active by stimulation; but as a " mysterious principle implanted" in the organism: a "something" which, although essentially mysterious and unknowable, appeared to be perfectly
well known to the metaphysicians.
While the reaction was strong against Cabanis and against
the whole eighteenth-century Philosophy, there arose another
doctrine, which, taking Physiology as its avowed basis, succeeded,
in spite of vehement opposition, in establishing itself permanently among the intellectual tendencies of the age; and that
doctrine may now be said to be the only psychological one which
counts any considerable mass of adherents. I allude to Phrenology.
* One living writer, of authority, has gravely declared that mental fatigue is the consciousness which the mind has of the brain's weariness!
In our confessed inability to understand what matter is, why will men
persist in dogmatizing on what it is not? We know neither matter nor
spirit, we only know phenomena.




CHAPTER II.
PHRENOLOGY.
~ I. LIFE OF GALL.
FRANCIS JOSEPH GALL was born at Tiefenbrunn, in Suabia, on
the 9th of March, 1757. In the preface to his great work,
Anatonmie et Physiologie du Systlme Nerveux, 1810, he narrates
how as a boy he was struck with the differences of character and
talents displayed by members of the same family, and how he
observed certain external peculiarities of the head to correspond
with these differences. Finding no clue given in the works of
metaphysicians, he resumed his observations of nature. The
physician of a lunatic asylum at Vienna allowed him frequent
occasions of noticing the coincidence of peculiar monomaniacs
with peculiar configurations of the skull. The prisons and
courts of justice furnished him with abundant material. Whenever he heard of a man remarkable either for good or evil,
he made his head a study. He extended his observation to animals; and finally sought confirmation in anatomy. The exterior
of the skull he found, as a general rule, to correspond with the
form of the brain.
After twenty years of observation, dissection, theorizing, and
arguing, he delivered his first course of lectures in Vienna. This
was in 1796. The novelty of his views excited a great sensation;
one party fanatically opposing them, another almost as fanatically
espousing them. Ridicule was not sparing. The new system
lent itself to ridicule, and angry opponents were anxious, as opponents usually are, to show that what made them angry was utterly
farcical. In 1800. Gall gained his best disciple, Spurzheim.




750                    PHRENOLOGY.
Hitherto Gall had been aided by a young anatomist named
Niklas, to whom he taught the new method of dissecting the
brain;* now Spurzheim's mastery of anatomical manipulation,
combined with his power of generalization and of popular expo-sition, came as welcome aids in the gigantic task of establishing
the new doctrine on a scientific basis.
In 1802, M. Charles Villers, the translator of Kant, published
his Lettre a Georges Cuvier sur une Nouvelle Theorie du Cerveau
par le Docte-ur Gall. I have not been able to procure this Letter, but it is in many points interesting to the historian of Phrenology, because it not only expounds the doctrine as it was then
conceived, but describes the localization of the organs then
fixed on by Gall. A plate represents the skull, marked by
Gall himself, with the four-and-twenty organs, which at that
period comprised the "original faculties " of the mind. Among
these twenty-four, there are four subsequently discarded altogether: Vital Force-Susceptibility-Penetration (independent
of that which characterizes the metaphysical faculty)-and Generosity (independent of benevolence.) Not only are these four astonishing organs marked by Gall as representing original faculties, but the twenty organs which were afterwards retained by
him  are differently localized; so that, according to M. Lelut,
from whom I borrow these details, "of those twenty organs
there is scarcely one which occupies the place Gall finally assigned to it."t
Phrenologists should give prominence to this fact. They are
bound not to pass it over. In every way it is important in the
history of the doctrine. It may perhaps be satisfactorily
explained; but until it be so explained, it must tell against them;
and for the very reason which they incessantly advance as their
claim to consideration, namely, that the several organs were
* Gall pays his tribute to Niklas in the first edition of the Anat. et Phys.
du Systeme Nerveux, i. preface xv. In the second edition this tribute is omitted; not very creditably.
- Lelut: &ejet de i' Organoloyie Phrenologique, 1843, p. 29.




LIFE OF GALL.                     751
established by observation, not by any theory.* For, if the doctrine
had been established by a mingling of hypothesis and observation, nothing would be more likely than that the first sketch of it
would be immature in conception, and uncertain in details;
whereas, if the doctrine grew up slowly from a gradual accumulation of rigorously verified facts, these facts would remain constant through all the tentative changes of doctrine. Gall had
been twenty years collecting facts of correspondence between external configuration and peculiarities of character. He had controlled these observations by repeated verifications. Prisons,
lunatic asylums, busts, portraits, remarkable men, even animals,
had furnished him with facts. Unless these facts really deserve
all the credit which is demanded for them, Phrenology has the
ground cut from under it; and if we are to give them our confidence, upon what ground can we relinquish it in favor of subsequent facts, which deny all that has been said before?  If Gall
could be deceived after twenty years of observation of facts
which, according to his statement, are very easily observed, because very obvious in their characters, why may he not have
been equally deceived in subsequent observations? If one collection of facts forced him to assign the organ of poetry to a
particular spot (on the skull marked by him for M. Villers), how
came another collection of facts to displace poetry, and substitute
benevolence on that spot? Are the manifestations of poetry and
benevolence so closely allied as to mislead the observer?
Probably Spurzheim's assistance came at the right moment to
rectify many of the hazardous psychological statements, and to
marshal the facts in better order. Together they made a tour
through Germany and Switzerland, diffusing the knowledge of
their doctrine, and everywhere collecting fresh facts.  On the
30th of October, 1806, they entered Paris. In 1808 they pre* " On voit par la marche de ces recherches que le premier pas fut fait par
la decouverte de quelques organes; que ce n'est que graduellement que nous
avons fait parler les faits pour en deduire les principes gdenraux, et que c'est
subsdquemment et a la fin que nous avons appris a connaitre la structure du
cerveau."-Anat. et Phys. i. preface xviii.




752                     PHRENOLOGY.
sented to the Institute their Memoire on the Anatomy and Physiology of the Nervous System in general, and of the Brain in
particular; and in 1810 appeared the first volume of their great
work, under the same title, which work was remodelled in 1823,
and published in six volumes, octavo, under the title of Fonctions
du Cerveau.
In 1813 Gall and Spurzheim quarrelled and separated. Spurzheim came to England, Gall remained in Paris, where he died
on the 22d of August, 1828. At the post-mortem examination,
his skull was found to be of at least twice the usual thickness,-a
fact which has been the source of abundant witticisms, for the
most part feeble. A small tumor was also found in his cerebellum: "a fact of some interest, from that being the portion of the
brain in which he had placed the organ of amativeness, a propensity which had always been very strongly marked in him."*
I know not in what sense the writer just quoted thinks the fact
so remarkable. Tumors in other organs are not usually the indications of increased activity; nor are we accustomed to find
great poets with tumors in the organ of "imagination;" great
artists with tumors in the perceptive region; great philanthropists with tumors on the frontal arch; great rebels with tumors
behind their ears.t
~ II. GALL'S HISTORICAL POSITION.
The day for ridiculing Gall has gone by. Every impartial competent thinker, whether accepting or rejecting Phrenology, is
aware of the immense services Gall has rendered to Physiology
and Psychology, both by his valuable discoveries, and by his bold,
if questionable, hypotheses. He revolutionized Physiology by
his method of dissecting the brain, and by his bold assignment
* The Enylish Cyclojpedia, vol. iii., Art. Gall.
t To anticipate the reply that the existence of disease in the organ would
provoke unusual activity of the organ, it is only necessary to state that Gall's
"propensity" is not said to have been called into unusual activity shortly
before his death, but to have always been very active. Had there been a
casual connection between the disease and the activity, increase of the activity would have followed the rapid progress of the disease.




GALL'S HISTORICAL POSITION.            753
of definite functions to definite organs. To verify or refute his
hypotheses, vast researches were undertaken; the nervous system
of animals was explored with new and passionate zeal; and now
there is no physiologist who openly denies that mental phenomena are directly connected with nervous structure; while even
Metaphysicians are beginning to understand the Mechanism of
the Senses, and the general laws of nervous action. The time
has arrived in which it seems almost as absurd to theorize on
mental phenomena in defiance of physiological laws, as it would
be to adopt Stahl's advice, and consider anatomical and chemical
researches futile in the study of Medicine. We owe this mainly
to the influence of Gall. He first brought into requisite prominence the principle of the necessary relation between organ and
function. Others had proclaimed the principle incidentally; he
made it paramount by constant illustration, by showing it in detail, by teaching that every variation in the organ must necessarily bring about a corresponding variation in the function. He
did not say mind was the product of organization: " Nous ne
confondons pas les conditions avec les causes efficientes;" all he
asserted was the correspondence between the state of the organ
and its manifestations.* This was at once to call the attention
of Europe to the marvellous apparatus of organs, which had previously been so little studied, except from a purely anatomical
view, that no one, until Sommerring (who was Gall's contemporary), had observed the relation between size of the brain and intellectual power, as a tolerably constant fact in the animal kingdom. This one detail is sufficient to make every reader suspect the
chaotic condition of Physiological Psychology when Gall appeared.
Nor has Gall's influence been less remarkable in the purely
psychological direction. People are little aware how that influ* So also Spurzheim says: " Both Dr. Gall and I have always declared that
we merely observe the effective and intellectual manifestations, and the organic conditions under which they take place; and that in using the word
organs we only mean the organic parts by means of which the faculties of the
mind become apparent, but not that these constitute the mind."-Phrenology, p. 16.
320




754                    PHRENOLOGY.
ence is diffused, even through the writings of the opponents of
Phrenology, and has percolated down to the most ordinary intelligences. " Ni les vains efforts d'un despotisme energique," says
Auguste Comte, " secondcs par la honteuse condescendance de
quelques savans fort accredites, ni les sarcasmes 6pheme'res de
l'esprit litteraire et metaphysique, ni meme la frivole irrationalite de la plupart des essais tentes par les imitateurs de Gall,
n'ont pu empecher pendant les trente dernieres annees l'accroissement rapide et continu, dans toutes les parties du monde savant,
du nouveau systeme d'etudes de l'homme intellectual et moral.
A quels autres signes voudrait-on reconnaitre le succes progressif d'une heureuse revolution philosophique?"*
Gall may be said to have definitively settled the dispute between the partisans of innate ideas and the partisans of Sensationalism, by establishing the connate tendencies, both affective
and intellectual, which belong to the organic structure of man.
Two psychological facts, familiar from all time to the ordinary
understanding, but shrouded from all time in the perplexities of
philosophy, were by Gall made the basis of a doctrine. The
first of these facts is, that all the fundamental tendencies are connate, and can no more be created by precept and education than
they can be abolished by denunciation and punishment. The
second fact is, that man's various faculties are essentially distinct
and independent, although intimately connected with each other.
What followed? That the Mind consists of a plurality of functions, consequently must have a plurality of organs, became the
necessary corollary of this second proposition, as soon as the relation between organ and function was steadily conceived.
These two propositions have entered into the body of all European doctrines, although the corollary from the second is still
vehemently disputed by many.    No man of any intellectual
eminence would now repeat Johnson's celebrated assertion of the
poetic faculty being simply intellectual activity in a special di-'' Coersde Philos,.Postve,'ii. 7'66 




CRANIOSCOPY                     755
rection, whereby Newton might have written Othello, and Shakspeare the Principia, had either of these great men set themselves the task. " Sir, a man can walk as far east as he can walk
west," was thought a conclusive illustration; which indeed it
was, when the "unity" of the faculties found no contradiction;
but which no one would now accept as more than a fallacious
analogy.
Another conception systematized by Gall has also passed into
general acceptance, namely, the pre-eminence of the affective
faculties over the intellectual; and the subdivision of the affective faculties into propensities and sentiments, and of the intellectual faculties into perceptives and reflectives; thus marking
the progress in development from the individual to the social,
from the sensuous to the intellectual, which constitutes the great
progress of civilization in the triumph of sociality over animality.
~ III CRANIOSCOPY.
Phrenology has two distinct aspects. It is a doctrine of Psychology, and it is an Art of reading character. The scientific
doctrine is based on the physiology of the nervous system, to
which is added psychological analysis and classification. The
Art is based on empirical observation of coincidences between
certain configurations of the skull and certain mental phenomena.
This latter is truly Cranioscopy, and is no more entitled to the
name of a science, than are Physiognomy or Cheironomy; a
point which Gall's successors have, with scarcely an exception,
entirely overlooked.  When therefore the phrenologists with
much emphasis declare their system to be a system of "facts"
and " observations," which claim our confidence because they
are facts and not "mere theories," it is absolutely necessary that
we should accurately discriminate in what sense these said facts
are to be understood; because according to that sense will be
the kind of confidence they will claim. If, for instance, they are
presented purely as empirical facts-the observed coincidences
between certain cranial appearances and corresponding mental




756                    PHRENOLOGYo
manifestations-we may thankfully accept them   as valuable
materials.  Abundance of such material does exist; no one
acquainted, even superficially, with phrenological writings will
deny it. But without desiring to lessen the value of these facts
by rigorous criticism of the evidence on which they rest, we' may,
nay more, we must, if our inquiry be regulated by scientific precision, treat them as we treat all other empirical facts, namely,
hold them as mere sign-posts, until they be proved universal,
and until they be bound together by some ascertained law. Now
it will scarcely be denied that the observed correspondences between special cranial configuration and mental peculiarities, do,
in many instances, fail. Large heads are sometimes observed in
connection with very mediocre abilities; small heads, on the
contrary, with very splendid abilities; particular "organs" do
not always justify their prominence by the presence of the particular "faculties" which they are said to indicate.  I wish
rather to understate than overstate the difficulty, and I will not
seek to gain any advantage by multiplying exceptions: it is
enough for the present argument if any exceptions have been
observed; because any exception to an empirical generalization
is fatal to it as an empirical generalization, and can only be set
aside when the generalization has ceased to be empirical, and
has become scientific. Thus, I am aware that phrenologists explain each exception to their perfect satisfaction.  But, in
explaining it, they quit the sphere of empirical observation to
enter that of science; and thus their explanation itself has only
the validity which can be given it by theory. To make my
meaning more definite, let us suppose that the empirical generalization of large chests being the cause of great muscular power,
is under discussion. As an observed fact-an empirical factthe correspondence of broad chests and muscular strength, is a
valuable addition to our empirical knowledge. Taken as an indication, no one disputes the fact; but taken as a cause, and
connected with a physiological theory, it bears quite a different
value. The physiologist may say that the fact proves breadth




CRANIOSCOPY.                   757
of chest to admit of more perfect oxygenation of the blood, and
thus causes greater muscular power. Against such a theory we
bring the fact that no absolute and constant relation between
broad chests and muscular power exists; if we find large chests
accompanying strength, we also find small chests in certain lithe,
wiry frames accompanying even greater strength; the empirical
generalization is thus destroyed, the explanation is shown to be
imperfect, and the ratio of muscular power is shown to depend
on some other condition besides the oxygenation of the blood.
When phrenologists explain away the exceptions to their empirical facts, they are on the field of pure science, and their explanations can only have value in proportion to the validity of
the scientific principles invoked; and thus the Art of Cranioscopy is perpetually forced to recur to that very Physiology which
the successors of Gall have so unwisely neglected, and of which
(because it refuses its aid?) they often speak so contemptuously.
The fact of a large head with a small mental capacity, or of a
small head with a great mental capacity, is explained by them
as resulting from the difference in the " temperaments" of the
two. But have they discriminated the conditions thus vaguely
indicated by the word temperament? Have they estimated the
proportions in which the temperaments are mingled? Have they
discovered a means of valuation by which the exact influence of
each temperament can be estimated? They have not even made
the attempt.
And yet that such a valuation is indispensable to the scientific
precision of their results, must be evident to every one. What,
strictly speaking, is this " temperament," which acts as a disturbing force in the calculation? I believe that science wil one day
show that it is the result of that law of indeterminate composition which distinguishes living tissue from all other substances.
Inorganic bodies combine according to the law of determinate
composition: the proportions of the constituent elements are
fixed, definite, invariable. In water we invariably find 88'9 of
oxygen, and 11-1 of hydrogen, in every 100 parts; never more,




758                      PHRENOLOGY.
never less; let the water be dew, rain, snow, or artificially produced in the laboratory, its composition is always determinate,
even to the fraction. In any piece of flint every 100 parts will
be composed of 48'2 of silicon and 51'8 of oxygen; never more,
never less. But this is not the case with organic substances
(those at least which we ventured to distinguish as teleorganic
substances),* which are indeterminate in composition. Elementary analyses do not yield constant results, as do the analyses of
inorganic substances. Nerve-tissue, for example, contains both
phosphorus and water, as constituent elements; but the quantity
of these elements varies within certain limits; some nerve-tissues
have more phosphorus; some more water; and according to
these variations in the composition will be the variations in the
nervous force evolved. This is the reason why brains differ so
enormously even when their volumes are equal. The brain differs at different ages, and in different individuals. Sometimes
water constitutes three-fourths of the whole weight, sometimes
four-fifths, and sometimes even seven-eighths. The phosphorus
varies from 0-80 to 1'65, and 1-80; the cerebral fat varies from
3-45 to 5-30, and even 6-10. These facts will help to explain
many of the striking exceptions to phrenological observations
(such, for example, as the manifest superiority of some small
brains over some large brains), and are, indeed, included within
the comprehensive formula constantly advanced by phrenologists
that "size is a measure of power, other things being equal." In
this formula there is a truth, and an equivoque. The truth may
be passed over by us, as claiming instantaneous assent. The
equivoque must arrest us. Phrenologists forget that here " the
other things" never are equal; and consequently their dictum,
* Matter is divided into Inorganic and Organic; in 1853 1 proposed a modification of this division into-1. Anorganic; 2. Merorganic; and 3. Teleorganic: the first including those usually styled inorganic; the second including those substances in an intermediate state, either wanting some
addition to become living, or having lost some elements, and passed from
the vital state into that of product; the third including only the truly vital
substances.




CRANIOSCOPY.                    759
" size is a measure of power," is without application. There
never is equality in the things compared, because two brains exactly similar in size, and external configuration, will nevertheless
differ in elementary composition. The difference may be slight,
but however slight, it materially affects the result. The difference of elementary composition brings with it a difference in
development; and by development, I do not mean growth, but
differentiation.*  Parallel with these differences, not appreciable
by any means in the phrenologist's power, there are psychological differences, resulting from the effect of education. So that
to say " size is the measure of power," is as vague as to say " age
is the measure of wisdom;" because, although it is true that size
is an index of power, and, other things being equal, the greater
the brain the greater the mental power, it is equally true, that
age and experience in minds of equal capacity will produce proportionate wisdom: unfortunately we cannot get minds of equal
capacity placed under the same conditions; and thus it happens
that we find some men with large brains inferior to others with
much smaller brains, and men of patriarchal length of years more
unwise than their nephews.
And, in a less degree, this is true of size, taken as the measure
of power, between one organ and another in the same brain.
Failing utterly when two different brains are compared, the indication of size will be no more than approximative when two
parts of the same brain are compared; although in this case the
other things are necessarily more nearly equal: it is the same
nerve-tissue, the same temperament we are dealing with. In a
given brain, therefore, we may reasonably expect to find that any
one organ which is larger in size than another, will be more
powerful in function. But although this, as an empirical generalization, is a valuable indication, it is by no means certain, because there may be, and indeed usually is, a difficulty thrown in
* I have explained, at some length, the relation of growth and development in an article on Dwarfs and Giants, in Frazer's Magazine for August
and September, 1856.




760                   PHRENOLOGY.
the way by the inappreciable yet potent differences of development
which have taken place. Differentiations occur in two directions, in elementary composition and in morphological development. One brain may have more phosphorus than another;
and in the same brain one organ may be vesicular or more fibrous
than another. Thus it by no means follows that a man with reflective organs large in size, shall have so exercised these organs
as to have brought their development into proportional advance;
while on the other hand his smaller imaginative organs may
have been so developed by culture and exercise, as to have placed
them on a par in efficiency with the reflectives. Daily experience assures us that such is the case; and the philosophic
phrenologist might point to it as one explanation of the many
exceptions which Cranioscopy must necessarily encounter in its
attempt to read character according to external indications.
This is not the place for an examination of Phrenology as an
Art, or as a Science. I content myself, therefore, with the foregoing indication of what I believe to be the true position of
Cranioscopy, and some of the difficulties which beset it. That
the collection of observed correspondences between certain configurations of the skull and certain mental characteristics, is a
worthy task, and one which must materially aid the science of
Psychology, I do not think would be denied by any philosopher,
if it were undertaken with that subsidiary aim; but when phrenologists obtrude their "system" on the notice of philosophers,
declaring it to be a completed science of Psychology, and a
true method of reading character, they must not be surprised if
contradiction meet them on all sides, and if this contradiction
often speak the language of contempt: since daily experience
cannot sanction the present pretensions of the Art, because the
Art is found to be constantly at fault; nor can psychologists
recognize the pretensions of the Science.




PHRENOLOGY AS A SCIENCE.             761
~ IV. PHRENOLOGY AS A SCIENCE.
To defend their Art, phrenologists are compelled to recur to
their Doctrine, founded on the physiology of the nervous system, and on a psychological classification of the faculties. Indeed,
while on the one hand we find every phrenologist since Gall,
Spurzheim, and Vimont, occupied entirely with Cranioscopy, and
many even speaking with disdain of anatomists and physiologists; on the other hand we find them anxious to bring forward
physiological and pathological evidence, whenever that evidence
favors their views; and we hear them confidently assert that
Phrenology is the only true Physiology of the nervous system.
This latter assertion I am quite willing to echo, if the terms be
somewhat modified, and the phrase run thus: "Phrenology aspires
to be the true Physiology of the nervous system; when that
Physiology is complete, Phrenology will be complete." But for
the present we find Physiology confessing its incompletenessconfessing itself in its infancy; whereas Phrenology claims to be
complete, equipped, full-statured! Rightly considered, that very
claim is a condemnation of Phrenology, as at present understood.
The pretension of being a perfect or nearly perfect system, surely
implies a profound ignorance of the subject, an entire misconception of the complexity of the problem it pretends to have solved.
At a time when Science is unable to solve the problem of three
gravitating bodies, phrenologists pretend to find no difficulty in
calculating the result of forces so complex as those which constitute character: at a time when the nervous system is confessed,
by all who have studied it, to be extremely ill-understood, the
functions of that system are supposed to be established; at a
time when Physiology is so rapidly advancing that every decade
renders most books antiquated, a Psychology professedly founded
on that advancing science remains immovable!
Gall was on the right path when he entitled his first great
work Anatomy and Physiology of the Nervous System.*  His
* " Quiconque," he says, " est convaincu que la structure des parties du




762                    PHRENOLOGY.
successors have quitted that path. In spite of his emphatic declarations, when he was engaged in his exposition of the anatomy
and physiology of the nervous system,* declarations of the necessity there was always to make the study of organ and function
go hand in hand, so that he would only have his labors regarded
" as the basis of an essay towards a more perfect work;" in spite,
we say, of every philosophical consideration, his successors have
neglected Physiology for Cranioscopy; not one of them has
made or attempted to make any discovery or extension of discovery in the direction Gall so successfully opened; and the
result of this neglect has been twofold-first, that since Gall and
Spurzheim, Phrenology has not taken a single step; second, that
all the eminent physiologists of Europe who have devoted themselves to the study of the nervous system, unanimously reject a
theory which does not keep pace with the advance of science.
It is very easy for phrenologists to disregard the unanimous
opposition of physiologists, and to place this opposition to the
account of prejudice, or the "not having sufficiently studied
Phrenology;" but an impartial on-looker sees clearly enough
that, making every allowance for prejudice, the opposition rests
mainly on the discrepancy between the facts stated by phrenologists and the facts which Science has hitherto registered. Had
phrenologists kept themselves acquainted with what was gradually being discovered by physiologists, they would have seen
that something more than prejudice must be at work when all
the eminent neurologists, such as Serres, Flourens, Majendie,
Leuret, Longet, Lelut, Lafargue, Bouillaud, Baillarger, Miiller,
Valentin, and comparative anatomists such as Owen, declare
against Phrenology; although every one of these is ready to
admit the importance of Gall's method of dissection, ready to
incorporate whatever results Gall arrived at, which can be in any
cerveau a un rapport necessaire et inlmediat avec leurs fonctions, trouvera
qu'il est naturel de reunir ces deux objects Pun a l'autre, en les considerant
et en les traitant comme un soul et meme corps de doctrine."-An. et Phys.,
pref. xxv.
* Compare his Anat. et Pliys. da Syst. Nferveux, i. 95 and 271.




PHRENOLOGY AS A SCIENCE.                763
way confirmed. I do not blame phrenologists for having rendered no assistance to Physiology by their own labors; but I
am forced to point out the historical consequences of their having neglected to follow the path commenced by Gall, and deviated into that of simple Cranioscopy.  The neglect of which
they complain, is entirely owing to their presenting a rude sketch
as a perfect science, and to their keeping behind the science of
their day, instead of on a level with it. Impatient of contradiction, they shut their eyes to difficulties; unable to accommodate
their principles to the principles of Physiology, they contemptuously dismiss objections as " merely theoretical," and fall back
upon their " well-established facts."
Gall undertook a gigantic task. He produced a revolution,
and his name will always live in the history of Science. It is
idle to attempt to undervalue his work by citing his predecessors.
Others before him had thought of localizing the different faculties in different parts of the brain. He and Spurzheim have
mentioned such predecessors.*  These, however, are very vague,
unfertile conceptions; they in no way lessen Gall's originality.
A nearer approach is to be read in Prochaska, whom Gall often
mentions, although he does not, I think, mention this particular
anticipation. It is the third section of chapter five, and is entitled, " Do each of the divisions of the intellect occupy a separate portion of the brain?" and it concludes thus: "It is by no
means improbable that each division of the intellect has its allotted organ in the brain, so that there is one for the perceptions,
another for the understanding, probably others also for the will
and imagination and memory, which act wonderfully in concert
and mutually excite each other to action. The organ of imagination, however, amongst the rest will be far apart from the
organ of perceptions."t  How far this general supposition of a
* Fonctions du Ce'veau, ii. 850 sq. Compare also Leut: Rejet de 1' Organologia, p. 21 sq., and Prochaska, p. 374 sq.
t Prochaska, p. 447. There is a remarkable passage, too long for quotation
here, in Willis's Ceirebri Anatosme, c. x. p. 125, on the convolutions as indi



764                    PHRENOLOGY.
"probability" is from Gall's specific attempt to localize the organs, need not be pointed out. The attempt was far from being
fully successful; but, as a tentative, it was truly philosophical,
and produced a revolution.
Having once conceived the brain to be an apparatus of organs,
not a single organ, the problem was to analyze this apparatus
into its constituent organs, and to assign to each its special function. In this difficult problem Gall, by the necessities of his position as a system-founder, was forced to proceed on a false
method, namely, that of determining the separate organs according to a purely physiological and superficial analysis, instead of
subordinating this analysis to anatomical verification. It is this
arbitrary and unscientific proceeding which has made all anatomists reject the system. What would he have said to a physiologist who, knowing that the liver formed bile and sugar, should
have assigned the function of bile-formation to one lobe, and
the function of sugar-formation to another lobe, no structural differences having been observed? or who should assign to the
different lobules of the kidney functions as different as are assigned to the different convolutions of the brain? It is perfectly
true that from inspection of an organ no idea of its function can
be obtained; and this truth has blinded phrenologists who are
not physiologists to the necessity of nevertleless always making
anatomy the basis of every physiological analysis. No inspection of
the alimentary canal could disclose to us that its function was that
of digestion. Nevertheless the function of digestion, except in
the crude conception of ordinary men, is only intelligible after a
rigorous analysis of the several processes, buccal, stomachal, and
intestinal; for the intelligence of each of which, we must assign
to each gland its specific secretion, and to each secretion its specific action: a physiologist who should attempt the explanation
of digestion on any other mode would justly be slighted by every
eating intellectual superiority. I give only the opening: " Plice sunt convolutiones cerebri longe plures ac majores in hornine snnt quam in quovis alio
animali, nempe propter varies etmultiplices facultatum superiorumn actus."




PHRENOLOGY AS A SCIENCE.               765
good biologist in Europe. If Phrenology is the Physiology of
the nervous system, it must give up Gall's approximative method
for a method more rigorously scientific; and as Auguste Comte
justly remarks, phrenologists, before they can take rank among
men of science, must "reprendre, par une serie derecte de travaux
anatomiques, l'analyse fondamentale de l'appareil cerebral, en
faisant provisoirement abstraction de toute idee de fonctions."*
One of the fundamental questions which must be answered by
this anatomical analysis, is that which no phrenologist condescends
to ask, namely, Are the convolutions the seat of intelligence? in
other words, Is the gray vesicular matter which forms the surface
of the brain, the sole and specific seat of those changes on which
all mental phenomena depend? This is a question which Cranioscopy may ignore, since the facts on which Cranioscopy is
founded are little if at all affected by it. To Phrenology the question is initial, all-important; because if the "Physiology of the
nervous system" should turn out defective in its basis, the whole
scaffolding will have to be erected anew. I put the question in
two forms, because although it is commonly said that the convolutions of the brain form the organs, yet as many animals are altogether without convolutions, the vesicular surface, whether convoluted or not, must be understood as the seat of mental changes;
the convolutions being only a mode of increasing the surface.
As the space at my disposal is inadequate to any exhaustive
discussion of this important question, the reader will be satisfied
with a brief indication of the doubt which Physiology forces me
to express respecting the convolutions as the specific seat of mental manifestations. I cannot reconcile the current opinion on
that subject with anatomical and zoological facts. I believe that
the vesicular matter which constitutes the convolutions, is only
one factor in the sum; it would, however, lead me too far to
enter on the discussion, which might be objected to as at present
only hypothetical.
* Coursde Philosophie Positive, iii. 821. Comte is much more favorable to Gall
than I am, yet see his remarks on the multiplication of the faculties, p. 823 sq.




766                     PHRENOLOGY.
Quitting all hypothetical considerations for the less questionable evidence of facts, I find M. Baillarger*-who invented a
new method of measuring the surfaces of brains, by dissecting
out all the white substance from their interior, and then unfolding the exterior, and taking a cast of it-declaring from his measurements that it is far from true that in general the intelligence
of different animals is in direct proportion to their respective
extents of cerebral surface. If their absolute extents of surface
be taken, the rule is manifestly untrue in many instances; and it
is not more true if the extent of surface in proportion to the volume of the brain be regarded; for the human brain has less
superficial extent in proportion to its volume than that of many
inferior mammalia: its volume is two and a half times as
great in proportion to its surface, as it is in the rabbit, for
example.
Nor is this all. The researches of M. Camille Darestet establish beyond dispute that the number and depth of the convolutions bear no direct relation to the development of intelligence;
whereas they do bear a direct relation to the size of the animal;
so that, given the size of the animal in any genus, he can predict
the degree of convoluted development; or given the convolutions,
he can predict the size: "toutes les especes a cerveau lisse ont
une petite taille; toutes les especes a circonvolutions nombreuses
et compliquees sont, au contraire, de gran detaille."  Further, I
am informed by Professor Owen that the grampus has convolutions deeper and more complicated than those of man. From all
which facts it becomes evident that the phrenological basis is so
far from being in accordance with the present state of our knowledge of the nervous system as to require complete revision.
Phrenology has another important point to determine, namely,
the relation of the size of the brain to mental power. Is the size
of the brain to be taken absolutely, and its functional activity in
* Gazette Mfedicale, 19 April, 1845. Paget: Report on the Progress of Anatomy, in British and Foreign Med. Rev. July, 1846.
t Annalesdes Sciences Naturelles, e3 serie, xvii. 30, and 4e serie, i. 73.




PHRENOLOGY AS A SCIENCE.              767
the purely mental direction to be measured by its absolute bulk?
A galvanic battery of fifty plates is five times as powerful as a battery of ten plates; a cord of twenty threads is five times as strong
as a cord of four threads, other things equal; and, in like manner,
we should expect that a brain of fifty ounces would be twice as
powerful as one of twenty-five ounces (the limits are really greater
than these). Nevertheless, we find no such absolute and constant
relation between size and mental power as would justify the
phrenological position; the weight of the human brain being
about three pounds; the weight of the whale's brain being five
pounds; the weight of the elephant's between eight and ten'pounds. If therefore the function of the brain be solely or mainly
that of mental manifestation, and if size be the measure of
power, the whale and the elephant ought to surpass man, as a
Newton surpasses an idiot. If on the contrary the brain, as a
nervous centre, has other functions besides that of mental manifestation, these discrepancies can be explained, although Phrenology must take these other functions into account.*
It is true that phrenologists have been aware of these discrepancies; and, unable to admit the whale and elephant as superior
to man, they have met the objection by saying the size must be
estimated relatively, not absolutely. Compared with the weight
of his body, the brain of man is certainly heavier than the brains
of most animals, including the whale and the elephant; and this
fact seems to restore Phrenology to its cheerfulness on the subject; but the fact does not hold good of monkeys, the smaller
apes, many species of birds, and some rodents. This is the dilemma: either the ratio of mental power depends on the absolute
size of the brain, and in this case the elephant will be thrice
as intelligent as man; or it depends on the relative size of the
brain compared with the body, and in this case man will be less
intelligent than a monkey or a rat, although more intelligent than
* I have sketched the relations of the brain to the body in the paper
before referred to, on Dwarfs and Giants. See Frazer's Mag., Sept. 1856,
p. 289.




768                  PHRENOLOGY.
the elephant. Moreover, if relative size is the basis taken, phrenologists would be bound to compare in each case the weight of
the brain with the weight of the body, before they could establish
a conclusion; and this is obviously impracticable. I have stated
the dilemma; but having stated it, I will add that although phrenologists attach importance to questions of weight of the brain,
there seems to me a great fallacy involved in such estimates. Intelligence is not to be measured by the balance. Weight is no index
of cerebral activity, nor of the special directions of the activity.
Enough has been said to show that Phrenology, so far fiom at
present being the only true physiological explanation of the nervous system, is in so chaotic and unstable a position with respect
to its basis, as to need thorough revision; and until some
phrenologist shall arise who, following up the impulsion given by
Gall, can once more place the doctrine on a level with the science
of the age, all men of science must be expected to slight the pretensions of Phrenology as a psychological system, whatever it may
hereafter become. That a new Gall will some day arise I have
little doubt, for I am convinced that Psychology must be established on a physiological basis. Meanwhile, for the purposes of this
History, it suffices to have indicated the nature of Gall's innovation, and the course of inquiry he opened. As a psychological classification, the one now adopted in Phrenology can only be regarded
in the light of a tentative sketch; superior indeed to those which
preceded it,but one which daily experience shows to be insufficient.
To conclude this chapter, we may point to Gall as having
formed an epoch in the History of Philosophy by inaugurating
a new Method. From the time when Philosophy itself became
reduced to a question of Psychology, in order that a basis might,
if possible, be laid, the efforts of men were variously directed,
and all ended in skepticism and dissatisfaction, because a true
psychological Method did not guide them. The history of the
tentatives towards a true Method has been sketched in various
chapters of this volume, and with Gall that Method may be said
to have finally settled its fundamental principles.




ELEVENTH EPOCH.
PHILOSOPHY FINALLY RELINQUISHING ITS PLACE IN FAVOR
OF POSITIVE SCIENCE.
CHAPTER I.
ECLECTICISM.
"Nous ne croyons pas les choses parce qu'elles sont vraies,"
says Pascal, "mais nous les croyons vraies parce que nous les
aimons." This is one ever-present obstacle to the progress of
mankind. We do not love truth because it is true, but because
it seems to countenance other opinions which we believe necessary
to our well-being. Only a few philosophic minds have strength
enough to detach their eyes from consequences, and concentrate
all their attention on Truth; and these few can only do so in
virtue of their steadfast conviction that Truth can never be really
injurious, whatever phantoms apprehensive ignorance may conjure up around it.
The reaction against the Philosophy of the eighteenth century
was not a reaction against a doctrine proved to be incompetent,
but against a doctrine believed to be the source of frightful immorality. The reaction was vigorous because it vas animated
by the horror which agitated Europe at the hideous excesses of
the French Revolution. Associated in men's minds with the
saturnalia of the Terror, the philosophical opinions of Condillac,
Diderot, and Cabanis were held responsible for the crimes of the
Convention; and what might be true in those opinions was
flung aside with what was false, without discrimination, without
33




770                   ECLECTICISM.
analysis, in fierce impetuous disgust. Every opinion which had
what was called "a taint of materialism," or seemed to point in
that direction, was denounced as an opinion necessarily leading
to the destruction of all Religion, Morality, and Government.
Every opinion which seemed to point in the direction of spiritualism was eagerly welcomed, promulgated, and lauded; not
because it was demonstrably true, but because it was supposed
capable of preserving social order. And indeed when, looking
back upon those times, we contemplate the misery and anarchy
which disgraced what was an inevitable movement, and dimmed
what was really noble in the movement, we can understand how
generous hearts and minds, fluctuating in perplexity, did instinctively revolt not only against the Revolution, but against all the
principles which were ever invoked by the revolutionists. Looking at the matter from this distance, we can see clearly enough
that "materialism" had really no more to do with the Revolution than Christianity had to do with the hideous scenes in
which the Anabaptists were actors; but we can understand how
indelible was the association of Revolution and materialism in
the minds of that generation.
So profoundly influential has this association been, that a celebrated surgeon of our own day perilled his position by advocating an opinion, now universally accepted, but then generally
shuddered at; namely, that the brain is the "organ" of the
mind. He had to retract that opinion, which the pious Iartley
and many others had advanced without offence.  He had to
retract it, not because it was scientifically untenable, but because
it was declared to be morally dangerous. It was " materialism,"
and materialism " led" to the destruction of all morality. Although every man now believes the brain to be veritably the
organ of the mind, the word materialism is still used as a bugbear. Instead of being refuted as false, it is by many denounced
as dangerous. I believe the philosophy of the eighteenth century to be dangerous because false; the writers to whom I allude
declare it false because they believe it dangerous. I believe it




ECLECTICISM.                    7
also to be in many respects healthful, because in many respects
true; and it would be uncandid in me not to declare that if I
oppose the eighteenth century doctrine, I believe the spiritualism
which denounces it is even more incomplete as a philosophy, and
consequently even more dangerous in its influence.
The history of the reaction in France is very instructive, but
it would require more space than can here be given adequately
to narrate the story.* Four streams of influence converged into
one, all starting from the same source, namely, horror at the
revolutionary excesses. The Catholics, with the great Joseph
de Maistre and M. de Bonald at their head, appealed to the religious sentiments; the Royalists, with Chateaubriand and Madame
de Stael, appealed to the monarchical and literary sentiments;
the metaphysicians, with Laromiguiere and Maine de Brian, and
the moralists with Royer-Collard, one and all attacked the weak
points of Sensationalism, and prepared the way for the enthusiastic reception of the Scotch and German philosophies. A
glance at almost any of these writers will suffice to convince the
student that their main purpose is to defend morality and order,
which they believe to be necessarily imperilled by the philosophy
they attack. The appeals to the prejudices and sentiments are
abiding. Eloquence is made to supply the deficiencies of argument; emotion takes the place of demonstration. The hearer
is charmed, roused, dazzled. He learns to associate all the nobler
sentiments with spiritualistic doctrines, and all grovelling ideas
with materialistic doctrines; till the one school becomes inseparably linked in his mind with emotions of reverence for whatever is lofty, profound, and noble, and the other with emotions
of contempt for whatever is shallow and unworthy. The leaders
of the reaction were men of splendid talents, and their work was
eminently successful. But now that the heats of controversy
have cooled, and all these debates have become historical, we
* The reader may consult on this topic DamiroA, Essai sur Z'Histoire de la
Philosophie en FIance an XIXieme Siecle; and Taine, Les Philosophes FranVais du XIXieme Siecle.




7'72                  ECLECTICISM.
who look at them from a distance can find in them no philosophical progress, no new elements added which could assist the evolution of Philosophy and form a broader basis for future monuments. In political and literary History these attempts would
claim a conspicuous position; in the History of Philosophy they
deserve mention only as having made mankind aware of the
limited nature of the eighteenth century philosophy, and its extraordinary lacunce.  Their office was critical, and has been
fulfilled.
One doctrine, and one alone, emerged from these attempts,
and held for some time the position of a school. It made a
noise in its day, but even the echoes have now become almost
inaudible, for a feebler doctrine scarcely ever obtained acquiescence. We must, nevertheless, bestow a few sentences on it to
make our history complete. Eclecticism is dead, but it produced
some good results, if only by the impetus it gave to historical
research, and by the confirmation it gave, in its very weakness,
to the conclusion that an ia priori solution of transcendental
problems is impossible. For Eclecticism was the last product of
philosophical speculation, the gathering together of all that philosophers had achieved, and the evolution from these separate
achievements of one final doctrine, which final doctrine is itself
rejected.
Victor Cousin and Thomas Jouffroy are the chiefs of this
school, one a brilliant rhetorician utterly destitute of originality,
the other a sincere thinker, whose merits have been thrown into
the shade by his brilliant colleague. As a man of letters, M.
Cousin deserves the respect which attends his name, if we except
the more than questionable use which he has made of the labors
of pupils and assistants without acknowledgment.  However,
our business is not with Cousin, but with Eclecticism. RoyerCollard introduced the principles of the Scotch school, to combat
with them the principles of sensationalism. Reid and Stewart
were translated by Jouffroy, explained and developed by RoyerCollard, Jouffroy, and Cousin. The talents of these professors,




ECLECTICISM.                  773
aided by the tendency towards any reaction, made the Scotch
philosophy dominant in France. But Victor Cousin's restless
activity led him to the study of Kant:-and the doctrines of the
"Konigsberg sage" were preached by him with the same ardor
as that which he had formerly devoted to the Scotch. As soon
as the Parisians began to know something of Kant, M. Cousin
started off to Alexandria for a doctrine: he found one in Proclus.
He edited Proclus; lectured on him; borrowed some of his
ideas, and would have set him on the throne of Philosophy, had
the public been willing. A trip to Germany in 1824 made him
acquainted with the modern Proclus-Hegel. On his return to
Paris he presented the public with as much of Hegel's doctrines as he could understand. His celebrated Eclecticism is
nothing but a misconception of Hegel's History of Philosophy,
fenced round with several plausible arguments.
All error, M. Cousin repeatedly enforces, is nothing but " an
incomplete view of the truth." Upon this definition is based the
proposition that " All systems are incomplete views of the reality,
set up for complete images of the reality." The conclusion is
obvious: " All systems containing a mixture of truth and error
have only to be brought together, and then the error would be
eliminated by the mere juxtaposition of system with system.
The truth or portion of the truth which is in one system would
be assimilated with the portions of the truth which are in other
systems; and thus the work would be easy enough."
Eclecticism, therefore, means the bringing together of all discovered truths eliminated from their accompanying errors; and
out of this body of truths a doctrine is to be elaborated. A great
task; but is it practicable? The system is based on the definition of error; by that it must stand or fall.
The definition appears to us altogether untenable. Error is
sometimes an incomplete view of the truth; but it is not always:
it is sometimes no view of the truth at all, but a mere divergence
from it. When Newton constructed his theory of the laws of
attraction, and interposed an ether as the medium through which




774                   ECLECTICISM.
they operated, he had an incomplete view of the truth. But
when Descartes developed his theory of vortices, he was quite
wide of the truth-he was altogether wrong. The phrase " incomplete view" is indeed so vague, that men who sport with
verbal subtleties may justify the theory of Descartes as an incomplete view of the truth; a very incomplete view. At any rate
no one will be disposed to assert that by the mere juxtaposition
of Newton's doctrine with that of Descartes he could in any way
eliminate the error that is in both.
If therefore all systems are not incomplete views of the reality
-if all systems do not contain certain portions of the truth-how
is the eclectic to decide which systems are available for his purpose, which philosophies are to be juxtaposed? This leads to the
necessity of a criterium. M. Jouffroy tells us that it is an easy
matter. We have only to collect all the systems which have
ever been produced, have them translated and arranged in their
legitimate order, and the truths discovered by each will become
organized in one doctrine.
Without stopping to ask what is the legitimate order, and how
we are to know it, the student is naturally anxious to learn by
what criterium Eclecticism proposes to judge and separate truth
from error in any system. The inquiry is pertinent. It is easy
to bid us be careful in separating the wheat from the chaff, that
we may garner it up in the storehouses of the world. Suppose
the farmer does not know the wheat when he sees it, what criterium do you give him whereby he may judge wheat to be wheat,
not chaff? None. The philosopher can only distinguish the
truth in two ways: either he knows it already, and then he has
what he is seeking; or else he knows it by its relation to and
accordance with those truths which he is already in possession
of. That is to say, he has a criterium in his System: those
views which range under it, he accepts as extensions of his
knowledge; those which range beyond its limits, he denies to be
true.
Suppose the eclectic places in juxtaposition the two great




ECLECTICISM.                   775
schools which have always divided the world, viz. that which
declares experience to be the source of all knowledge; and that
which declares we have a great deal of our knowledge antecedent to and independent of experience. Both of these systems
he pronounces to be composed of truth and error. He assumes
this; for a little consideration might tell him that it is utterly
impossible both should be correct: experience either is or is not
the sole fountain of knowledge. The difference is as decided as
that respecting the motion of the earth, or the motion of the
sun. Ptolemy and Copernicus: choose between them; any
compromise is impossible, unless you wish to side with the Sizar
who, when the question was put, "Does the earth move round
the sun, or the sun round the earth?" replied, " Sometimes one
and sometimes the other." He was an eclectic apparently. Let
us however for a moment grant that the two schools of Psychology are both partly right and partly wrong; we then ask, What
criterium  has the eclectic whereby to distinguish error from
truth? He has none; the doctors are silent on the point.
That men derive assistance from others, and that those who
went before us discovered many truths, all admit. And there
can be no doubt that a juxtaposition and comparison of various
doctrines would be of service. Eclecticism, therefore, as a subsidiary process is valuable; and has always been practised. M.
Cousin however converts this subsidiary process into a primary
one, and dignifies it with the attributes of a Method. In the one
sense it is simply that the inquirer consults the works of his predecessors, and selects from them all that he considers true: viz.
such portions as confirm, extend, and illustrate his previous opinions; these opinions constituting his criterium. Let the reader
reflect on the pertinacity with which men refuse to admit views
which to others are self-evident, because those views are or seem
to be opposed to religion, or the reigning doctrine, and he will
clearly enough see the nature of this criterium. The history of
opinion is crowded with instances of it. M. Cousin however does
not so understand Eclecticism. Hie says we should admit all




776                  AIUGUSTE COMTE.
systems as containing some truths; and these truths separate
themselves from errors by the mere process of juxtaposition,
somewhat in the manner, we presume, of chemical affinities.A theory that needs, one would think, no further refutation than
a simple statement of its principles.
Having dismissed Eclecticism as a Method, we need not waste
time in examining M. Cousin's various and constantly shifting
opinions. It is enough that he himself has relinquished them.
It is enough that France and Europe reject them.
This final doctrine then fares no better than the doctrines
which preceded it. Philosophy is still in search of its Method
and its basis; and wearied out by so many fiuitless efforts, it
finally gives up the quest, and allows itself to be absorbed by
Science. The dogmatic assertion of this position is to be found
in Auguste Comte.
CHAPTER II.
AT GUSTE COMTE.
As I have devoted a whole volume to the exposition of Comte's
philosophy,* it will be unnecessary to enter into a detailed exposition here; and the small space at disposal may be occupied with
a general indication of his historical position and the nature of
his Method.
In the course of this History one fact has been gradually assuming more and more distinctness, as the various failures to
establish any solid basis for Philosophy have been brought before
us: namely, that mankind has, from the origin of speculative inquiry, been pursuing a false Method. Gradually, as men became
aware of this fact, they withdrew themselves more and more fiom
Philosophy, and devoted their speculative energy to Science.
* Comte's Philosophyof theSciences, 1853 (Bohn's Scientific Library, vol. 20).




AUGUSTE COMTE.                    777
Even those who, reluctant to relinquish the high aims of Philosophy, tried by changes of direction to discover new and more prosperous issues, and hoped in reinvestigating the nature of human
knowledge to disclose some yet unsuspected path which might
lead them to the goal, found Psychology itself forced to range
beside the positive sciences, and to adopt the one Method which
hitherto had alone been fruitful in results. And while from all
directions a convergence towards Science was silently taking
place, there arose a powerful thinker who proclaimed the inherent necessity of this convergence, and the necessity under
which Philosophy now was of definitively relinquishing its
ancient claims in favor of the positive Method, which could lead
men to a general doctrine such as might once more establish harmony in their endeavors, and give to Europe an invigorating faith.
In the Cours de Philosophie Positive, 6 vols., 1830-42, Auguste Comte did for the nineteenth century what Bacon did for
the seventeenth: he resumed in one vast work the various reforming tendencies of preceding ages.  Whoever casts his
glance at the present intellectual state of Europe, will perceive a
great want of unity, caused by the absence of any one doctrine,
general enough to embrace every variety of ideas, and positive
enough to carry with it irresistible conviction. Look at the state
of Religion:-Catholicism and Protestantism make one great
division; but within the sphere of each we see numerous subdivisions; the variety of sects is daily increasing. Each Religion
has remarkable men amongst its members; but each refuses to
admit the doctrines of the others. There is, in fact, no one general doctrine capable of embracing Catholics, Protestants, Mohammedans, and their subdivisions. Look also at the state of
Philosophy. There is no one system universally accepted; there
are as many philosophies as there are speculative nations, almost
as many as there are professors. The dogmas of Germany are
held in England and Scotland as the dreams of alchemists; the
Psychology of Scotland is laughed at in Germany, and neglected
in England and France. Besides this general dissidence, we see,
330




778                  AUGUSTE COMTE
in France and Germany at least, great.opposition between Religion and Philosophy openly pronounced. This opposition is
inevitable: it lies in the very nature of Philosophy; and although,
now as heretofore, many professors eagerly argue that the two
are perfectly compatible and accordant, the discordance is, and
always must be, apparent.
With respect to general doctrines, then, we find the state of
Europe to be this: religions opposed to religions; philosophies
opposed to philosophies; and Religion and Philosophy at war
with each other. Such is the anarchy in the higher regions.
In the positive sciences there is less dissidence, but there is the
same absence of any general doctrine; each science is on a firm
basis, and rapidly improves; but a Philosophy of Science is nowhere to be found except in the work of M. Auguste Comte,
which comes forward with the express purpose of supplying the
deficiency. The speciality of most scientific men, and their incapacity of either producing or accepting general ideas, has
long been a matter of complaint; and this has been one great
cause of the continuance of Philosophy: for men of speculative
ability saw clearly enough that however exact each science
might be in itself, it could only form  a part of Philosophy.
Moreover, the evil of speciality is not confined to neglecting the
whole for the sake of the parts; it affects the very highest condition of Science, namely, its capability of instructing and directing society.
In the early ages of speculation, general views were eagerly.sought and easily obtained. As Science became rich and conplex in materials, various divisions took place; and one man
cultivated one science, another man another. Even then general
views were not absent. But as the tide rolled on, discovery succeeding discovery, and new tracts of inquiry leading to vast
wildernesses of undiscovered truth, it became necessary for one
man to devote himself only to a small fraction of a science, which
he pursued, leaving to others the task of bringing his researches
under their general head. Such a minute division of labor was




AUGUSTE COMTE.                   779
necessary for tie successful prosecution of minute and laborious
researches; but it ended in making men of science regard only
the individual parts of science; the construction of general doctrines was left to philosophers. A fatal error; for such doctrines
could only be truly constructed out of the materials of Science
and upon the Method of Science; whereas the philosophers were
ignorant of Science-or only superficially acquainted with itand despised the Method. The Natur-Philosophie of Schelling
and Hegel is a sufficiently striking example of the results of such
a procedure.
We come then to this conclusion: in the present state of
things the speculative domain is composed of two very different
portions,-general ideas and positive sciences. The general ideas
are powerless because they are not positive; the positive sciences
are powerless because they are not general. The new Philosophy
which, under the title of Positive, M. Comte proposes to create
-and the basis of which he has himself laid-is destined to put
an end to this anarchy, by presenting a doctrine which is positive, because elaborated from the sciences, and yet possessing all
the desired generality of metaphysical doctrines, without possessing their vagueness, instability, and inapplicability.
Besides this general aim of the new " Great Instauration," we
have to notice three initial conceptions which Comte advances,
two of which relate to Method, and one to History.
The first is the conception of Philosophy, which, in its widest
sense, is identical with Science; consequently one Method must
be followed in all investigations, whether the investigations relate
to Physics, to Psychology, to Ethics, or to Politics. Every special science, no matter what its subject-matter, is but a branch of
the one Positive Philosophy.
The second conception is that of Classification, whereby all
the special sciences will assume their proper place in the hierarchy of Science, the simpler being studied first, and thus becoming instruments for the better prosecution of those which succeed. Thus Mathematics becomes the instrument of Astronomy




'780                 AUGUSTE COMTE.
and Physics; Chemistry becomes the instrument of Biology;
and Biology becomes the instrument of Sociology.
The third conception is that of the fundamental law of evolution. This conception sets forth that Humanity has three stages,
the Theological, the Metaphysical, and the Positive. Whether
we examine the history of nations, of individuals, or of special
sciences, we find that speculation always commences with supernatural explanations, advances to metaphysical explanations, and
finally reposes in positive explanations. The first is the necessary point of departure taken by human intelligence; the second
is merely a stage of transition from the supernatural to the positive; and the third is the fixed and definite condition in which
knowledge is alone capable of progressive development.
In the Theological stage, the mind regards all effects as the
productions of supernatural agents, whose intervention is the
cause of all the apparent anomalies and irregularities. Nature is
animated by supernatural beings. Every unusual phenomenon
is a sign of the pleasure or displeasure of some being adored and
propitiated as a God. The lowest condition of this stage is that
of the savages, viz. Fetishism. The highest condition is when
one being is substituted for many, as the cause of all phenomena.
In the Metaphysical stage, which is only a modification of the
former, but which is important as a transitional stage, the supernatural agents give place to abstract forces (personified abstractions) supposed to inhere in the various substances, and capable
themselves of engendering phenomena. The highest condition
of this stage is when all these forces are brought under one general force named Nature.
In the Positive stage, the mind, convinced of the futility of all
inquiry into causes and essences, applies itself to the observation
and classification of laws which regulate effects: that is to say,
the invariable relations of succession and similitude which all
things bear to each other. The highest condition of this stage
would be, to be able to represent all phenomena as the various
particulars of one general view.




AUGUSTE COMTE.                   781
Thus, in Astronomy we may trace the gradual evolution from
Apollo and his chariot, through the Pythagorean ideas of Numbers, Harmonies, and so many other metaphysical abstractions,
to the firm basis on which it is now settled: the law of gravitation. So that it is by geometry and dynamics we hope to wrest
their secret from the spheres; not by the propitiation of a Sungod. Thus also in Physics, where thunder was the intervention
of Jove, and where Metaphysics had introduced Nature's " horror of a void," Science seeks the laws of gravitation, electricity,
light, etc.
In the work already mentioned I have illustrated this law in
many ways. The reader is advised however to seek in Comte's
own volumes for a complete verification of the law, and its im.
portance in all historical inquiry.* A few sentences will suffice
to indicate the nature of the three stages:-All are agreed, in
these days, that real knowledge must be founded on the observation of facts. But no science could have its origin in simple observation; for if, on -the one hand, all positive theories must be
founded on observation, so, on the other, it is equally necessary
to have some sort of theory before we address ourselves to the
task of steady observation. If, in contemplating phenomena, we
do not connect them with some principle, it would not only be
impossible for us to combine our isolated observations, and consequently to draw any benefit from them; but we should also
be unable even to retain them, and moo frequently the important facts would remain unperceived.  We are consequently
forced to theorize. A theory is necessary to observation, and a
correct theory to correct observation.
This double necessity imposed upon the mind-of observation
for the formation of a theory, and of a theory for the practice of
observation-would have caused it to move in a circle, if nature
had not fortunately provided an outlet in the spontaneous activ* This advice can the more easily be followed now that a translated condensation of the Positive Philosophy by Harriet Martineau, has placed the
work within reach of English readers.




782                  AUGUSTE COMTE.
ity of the mind. This activity causes it to begin by assuming a
cause, which it seeks out of nature, i. e. a supernatural cause.
As man is conscious that he acts according as he wills, so he naturally concludes that every thing acts in accordance with some
superior will. Hence Fetishism, which is nothing but the endowment of inanimate things with life and volition. This is the
logical necessity for the supernatural stage: the mind commences with the unknowable; it has first to learn its impotence,
to learn the limits of its range, before it can content itself with
the knowable.
The metaphysical stage is equally important as the transitive
stage. The supernatural and positive stages are so widely opposed that they require intermediate notions to bridge over the
chasm. In substituting an entity inseparable from phenomena
for a supernatural agent, through whose will these phenomena
were produced, the mind became habituated to consider only the
phenomena themselves. This was a most important condition.
The result was, that the ideas of these metaphysical entities
gradually faded, and were lost in the mere abstract names of the
phenomena.
The positive stage was now possible. The mind having ceased
to interpose either supernatural agents or metaphysical entities
between the phenomena and their production, attended solely
to the phenomena themselves. These it reduced to laws; in
other words, it arraned them according to their invariable relations of similitude and succession. The search after essences
and causes was renounced. The pretension to absolute knowledge was set aside. The discovery of laws became the great object of mankind.
Remember that although every branch of knowledge must
pass through these three stages, in obedience to the law of evolution, nevertheless the progress is not strictly chronological.
Some sciences are more rapid in their evolution than others;
some individuals pass through these evolutions more quickly than
others; so also of nations. The present intellectual anarchy re



AUGUSTE COMTE.                   783
suits from that difference; some sciences being in the positive,
some in the supernatural, and some in the metaphysical stage:
and this is further to be subdivided into individual differences;
for in a science which, on the whole, may fairly be admitted as
being positive, there will be found some cultivators still in the
metaphysical stage. Astronomy is now in so positive a condition, that we need nothing but the laws of dynamics and gravitation to explain all celestial phenomena; and this explanation
we know to he correct, as far as any thing can be known, because
we can predict the return of a comet with the nicest accuracy,
or can enable the mariner to discover his latitude and find his
way amidst the "waste of waters."  This is a positive science.
But so far is meteorology from such a condition, that prayers for
dry or rainy weather are still offered up in churches; whereas if
once the laws of these phenomena were traced, there would no
more be prayers for rain than for the sun to rise at midnight.
Remark also, that while in the present day no natural philosopher is unwise enough to busy himself with the attempt to discover the cause of attraction, thousands are busy in the attempt
to discover the cause of life and the essence of mind. This difference characterizes positive and metaphysical sciences. The one
is content with a general fact, that " attraction is directly as the
mass and inversely as the square of the distance;" this being
sufficient for all scientific purposes, because enabling us to predict with unerring certainty the results of that operation. The
metaphysician or metaphysical physiologist, on the contrary, is
more occupied with guessing at the causes of life, than in observing and classifying vital phenomena with a view to detect their
laws of operation. First he guesses it to be what he calls a
" vital principle"-a mysterious entity residing in the fiame, and
capable of engendering phenomena. He then proceeds to guess
at the nature or essence of this principle, and pronounces it
" electricity," or "nervous fluid," or " chemical affinity."  Thus
he heaps hypothesis upon hypothesis, and clouds the subject from
his view.




784                  AUGUSTE COMTE.
The more closely we examine the present condition of the sciences, the more we shall be struck with the anarchy above indicated. We shall find one science (Physics) in a perfectly positive stage, another (Biology) in the metaphysical stage, a third
(Sociology) in the supernatural stage. Nor is this all. The
same varieties will be found to co-exist in the same individual
mind. The same man who in Physics may be said to have arrived at the positive stage, and recognizes no other object of inquiry than the laws of phenomena, will be found still a slave to
the metaphysical stage in Biology, and endeavoring to detect the
cause of life; and so little emancipated from the supernatural
stage in Sociology, that if you talk to him of the possibility of a
science of history, or a social science, he will laugh at you as
a "theorizer."  The present condition of Science, therefore, exhibits three Methods instead of one: hence the anarchy.  To
remedy the evil all differences must cease: one Method must
preside. Auguste Comte was the first to point out the fact, and
to suggest the cure; and it will render his name immortal. So
long as the supernatural explanation of phenomena was universally accepted, so long was there unity of thought, because one
general principle was applied to all facts. The same may be
said of the metaphysical stage, though in a less degree, because
it was never universally accepted; it was in advance of the
supernatural, but before it could attain universal recognition, the
positive stage had already begun. When the positive Method is
universally accepted-and the day we hope is not far distant, at
least among the elite of humanity-then shall we again have
unity of thought, then shall we again have one general doctrine,
powerful because general. That the positive Method is the only
Method adapted to human capacity, the only one on which truth
can be found, is easily proved: on it alone can prevision of phenomena depend. Prevision is the characteristic and the test of
knowledge. If we can predict certain results and if they occur
as we predicted, then are we assured that our knowledge is correct. If the wind blows according to the will of Boreas, we may,




AUGUSTE COMTE.                   785
indeed,propitiate his favor, but we cannot calculate upon it. We
can have no certain knowledge whether the wind will blow or
not. If, on the other hand, it is subject to laws, like every thing
else, once discover these laws, and men will predict concerning
it as they predict concerning other matters. "Even the wind
and rain," to use the language of one of our clearest writers,
"which in common speech are the types of uncertainty and
change, obey laws as fixed as those of the sun and moon; and
already, as regards many parts of the earth, man can foretell
them without fear of being deceived. He plans his voyages to
suit the coming monsoons, and prepares against the floods of the
rainy season."* If one other argument be needed, we would
simply refer to the gradual and progressive improvement which
has always taken place in every department of inquiry conducted upon the positive Method-and with a success in exact proportion to its rigorous employment of that Method-contrasted
with the circular movement of Philosophy, which is just as far
from a solution of any one of its problems as it was five thousand
years ago; the only truths that it can be said to have acquired
are a few psychological truths, and these it owes to the positive
Method. So little has the Philosophy of Science been studied,
that Comte's admirable classification of the fundamental sciences
has not only been regarded as a merely ingenious speculation,
but many writers have said that it was not different from other
classifications which had been proposed, among which Hegel's
has been mentioned. But the resemblance is only superficial.
A few sentences must suffice here to indicate the principle on
which it is based:-The problem to be solved is the dependence
of the sciences upon each other. This dependence can only result from that of the corresponding phenomena. In considering
these, it is easy to class them in a small number of natural categories, so disposed that the rational study of each successive
category should be founded on the knowledge of the principal
* Dr. Arnott's Elements of Physics, fifth edition, vol. i. p. 13.




786                  AUGUSTE COMTE.
laws of the preceding category. The order of their dependence
is determined by the degree of simplicity or generality of the
phenomena. It is evident that the most simple phenomenathose which are least mixed up with others-are the imrc  general; for that which is observed in the greatest number c(  rcumstances is the most independent of the various particulars of
those circumstances. The principle therefore to be adopted is
this: we must commence with the study of the most simple or
general phenomena, and proceed successively to the most com.plex and particular.
A distinction is to be made between the two classes of phenomena which are manifested by inorganized bodies and by organized bodies. The phenomena of the latter are obviously more
complex than those of the former: they greatly depend upon inorganized bodies, while these in no way depend upon organized
bodies. Organized bodies manifest all the phenomena of the inorganized, whether chemical or mechanical; but they also manifest the phenomena named vital, which are never manifested by
inorganized bodies.
In the study of inorganic Physics we commence by separating
the general phenomena of the universe from the less general terrestrial phenomena.  Thus we have, first, celestial Physics, or
Astronomy, whether geometrical or mechanical; secondly, terrestrial Physics. The phenomena of Astronomy being the most
general, the most simple, and the most abstract of all, we must
begin our study with them. Their laws influence all other terrestrial phenomena, of which they are essentially independent.
In all terrestrial Physics universal gravitation is a condition;
and so the simple movement of the body, if we would consider
all the determining conditions, is a subject of greater complexity
than any astronomical question.
Terrestrial Physics is also divided into two classes: Physics
and Chemistry.  Chemistry, rightly conceived, presupposes a
knowledge of Physics: for all Themical phenomena are more
complex than those of Physics, and depend on them in great part:




AUGUSTE COMTE.                  787
whereas they have no influence on physical phenomena. All
chemical action is subject to the influence of weight, heat, etc.,
and must therefore be treated after them.
02    c Physics requires a similar division into Biology and
Sociologj. The phenomena relating to mankind are obviously
more complex than those relating to the individual man, and
depend upon them. In all social questions we see in operation
the physiological laws of man; and we see also something peculiar, not physiological, which modifies the effects of these laws,
and which results from the action of individuals on each other,
curiously complicated by the action of each generation on its successor. It would be manifestly as impossible to treat the study
of the collective species as a pure deduction from the study of
the individual, as it would be to treat Physiology as a pure deduction from Chemistry.
The Positive Philosophy therefore resolves itself into five fundamental sciences, of which the succession is determined by a
necessary and invariable subordination founded on a comparison
of corresponding phenomena. The first (Astronomy) considers
the most general, simple, and abstract phenomena-those farthest removed from humanity: they influence all others, but are
not influenced by them.  The last (Sociology) considers the
most particular, complex, and concrete phenomena-those most
directly interesting to man: they depend more or less upon all
the preceding classes, without exercising on the latter the slightest influence. Between these two extremes the degrees of speciality and of complication of phenomena gradually augment
according to their successive independence.
The foundation of a comprehensive Method is the great
achievement of Comte, as it was of Bacon, and the influence he
has exercised, and must continue to exercise, will be almost exclusively in that direction. Over his subsequent efforts to found
a social doctrine, and to become the founder of a new religion,
let us draw the veil. They are nfortunate attempts which remind us of Bacon's scientific investigations; and, in the minds of




788                   CONCLUSION.
many, these unfortunate attempts will create a prejudice against
what is truly grand in his philosophic career. In the Cours de
Philosophie Positive we have the grandest, because on the whole
the truest, system which Philosophy has yet produced; nor
should any differences, which must inevitably arise on points of
detail, make us forget the greatness of the achievement and the
debt we owe to the lonely thinker who wrought out this system.
CONCLUSION.
MODERN Philosophy opens with a Method; and ends with a
Method; and in each case this method leads to positive Science,
and sets Metaphysics aside. Within these limits we have witnessed various efforts to solve the problems of Philosophy; and
all those efforts have ended in skepticism.
There are two characteristics of Modern Philosophy which
may here be briefly touched on. The first is the progressive
development of Science, which in ancient speculations occupied
the subordinate rank, and which now occupies the highest. The
second is the reproduction in Philosophy of all the questions
which agitated the Greeks, which also pass through a similar
course of development: not only are the questions similar, but
their evolutions are so.
After the Eleatics had vexed the problems of Existence to no
purpose, there came Democritus, Anaxagoras, Plato, and Aristotle, who endeavored to settle the problems of the nature and
origin of human knowledge. So, in modern times, after Descartes and Spinoza, came Hobbes, Locke, Leibnitz, Reid, and
Kant.  The ancient researches into the origin of knowledge
ended in the Skeptics, the Stoics, and the New Academy: that
is to say, in Skepticism, Common Sense, and Skepticism again.
The modern researches ended in Berkeley, Hume, Reid, and
Kant: that is, in Idealism, Skepticism, Common Sense, and




CONCLUSION.                   789
Skepticism again. These inquiries terminating thus fruitlessly,
a new and desperate spring was made in Alexandria: reason
was given up for ecstasy; Philosophy merged itself in Religion.
In Germany a similar spectacle presents itself: Schelling identified Philosophy with Religion. Thus has Philosophy completed
its circle, and we are left in this nineteenth century precisely at
the same point at which we were in the fifth.
Observe, however-and the fact is full of significance-how,
in the course of speculation, those questions which were susceptible of positive treatment, gradually acquired strength and development. If we are as far removed from a solution of any ontological problem as we were in the days of Proclus, we are not
nearly so ignorant of the laws of mental operation. Psychology
is not a mature science yet; but it boasts of some indisputable
truths. Although much remains to do, much also has been
done; and whatever be the ultimate results of the new Method,
it is satisfactory to feel that we have at least escaped from the
vicious circle of verbal quibbling and logomachy, and are advancing on a straight road, every step bringing us nearer to positive
knowledge, every addition being that of inalienable truth.
Modern philosophy staked its pretensions on the one question: Have we any ideas independent of experience? This was
asking, in other words, Have we any organon of Philosophy?
The answer always ends in a negative. If any one, therefore,
remainSunshaken by the accumulated proofs this History affords
of the impossibility of Philosophy, let him  distinctly bear in
mind that the first problem he must solve is, Have we ideas independent of experience? Let him solve that ere he begins to
speculate.
THE END.








INDEX.
Abelard, his character, birth, de- Ameinias, his statement respecting
scent, studies, 346; love of dia-   Parmenides, 49.
lectics, taste for notoriety, personal Anaximander, his birth, inventions
appearance, trinmph over his mas-   ascribed to him, 10; astronomical
ter, origin of his misfortunes, 348; and mathematical knowledge, leadestablishes a school of philosophy,  er of a colony to Apollonia, resihis debate with Champeaux, 349:    dence at the court of Polycrates,
his brilliant career, intrigue with  doctrines and speculations, 11; Iis
Heloise, 350-855; becomes amonk,    distinction between finite things
founds the convent of the Para-     and the Infinite All, 13; his specuclete, his philosophy and contribu-  lations wholly deductive, 14; his
tions to the development of specu-  physical speculations, 15; harmony
lation, 355; peculiarity of his doc-  between him and Pythagoras, 33.
trine, 357-359; object of his work  Anaximenes, doctrines of, a developI.tzoductio ad T/leologiac?, his trea-  ment of those of Thales, his birthtise Sic et NlAon, 859.             place, his theory respecting air, 6;
Academy, the New, difference be-      his doctrine an advance on Thales, 7.
tween the skepticism of the New   Anaxagoras: birth, patrimony, charAcademicians and that of the Pyr-   acter, passion for philosophy, and
rhonists, 29; its derivation from  residence at Athens, 71; his povPlato explained, 296.               erty, career as a teacher, pupils,
Academicians, the New, problem re-    accusation, banishment, death, 72;
specting perception presented by    his philosophy, 72; leading docthem, 298-304.                      trines, 74; cosmology, 75; his reAlcibiades, his description of Socra-  jection of Fate and Chance, 76
tes, 123.                           Plato's objection to him, 78; his
Alcazzali: birth, parentage, studies,  notion respecting Intelligence, 80;
profession, 363; resemblance be-    mistakes made by him, inapplicatween him and Descartes, 363; his   bility of the title iEclectic to him, 82;
skepticism, 364; his examination    admission of both Sense and 1i-eaof doctrines held by the faithful,  son into his system, 83.
366; his career and endeavors to  Antisthenes, his life, teachers, sysattain the ecstatic state, 867; his  tem, 177; his manners and gloomy
attempts to prove the existence of   temper, school founded by him,17S.
prophetism, 389.                   Arabians, two great epochs in the inAlexandrian schools, the, 307; schools  tellectual development of the, 369;
of philosophy formed at Alexandria,  Arabian philosophy, 361; Arabian
308; illustrious men   assembled     philosophers, their familiaritywith
there, 309; direction given to the  Greek writers, 862; obligations of
mind by the Alexandrian school,      Europe to, 370.
313; in wlat its originality con- Arcesilaus: birth, studies, promotion
sists, its dialectics, 315; its theories  to the academic chair, character,
of inspiration, 319; the Alexandrian  death, 294; his doctrine of a acataTrinity, 320-324; similarity of the  lepsy, 297.
Alexandrian Trinity to that of Spi- Archytas and Timaeus, works attribnoza, 326; aim of the Alexandrian    uted to them, spurious, 24.
school, 8333 its termination in Pro- Aristippus, founder. of the Cyrenaic
clus, 386.                           school; his acquaintance with Soc



792                             INDEX.
rates, 173; residence at Corinth;    it by Le Maistre and Macaulay redisposition and character, return   futed, 420-434.
to Cyrene, 174; his philosophy, a  Baillarger, M., his method for measprecursor of Epicureanism, its re-  uring the surfaces of the brain, 766.
Iation to Socrates, 175; his doc- Belief and perception, difference betrine of pleasure, 177.             tween, 585.
Aristotle: birth, origin, 241; educa- Berkeley, George: birth, education,
tion, visit to Athens, 242; writes  publication of his writings, visit to
his listory of Animals, 243; founds  London, reception there, character,
the school of the Peripatetics, in-  548; career, travels, preferment,
fluence of his writings, 244; nature  visit to America, return to Engof his method, 246; difference be-  land, made Bishop of Cloyne, retween him and Plato, 247; his doc-  roval to Oxford, death, his idealtrine of induction, 249; commence-   ism, 549;   misunderstanding  of
ment of positive science in Aris-   him by his critics, his rejection of
totle's method, 250; difference be-  the noumenon explained, 550; actween the Aristotelian method and    cusation brought against him rethe method of positive science, 250;  futed, doctrine of the reality of
difference between Aristotle's and   things maintained by him, 552;
Plato's use of the term dialectics,  his definition of substance, 553; his
252; his categories, 255; object of  starting-point, 556; his theory of
his logic, 256; his propositions,  the origin of knowledge, 557; ker257; his definition of the syllo-    nel of his system, 558; his identigism, 259; his metaphysics, 261;     fication of the object with sensaerrors in his theory, 262; his va-  tion, 559; fundamental principle
rious doctrines, 263;   compared     of his theory, 560; his refutation
with Plato, his versatile intellect,  of realism, 561; his triumph over
264; results of his labors, 266      dualism, 563; his theory irrefutahis long authority explained, 372    ble, 564; his main position inconhis influence on the sixteenth cen-  trovertible, 566; causes of his failtury, 378.                           ure, results of his labors, 569.
Authority and   Liberty, principles  Brain, function of the, 597; discrepof, 371.                             ancies in the size of the, 767.
Bruno, Giordano, his martyrdom,
Bacon, Francis: birth, ancestry, edu-  373; rarity of his works, 374; his
cation, 398; visits France, studies  birth and disposition, character,
common law, distinguished as an      adopts the Douminican frock, 375;
orator, 399; sworn a member of the   his doubts on transubstantiation
Privy Council, appointed keeper of   and respecting Aristotle, his adthe Great Seal; created Baron Ver-   venturous course, 376; his persculam, accused of corruption, 400;    cutions, 377; his teachers, 379;
impeached, retires from public life,  his position among teachers, his
401; his death, his method, 402;     travels and adventures, 379-384;
his four classes of idols, 402; his  flight to Venice, thrown into prisdescription of induction, 404; his   on, 385; sent to Rome, exconmmunidoctrine illustrated, 405; his Pre-  cated and perishes at the stake,
rogative Instances, 406; distinguish-  386; historical value of his system,
ing characteristic of his philosophy,  character of his writings, 388; his
408; his chief merit, 409; division  anticipation of Spinoza and Desof his method into two parts, his    cartes, impulse given by him to the
Aphorisms, 410; positive tendency    study of Nature, 390; his creed,
of his speculations, 411; his sepa-  391; grandeur of his system, 392;
ration of science from theology il-  his comedy, 393; his various writlustrated, 412  his declaration re-  ings, 394-397.
specting physics, 413; his testimonies to the genius and errors of the  Cabanis, Pierre Jean Georges, 740;
ancients, 415; the groundwork of     physiological method to be sought
his Organum, 416; his constant       in him, 742; birth, profession, resaim, 417; inquiry into the ori-    idence at Auteuil, death, his work
ginality  and  usefulness  of his    entitled sapports en Physique, his
method, objections brought against   position in tile history of philoso



INDEX.                            793
phy, 742; his recognition of the  Cousin, Victor, 772.
unity of life and mind, 743; his Cranioscopy, 755-759; difficulties bepredecessors, his physiological psy-  setting, 760.
chology, 744; results of his survey  Cyrenaic school, the, 173.
of the human organism, 746; object Cynic school, the, 177; effect created
of his treatise, 746; popularity and  by the school in Athens, great
influence of his work, 747.        qualities of its disciples, 181; causes
Carneades, birth, teachers, promo-   of the want of respect felt for them,
tion to the academic chair, sent as  182.
ambassador to Rome, 295; influence, return to Athens, death, 296. Dareste, Camille, his researches into
Cartesian doctrine, 454.             the convolutions of the brain, 766.
Causation, defined, 586; weakness of Darwin, Erasmus: birth, studies,
the theory of, exposed, 662; in-   profession, his poem of the Botanie
stinctive belief in causation proved  Garden, his Zoonomia, his theory
to be false, 666; belief in causa-  the same as Hartley's, his definition, on what founded, 668; uni-   tion of the word idea, 609; his
versal causation, source of the be-  conception of psychology, 610; his
lief in, 664; reflection required for  theory of vibrations, explanation of
the belief in, not an instinct, 666.  perception, 615; theory of beauty,
Century, the sixteenth, its place in  616.
history, 377.                    Definitions, employment of, by SocCertainty, how attainable, xxxiv.    rates, 153; importance of, in the
Christology, Hegelian, Spinoza's an-  Socratic method, 156; in what they
ticipation of, 466.                consist, 253.
Collard, Royer, 772.               Democritus, the laughing philosoCommon sense philosophy, failure of  pher: birth, 94; character, station,
and benefits conferred by, 629.    career, anecdotes respecting, obComte, Auguste: historical position,  scurity of his philosophy, difficulty
nature of his method, 776; his     of assigning him a position, 94;
Cours de Philosophie Positive, 777;  differences between him and other
his inauguration of a philosophy of  schools, nature of his doctrine and
science, 778; his three initial con-  teaching, his identification ofsensaceptions, 779; his fundamental law  tion and thought, 95; his doctrine
of evolution, 780; nature of, 781;  of reflection, 96; his hypothesis to
its three stages not strictly chrono-  explain perception, 98; his doctrine
logical, 782; his classification of the  of atomism, 99; superiority of his
fundamental sciences, 785; his in-  system, 100.
fluence, 787.                    Descartes, Rene: birth, parentage,
Condillac, Etienne de, birth, career,  precocity, studies, 435; travels,
publication of his essay, appointed  pursuits, 436; conceives the design
tutor to the Prince of Parma, made  of a reformation in philosophy,
a member of the French Academy,    publication of his Discourse on,
publication of his Logic, death, 589;  Method, sensation produced by it,
the representative of Locke in     visit to Stockholm, death, 437;
France, object of his Traite des Sen-  character, 438; causes which led
sations, peculiarity of his system,  him to the invention of his method,
590; his misconception of Locke,   439; logical imperfection of his
his doctrine refuted, 591; his error  Cogito, ergo Sam, 440; vital portion
respecting the mental faculties,   of his system, 441; psychological
592; his theory of sensations, 593;  portion, 442; mathematical or dehis definition of ideas, 594; the  ductive portion, 443; differences
systematic error of his system, 597;  and resemblances between him and
cxalmined into, 598, 599; destruc-  Bacon, nature and tendency of his
tion of the basis of his system, his  method, 445; applications of his
discovery that our faculties are not  method, 446; weakness of his atinnate or even connate, 600; merits  tempts to demonstrate the existof his works and style, his'want of  ence of God, 447; physical specua true psychological nmethod, 602.  lations, 448; position, 450; his
Consciousness, limitation of, 451.   criterion examined, fallacy of his
Continuity, law of, 405.             system, 451; fallacy of his notion
34




794                            INDEX.
that the mind is a passive recipient,  lations on the creation of the uni453; his doctrine respecting innate  verse and the origin of knowledge,
ideas, 454.                        63; third epoch-intellectual crisis,
Dialectics, Zeno of Elea, the inventor  101; fourth epoch-a new   era
of, 57; creation of, to what owing,  opened, 122; fifth epoch-partial
62.                                adoption of the Socratic method,
Diogenes of Apollonia: birth, tenets,  169; sixth epoch-complete adop7; theory of life, 8; the last ancient  tion of the Socratic method, 186;
philosopher attached to the physi-  seventh epoch-philosophy again
cal method, 9.                     reduced to a system, 241; eighth
Diogenes of Sinope: birth, parent-   epoch —second crisis of Greek phiage, flight to Athens, poverty, life,  losophy, 26S; ninth epoch-phi179; his ostentation, 182; charac-  losophy allies itself with faith, 307;
teristics, death, 184.             conclusion of ancient philosophy,
336. Transition period, 343. First
Eclecticism, 769; origin and growth  epoch, foundation of the inductive
of, 771; definition of, 773; crite-  method, 398; second epoch-founrium, necessity of a, 774; want of  dation of the deductive method,
a criterium  in the system, 775;   435; third epoch-philosophy revaluable as a subsidiary process,  duced to a question of psychology,
776.                               495; fourth epoch-the subjective
Ecstasy, faculty of, place it holds in  nature of knowledge leads to idealNeo-Platonism, 318.                ism, 548; fifth epoch-the arguEgo, the activity and passivity of the,  ments of idealism carried out into
696.                               skepticism, 570; sixth epoch-the
Eleatics, the, 37.                   origin of knowledge referred to
Empedocles, contrary opinions as to  sensation, 589; seventh epochthe place occupied by him, 83; in-  second crisis, 618; eighth epochterpretation of the disputed pas-  recurrence  to the   fundamental
sage in Aristotle respecting, 84;  question respecting the origin of
oirth, station, espousal of the dem-  knowledge, 630; ninth epoch-onocratic party, travels, character,  tology reasserts its claim, 675;
and anecdotes respecting him, 86;  tenth epoch-psychology seeking
uncertainty as to his teachers and  its basis in physiology, 740; elevhis writings, 88; diversity of opin-  enth epoch-philosophy finally reion with respect to his position sig-  linquishing its place in favor of
nificant, his relation to the Eleatic  positive science, 769.
school, his resemblance to Zenoph- Euclid of Megara; birth, delight in
anes, 88; his attempts to prove the  listening to Socrates, 170; his reexistence of Reason and of the Di-  semblance to the Eleatics, his diavine Nature, 90; his attacks on an-  lectics, 172.
thropomorphism, 90; his relation  Existence, belief in, 583.
to the Pythagorean school, 91; ad- Experience, dispute concerning, 546 
vance made by him on Anaxago-      the foundation of our belief in
ras's doctrine, 92; his conception  causality, 663.
of God, 93.                       Experimentumn crucis, value of the,
Epicureans, the, 274.                408.
Epicurus: birth, origin, and education, 274; his travels, opening of Fathers, the Christian, 343.
his school in the garden, his char- Fichte, Johann Gottlieb: birth, preacter, accusations brought against  cociousness, 675; anecdotes of, 676,
him refuted, misrepresentations of  677; education, 678; life at Schulphis doctrine, 275; dislike felt for  forte, 679; becomes a candidatus
him by the Stoics, 276; his doc-   theologice, residence in Switzerland,
trine and system, 277, 278; his     acquaintance with  Kant's writethical doctrine, psychology and    ings, 681; writes an abridgment of
physics, 279; his doctrine review-  Kant's Kritik, 683; extracts friom
ed, 280.                           his journal, made professor of phiEpochs in Philosophy: first epoch-   losophy at Jena, 684; residence at
speculations on the nature of the  Berlin, 685; death, character, hisuniverse, 1; second epoch-specu-   torical position, 686; his opinions,




INDEX.                           795
his definition of faith, and place  for Bamberg and Niirnberg, maroccupied by it in his system, 688;  riage, residence at Heidelberg, pubbasis of his system, 690; his doc-  lishes his Encyclopddie, made protrine of the Ego and Non-Ego,     fessor at Berlin, death, his method,
691; his doctrine of the identity  teaching, 717; his position, invenof Subject and Object, 692; his   tion of a new method, 718; nature
doctrine of the Will, 693; his    of his method, 719; results of his
idealism, his distinction between  method, 720; his doctrine respectthe Ego and Non-Ego, 694; differ-  ing contraries, 721; process of his
ence between him and Berkeley,    law respecting contraries, 722; his
698; application of his idealism,  notion of God, his method, whithhis doctrine of the aim of man's  er it led him, 723; similarity to
existence, 699; his definition of  Hume, 724; estimate of his phiDuty, his doctrine of the condition  losophy by his disciples, 725; his
of existence and the freedom of the  greatness, uselessness and perniEgo, 700; his opinions respecting  ciousness of his system, 726; his
God, 701; his philosophy of his-  logic, in what it consists, first proptory, 702.                        osition in his logic, how treated by
him, 727, 730; his system, why
Gall, Francis Joseph: birth, atten-  overrated, 731; application of his
tion early called to phrenology,  method, 732; his Philosophy of
lectures at Vienna, 749; Gall and  Nature, 733; his Philosophy of InSpurzheim visit Paris, quarrel be-  telligence, his Lectures on History,
tween them, his historical position,  734; Philosophy of Religion, 736;
services rendered by him to phys-  applicability of his method to all
iology and psychology, 752; his   subjects, 737; analysis of his History
influence, 753; his systematization  of Philosophy, 738; editions and
of the affective faculties, 755; his  abridgmoent his of hisworks, 739.
anatomy of the nervous system, Heloise, her history, 350-355.
761; consequence of the abandon- Heraclitus, the crying philosopher,
mrent of Gall's method, 768; his  his origin, birth, and character,
predecessors, necessary rejection  64; his philosophy, tendency of
of his system, 764.               his doctrines, contradiction beGerman Pantheists, 706.             tween him and Xenophanes, 65;
Greek ethics, their range, 837.     a materialist, 66; his doctrine a
Greek inquiry, its results, 337.    modification of the Ionian system,
Greek philosophy, nature of the sec-  69; his explanation of phenomena,
ond crisis of, 306.               70; his office negative, 70.
Greek speculation, conclusions ar- History, two principal epochs in, 703.
rived at after reviewing the history  Hobbes, Thomas, depreciation of,
of, 327.                          his errors, writings, 495; his style
and matter, 496; his position in
Hartley, David: birth, parentage,   the history of philosophy; 497;
studies, profession, 603; publica-  the precursor of the eighteenth
tion of his Treatise, misapprehen-  century-school of psychology, his
sion of him by Dr. Parr, death,   discovery respecting our sensa604; character, his system, his  tions, 498; his definition of imagidefinition of man, 605; his opinions  nation, 500; definition of memory,
respecting mind and matter, 606;  501; association of ideas demonhis theory of vibrations, applica-  strated by him, 502; his psycholtion of the doctrine of association,  ogy, 504; definition of understand607; position occupied by him, 608.  ing, 505.
Hegel, George Frederick William, Humanity, five periods in the life of,
birth, education, residence at Ti-  704.
bingen, intimacy with Schelling, Hume, David, birth, parentage, visit
715; residence at Jena, publica-  to France, 570; publication of his
tion of his dissertation De Orbitis  treatise on Human Nature, and his
and his essay Glauben und Wissen,  Essays, travels, publication of his
intimacy with Goethe and Schiller,  Political Discourses and his Inlectures at Jena, publishes his   quiry, appointed librarian to the
Phinomenologie, 716; leaves Jena  Faculty of Advocates, publication




796                            INDEX.
of his History of England, his     635; his theory of knowledge, 636;
death and character, 571; his skep-  his theory of the purpose of crititicism, his influence on specula-  cism, 637; his answer to the
tion, his theory respecting matter  skeptic and dogmatist, 639; difand mind, 572; unreasonableness    ference between him  and Hume,
of the objections to him, 573; his  his theory of the veracity of contheory of the source of our reason-  sciousness, 640; leading points of
ing, 574; charges brought against  his analysis of the mind, his divihim refuted, 575; nature of his    sion of judgments into analytic
mission, 576; his skepticism, na-  and synthetic, 641; his theory that
ture of, 577; his theory of causa-  mind does add something to sensetion, 578; source of the opposition  experience, 642; his psychology,
to it, 579, 580; incompetency of   object of his Critique, 644; his inhis explanation of our belief in   quiry into the objective reality of
causation, 581.                    space and time, 646; his analysis
of the forms of the understanding,
Idealism, unsatisfactory nature of,  647; his Categories, his inquiry
569; idealistic arguments answer-  into the pure forms of reason, 648;
ed, 566; errors and truths in the  his theory of the office of reason,
system, 568.                        his theory of the three pure forms
Idea, use of the word, 558.           of reason, 649; consequences of
Ideas, innate, doctrine of, antici-   his psychology, 650; his theory of
pated by Parmenides, 50; ideas,    an external world, 651; his theory
innate, 453; inquiry into the ori-   f the constitution of knowledge,
gin of, by Locke, 518; theory of    his assumption of the impossibility
fundamental ideas, 583.             of ontology as a science, 652; reInduction and Syllogism, distinction  suits of his analysis, 653; his
between, 258; nature of induction,  theory of moral certitude, of the
404; how to be conducted, 405;     freedom of the will, 654; fundaco-ordination of its elements into  mental principles, examination of,
a compact body of doctrine, 409;   655; vital point in his system,
difference between simple-incau-   656; his theory of causation and
tious, and   cautious-methodical,   doctrine of necessary truths, 657423; a graduated and successive,    659; his distinction between a
insisted upon, 426; ordinary con-  pure and an empirical cognition,
fused with scientific, 427; induc-  660; his views on causation retive method as distinguished from   stated by Whewell, 661-664; error
induction, inductive  rules, im-   in his theory of causation, 665-667;
portance of, overrated by Bacon,   latest development of his doctrine,
428.                                668; his doctrine of fundamental
Intellectual  operations  explained,  ideas, 669; his notion of progresxxix.                               sive intuition, 670-673; result of
Intuitional reason, assumption re-   his system, 674.
spectinX, xxv.
Ionian school, distinctive character-  Leibnitz: his  arguments against
istics of, 2.                       Locke, reputation as a philosopher
and mathematician, 541; influence
Jouffroy, Thomas, 772.                of the ancients over him, 542; his
arguments respecting universality
Kant, birth, parentage, education,   and necessity, his doctrine of nepursuits, character, life at Kinigs-  cessary truths, 543; real force of
berg, 630; publication of his Ci-  his theory, 545.
tique of Pure Reason, 631; death, Locke, John: birth, parentage, edurelation to Swcdenborg, 632; his-   cation, life at Oxford, contenpt for
torical position, clearness of his  university studies, 506; his prosystem, 633; object he had in      ficiency in medicine, turns his atview, 634; his inquiry into the na-  tention to politics, travels, plans
ture of experience, his criticism of  his Essay, 507; returns to Oxford,
the operation of the mind, problem  is deprived of his studentship,
he set himself to solve, his concep-  goes to the Hague, publication of
tion of a purely critical philosophy,  his letter on Toleration, returns to




INDEX.                           797
England, publication of his Essay,  ful, 432; Bacon's method latent in
its success, opposition excited, ac-  the spirit of the age, no evidence
quaintance with  Newton, 508;     against his originality, 433; full esdeath, spirit of his writings, charges  tablishment of the deductive methbrought against him, 509; proof   od, 444; Descartes' method, goodthat he did not borrow    from    ness of, examined, 449; Spinoza's
Hobbes, 510, 511; his good quali-  method, novelty of, 472; Locke's
ties and originality, 512; his esti-  method, 515; Hegel's method, 717;
mate of the value of hypothesis,  the history of the rise of the psyhis readiness to change his opin-  chological method, 740; the posiions, 513; characteristics of his  tive method, 776; value of the
Essay, 514; his method, 515; the  positive method, 784; illustrations
founder of modern psychology,     of the superiority of the positive
516; object he had in view, 517;  method, 785; the birth of the new
plan laid down by him in the con-  method, xiii.
duct of his inquiry, 518; his posi- Mill, John, his strictures on the dogtivism, 519; his theory of the origin  ma ceesante causa cessat et effectus,
of our ideas, 521; and of the origin  587.
of our knowledge, 523; his defini- Mysticism, infusion of, into philosotion of reflection and sensation,  phy, 331.
525; elements of idealism  and
skepticism in his system, 527; his Neo-Platonism, antagonism between
theory of the primary and second-  it and Christianity, causes of its
ary qualities of bodies, 528; his  failure, 314; Neo-Platonic theory
anticipation of the doctrine of cau-  of God, 322; Neo-Platonic doctrine
sation, 529; his definition ofknowl-  of emanation, Neo-Platonic theory
edge, his doctrine respecting sim-  of the orioin of the world, 328;
lpe and complex ideas, 530; his   their doctrine respecting God, 329.
denunciation of skepticism, 532; Nominalism, dispute concerning, 346.
object of his essay, 533; his critics,
533-539; careful study of him rec- Object, the, and sensation, want of
ommended, 540.                    correspondence between, 303.
Logic, definition of, 252; object of Ontological speculations, basis of all
Aristotle's logic, 256; bad logic de-  modern, 455.
fined, 585.
Parmenides, his birth, 48; wealth and
Macaulay, his argument against the  devotion to study, his politics, charoriginality and usefulness of Ba-  acteristics of his philosophy, 49;
con's method refuted, 420-434.    his doctrine respecting the duality
Materialism, principle of, stated, 493.  of thought, 50; his antithesis to
Mathematicians, the, 10; collision be-  U6a always,iarrs, 53; central point
tween the mathematical and physi-  in his system, his notion on the
cal systems, 62.                  science of Being, 53; his doctrine
Megaric school, the, 169.           of the identity of thought and exMetaphysics, science of, denied by  istence, 54; his physical speculathe Sophists, 121; three questions  tions, ideal element introduced in —
propounded by metaphysics, an-    to his speculations, skeptical tendswered by the Alexandrian school,  ency of his doctrines, 55.
328; metaphysical and scientific Perception and reasoning, difference
methods, germinal difference be-  between, xxv; perception and sentween, xxii; irrationality of spec-  sation, difference between, xxvi;
ulation or metaphysics, xxxi.      nature of perception defined, 301;
Method, estimate of, by Socrates,   process of, 611. -
158; peculiarities of a philosophi- Philo: birth, genius, education, his
cal method, Socratic method, its  teachers, Greek and Oriental clevagueness, 169; Aristotle's method,  nments of his mind, 310; agreement
246; spirit ofBacon's method, 408;  and difference between him and
method of verification, 410; useful-  Plato, 311; his theology, 312.
ness of Bacon's method, 427; radi- Philosophy, distinction between it
cal defect of Bacon's method, 429;  and science, present decadence of,
Bacon's method only indirectly use-  circular movement of, xi; spectacle




798                            INDEX.
presented by the history of, xii;   chronology of, 201; necessity for a
definition of, ancient philosophy es-  positive arrangement of his works,
sentially metaphysical, xiii; supe-  variations in his opinions, 203, 204;
riority of science to, xiv; charac-  new classification of his works proteristics of, xv; difference between  posed, purpose of his Dialogues,
and science illustrated, xvi; re-   206; his method, nature of his phigarded as a system of credit, xxii*  losophy, 207; nature of his method,
contrast between philosophy and     209; his conception of philosophy
science, xxii; proved to be impos-  as dialectics, his great dogma, 210;
sible, xxx; the initiator of science,  his thecry of general terms, 212;
xxxi; purpose of the author in     his doctrine of ideas, 214-216; his
writing the history of; xxxi; mor-   sychology illustrated, 216-220; his
al philosophy created by Socrates,  doctrine of innate ideas, 221; his
266; conclusion of ancient philoso-  doctrine of recollection, 222; diviphy, 336; influence of, 337; Chris-  sion of his philosophy into two
tian philosophy a misnomer, phi-    branches, 223; passage from the
losophy, in what it consists, 338;  Republic illustrative of his method,
modern   philosophy, commence-     224; his doctrine of rational and
ment of, medieval philosophy, 343;  sensitive souls, his system a resume
influence of Aristotle over medie-  of the conflicting tendencies of his
val philosophy, 345; emancipation   age, 226; summary of his dialectics,
of philosophy, 370; fundamental     227; his theology and cosmology,
question of modern, 455; first cri-  228 his analogical reasoning, 229;
sis in modern philosophy, 493; re-  his doctrine of evil, 231; doctrine
action against the eighteenth cen-  of metempsychosis as applied by
tury philosophy, 769-771; office of  him, 232; his view of the beautiful
positive philosophy, 779; redpc-    and the good, 233; his ethics, 236;
tion of positive philosophy into five  contradictions in his ethical opinfundamental sciences, 787; two     ions, his Republic, 236-240.
characteristics of modern philoso- Platonic philosophy, central error of,
phy, present condition of, impos-   154.
sibility of a, 788.               Platonism, its union with Oriental
Phenomena, order of their depend-     mysticism, 312.
ence, 786.                        Plotinus, 314; his agreement with
Phrenology, rise of, 748; changes     Plato, 316; his resemblance to Germade in the localization of the or-  man metaphysicians, 324; spirit of,
gans, 750; two distinct aspects of,  revived by Schelling, 710.
755; difficulties of, 759; proper ob- Position of the Socratic method in
ject of, 760; assumptions of, 761;  the history of speculation, 266.
initial question affecting, 765; im- Process, the exclusive, necessity of,
portant point it has to determine,  insisted on, 406.
766; chaotic aspect of, 768.      Proclus: birth, visit to Alexandria
Physics, organic and inorganic, treat-  and Athens, his theological tended by the positive method, 786.     ency, 332; his estimate of faith, his
Physicists, the, 1.                   method, 333; his assumption rePlato: interest felt in him, his char-  specting mathematics, 334; his asacter, nature of his metaphysics,   sertion respecting the mind, 335;
morals, and politics, 186; parent-  the last of the ancient philosophers,
age, birth, and education, 188; his  336.
skepticism, and correction of, by  Prophetism, 368.
Socrates, his travels, 189; his le- Protagoras. the first avowed Sophist,
tures, 191; their purely argument-  his studies, resemblance between
ative character, visit to Sicily, 192;  him and Heraclitus, his doctrine of
sold as a slave, visit to Syracuse,  sensation, 116; a teacher of moraldeath, disposition, 193; character  ity, 119.
of his writings, 195; his Dialogues Psychology, lesson taught by, xxix;
and Epistles, various of them spu-  its assumption of the place of onrious, 165, 166; his opinions illus-  tology, 493; reason  of the imtrated in his Dialogues, 197; design  portance it has assumed, 494;
of his Dialogues, his dialectics, 199;  psychological method, history of
attempts to classify his Dialogues,  the, 740; necessity of its estab



INDEX.                            799
lishment on a physiological basis,  pothesis and Reid's theory, the
768.                                great point in his theory, 625; his
Pyrrho, founder of the skeptical phi-  theory of ideas of sensation, 627;
losophy, contrast between him and   difference between Reid and BerkeSocrates, 268; his doctrine, irre-  ley, his mistake respecting the oricoverability of, 269.               gin of knowledge, 628.
Pythagoras: birth, 15; one of the   Reminiscence, doctrine of, implied il
great founders of mathematics, fa-  a passage from the Phcedo, 220.
bles current about him, 16; proba- Republic, the, of Plato, difficulty of
bility of his having visited Egypt,  determining its date, 201.
unlikelihood of his having been in- Revolution, the French, and materialstructed by Egyptian priests, 17;   ism, fancied association between,
invention of the word philosopher   770.
by him, 18; its interpretation, his Rome and the Eastern schools of phisecret society, 19; political career  losophy, xxxii; Roman philosophy,
20; residence at Croton, difference  308.
between him and his predecessors,
21; risings against him, death, 22; Sensation, growth of, 525: impossimusical scale invented by him, his  bility of displacing by an idea, 596;
philosophy, 23; his doctrines a con-  distinction between sensation and
tinuation of Anaximander's, uncer-  ideation, 597; sensation independtainty as to the genuineness of the  ent of thought, 599; dependent on
opinions ascribed tohim, no peculiar  the sensational centre, 613; visual
doctrines attributed to him by Plato  sensation, how produced, 614.
and Aristotle, his oral teaching, 24; Sensation school, the, 589; sensationhis theory of numbers, 26; his doc-  al centres, 598.
trines contained in a few mystical Skeptics, mistakes made by the ansentences, 30; his opinions on sub-  cient, nature of their influence,
sidiary points, his doctrine of the  271; main position of skepticism,
transmigration ofsoul., 31; his doc-  621; skepticism  not refuted by
trines in relation to the preceding  Reid's theory, 622.
philosophy, 32; the representative  Schelling: birth, studies at Tiibingen,
of the second branch of Ionian phi-  friendship with Heal, residence at
iosophy, 33.                        Jena and Berlin, death, 705; his
Pythagoreans, celebrated, Pythago-    doctrines, his pantheistic tendency,
rean school, its method and ten-    706; his improvement on Fichte's
dency, why called the mathemati-    doctrine, 707; difference between
cal, 25; Pythagorean system, a     him and Fichte, the Ego in Schelverbal quibble at the foundation of,  ling's system, 709; function of rea27; Pythagorean formula, mistake    son in his system, 710; three divias to its meaning by Ritter and     sions in his system, his speculations
others, 28; Pythagorean doctrine,   on Nature, 711; luminousness of
33; translations from  Aristotle's  some of his ideas, 712; his opinion
Metaphysics respecting, 34-36.      of science, results of his speculaRealisll and Nominalism, origin of the  tions, 713; similarity and difference
dispute between, 211.               between him  and Spinoza, differReasoning, how conducted in Bacon's   ence between their methods, 714.
time, 425.                        Science, linear progress of, xi; sciReformers, sixteenth century, spirit  ences, progressive development of,
common to the, 377.                 777; present condition of, 784.
Reid, Thomas; birth, education, made  Scientific method, its superiority,
Professor of Moral Philosophy at    xxii.
Aberdeen, publication of his In-  Scholasticism, 343; manifestations of
uiry into the Human Mind and of    the philosophical element in, 844.
hiis says on the Intellectual Powers, Schoolmen, the error committed by,
death, his philosophy, 618; his mis-  346.
statement of Locke, 619; his refu- Scotch philosophy, failure of, 629.
tation of the Ideal theory, 620; his Socrates: his opinions respecting
attack on skepticism, 621; his the-  Anaxagoras, 78; his life, antagonory of perception and instinct, 623;  ism between him and the Sophists,
difference between the Ideal hy-    his mission, 122; treatment by the




800                            INDEX.
Sophists, effect produced by him, Spinoza: his childhood, 456; his pahis personal appearance, 123; his  rents, his early passion for study,
qualities, 125; his birth, parents,  his doubts, 457; summoned before
education, and early studies, 127;  the Rabbins, withdraws from the
his wife, his military services, 128;  synagogue, 458; his attempted asanecdotes respecting him, 129; his  sassination, his excommunication,
public career, 130; conduct as Epis-  459; his subsequent career, his love
tates, 182; mistaken for a Sophist,  for his master's daughter, 460; his
138; his mode of disputation, 134;  disappointment, his Latin studies,
his tastes and habits, 135; his daily  461; leaves Amsterdam for Leyoccupation, 136; his enemies, 137;  den, writes his abridgment of the
his condemnation, apology for the   Meditations of Descartes, sensation
Athenians, 138; his alleged impiety,  produced by it, his residence at the
139; his religious opinions, 140; his  Hague, 462; declines the chair of
trial, 141; speech made by him,     philosophy at Heidelberg, beauty
142; his behavior in the prospect of  of his course of life, 463; his povdeath, 143; impression produced     erty, 464; publication of his Tractaby it on Phedo, 144; the closing    tus T/heologico-Politicus, 465; state
scene, 145; his character, 147; his  of things in Holland on its appearphilosophy, new method invented     ance, 466; his character, amuseby him, 148; his use of the terms   ments, death, 468; his doctrine, a
genus and species, 149; assertion re-  logical development of the system
specting his anticipation of Bacon's  of Descartes, 469; his doctrine of
method, differences and resem-      Substance, 470; his agreement with
blances between him and Bacon,      Descartes, 471; novelty of his meth151; drift of his questioning, 153  od, his Defnitions, 472; his Axioms,
the founder of a new epoch, 155;   474; his notions on cause and
his opinion of physical speculation,  effect, 475: his Propositions and
156; philosophic basis given by him  Corollaries, 476-478; his proof of
to the doctrine of the immortality of  the existence of Substance, his thethe soul, 160; his arguments in fa-  ology, 4S0; his exposition of his
vor of a beneficent Providence, 161-  doctrine completed, causes why it is
165; conjectures respecting his de-  branded as atheistical, 481; his docmon, 166; his statement respecting  trine of Final Cauwses, 482; his dethe Divine Voice, 167; Socrates' phi-  nonstration of the anthropomorlosophical career justified, 199; sum-  phic tendency of judging infinite by
mary of the Socratic movement,     finite wisdom, 484; impression left
266; benefit conferred by the So-   on the mind by his theological syscratic epoch, 267.                 ten, 485; initial error of his sysSophos, meaning of the word, 19.     tem, 486; whence it arises, 487;
Sophists, the, much calumniated, 102;  logical perfection of his system, his
cause of the dislike felt for them by  criticism of Bacon, 490; justificaPlato, 103; meaning of the word,   tion of his employment of the geo104; vagueness of the term, 105;    metrical method, 491.
various assertions respecting them  Stoics, the, 281; Stoical doctrine,
proved to be false, 106; their teach-  analogy between the Stoics and the
iug, 107; art taught by them, not   Scotch philosophers, their ethical
reprehensible, 108; art of disputa-  doctrine, 289; tendency of their
tion taught by them, 109; their art  ethical formula, 291; mistakes made
compared with forensic oratory,     by them, merits and demerits of
111; their popularity, 112; estima-  Stoicism, 292.
tion of their art by the Greeks, 113; Systems, errors at the root of philodoctrines taught by them ethical,  sophical, 14.
examination of their doctrines, 114;
difference between them  and the  Table-turning, xvi.
Skeptics, 118; their opinion of ora-Thales, father of Greek speculation,
tory, the natural production of the  birth, origin of his activity in poliopinions of the epoch, 120.         tics, 1; a proficient in mathematiSoufism, 369.                         cal knowledge, 2; his attempt to
Speculation, tendency of early philo-  discover the beginning of things,
sophical, 3.                        3; his philosophy in harmony with




INDEX.                            801
ancient opinions, wrongly accused  theists and Skeptics, his philosoof atheism, 4; his speculations, in-  phy, attempted solution of the productive in their nature, 14.       blem of existence, 42; explanation
Timseus and Archytas, works attrib-  of his notion respecting God, conuted to them, spurious, 24.        tradiction between his opinions, 43;
Timceus, Aristotle's comment on the,  his pantheism, his monotheism dif200.                               ferent from anthropomorphism, a
Truths, necessary and contingent,    monotheist only in contradiction to
671; nature of contingent truths,  his polytheistical contemporaries,
673.                               44; nature of his skepticism, 46;
his conceptions of the Deity, 47;
Universals, importance of the dispute  his influence on the progress of
concerning, 356.                   speculation, 48.
Van Heusde's arrangement of Plato's Zeno, alias Palamedes of Elea, 55;
works, 205.                        character, political activity, capVerification of particulars, the distin-  tured by Nearchus, 56; death, his
guishing characteristic of the sci-  philosophy, the inventor of dialecentific method, xxx.               tics, 57; the first prose writer, 58;
Verification, graduated, systematiza-  difference between him and Parmetion of, 408.                      nides, his doctrine of one existence
Villers, Charles, his letter to Cuvier,  and many appearances, his argu750.                               ments respecting motion, 59; his
Achilles puzzle, 60; its refutation,
Xenophanes: birth, a cultivator of   61; Zeno, the terminator of the
elegiac and gnomic poetry, banish-  second great line of independent
ment, and wanderings as a rhapso-  inquiry, 62.
dist, poverty and fanaticism, 37; Zeno, the Stoic: birth, origin, pura monotheist, 38; his doctrine re-  suits, studies, career, 281; founds
specting Truth, disagreement be-   a school, his character, personal aptween his doctrines and those of   pearance, death, 282; his philosoPythagoras, few of his rhapsodies  phy, psychology, 284; his theory
extant, 39; conclusions arrived at  of sensation, 286.
by him, 41; the head of the Mono